tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8692381608294018617.post3691581683788098414..comments2023-11-05T07:27:43.837-05:00Comments on Narrative and Technology: Engineering Major = Too much Caffine + No Fun + No Sleep: (Graded blog #6, question 2)Adamhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16302919444091859459noreply@blogger.comBlogger1125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8692381608294018617.post-39484313576380292542007-10-03T07:13:00.000-04:002007-10-03T07:13:00.000-04:00In the first paragraph you point out something tha...In the first paragraph you point out something that Taylor only occasionally acknowledges -- that efficiency is ultimately about competition, even if he doesn't like to frame it that way.<BR/><BR/>My only complaint (and a predictable one) is that you're interacting with Taylor only in a highly general way - there are specifics in his text which would have helped you here.<BR/><BR/>Your critique of Taylor or Taylorism basically shows the unsurprising fact that there are situations in which people are motivated, by themselves, to be efficient. A research lab is a good example; a more radical one, maybe, is an professor in the humanities who produces research: when you research in the humanities, you are almost always working completely by yourself, with no supervision (ever) and no interaction with colleagues doing similar work (usually). <BR/><BR/>Still, though, Taylor is writing explicitly about factories and what goes on in them: he's concerned with people who do brutal, hard physical labor for low wages (47 tons of pig iron!).<BR/><BR/>The fact that you and your colleagues are motivated has an analogue in Taylor: he himself is motivated, as her his bosses and his colleagues in scientific management. There _is_ a white collar/blue collar division in Taylor, corresponding with your experience (people in research labs are motivated in different ways than people lifting pig iron for a living) -- my main criticism is that Taylor _implicitly_ addresses some of these issues, which is why going more directly to the text would have been helpful.Adam Johnshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11588769281227456640noreply@blogger.com