Two approches to the scientific management

Project done by Tsingovatova Elena


                 TWO APPROCHES TO THE SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT


Historical Review of the Principals of Management


The traditional model characterised as   administration  under  'the  formal
control of political leadership, based on a strictly hierarchical  model  of
bureaucracy,  staffed  by  permanent  ,  neutral  and  anonymous  officials,
motivated only by the public interest, serving any governing  party  equally
and  not contributing to policy  but  merely  administering  those  policies
decided by  the  politicians'  (Public  Management  and  Administration  and
Introduction by Owen E Huges, p.23).

By the 1920s this model  was  fully  formed  and  continued  with  extremely
little change for at least  fifty  years.  'Young'  practitioners  were   so
assured of  their  theories  and  they  believed  that  the  improvement  of
government and its administration would promote a better life for all.

After the critique of the theory of the  separation  between  administration
and politics considered as  the  myth  to  tolerate  that  politicians   and
administrators could be separated, the argument took place between  scholars
of public administration.

Nevertheless  the  political  control  and  the  theoretical  basis  of  the
bureaucracy were thoroughly established and  unchanged,  there  were  public
sector adaptations of  management  theory.  The  row  of  imports  from  the
private sector  took  place  and  the  most  important   is  the  scientific
management. That was explained by pretending that Public Management is  able
to be non-political and hence the operational methods  used  in  the  public
sector would be  the same as those used in the private sector.

But the larger waste is still human resources, like human efforts, which  go
on every day through such of our acts as  are  blundering,  ill-directed  or
inefficient, and which referred to as a lack of 'national efficiency'.

Scientific Management School


The basic assumption  of this school is the philosophy that workers, at  the
operational  level, are economically motivated and that they will put  forth
their best efforts if they are rewarded  financially.  The  emphasis  is  on
maximum output with minimum strain, eliminating waste  and  efficiency.  The
work of Frederick Winslow Taylor  dominates the thinking of this 'school'.


Biography of F.Taylor


Frederick Winslow  Taylor  (1856-1915)   was  a  mechanical  engineer  whose
writings on efficiency and scientific management were  widely  read.  Taylor
devised the system he called scientific management,  a  form  of  industrial
engineering that established the organisation of work.   The  main  goal  of
his theory was to increase productivity. And at the same  time  he  did  not
favour unions or industrial democracy. That's why his theory is regarded  as
authoritarian style of administration.

Efficiency was the most important theme of Taylor's works. As a steel  works
manager in Philadelphia, he was interested in knowing how to get  more  work
out  of  workers,  who  are  'naturally  lazy  and  engage   in   systematic
soldiering.'  This  attitude,  he  found,  was  contributed   to   by   poor
management. He observed 'when a naturally energetic  man  works  for  a  few
days beside a lazy one, the logic of the  situation  is  unanswerable.  'Why
should I work hard when the lazy fellow gets the same  pay  that  I  do  and
does only half as  much  work?'.   He  proposed  using  scientific  research
methods to discover the one best way to do a job.

Taylor's efforts were  resented  by  unions  and  managers  alike:  managers
because their intuition  and  discretion  were  challenged,  unions  because
their roles were questioned. Taylor was  fired  from  his  original  job  in
Philadelphia. He then went to Bethlehem Steel,  where  he  again  was  fired
after three years. The unions, indignant by this time, were instrumental  in
getting his methods investigated by a special congressional committee;  they
succeeded in forbidding the use of 'stop  watches'  and  'bonuses'  in  army
arsenals until World War II. However, his  concepts  spread  to  Europe  and
Great  Britain  and  received  impetus  in  the  Soviet  Union   after   the
Revolution. Many maintain that this movement represents techniques only  and
'hinders' the development of a philosophy.

Conception of Frederic Taylor


Tayrol's attitude toward work was that  man  and  machine  are  similar.  He
stated that 'it is no single element, but  rather  this  whole  combination,
that  constitutes  scientific  management,  which  may  be  summarised   as:
Science,  not  rule  of  thumb;  Harmony,  not  discord;  Co-operation,  not
individualism;  Maximum  output,  in  place  of   restricted   output;   The
Development of each man to his greatest efficiency and prosperity.'

Taylor believed that the best management is the true science,  resting  upon
clearly defined laws, rules, and principles of scientific  management  which
are applicable to all kinds of human activities, from our simple  individual
acts to the work  of  our  great  corporations,  which  call  for  the  most
elaborate co-operation. He also believed  that   whenever  these  principles
correctly applied, results must follow which are truly.

Taylor expounded several basic principles:

1)To gather all traditional knowledge and classify, tabulate, and reduce  it
to rules, laws, and formulas so as to help workers in their daily work.
2)To develop a science of each element of man's work to replace the rule-of-
thumb method.
3)To scientifically select and then train, teach, and develop the worker.
4) To co-operate with workers to  ensure  is  done  according  to  developed
science principles.
5) To effect an almost equal division of  work  and  responsibility  between
workers and managers are to be given work for which they  are  best  fitted,
as are employees.

He felt that faster work could be assured only through:
1)enforced standardisation of methods

2)enforced adaptation of best instruments and working conditions

3)enforced co-operation
Scientific management as a process involves:

1) time-and-motion studies to decide a standard for working;
2) a wage-incentive system that was a modification of the  piecework  method
already in existence;
3)changing the functional organisation.

Although he hasn't invented time-and-motion studies but did carry  them  out
more  thoroughly than predecessors.

