Shop Management - Frederick Winslow Taylor (top 10 non fiction books of all time .TXT) 📗
- Author: Frederick Winslow Taylor
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involving at the same time more brain work and less monotony. The type
of man who was formerly a day laborer and digging dirt is now for
instance making shoes in a shoe factory. The dirt handling is done by
Italians or Hungarians.
After the planning room with functional foremanship has accomplished its
most difficult task, of teaching the men how to do a full day’s work
themselves, and also how to get it out of their machines steadily, then,
if desired, the number of non-producers can be diminished, preferably,
by giving each type of functional foreman more to do in his specialty;
or in the case of a very small shop, by combining two different
functions in the same man. The former expedient is, however, much to be
preferred to the latter. There need never be any worry about what is to
become of those engaged in systematizing after the period of active
organization is over. The difficulty will still remain even with
functional foremanship, that of getting enough good men to fill the
positions, and the demand for competent gang bosses will always be so
great that no good boss need look for a job.
Of all the farces in management the greatest is that of an establishment
organized along well planned lines, with all of the elements needed for
success, and yet which fails to get either output or economy. There must
be some man or men present in the organization who will not mistake the
form for the essence, and who will have brains enough to find out those
of their employees who “get there,” and nerve enough to make it
unpleasant for those who fail, as well as to reward those who succeed.
No system can do away with the need of real men. Both system and good
men are needed, and after introducing the best system, success will be
in proportion to the ability, consistency, and respected authority of
the management.
In a book of this sort, it would be manifestly impossible to discuss at
any length all of the details which go toward making the system a
success. Some of them are of such importance as to render at least a
brief reference to them necessary. And first among these comes the study
of unit times.
This, as already explained, is the most important element of the system
advocated by the writer. Without it, the definite, clear-cut directions
given to the workman, and the assigning of a full, yet just, daily task,
with its premium for success, would be impossible; and the arch without
the keystone would fall to the ground.
In 1883, while foreman of the machine shop of the Midvale Steel Company
of Philadelphia, it occurred to the writer that it was simpler to time
with a stop watch each of the elements of the various kinds of work done
in the place, and then find the quickest time in which each job could be
done by summing up the total times of its component parts, than it was
to search through the time records of former jobs and guess at the
proper time and price. After practicing this method of time study
himself for about a year, as well as circumstances would permit, it
became evident that the system was a success.
The writer then established the time-study and rate-fixing department,
which has given out piece work prices in the place ever since.
This department far more than paid for itself from the very start; but
it was several years before the full benefits of the system were felt,
owing to the fact that the best methods of making and recording time
observations, as well as of determining the maximum capacity of each of
the machines in the place, and of making working tables and time tables,
were not at first adopted.
It has been the writer’s experience that the difficulties of scientific
time study are underestimated at first, and greatly overestimated after
actually trying the work for two or three months. The average manager
who decides to undertake the study of unit times in his works fails at
first to realize that he is starting a new art or trade. He understands,
for instance, the difficulties which he would meet with in establishing
a drafting room, and would look for but small results at first, if he
were to give a bright man the task of making drawings, who had never
worked in a drafting room, and who was not even familiar with drafting
implements and methods, but he entirely underestimates the difficulties
of this new trade.
The art of studying unit times is quite as important and as difficult as
that of the draftsman. It should be undertaken seriously, and looked
upon as a profession. It has its own peculiar implements and methods,
without the use and understanding of which progress will necessarily be
slow, and in the absence of which there will be more failures than
successes scored at first.
When, on the other hand, an energetic, determined man goes at time study
as if it were his life’s work, with the determination to succeed, the
results which he can secure are little short of astounding. The
difficulties of the task will be felt at once and so strongly by any one
who undertakes it, that it seems important to encourage the beginner by
giving at least one illustration of what has been accomplished.
Mr. Sanford E. Thompson, C. E., started in 1896 with but small help from
the writer, except as far as the implements and methods are concerned,
to study the time required to do all kinds of work in the building
trades. In six years he has made a complete study of eight of the most
important trades—excavation, masonry (including sewer-work and paving),
carpentry, concrete and cement work, lathing and plastering, slating and
roofing and rock quarrying. He took every stop watch observation himself
and then, with the aid of two comparatively cheap assistants, worked up
and tabulated all of his data ready for the printer. The magnitude of
this undertaking will be appreciated when it is understood that the
tables and descriptive matter for one of these trades alone take up
about 250 pages. Mr. Thompson and the writer are both engineers, but
neither of us was especially familiar with the above trades, and this
work could not have been accomplished in a lifetime without the study of
elementary units with a stop watch.
