Narayana Rao K.V.S.S.
On 11 June 2019
Industrial Engineering and Industrial Management, that is Engineering Management have common beginning. Henry Towne in his 1886 address highlighted the need for person having knowledge of engineering, business and management, and accounting and interpretation and acting on the basis of accounting figures. He gave the opinion that engineers are the best persons to acquire knowledge of all the three and provide the required services to engineering concerns. He also highlighted the need to for evaluating cost of production and reducing it by engineers as well as by the operators. From this paper presentation in ASME, the development of industrial management and industrial engineering started. Towne himself presented a paper on "Gain Sharing" in 1889.
F.W. Taylor, who was present in the 1886 and made comments on a paper on cost system first presented his industrial engineering contribution that is concerned with cost reduction. in 1893, he presented his paper on redesign of belting systems based on the cost data collected over a period of nine years to reduce the cost of operation. In 1895, he presented his paper on Piece rate system wherein he proposed study of elements of operations and redesigning them to decrease the time taken to complete them and cost incurred. The best of way of doing an element is determined based on time study and the times are used to give daily task to workmen or set piece rates. The way of doing an element of work is to be standardized by the mangers or engineers and the time taken for completing it is also predetermined. Thus the paper on piece rate system has addressed a management problem and an industrial engineering issue simultaneously. Taylor further wrote Shop Management and Scientific Management. Thus Taylor is termed Father of Industrial Engineering as well as Industrial Management, Engineering Management and Scientific Management (Principles of Scientific Management).
The second point to be highlighted is the need for masters students to think of mastery of the subject. There is a practice of relying on power point slides that is developing in the education process. The purpose of slides prepared by a teacher is very limited. Some key issues which are covered in the lecture are included in slides. The lecture itself is a brief collection of points from a text book chapter. The text books chapter is condensation of available knowledge to be presented in a limited number of pages. The objective of masters program students is to master the knowledge base. Hence an undue reliance on slides is extremely detrimental to knowledge level of students and the society. Students every day have to think to what extent they mastered some elements of knowledge.
Is world class contribution possible from India? With the availability of research papers, white papers and online magazines and blogs, it has become possible to access and read latest scientific and professional developments. Also, patents information is available online. There is scope to work on current topics. As an examples blogs http://nraomtr.blogspot.com and http://nraoiekc.blogspot.com are global top blogs in management and industrial engineering. If in the field of knowledge transfer we can reach world levels, we can reach world levels also in embodied products and methods.
Role of Engineering: Industrial engineering and Engineering management have engineering as the primary discipline. Hence all students have to preserve their engineering knowledge and enhance it. If engineering knowledge is not used, both industrial engineering and engineering management will be without their core strength or purpose of existence.
Finally, an article on service leadership by Swami Muktananda was mentioned to highlight that we are all there in the service of creation of the God and we need to learn first as many things as possible and to a depth as per our choice to provide the right service in our professional life.
https://www.jkyog.org/blog/leadership-through-service
To insure the best results, the organization of productive labor must be directed and controlled by persons having not only good executive ability, and possessing the practical familiarity of a mechanic or engineer with the goods produced and the processes employed, but having also, and equally, a practical knowledge of how to observe, record, analyze and compare essential facts in relation to wages, supplies, expense accounts, and all else that enters into or affects the economy of production and the cost of the product.
The questions to be considered, and which need recording and publication as conducing to discussion and the dissemination of useful knowledge in this specialty, group themselves under two principal heads, namely: Shop Management, and Shop Accounting.
Shop Management fall the questions of organization, responsibility, reports, systems of contract and piece work, and all that relates to the executive management of works, mills and factories. Under the head of Shop Accounting fall the questions of time and wages systems, determination of costs, whether by piece or day-work, the distribution of the various expense accounts, the ascertainment of profits, methods of book-keeping, and all that enters into the system of accounts which relates to the manufacturing departments of a business, and to the determination and record of its results.
Taylor contributed to shop management with books shop management and scientific management.
Taylor contributed to recording and analyzing costs and taking actions based on them through his papers on Belting system design, elementary rate fixing and piece rate system and art of cutting metals. This work on reducing cost of production became industrial engineering.
What Henry Towne said regarding Engineers Involvement in Management Issues & Understanding Cost Production?
To insure the best results, the organization of productive labor must be directed and controlled by persons having not only good executive ability, and possessing the practical familiarity of a mechanic or engineer with the goods produced and the processes employed, but having also, and equally, a practical knowledge of how to observe, record, analyze and compare essential facts in relation to wages, supplies, expense accounts, and all else that enters into or affects the economy of production and the cost of the product.
The questions to be considered, and which need recording and publication as conducing to discussion and the dissemination of useful knowledge in this specialty, group themselves under two principal heads, namely: Shop Management, and Shop Accounting.
Shop Management fall the questions of organization, responsibility, reports, systems of contract and piece work, and all that relates to the executive management of works, mills and factories. Under the head of Shop Accounting fall the questions of time and wages systems, determination of costs, whether by piece or day-work, the distribution of the various expense accounts, the ascertainment of profits, methods of book-keeping, and all that enters into the system of accounts which relates to the manufacturing departments of a business, and to the determination and record of its results.
Taylor contributed to shop management with books shop management and scientific management.
Taylor contributed to recording and analyzing costs and taking actions based on them through his papers on Belting system design, elementary rate fixing and piece rate system and art of cutting metals. This work on reducing cost of production became industrial engineering.
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