HBO - PRELIM
Task 1(a)
According to Taylor (1909), “Scientific Management is an art of knowing exactly what you want your men to do and seeing that they do it in the best and cheapest way”. In Taylors view, if a work is analysed scientifically it will be possible to find one best way to do it. It implies application of scientific principles for studying & identifying management problems. In this, he proposed that by optimizing and simplifying jobs, productivity would increase. He also advanced the idea that workers and managers needed to cooperate with one another. This was very different from the way work was typically done in businesses beforehand. A factory manager at that time had very little contact with the workers, and he left them on their own to produce the necessary product. There was no standardization, and a worker's main motivation was often continued employment, so there was no incentive to work as quickly or as efficiently as possible.
Taylor believed that all workers were motivated by money, so he promoted the idea of "a fair day's pay for a fair day's work." In other words, if a worker didn't achieve enough in a day, he didn't deserve to be paid as much as another worker who was highly productive (Taylor, 1909).
Hence scientific management is a thoughtful, organized, dual approach towards the job of management against hit or miss or Rule of Thumb.
Principles of Scientific Management 1. Development of Science for each part of men’s job (replacement of rule of thumb) a. This principle suggests that work assigned to any employee should be observed, analyzed with respect to each and every element and part and time involved in it. b. This means replacement of odd rule of thumb by the use of method of enquiry, investigation, data collection, analysis and framing of rules. c. Under scientific management, decisions are made