The History of Work

The History of Work Richard Donkin

© Richard Donkin 2001, 2010 Foreword © Warren Bennis 2010 All rights reserved. No reproduction, copy or transmission of this publication may be made without written permission. No portion of this publication may be reproduced, copied or transmitted save with written permission or in accordance with the provisions of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988, or under the terms of any licence permitting limited copying issued by the Copyright Licensing Agency, Saffron House, 6–10 Kirby Street, London EC1N 8TS. Any person who does any unauthorized act in relation to this publication may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages. The author has asserted his right to be identified as the author of this work in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. First published 2001 as Blood, Sweat and Tears by Texerey This edition published 2010 by PALGRAVE MACMILLAN Palgrave Macmillan in the UK is an imprint of Macmillan Publishers Limited, registered in England, company number 785998, of Houndmills, Basingstoke, Hampshire RG21 6XS. Palgrave Macmillan in the US is a division of St Martin’s Press LLC, 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, NY 10010. Palgrave Macmillan is the global academic imprint of the above companies and has companies and representatives throughout the world. Palgrave® and Macmillan® are registered trademarks in the United States, the United Kingdom, Europe and other countries. ISBN 978–0–230–23893–0 This book is printed on paper suitable for recycling and made from fully managed and sustained forest sources. Logging, pulping and manufacturing processes are expected to conform to the environmental regulations of the country of origin. A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library. A catalog record for this book is available from the Library of Congress. 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 19 18 17 16 15 14 13 12 11 10 Printed and bound in Great Britain by CPI Antony Rowe, Chippenham and Eastbourne

To the memory of my sister, Janet

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CONTENTS

Foreword by Warren Bennis Acknowledgments Introduction

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Chapter 1

Hands to the Grindstone

1

Chapter 2

Fettered Lives

14

Chapter 3

Job Creation

28

Chapter 4

The New Religion of Work

43

Chapter 5

The Most Important Pile of Bricks in the World

57

Chapter 6

Secrets of the Dumb Steeple

72

Chapter 7

The Silent Monitor

87

Chapter 8

The Last Puritan in a Nation of Amateurs

103

Chapter 9

The Yellow Dog Unleashed

117

Chapter 10 The Philadelphia Catechism

133

Chapter 11 Modern Times

146

Chapter 12 Western Electric Discovers Motivation

160

Chapter 13 Unnatural Selection

177

Chapter 14 Arbeit Macht Frei

189

Chapter 15 Whatever Happened to Homer Sarasohn?

202

Chapter 16 Managing the Corporate State

216

Chapter 17 The Wanting Animal

231 v

Contents

vi

Chapter 18 Sharp-suited Philanthropists

250

Chapter 19 The End of Management

265

Chapter 20 Melting the Frozen Assets

281

Chapter 21 The Road to Panama

295

Chapter 22 One Life. Live it.

309

Chapter 23 Age of the Search Engine

327

Postscript: New Century, New Ethic

343

Notes

352

Index

382

FOREWORD

This book is huge. In e very good sense of the w ord. It certainly belongs on the bookshelf of every leader and every scholar in the area of management and or ganizational life; but even more than that, it demands to be read closely . The stories it contains are enlightening, the questions it asks are profound, and the conclusions that it of fers are sure to e xplode many of our most sacred assumptions. An outstanding journalist and observ er of human institutions, Richard Donkin has rare qualif cations for leading readers on a journey of an immense historical scope. I w ant to emphasize for a moment the signif cance of this, because I am con vinced that one of the secret scandals of contemporary or ganizations is the ahistoricity of its managers. The nature of w ork has al ways been changing; once it did so gradually and steadily, and now it does so at a breakneck pace. When Heraclitus observ ed 2,500 years ago that “there is nothing permanent b ut change,” he had no w ay of conceiving e xactly how right he could be. Yet a manager’ s ability to shape change, to mak e change w ork for us and not against us, is negligible unless one has a grasp of ho w change has already left its imprints on human industry . History is indeed one of the most signif cant laboratories for management theory , and Donkin unlocks the door to that laboratory and leads us on a remarkable guided tour. Donkin shows how we ha ve become “sla ves to w ork” at precisely the time that most of us li ving in the industrialized w orld have been deli vered from the oppressi ve yoke of manual labor . Our liberation has ironically led to a new and perhaps more troubling form of bondage. “Our li ves are chok ed with w ork,” he writes. “How did it get lik e this?” He then proceeds to address the matter skillfully over the course of several hundred pages. Our concept of w ork, as he observ es, lags se veral decades behind the current reality; our outdated concept is founded on vii

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Foreword an agricultural and industrial past, and has been reinforced by a centuries-old theological and cultural sanctif cation of a manner of work that is no longer even performed by most of us. He offers an enc yclopedic examination of the scientif c, societal, and mythic progressions of w ork. Ev erything is e xplored here: the f rst forms of w ork, performed by our ancestors eons ago; the de velopment of the modern “job”; the simultaneous blessing and curse of industrial innovation; serfdom, slavery, and child exploitation; and of course the ne w and dizzying computer era characterized by what I call Information Overload Anxiety. Over the course of this historical journe y, Donkin never loses sight of the central issues that he w ants to lea ve each reader alone to wrestle with. Seeing where we ha ve come from and sensing where we might be headed, he e xhorts us to f nd new ways to think about the v ery nature of w ork and ho w we measure and re ward it. Can we do so, he asks, in a manner that allows humans to express their full range of gifts in the classical Greek ideal? Can we k eep women and men from being victimized by social and technological change, and can we help people who are so depleted by their treadmill w ork pace that the y have forgotten the greater purposes of their work? Even be yond these soul-sized matters, I ha ve found myself in recent years telling leaders and academics that there are a number of specif c questions about w ork that will need to be answered soon. Among them: Will the best or ganizations of the future be smallish, ramshackle clusters of indi viduals or large federations? Are there limits to the v alue of the so-called “high-involvement” and “self-managed” approach that is f nally winning acceptance in so man y organizations? What are we as a society to do with disparities in talent? What about the oncecherished Social Contract between emplo yers and emplo yees? Do we ha ve or e ven need one single theory of or ganizational change? And f nally, ho w do we f nd balance in our li ves? I belie ve that Richard Donkin’ s book is of considerable use in helping us to address all these sorts of questions. Most signif cantly, it is by walking us through the ages that he helps us to percei ve the enormous signif cance of our o wn day. In his Report to Greco, Nikos Kazantzakis points out an ancient Chinese imprecation: “I curse you; may you li ve in an important

Foreword age.” And indeed we are all damned, encumbered, and burdened, as well as charmed, e xhilarated, and f ascinated by this curse. What a time! No small measure of credit goes to Richard Donkin for allowing us to understand this anew. Warren Bennis Distinguished Professor of Business Administration University of Southern California

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ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

I owe thanks to man y people for their help in the production of this book. The Financial T imes library staf f pro vided constant support and advice. I w ould particularly lik e to thank Pedro Das Gupta, Peter Cheek, Neil McDonald, Bha vna P atel, David Snaddon, and Philip Po well. In the F T Tokyo Bureau, Mitsuk o Matsutani, Nob uko Juji, and P aul Abrahams ensured that my Japanese research program ran lik e clockw ork. My w armest thanks also to Jackie Hare in the F T London off ce for her patience, hard w ork, and understanding as a friend and colleague. Man y other FT colleagues deserv e my thanks. I w ould single out: Martin Neilson, Bernie Flynn, Helen Timpson, and Celia Clack; Richard Lambert for letting me go; and John Ridding for bringing me back. Pradeep Jethi ga ve me some much-needed insights into the publishing market. David de Haan, the Deputy Director of Ironbridge Gor ge Museum Trust, took time out to e xplain the Darby dynasty , and Lorna Davidson, of Ne w Lanark Conserv ation Trust, shared her extensive knowledge of Robert Owen. Peter Starb uck, probably the UK’s most knowledgeable individual on the life and w ork of Peter Druck er, prompted man y new a venues of inquiry . Robert Taylor, employment editor of the Financial Times, has pro ved a reliable source of e xpertise. Martin Wood at Board-level Interim Executive explained to me the history and signif cance of interim management. Charles Handy , Peter Druck er, and Joseph Juran all spared time to share with me their personal philosophies. Stephen Blinkhorn and Robert McHenry pro vided much needed clarity on the usefulness and limitations of psychometric testing. Chris Dyson, Le x Melzer, and Russell Hobby of Hay Management Consultants allo wed me to tap their considerable e xperience of the competenc y mo vement and e xecutive pay . Eric Duffelen and Duncan Bro wn, of Towers Perrin, were equally helpful in e xtending their pay e xpertise. Geof f Armstrong and x

