Plan:
Introduction:
– Thesis statement (state position and argument w/ evidence and combine sources)
– What is scientific management?
– Why is Taylorism a controversial issue
– Thesis: Scientific management approach is highly problematic, out of date and not relevant in a modern business environment
– Use case studies to back this up
Paragraph 1:
– Who supports Taylor’s theory – case study/example 1
– Link back to thesis statement
Paragraph 2
– Who disagrees with Taylor’s theory
– Case study/example 2
– Link back to these
Paragraph 3
– Counter argument continued
– Who supports scientific management
– Case study/example 3
– Link back to thesis
Conclusion
– Scientific management practices are problematic, out-dated and irrelevant
– Summarise paragraphs
– Restate thesis
– Powerful conclusion
Don’t sit on the fence – make your argument clear
Evaluate everything
Use sources for everything
Starter Questions:
Who is Taylor?
– Frederick Winslow Taylor (F. W. Taylor)
– Founder of ‘Taylorism’ or Scientific Management
– The scientific approach to organise the work, how we work and approach everyday tasks
– Organising into bits and pieces to become more effective
– Everything an employee did was recorded and their salary was then based on that
– Tried to control how people spent their money – holidays, cars, houses
What is Scientific Management?
– A focus on rationality and rationalism: use of scientific reason and positivism, using logical argument and reasoning
– Focused on the first of the .3 stages’ – the transformation of the work piece (Gill, 1985)
– Scientific management was concerned with mechanisation and a new form of work design:
– Characteristics of SM:
Old Examples of Scientific Management
– Henry Ford
– In the 1930s, Walt Disney applied the techniques of mass production to the task of making cartoons in his Hollywood film studio (Watts, 2001)
Positives of Scientific Management
– It offered a solution to the major organizational problem of workers being ill-disciplined and unproductive
– Could be applied to different companies
– Taylor argued that his approach enabled people to do more work, in less time and using less effort.
– Ford’s legacy enabled the mass production of simpler products e.g. radios, vacuum cleaners, mobile phones etc.
Limitations of Scientific Management
– Lack of employee ownership – won’t see the finished product
– Individuals need to connect to their peers
The effect of lighting in the workplace and how it changed human relations
Important how colleagues interacted and approached each other
The result was that communication (and the positive interactions between employees) was the most important element of employee productivity – not financial motivation or anything else
– No human element = human ownership
– Neglected the importance of other rewards from work (achievement, job satisfaction, recognition)
– Neglected the subjective side of work – the personal and interactional aspects of performance like the significance of social relationships
– Failed to account for how the workers would react to being timed and closely supervised
– ‘Destroyed’ individuality by ignoring the psychological needs and capabilities of workers
– The Braverman thesis
– System inflexibility
– Work design was not able to respond to changes in customer demand
– Not as applicable to knowledge-based jobs and service industry
Current examples of Scientific Management
– Assembling a Pret-a-Manger sandwich [(Boddy, 2011, p.46), P+O Book, 467]
– Taylorism in HMRC (based on Carter et al. 2011)
– Call centres
Most operators being trained with just one aspect of the incoming phone enquiries
What is the Human Relations movement?
– Criticisms of scientific management led, in part, to more people-focused movements
– The human relations approach focuses on issues such as:
– These human relations are seen as key to achieving greater organisational effectiveness, and focus on psychology and sociology
– https://www.business.com/articles/human-relations-management-theory-basics/
– An approach to management based on the idea that employees are motivated not only by financial reward but also by a range of social factors (e.g. praise, a sense of belonging, feelings of achievement and pride in one's work). The theory, which developed from empirical studies carried out in the 1920s and 1930s (see Hawthorne studies), holds that attitudes, relationships, and leadership styles play a key role in the performance of an organization. See motivation; self-actualization.www.oxfordreference.com/view/10.1093/oi/authority.20110803095949990
– https://www.tutor2u.net/business/reference/motivation-mayo-human-relations-school
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Why is Human Relations school of thought worse than Scientific Management?
– ‘Our central argument is that HRS presented conservative business leaders with a set of management ideas and practices that enabled them to deny that workers should become active participants in workplace decision making and in wider so
ciety.’ (Elton Mayo article)
–
What does critically evaluate mean?
– Give your verdict as to what extent a statement or findings within a piece of research are true, or to what extent you agree with them. Provide evidence taken from a wide range of sources which both agree with and contradict an argument. Come to a final conclusion, basing your decision on what you judge to be the most important factors and justify how you have made your choice.