Page 8 - DLIS104_MANAGEMENT OF LIBRARIES AND INFORMATION CENTRES

Unit 1: Concept of Management

1. Deceptive belief that a material increase in the output of each man or each machine in the Notes
trade would throw people out of work.
2. Defective management systems, which made it necessary for each workman to soldier, or
work slowly to protect his own best interests.
3. Inefficient rule of thumb methods, which were almost universal in all trades, which cost
much wasted effort.
The paper tried to show that enormous gains would result from substituting scientific methods for
rule-of-thumb. Taylor argued that the cheapening of any article in common use almost immediately
results in a largely increased demand for that article. This view contradicts the belief that a
material increase in the output of each man or each machine in the trade would result in the end in
throwing a large number of men out of work. As to the second cause for soldiering, Taylor pointed
to many quotes from ‘Shop Management’ and hoped that it would explain fully the cause for
soldiering. Some quotes illustrating his views are:
“This loafing or soldiering proceeds from two causes. First, from the natural instinct and
tendency of men to take it easy, this may be called natural soldiering. Second, from more
intricate second thought and reasoning caused by their relations with other men, who may
be called systematic soldiering”.
“This common tendency to ‘take it easy’ is greatly increased by bringing a number of men
together on similar work and at a uniform standard rate of pay by the day”.
“To illustrate: The writer has timed a naturally energetic workman who, while going and
coming from work, would walk at a speed of from three to four miles per hour, and not
infrequently trot home after a day’s work. On arriving at his work he would immediately
slow down to a speed of about one mile an hour. When, for example, wheeling a loaded
wheelbarrow, he would go at a good fast pace even up hill, to in order to be as short a time
as possible under load, and immediately on the return walk slow down to a mile an hour,
improving every opportunity for delay short of actually sitting down. In order to be sure not
to do more than his lazy neighbour, he would actually tire himself in his effort to go slow”.
“The feeling of antagonism under the ordinary piece-work system becomes in many cases
so marked on the part of the men that any proposition made by their employers, however
reasonable, is looked upon with suspicion, and soldiering becomes such a fixed habit that
men will frequently take pains to restrict the product of machines which they are running
when even a large increase in output would involve no more work on their part”.

Did u know? Taylor argued that the substitution of scientific method for rule of thumb
methods would be benefiting both employers and employees.

Self Assessment

Fill in the blanks:
1. .................... systems is responsible for the design and development of PC card catalog.
2. DIAKON system was established in the early .................... as a custom software design
company.
3. .................... is the father of scientific management.
4. Taylor was an .................... Engineer.

1.2 Scientific Application to Libraries

In computing, the Scientific Library is a software library written in the C programming language
for numerical calculations in applied mathematics and science. The GSL is part of the GNU Project
and is distributed under the GNU General Public License.

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