Acknowledgments his staff at the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development remained consistently helpful throughout. The British Library staff deserv e enormous praise for the w ay the y deli ver one of the w orld’s greatest research services. I must also thank here the librarians at the Elton Collection, Ironbridge; the Henry Ford Museum, Greenf eld Village; the Chicago History Society; the Ne w Harmon y Library; the Wiener Library , London; the Germantown History Society; Bethlehem Library; and Woking Library. Will and K enneth Hopper took time out of their o wn project on the contribution of Japanese management to mak e some telling points on the de velopment of scientif c management in the USA and Japan. Liz Ann Borden, Hugh Torrens, and Crispin Tickell ga ve their time, e xplaining the story of Mary Anning. The archi vists at Lucent Technologies shared with me some valuable documents on the w ork of US engineers helping to restore management discipline in post-Second World War Japan. Masaharu Matsushita found time to outline his memories of the Ci vil Communications Section seminars, while Professor Hajime Karatsu of Tokai University loaned me his cop y of the groundbreaking NBC documentary If Japan Can Why Can’ t We. Yoshihiro Kitade ya lent v aluable assistance at Matsushita Electrical. My thanks too to Da vid Erdal for sharing his per spectives on cooperati ve working in Italy and Dr Da vid Hill at the University of Manchester , who e xplained the background to the Julian Work Calendar . Dr Barry Alpha, Timothy Bottoms, Jerry Mission, and Vol Norris made my trip to Ka wanyama so w orthwhile and enjo yable. John Lord, an e xpert f int knapper, provided a living link to the skills of the Neolithic Age, and Mark Roberts w as happy to reli ve for me the e xcitement of the Boxgrove discoveries. I w ant to e xtend a special thank you to Chay Blyth, Da vid Tomkinson, the management of 3Com, the compan y, and my fellow crew members on board 3Com, the yacht, for deli vering a ne ver-to-be-forgotten e xperience which inspired a number of the ideas in this book. Valuable inspiration and support w as also extended by Clare Neal, who helped me to clarify the issues sur rounding my career break.

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Acknowledgments Warm thanks also to Dennis Kilcommons, a great writer and one of my oldest friends, who enlightened this story with his extensive kno wledge of the Luddite mo vement. Philippe F alle, another great friend and a f ne photographer, endured an exhausting and sometimes harrowing trip to the east of Poland in winter, which w ould ha ve been an impossible undertaking without his help. Above all I must thank Warren Bennis, whose friendship and advice ha ve been immeasurable in helping me to handle the Byzantine dealings of the international publishing mark et. Finally I want to thank my wife, Gillian, for her encouragement, understanding, and sensiti ve support in reading the manuscript as it de veloped, and my children, John, Robert, and Geor ge, simply for being there. Richard Donkin

INTRODUCTION

My grandmother w as a strong w oman, unf altering in her judgment on the merits of w ork. “Mak e w ay for the w orkers,” she would say as my f ather came home from the steel w orks wearing his blue overalls and cloth cap, a knapsack hanging from his shoulder. Dad recei ved a hero’ s welcome in mark ed contrast to the disdain that grandma displayed for my o wn efforts at school. “There’s too much education, ” she insisted. “There will al ways have to be the w orkers.” I kne w what she meant by this. There was something solid and reassuring about the blue-collared masses f ling from the f actory gate. There was a sense of order and continuity punctuated by the f actory hooter and the unchallenged certainty of the clocking-on machine. From 1945 to 1975 my f ather w orked as an electric welder for the same emplo yer, a steel f abrication compan y. Returning from the army to claim back his job at the end of the Second World War, he found a young w oman, dressed in overalls, doing the work he used to do. So he married her, and she returned willingly to the chore-f lled domestic existence of the housewife. The steel w orks w as a dirty , cold, noisy place. Dad w orked there for most of his adult life, unquestioning, carrying out his job. Sometimes he w orked during the day and sometimes he worked nights. It didn’ t matter much. Little natural light w as able to f lter through the shed’s grime-covered skylights. Just after the w ar his main job in volved making angle brackets for the holds of Grimsby f shing boats, allo wing the cre ws to separate their catches. F or this he w as paid a “piece rate” – a f xed price for each brack et based on the time it could be reasonably e xpected to tak e an indi vidual to complete the w ork. My father worked quickly. “We made good mone y on that job, ” he said. Later his welding w ork switched to constructing girders in a w ay that maintained their strength while reducing their steel content. Some days the w ork was so hot his welding shield collected his sweat like a bucket. xiii

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Introduction Mum and dad’ s f rst child w as a daughter the y called Janet. On a rare outing, the y took her to the seaside as a four -year-old. There, playing in the w aves, she contracted polio. The disease withered one of her le gs and left her with an acute curv ature of the spine and one functioning lung. My parents had no car , so the care and upbringing of a disabled daughter and two energetic boys must ha ve been a struggle. But it ne ver seemed so. There was never any talk of layoffs or redundancy. Our family life was relatively free of such anxieties. This was that golden age of almost full emplo yment after the war. Not until dad had retired in the mid-1970s did the axe begin to fall among the smokestack industries in the North of England. The steel w orks closed, the Grimsby tra wlers were brok en up and scrapped or sold. Those great industries – te xtiles, steel, shipbuilding, and coal mining, stal warts of Britain’ s Industrial Revolution – all be gan to crumble. Man y of those queuing for benef ts had never known unemployment. Grandma w as dead by then. She had gone to her gra ve unf inching in the certainty of her beliefs. Ho w meaningless and hollow her mantra had become. “There will always have to be the workers.” We knew who the workers were. They were the factory masses, usually unionized, blue-collared labor . The Financial Times w as the f rst UK ne wspaper to recognize their strength with its daily labor pages, pack ed with stories of disputes, pay deals, and trade union ne ws. Six journalists, dedicated to labor reporting, were supplying this demand when I joined the ne wspaper in 1987. Today there is no individual brief for employment. Instead there is a b usiness and emplo yment editor . The labor pages have gone because labor, as we knew it only 30 years ago, no longer e xists. The lines of men and w omen streaming from the f actory gates ha ve dwindled to a trickle, the massed ranks of years gone by ha ve f aded lik e ghosts into the computerized, robot-dominated machine shops of automated manufacturing. Something has happened to the w ay we work, something far more fundamental than changes arising from dere gulation and the easing of industrial relations’ legislation. Grandma was right in one sense. There are still people w orking and there is still work to be done, but not so much that would f t with her notion of work.

Introduction Once there w as w ork, and what we understood as w ork w as what we were paid to be doing. Today there is what we do, and sometimes the benef ts to our employer of what we do are unclear. Sometimes it is diff cult to think of what we do as w ork, and sometimes there seems to be so much w ork to shift that we feel overwhelmed. Once we may have left our work behind. Today we take it with us in our cellphones, our BlackBerries, our memory sticks, and our computers. Our working life is woven, warp across weft, into the texture of our domestic existence. For 15 years now, the subject of work has been my work, writing on all the things that people do to f nd workers (recruitment, headhunting, testing), all the things that are done to encourage work (pay raises, promotion, incenti ves, perks, recognition), and all the w ays that people are mo ved out of structured b udgeted work (do wnsizing, redundanc y, f ring, and outplacement). The more I write, the more I ask myself this recurring question: Why on earth do we do it? Why, at least, do we do so much of it? Whenever I have confronted the question why?, my response has been, where ver possible, to get back to f rst principles. This is not so easy with w ork. It has been around f ar longer than the human race itself, emerging in its organized form in the practices of our early ancestors. Today we seem to tak e the need to w ork for granted. Some would ar gue that it is a psychological necessity . Man y w ould argue that the only reason the y work is to earn a li ving. What is a living? One def nition might be an income suff cient to house, clothe, and feed a f amily unsupported by welf are supplements. But a verage incomes in Western industrialized society among the ever-broadening middle class can provide a standard of living far be yond that def nition. So maybe we w ork to progress in some way, to better our children and ourselves. This may help to explain why – in addition to our paid work – we w ork in the garden, w ash the car , decorate the house, and make the beds, e ven why we carry out v oluntary w ork in the community. Some of this w ork may be necessary to maintain domestic order, but some might more properly be called lifestyle enhancement. In some cases we may be f lling some inner need for recognition and respect that we cannot obtain in our paid work. It is clear that we w ork for man y dif ferent reasons. But

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Introduction work we do, heads do wn, fulf lling daily routines and rituals in the belief – often without an y great con viction – that someho w our contributions are helping to make a better world. We grew up during the last half-century in the certainty that all the great technological adv ances – robots, computers, the Internet, the silicon chip – would save labor and thus create more leisure time. Today we are no longer so sure. Just as motorw ays created more traff c, technology has created more industries and yet more w ork. There seems to be an e xponential relationship between what can be described loosely as “progress” and work. In the f rst part of the twentieth century this might ha ve seemed a good thing, because the regulated structure and factorybased nature of manuf acturing emplo yment dictated that more work equated to more jobs. These jobs were needed for gro wing populations, boosted by health impro vements and as yet unchecked by reliable and widely a vailable contraception. But the last decade of the twentieth century witnessed a dismantling of this structure and an erosion of the concept of the job, that neat package of w ork which had def ned much of the emplo yment of the pre vious two to three hundred years. The f rst decade of the twenty-f rst century has only reinforced the trend with the globalization of w ork through the of fshoring of labor, increased labor migration, and the commoditization of many jobs. Such changes ha ve led to a belief that in the ne w century the inf uence of computers and the Internet is creating a w atershed in the w ay we w ork as fundamental as that of the Industrial Revolution and the earlier Agrarian Re volution ten thousand years ago, when people developed the ability to raise crops. While academics argue over the evidence for changes in work systems – the debates ha ve been running for se veral years o ver whether job turnover is increasing or whether the rise in f exible working really is as mark ed as some ha ve suggested – society across the Western w orld appears to be di viding increasingly into the haves and have-nots. This is not, however, simply a picture of rich and poor or emplo yed and unemplo yed. The United States is witnessing the phenomenon of the working poor, people whose work provides them with insuff cient income on which to live. At the same time there are chief e xecutives of big publicly quoted companies who ha ve seen their salaries and bonuses rise

