Frank and Lillian Bunker were the Dynamic Duo of the Engineering field. Together, and individually, they left a lasting impact on the way businesses are run, homes are managed, and time is used. Working to make life better, happier and more fulfilled, they touched people on a professional and personal level. From cooking in the kitchen, to hospital operating rooms, the Gilbreths set standards and made changes that are still used, more than a century later.
Frank Bunker Gilbreth, Sr. was born the youngest of three children in Fairfield, ME, on July 7, 1868. Frank was three when his father, John, died from pneumonia. Due to financial reasons, his mother Martha moved with Frank and his sisters, Anne and Mary, to Boston where Martha opened …show more content…
They saw the need to improve worker satisfaction, which would in turn improve overall job performance and worker efficiency. Frank designed systems to ease worker fatigue and increase productivity by studying each movement a worker made and in doing so, document the best way to perform the task. They also considered the physical comfort of the worker and their innovations in office furniture led to the study of ergonomics. Lillian dealt with the human aspects of time management. She knew that workers are motivated by indirect incentives, which included money, and direct incentives, such as job satisfaction. They created job standardization, incentive wage-plans, and job …show more content…
During this time, he devised the steps used by the military around the world to teach recruits how to rapidly disassemble and reassemble their weapons even when blindfolded or in total darkness. As wounded soldiers began returning home, Frank used these same principles to improve surgical procedures and, introduced the use of cameras in the operating room for educational purposes. The Gilbreths would use the films to identify the individual motions needed to do each task as well as the unnecessary motions included in the doing of each task. They would eliminate any unnecessary motion or activity, streamlining the work, saving time and increasing output. In addition, he devised the concept of a surgical nurse serving as the “caddy” for the surgeon by handing surgical instruments to the surgeon as requested during a procedure. Prior to this, surgeons had located their own instruments while