9
Thanks, Tom. I want to share a few pieces of information about Elton Mayo.
Elton Mayo
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
George Elton Mayo (December 26, 1880 - September 7, 1949) was a psychologist and sociologist.
He lectured at the University of Queensland from 1919 to 1923 before moving to the University of Pennsylvania but spent most of his career at Harvard Business School (1926 - 1947), where he was a professor of industrial research.
Mayo is known as the founder of the Human Relations Movement and is recognized for his research, including the Hawthorne Studies, and his book "The Social Problems of an Industrialized Civilization" (1933). The research conducted under the Hawthorne Studies in the 1930s demonstrated the importance of groups in influencing individuals' behavior at work. However, it was not Mayo who conducted the practical experiments, but his employees Roethlisberger and Dickinson. This allowed him to draw conclusions about how managers should behave. He conducted various investigations to explore ways to enhance productivity, such as altering lighting conditions in the workplace. He discovered that work satisfaction largely depended on the informal social structure of the workgroup, where norms of cooperation and increased output were established due to a sense of significance. Physical conditions or financial incentives held little motivational value. People naturally form workgroups, which management can leverage for the organization's benefit. He concluded that individuals' work performance is influenced by both social dynamics and job content. He proposed a tension between workers' "logic of sentiment" and managers' "logic of cost and efficiency," which could lead to conflicts within organizations.
Criticism of his employees' procedures during the studies:
The groups whose behavior was studied were allowed to self-select.
Two women were replaced as they were chatting during work and were later identified as members of a leftist movement.
An Italian member performed above average due to having to care for her family alone, thereby affecting the group's performance significantly.
Summary of Mayo's Beliefs:
Individual workers should not be viewed in isolation but as part of a group.
Monetary incentives and good working conditions are less critical to individuals than the need to belong to a group.
Informal workgroups at the workplace strongly influence workers' behavior.
Managers should acknowledge these "social needs" and address them to ensure employees collaborate with the organization.
Mayo's work in the Hawthorne Experiments was later refined by Douglas McGregor as it did not initially address how work practices and organizational structure should be adjusted to enhance worker satisfaction and productivity. McGregor suggested that the relationships between organizational design, motivation, and productivity were more intricate than originally thought by Mayo.
Regards,
cgnanij
From India, Madras
Acknowledge(0)
Amend(0)
Elton Mayo
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
George Elton Mayo (December 26, 1880 - September 7, 1949) was a psychologist and sociologist.
He lectured at the University of Queensland from 1919 to 1923 before moving to the University of Pennsylvania but spent most of his career at Harvard Business School (1926 - 1947), where he was a professor of industrial research.
Mayo is known as the founder of the Human Relations Movement and is recognized for his research, including the Hawthorne Studies, and his book "The Social Problems of an Industrialized Civilization" (1933). The research conducted under the Hawthorne Studies in the 1930s demonstrated the importance of groups in influencing individuals' behavior at work. However, it was not Mayo who conducted the practical experiments, but his employees Roethlisberger and Dickinson. This allowed him to draw conclusions about how managers should behave. He conducted various investigations to explore ways to enhance productivity, such as altering lighting conditions in the workplace. He discovered that work satisfaction largely depended on the informal social structure of the workgroup, where norms of cooperation and increased output were established due to a sense of significance. Physical conditions or financial incentives held little motivational value. People naturally form workgroups, which management can leverage for the organization's benefit. He concluded that individuals' work performance is influenced by both social dynamics and job content. He proposed a tension between workers' "logic of sentiment" and managers' "logic of cost and efficiency," which could lead to conflicts within organizations.
Criticism of his employees' procedures during the studies:
The groups whose behavior was studied were allowed to self-select.
Two women were replaced as they were chatting during work and were later identified as members of a leftist movement.
An Italian member performed above average due to having to care for her family alone, thereby affecting the group's performance significantly.
Summary of Mayo's Beliefs:
Individual workers should not be viewed in isolation but as part of a group.
Monetary incentives and good working conditions are less critical to individuals than the need to belong to a group.
Informal workgroups at the workplace strongly influence workers' behavior.
Managers should acknowledge these "social needs" and address them to ensure employees collaborate with the organization.
Mayo's work in the Hawthorne Experiments was later refined by Douglas McGregor as it did not initially address how work practices and organizational structure should be adjusted to enhance worker satisfaction and productivity. McGregor suggested that the relationships between organizational design, motivation, and productivity were more intricate than originally thought by Mayo.
Regards,
cgnanij
From India, Madras
Acknowledge(0)Amend(0)
One should also be concerned with what followed thereafter. I have seen so many people offering recruitment courses on this forum in the past one month. One of the primary functions of HR is to ensure the right candidate for the right job, which is desirable both from the individual and the company's perspective. Despite so many HR consultants in the US, there are people writing entire books about the misery of being in the wrong occupation - http://mypyp.wordpress.com/. One then becomes skeptical of the recruitment process and the people offering them - the efficacy of psychometric tests and so on.
Apart from being invited by the institute from where I did my MBA (International Management Institute), I have been asked by an American Institute to write a white paper on this issue. How far is recruitment or talent management effective? That is the mother of all questions if I may say so. Brothers, sisters, sons, daughters who carry the baton forward are equally, if not more important.
From India, New Delhi
Acknowledge(0)Amend(0)
Apart from being invited by the institute from where I did my MBA (International Management Institute), I have been asked by an American Institute to write a white paper on this issue. How far is recruitment or talent management effective? That is the mother of all questions if I may say so. Brothers, sisters, sons, daughters who carry the baton forward are equally, if not more important.
From India, New Delhi
Acknowledge(0)Amend(0)CiteHR is an AI-augmented HR knowledge and collaboration platform, enabling HR professionals to solve real-world challenges, validate decisions, and stay ahead through collective intelligence and machine-enhanced guidance. Join Our Platform.
Human Resource Management.ppt
Human Resource Management in Service Sector.doc