INDUSTRY AND PRODUCTION.

Manawatu Herald, Volume XLV, Issue 2552, 8 March 1923, Page 4

INDUSTRY AND PRODUCTION.

NEED. FOR ALL-ROUND EFFICIENCY.

Following the great Avar with its wide-spread!, loss, it has become imperative to face the great work of reconstruction. This is particularly so in the older countries of the world but in a degree it is also the case in these new lands under the Southern Cross. New Zealand, during the Avar, Ayas one of the “blessed isles” —money Avas plentiful and conditions all round very easy in comparison with some other lands. Noav Ave have the great burdens of increased debt, financial stress and the pinch of insistent demands upon our resources. Reconstruction calls for increased efficiency—Avhat this means is Avell expressed by an English Avriter —Sir Vincent Caillard — in a recent publication. EFFICIENCY OF MANAGEMENT.

“Efficiency of management does not mean merely good management of a given workshop equipped with given machinery worked by a given number of men —although it naturally includes it. It means, above and beyond that, the thorough knowledge of world-markets, home and foreign—or, in other Avords, practical realisation of what the world’s demands are —bold enterprise, economical fianace, perfect knowledge of the most modern and efficient mechanical appliances and Avorkshop methods, careful and sympathetic study of the requirements of the workers and carrying into effect all reasonable meausres to meet them, and, finally, eo-oceration among all to nieet the desired end of the greatest possible production by the nation as a Avliole. This last point is one which was exemplified almost to perfection during the war. I may perhaps be allowed to repeat words here on this matter Avhieh I Avrote some time back elsewhere. ‘A leading feature of this (industrial war) organisation was co-operation on a marvellous scale and co-operation hitherto scantily recorded, and therefore scarcely appreciated. Manufacturers, for the good of their country, threAv aAvay their old prejudices and put themselves unreservedly at the disposal of one another. Paents', secret processes, special methods, goodAvill, were flung into the melting pot for the common weal .

. . .’ If this was done under the tragic and gigantic national emergency of the war, is it a counsel of perfection to press that it should be continued in face of the equally gigantic, and perhaps equally tragic, Emergency of setting the country on a lasting and unassailable foundation of industrial security and prosperity in peace? Surely it may be hoped not. Industrial firms must learn that the prosperity of their individual businesses counts but little in comparison with the prosperity of the nation as a whole —and, indeed, that the latter truly connotes the former.” MECHANICAL PERFECTION. “Of no less importance 'is the knowledge and application of the best mechanical appliances and the best workshop methods. In the eyes of good managers nothing but the most perfect machines should be good enough for them —for without the best labour-saving machinery mass production is not practicable. This machinery forms the equipment of the workshops of which the ‘lay-out’ must be so concieved that the sequence of operations is absolutely perfect, the raw material entering at one end of the sequence and the finished article emerging from the other without the slightest interruption, or any unnecessary movement of material from one part of the works, or indeed from one part of a shop to another. This point should be most carefully and meticulously studied, for the transport of material over one unnecessary yard jiAeans unnecessary delay and expense. Wherever possible mechanical transporters should be employed for the requisite movement of material in order to avoid the expenditure of human labour on functions better performed by machines. EFFICIENCY OF LABOUR.

“Efficiency of labour, stated in other -words, means no more nor less than that every worker should put his whole energy and skill into his work and produce the utmost of which he is personally capable. Before briefly discussing the ‘atmosphere’ or conditions of work necessary for this, some reasons may be mentioned which have been and are formidable stumbling-blocks in the minds of a vast number of working people. They believe, in the first

place, that by working below their capacity they give room for a larger number to be employed; and, in the second, that by the introduction of labour-saving methods and machinery the demand for labour is reduced. The answer in simple language is that if only one article of a certain complexity is made its cost is too great for anyone to care to buy it; if one hundred such articles are made they might be within the means of the very rich; but that if you produce them by the hundred thousand they might become so cheap as to be Avithin the means of all, and a demand is create* calling for greater and greater production and the employment of more and more labour. Increase the cost by decreasing the energy put into the Avork of production, or by the employment of less skilful methods, and the demand for the article and therefore the demand for labour to produce it, must inevitably fall also or possibly cease altogether. THE HUMAN ASPECT.

“Last and not least, however well and scientifically management may be equipped in all the above respects, no managers are truly efficient that do not realise that men are not machines, but human beings, as they themselves are, and must be treated as such. Workshops must be Avell lighted, Avell ventilated, properly floored and properly waimed. Housing must he good and well laid out. Recreation must be prov’ided in the shape of rccicationgrounds, of athletic, football and cricket clubs, and of reading-rooms —and in fact what is now generally understood as ‘welfare’ must be thoroughly organised and attended to.”

To sum up, what is called for is: (1) Efficiency of management. (2) Efficiency of labour. (3) Co-operation and good-Avill behveen the two, the lack of Avhieh proves inefficiency of either one or the other, or of both. (Contributed by the New Zealand Welfare League.)