Introduction so much that the y are earning 500 times more than their lo west paid employees. The redistribution of wealth has be gun to look like “trickle up” rather than “trickle down.” The craziness is that some of these highly paid indi viduals are working such long hours they rarely have the opportunity to step outside their jobs and enjoy a moment’s leisure. There used to be parts of our li ves we could de vote solely to play and leisure, but these precious days, once sacrosanct, ha ve been in vaded by the ne w communications of the w ork place. So often today , play is no longer di vorced from w ork. I ha ve sat alongside an FTSE 100 compan y chief, f shing by the ri verbank – a form of work in itself, converted into relaxation – listening to him giving instructions on his cellphone. Standing ne xt to him w as a Scottish ghillie – the ri ver keeper employed by the landowner to look after the w ater and assist the anglers. “Ghillie” is a Gaelic word, meaning “servant.” On the river, however, the ghillie is the master of the company boss. Out of his b usiness en vironment the e xecutive is happ y to assume the role of apprentice. This change of role is subtle but signif cant. We must recognize that we have different roles in different situations. In Finland, schoolchildren are teaching their teachers in computing skills. In the ne w w orkplace authority is in vested in kno wledge, and kno wledge is dissipated throughout society . It is not the exclusive preserve of the rich or the privileged. Work has come to dominate the li ves of the salaried masses, so much so that the y are losing the ability to play . It is as if the world has become split into tw o societies – one with the means to enjoy leisure b ut not the time, and one that has the time b ut not the means. Of course people still have their sports and pastimes. But when the salaried classes play today , they often condense their leisure into “leisure snacks. ” A party that w ould once ha ve lasted all evening is shortened into a two-hour cocktail session. Meanwhile, “work snacks” are tak en during leisure hours, as deals are negotiated on cellphones during breaks in the football game. Either way, the chunks of a vailable time in today’ s “sound-bite” society are shortened to match our shrinking attention span. In his book, The T ime Machine , H. G. Wells imagined a future society which at some stage in its de velopment had taken

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Introduction divergent paths, one in which the hedonist aristocrac y and leisure seek ers had de volved into a people of childlik e innocence and nai vety – he called them the Eloi – and one in which the laborers and mechanics, a manual underclass, had de generated into troglodyte cannibalistic Morlocks trapped in a nether w orld of darkness and noise. He need not ha ve w orried. The laborer now seems as endangered a species as the blue whale. Neither has the aristocrac y prospered. The middle class has inherited the earth. It is a class that has successfully blended the industry of the Morlocks with the domestication of the Eloi, as dependent on its w ork as a co w is dependent on its f eld. The big dif ference is that cattle are herded into the f eld, whereas people go willingly and shut the gate behind them. We ha ve become willing prisoners in what Max Weber, the German economist, called the “iron cage” of consumer and production dri ven materialism.1 At the da wn of a ne w century, as we tra vel on the commuter train, wearing our suits, reading our ne wspapers, and carrying our briefcases, are these troglodyte traits be ginning to erode the roots of happiness in an insatiable pursuit of wealth and position? It w as W. H. Da vies, the itinerant poet, who wrote: “A poor life this if, full of care, We have no time to stand and stare.” Some years ago Juliet Schor , a Harv ard economist, disco vered in the research for her book, The Overworked American, that in the twenty years to 1992 the w orking hours of the a verage employee in the USA had increased by the equivalent of one month per year . Americans were choosing mone y o ver time. 2 Something appears to have gone terribly wrong with the w ay we work. The UK’s Ro yal Society for the Encouragement of Arts, Manufactures and Commerce went so f ar as to publish a report, Redef ning Work, which called for radical reforms to the infrastructure of society underpinning traditional forms of working.3 We ha ve reached the stage where the w ay we w ork needs not only ne w def nitions b ut also ne w e xplanations and under standings. It is important not just for us as indi viduals b ut for those who employ our skills. People today are often described as assets. Is that what we are – li ving, breathing assets, trapped and cocooned in the corporate and public sector webs that generate our incomes?

Introduction Charles Handy, the management writer , had predicted a portfolio society where people w ould live a kind of freelance e xistence, bundling together bits of w ork rather than holding do wn a traditional job . This seemed a logical alternati ve to the job, driven by demands for an indi vidual’s expertise, but as any actor or freelance writer can attest, the portfolio does not help when seeking a mortgage on the strength of it. Only those portfolio w orkers who can demonstrate consistent employment over several years are going to be regarded by lending institutions on equal terms with those who ha ve so-called permanent jobs. The infrastructure supporting the w ay we w ork has not caught up with this technological re volution, placing extraordinary pressures on the w orking lives of those in temporary or short-term positions. Technology no w allo ws a gro wing proportion of the population to w ork where it chooses, b ut attitudes to w ork remain rooted in the “nine to f ve” off ce model. Ev en the language of work dra ws upon outmoded def nitions. The phrase “w orking from home” seems contradictory to man y who associate home with leisure and domestic concerns. It is as if there is a great demarcation in time and space that many believe they must cross in their daily commute. Ev en those who ha ve made the psychological break into home-w orking are struggling, f aced with the need to stay in touch with others. For millions of working people the emancipation promised by information technology has f ailed to materialize. Instead the y f nd themselves ensnared by the demands of modern communication and the Internet. Voice mail, emails, the BlackBerry , and instant messaging ha ve disrupted the en vironment for concentrated work. In the information society w ork can be in visible. Ho w do you reward the emplo yee who is “thinking” o ver a w ork-related problem? Is this “thinking” not w ork? And what of the off ce gossip who might perform a more ef fective communications function than any management memo? Is that work? There is a desperate need for a ne w psychology of w ork, a thorough dismantling of the old demarcations between w ork and leisure. Just as sports professionals are paid for what the y enjoy doing, there must be some recognition by all emplo yers that

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Introduction work can be fun and that there is a corporate necessity to mak e it so. At John Lewis, the UK retailer, the happiness of employees is considered a management priority. There’s the nub of it. Work can be stressful and taxing and boring and painful, b ut it can also be fun. So should we feel guilty for having fun in our work? Perhaps not, but we do, because most of Western society has become immersed in the Protestant w ork ethic – an ethos that has def ned work for man y people for hundreds of years, creating the belief among most of us that w ork is toil, that it is actually something we w ould rather not be doing but that we kno w we must do, ne vertheless, because therein lies salv ation; there is virtue in its accomplishment. This is the ethic that lea ves no confusion about w ork, because w ork is categorized, pigeonholed, and def ned. This is the ethic that def nes work for work’s sake, the ethic of job creation. Challenging the Protestant work ethic, particularly inAmerican society, has become a heresy . Suggesting that we might enjo y more leisure time, or asking the question “Why do we w ork?,” is looked upon with scorn and suspicion, as the language of the shirker. In the w orld described by the Protestant w ork ethic there are those who w ork and those who are idle, and some of those who are idle, we all kno w, are idle because the y choose to be, and idleness from choice is a sin. But what of those whose work has been in vain or misdirected or downright destructive – scientists who struggle all their w orking lives on some false premise, architects who create ugly tower blocks, loggers who destroy the rain forest, soldiers whose w ork and expertise involve taking life in some pointless war? What, also, of those whose w ork has been w asted – designers whose ideas are dismissed, writers whose books are not published, painters who destro y their w ork in despair? Some of this can be e xplained as training or necessary preparation for some later great w ork. It w as the American artist J. A. McNeill Whistler who reminded a critic that his fees were based on “the knowledge of a lifetime.” But much effort, indeed, is lost or misdirected in the makework society. It sometimes seems as if there is no longer an y working class. We are all middle class no w. Yet, ask ed in a recent UK surv ey to describe their status, most people opted for the def nition

Introduction “working class. ”4 Why should we be surprised at such results when w ork has come to dominate our e xistence? Dual-income couples toil in off ces to f nance pri vate schooling, to pay for nannies to rear their children, gardeners to tend their la wns, and domestic cleaners to k eep their houses. Work has run out of kilter. It is messing up our lives. People are yearning for the opportunity to re gain some balance in their lives but governments and companies appear blinkered to this daily struggle. Social security systems are structured for a society of emplo yed and unemplo yed. Yet impo verishment is e verywhere, not the grinding po verty of hunger and hopelessness, b ut the po verty of riches. Our li ves are chok ed with work. How did it get like this? The aim of this book is to e xamine, using a historical per spective, the e volution of w ork from the earliest times and the impact of great w atersheds of de velopment. It will look at early societies, sla very, the guilds, the creation of trade secrets, and the inf uence of religion on work, examining the humanist ideals of the great Quak er industrialists and the ideas of theorists lik e F. W. Taylor, Max Weber, Elton Mayo, Mary Parker Follett, Peter Drucker, and W. Edwards Deming. It will look at where we ha ve been and where we are going. Finally it will suggest some ideas for adjusting our outlook on work and its role in our lives.

