The Psychology of Management Part 23

INSTRUCTION CARD CREATES AND HOLDS ATTENTION.--As has been already said in describing the instruction card under Standardization, it was designed as a result of investigations as to what would best secure output,--to attract and hold the attention.[30]

Providing, as it does, all directions that an experienced worker is likely to need, he can confine his attention solely to his work and his card; usually, after the card is once studied, to his work alone. The close relation of the elements of the instruction card affords a field for attention to lapse, and be recalled in the new elements that are constantly made apparent.

ORAL INDIVIDUAL TEACHING FOSTERS CONCENTRATED ATTENTION.--The fact that under Scientific Management oral teaching is individual, not only directly concentrates the attention of the learner upon what he is being taught, but also indirectly prevents distraction from fear of ridicule of others over the question, or embarra.s.sment in talking before a crowd.

THE BULLETIN BOARD FURNISHES THE ELEMENT OF CHANGE.--In order that interest or attention may be held, there must be provision for allied subjects on which the mind is to wander. This, under Scientific Management, is constantly furnished by the collection of jobs ahead on the bulletin board. The tasks piled up ahead upon this bulletin board provide a needed and ready change for the subject of attention or interest, which conserves the economic value of concentrated attention of the worker upon his work. Such future tasks furnish sufficient range of subject for wandering attention to rest the mind from the wearying effect of overconcentration or forced attention. The a.s.signed task of the future systematizes the "stream of attention," and an orderly scheme of habits of thought is installed. When the scheme is an orderly shifting of attention, the mind is doing its best work, for, while the standardized extreme subdivision of Taylor's plan, the comparison of the ultimate unit, and groupings of units of future tasks are often helps in achieving the present tasks, without such a definite orderly scheme for shifting the attention and interest, the attention will shift to useless subjects, and the result will be scattered.

INCENTIVES MAINTAIN INTEREST.--The knowledge that a prompt reward will follow success stimulates interest. The knowledge that this reward is sure concentrates attention and thus maintains interest.

In the same way, the a.s.surance of promotion, and the fact that the worker sees those of his own trade promoted, and knows it is to the advantage of the management, as well as to his advantage, that he also be promoted,--this also maintains interest in the work.

THIS INTEREST EXTENDS TO THE WORK OF OTHERS.--The interest is extended to the work of others, not only by the interrelated bonuses, but also by the fact that every man is expected to train up a man to take his place, before he is promoted.

CLOSE RELATIONSHIP OF ALL PARTS OF SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT HOLDS INTEREST.--The attention of the entire organization, as well as of the individual worker, is held by Scientific Management and its teaching, because all parts of Scientific Management are related, and because Scientific Management provides for scientifically directed progression. Every member of the organization knows that the standards which are taught by Scientific Management contain the permanent elements of past successes, and provide for such development as will a.s.sure progress and success in the future. Every member of the organization realizes that upon his individual cooperation depends, in part, the stability of Scientific Management, because it is based on universal cooperation. This provides an intensity and a continuity of interest that would still hold, even though some particular element might lose its interest.

THIS RELATIONSHIP ALSO PROVIDES FOR a.s.sOCIATIONS.--The close relationship of all parts of Scientific Management provides that all ideas are a.s.sociated, and are so closely connected that they can act as a single group, or any selected number of elements can act as a group.

SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT ESTABLISHES BRAIN GROUPS THAT HABITUALLY ACT IN UNISON.--Professor Read, in describing the general mental principle of a.s.sociation says, "When any number of brain cells have been in action together, they form a habit of acting in unison, so that when one of them is stimulated in a certain way, the others will also behave in the way established by the habit."[31] This working of the brain is recognized in grouping of motions, such as "playing for position."[32] Scientific Management provides the groups, the habit, and the stimulus, all according to standard methods, so that the result is largely predictable.

METHOD OF ESTABLISHING SUCH GROUPS IN THE WORKER'S BRAIN.--The standard elements of Scientific Management afford units for such groups. Eventually, with the use of such elements in instruction cards, would be formed, in the minds of the worker, such groups of units as would aid in foreseeing results, just as the foreseeing of groups of moves aids the expert chess or checker player. The size and number of such groups would indicate the skill of the worker.

That such skill may be gained quickest, Scientific Management synthesizes the units into definite groups, and teaches these to the workers as groups.

TEACHING DONE BY MEANS OF MOTION CYCLES.--The best group is that which completes the simplest cycle of performance. This enables the worker to a.s.sociate certain definite motions, to make these into a habit, and to concentrate his attention upon the cycle as a whole, and not upon the elementary motions of which it is composed.

For example--The cycle of the pick and dip process of bricklaying is to pick up a brick and a trowel full of mortar simultaneously and deposit them on the wall simultaneously.[33] The string mortar method has two cycles, which are, first to pick a certain number of trowelfuls of mortar and deposit them on the wall, and then to pick up a corresponding number of bricks and deposit them on the wall.[34] Each cycle of these two methods consists of an a.s.sociation of units that can be remembered as a group.

