President Roosevelt in his address to the Governors at the White House,
prophetically remarked that "The conservation of our national resources
is only preliminary to the larger question of national efficiency."
The whole country at once recognized the importance of conserving our
material resources and a large movement has been started which will be
effective in accomplishing this object. As yet, however, we have but
vaguely appreciated the importance of "the larger question of increasing
our national efficiency."
We can see our forests vanishing, our water-powers going to waste, our
soil being carried by floods into the sea; and the end of our coal and
our iron is in sight. But our larger wastes of human effort, which go on
every day through such of our acts as are blundering, ill-directed, or
inefficient, and which Mr. Roosevelt refers to as a, lack of "national
efficiency," are less visible, less tangible, and are but vaguely
appreciated.
We can see and feel the waste of material things. Awkward, inefficient,
or ill-directed movements of men, however, leave nothing visible or
tangible behind them. Their appreciation calls for an act of memory, an
effort of the imagination. And for this reason, even though our daily
loss from this source is greater than from our waste of material things,
the one has stirred us deeply, while the other has moved us but little.
As yet there has been no public agitation for "greater national
efficiency," no meetings have been called to consider how this is to be
brought about. And still there are signs that the need for greater
efficiency is widely felt.
The search for better, for more competent men, from the presidents of
our great companies down to our household servants, was never more
vigorous than it is now. And more than ever before is the demand for
competent men in excess of the supply.
What we are all looking for, however, is the readymade, competent man;
the man whom some one else has trained. It is only when we fully realize
that our duty, as well as our opportunity, lies in systematically
cooperating to train and to make this competent man, instead of in
hunting for a man whom some one else has trained, that we shall be on
the road to national efficiency.
In the past the prevailing idea has been well expressed in the saying
that "Captains of industry are born, not made"; and the theory has been
that if one could get the right man, methods could be safely left to
him. In the future it will be appreciated that our leaders must be
trained right as well as born right, and that no great man can (with the
old system of personal management) hope to compete with a number of
ordinary men who have been properly organized so as efficiently to
cooperate.
In the past the man has been first; in the future the system must be
first. This in no sense, however, implies that great men are not needed.
On the contrary, the first object of any good system must be that of
developing first-class men; and under systematic management the best man
rises to the top more certainly and more rapidly than ever before.
This paper has been written:
First. To point out, through a series of simple illustrations, the great
loss which the whole country is suffering through inefficiency in almost
all of our daily acts.
Second. To try to convince the reader that the remedy for this
inefficiency lies in systematic management, rather than in searching for
some unusual or extraordinary man.
Third. To prove that the best management is a true science, resting upon
clearly defined laws, rules, and principles, as a foundation. And
further to show that the fundamental principles of scientific management
are applicable to all kinds of human activities, from our simplest
individual acts to the work of our great corporations, which call for
the most elaborate cooperation. And, briefly, through a series of
illustrations, to convince the reader that whenever these principles are
correctly applied, results must follow which are truly astounding.
This paper was originally prepared for presentation to the American
Society of Mechanical Engineers. The illustrations chosen are such as,
it is believed, will especially appeal to engineers and to managers of
industrial and manufacturing establishments, and also quite as much to
all of the men who are working in these establishments. It is hoped,
however, that it will be clear to other readers that the same principles
can be applied with equal force to all social activities: to the
management of our homes; the management of our farms; the management of
the business of our tradesmen, large and small; of our churches, our
philanthropic institutions our universities, and our governmental
departments.