Among the experiments he performed to prove his theory were:
1. Work study:

One experiment detailed movements of workers in a shop and suggested short
cuts or more efficient ways of performing certain operations. Within three
years the output of the shop had doubled.
2. Standardised tools for shops:

In another area he found that the coal shovels being used weighed from 16
to 38 pounds. After experimenting, it was found that 21-22 pounds was the
best weight. Again, after three years 140 men were doing what had
previously been done by between 400 and 600 men.
3. Selection and training of workers:

Taylor insisted that each worker be assigned to do what he was best suited
for and that those who exceeded the defined work be paid 'bonuses.'
Production, as might be expected, rose to an all-time high.

Taylor,  as  a  result  of  these  experiments,  advocated   assignment   of
supervisors by 'function' - that is, one for training, one  for  discipline,
etc. This functional  approach  is  evident  today  in  many  organisations,
including libraries.

Taylor took many of his concepts from the bureaucratic  model  developed  by
Max Weber, particularly in regard to rules and procedures  for  the  conduct
of work in organisations.  Weber,  the  first  to  articulate  a  theory  of
authority  structure  in  organisations,  distinguished  between  power  and
authority, between compelling action and voluntary response.  He  identified
three characteristics which aided authority:
1) charisma (personality)

2) tradition (custom)

3) bureaucracy (through rules and regulations)

The concept of bureaucracy developed  about  the  same  time  as  scientific
management, and thoughts on specialisation of  work,  levels  of  authority,
and control all emerged from Weber's  writings.  Weber  was  more  concerned
with the structure of the organisation in which people  perform  their  work
roles, rather than with the individual. Most of his  writings  and  research
related to the importance  of  specialisation  in  labour,  regulations  and
procedures, and the advantages of a hierarchical system in  making  informed
decisions.

Luther Gulick and Lyndal Urvick's Principals of Administration

The culmination  of  the  Principles  of  Administration  Approach  was  the
publication of Luther Gulick and Lyndall Urwick's Papers on the  Science  of
Administration. In that time, 1937, public administration scholars had  come
to believe in a static set of principles by which any organisation could  be
designed  or  its  function  improved.  These   principles,   implied   that
organisations were very much like machines, and that managers  could  follow
a set of formulae to maximise their efficiency.

Luther Gulick and Lyndall Urwick are known in the world for the work  'Notes
on a Theory of Organization' issued in  1937.  They  developed  the  acronym
POSDCORB to describe the administrative functions of managers.

POSDCORB stands for:

Planning     -  Preparing methodical plans for managing programs;
Organising    - Creating the different sub-units of the organisation;
Staffing         - Hiring competent employees to fill vacancies;
Directing       - Issuing directives with time and performance criteria;
Co-ordinating - Interrelating employees' effort efficiently;
Reporting      - reports for superiors;
Budgeting      - Preparing and executing budgets.


Analysis of two stands


An often repeated criticism of the scientific management  approach  is  that
it  overemphasised  productivity  and  underemphasised  human  nature.  This
criticism is well expressed by Amitai  Etzioni,  who  wrote  that  'although
Taylor  originally  set  out  to  study  the   interaction   between   human
characteristics and the characteristics of  the  machine,  the  relationship
between these two elements which make up the  industrial  work  process,  he
ended  up  by  focusing  on  a  far  more  limited  subject:  the   physical
characteristics of the human body in routine jobs -  e.g.,  shovelling  coal
or picking up loads. Eventually  Taylor  came  to  view  human  and  machine
resources not so much as mutually adapt able, but rather man functioning  as
an  appendage  to  the  industrial  machine'.  Similar  criticism  could  be
levelled at other movements within the scientific management  approach.  The
Scientific Management approach  directed to create scientific,  specialized,
technocratic environment which makes it clear how to be more productive  and
maximize rewards. But his theory  can  be  seen  as  one-sided.  You  cannot
interpret the human being as a machine as it has  it's  own  interest,  it's
own needs, that the human being is a  entity  of  the  different  moods  and
emotions. He hasn't  counted that the motivating factor  for  employees  can
be not only monetary, worker can be motivated for example  by  the  interest
of working in the particular field (e.g. teachers  do   not  owe  a  lot  of
money from  their work but  they  are  usually  motivated  by  the  interest
working with people; e.g. some tourists guides also do  not  owe  a  lot  of
money but they  are  interested  in  meeting  new  people  and  travelling),
experience that he/she would gain through being on particular working  place
(e.g. nurse doesn't get much money for her work, but  she wants to get  more
experience with time). It is also noted that
design of work procedures is not possible to establish in every field.

Luther  Gulick  and  Lyndall  Urwick  tried  to  establish   principles   of
management to motivate worker they believed that economic efficiency  rooted
in human tendency toward rationality and order.

As with the Principles of  Administration  Approach,  subsequent  experience
has shown public organisations, and the implementation process,  to  be  far
more complex than was imagined in 1937.

The both of theories was searching for the 'one best way of doing work'  for
increasing of productivity, efficiency and effectiveness of  completing  any
work. But  implementation  of  each  of  them  has  limited  effect  on  the
productivity and depends on particular circumstances.

Not any of listed theories can be implemented in modern  society,  specially
in  modern  Public  Administration,  the  reason  for  that   is   extremely
complicated human  relations.  Public  Administration  is  a  human  science
therefore human behaviour plays the most important role in  the  subject  of
PA.

Therefore, there is no use in implementing of  the  considered  theories  of
Science Management in practice.



List of Bibliography used:

1. Lecturer Notes.

2. Owen E Huges  Public  Management  and  Administration  and  Introduction,
Great Britain: Macmillan Press Limited, 1994.

3. Public Administration Biographies http://www.usc.edu/.

4. THEORY AND ANALYSIS IN PUBLIC ADMINISTRATION
http://www.niu.edu/pub_ad/culhane/561.htm.

5. Scope and Theory Of Public Policy
http://www.gsu.edu/~padjem/PHDSYL.html.