SUCH CYCLES INDUCE SPEED.--The worker who has been taught thus to a.s.sociate the units of attention and action into definite rhythmic cycles, is the one who is most efficient, and least fatigued by a given output. The nerves acquire the habit, as does the brain, and the resulting swift response to stimulus characterizes the efficiency of the specialist.[35]

SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT RESTRICTS a.s.sOCIATIONS.--By its teaching of standard methods, Scientific Management restricts a.s.sociation, and thus gains in the speed with which a.s.sociated ideas arise.[36]

Insistence on causal sequence is a great aid. This is rendered by the Systems, which give the reasons, and make the standard method easy to remember.

SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT PRESENTS SCIENTIFICALLY DERIVED KNOWLEDGE TO THE MEMORY.--Industrial memory is founded on experience, and that experience that is submitted by teaching under Scientific Management to the mind is in the form of scientifically derived standards.

These furnish

(a) data that is correct.

(b) images that are an aid in acquiring new habits of forming efficient images.

(c) standards of comparison, and constant demands for comparison.

(d) such arrangement of elements that reasoning processes are stimulated.

(e) conscious, efficient grouping.

(f) logical a.s.sociation of ideas.

PROVISION FOR REPEt.i.tION OF IMPORTANT IDEAS.--Professor Ebbinghaur says, "a.s.sociations that have equal reproductive power lapse the more slowly, the older they are, and the oftener they have been reviewed by renewed memorizing." Scientific Management provides for utilizing this law by teaching right motions first, and by so minutely dividing the elements of such motions that the smallest units discovered are found frequently, in similar and different operations.

BEST PERIODS FOR MEMORIZING UTILIZED.--As for education of the memory, there is a wide difference of opinion among leading psychologists in regard to whether or not the memorizing faculty, as the whole, can be improved by training; but all agree that those things which are specially desired to be memorized can be learned more easily, and more quickly, under some conditions than under others:

For example, there is a certain time of day, for each person, when the memory is more efficient than at other times. This is usually in the morning, but is not always so. The period when memorizing is easiest is taken advantage of, and, as far as possible, new methods and new instruction cards are pa.s.sed out at that time when the worker is naturally best fitted to remember what is to be done.

INDIVIDUAL DIFFERENCES RESPECTED.--It is a question that varies with different conditions, whether the several instruction cards beyond the one he is working on shall be given to the worker ahead of time, that he may use his own judgment as to when is the best time to learn, or whether he shall have but one at a time, and concentrate on that. For certain dispositions, it is a great help to see a long line of work ahead. They enjoy getting the work done, and feeling that they are more or less ahead of record. Others become confused if they see too much ahead, and would rather attack but one problem at a time. This fundamental difference in types of mind should be taken advantage of when laying out material to be memorized.

AID OF MNEMONIC SYMBOLS TO THE MEMORY.--The mnemonic cla.s.sifications furnish a place where the worker who remembers but little of a method or process can go, and recover the full knowledge of that which he has forgotten. Better still, they furnish him the equivalent of memory of other experiences that he has never had, and that are in such form that he can connect this with his memory of his own personal experience.

The ease with which a learner or skilled mechanic can a.s.sociate new, scientifically derived data with his memory, because of the cla.s.sifications of Scientific Management, is a most important cause of workers being taught quicker, and being more intelligent, under Scientific Management, than under any other type of management.

PROPER LEARNING INSURES PROPER REMEMBERING.--Professor Read says, "Take care of the learning and the remembering will take care of itself."[37] Scientific Management both provides proper knowledge, and provides that this shall be utilized in such a manner that proper remembering will ensue.

BETTER HABITS OF REMEMBERING RESULT.--The results of cultivating the memory under Scientific Management are c.u.mulative. Ultimately, right habits of remembering result that aid the worker automatically so to arrange his memory material as to utilize it better.[38]

"IMAGINATION" HAS TWO DEFINITIONS.--Professor Read gives definitions for two distinct means of Imagination.

1. "The general function of the having of images."

2. "The particular one of having images which are not consciously memories or the reproduction of the facts of experience as they were originally presented to consciousness."[39]

SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT PROVIDES MATERIAL FOR IMAGES.--As was shown under the discussion of the appeals of the various teaching devices of Scientific Management,--provision is made for the four cla.s.ses of imagination of Calkins[40]--

1. visual, 2. auditory, 3. tactual, and 4. mixed.

