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Elton Mayo conducted the famous Hawthorne Studies in the 1920s and 1930s which found that social and psychological factors in the workplace have a significant impact on worker productivity. The studies concluded that factors like job satisfaction, quality of leadership, and feeling part of a group were more important than physical working conditions or financial incentives alone. This led to the development of the Human Relations Movement which emphasized the social aspects of work.

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Jamal Ajamhs Abdullahi
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278 views

HJGJ

Elton Mayo conducted the famous Hawthorne Studies in the 1920s and 1930s which found that social and psychological factors in the workplace have a significant impact on worker productivity. The studies concluded that factors like job satisfaction, quality of leadership, and feeling part of a group were more important than physical working conditions or financial incentives alone. This led to the development of the Human Relations Movement which emphasized the social aspects of work.

Uploaded by

Jamal Ajamhs Abdullahi
Copyright
© Attribution Non-Commercial (BY-NC)
Available Formats
Download as TXT, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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Elton Mayo was a philosopher, author, Harvard professor, and designer of the 'Ha wthorne Experiments', which significantly

changed management science thinking. R ead on to learn what he discovered, and how it still impacts management practice s today. Who was Elton Mayo? Elton Mayo was born in Australia in 1880. He became a lecturer at the University of Queensland (1911 - 1923) and the University of Pennsylvania, and then became a professor of Industrial Research at Harvard University from 1926 - 1949. He i s best known for his work on the Hawthorne Studies, and is considered one of the fathers of the Human Relations Movement. What Was the Prevailing Theory of Management Prior to Mayo's Work? factory worker Elton Mayo started his work at Hawthorne in 1924. The prevailing management theo ry at that time was scientific management, as defined by Frederick Winslow Taylo r, an industrial engineer who felt that standardization and enforced cooperation was the way to guarantee the highest work output from a team, after conducting numerous time and motion studies to determine the best way to do specific jobs. What were the Hawthorne Studies? Hawthorne refers to a Chicago-based Western Electric plant. It had agreed to a s tudy by the National Research Council at its plant to determine the impact on pr oductivity of lighting changes on its 29,000 employees. Initially, two groups were selected and the impact of lighting changes on their productivity was measured. It was found that any change in lighting - even makin g it worse - improved productivity, so the initial conclusion was that change in working conditions led to the improvements. Additional changes were then made to working conditions, to see what other types of modifications could improve output. In all cases productivity went up. Mayo was invited to participate in this study, and visited the project in 1929 a nd 1930 to conduct interviews with workers. A third stage in the research project involved a group that did not have product ivity increases. Interviews showed that the group had a standard for output whic h they all worked toward, and that they had higher regard for the standards set by their group than those of company management. What Was the Outcome of This Work? Mayo concluded that these experiments showed that workers who have the ability t o impact their working conditions and output requirements are more satisfied wit h their positions, and that cooperation and a feeling of being part of a cohesiv e group were more important to productivity than financial incentives or physica l working conditions. This work also led to the conclusion that managers need good interpersonal and l eadership skills, not just technical ability, to effectively lead a team. What is the Human Relations Movement? shaking hands The Human Relations Movement is the name today for the concept that social aspec ts - such as job satisfaction, group norms, and quality of leadership - have a g reater impact on productivity than non-social aspects, such as compensation. Thi

s concept has resulted in much greater attention paid to these social aspects of work by today's employers vs. those in the early 1900's.

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