Efficiency Methods
An Introduction to Scientific Management

l6 EFFICIENCY METHODS skill had passed over to the machines, and the workmen just tended them. The system of ap- prenticeship was extinct; boys picked up anything of instruction that they could in the first years in the shops ; “ hands ” were hired, and the foremen were to see to it by any rough means that the hands acquired some knowledge of what they were about. In certain trades the men have kept up a traditional form of skill and an all-round acquaintance with the use of tools which is still extremely valuable. But the introduction of a new machine has been apt to interfere greatly with their methods; and the directors of a business have often been eager to adopt new machines which promised a cheaper rate of production without making any systematic attempt to provide operators with the necessary training to work these machines. “ Hiring or firing ” is the Yankee brief description of this relationship with workpeople. The modern man- agement finds that the study of their workmen and the ascertaining how to use their capacities properly is as profitable as the study of the machinery or of the markets. The authors have been struck by the resemblance of the “ hiring or firing ” method in factories to that prevalent in domestic service. As conditions in the latter are familiar to every reader, it may be worth while to compare the two methods briefly. Ob- viously the great differences between the cases are due to the unorganized condition of domestic labour. The tradition has been that a servant is trained by