Industrial Engineering

Class notes, readings and more

Methods Engineering and Work Simplification in Industrial Engineering

Methods Engineering and Work Simplification in Industrial Engineering

These reactions led to an increased interest in the work of the Gilbreths. Their efforts in methods analysis, which had previously been considered rather theoretical and impractical, became the foundation for the resurgence of industrial engineering in the 1920s and 1930s. In 1927, H. B. Maynard, G. J. Stegmerten, and S. M. Lowry wrote Time and Motion Study, emphasizing the importance of motion study and good methods. This eventually led to the term methods engineering as the descriptor of a technique emphasizing the “elimination of every unnecessary operation” prior to the determination of a time standard. In 1932, A. H. Mogenson published Common Sense Applied to Time and Motion Study, in which he stressed the concepts of motion study through an approach he chose to call work simplification. His thesis was simply that the people who know any job best are the workers doing that job. Therefore, if the workers are trained in the steps necessary to analyze and challenge the work they are doing, then they are also the ones most likely to implement improvements. His approach was to train key people in manufacturing plants at his Lake Placid Work Simplification Conferences so that they could in turn conduct similar training in their own plants for managers and workers. This concept of taking motion study training directly to the workers through the work simplification programs was a tremendous boon to the war production effort during World War II.

The first Ph.D. granted in the United States in the field of industrial engineering was also the result of research done in the area of motion study. It was awarded to Ralph M. Barnes by Cornell University in 1933 and was supervised by Dexter Kimball. Barnes’s thesis was rewritten and published as Motion and Time Study: the first full-length book devoted to this subject. The book also attempted to bridge the growing chasm between advocates of time study versus motion study by emphasizing the inseparability of these concepts as a basic principle of industrial engineering.

Another result of the reaction was a closer look at the behavioral aspects associated with the workplace and the human element. Even though the approach taken by Taylor and his followers failed to appreciate the psychological issues associated with worker motivation, their work served to catalyze the behavioral approach to management by systematically raising questions on authority, motivation, and training. The earliest writers in the field of industrial psychology acknowledged their debt to scientific management and framed their discussions in terms consistent with this system.

Industrial Engineering and the post–world war I era

Industrial Engineering and the post–world war I era

By the end of World War I, scientific management had firmly taken hold. Large-scale, vertically integrated organizations making use of mass production techniques were the norm. Application of these principles resulted in spectacular increases in production. Unfortunately, however, because increases in production were easy to achieve, management interest was focused primarily on the implementation of standards and incentive plans, and little attention was paid to the importance of good methods in production. The reaction of workers and the public to unscrupulous management practices such as “rate cutting” and other speedup tactics, combined with concerns about dehumanizing aspects of the application of scientific management, eventually led to legislation limiting the use of time standards in government operations.

Adds

INDUSTRIAL ENGINEERING STUDY MATERIAL, LECTURES NOTES ON INDUSTRIAL ENGINEERING, INDUSTRIAL ENGINEERING LECTURES NOTES, INDUSTRIAL ENGINEERING CLASS NOTES, HOMEWORK, DOWNLOADS AND ALL ABOUT INDUSTRIAL ENGINEERING

Powered By Blogger

Popular articles

Topics

Accidents (8) Activities of industrial engineering (6) Batch of one (1) Continuos improvement (1) Costs of accidents (6) DEFINITIONS (17) Domain of industrial engineering (1) EDUCATION AND TRAINING (1) EVOLUTION OF INDUSTRIAL ENGINEERING (16) GETTING A JOB (2) Health and Safety at Work (10) Health and safety management (5) HISTORY OF INDUSTRIAL ENGINEERING (24) HS (1) HSE (6) HUMAN FACTORS AND INDUSTRIAL ENGINEERING (6) Industrial accidents (3) INDUSTRIAL AND SYSTEMS ENGINEERING (5) Industrial engineer job (9) INDUSTRIAL ENGINEERING (20) Industrial engineering functions (4) INDUSTRIAL ENGINEERS (2) Industrial revolution (1) Industrial Safety (9) Inputs (1) Investigation of incidents and accidents (4) Just in time (2) Kan-ban (2) Machine accidents (2) Manufacturing methodologies (2) Measure of productivity (3) Methods design (5) METHODS ENGINEERING (11) Motion and time study (4) Non machine accidents (3) Occupational health and safety (4) OPERATIONS RESEARCH (1) Outputs (1) Performance measurement (2) POSTGRADUATE CURRICULUM (1) Process analysis (5) Production engineering (2) Production systems (4) Productivity (6) Pull system (2) Push system (2) Quality control (1) Reporting (4) Solving problems (2) Statistical process control (1) TOPICS RELATED TO INDUSTRIAL ENGINEERING (11) Types of productivity (3) UNDERGRADUATE CURRICULUM (1) WHAT INDUSTRIAL ENGINEERS DO (7) WHERE INDUSTRIAL ENGINEERS WORK (6) Work simplification (9) Work study (2) Workplace design (2) Workplace desing (2)

Visiting from

Labels

Last Articles

Interesting blogs

Total Pageviews

Followers

free counters