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CHAPTER 1

Hands to the Grindstone Two roads diverged in a wood, and I – I took the road less traveled by, And that has made all the difference. (Robert Frost, 1874–1963) Some years ago on a h ike in t he English La ke District with my two eldest sons, we struck out off the path to climb a scree slope on the southern side of Pike O’Stickle, a conical peak near the head of the Langdale Valley. The steep slope is covered in shards of hard blue rock. Some of the pieces have distinctive chips down a n arrow ed ge, s igns t hat t hey w ere o nce w orked b y a h uman hand. These are the discards from a S tone Age axe quarry sited where the hard rock outcrops near the peak. Just how the rock was mined and worked is unknown. The outcrop is nearly two thousand feet above the valley f oor. A s mall shelter h as be en h ewn i nto t he r ock n earby. I t i s n ot k nown whether the shelter was associated with the workings, but what is quite clear is that the mine was used regularly for extraction and the preparation of axes.1 Was t his a n ea rly f orm o f p roduction l ine i n w hich e xperts created tools and passed them on or traded them with other communities n earby?2 H owever t he w ork w as ac hieved, w hether i t involved individuals, specialist teams, or family groups, it was industry in every sense of the word. But by the Neolithic period we should expect such organization. This, a fter a ll, w as t he pe riod w hen peo ple w ere c onstructing Stonehenge. To f nd the origins of work itself we must look back much further, since our ancestors had been perfecting recognizable s kills f ar ea rlier t han t he S tone A ge, po ssibly t o t he v ery dawn of humanity when hominids were beginning to spread out 1

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The History of Work of Africa. Was life at that time really so “solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short,” as Thomas Hobbes would have it? The notion of humanity’s miserable existence in an early struggle for survival has long proved attractive to those who are unable to conceive of evolution as anything less than progressive. The evidence f or c ontinual i mprovement s eems o verwhelming, p articularly i n te chnology, w here o nly t he v ery ea rliest i nventions s uch as t he ability to create f re, ma ke rope, a nd t ie k nots continue to evade our detection. The evidence accumulated from the discovery of f int and stone artifacts, however, means that we now know from discoveries i n T anzania’s O lduvai Go rge t hat o ur a ncestors h ad learned to use rudimentary tools as early as 2,500,000 years ago.3 We have come a l ong way since then. But what k ind of route did w e t ake? Was i t f orever o nwards a nd u pwards? Is t he w ay we l ive n ow i mmeasurably i mproved f rom t hat w hich e xisted when t he d ifferentiation between ma n a nd beast may have been little m ore t han t he c ombination o f i nventiveness, c hance, a nd motivation? S uff cient e vidence i s e merging f rom re mains o f human ac tivity g oing b ack 5 00,000 y ears t o s uggest t hat ea rly hominids ma y h ave s truggled l ess t han f ashionable t hinking would once h ave h ad u s believe. So much so t hat we may h ave to alter the way we think about progression and regression. Even the a bility t o walk o n t wo feet h as be en s een t o h ave its d rawbacks, a lthough G raham R ichards, t he a nthropologist, pe rhaps went too far when he wrote some years ago that bipedalism did not so much free the hands as enslave the feet.4 But the comment did remind us that progression in one direction can and often does lead to regression in others. One person’s technological re volution i s a nother pe rson’s d e-skilling. Is t his always for t he be st? R ichards’s point was p robably m eant t o be mischievous. T he a bility t o walk g ave o ur a ncestors t he o pportunity to spread themselves over a far greater range. It gave them the f exibility t o c ome d own f rom t he t rees a t wi ll. W alking would h ave be en g radually t ransformed b y e volution f rom a n acquired to a n innate ability a nd, for some, to a j oy. Most of us can e xperience t he j oy o f w alking, e ven t oday. W hy, t hen, d o people continue to be obsessed by the idea of taking short cuts? This is one of the underlying questions of this book, one that the m embers o f s ome h ouseholds a nd t he d irectors o f s ome

Hands to the Grindstone businesses m ight ask t hemselves occasionally. W hy take a s hort cut w hen y ou e njoy w alking? T he a nswer o f c ourse i s t hat w e must f orget t he e njoyment w hen t he s hort c ut a llows u s t o g et there faster, beating the other guy, the one who for some unfathomable reason chose the path less traveled by. But what happens when we get there? Is the “being there” as good as the getting there? When Neil Armstrong put his foot on the moon he spoke of “one small step” and “one giant leap.” It was the step, the leap, the getting there that occupied his mind. The a rtifacts o f p rehistory c annot po ssibly te ll u s e verything about the lifestyles, the character, and the priorities of our ancestors, but, as w e shall see, t hey do provide clues which can be matched with what we know about the lifestyles of those who have not obviously changed their patterns of living beyond those offered by hunter-gathering. The Y ir Y oront t ribe o f A borigines w ho l ive a t t he m outh of t he C oleman R iver o n t he Ca pe York P eninsula i n N orthern Australia h ad n ot d eveloped te chnologies be yond s tone a xes before t heir f rst c ontact wi th E uropean m issionaries i n 1 903.5 They w ere g enuine h unter-gatherers, re lying o n g ame a nd f sh that they caught and vegetables they found growing wild in the bush. T heir a xes w ere mad e f rom s tone q uarried f our h undred miles to the south, but they were able to trade for them through a succession of middlemen.6 Their currency was spears tipped with the barbs of stingrays. Who is to say that some similar trade did not occur in Neolithic Europe? Was t his h unter-gathering l ifestyle n ecessarily s o a rduous? Richard Lee, an anthropologist who spent f fteen months with a tribe of Ka lahari bushmen, noted t hat t he adults spent no m ore than two or three days each week f nding food.7 Men who were out of luck in the hunt would give up and spend time talking with their neighbors or dancing. The Hadza people in Africa managed to l imit t heir hunting to two hours a da y, on average, preferring to spend more time in diversionary pursuits such as gambling. “Hadza men se em mor e conc erned wi th g ames o f c hance t han chances o f g ame,” wr ote M arshall S ahlins, t he a nthropologist, who went so far as to describe hunter-gatherers as “the original aff uent society.” What would Thomas Hobbes have made of such remarks?

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The History of Work The Y ir-Yoront d o n ot ma ke a ny g reat d istinction be tween work a nd play. T hey d o h ave a w ord – “w oq” – t hat i s u sed t o refer to various tasks and chores.8 But the chores – this woq – did not include hunting. Hunting, the most fundamental activity in a hunter-gathering society, was not viewed as w ork.9 Work in this society seemed to be viewed as something they would rather not be d oing. Is n’t t his c oncept – s omething I w ould ra ther n ot be doing – one of the most recognizable def nitions of work for most of u s? A nd w hat i f i t i s? S urely i n o ur s ophisticated world, we may a rgue, t here i s nothing we c an learn f rom peo ple, whether ancient or modern, whose lives were so basic. How can we compare the needs and desires of hominids with our own? Mankind has ma rched s o c onf dently t hrough t he m illennia t hat its ea rliest experiences c an be n othing b ut a n i mprint i n o ur genes. O r are we closer to our origins than we think? Perhaps we can learn something from the meager evidence left behind by our ancestors of their existence. It i s n ot s o l ong a go t hat we d escribed t hese ea rly peo ple as subhuman. T here w ere t hose d etractors w ho s eized u pon t he romantic notion of man the hunter – John Dryden’s “noble savage” – only to ha ve t heir j udgment q uestioned b y t heories s uggesting that early hominids were scavengers who competed with hyenas and other carnivores foraging for the remains of some fresh kill.10 The debate over humanity’s progression along the pecking order continues, but evidence is accumulating to suggest that, if scavenging was practiced, the hominid had also become a h unter by the time he moved out of Africa. The 1 997 d iscovery i n S chöningen, Ge rmany, o f t hree 400,000-year-old w ooden s pears, t he o ldest c omplete h unting weapons found to date, is surely enough to restore man the hunter to his pedestal. The spruce spears, one of which measured seven feet i n length, were s urrounded by t he re mains of a t least fourteen horses. These remains showed signs that the horses had been butchered, suggesting that the archeologists had found some kind of preparation station, where spears were sharpened for the hunt and m eat f rom successful k ills was cut up a nd po ssibly c ooked for consumption.11 It n ow a ppears t hat t he f rst h ominids to co lonize n orthern Europe were not, as some had thought, opportunistic scavengers

