Management and the Worker

William J. Dickson, F. J. Roethlisberger

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2004
• ISBN:
  9781134465958
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Commerce
• Subtopic: Management

This is the official account of the experiments carried out at the Hawthorne Works of the Eastern Electric Company in Chicago. These were divided into test room studies, interviewing studies and observational studies. The test room studies were experiments into what variables in a workplace environment might affect worker fatigue. The findings of these tests led to extensive interviewing on the attitudes of the workers. The final phase of the Hawthorne experiment focused on social factors, using techniques of cultural anthropology to observe small working groups. The results of these experiments profoundly influenced the Human Relations movement.

PART I

WORKING CONDITIONS AND EMPLOYEE EFFICIENCY

CHAPTER I

INTRODUCTION

THE SCOPE AND DURATION OF THE INQUIRY

THE experimental studies of human relations to be reported in this book were conducted at the Hawthorne Works of the Western Electric Company in Chicago. They were begun in the spring of 1927, when five employees were segregated from a regular operating department for special study. At the beginning of the inquiry the general interest was primarily in the relation between conditions of work and the incidence of fatigue and monotony among employees. It was anticipated that exact knowledge could be obtained about this relation by establishing an experimental situation in which the effect of variables like temperature, humidity, and hours of sleep could be measured separately from the effect of an experimentally imposed condition of work.

Little was it doubted that within a year, or perhaps less, definite answers to these questions could be obtained. But the inquiry developed in an unexpected fashion. In most cases the results obtained, instead of giving definite answers to the original questions, demanded a restatement of them. More adequate working hypotheses had to be formulated. Old methods had to be modified, and quite frequently new methods had to be introduced. As a result, the inquiry continued for five years, from 1927 to 1932, when for reasons unconnected with the experiment it was suspended. From the original observation of five workers, the investigation during one phase of its development had expanded until it included studies of about 20,000 individual employees.

PROBLEMS OF PRESENTATION AND SELECTION

In reporting an inquiry of such magnitude the authors were faced with many problems. There were problems of presentation: How was the material to be presented so as to give a clear account which would involve the least possible distortion of the way in which things actually took place? How could the studies be presented without placing those people or groups of people with whom they dealt in an unfavorable or ambiguous position? There were problems of selection and emphasis: What weight was to be given to the theories which the investigators separately or collectively held? Where and when were the practical implications of the findings for industry to be discussed? To help them in solving these problems, the authors adopted certain guiding principles.

(1) In an experiment which ran over such a long period of time, and in which there was a considerable time interval between the conclusion of the experiment and the publication of the results, two alternative methods of presentation were possible. Either the authors could take the standpoint of the investigators at each stage of the inquiry, describing in chronological order the things they did, the discriminations they made, the leads they followed, and the conclusions they drew; or the authors could take the standpoint of the investigators at the end of the inquiry, presenting in a more systematic and logical order the results obtained and interpreting them in terms of the final conceptual scheme. Either approach had its advantages and disadvantages.

The authors finally decided to follow the chronological form of presentation for the following reasons. Although a narrative account of what was done step by step would bear the stamp of human imperfection, nevertheless it would describe what actually took place. It would picture the trials and tribulations of a research investigator at his work, and thus allow future investigators to see and to profit from the mistakes which were made. In turn, the authors would be spared the task of having to strengthen weak places and make their façades more imposing.

The authors realized that among the readers of the book there might be a substantial number of the Western Electric supervisory force and many of the workers themselves. They recognized their obligation to these people and to the company, which at all stages of the inquiry had done everything possible to protect these individuals or groups of individuals whose situations were being studied. It was important that no one employee or group of employees should feel that the company, of which they were justly proud, had not protected their interests in allowing certain material to be published. The authors felt that they could best fulfill their obligation to all parties concerned by maintaining a spirit of scientific objectivity, by being faithful to the data before them, and by presenting them, in so far as they were humanly capable of doing so, free from bias. In no other way could the authors represent better to the employees who might read the book the purpose of the inquiry and the attitude of management toward it, which can be described as a sincere desire on management’s part to understand better the facts of human behavior, their own as well as that of their employees.

(2) In presenting the material, it was decided to keep separate the facts observed, as well as the uniformities among them, from the methods, working hypotheses, theories, or conceptual schemes employed by the investigators. The original facts of observation, as well as the final facts of verification, were to be granted primary importance. Theories were conceived of as only part of the working equipment of the investigators and never as ends in themselves. Therefore, it was decided to include for discussion only those theories or ways of looking at facts which assisted the research investigators to find more facts or to make more adequate discriminations in fact.

