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Though not nearly as well known as Ford or Edison,
Frederick Winslow Taylor's influence on the modern age is no less significant; management guru
Peter Drucker calls Taylor "the most powerful as well as the most lasting contribution America has made to Western thought since the Federalist Papers." Although Taylor's name may have been forgotten by the masses, the management practices he implemented have become the worldwide standard for efficiency. Taylor invented what became known as "Scientific Management," or simply "Taylorism," an approach to organizing factories and offices that placed workers within a rigid system designed for maximum productivity. Taylor broke down the machinery and management of industrialization, measuring each movement with stopwatch precision to deduce how the whole could operate more efficiently. A man perfectly suited to his times, he lived during the peak of the Industrial Revolution, providing him a grand stage for displaying his ideas. Today his legacy may be viewed by some as a sort of curse; the modern workplace he helped to create pits employees in a race against the clock, virtual slaves to a system created nearly a century ago.
The One Best Way is a fascinating history of the man who revolutionized the way we do business and, in turn, the way we live.
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From Library Journal
In 1995, the Safelite Glass Corporation moved from hourly to piece-rate pay for its workers and realized a productivity increase of 20 percent per worker. After over 100 years, the work of Frederick Winslow Taylor, a management expert who emphasized such an approach to paying workers, still permeates the American work force. Kanigel (Apprentice to Genius, Johns Hopkins Univ., 1993) brings his winning writing style to this treatment of the enigmatic Taylor?often called the "father of scientific management"?whom Peter Drucker has said warrants a place alongside Darwin and Freud in the making of the modern world. Kanigel deftly shies away from a psychologically interpretive approach, drawing the reader right into the heart of life in late-19th-century America, the age of steam and steel (Taylor died in 1915). This rewarding and beautifully written work is a shoo-in as a best business book and will likely stand as the definitive work on Taylor. Essential.?Dale F. Farris, Groves, Tex.
Copyright 1997 Reed Business Information, Inc.
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