The Psychology of Management Part 7

The employe over him, or the foreman, to whom he is supposed to have done some injustice, would be in no state of mind to judge as to the man's culpability. In the case of an offense against an employe of the same grade, the best that the injured employe could do would be to appeal to his foreman, who oftentimes is not an unprejudiced judge, and the multiplicity of whose duties give him little time to give attention to the subject of disciplining.

If the offense is against quant.i.ty or quality of work, again the old fas.h.i.+oned foreman, for lack of time, and for lack of training and proper standards of measurement, will find it almost impossible to know how guilty the man is, and what form of punishment and what amount of punishment or loss of opportunity for progress will be appropriate.

CHANGES IN DISCIPLINARIAN'S FUNCTION UNDER SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT.--All this is changed under Scientific Management. The disciplinarian is a specially appointed functional foreman, and has few other duties except those that are directly or indirectly connected with disciplining. He is in touch with the requirements of the work, because he is in the Planning Department; he is in touch with the employment bureau, and knows which men should be employed; he has a determining voice in deciding elementary rate fixing and should always be consulted before wages are changed or a rea.s.signment of duties is determined. All of these are great advantages to him in deciding justly and appropriately punishments and promotion, not for the workers alone but also for the foremen and the managers.

DUTIES OF THE DISCIPLINARIAN.--The Disciplinarian keeps a record of each man's virtues and defects; he is in position to know all about the man; where he comes from; what his natural and acquired qualifications are; what his good points, possibilities and special fitness are; what his wages are, and his need for them. All that it is possible for the managers to know of the men is to be concentrated in this disciplinarian. He is, in practice, more the counsel and advocate of the worker than an unsympathetic judge, as is indicated by the fact that his chief function is that of "diplomat" and "peacemaker." His greatest duty is to see that the "square deal" is meted out without fear or favor to employer or to employe.

IMPORTANCE OF PSYCHOLOGY IN DISCIPLINING.--Not only does the position of disciplinarian under Scientific Management answer the psychological requirements for such a function, but also the holder of the position of disciplinarian must understand psychology and apply, at least unconsciously, and preferably consciously, the known laws of psychology, if he wishes to be successful.

The disciplinarian must consider not only what the man has done and the relation of this act of his to his other acts; he must also investigate the cause and the motive of the act, for on the cause and motive, in reality, depends more than on the act itself. He must probe into the physical condition of the man, as related to his mental acts. He must note the effect of the same kind of discipline under different conditions; for example, he must note that, on certain types of people, disciplining in the presence of other people has a most derogatory effect, just as rewards before people may have a most advantageous effect. Upon others, discipline that is meted out in the presence of other people is the only sort of discipline which has the desired effect. The sensitiveness of the person to be disciplined, the necessity for sharp discipline, and for that particular sort of discipline which may require the element of shame in it, must all be considered. He must be able to discover and note whether the discipline should be meted out to a ringleader, and whether the other employes, supposed to be blameworthy, are really only guilty in acquiescing, or in failing to report one who has really furnished the initiative. He must differentiate acts which are the result of following a ringleader blindly from the concerted acts of disobedience of a crowd, for the "mob spirit" is always an element to be estimated and separately handled.

INADEQUACY OF TERMS IN DISCIPLINING.--The words "disciplinarian"

and "punishment" are most unfortunate. The "Disciplinarian" would be far better called the "peacemaker," and the "punishment" by some such word as the "adjustment." It is _not_ the duty of the disciplinarian to "take out anybody's grudge" against a man; it _is_ his duty to adjust disagreements. He must remember constantly that his discipline must be of such a nature that the result will be for the permanent best interests of the one disciplined, his co-workers, his a.s.sociates and his family.

The aim is, not to put the man down, but to keep him up to his standard, as will be shown later in a chapter on Incentives. If the punishment is in the form of a fine, it must not in any way return to the coffers of the management. The fines collected--even those fines collected from the individuals composing the management, should go in some form to the benefit of the men themselves, such, for example, as contributions to a workman's sick benefit fund or to general entertainment at the annual outing of employes. In practice, the disciplinarian is rather the friend of the worker than of the employer, if the two interests can possibly be separated. Again "penalty" is a bad word to use. Any words used in this connection should preferably have had taken from them any feeling that personal prejudice affects the discipline. It is the nature of the offense itself which should prescribe what the outcome of it shall be.

