The Psychology of Management Part 8

SUMMARY

EFFECT OF FUNCTIONALIZATION UPON THE WORK.--Under Traditional Management, there was little or no definite functionalization. If the quant.i.ty of output did increase, as the result of putting a man at that work for which he seemed best fitted, there was seldom provision made for seeing that the quality of product was maintained by a method of constructive inspection that prevented downward deviations from standard quality, instead of condemning large quant.i.ties of the finished product.

Under Transitory Management, the Department of Inspection is one of the first Functions installed. This a.s.sures maintained quality, and provides that all increase in output shall be actual gain.

Under Scientific Management, functionalization results in increased quant.i.ty of output,[16] with maintained and usually increased quality.[17] This results in decreased cost. The cost is sufficiently lower to allow of increased wages to the employes, a further profit to the employer, and a maintained, or lowered, selling price. This means a benefit to the consumer.

It may be objected that costs cannot be lowered, because of the number of so-called "non-producers" provided for by Scientific Management.

In answer to this it may be said that there are no non-producers under Scientific Management. Corresponding work that, under Scientific Management, is done in the planning department must all be done somewhere, in a less systematic manner, even under Traditional Management.[18] The planning department, simply does this work more efficiently,--with less waste. Moreover, much work of the planning department, being founded on elementary units, is available for constant use. Here results an enormous saving by the conservation and utilization of planning effort.

Also, standard methods are more apt to result in standard quality, and with less occasion for rejecting output that is below the requisite standards than is the case under Traditional Management.

EFFECT OF FUNCTIONALIZATION UPON THE WORKER.--Under Traditional Management, even if the worker often becomes functionalized, he seldom has a.s.surance that he will be able to reap the harvest from remaining so, and even so, neither data nor teaching are provided to enable him to fulfill his function most successfully.

Under Transitory Management the worker becomes more and more functionalized, as the results of motion study and time study make clear the advantages of specializing the worker.

EFFECTS UPON THE SCIENTIFICALLY MANAGED WORKER.--Under Scientific Management the effects of Functionalization are so universal and so far reaching that it is necessary to enumerate them in detail.

WORKER RELIEVED OF EVERYTHING BUT HIS SPECIAL FUNCTIONS.-- Functionalization, in providing that every man is a.s.signed a special function, also provides that he be called upon to do work in that function only, relieving him of all other work and responsibility.

Realization of this elimination has a psychological effect on action and habits of thinking.[19]

PLACES ARE PROVIDED FOR SPECIALISTS.--Functionalization utilizes men with decided bents, and allows each man to occupy that place for which he is fitted.[20] a.s.signment to functions is done according to the capabilities and desires of those who are to fill them.

SPECIALIZING IS ENCOURAGED.--It is most important to remember that the man with any special talent or talents, individuality or special fitness is much more likely, under Scientific Management, to obtain and retain the place that he is fitted for than he ever could have been under Traditional Management, for, while many fairly efficient men can be found who can fill a general position, a man with the marked desirable trait necessary to fill a distinct position requiring that trait, will be one of few, and will have his place waiting for him.

ONE-TALENT MEN UTILIZED--.With Functionalization, men who lack qualifications for the position which they may, at the start, endeavor to fill, may be transferred to other positions, where the qualities they lack are not required. If a man has one talent, Scientific Management provides a place where that can be utilized.

For example:--

Men who cannot produce the prescribed output constantly, are placed on other work. The slow, unskilled worker who has difficulty to learn, may be put upon work requiring less skill, or where speed is not required so much as watchfulness and faithfulness. The worker who is slow, but exceptionally skilled, has the opportunity to rise to the position of the functional foreman, especially in the planning department, where knowledge, experience and resourcefulness, and especially ability to teach, are much more desired than speed and endurance. Thus there are places provided, below and above, that can utilize all kinds of abilities.

"ALL ROUND" MEN ARE UTILIZED.--The exceptional man who possesses executive ability in all lines, and balance between them all, is the ideal man for a manager, and his special "all round" ability would be wasted in any position below that of a manager.

STABILITY PROVIDED FOR.--Every man is maintained in his place by his interresponsibility with other men. If he is a worker, every man's work is held to standard quality by the inspector, while the requirements and rewards of his function are kept before him by the instruction card man, rate fixer and the disciplinarian.

PROMOTION AND DEVELOPMENT PROVIDED FOR.--Functionalization provides for promotion by showing every man not only the clearly circ.u.mscribed place where he is to work, but also by showing him the definite place above him to which he may be promoted and its path, and by teaching him how he can fill it. This allows him to develop the possibilities of his best self by using and specially training those talents which are most marked in him.

Functional Foremans.h.i.+p allows many more people, to become foremen, and to develop the will and judgment which foremans.h.i.+p implies.

MEN IN THE ORGANIZATION PREFERRED TO OUTSIDERS.--Men in the organization are preferable to outsiders as functional foremen and for promotion. Not only does a worker's knowledge of his work help him to become more efficient when he is promoted to the position of foreman,--but his efficiency as a teacher is also increased by the fact that he knows and understands the workers whom he is there to teach.

ALL MEN ARE PUSHED UP.--Scientific Management raises every man as high as he is capable of being raised. It does not speed him up, but pushes him up to the highest notch which he can fill. Actual practice has shown that there is a greater demand for efficient men in the planning department than there is supply; also, that men in the planning department who fit themselves for higher work can be readily promoted to positions of greater responsibility, either inside or outside the organization.