Hands to the Grindstone reacting t o c ircumstances i n a h aphazard f ashion. T hey w ere hunters wi th a n e lement o f s ophistication a nd o rganization i n the w ay t hey w ent a bout t heir w ork. We h ave n ot o nly d iscovered ma n t he h unter, b ut ma n t he w orker. Is i t t oo f anciful t o believe that these hominids could have formed pioneering bands of c olonization? T hey ma y h ave i ncluded t he m ost s killed a nd adventurous spirits of their time. The wooden spears mentioned were constructed with care. The tips were carved from the base of the tree where the wood was hardest a nd m ost d ense, weighting t hem pe rfectly for t hrowing. Similarly, albeit at a much later date toward the end of the Stone Age, the Lake District site had been chosen specially because of the q uality of t he s tone. T he o utcrop c an o nly be reac hed a fter some tough climbing. Some of the most convincing evidence of highly skilled work, dating back some half a million years, has been discovered in quarry sites a t t he West Sussex vi llage of Boxgrove i n t he U K, where archeologists have unearthed eight hundred f int handaxes. Some w ere e xpertly crea ted a nd s ome, as N ick As hton, a f int tool specialist at the British Museum points out, were less well made, “as if experts and novices were working side by side.”12 The d exterity n eeded i n h and-axe c onstruction s hould n ot be u nderrated. T he p rocess u sed t o w ork a f int nodule by striking away shavings – u sually using a bo ne hammer – u ntil t he required shape a nd sharpness h ave be en achieved i s c alled f int knapping. Francis Wenban-Smith, an archeologist who has mastered t hese k napping s kills, d escribes h and-axe c onstruction as a n a rt. He l ikens t he skill to playing chess, be cause t he a xemaker needs to think some f ve or six moves ahead when making blows to shape the tool.13 Most o f th e B oxgrove h and-axes, th ough o vate w ith o ne pointed edge, have a t apered shape, like that of a d iscus, sharpened around their entire perimeter. When the Boxgrove archeologists asked a professional butcher to use one for cutting meat, he handled i t wi th eas e. T he s hape a llowed h im t o c ut wi th c omfortable sweeping motions. He found he did not need to hold it f rmly, which might have led to him suffering cuts to his hand. It is possible that the f ints may have had some other use, but all the evidence at Boxgrove points toward butchery.

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The History of Work Mark R oberts, t he s ite d irector, h as d escribed t he b utchery area as a m eat-processing s ite.14 T he e vidence i s c ompelling. Unlike many other paleontological sites, this one involved examining a n a lmost pe rfectly p reserved l evel o f l and. T he l and, buried by d ebris f rom a c ollapsed cliff a nd successive l ayers of glacial d eposits, h ad be en vi rtually u ndisturbed f or 5 00,000 years. T he f ints w ere f ound w here t hey h ad be en d iscarded. From the arrangement of shards of f int on the ground it was possible to detect in which position the k napper had been sitting as he worked on the tool. Knapping is an acquired art. John Lord, an expert knapper who often gives lessons to students, says that even after a week’s practice novices a re ra rely competent enough to fashion a h andaxe with the level of skill used on the Boxgrove axes. “The one thing t hese ea rly peo ple h ad w hich w e l ack t oday,” s ays L ord, “is time. They could take the time to make their tools properly.” While the sex of the toolmakers is not known, Lord believes that some may have been women. “Women seem to pick up the skill more quickly than men,” he says.15 In t heir boo k, Fairweather E den, M ichael P itts a nd M ark Roberts describe the way that the archeological team at Boxgrove was able to map out a specif c area. From the positioning of f ints around t he bo nes of a h orse t hey were a ble t o re construct what must be one of the earliest examples of people engaged in organized work. Grooves made from the butchery were clearly visible in t he h orse bo nes. “ The h orse r ose f rom t he d rawings, h eavy on t he g round,” t hey wr ite, “ surrounded b y s quatting f gures, knapping their f int knives.” With justif able pride they note that “nowhere, never, had anyone before seen anything like this. Not for half a million years, anyway.”16 The site was based on a p lain at the foot of chalk cliffs on an area of l and t hat i n even ea rlier t imes h ad be en c overed by t he sea. W hether t hose w ho w orked t here l ived i n t he i mmediate area or on a higher and more protected site nearby is unknown, but the excavation found no remains of burial or habitation. Two teeth and a tibia were found, conf rming beyond doubt the hominid presence. Were these ea rly commuters who walked home to a safer shelter a fter a da y of hunting a nd foraging on t he plain? Clearly t he d exterity o f t hese h ominids c annot be d ismissed as

Hands to the Grindstone the brutish efforts of beasts at the lower end of the evolutionary scale. People a nd t heir a ncestors h ave be en c apable of a pplying their brains to carry out work for hundreds of thousands of years. The ingenuity of the people who created houses from mammoth bones a t a n umber o f s ites i n eas tern E urope t wenty t housand years a go d emonstrates t hat t he a rt o f b uilding h as a l ong a nd creative history.17 Would specialization have been attached to the work of some individuals, designated as builders, perhaps? This s eems t o h ave be en t he c ase a mong t hose re sponsible for c ave a rt. T he s eventeen-thousand-year-old c ave p aintings a t Lascaux, i n s outhern F rance, w ere crea ted b y i ndividuals w ho could d emonstrate rea l a rtistic t alent. T hey d isplayed a mas tery of techniques such as s tenciling and the use of shading to create a t hree-dimensional re presentation. Working by t he l ight of t allow lamps, the Lascaux artists showed so much technical ability that P rofessor A ndré L eroi-Gourhan, a s pecialist i n French prehistoric a rt, ha s desc ribed t hem a s “professionals.”18 Cr aftsmen, he believes, would have been released from other duties to create these paintings. By the time they began their work they could already draw on thousands of years of experience. Paintings found in the Chauvet Cave in th e A rdeche, d ated s ome thir ty-two th ousand y ears ago, reveal t hat even at t his stage people had developed a n ability t o crea te a f aithful re presentation o f s hape a nd f orm. T hey also understood t he r ules of perspective. T he f nest illuminators of m edieval ma nuscripts c ould not re produce a nything l ike t his realism. T he Aurignacian people responsible for t his work were also carving ivory f gurines of animals and fantasy f gures, such as ma n-beasts. S uch f gurines, da ted t o t he s ame pe riod as t he Chauvet c ave p aintings, h ave be en found i n t he Volgelherd a nd Hohlenstein-Stadel sites in the Danube river valley. A bo ne f ute has be en f ound i n a f urther c ave a t Ge issenklosterle.19 By t he time that art appeared at Lascaux, people were already weaving textiles.20 We k now f rom the Renaissance that when a p articular talent, such as p ainting, i s p rized b y a s ociety, i t c an s timulate a c ultural f owering in which skills and abilities are transferred across whole po pulations, b ut t hese s kills ma y n ot a lways be re tained where s ocieties a re e xposed t o t he e bb a nd f ow o f c ompeting

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The History of Work inf uences. According to Alice Kelly, an aboriginal woman interviewed i n National G eographic magazine, “ all A borigines a re born artists.” She told her interviewer: “You would be too, but your c ulture h as d riven i t o ut o f y ou.”21 I t se ems t hat at v arious s tages i n h uman h istory peo ple h ave d eveloped re markable skills th en lost th em. E ither th at or th e skills h ave simply b een discarded as n o l onger i mportant. W e m ust reas sess o ur a ttitudes t o ea rly s ocieties. As o ur k nowledge o f u nrecorded h istory acc umulates w e be gin t o u nderstand t he s ophistication o f Stone A ge peo ple. T hey h ad be come acc omplished h unters, farmers, and artists. They had medical skills and had developed rituals a nd s piritual be liefs. T hey u nderstood t he s easons a nd weather patterns. They towered over the land, conquerors of their environment. Stone Age society was witnessing the emergence of industrial people. The ability to quarry and mine, for example, had become both specialized and organized by the time that Neolithic people began constructing t he f int m ines at G rimes G raves i n Norfolk (where a xes f rom La ngdale, s ome 3 00 m iles a way, h ave be en discovered, reinforcing t he notion of a h ealthy Neolithic t rading society) somewhere between 2,800 and 1,800 bc. By these dates humanity had created or embarked on some of the greatest undertakings in history. They had built the city of Ur and i ts g reat zi ggurat, t he p yramids a t Giza, a nd t he s tone c ircle of Stonehenge. How did the earliest industries emerge? Were people born to work? Was work a means to an end? Or had work, even t hen, be come a n ecessary c onstituent o f s elf-fulf llment? The e xperience o f t he Y ir Y oront s uggests t hat t he d evelopment of t he t ool p re-dates a ny rea l u nderstanding o f w ork as a concept. There was what needed to be done. It was a way of life. As Richard Lee and Irven De Vore wrote after a 1966 conference in Ch icago h ad re newed i nterest i n ea rly l ifestyles: “ Cultural Man h as be en o n Ea rth f or s ome t wo m illion y ears; f or o ver 99 percent of this period he has lived as a hunter-gatherer.” They called the hunting way of life “the most successful and persistent adaptation man has ever achieved.”22 So how did he ever come to be carrying a briefcase, following a dress code, and pushing buttons on a keyboard? And was it for the be st? I n t he 1950s Ca rleton C oon d rew a N eanderthal ma n

