In one concern I heard that
the scientific manager became convinced that all the working-chairs
for the women were too low and that the laborers therefore had to hold
their arms in a psychophysically unfavorable position during the
handling of the apparatus. All were strongly opposed to the
introduction of higher chairs. The result was that the manager
arranged for the chairs to be raised a few millimeters every evening,
without the knowledge of the working-women, as soon as the factory was
empty. After a few weeks the chairs had reached the right height
without those engaged in the work having noticed it at all. The
outcome was a decided increase of efficiency.
But the most rational scheme will after all be to prepare for such
arrangements of tools and apparatus by systematic experiments in the
psychological laboratory. The subtlety of such investigations will
lead far beyond the point which is accessible to the attempts of
scientific management. Exact experiments on attention, for instance,
will have to determine how the various parts of the apparatus are to
be distributed best in space if the laborer must keep watch for
disturbances at various places. Only the laboratory experiment can
find the most favorable speed of the machine or can select the muscles
to which the mind can send the most effective impulses. The
construction of the machine must then be adapted to such results.
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