YEARS OF PRODUCTIVITY PROLONGED.--Under Functionalization the number of years of productivity of all, workers and foremen alike, are increased. The specialty to which the man is a.s.signed is his natural specialty, thus his possible and profitable working years are prolonged, because he is at that work for which he is naturally fitted.

Moreover, the work of teaching is one at which the teacher becomes more clever and more valuable as time goes on, the functional foreman has that much more chance to become valuable as years go by.

CHANGE IN THE WORKER'S MENTAL ATt.i.tUDE.--The work under functionalization is such as to arouse the worker's attention and to hold his interest.[21] But the most important and valuable change in the worker's feelings is the change in his att.i.tude towards the foremen and the employer. From "natural enemies" as sometimes considered under typical Traditional Management, these all now become friends, with the common aim, cooperation, for the purpose of increasing output and wages, and lowering costs. This change of feeling results in an appreciation of the value of teaching, and also in promoting industrial peace.

CHAPTER III FOOTNOTES: =============================================

1. Mary Whiton Calkins, _A First Book in Psychology_, p. 273.

2. Sully, _The Teacher's Handbook of Psychology_, p. 1.

3. _Ibid._, p. 54.

4. Hugo Munsterberg, _American Problems_, p. 35.

5. Gillette and Dana, _Cost Keeping and Management Engineering_, p. 1.

6. F.W. Taylor, _Shop Management_, para. 221. Harper Ed., p. 96.

7. F.W. Taylor, _Shop Management_, para. 221-231. Harper Ed., pp. 96-98.

8. Compare H.L. Gantt, No. 1002, A.S.M.E., para. 9.

9. Compare H.P. Gillette, _Cost a.n.a.lysis Engineering_, pp. 1-2.

10. F.W. Taylor, _Principles of Scientific Management_, p. 37.

11. F.W. Taylor, _Shop Management_, para. 245. Harper Ed., p. 104.

12. For excellent example of special routing see: Charles Day, _Industrial Plants_, chap. VII.

13. C. Babbage, _Economy of Manufacturers_. p. 172. "The constant repet.i.tion of the same process necessarily produces in the workman a degree of excellence and rapidity in his particular department, which is never possessed by a person who is obliged to execute many different processes."

14. F.W. Taylor, _On the Art of Cutting Metals_, Paper No. 1119, A.S.M.E.

15. C.G. Barth, _Slide Rules for Machine Shops and Taylor System_.

Paper No. 1010, A.S.M.E.

16. H.L. Gantt, _Work, Wages and Profits_, p. 19.

17. Adam Smith, _Wealth of Nations_, p. 2. "The greatest improvement in the productive powers of labor, and the greater part of the skill, dexterity, and judgment, with which it is anywhere directed, or applied, seem to have been the effects of the division of labor." Also p. 4.

18. H.K. Hathaway, _The Value of "Non-Producers" in Manufacturing Plants. Machinery_, Nov., 1906, p. 134.

19. Gillette and Dana, _Cost Keeping and Management Engineering_, p. 11.

20. Morris Llewellyn Cooke, _Bulletin No. 5, Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching_, p. 15.

21. H.L. Gantt, _Work, Wages and Profits_, p. 120.

CHAPTER IV

MEASUREMENT

DEFINITION OF MEASUREMENT.--"Measurement," according to the Century Dictionary,--"is the act of measuring," and to measure is--"to ascertain the length, extent, dimensions, quant.i.ty or capacity of, by comparison with a standard; ascertain or determine a quant.i.ty by exact observation," or, again, "to estimate or determine the relative extent, greatness or value of, appraise by comparison with something else."

MEASUREMENT IMPORTANT IN PSYCHOLOGY.--Measurement has always been of importance in psychology; but it is only with the development of experimental psychology and its special apparatus, that methods of accurate measurements are available which make possible the measurement of extremely short periods of time, or measurements "quick as thought," These enable us to measure the variations of different workers as to their abilities and their mental and physical fatigue;[1] to study mental processes at different stages of mental and physical growth; to compare different people under the same conditions, and the same person under different conditions; to determine the personal coefficient of different workers, specialists and foremen, and to formulate resultant standards. As in all other branches of science, the progress comes with the development of measurement.

METHODS OF MEASUREMENT IN PSYCHOLOGY.--No student of management, and of measurement in the field of management, can afford not to study, carefully and at length, methods of measurement under psychology. This, for at least two most important reasons, which will actually improve him as a measurer, i.e.--

1. The student will discover, in the books on experimental psychology and in the "Psychological Review," a marvelous array of results of scientific laboratory experiments in psychology, which will be of immediate use to him in his work.

2. He will receive priceless instruction in methods of measuring. No where better than in the field of psychology, can one learn to realize the importance of measurements, the necessity for determination of elements for study, and the necessity for accurate apparatus and accuracy in observation.

Prof. George M. Stratton, in his book "Experimental Psychology and Culture,"--says "In mental measurements, therefore, there is no pretense of taking the mind's measure as a whole, nor is there usually any immediate intention of testing even some special faculty or capacity of the individual. What is aimed at is the measurement of a limited event in consciousness, such as a particular perception or feeling. The experiments are addressed, of course, not to the weight or size of such phenomena, but usually to their duration and intensity."[2]

The emphasis laid on a study of elements is further shown in the same book by the following,--"The actual laboratory work in time-measurement, however, has been narrowed down to determining, not the time in general that is occupied by some mental action, but rather the shortest possible time in which a particular operation, like discrimination or choice or a.s.sociation or recognition, can be performed under the simplest and most favorable circ.u.mstances.[3]