Taylor, Frederick

Frederick Winslow Taylor (1856–1915), “father” of scientific management, formalized the principles of scientific management and rational efficiency during an era of industrial growth at the height of the Progressive era. Though Taylor is best known for his experiments designed to make labor more productive and his work on tool steel, the impact of scientific management on organizations, including schools, was enduring. He viewed workers as rational people who were motivated by money, and from an organizational perspective, this meant the provision of incentive schemes, clear delineation of authority, task specialization, and division of labor.

Born to a well-to-do Quaker family in Germantown, Pennsylvania, Taylor traveled extensively in Europe and attended Phillips Exeter Academy as a young man. Due to headaches probably attributable to poor eyesight (he was diagnosed with astigmatism later in life), Taylor left Exeter to apprentice at a small machine shop, which served to solidify his interest in an engineering career.

After his apprenticeship, Taylor took a position at Midvale Steel in Philadelphia. While employed full-time, he also enrolled at the Stevens Institute of Technology, in New Jersey, but never attended classes. Despite this fact, he earned an engineering degree. He spent 12 years at Midvale Steel, advancing rapidly from a laborer to a foreman and ultimately to chief engineer. At Midvale, he developed and implemented the fundamental essentials of what later became known as scientific management, including the dissection of work tasks into discrete actions and the timing of each action based on repeated stopwatch studies. The time studies led to the implementation of a differential rate, which meant that workers earned an amount that depended on the output for the whole day. Consumed with finding the most efficient way to perform tasks, Taylor realized that productivity meant standardizing work, tools, and maintenance techniques.

Taylor left Midvale and moved to Maine to run a pulp mill, a largely unsuccessful and unprofitable move for him. His next move was to Pennsylvania in 1898 to take a position at Bethlehem Steel, where he was hired to introduce a piecework system in the machine shop. However, Taylor was initially more interested in improving machine tools and machine shop processes, an interest that led to the development of a new “highspeed” tool steel, a material that allowed machine tools to cut metal at 3 to 4 times the previous speeds, as well as a special slide rule for calculating machine speed and feed. Both were innovative engineering breakthroughs.

Bethlehem was also the site of one of Taylor's most famous industrial time-and-motion experiments. Common laborers were hired to load pig iron from the yard pile into railcars for shipment. With an immigrant worker he named Schmidt, Taylor conducted a series of tests on the effect of pace, rest periods, method of handling the load, and compensation. Taylor demonstrated that an efficient worker could earn higher wages with an increase in total output. In Schmidt's case, he earned $1.85 a day rather than $1.15, earning a 60% higher wage for loading 380% more pig iron.

Bethlehem would be Taylor's last permanent job. After leaving Bethlehem Steel, he worked primarily as a consultant and lecturer, preaching the gospel of scientific management. In 1910, his most well-known essay, “The Principles of Scientific Management,” was published. Labor leaders and other critics denounced “Taylorism” as oppressive and antidemocratic. A strike at a government arsenal over the introduction of scientific management prompted a congressional investigation of the Taylor system, though little was accomplished other than a general denouncement of Taylorism. Wounded by the conflict, Taylor withdrew from public life, letting his growing number of followers carry the battle for “the one best way,” a catchword of the movement he introduced. After his death in 1915, his followers continued his efforts.

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