Hands to the Grindstone wearing a t rilby hat to emphasize how close he was i n looks to modern people, suggesting we wouldn’t look askance if we saw him on the subway. The only thing about the cartoon that looks out of place today is the trilby. But t here ma y be s omething e lse o ut o f p lace. W ould t he Neanderthal have t he same way of t hinking as t hose of us who were rea red i n h ouseholds w here t he n earest t hing t o h untergatherers a re t hose w hom w e d escribe as t he b readwinners? I f we look back to t hese ea rliest t imes we can see t hat work itself has a history, changing in nature and understanding, just as language, customs, and fashions have changed throughout the ages. What can this history tell us about the way we approach our work today? One important lesson is that the way we organize work should not be t aken for granted. Does work need a bo ss, a l eader, some director of operations? O r can it simply happen, d riven by need or desire or a spirit of cooperation? What can we learn from what has been discovered about the patterns of early societies? Many c ontemporary p aleo-archeologists a nd a nthropologists are c oming a round t o t he idea t hat t he h istory of c ivilization i s not characterized by a s teady upward curve of progress and that progress itself must be def ned with some ca re if we understand its meaning as a n ascent f rom barbarism. T here is growing evidence that some of the earliest societies had learned to coexist in a harmonious relationship. The late Marija Gimbutas aroused controversy among archeologists when she made a case for the existence of a pan-European civilization or iented to ward w omen. T his ci vilization, s he believed, f ourished for three thousand years between 6,500 and 3,500 bc. Discoveries of female eff gies at many Stone Age sites, and the arrangement of some burial sites which seem to represent the f emale f orm, h ave l ed t o a h ypothesis t hat ma ny E uropean Stone Age communities were centered on the woman as the giver of life. Ms Gimbutas – supported, it should be said, by sections of the feminist movement – used these discoveries to argue against a model of civilization based on a warrior-led hierarchical political and re ligious o rganization o verseeing a c omplex d ivision o f l abor. Societies h ad s hown t hey c ould t hrive, s he a rgued, b ased on b alanced a nd c ooperative a rrangements be tween m en a nd

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The History of Work women. Ce rtainly t he a rcheological d iscoveries a t Ça tal H üyük in Turkey, a S tone Age town founded more t han eight t housand years ago, suggest that Stone Age people were capable of organizing themselves with a degree of complexity suff cient to support a c ommunity e stimated a t a bout s even t housand peo ple. Ça tal Hüyük’s b uildings w ere m udbrick c onstructions a round t imber frames. The town was built close to a volcano, an important source o f o bsidian, u sed f or ma king c utting t ools a nd m irrors. The people were capable of making pottery and fabrics. One wall painting was created in the image of a geometric textile pattern. As Richard Rudgley points out in his book, Lost Civilizations of th e St one A ge, “ This s hows t hat w oven r ugs, w hat w e n ow know as k ilims, w ere i nnovations o f t he S tone A ge.”23 Ot her artifacts a nd i conography s uggest t hat t he peo ple o f t his s ite, too, e ngaged i n t he w orship o f s ome m other g oddess. Ex actly what led to Çatal Hüyük’s abandonment, after a period of settled development spanning more t han a t housand years, is not clear, but i t s eems t hat t his c ivilization, l ike t he m uch l ater R oman Empire, was overtaken by people who, to put it simply, chose to live differently.24 These c hanges a re s o o ften c haracterized as b arbaric i nvasions that we have become accustomed to view history as a story of c onquest. Even t he c ombined g enius of S tanley K ubrick a nd Arthur C. Clarke, in the opening to the f lm 2001, portrayed the f rst hominid discovery of the tool as a type of weapon to be used as a s ource of dominance of one group over another. As t he sun rises to t he t une of Thus Spake Z arathustra by R ichard Strauss an ani mal b one i s tr ansformed i n th e mi nd o f an a pe i nto a weapon with which it can subdue its enemies. The interpretation is u nderstandable e nough. I nnovation, t hroughout t he h istory of the l ast f ve t housand years, h as s o o ften be en s purred b y c onf ict and the urge of one society to prevail against another. Be it the longbow or the tank, there seems to be a common purpose of domination. Weaponry a nd warfare p re-dated t he s ociety of Ça tal Hüyük for sure. The earliest evidence of human conf ict has been found at W addi K ubbaniya i n t he N ile V alley, E gypt, w here a rcheologists h ave f ound t he t wenty-thousand-year-old s keleton o f a ma n k illed b y s pears.25 At that time, most of Europe was in

Hands to the Grindstone the g rip o f t he l ast I ce A ge, w hich w ould h ave f orced peo ple together in areas such as the Nile f ood plains, where they could still f nd f ood. Con f ict m ost p robably a rose o ut o f c ompetition for resources. When the ice retreated, providing increased living space, i t c ould w ell h ave crea ted t he c onditions f or a s ettled society. Kubrick w as e ngaged b y t he i dea o f h umanity’s i nability t o control a propensity to violence. His suggestion that our ancestor f rst picked up a stick in order to beat another ape over the head, however, is not supported by observation of the use of tools in the animal kingdom. Laying aside Kubrick and Clarke’s entertaining notion that human invention was triggered by aliens, their interpretation o f t his t ransformational d iscovery ove rlooks t he ove rwhelming evidence from the earliest hominid-related archeology that the tool, not the weapon, is the def ning symbol of humanity. Surely the plowshare came before the sword. The tool, after all, is simply a d evice to achieve an aim more effectively. Given that basic human needs are food, warmth, and shelter i t s eems reas onable t o s uggest t hat t he f rst t ools w ere used in the pursuit of such needs and that their use as weaponry, beyond t hat o f h unting, w as a l ater d evelopment. T he t ool, w e now know, is not the sole preserve of humans. Neither is the division of labor. Chimpanzees have been observed using stones to crack n uts a nd s ticks t o s earch o ut te rmites.26 Meerkats have a cooperative a rrangement i n wh ich t hey i nterchange r oles, s ometimes b urrowing f or f ood, s ometimes ac ting as l ookouts. Do meerkats o r c himpanzees re gard t heir t asks as w ork? Di d p it ponies who rarely saw the light of day as they pulled their heavy loads, and do carrier pigeons and guide dogs for the blind, have any i dea t hat w hat t hey a re d oing w ould be , i n h uman te rms, classed as work? The major distinction is that the chimpanzees are either helping t hemselves o r working for t he be nef t o f t heir s ocial g roup, whereas t he a nimals pressed into t he service of people a re constrained to do the bidding of others. Only people appear to have recognized a t s ome s tage in th eir hi story th at thin gs th ey were doing i nitially t o s ustain a nd e nhance t he q uality o f t heir l ives could be regarded as work. In that sense humanity is unique. But when did work begin to take on its biblical def nition as a burden,

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The History of Work something t hat ma n, i n h is p unishment, would be c ompelled t o suffer “in the sweat of thy face?”27 The g rindstone so c learly a ssociated wi th mo notonous labor can be dated back almost f fty thousand years.28 By the time the Natuf an c ulture o f t he L evant, t hat f ourished be tween 1 0,500 and 8,000 bc, had demonstrated the capabilities to process grain with m ortar a nd pe stle a nd s tore h arvests i n s ettled s ites, t he daily grind was already a well-established constituent of domestic living. At t he dawn of t he dynastic period of a ncient Egypt, t he age in which some historians would have us believe that civilization began,29 manual work, at least, had already come to be recognized as s omething t o be a voided b y t hose p rivileged e nough to escape its clutches. Moreover, people had d iscovered t hat t he slingshot c ould be a imed as read ily a t a n o pponent’s h ead as i t could at a threatening wolf. They h ad t asted c onquest. T hey h ad be gun t o e nslave eac h other. If ever there had been an Eden where people did what they had to do, free from any compulsion beyond that of satisfying their m ost b asic n eeds, b y t he t ime t he f rst P haraohs as sumed control over u pper a nd l ower E gypt, a ny s emblance o f s uch a n age of innocence had passed. Accumulating k nowledge o f p rehistoric s ociety i s re shaping our understanding of the past. It may also begin to inf uence our thinking about organizations a nd the way we work. Is t here a “ natural s tate” f or t he o rganization? Is a h ierarchical, s tatus driven s ociety a n atural p rogression o f ma nkind o r a s uccessful deviation that has held sway over the most creative yet, at the same time, destructive period of our existence? Is it time for us to consider some different path, one that, though less traveled, might lead us to a better accommodation between the way we work and the way we live and enjoy our lives? The crea tures t hat c ame d own f rom t he t rees a nd be gan t o roam upright over the land appear to have developed something beyond the need simply to survive. Uniquely they had the ability to oppose the foref nger precisely to the thumb. They were handy people and they seem to have moved with a s ense of purpose. If anything d rives o ur o rganizations t oday i t m ust be i n a s imilar sense that what they are doing has a common purpose to improve

Hands to the Grindstone the l ives of a ll t hose i nvolved with t he e ndeavor. I f t hey fail t o fulf ll this objective, then they, like some species of hominid, will in t ime reac h t heir o wn e volutionary d ead e nd. W hat e vidence of t heir i ndustry wi ll t he g reat c ommercial u ndertakings o f t he twentieth century leave behind them?

