The Repair Boss. — The repair boss has charge of the plant and its maintenance. He must have a natural love of order and of cleanliness, and a systematic type of mind. This position calls for a man with an experience that will enable him to detect liability of breakdowns before they actually occur. He must be resourceful in repairing unexpected breakdowns in an emergency, and be able at all times
to carry out literally the directions given on the instruction cards of the Planning Department for cleaning, maintaining, and repairing the machines.
The Inspector. — The function of inspector under scientific or the Taylor plan of management is most important, especially in connection with the "first inspection." During the manufacture of the first piece and after it is finished the inspector passes and reports upon it before the worker proceeds with the other pieces. Here the worker gets a return in person for each successive act on the first piece he makes under a new instruction card, or, if he is a new worker, under an old instruction card. Ambiguity of instructions, if present, is thus eliminated, and wrong actions or results are corrected before much damage to material has been done and before much time and effort are wasted. The first erroneous cycles of work are not repeated, and the worker is promptly shown exactly how efficiently he has succeeded in determining the requirements of his instructions.
The inspector is responsible for the quality of the work. He fulfills the requirements of Schloss, who says, in speaking of the danger, under some managements, that the foreman will sacrifice quality to speed, if he gets a bonus for quantity of output, — "The best safeguard against this serious danger would be found in the appointment of a distinct staff of inspectors whose duty it should be to ascertain, as the work proceeds, that the stipulated standards of excellence are at all times scrupulously maintained." This position of inspector requires an observant man who naturally is inclined to give constructive rather
than destructive-criticism. He should be a man who can coöperate with the workman and foreman to rescue condemned or damaged material with the least expenditure of time, effort and expense.
Functionalizing the Worker. — Under Scientific Management, the worker as well as the foreman, is a specialist. This he becomes by being relieved of everything that he is not best fitted to do, and allowed to concentrate upon doing, according to exact and scientifically derived methods, that work at which he is an expert.[13]
Relieving the Worker of the Planning. — The planning is taken away from the worker, not because it is something too choice, sacred or entertaining for him to do, or something which the managers desire to do themselves, but because it is best, for the workers themselves as well as the work, that the planning be done by specialists at planning. If he is expert enough to plan, the worker will be promoted to the planning department. In the meantime, he is working under the best plan that experts can devise.
Master Planning a Life Study. — The best planner is he who, — other things being equal, — is the most ingenious, the most experienced and the best observer. It is an art to observe; it requires persistent attention. The longer and the more the observer observes, the more details, and variables affecting details,
he observes. The untrained observer could not expect to compete with one of special natural talent who has also been trained. It is not every man who is fitted by nature to observe closely, hence to plan. To observe is a condition precedent to visualizing. Practice in visualizing makes for increasing the faculty of constructive imagination. He with the best constructive imagination is the master planner.
The art of observing is founded on a study of fundamental elements. In order that planning may be done best, previous to starting work, the entire sequence of operations must be laid out, so that the ideas of value of every element of every subdivision of the process of working may be corrected to act most efficiently in relation with each and all of the subsequent parts and events that are to follow. This planning forwards and backwards demands an equipment of time study, motion study and micro-motion study records such as can be used economically only when all the planning is done in one place, with one set of records. The planner must be able to see and control the whole problem in all of its aspects.