1.1.3 The Modern Theories of O.B.
Scientific Management
The modern era of management advice began with Frederick Taylor and what is called Scientific Management. Taylor's approach developed out of his beliefs about the average factory worker. These workers tended to be uneducated, at the lower rungs of socio-economic status, and have a need for money for day-to-day subsistence. For these reasons, Taylor taught managers to carefully design each job so that they were foolproof. He also believed that money motivates individuals and that humans are rational--the fatal flaw in all of our dealings with others. Therefore, all incentives were geared toward individuals and what developed was the piecework system of compensation.
Bureaucratic Management
Max Weber introduced an approach called Bureaucratic Management. Typically, we use the term, bureaucracy, as derogatory, so it is hard to believe that it was actually advocated by a management expert. Weber believed that authority ought to equal responsibility, the goals of the organization are more important than individuals, pay should be fair and tied to effort, everyone should have just one boss, and communication should follow a chain of command. He also believed that workers are rational. As you all know, most government agencies, Fortune 500 companies, and the military are all designed based on this model. Although we hear lots of talk about "boundarylessness," boundaries do exist in every organization; we owe Max Weber for that.
Human Relations Theory
Human Relations Theory developed next, accidentally. After assisting a large company with surprising findings to its research on the impact of lighting on productivity, Mayo and others learned that humans use social interaction to decide how much effort to expend. As lighting levels were increased for an experimental group of workers, performance went up. However, this lighting manufacturer was surprised to learn that performance went up when the lighting level was lowered too. The Hawthorne Effect, as it was called by the scientists, taught us that groups set rules for behavior--"Don't do too much, Don't do too little, Never tell on a coworker, and We are all equal." Of course, these rules are based on potential negative outcomes experienced when one person violates one of the rules. The most important outcome of this approach and the research that followed was that managers realized that management was much more complex than training a dog to do tricks with a treat.
Human Resources Theory
After years of study, experimentation, and observation of the most effective organizations, many modern OB practitioners advocate an approach called Human Resources Theory. This approach suggests that workers want and need a sense of accomplishment, creativity, autonomy, and feedback; they want to be involved in goal setting and problem solving; communication should be horizontal and diagonal, as well as vertical, and workers must be trained to effectively perform.
Like all previous ideas about management, we have learned that sometimes these ideas work and sometimes they do not. Their effectiveness depends on two important variables--individual differences and group make-up. For this lesson, we will focus on individual differences.