What is scientific management?
Development of the “one best way” to engage in work process using the scientific principles established by Frederick Winslow Taylor.
Name the four principles of scientific management.
- Scientific job design
- Scientific selection and training of individual workers
- Cooperation between management and workers
- Equal division of work between mangagement and workers.
Scientific job design
Each element of the work task is designed according to scientific principles.
Scientific selection and training of individuals
Each worker is matched to the job for which he or she is best suited and then trained in the necessary skills.
Cooperation between management and workers
In order to ensure that all the work being done corresponds to scientific principles, mangers supply a supportive environment that provides workers with a sense of achievement.
Equal division of work between management and workers
Under the old system, workers were responsible for both the planning and labor of work. Under the new system, managers develop the laws and formulas necessary to design and plan tasks scientifically.
What are the criticisms of scientific management?
- An attempt to apply the methods of science to the increasingly complex problems of the control of labor in a rapidly growing capitalist enterprise
- Viewed the individual worker as his basic unit of analysis and neglected the social dimensions of work
- Limited view of workers, seeing them as motivated only by economic incentives
- Elevating scientific management to a moral system that could cure society’s ills
5.
Describe the legacy of scientific management.
- McDonald’s:
- efficiency, calculability, predictability, and control
- Customer-service Industry
- Cash register weekly efficiency score
What are Max Weber’s three types of authority?
- Charismatic
- Traditional
- Rational-Legal
Charismatic Authority
The ability of a particular individual to excercise authority over others by virtue of their special abilities. Charismatic figures often emerge at times of instability and social unrest.
Traditional Authority
The inherited right of individuals to expect loyalty and obedience from other; authority is based in custom and tradtion.
Rational-legal Authority
Exercise of authority through the impersonal system of rules and responsibilities that come with the holding of a bureaucratic office.
Explain Bureaucratic Theory.
- A hierarchically organized chain of comand with appropriately assigned responsibilities
- A clearly defined system of impersonal rules that govern the rights and responsibilities of office holders
- The development of written regulations that describe the rights and duties of organization members
- A clearly defined division of labor with specialization of tasks
- Norms of impersonality that govern relations between people in the bureaucracy. Employees behave and make decisions according to the rules of their positions rather than personal ties to others
- Written documentation and use of a file system that stores information on which decision making is based