The position of disciplinarian requires a man who has a keen sense of justice, who has had such experience as to enable him to smooth out difficulties until all are in a frame of mind where they can look upon their own acts and the acts of others calmly. He must be able so to administer his duties that each decision inspires the realization that he acted to the best of his knowledge and belief.

He must be one who is fearless, and has no tendency to have favorites. He must have a clear knowledge of the theories and principles of Scientific Management, in order that he can fill the position of enforcer of its laws.

THE GANG BOSS.--The duties of The Gang Boss are to see that the worker has plenty of work ahead, to see that everything that he will need with which to do the work is at hand, and to see that the work is actually "set," or placed and performed correctly. This position calls for a practical demonstrator, who must himself be able and willing actually to prepare and help on the work. It calls particularly for a man with teaching ability, with special emphasis on ability to teach, with great exactness, the prescribed method and to follow the orders of the planning department implicitly.

THE SPEED BOSS.--The speed boss is responsible for the methods of doing work with machinery. He has charge of overseeing the work, and teaching the worker, during the entire time that the work is being done. He must be prepared constantly to demonstrate at any time not only _how_ the work is done, but also that it can be done in the specified time called for in order to earn the bonus. This position calls for a man who is able, personally, to carry out the detailed written orders of the instruction card in regard to speeds, feeds, cuts, methods of operation, quality and quant.i.ty.

He must be proficient at the art of imparting his knowledge to other workmen, and at the same time be able to secure the prescribed outputs and quant.i.ties. He need not be the fastest worker in the shop, but he should be one of the most intelligent workers and best teachers, with a keen desire to cooperate, both with the workers and with the other foremen.

THE REPAIR BOSS.--The repair boss has charge of the plant and its maintenance. He must have a natural love of order and of cleanliness, and a systematic type of mind. This position calls for a man with an experience that will enable him to detect liability of breakdowns before they actually occur. He must be resourceful in repairing unexpected breakdowns in an emergency, and be able at all times to carry out literally the directions given on the instruction cards of the Planning Department for cleaning, maintaining, and repairing the machines.

THE INSPECTOR.--The function of inspector under scientific or the Taylor plan of management is most important, especially in connection with the "first inspection." During the manufacture of the first piece and after it is finished the inspector pa.s.ses and reports upon it before the worker proceeds with the other pieces.

Here the worker gets a return in person for each successive act on the first piece he makes under a new instruction card, or, if he is a new worker, under an old instruction card. Ambiguity of instructions, if present, is thus eliminated, and wrong actions or results are corrected before much damage to material has been done and before much time and effort are wasted. The first erroneous cycles of work are not repeated, and the worker is promptly shown exactly how efficiently he has succeeded in determining the requirements of his instructions.

The inspector is responsible for the quality of the work. He fulfills the requirements of Schloss, who says, in speaking of the danger, under some managements, that the foreman will sacrifice quality to speed, if he gets a bonus for quant.i.ty of output,--"The best safeguard against this serious danger would be found in the appointment of a distinct staff of inspectors whose duty it should be to ascertain, as the work proceeds, that the stipulated standards of excellence are at all times scrupulously maintained." This position of inspector requires an observant man who naturally is inclined to give constructive rather than destructive-criticism. He should be a man who can cooperate with the workman and foreman to rescue condemned or damaged material with the least expenditure of time, effort and expense.

FUNCTIONALIZING THE WORKER.--Under Scientific Management, the worker as well as the foreman, is a specialist. This he becomes by being relieved of everything that he is not best fitted to do, and allowed to concentrate upon doing, according to exact and scientifically derived methods, that work at which he is an expert.[13]

RELIEVING THE WORKER OF THE PLANNING.--The planning is taken away from the worker, not because it is something too choice, sacred or entertaining for him to do, or something which the managers desire to do themselves, but because it is best, for the workers themselves as well as the work, that the planning be done by specialists at planning. If he is expert enough to plan, the worker will be promoted to the planning department. In the meantime, he is working under the best plan that experts can devise.

