pletely controls the acts of the management as well as those of the workmen."

There seem to be at least two very diverse conceptions of time and motion study. In its narrower conception and as understood by labor generally, time and motion study is looked upon simply and solely as an instrument for task-setting and efficiency-rating, used thus, in the main, to determine how much can be done by a workman engaged in a given operation within a given time, and, therefore, to set the maximum task accomplishable by him and the group of laborers to which he belongs.

This view of time and motion study, however, accords ill with the later and enlarged conception held, apparently, by Mr. Taylor and by many, if not all, of the present members of the scientific manage- . ment group. Judged by this standard, it is erroneous in two very essential respects.

In the first place, time and motion study, according to this later conception, when used for task-setting purposes, is not designed to discover and set the minimum time or the maximum task, but the scientific time or task, i.e., the reasonable or just task, considering the technical conditions, the character and training of the workmen, the element of fatigue, etc.

In the second place, time and motion study, in its larger conception, is not merely or perhaps mainly a method used for task-setting and efficiency-rating. On the contrary, in the light of the recent claims based upon its use, made by Mr. Taylor, and of the problems to the solution of which it is apparently being applied by progressive scientific managers, time and motion must be conceived as little less than a universal method of attempted accurate industrial analysis, usable, with or without the stop watch, to discover, at almost every step of the productive and distributive process, not only the most effective material, organic, and human arrangements, adaptations, and combinations, but the reasonable demands which can be made upon the intelligence and energy of the management as well as the men, and the just apportionment of the product to all the factors and individuals concerned.

According to statements made by scientific managers, this process of analysis or time and motion study, in the larger sense, should, where possible, begin with the determination of a site for manufacture. The really scientific manager, starting out de novo, will consider all available sites with reference to the time and motion expenditure, determined by actual experiment, necessary in securing an adequate supply

of proper materials, in the going to and from the shop of the numbers of the different classes of workmen needed or likely to be needed, in the shipment and marketing of the product, etc. Having in mind the character of the productive process and the most efficient productive arrangements possible, he will then, with regard to the greatest possible saving of waste time and motion, work out, with the utmost care, and with reference to future expansion, the plans for the construction of his plant. This will involve a most careful study of all the general internal arrangements and processes, the most efficient methods of planning the work to be done and of routing it through the shop so that there may be no delay in transmitting orders, no waste carriage of materials and partly finished products, no lost time in the assembly .room waiting for delayed parts. With the same ends in view, and in the same manner, he will also determine the most effective placement of machinery, the storage of tools and materials, and the location of the various elements of the office force.

The shop constructed and the machinery installed, he will apply time and motion study in an endless series of experimental tests to determine what possible improvements can be made in machinery and its operation, and in the tools, fixtures, materials, and specific processes of work. The best feed and speed for each machine, with reference to the different grades of materials, will then be established. The different jobs or processes will be analyzed and re-analyzed, and their elements experimentally combined and recombined, the tools and fixtures changed and rearranged, and all these variations timed and retimed in an effort to discover the most efficient productive combinations and methods.

This time and motion study analysis will extend, it is thus claimed, to every feature and all organic relationships of the mechanical process of production. But it will not stop there. It will be extended to cover the managerial functions and the office work. The duties of the managers, superintendents, and especially of the shop foremen, will be analytically studied and reorganized. As a result, the work of the old managerial functionaries will be split up, and new departments with new department heads established. In place of the single oldline foreman, for example, charged with hiring, discipline, discharge, apportionment of work, the setting-up of jobs, the determination of speed and feed of machinery, repair of machinery and belting, inspection of the product, etc., there will be a separate head charged with the selection, hiring, adaptation, and discharge of workmen, and a

series of functional foremen, each responsible for a particular duty, e.g., a gang boss, a speed boss, a repair boss, an inspector of work, an instructor, a route clerk, a time and cost clerk, a disciplinarian. The methods of storage and delivery of tools and materials, the dispatching of orders from the office to the shop, the purchasing of materials, the marketing of products, and all the methods of accounting will likewise be subjected to time and motion study in this larger sense, with a view to discovering the most efficient means and methods. All this and much more is time and motion study in the larger conception of the term, which seems to be sanctioned by progressive scientific managers. And not until, through this broader time and motion study, a larger degree of improvement and standardization of the general productive process has been well advanced should the scientific manager, according to these experts, enter upon time and motion study in the narrower sense, i.e., putting the timestudy men, with stop watches, over the workmen engaged in a particular job for the express purpose of setting tasks and rates of wage payment.

