Page 257 - Introduction to Business

CHAPTER 7 Motivating and Leading Employees 231

between countries, diversity within a country, and the stage of economic develop-
ment or business cycle are all crucial factors that determine how employees can or
should be motivated.
reality What motivated you to go to college?
CH ECK

Traditional Motivational Theories

Managers have always wrestled with keeping employees motivated. While some
employees may be encouraged by certain incentives, others may be indifferent to
them. Psychologists and industrial engineers have been studying these issues for
almost a hundred years to determine how best to motivate employees and improve
the work environment. The evolution of motivation theories over time is summa-
rized in Exhibit 7.2 (on pp. 232–234).

LEARNING OBJECTIVE 2
Discuss Frederick Taylor’s scientific management theory, and explain how his pio-
neering work has practical value even today.

Classical Theory: Taylor’s Scientific
Management Theory
The classical era of management lasted from 1900 to 1930, and the most-respected
scholar at that time was Frederick W. Taylor, an American mechanical engineer.
Frederick Taylor is often regarded as the father of scientific management, because scientific management Figuring out and
of his role in dissecting factory work into its logical components and figuring out using the best way of getting a job done
by dissecting the work into its logical
the most efficient way of getting the job done. Taylor believed in two basic princi-
components
ples. First, he believed that workers were interested only in money, so the more
money they earned the more satisfied they would be with their jobs. Second, he
believed that there was one best way to get any job done and, once that way was
identified, output could be measured scientifically along with productivity and
corporate goals.
Taylor’s interest in a scientific approach to management began in the early
1900s when he took one of his first jobs with Midvale Steel and Bethlehem Steel
companies in Philadelphia where he noticed that employees wasted tremendous
amounts of resources and time on the shop floor. He found that employees worked
slowly in order to keep a steady flow of work and that management had no way to
determine what optimum factory output ought to be. Convinced that there was a
better way of doing business, Taylor came up with an idea whereby both workers as
well as the firm would gain through changes in workplace tasks. Taylor believed
that since factory workers were most concerned about money, if workers were pro-
vided with money incentives, they would be motivated to work harder, produce
more steel, and earn more money. However, in order to achieve this objective,
Taylor believed that the company would first have to earn more profits; this could
be done through a scientific reform of the workplace task.
First, the company would have to break each job into several independent tasks.
Second, it would have to identify, select, and train the best workers to perform each
task efficiently with the help of appropriate machine tools. Third, it would have to
promote cooperation between managers and workers to guarantee that the jobs
were accomplished as planned. This approach led to the development of the

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