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CHAPTER 2

Fettered Lives Slavery they can have anywhere. It is a w eed that grows in every soil. (Edmund Burke, 1729–97) Whenever we try to create categories for anything we lose something. We lose the subtle shading, the variety that exists in almost every aspect of l ife. How often do we be come a ngered o r f rustrated w hen f aced wi th a c heck-box q uestionnaire o ffering u s no choice that really f ts the description we want to apply to the subject? Well, this box, we decide, is the closest, so we compromise or settle for checking the standard questionnaire miscellany box marked “other.” I f ound m yself e ncountering s imilar f rustration as I be gan to o pen t his c hapter wi th t he o bservation t hat a t s ome s tage i n his e volution t he h unter-gatherer a bandoned a n omadic l ifestyle f or t he m ore s ecure a rrangement o ffered b y s ubsistence farming. I a m sure this is true for some, but not for all. Huntergathering was not necessarily an exclusive activity. Some people who farmed would c ontinue t o h unt. Some peo ple who r oamed nomadically w ould p lant cr ops. S ome w ould r oam c ontinuously; s ome would p ut d own r oots for a w hile t hen r oam s ome more; some would put down roots and settle in one spot for the rest o f t heir l ives. T hese s tages i n h uman e volutionary be havior w ere wi tnessed b y t he ea rliest E uropean c olonists o f N ew England, who n oticed t hat t he n ative peo ple bo th planted cr ops and hunted.1 When historians talk, therefore, about the Agrarian Revolution or the Industrial Revolution, they are talking about a l arge-scale change i n l ifestyles b ut n ot a n e xclusive c hange. T he I ndustrial Revolution d id n ot p ut a n e nd t o f arming, j ust as t he A grarian Revolution d id n ot p ut a n e nd t o h unter-gathering o r n omadic lifestyles. 14

Fettered Lives The urge to categorize and def ne – very much a feature of masculine l eft-brained th inking – c ontinues t o c reate p roblems a nd unnecessary arguments. Did, for example, civilization begin with the ability to write and govern – two of the traditional pointers – or d id i t be gin wi th s ome re laxed ac knowledgment o f ce rtain “human” rights or behaviors grouped around some common purpose such as collective security or mutualism? If we accept the traditional view of civilization, that it emerged with th e r ecognizable f eatures o f th e o rdered s tate, w e m ust accept that one underlying feature of those states – the systematic use of slave labor – d id not re cognize t he most basic of human rights, t hose o f f reedom o f m ovement a nd f reedom o f e xpression. We d o n ot k now w hen i t was t hat ma n c ame u p wi th t he idea of enslaving his fellow man. But it is a s tage in human history as f undamental t o o ur d evelopment as a ny te chnological discovery.2 We m ight s urmise t hat s lavery o nly occ urred a fter ce rtain patterns o f l iving h ad be en e stablished a nd ce rtain te chnologies were ref ned enough to determine t he physical character of enslavement. A t rue nomad, for example, can have few material possessions i f h is l ivelihood d epends o n f ollowing m igrating herds. Slavery i n a m obile hunter-gathering t ribal society would have been less desirable, partly because the most important work of the tribe involved hunting. Giving your slave a weapon for the hunt would not have been the brightest of ideas. There were few chores that did not involve tools easily adaptable as weapons. North American Indians who hunted the buffalo on the Great Plains had no tradition of slavery. If they fought with neighboring t ribes t heir c aptives w ould be s laughtered o r s et f ree. B ut then, as w e h ave s een wi th t he Y ir Yoront, t he h unter-gatherer may have had an ill-def ned concept of work. It may well be that an i nitial n otion o f work, t hat w hich d ef nes i t as s omething t o be a voided, e merged be tween t he s exes. W omen w ere n ot as physically s uited t o h unting be cause o f t heir c omparative l ack of strength. T hey would a lso have t he maternal duty of feeding their young. Both issues remain to u ndermine workplace e quality t o t his day. But t hese d ef ciencies a nd res ponsibilities would not have precluded the gathering of wild vegetables and berries. It seems l ikely t hat women, t herefore, would have been t he f rst

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The History of Work to e xplore w ays o f p reparing, p reserving, a nd c ultivating f ood. They, a fter a ll, s uffered t he g reatest i nconvenience i n following the hunt. Men d id t he h unting a nd m ost p robably b utchered t he m eat. These a re t he a reas o f f ood p reparation i n w hich m en te nd t o maintain the strongest interest. Even the most domestically challenged ma le who views t he k itchen s trictly as a f emale d omain will t ransform h imself i nto c hief c ook a nd p rovider i f a m odern f amily d ecides t o h ave a b arbecue. Gi ve h im a p an a nd a gas stove and he doesn’t want to know. Give him some charcoal, f relighters, and tongs and he is happiness personif ed. Was there some e volutionary e vent th at e quipped th e h uman m ale w ith a barbecue gene? In h is boo k, The S elf sh G ene, R ichard D awkins s peculates on t he w ay i deas c an be t ransferred a lmost l ike vi ruses acr oss populations. He calls these ideas “memes.” Building on this idea, Susan Blackmore has suggested in her book, The Meme Machine, that s uch c ultural i deas c an e volve an d r eproduce w ithin th e mind. Douglas Adams toyed with the theory in his Hitch Hiker’s Guide t o th e G alaxy, in w hich M r P rosser – c ouncil e mployee and direct male-line descendant of Genghis Khan – i s unable to explain h is a ttraction t o f ur h ats o r h is regressionary i mages of axe-wielding horsemen. So was the early division of labor a matter of natural selection, sexual preference, or possibly both? We can only speculate. We do not k now, of c ourse, whether women were t he f rst to experiment with grindstones, but we do know that the ability to create s urplus f ood a nd t o l ive i n o ne p lace crea ted n ew t asks, new chores, new work. A place needed to be kept clean, there was a need for building skills, woodworking skills, and all the skills and accumulating of knowledge associated with agriculture. When peo ple began t o s ettle t hey were, h owever u nwittingly, creating the conditions for slavery to exist. The idea of sparing a foe’s life in return for his labor might have begun to appeal where a n eed f or e xtra l abor h ad be en i dentif ed a nd w here a s urplus existed for its support. The late Moses Finley, a Cambridge-based historian, i dentif ed t hree co nditions he co nsidered ne cessary for t he d evelopment o f s lavery: t he p rivate o wnership o f l and requiring a permanent workforce, the development of commodity

Fettered Lives production and markets, and the scarcity of any alternative internal labor supply.3 Certain technological developments would also have been necessary. Wood a nd r ope would h ave be en s uff cient to se cure a n individual’s i mprisonment, a lthough t he a bility t o crea te m etal chains w ould h ave ad ded a n ew d imension o f s ecurity. T he domestication o f a nimals w as n ot ac hieved o vernight. N either was the domestication and enslavement of humanity. By the time the slave had become an accepted part of society in the Greek and Roman eras, the ways and means of maintaining l arge n umbers o f peo ple i n s lavery w ere w ell e stablished. A f urther i mportant feature of mas s slavery was t he d esire a nd ability o f o ne s ociety t o c onquer a nd s ubjugate a nother. C ould it be t hat h umanity’s c apacity f or w ar w as d erived f rom s ome innate urge to remain mobile and hunt? Whether or not Marija Gimbutas was correct in her belief that European Stone Age society had perfected an egalitarian idyll, it was a way of life that was unable to defend itself from the horseborne a nd w arlike K urgan t ribes w ho s wept i nto E urope f rom the s teppe l ands t o t he eas t. W hatever c ustoms h ad p revailed throughout the Stone Age were swept away by a hierarchical and status-driven society that would become the dominant model for human re lations. T he p hysically s trongest o f t he h umans – t he men – e stablished t hemselves a t t he h ead o f t his s ociety. M ale thinking, ma le concerns, ma le attitudes would shape what men, without a trace of irony, would come to recognize as civilization. The economies of the greatest of classical civilizations – t hose of G reece a nd Rome – w ere founded on t he most u ncivilized of human conditions: slavery. For hundreds of years i n G reece a nd Rome slavery was the most common form of manual labor. These were slave societies – t he two most ancient of f ve slave societies identif ed by Finley. (The other three were the United States, the Caribbean, and Brazil.) In classical Greece and Roman Italy, even skilled labor was often carried out by slaves. Some were employed in a p rofessional c apacity as d octors a nd teac hers. B y f ar t he greatest use of slave labor, however, was in agriculture, a common feature of slavery wherever it has been used throughout history. That R oman s laves w ere c hained, w hipped, a nd s ubject t o gross physical abuse is well documented. T his did not ma ke for

