Taylor's Scientific Theory

Taylor’s Scientific Management attempts to find the most efficient way of performing any job. He believed that there were universal laws which governed efficiency and that these laws were independent of human judgment. The goal of Scientific Management was to find this “one best way” of doing things as efficiently as possible.

Frederick Taylor

Frederick Winslow Taylor is an American mechanical engineer who published his ideas about scientific management in 1911, to encourage industrial companies to proceed to mass production.

He proposed that by optimizing and simplifying jobs, productivity would increase since he noticed that make people work as hard as they could was not as efficient as optimizing the way the work was done.

Principle 1:

Break Down Assignment into Subtasks

Break down larger tasks into smaller parts.
Multiple employees working on only one assignment.
Organized and efficient.

Drawbacks:

Closely related to an autocratic style of leadership.

Principle 2:

Delegate Responsibility and Train Workers

Give subtasks only to employees with the proper skills and abilities.
Certain people could work more efficient than others.
Match workers to jobs. Scientifically select and train each workers.
Employees are trained to specific jobs which are delegated to them.

Drawbacks:

Employees often feel insignificant, completing the same chore hours on end, which will reduce their passion.

Principle 3:

Monitor Performance

Monitor worker performance and provide instructions and supervision to ensure that they're using the most efficient ways of working.
The more efficient the worker is, the higher their pay will be.
Incentives for mundane tasks are high. Workers are motivated to deliver quality work because they are financially rewarded based on their performance.

Drawbacks:

The principle of supervising workers is not relevant in business today because modern employees hate to be micro-managed.

Changes:

From monitor to cooperate (mutual supervision).
Work with employees to retrain and recalibrate them, so that they are exactly following the most efficient way to perform their job.

Principle 4:

Allocate Work between Managers & Employees

Managers should be responsible for developing the processes, ways of working and monitoring employees.
Employees should be responsible for executing a task as quickly as possible.

Criticisms

Although production is increased it creates very monotonous jobs containing no autonomy.
It was conceived to benefit both worker and company, but the reality is that it benefits the company far more than the worker.
Scientific Management is often seen as dehumanizing. This is because workers do not think for themselves, they simply have to follow a few simple instructions as quickly as possible.

Back