The Legacy of F W Taylor - nobody wants to be called a manager?

CMI Academic Advisory Council Member Professor Jean Hartley of the Warwick Business School http://www.managers.org.uk/policy/academic-advisory-council has sent me details of a conference she is involved in organising in Italy in October.   The conference uses the occasion of the 100th anniversary of the publication of Frederick Winslow Taylor’s book Scientific Management, which is often credited with being the real beginning of the discipline of management as a discipline and an academic field.  So if spending time in the Italian sunshine discussing the finer points of management theory with some top-notch academics appeals to you , a trip to Prato looks a good bet .  For more information:  http://www.buseco.monash.edu.au/faculty/global/taylorism2011

Professor Hartley would be the first to point out, the legacy of ‘Taylorism’ is mixed.  His ideas became associated with time-and-motion studies, the search for the ‘one best way’,  and a harsh, unfeeling approach to manufacturing which deskilled many jobs and took away the dignity of the worker.  Even though most people have never heard of F W Taylor the negative perception of managers and management lives on in folk memory today, and not just with trade unionists.  For example, take a look at the current debate about reform of the NHS where there is widespread popular belief that there are ‘too many managers’.  The assumption seems to be that spending money on management equates to inefficiency and spending less on caring for patients.  In fact a recent study by the King’s Fund reported in the Health Service Journal  http://www.hsj.co.uk/ by Simon Lewis argues that although the NHS is over administered, it is in fact under-managed.  Will the reputation of management ever recover?