Efficiency Methods
An Introduction to Scientific Management

TIME-STUDY AND MOTION-STUDY 83 this application of scientific method to human labour is the step for which the most careful pre- paration must be made, and that it will generally be advisable to make it one of the last items on any programme of reform establishing methods of efficiency. Nevertheless, no programme is complete without it; and to a large extent the standardization which we have previously been discussing is merely paving the way for the standardization of human effort as far as that may be. H. K. Hathaway says in an article on Time-Study1 that it would be almost as difficult for modern chemistry to exist without quantitative analysis as for scientific management to exist without time-study. Is there anything novel in saying to a workman, “ You have taken two hours to do that job ; I believe that you could do it quite easily in less than half the time ” ? The innovations are, first, that the person making the statement is in a position to demonstrate its truth ; second, that he will demon- strate it under the ordinary conditions with which the workman is to be surrounded ; and third, that he will prove it can be done without undue fatigue. To ensure the validity of his statement, then, a large amount of observation and experiment is necessary, followed by certain changes and modifications in the conditions, designed to eliminate waste of time and waste of energy. The men who are to make these observations, experiments, and final modifications must be chosen 1 Industrial Engineering, vol. xi., p. 85.