(3) During the inquiry many studies developed as offshoots from the main line of the experiment and ran their own course as more or less separate and independent phases. Although such studies have not been entirely omitted from this book, as in many cases they were of great interest, preference has been given to those studies which contributed more directly to the development of the inquiry and to the understanding of the investigators.

(4) The narrative form of presentation made it difficult at times to elaborate certain findings of the research with reference to industrial problems without, at the same time, losing the trend of the inquiry. Therefore, it was decided to leave such a discussion until the last part (Part V) of the book, where it would also be possible to discuss some of the practical problems of industry in terms of the final conceptual scheme which the investigators achieved.

(5) Chronologically, the inquiry divided itself naturally into four stages, each stage representing a major change in working hypothesis and method. The first four parts into which the book is divided correspond to these four stages of the inquiry. Part I is concerned with an experiment on working conditions and employee efficiency. During this phase of the inquiry the “test room method” was developed. Part II is concerned with an experiment in interviewing some 20,000 employees from all parts of the Hawthorne plant with a view to determining those aspects of their working environment which they either favored or disliked. In Part III the comments obtained in the interviews are analyzed and a general theory is presented to explain the nature of employee satisfaction and dissatisfaction. In Part IV a study of fourteen male operators is reported; in this study the interviewing method elaborated in the second phase was supplemented and reinforced by direct and simultaneous observation.

THE WESTERN ELECTRIC COMPANY ORGANIZATION

It may be helpful to describe briefly the setting of the Hawthorne plant, in which the tests were conducted. This description applies only to the company at the beginning of the inquiry. Many changes have occurred since then which, although not altering the general picture conveyed in this material, nevertheless would make the following description inaccurate at the present time in specific details.¹

The Hawthorne Works of the Western Electric Company is situated partly in the city of Chicago at its western border and partly in the town of Cicero, Illinois. This plant is the largest unit of the Western Electric Company, which, in turn, is the supply organization for the telephone companies of the Bell System. Hawthorne covers many acres of floor space and gives employment to thousands of men and women engaged in the manufacture of telephones, central office equipment, loading coils, telephone wire, lead-covered cable, toll cable, and other forms of telephone apparatus. A wide range of type and grade of occupation is to be found, from iron worker to diamond cutter, from toolmaker to accountant, from apparatus assembler to engineer, from wire-drawer to textile dyer, from office boy to superintendent. By imagining the kind and amount of equipment necessary to serve millions of telephone subscribers, some impression of the exacting quality and tremendous quantity of small piece parts which are manufactured and assembled can be obtained.

In 1927, when the studies commenced, the company employed approximately 29,000 workers, representing some 60 nationalities. About 75 per cent of the employees were American born. The Poles and Czechoslovakians were by far the largest foreign groups; there was a fair sprinkling of Germans and Italians.

Eight Functional Organizations

The primary manufacturing activities of the plant were divided among eight functional organizations which the company called branches. These branches were Accounting, Operating, Production, Inspection, Technical, Specialty Products, Public Relations, and Industrial Relations. Except in the case of the Industrial Relations Branch, it will not be necessary to give detailed accounts of the functions of these respective branches. In passing, it can be said that the Technical Branch set piece rates, maintained the plant, and serviced machinery. The Production Branch provided material, seheduled work, followed production, maintained stocks, and handled and stored materials. The Operating Branch made the products. The Specialty Products Branch planned the manufacture of and made special products and articles of small demand. The Inspection Branch controlled the quality of output. The Accounting Branch paid employees, figured costs, prepared local budgets, and issued financial reports. The Public Relations Branch maintained local publicity and civic contacts and promoted safety and health.

In as much as the company’s terminology differed slightly from that in use in other industries, it is well to distinguish the functions of the Operating Branch from those of the Production Branch. It was the Operating and not the Production Branch which made the products. The Operating Branch was that part of the company which carried out the actual shop operations necessary to convert raw material into finished telephone equipment. The Production Branch, on the other hand, controlled all direct manufacturing work performed by the company: It gave the shop information concerning what, how much, and when to manufacture and assumed responsibility for meeting delivery dates. It was the duty of this branch to issue and trace all orders through the shop and to maintain stocks of raw material, piece parts, and apparatus sufficient to meet the manufacturing requirements. In terms of the number of people employed, the Operating Branch was by far the largest of the eight branches.

The Industrial Relations Branch

The Industrial Relations Branch was on a co-ordinate basis with the other branches and had as its function all those activities which have to do with employee relations. A prominent part of the Industrial Relations activities were discharged by a personnel organization working within each one of the eight branches. The major responsibility of these organizations was to supervise the carrying out of the company’s employee relations policies¹ within the respective branches. To see that the employees were properly placed in work best suited to them, to arrange the ...