Taylorism has permeated every form of organization and has become the bedrock for most economies since he proposed his theory of scientific management in 1911. At the same time, Taylor was also the most maligned organizational theorist of all time. Taylorism expects workers to be reliable, efficient, predictable, and interchangeable as parts of a well-oiled machine. So the obvious question is how can we create organizations that facilitate emancipation from Taylorism? What designs and strategies can help us create emancipatory organizations?
Braverman argued that by controlling the means of production, owners or capitalists engaged in the systematic deskilling of labor resulting in job fragmentation and routinization. Any process that reduces the skills required to perform a job is called deskilling. Braverman argued that deskilling continues until the work becomes so simple that hardly any skills are required. This gives managers the flexibility to replace workers and increase their power over the work and erode workers’ power to resist management demands. That is, workers, lose all control over the work process and are reduced to working like robots, per management demands, engaged in menial and repetitive tasks. Management gains full control of the production process, allowing them to reduce the cost of labor, resulting in the commodification of labor and increase profits. The commodification of labor leads to the exploitation of labor by capitalists leading to the alienation of workers from their work. Morgan (2006) argues that even though Taylor is seen as the villain he was part of a broader trend of mechanization of life that has happened over the past century. George Ritzer in his book, The McDonaldization of society, argues that over the last century organizations have gradually moved towards instrumental rationalization governed by homogenization achieved through technological and bureaucratic efficiency. The guiding principles are efficiency, calculability, predictability, and control. Taylorism was followed by Fordism, which lead to rational and administrative organizations creating managerial capitalism again to be followed by lean and mean organization or flexible production where subcontracting, outsourcing, and part-time jobs or “McJobs”[1] are standards.
Over the years, the focus on instrumental rationalization has reinforced Braverman’s theory of deskilling and total control over the labor process by managers. The ideology of managerialism assumes the need for managers to coordinate the aims and activities of an organization, usually for higher pay or status than their subordinates. This assumption is used to legitimize domination by managers justifying their right to control. At the same time, workers are under false consciousness[2] and consent to their self-exploitation by buying into managerialism. This is because workers take for granted these institutional and ideological forms of dominance. This creates hegemonic routines where existing systems maintain the power differential.
Emancipation from Taylorism – Organizational designs and strategies
So what strategies and organizational designs can lead to the emancipation from Taylorism? If history has taught us anything, it is that such hierarchical power of dominance has always invited resistance and conflict. Other organizational theorists have advocated for more humanistic forms of organizations that emphasize human factors of management and encourages cooperation. Here are some strategies and organizational designs to create emancipation from Taylorism.
- Resistance – Taylorism brought dehumanizing conditions to the workplace and through deskilling the power of workers was diminished. Alienation and exploitation of workers were the natural outcomes. The stronghold of rationalization leading to greater profits further gave economic justification to managerial causes. With the invention of the assembly line, productivity sored at the cost of deteriorating working conditions, where workers were closely monitored and punished for non-performance. Workers resisted such standardized ways of physical labor and starting forming unions. They started demanding better conditions, better pay, better treatment, and some kind of due process to address perceived grievances.
The high number of strikes by the labor force in the early 20th century resulted in The National Labor Relations act aka the Wagner Act in 1935 and the Fair Labor Standards Act in 1938 in the United States that gave workers the right to unionize and protect their rights from management practices commonly perceived as unfair. Long story short, labor unions work to protect the rights of workers and improve their working conditions. Workers often use resistance as a way to empower themselves. Resistance does not have to be open rebellion. It can also be quite subtle. For example, withdrawing effort and attention, engaging in dishonesty, theft, or sabotage, and sharing stories of injustice and oppression are also acts of resistance. - Humanistic forms of communication and decision making are based on the ideas of recognizing employees as valued human capital. The Hawthorne studies carried out in the 1930s and the 1940s found that important social and psychological factors impacted workers. That led to the recognition of the ‘human factor’, where workers are not just seen as economic entities but need to be treated with respect, listened to, and be expected to grow and improve over time. They have psychological and social needs and are not just motivated by money. The humanistic form of management considers employees as holistic, unique beings. The humanistic form of management recognizes and even celebrates individual differences and diversity in its employees. Humanistic management is dedicated to finding a balance between individual happiness and work efficiency. And finally, humanistic management believes in ethical codes, accountability, and social responsibility toward the community and society.
Other research has emphasized the importance of group work compared to individual work, division of labor that increases a variety of work and skills, and self-managed teams. Encouraging such management strategies can transform employees as strategic partners across functional areas leading to better utilization of their employee human capital. In turn, such processes aim to create communication and decision-making processes that represent the full range of stakeholder interests. - Communicative rationality: Habermas claimed that over-reliance on rational processes adopted by organizations ignores humanistic concerns in favor of goal achievement through efficient means (instrumental rationality). Instead, he argues, what emancipatory organizations need is communicative rationality. Communicative rationality is characterized by a particular logic of interaction among individual (or collective) actors that is determined by argumentative processes in which actors come to a mutual consensus on the most persuasive arguments. Unless communicative rationality is followed, an organization runs the risk of marginalizing their employees. Managers can knowingly or unknowingly engage in distorted communication when they frame the argument or by responding to only those suggestions that support their goal achievement through the efficient means mindset. Such behavior can prevent open and informed communication.
Communicative rationality also forms the basis for communicative action. This allows the participants to harmonize their respective plans and reach a common understanding of the situation as it is characterized by reciprocity. Jack Gibb, proposed six rules in one’s communication: use speech that is descriptive rather than evaluative, be problem-oriented rather than controlling, encourage spontaneity rather than strategizing, be empathic rather than neutral, provide a sense of equality rather than superiority, and be provisional rather than dogmatic. - Workplace democracy is when you put communicative rationality into action. It is a participatory organization that brings ideas of standards of democracy into the workplace. Mary Parker Follett was the first to talk about the principle of self-government in organizations. Such an organization allows individual influence on a large range of organizational processes. It promotes collaboration among multiple stakeholders. It believes in the superiority of shared decision-making among all the stakeholders and regards this as a critical component for success. Cooperative organizations are a great example of workplace democracy as their governing principles are guided by employees, democratic decision-making process, and distribution of profit among employees in an equitable manner. Such kind of employee ownership leads to community-based and socially responsible decision making.
Even though we see the dehumanization of work over the last century, there are ways in which workers and employees have gained back some of their rights by engaging in the different techniques mentioned here. Emancipation from Taylorism has been slow but has been making progress. More and more organizations are now aware of the potential of utilizing human capital more effectively, but much more needs to be done.
Footnote
[1] A low paying job that requires little skill and provides little opportunity for advancement. (Merriam-Webster Dictionary)
[2] A denial of the truth on the part of the oppressed (employees in this case) when they fail to recognize that the interests of the ruling class (managers/owners in this case) are embedded in the dominant ideology.
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Cite this article (APA)
Trivedi, C. (2020, November 30). Emancipation from Taylorism: Organizational designs and strategies. ConceptsHacked. https://conceptshacked.com/emancipation-from-taylorism/