MASTER PLANNING A LIFE STUDY.--The best planner is he who,-- other things being equal,--is the most ingenious, the most experienced and the best observer. It is an art to observe; it requires persistent attention. The longer and the more the observer observes, the more details, and variables affecting details, he observes. The untrained observer could not expect to compete with one of special natural talent who has also been trained. It is not every man who is fitted by nature to observe closely, hence to plan.

To observe is a condition precedent to visualizing. Practice in visualizing makes for increasing the faculty of constructive imagination. He with the best constructive imagination is the master planner.

The art of observing is founded on a study of fundamental elements. In order that planning may be done best, previous to starting work, the entire sequence of operations must be laid out, so that the ideas of value of every element of every subdivision of the process of working may be corrected to act most efficiently in relation with each and all of the subsequent parts and events that are to follow. This planning forwards and backwards demands an equipment of time study, motion study and micro-motion study records such as can be used economically only when all the planning is done in one place, with one set of records. The planner must be able to see and control the whole problem in all of its aspects.

For example,--the use that is to be made of the work after it is completed may entirely change the methods best used in doing it.

Thus, the face of a brick wall that is to be plastered does not require and should not have the usual excellence of nicely ruled joints required on a face that is not to be plastered. In fact, the roughest, raggedest joints will be that quality of wall that will make the plaster adhere the best.

As an example of professional observation and investigation with which no untrained observer could compete, we cite the epoch making work of Dr. Taylor in determining the most efficient speeds, feeds, cuts and shape of tools to use for the least wastefulness in cutting metals.[14]

Dr. Taylor, an unusually brilliant man, at the end of twenty-six years, working with the best scientists, engineers, experimenters, and workmen, after an expenditure of literally hundreds of thousands of dollars, was able to determine and write down a method for cutting metals many times less wasteful in time than was ever known before; but the data from the experiments was so complex and involved that a considerable knowledge of higher mathematics had to be used to apply the data. Furthermore, the data was in such form that it took longer to use the knowledge contained therein than it did to do the work on any given piece of metal cutting. After gathering this knowledge, Dr. Taylor, with his a.s.sistants, first Mr.

Gantt and finally Mr. Barth, reduced it to such a form that now it can be used in a matter of a few seconds or minutes. This was done by making slide rules.[15] Today workers have this knowledge in a form that any machinist can use with a little instruction. As a result, Dr. Taylor's observations have revolutionized the design of metal cutting machinery and the metal cutting industry, and the data he collected is used in every metal cutting planning department.

Furthermore, as a by-product to his observations and investigations, he discovered the Taylor-White process of making high speed steel, which revolutionized the steel tool industry. No untrained workman could expect ever to compete with such work as this in obtaining results for most efficient planning and at the same time perform his ordinary work.

WASTEFULNESS OF INDIVIDUAL PLANNING.--Even if it were possible so to arrange the work of every worker that he could be in close proximity to the equipment for planning and could be given the training needed, individual planning for "small lots" with no systematized standardization of planning-results would be an economic waste that would cause an unnecessary hards.h.i.+p on the worker, the employer and the ultimate consumer. Individual planning could not fit the broad scheme of planning, and at best would cause delays and confusion, and make an incentive to plan for the individual self, instead of planning for the greatest good of the greatest number.

Again, even if it were possible to plan best by individual planning, there is a further waste in changing from one kind of work to another. This waste is so great and so obvious that it was noticed and recognized by the earliest manufacturers and economists.

HARDs.h.i.+P TO THE WORKER OF INDIVIDUAL PLANNING.--To obtain the most wages and profits there must be the most savings to divide.

