The Life and Influence of Frederick Taylor

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The Life and Influence of Frederick Taylor Frederick Winslow Taylor was born on March 20, 1865 in Philadelphia. He went to Harvard University to become a lawyer like his father. However, he quit the school because of deteriorating eyesight and had to give up on his dream of becoming a lawyer. In 1874, he became an apprentice patternmaker and machinist. In 1878, He got the license as an engineer and became a machine shop laborer at Midvale Steel. He began developing his management philosophies during his time at the Midvale Steel Works. It was during this period that he developed his theory of “Scientific Management.” He started as shop clerk and quickly progressed to machinist, foreman, maintenance foreman, and chief draftsman. Within six years, he advanced to research director, then chief engineer. Later, at Bethlehem Steel, he and Maunsel White developed high-speed steel. In 1890, he left Midvale Steel Works and worked at a couple companies. He joined Bethlehem Steel in order to solve an expensive machine shop capacity problem in 1898. He registered about fifty patents of machines inventions, tools and work processes. In 1895, he presented to the American Society of Mechanical Engineers an experimental study named “A note on belting” and no long after, he published, “A piece rate system”. Among Taylor’s other contributions to Bethlehem were, a real time analysis of daily output and costs, a modern cost accounting system, reduced yard worker’s ranks from 500 to 140, double stamping mill production, and lowered cost per ton of materials handled from eight cents to four cents. He successfully implemented cost saving techniques even though he added clerks, teachers, time-study engineers, supervision and staffing support positions. While at Bethlehem, Taylor and Manusel White co-developed the Taylor-White system for heat-treating chrome-tungsten tool steel, which

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