23 



It is, I think, clear that the aim of each of these four propositions 

 would be acceptable to management under systems of State Socialism 

 or Guild Socialism, just as much as under Capitalism, provided that 

 the working out of them does not introduce conditions incompatible 

 with good citizenship on the part of the workers. I suggest, therefore, 

 that in considering these four propositions of Scientific Management 

 three tests should be applied, namely : 



1. Do they, in fact, succeed in making the efforts of the workman 

 more ' productive ' ? or, in other words, in rendering the com- 

 bination of the human and material factors in production 

 more efficient than hitherto ? 



2. Do they enable the workman to attain a higher standard of 

 living ? 



3. Do they make it more possible or less for the workers to under- 

 take some of the functions of management ? 



Dealing with the first of these tests, there is no question whatever 

 that the detail study of work always enables a greater output to be 

 obtained from the same effort; indeed, in discussing Scientific 

 Management a great deal is always made by Labour critics of the 

 extraordinary increases in production which are in fact obtained, 

 and these are apt to be condemned as being simply instances of 

 increased effort on the part of the workmen, due to driving and 

 resulting in strain and overwork. It should be realised that there 

 are two quite distinct sources of increased production under such 

 systems as Scientific Management, namely : first, increases due to 

 re-arrangements of tools, methods, processes, or movements ; and 

 secondly, the calling forth of increased effort from the workmen by 

 the offering of some special payment. The proportion of the increase 

 due to one cause as compared with the other differs in every case, 

 but in general on machine work, the increase due to changed methods 

 is several times greater than that due to increased exertion. The 

 first increase is due chiefly to the efforts of the management, the second 

 to those of the man. The special payment is made partly to compensate 

 the workman for increased exertion and partly for being required to 

 work to detailed instructions. How great this extra pay should be, 

 and how it should be calculated, are obviously among the most difficult 

 questions with which Management and Labour are concerned. It 

 should be noted, in passing, however, that there is no case at all for 

 ascribing all the increase to the efforts of the workman. Moreover, 

 the increase of product is not by any means all gain, as the work of 

 carrying out the study and of operating the system based on it is 

 expensive and has a first claim on the increased product. 



Dealing still with the effect of the system in increasing productivity, 

 it is clear that the selection of men and the functionalisation of control 

 also tend in this direction. When all the various jobs in a works have 

 been studied and the requirements for their performance are known, it is 

 obviously much easier to transfer men who are not making good, or who 

 are dissatisfied, at one job to another, for which their particular skill and 