Nor, under the direction of this really scientific manager, we are told, will this part of the time and motion study correspond to the conception of it held by labor. On the contrary, it will be done in the same spirit and with the same care that we have noted above. It will endeavor to discover by repeated analysis and experimental timing the best character, combination, and arrangement of tools, materials, machinery, and workmen, the most efficient and convenient lighting, heating, and seating arrangements for the workmen, the proper period for continuous operation by them, considering the element of fatigue, the rest periods needed, their most efficient character, combination, and sequence of motions, etc. Moreover, these particular job experiments will not be confined to one man, or to a few of those who are to accomplish the task. Many men will be timed with the idea of discovering, not the fastest speed of the fastest man, but the normal speed which the group can continuously maintain. If necessary, hundreds and perhaps thousands of time and motion studies will be made to determine this, before the task is set and the rate established. And whenever a new or better method or combination has been discovered by the time and motion analysis, which is supposed to continue even after the task is set, the whole process of careful and extended timing for task-setting will be repeated, and new tasks and rates established reasonably conformable to the new condition.

Finally, as an integral part of this broader time and motion study, all the results secured by it will be continuously and systematically filed as permanent assets and guides to future action.

Thus conceived, time and motion study appears to be considered a method of analysis applicable to practically every feature of the productive and distributive process, considered apart from its purely financial aspects, a process of analysis applied continuously throughout the life of the establishment. And the scientific management based upon it is conceived to be a perpetual attempt to discover and put into operation the new and continuously developing technical, organic, and human arrangements, methods, and relationships constantly revealed by it to be more efficient and more equitable.

In considering this question of time and motion study we must carefully distinguish between two factors or elements which enter into the industrial process, the mechanical or material, and the human.

With respect to the first of these elements, the claim of scientific management seems to be fairly justified. Through time and motion study in its broader conception, it appears to be possible to discover and to establish in practice the objective facts and laws which underlie the most efficient mechanical arrangements, processes, and methods of production in the shop.

The moment, however, that the conception is broadened and the human factor enters into the situation, and the problem becomes one of setting each man to the work for which he is best fitted, determining how much work any man ought to do, the claims of scientific management with respect to time and motion study, and, therefore, with respect to the character and effects of scientific management, do not seem capable of practical realization.

See also 66. Calculation and Capitalism.

328. Is the Entrepreneur Active or Passive? 332-35 on Science in Management.

317. IMPERSONALITY, BUSINESS PRINCIPLES, AND

MIDDLE-CLASS VIRTUES1

Business principles likewise have undergone a change. That was only to be expected when the goal of enterprise has become different. Today, it may be said, five main rules regulate economic activities.

Adapted by permission from Werner Sombart, The Quintessence of Capitalism, pp. 182-89. (E. P. Dutton & Co., 1915.)

a) Absolute rationalism is the first. Economic activities are ruled by cold reason, by thought. That has always been the case; it shows itself in the making of plans, in considering whether any policy was likely to be successful or no, and in calculation generally. The last trace of traditionalism has vanished. The man of today (and the American undertaker may stand as the most perfect type) is filled with the will to apply cold reason to economic activities; moreover, he possesses the determination to make the will effective. Accordingly, he is ever ready to adopt a newer method if it is more rational, whether in the sphere of organization, of production, or of calculation.

b) Production for exchange (as opposed to production for use) is the motto of economic activities. As much profit as possible is their ideal; consequently what matters is not the goodness or the kind of commodities produced, but their salability. How they are sold is secondary, so long as they are sold. Consequently the undertaker is wholly indifferent to the quality of his wares; he will make shoddy goods or cheap substitutes, if only it pays. If cheap and nasty boots yield more profit than good ones, it would be a deadly sin against the holy spirit of capitalism to manufacture good ones. It is no argument against the truth of this to point to a movement in certain industries (the chemical industry is one), the object of which is to improve quality. They are cases where there is more profit from high-class goods than from inferior articles.

What follows from this is plain. Since it is inherent in acquisitiveness to enlarge incomings to the uttermost; and since, again, the greater the sale the larger the profits, it is only to be expected that the undertaker will try all he can to increase his sales. Apart from the greater gain, more extended sales will give him certain advantages over competitors. Hence it is by no means remarkable that the desire for greater sales, for new markets, for more customers, is one of the mightiest motive powers in modern capitalism. It is directly responsible for a number of business principles, all of which have one end in view-to make the public buy. The more important of these principles deserve to be mentioned.

c) The first (and the third in the general scheme) may be enunciated as follows: Search out the customer and attack him. That is today as self-evident a maxim in all branches of business as it was strange and wrong in the age of early capitalism. In practice it means that you set out to attract the customer's attention and to stir up within him the desire to purchase.