These cannot be obtained when each man plans for himself (except in the home trades), because all large modern operations have the quant.i.ty of output dependent upon the amount of blockades, stoppages and interferences caused by dependent sequences. It is not, therefore, possible to obtain the most profit or most wages by individual planning. Planning is a general function, and the only way to obtain the best results is by organized planning, and by seeing that no planning is done for one worker without proper consideration of its bearing and effect upon any or all the other men's outputs.

THE MAN WHO DESIRES TO BE A PLANNER CAN BE ONE.--If the worker is the sort of a man who can observe and plan, or who desires to plan, even though he is not at first employed in the planning department, he is sure to get there finally, as the system provides that each man shall go where he is best fitted. Positions in planning departments are hard to fill, because of the scarcity of men equipped to do this work. The difficulty of teaching men to become highly efficient planners is one of the reasons for the slow advance of the general adoption of Scientific Management.

THE MAN WHO DISLIKES PLANNING CAN BE RELIEVED.--It must not be forgotten that many people dislike the planning responsibility in connection with their work. For such, relief from planning makes the performance of the planned work more interesting and desirable.

PROVISION FOR PLANNING BY ALL UNDER SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT.--Much has been said about the worker's "G.o.d-given rights to think," and about the necessity for providing every worker with an opportunity to think.

Scientific Management provides the fullest opportunities for every man to think, to exercise his mental faculties, and to plan

1. in doing the work itself, as will be shown at length in chapters that follow.

2. outside of the regular working hours, but in connection with promotion in his regular work.

Scientific Management provides always, and most emphatically, that the man shall have hours free from his work in such a state that he will not be too fatigued to do anything. Furthermore, if he work as directed, his number of working hours per day will be so reduced that he will have more time each day for his chosen form of mental stimulus and improvement.

Our friend John Brashear is a most excellent example of what one can do in after hours away from his work. He was a laborer in a steel mill. His duties were not such as resemble in any way planning or research work, yet he became one of the world's most prominent astronomical thinkers and an Honorary member of the American Society of Mechanical Engineers, because he had the desire to be a student.

Under Scientific Management such a desire receives added impetus from the method of attack provided for through its teaching.

FUNCTIONALIZING THE WORK ITSELF.--The work of each part of the planning and performing departments may be functionalized, or subdivided, as the result of motion study and time study. The elementary timed units are combined or synthesized into tasks, made to fit the capabilities of specialized workers. It is then necessary to:--

1. List the duties and requirements of the work.

2. Decide whether the place can be best handled as one, or subdivided into several further subdivisions, or functions, or even sub-functions, for two or more function specialists.

For the sake of a.n.a.lysis, all work may be considered as of one of two cla.s.ses:--

1. the short time job.

2. the long time job.

These two divisions are handled differently, as follows:

THE SHORT TIME JOB.--On the short time job that probably will never be repeated, there is little opportunity and no economic reason for specially training a man for its performance. The available man best suited to do the work with little or no help should be chosen to do it. The suitability of the man for the work should be determined only by applying simple tests, or, if even these will cause costly delay or more expense than the work warrants, the man who appears suitable and who most desires the opportunity to do the work can be a.s.signed to it.

If the job is connected with a new art, a man whose habits will help him can be chosen.

For example:--in selecting a man to fly, it has been found advantageous to give a trick bicycle rider the preference.

There is no other reason why the man for the short job should not be fitted as well to his work as the man for the long job, except the all-important reason of cost for special preparation. Any expense for study of the workers must be borne ultimately both by worker and management, and it is undesirable to both that expense should be incurred which will not be ultimately repaid.

THE LONG TIME JOB.--The long time job allows of teaching, therefore applicants for it may be carefully studied. Usually that man should be chosen who, with all the natural qualifications and capabilities for the job, except practical skill, requires the most teaching to raise him from the lower plane to that highest mental and manual plane which he is able to fill successfully continuously.

In this way each man will be developed into a worker of great value to the management and to himself.

The man who is capable and already skilled at some work is thus available for a still higher job, for which he can be taught. Thus the long job affords the greatest opportunity for promotion. The long job justifies the expenditure of money, effort and time by management and men, and is the ideal field for the application of scientific selection and functionalization.