National Efficiency Essay Research Paper National efficiencyBy

.National Efficiency. Essay, Research Paper

.National efficiency.

By Miguel Angel Molina

Well, I.d like to begin my paper with some words of the ex-president Roosvelt whom by that time said, .The conservation of our national resources is only preliminary to the larger question of national efficiency.. The quote was taken from the book called .Scientific Management. by Taylor, from whom I.ll be taken most of the information, so he is consider the father of scientific management and his book, his bible. By efficiency we may understand, .The ratio of the effective or useful output to the total input in any system.. And that is exactly what everything is all about, efficiency and effectiveness without caring about the ambit, it is what we look at home, work and in a wider sense, government. Get as much as possible, putting as less effort as possible, but we have to remember everything has got a price.

But now, the question arises. Is scientific management effective and efficient providing a solution managing others efforts. Well, the answer has to be yes, definitely. Federick Winslow Taylor a managerial guru developed a technique that is more effective in productivity, as well as in worker relations that any other management.

First of all, we have to understand what Scientific Management implies. Management by itself has an objective, to provide the maximum, both for the employer and for the employee. Some of us may think that it is not possible the coexistence of the employers and employees interests. Well, for Scientific Management these two interests are only one. It is there where this technique has its foundations, and this prosperity can be reached when the work, as Taylor would put it, .is done with the smallest combined expenditure of human effort..

One should think that it should not be very difficult for workers, to understand that .maximum prosperity can only exist as a result of maximum productivity., but the truth is that workers do as little as possible. This phenomenon is called .soldiering., and it is widely employed. For instance, in Mexico it is very common to hire a person, only for verifying that the workers are doing what they are supposed to do, the so often called supervisors. This implies another salary to pay and what is worse, the impossibility of reaching a high prosperity that will enable both employers and employees find this extraordinary efficient state.

Why is it then that workers do work slowly when performing their duties. Taylor has given three reasons. First of all because they think they will lose their jobs, blaming an increase in the output. Ladies and gentlemen, this is such a great myth that forms part of an educational an informative problem. Historical data proves that nothing is further from truth, and that any improvement made to machines or methods make in the end more jobs. Taylor gives the shoe industry example, and it is basically the same in every other industry. With all the improvements of technology the product gets cheaper, causing an increase in the demand and more people wants to acquire the products. In order to keep with the demand, more workers will be needed. We could go deeply in this particular subject only to find that ignorance causes much more disadvantages than any other thing.

Secondly we have soldiering, natural and systematic. The natural soldiering refers to the basic and universal take it easy; that is almost an instinct for humans whenever is possible. We have also the systematic soldiering, which takes place when we gather a group of workers. These people suffer a contagious phenomenon when they think, as Taylor would point it, .Why should I work hard when that lazy fellow gets the same pay I do and does only half as much work.. Soldiering is a natural thing, and has its best part, when keeps the employers from knowing what are the capabilities of the workers, and how fast a work could be done.

The third reason, in which Taylor explains the why workers do work slow, in my opinion shall not be called like that. It is not properly a slow motion work, and because there are not waste movements, there.s a considerable increase in the output while a decrease in the activities that are not useful at all. In order to perform this kind of work, a gradual substitution from the rule of thumb to scientific management is required. And through this change, we.ll see how Taylor.s management is efficient when handling other people efforts.

The change from one managerial type to another involves certain changes. Some of these changes are so simple that certainly by the time we perform them we.ll be asking ourselves how didn.t we find this before. Some key points that have to suffer some changes go from given responsibilities, co-operation, and contact with the management.

It is possible to say that the roots of scientific managing are planning and transforming workers tasks into science. Managers shall give advice and behave as friendly and as helpful as possible, always planning and teaching. Furthermore through observation and picking up data placed a worker where he is best suited to be. Quoting Taylor once again, .This close intimate co-operation between the management and the men is the essence of modern scientific. management. These changes will produce an increase in the wages. This increase, when performed with intimate co-oper