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Taylorism and Fordism

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Taylorism and Fordism
Name: Nga Vo
Student ID number: 200710647
Course: BA International Business

“Critically evaluate (using no more than 750 words) the claim that Taylorist and Fordist Management control methods increased organizational productivity at the expense of employee job-satisfaction”

Taylorist and Fordist management control methods have had the most influence impact on organisational production till present day. Taylorism, also know as scientific management was developed by Frederick Winslow Taylor (1856 – 1915) based on making labour more efficient. Taylor believed that “the best management was true science ‘resting upon clearly defined laws, rules and principles’” (Wilson, 2004). In order to gain control over the workforce, all three key principles needs to be achieved. Taylor’s principles are, produce rules, laws and formulae, take brain work away form the factory floor, and plan out, give written instructions to every worker on exactly what to do (Braveman, 1974). Fordism was named after Henry Ford, an American car manufacturer who pioneered mass production based on direct controls over the workers. According to Braverman, there are three principles to Taylorism, “the dissociation of the labour process form the skills of the workers, the separation of conception (the thinking about how work is done) form the execution (doing) of the work, and the managerial use of the monopoly of this knowledge to control each step of the labour process and its mode of execution”. (Braverman, 1974). In this essay, the claim of that Taylorist and Fordist management control methods increased organization productivity at the expense of employee job-satisfaction will be evaluated by using various case studies.

Scientific management can be seen in McDonaldization, which is “the process by which the principles of the fast-food restaurant are coming to dominate more and more sectors of American society as well as the rest of the world” (Ritzer, 2008, page 1). Is it based on four

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