IT ALSO REALIZES THE IMPORTANCE OF PRODUCTIVE IMAGINATION.--Scientific Management realizes that one of the special functions of teaching the trades is systematic exercising and guiding of imaginations of apprentices and learners. As Professor Ennis says,--"Any kind of planning ahead will result in some good,"

but to plan ahead most effectively it is necessary to have a well-developed power of constructive imagination. This consists of being able to construct new mental images from old memory images; of being able to modify and group images of past experiences, or thoughts, in combination with new images based on imagination, and not on experience. The excellence of the image arrived at in the complete work is dependent wholly upon the training in image forming in the past. If there has not been a complete economic system of forming standard habits of thought, the worker may have difficulty in controlling the trend of a.s.sociations of thought images, and difficulty in adding entirely new images to the groups of experienced images, and the problem to be thought out will suffer from wandering of the mind. The result will be more like a dream than a well balanced mental planning. It is well known that those apprentices, and journeymen as well, are the quickest to learn, and are better learners, who have the most vivid imagination. The best method of teaching the trade, therefore, is the one that also develops the power of imagination.

SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT a.s.sISTS PRODUCTIVE IMAGINATION.-- Scientific Management a.s.sists productive, or constructive, imagination, not only by providing standard units, or images, from which the results may, be synthesized, but also, through the unity of the instruction card, allows of imagination of the outcome, from the start.

For example,--in performing a prescribed cycle of motions, the worker has his memory images grouped in such a figure, form, or sequence,--often geometrical,--that each motion is a part of a growing, clearly imagined whole.

The elements of the cycle may be utilized in other entirely new cycles, and are, as provided for in the opportunities for invention that are a part of Scientific Management.

JUDGMENT THE RESULT OF FAITHFUL ENDEAVOR.--Judgment, or the "mental process which ends in an affirmation or negation of something,"[41] comes as the result of experience, as is admirably expressed by Prof. James,--"Let no youth have any anxiety about the upshot of his education whatever the line of it may be. If he keeps faithfully busy each hour of the working day, he may safely leave the final result to itself. He can with perfect certainty count on waking up some fine morning, to find himself one of the competent ones of his generation, in whatever pursuit he may have singled out.

Silently, between all the details of his business, the _power of judging_ in all that cla.s.s of matter will have built itself up within him as a possession that will never pa.s.s away. Young people should know this truth in advance.[42] The ignorance of it has probably engendered more discouragement and faint-heartedness in youths embarking on arduous careers than all other causes put together."[43]

TEACHING SUPPLIES THIS JUDGMENT UNDER SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT.--Under Scientific Management this judgment is the result of teaching of standards that are recognized as such by the learner.

Thus, much time is eliminated, and the apprentice under Scientific Management can work with all the a.s.surance as to the value of his methods that characterized the seasoned veterans of older types of management.

TEACHING ALSO UTILIZES THE JUDGMENT.--The judgment that is supplied by Scientific Management is also used as a spring toward action.[44] Scientific Management appeals to the reason, and workers perform work as they do because, through the Systems and otherwise, they are persuaded that the method they employ is the best.

THE POWER OF SUGGESTION IS ALSO UTILIZED.[45]--The dynamic power of ideas is recognized by Scientific Management, in that the instruction card is put in the form of direct commands, which, naturally, lead to immediate action. So, also, the teaching written, oral and object, as such, can be directly imitated by the learner.[46]

Imitation, which Dr. Stratton says "may well be counted a special form of suggestion," will be discussed later in this chapter at length.[47]

WORKER ALWAYS HAS OPPORTUNITY TO CRITICISE THE SUGGESTION.--The worker is expected to follow the suggestion of Scientific Management without delay, because he believes in the standardization on which it is made, and in the management that makes it. But the Systems afford him an opportunity of reviewing the reasonableness of the suggestion at any time, and his constructive criticism is invited and rewarded.

SUGGESTION MUST BE FOLLOWED AT THE TIME.--The suggestion must be followed at the time it is given, or its value as a suggestion is impaired. This is provided for by the underlying idea of cooperation on which Scientific Management rests, which molds the mental att.i.tude of the worker into that form where suggestions are quickest grasped and followed.[48]

"NATIVE REACTIONS" ENUMERATED BY PROF. JAMES.--Prof. James enumerates the "native reactions" as (1) fear, (2) love, (3) curiosity, (4) imitation, (5) emulation, (6) ambition, (7) pugnacity, (8) pride, (9) ownership, (10) constructiveness.[49]

These are all considered by Scientific Management. Such as might have a harmful effect are supplanted, others are utilized.

FEAR UTILIZED BY ANCIENT MANAGERS.--The native reaction most utilized by the first managers of armies and ancient works of construction was that of fear. This is shown by the ancient rock carvings, which portray what happened to those who disobeyed.[50]

FEAR STILL USED BY TRADITIONAL MANAGEMENT.--Fear of personal bodily injury is not usual under modern Traditional Management, but fear of less progress, less promotion, less remuneration, or of discharge, or of other penalties for inferior effort or efficiency is still prevalent.