Harrington Emerson: Operator

Harrington Emerson was American efficiency engineer and business theorist. Explore interesting quotes on operator.
Harrington Emerson: 18   quotes 1   like

“The schedule is a moral contract or agreement with the men as to a particular machine operation, rate of wages and time. Any change in men [etc. ] calls for a new schedule.”

Harrington Emerson

Harrington Emerson, as cited in: Horace Bookwalter Drury (1918) Scientific Management: A History and Criticism http://archive.org/stream/scientificmanag00druruoft#page/140/mode/2up. p. 142

Men , Change , Time

“The type for the great newspaper is set up by linotype operators. Apprenticeship is rigorously limited. Some operators can never get beyond the 2500-em class, others with no more personal effort can set 5000 ems. Do the employers test out applicants for apprenticeship so as to be sure to secure boys who will develop into the 5000-em class? They do not: they select applicants for any near reason except the fundamental important one of innate fitness.”

Harrington Emerson

Source: The twelve principles of efficiency (1912), p. 156; ; cited in Münsterberg (113; 53)

Boy , Effort , Personality

“The individual effort method of increasing the reward of the wage-earner includes all that is best in other methods, and attempts to exclude all that is objectionable. Its good points are summed up as follows:
# The standard time set is reasonable and one that can be reached without extraordinary effort, is in fact such time as a good foreman would demand.
# An extra reward of one-fifth of the regular wages for the operation is given to whoever makes standard time.
# Extra compensation above the hourly rate is paid even if standard time is not reached, although this extra compensation diminishes in percentage above standard time-and-a-half.
# If longer than time-and-a-half is taken, the regulai day rate is paid. Of this, the wage-earner is also sure.
# Standard time is carefully determined by observation and experiment, and is only changed when conditions change.
# The arrangement is one of mutual benefit to both parties — of increased earning to the worker, of increased saving to the employer.
# The employer loses more than the wage-earner if schedules do not encourage co-operation.
# The wage-earner, working on a schedule, becomes in a large degree his own foreman.
# The wage-earner determines his own earning power, and by co-operating to cut out wastes increases his own value.”

Harrington Emerson

Harrison Emerson, " Shop betterment and the individual effort method of profit-sharing http://archive.org/stream/americanengineer80newy#page/64/mode/1up" in: International Railway Journal Vol. 13. p. 61. 1905; Partly cited in Drury (1918, p. 141)

Effort , Change , Time