The first illustration is that of handling pig iron, and this work is chosen because it is typical of perhaps the crudest and most elementary form of labor which is performed by man.This work is done by men with no other implements than their hands.The pig-iron handler stoops down, picks up a pig weighing about 92 pounds, walks for a few feet or yards and then drops it on to the ground or upon a pile.This work is so crude and elementary in its nature that the writer firmly believes that it would be possible to train an intelligent gorilla so as to become a more efficient pig-iron handler than any man can be.Yet it will be shown that the science of handling pig iron is so great and amounts to so much that it is impossible for the man who is best suited to this type of work to understand the principles of this science, or even to work in accordance with these principles without the aid of a man better educated than he is.And the further illustrations to be given will make it clear that in almost all of the mechanic arts the science which underlies each workman's act is so great and amounts to so much that the workman who is best suited actually to do the work is incapable (either through lack of education or through insufficient mental capacity) of understanding this science.This is announced as a general principle, the truth of which will become apparent as one illustration after another is given.After showing these four elements in the handling of pig iron, several illustrations will be given of their application to different kinds of work in the field of the mechanic arts, at intervals in a rising scale, beginning with the simplest and ending with the more intricate forms of labor.
One of the first pieces of work undertaken by us, when the writer started to introduce scientific management into the Bethlehem Steel Company, was to handle pig iron on task work.The opening of the Spanish War found some 80,000 tons of pig iron placed in small piles in an open field adjoining the works.Prices for pig iron had been so low that it could not be sold at a profit, and it therefore had been stored.With the opening of the Spanish War the price of pig iron rose, and this large accumulation of iron was sold.This gave us a good opportunity to show the workmen, as well as the owners and managers of the works, on a fairly large scale the advantages of task work over the old-fashioned day work and piece work, in doing a very elementary class of work.
The Bethlehem Steel Company had five blast furnaces, the product of which had been handled by a pig-iron gang for many years.This gang, at this time, consisted of about 75 men.They were good, average pig-iron handlers, were under an excellent foreman who himself had been a pig-iron handler, and the work was done, on the whole, about as fast and as cheaply as it was anywhere else at that time.
A railroad switch was run out into the field, right along the edge of the piles of pig iron.An inclined plank was placed against the side of a car, and each man picked up from his pile a pig of iron weighing about 92 pounds, walked up the inclined plank and dropped it on the end of the car.
We found that this gang were loading on the average about 12 1/2 long tons per man per day.We were surprised to find, after studying the matter, that a first-class pig-iron handler ought to handle between 47(3*) and 48 long tons per day, instead of 12 1/2 tons.This task seemed to us so very large that we were obliged to go over our work several times before we were absolutely sure that we were right.Once we were sure, however, that 47 tons was a proper day's work for a first-class pig-iron handler, the task which faced us as managers under the modern scientific plan was clearly before us.It was our duty to see that the 80,000 tons of pig iron was loaded on to the cars at the rate of 47 tons per man per day, in place of 12 1/2 tons, at which rate the work was then being done.And it was further our duty to see that this work was done without bringing on a strike among the men, without any quarrel with the men, and to see that the men were happier and better contented when loading at the new rate of 47 tons than they were when loading at the old rate of 12 1/2 tons.
Our first step was the scientific selection of the workman.In dealing with workmen under this type of management, it is an inflexible rule to talk to and deal with only one man at a time, since each workman has his own special abilities and limitations, and since we are not dealing with men in masses, but are trying to develop each individual man to his highest state of efficiency and prosperity.Our first step was to find the proper workman to begin with.We therefore carefully watched and studied these 75 men for three or four days, at the end of which time we had picked out four men who appeared to be physically able to handle pig iron at the rate of 47 tons per day.A careful study was then made of each of these men.
We looked up their history as far back as practicable and thorough inquiries were made as to the character, habits, and the ambition of each of them.Finally we selected one from among the four as the most likely man to start with.He was a little Pennsylvania Dutchman who had been observed to trot back home for a mile or so after his work in the evening about as fresh as he was when he came trotting down to work in the morning.We found that upon wages of $1.15 a day he had succeeded in buying a small plot of ground, and that he was engaged in putting up the walls of a little house for himself in the morning before starting to work and at night after leaving.He also had the reputation of being exceedingly "close," that is, of placing a very high value on a dollar.As one man whom we talked to about him said, "A penny looks about the size of a cart-wheel to him." This man we will call Schmidt.The task before us, then, narrowed itself down to getting Schmidt to handle 47 tons of pig iron per day and making him glad to do it.This was done as follows.Schmidt was called out from among the gang of pig-iron handlers and talked to somewhat in this way:
