Taylorism
Did Taylorism ultimately cause inefficiency in the workplace due to employee dissatisfaction?
Scientific management also known as Taylorism was a management theory coined by Fredrick Winslow Taylor in which the main objective was to improve efficiency in the workplace. This was achieved by implementing scientific methods to the management of workers. These processes include optimizing the way tasks were performed and simplifying the jobs enough so that workers could be trained to perform tasks in the “one best way”(Scientific Management pg 131). Taylor believed there was only one method of work that would fully maximise efficiency and that this best method could only be discovered through studies and analysis (Scientific Management pg 131). Taylorism took away any independence or individuality in the work process and converted skilled crafts into a series of simplified jobs that could be performed by unskilled workers who could be trained to do the tasks.
Scientific management is set out in four main principles; the development of a true science, the scientific selection of the workman, the scientific education and training of the workman and cooperation between management and the workman (Scientific Management pg 130). Taylor from his time working in the steel industry realised that many workers were purposely working below their capabilities, he called this soldiering. He explained that the main reasons that workers were not working to their full potential was due to the belief that increasing output would lead to less workers and hence would put their own job in jeopardy and also there was no incentive to work harder than another employee as wages were the same regardless of their work efforts (Scientific management page 23). Taylor managed to combat these ideas firstly by arguing that efficient work methods would increase demand and therefore decrease price. Also by introducing a wage that reflected the amount of output produced by each employee
Scientific management also known as Taylorism was a management theory coined by Fredrick Winslow Taylor in which the main objective was to improve efficiency in the workplace. This was achieved by implementing scientific methods to the management of workers. These processes include optimizing the way tasks were performed and simplifying the jobs enough so that workers could be trained to perform tasks in the “one best way”(Scientific Management pg 131). Taylor believed there was only one method of work that would fully maximise efficiency and that this best method could only be discovered through studies and analysis (Scientific Management pg 131). Taylorism took away any independence or individuality in the work process and converted skilled crafts into a series of simplified jobs that could be performed by unskilled workers who could be trained to do the tasks.
Scientific management is set out in four main principles; the development of a true science, the scientific selection of the workman, the scientific education and training of the workman and cooperation between management and the workman (Scientific Management pg 130). Taylor from his time working in the steel industry realised that many workers were purposely working below their capabilities, he called this soldiering. He explained that the main reasons that workers were not working to their full potential was due to the belief that increasing output would lead to less workers and hence would put their own job in jeopardy and also there was no incentive to work harder than another employee as wages were the same regardless of their work efforts (Scientific management page 23). Taylor managed to combat these ideas firstly by arguing that efficient work methods would increase demand and therefore decrease price. Also by introducing a wage that reflected the amount of output produced by each employee