Lecture The evolution of management thought (6th edition) - Chapter 18: The social person era in retrospect

Two approaches to post-Hawthorne research: Micro researchers studied people in groups. Macro researchers viewed leadership as a group interactive-situational phenomenon, leading to organizational behavior and organization theory.

THE EVOLUTION OF MANAGEMENT

THOUGHT, 6TH

EDITION

Electronic Resource by:

Regina Greenwood and Julia Teahen

The Social Person Era in Retrospect

Chapter Eighteen

The Social Person Era

The Economic Environment

rising real wages, and low

unemployment.

percent.

1929, the impact on employment came more slowly and the peak was not

reached in 1933.

gauge how federal and state

unemployment relief programs reduced the reported number of unemployed by about 5 percent

Stock Market Crash – 1929

Attitudes toward women working outside the home changed as two wage earner families became more important

Stock Market Crash

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Stock Market Crash

 Will Rogers’ made

an observation that the automobiles

bought during the prosperous 1920s were used to look for work in the 1930s

 Keynesian economics ran counter to the Protestant ethic notion of thrift

The New Technologies

The New Technologies

 Transportation, communication, and entertainment

progress was apparent

in automobiles, aircraft, radio, television, etc.

 Developments in main frame computers, dry copying, polio vaccine, antibiotics, DNA, etc.

 Public sector projects led to atomic energy; dam, road, and bridge building; the

Tennessee Valley Authority, etc.

Spirit pf St Louis and Charles Lindberg, 1901

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The Social Environment

 The Lynds’ study

limited basis, the

pros and cons of

The Social Environment

from the Protestant work ethic to a

social ethic.

groups for security – consistent with an emphasis in management thought

during this time on social needs

David C McClelland (1917-1998)

 David McClelland found a decline in the need for achievement and the rise of a need for affiliation.

David Riesman

inner-directed to the other-inner-directed person

 Inner-directed – represented the era of

laissez-faire capitalism, the Protestant Ethic, and emphasized self-direction and control

 Other-directed – characterized by high social mobility and by emphasis on consumption rater than production and on getting along and being accepted by others as the key to accomplishment

 Shift from the “invisible hand to glad hand” – shift from individualism to collectivism

The Social Environment

The Political Environment

F D Roosevelt promised to

reshuffle society’s cards to benefit the “little people.”

abundance of legislation.

work week, with time

and a half pay for

hours over that, for

The National Labor Relations Act (1935)

legislation for labor in U.S History

 Guaranteed the right to bargain

collectively

 Guaranteed the right of self-organization This would lead to the downfall of

employee representation plans

 Specified unfair practices of management

 Established the National Labor Relations Board

The Wagner Act

 Also a critical

turning point for

unions…

 A new union, the

CIO, was formed

Summary of Part Three

 Figure 18-1 depicts the Social Person Era.

 Mary Parker Follett bridged the Scientific

Management era with the emerging group.

 The Hawthorne Studies brought the human relations movement to the forefront.

 Increased concern for people

 Calls for less rigid organizational structures

 View that financial motives are only one part

 Concern for emotion as well as efficiency

 The human relations movement reflected the cultural environment.

Summary of Part Three

 Two approaches to post-Hawthorne research:

 Micro researchers studied people in groups.

 Macro researchers viewed leadership as a group

interactive-situational phenomenon, leading to

organizational behavior and organization theory.

 Descendants of Scientific Management, like Mooney, Reiley, Davis, and Barnard, addressed new organizational issues.

 The culture of the period, shaped by economic stress, led to a decline in the Protestant ethic and more focus on people, not production.

END OF PART THREE