Managing Work - Research Paper Example

The first literature got published by a renowned professor named Taylor. The book was published in the year 1909 and was titled "The Principles of Scientific Management.” Through his book, Taylor suggested that optimization or rather a simplification jobs result in increased productivity in any production setting. He championed the idea of a warm and close co-existence between the managerial personnel and their workers in any company. The methods were on contrary to the previous techniques used in management. During the early times, Managers would alleviate themselves from their workers and, therefore, most of the employee’s performance carried out their responsibilities independently. The work setting, therefore, lacked an ultimate supervisory structure that would result in effective and optimized productivity. There existed no policies that would cover for motivational provision for the workers. Thus, the workers were solely motivated by their continued employment and the evident job security (Taylor 1997).

1. W. Taylor was among the pioneers of scientific management. He defined it as the systematic study of people and tasks so in order to redesign jobs. Among Taylor’s core principles was the belief that by optimizing processes and procedures involved in accomplishing a task, the time spent by each worker on that particular task is significantly reduced and thus cost reduction. He held the belief that all workers received ultimate motivation through monetary incentives and bonuses. He, therefore, pioneered and championed the philosophy of better pay better productivity.

Taylor's engineering background enabled him to carry out all his studies putting more attention on efficiency. During his tenure at a United States-based steel manufacturer, he managed to come up with an attractive design. Taylor developed an experiment with the capabilities of determining optimum performance levels within the production level (Taylor 1997).

He did his experiment then by use of a shovel design. He performed the operation repeatedly until when he was able to come up with an optimum design that would ensure the optimum performance of the workers.

He also tested his design in bricklaying. As, a result, he came up with an efficient way of laying the bricks that would ensure optimum performance. His models were, however, universal. As such, the interpolation of these models would fit any workplace setting and ensure optimum performance and productivity. He could develop the best and the most efficient way of accomplishing almost every task.

Taylor’s extensive studies in time and motion helped them to come up with the conclusion that there were considerable differences between the performances of every individual. The best performers were the people targeted by most managers if they needed to ensure optimum performance.  Taylor recognized the criticality and volatility of the relationship between employees and the employer. He studied these relationships and found that it was important to have a list of the best performing individuals while selecting workers for a particular task. Taylor developed four principles based on his research and famously known as "Taylorism".

Fayol’s theories faced a lot of criticism from other economists for all the period it lasted. Few scholars bought Fayol`s ideas. The methods have provided a means through which managers can efficiently and effectively deliberate on their duties. Few scholars have paid attention to Fayol`s literature and theories. However, extensive studies on these theories have been advanced by various economists. Taylor tried to merge scientific methods with management and thus come up with scientific proven managerial techniques (Fayol 1987).