A very brief history of management theories

Carter McNamara explains that views on management have changed ..... over the past century - particularly in the past few decades.

The Scientific Management Theory (1890-1940): At the ..... of the century, the most notable organizations were large and industrialized, and often they included ongoing, routine tasks that manufactured a variety of products.

The United States highly ..... scientific and technical matters, including careful measurement and specification of activities and results, so management tended to be the same.

Frederick Taylor developed the 'scientific management theory', which ..... this careful specification and measurement of all organizational tasks.

Tasks were standardized as much as possible, and workers were rewarded and punished; this approach appeared to work well for organizations with ..... lines and other mechanistic, routinized activities.

The Bureaucratic Management Theory (1930-1950): Max Weber ..... the scientific management theory, focussing on dividing organizations into hierarchies to establish strong lines of authority and control; he suggested organizations develop comprehensive and detailed standard operating procedures for all routinized tasks.

The Human Relations Movement (1930-today): Eventually, unions and government regulations reacted to the rather ..... effects of these theories, and more attention was given to individuals and their unique capabilities in the organization.

A major belief included that the organization would prosper if its workers prospered as ....., and Human Resource departments were added to organizations. well much before possible

The behavioral sciences played a strong role in helping to understand the needs of workers and how the needs of the organization and its workers could be better ......

Various new theories were ....., many based on the behavioral sciences (some had names like theory 'X', 'Y' and 'Z').