In the course of this work, Mr. Thompson has developed what are in many
respects the best implements in use, and with his permission some of
them will be described. The blank form or note sheet used by Mr.
Thompson, shown in Fig. 2 (see page 151), contains essentially:
[Transcriber’s note — Figure 2 omitted]
(1) Space for the description of the work and notes in regard to it.
(2) A place for recording the total time of complete operations—that
is, the gross time including all necessary delays, for doing a whole job
or large portions of it.
(3) Lines for setting down the “detail operations, or units” into which
any piece of work may be divided, followed by columns for entering the
averages obtained from the observations.
(4) Squares for recording the readings of the stop watch when observing
the times of these elements. If these squares are filled, additional
records can be entered on the back. The size of the sheets, which should
be of best quality ledger paper, is 8 3/4 inches wide by 7 inches long,
and by folding in the center they can be conveniently carried in the
pocket, or placed in a case (see Fig. 3, page 153) containing one or
more stop watches.
This case, or “watch book,” is another device of Mr. Thompson’s. It
consists of a frame work, containing concealed in it one, two, or three
watches, whose stop and start movements can be operated by pressing with
the fingers of the left hand upon the proper portion of the cover of the
note-book without the knowledge of the workman who is being observed.
The frame is bound in a leather case resembling a pocket note-book, and
has a place for the note sheets described.
The writer does not believe at all in the policy of spying upon the
workman when taking time observations for the purpose of time study. If
the men observed are to be ultimately affected by the results of these
observations, it is generally best to come out openly, and let them know
that they are being timed, and what the object of the timing is. There
are many cases, however, in which telling the workman that he was being
timed in a minute way would only result in a row, and in defeating the
whole object of the timing; particularly when only a few time units are
to be studied on one man’s work, and when this man will not be
personally affected by the results of the observations. In these cases,
the watch book of Mr. Thompson, holding the watches in the cover, is
especially useful. A good deal of judgment is required to know when to
time openly, or the reverse.
FIGURE 3. -WATCH BOOK FOR TIME STUDY
[Transcriber’s note — Figure 3 omitted]
The operation selected for illustration on the note sheet shown in Fig.
2, page 151, is the excavation of earth with wheelbarrows, and the
values given are fair averages of actual contract work where the
wheelbarrow man fills his own barrow. It is obvious that similar methods
of analyzing and recording may be applied to work ranging from unloading
coal to skilled labor on fine machine tools.
The method of using the note sheets for timing a workman is as follows:
After entering the necessary descriptive matter at the top of the sheet,
divide the operation to be timed into its elementary units, and write
these units one after another under the heading “Detail Operations.” If
the job is long and complicated, it may be analyzed while the timing is
going on, and the elementary units entered then instead of beforehand.
In wheelbarrow work as illustrated in the example shown on the note
sheet, the elementary units consist of “filling barrow,” “starting”
(which includes throwing down shovel and lifting handles of barrow),
“wheeling full,” etc. These units might have been further
subdivided—the first one into time for loading one shovelful, or still
further into the time for filling and the time for emptying each
shovelful. The letters a, b, c, etc., which are printed, are simply for
convenience in designating the elements.
We are now ready for the stop watch, which, to save clerical work,
should be provided with a decimal dial similar to that shown in Fig. 4.
The method of using this and recording the times depends upon the
character of the time observations. In all cases, however, the stop
watch times are recorded in the columns headed “Time” at the top of the
right-hand half of the note sheet. These columns are the only place on
the face of the sheet where stop watch readings are to be entered. If
more space is required for these times, they should be entered on the
back of the sheet. The rest of the figures (except those on the
left-hand side of the note sheet, which may be taken from an ordinary
timepiece) are the results of calculation, and may be made in the office
by any clerk.
FIGURE 4. -STOP WATCH WITH DECIMAL FACE
[Transcriber’s note — omitted]
As has been stated, the method of recording the stop watch observations
depends upon the work which is being observed. If the operation consists
of the same element repeated over and over, the time of each may be set
down separately; or,
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