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The History of Work happy slaves a nd led to several serious revolts, the most famous of which, led by Spartacus in 73 bc, was brutally suppressed, the bodies of the executed captives lining the routes into Rome so that all could witness the futility of insurrection. The u nease o f t he s lave o wner – be st s ummarized, pe rhaps, by a Roman proverb which held that the number of your enemies equaled t he n umber o f y our s laves – crea ted a t hirst f or s ome better ra tionale for t he ma nagement of slaves. I n De re r ustica, which must surely be one of the earliest examples of the management textbook – i t was wr itten i n t he m id-f rst century ad – the a gricultural wr iter, C olumella, o utlined g uidelines f or t he treatment a nd ma nagement o f s laves.4 I ts p hilosophy w as v ery much that of the stick and the carrot. Columella’s a pproach w as d riven b y e xpediency. P eople wi ll respond most positively, he reasoned, if you treat them well and give them some promise of reward. Sick slaves need careful attention, he wrote. Those working inside a vi lla need ample k itchen space t o acc ommodate t heir h ouseholds. T heir ce lls, a lthough f tted wi th c hains f or t he h ours o f da rkness, s hould h ave s ome opening for natural light; slaves need also to be provided with sturdy clothes to allow them to work in all weathers. Even some consultation with a slave is desirable, he argued, since it gives the impression that the slave master is interested in the slave’s work, thereby generating greater enthusiasm on the part of the slave. The motive behind these methods is clearly stated: “Such justice and consideration on the part of the owner,” says Columella, “contributes g reatly to t he i ncrease o f h is es tate.”5 Is t his w hat many h undreds o f y ears l ater w ould be d escribed as e nlightened s elf-interest? S uch t hinking w ould n ot be o ut o f p lace i n the “family friendly” employment policies of today’s companies. Should we, therefore, identify Columella as t he father of human resources management as we know it? Maybe n ot. K eith B radley s ays i n h is boo k, Slaves a nd Masters in th e R oman E mpire: A St udy in S ocial Contr ol, t hat Columella’s advice was not unique in Roman society. Others such as Varro, Cato, and Seneca recognized the benef ts to be g ained from the humane treatment of slaves. But the management theory was d esigned as a m eans t o a n e nd. As B radley po ints o ut: “I t is quite clear that Columella’s recommendations on the treatment

Fettered Lives of slaves were designed to promote servile eff ciency as t he key to e conomic productivity i n a s ituation where t he owner’s prof t from the agricultural production was a dominating principal.”6 None o f C olumella’s g uidelines c ould e nsure p roductivity. “Slaves could not simply be forced to work by virtue of their subject status,” wr ites Bradley, but “their social contentment had to be s ecured as a p relude t o work eff ciency a nd general loyalty.” In f act p roductivity w as n ot a s ignif cant factor in Columella’s advice. A s lave’s output seemed to be l ess of a c oncern than his behavior. Fides e t obse quium, l oyalty a nd o bedience, w ere t he most s ought-after u nderlying qu alities.7 C olumella w ent f urther than other theorists when he recommended that the slave owner could hold out the prospect of freedom as the strongest incentive for good and faithful service. Bradley is at pains to emphasize that none of these ideas inf uenced the general view of slaves among the ruling classes as idle and feckless. Again this has parallels in some of the entrenched attitudes a mong those twentieth-century employers who allowed their labor relations to be c onducted in an atmosphere of mutual distrust. That Columella’s ideas did not enjoy universal or lasting support was demonstrated centuries later by Frederick Douglass, a former slave whose moving stories of slave mistreatment proved to be a powerful inf uence on the US abolitionist movement. A s killed o rator, Do uglass n oted i n 1855 t hat d ifferent levels of t reatment c ould p roduce a h ierarchy o f as pirations: “B eat and cuff your slave, keep him hungry and spiritless, and he will follow t he c hain o f h is mas ter l ike a d og; b ut f eed a nd c lothe him well – w ork h im m oderately – s urround h im with p hysical comfort – and dreams of freedom intrude. Give him a bad master, and he aspires to a g ood master; give him a g ood master and he wishes to become his own master.”8 This seems to echo the popular nineteenth-century tenet that if you “spare the rod you spoil the child,” an attitude born in the same Protestant stable. There is no doubt that the practice of slavery underpinned the great classical empires of Greece and Rome. But these slave societies w ere n ot s ustainable. T he v ery s uccess o f s lavery, w here slaves became part of almost every area of employment outside the m ilitary a nd t he senate, may have been one of t he principal ingredients of Rome’s demise. The citizens of Rome had lost any

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The History of Work work ethic they once possessed. Their lifestyle was so corrupted, so hedonistic, that they were no longer capable of defending t heir o verstretched e mpire. We c an s ee t he d evelopment o f something resembling Wells’s Eloi a nd Morlocks. T he relatively sophisticated a nd, in terms of administration a nd infrastructure, advanced society within Rome’s walls had become supine, physically a civilization but spiritually and morally retarded. While i ts c itizens o n t he s treets w ere s edated b y t he C olosseum’s increasingly degrading spectacles, beneath the city, hidden in t he c atacombs, h uman m orality a nd d ecency were p reserved among a g radually s trengthening t roglodyte po pulation – t he persecuted Ch ristians. B ut, u nlike t he W ellsian vi sion, R ome’s underground Ch ristians w ere t he v ulnerable o nes, h iding f rom the ruling elite who could enjoy the daylight. Rome’s f ckle, leisure-loving populace, a d egenerating society enfeebled by its very success and wealth, began to weaken at the center, so that when the northern hordes under Alaric crossed the Rhine a nd ma rched on t he world’s g reatest city i n ad 41 0, t hey discovered a po pulation t hat h ad g rown f abby a nd d ebased, a society that, in spite of – o r even because of – i ts grandeur, was evaporating wi thin a m oral vacuum o f i ts own ma king. Roman society dissolved because the will to preserve it had disappeared. This i s n ot t o s ay t hat R oman s ociety w as re placed b y a n industrious Ge rmanic c ode. T acitus s aw i t d ifferently. T he Visigoth w as a ction p ersonif ed i n w ar, b ut a fter t he f ght was over he liked to take life easy. Tacitus wrote: “When the state has no war to manage the German mind is sunk in sloth. The chase does n ot p rovide s uff cient e mployment. T he t ime i s p assed i n sleep and gluttony. The intrepid warrior, who in the f eld braved every da nger, be comes i n t ime of peace a l istless sluggard. T he management of h is house a nd lands he leaves to t he women, to the old men, and the inf rm. He himself lounges in stupid repose, by a wonderful diversity of nature exhibiting in the same man the most inert aversion to labor, and the f ercest principle of action.”9 This passage from Germanica is more than simply an interesting early example of the pot calling the kettle black. It suggests that even in Roman times there was a recognition of the merits of industry and a d issatisfaction with the unadulterated pursuit of leisure. Is this a p recursor of the Protestant work ethic? The Greek poet,

Fettered Lives Hesiod, ce rtainly a ppeared t o be t hinking o n t hese l ines i n h is Works and Days, some 828 lines of friendly advice for the working man in the eighth century bc, when he wrote: “Work is no disgrace: it is idleness which is a disgrace.” Slavery did not disappear with the fall of Rome. The very word “slave,” from the eastern European Slav, is passed down from the continuing trade in European slaves, often with North Africa, that persisted i nto m edieval t imes. T he La tin word for slave, servus, became the basis of “serf.” Most historians seek to distinguish the status of “serf” from that of “slave,” arguing that the serf was the master o f ce rtain po ssessions – f arm b uildings a nd a gricultural tools – even if they did not belong to him. But the same could be argued for some slaves. The most helpful distinction might be t o think of the slave as a c hattel, a po ssession, a t radable commodity, whereas the serf was more a unit of production who had some measure o f p rotection f rom t he l ord a nd g reater a utonomy over his working hours, so long as he delivered the goods. The distinction is muddied and possibly irrelevant outside academic c ircles, w here t he c lassicist ma y f eel t hat s lavery c omes into h is te rritory, l eaving s erfdom f or t he m edievalist. Ov er time it may have been economic rather than any emancipatory concerns or pressures t hat a llowed t he practice to wither. Adam Smith n oted i n t he Wealth o f N ations: “I t a ppears f rom t he experience of all ages and nations, that work done by free men comes cheaper in the end than that performed by slaves.”10 More i mportant t han t he c oncept o f s lavery, pe rhaps, i s t he concept of freedom. Only when you understand what it is to be f ree can you determine whether your condition is t hat of t he slave. A ncient G reeks w ho c onsulted t he De lphic O racle c ould see def nitions of the four elements of f reedom inscribed on the walls of t he shrine. T he f ree ma n, said t he O racle, could represent himself in legal matters, would not be subject to seizure and arrest, could do what he wished, and could go where he wished. All o f t hese f actors, o f c ourse, n eeded t o be i nterpreted wi thin the bounds of t he law. William Li m Westerman, a nother classicist, argued that the reversal of these factors could def ne the condition o f s lavery i n a ncient G reece. T he G reek s lave, t herefore, must be represented by a master, be subject to seizure and arrest, must do as his master orders, and cannot go where he pleases.11

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The History of Work The diff culty for those seeking to arrive at a modern interpretation of classical slavery is that it was possible in Greece for people to f ll some of these def nitions in part. Thus there were different degrees of slavery, a nd t here was no sharp d ividing l ine between slavery and freedom. Some slaves in industrial towns, for example, lived together, away from their masters. Some could attain a degree of elevation in their social rank. According to Finley, “the eff cient, skilled, reliable slave could look forward to managerial status.”12 The d ifference be tween s lavery a nd f reedom h as t axed philosophers throughout the ages. In De cive, published in 1642, Thomas Hobbes decided t hat t he f ree ma n was subservient only to the state.13 The slave, he concluded, was an individual who was subservient to his fellow man as well as to the state. This is not so very different from Aristotle’s observation that “the condition of a free man is that he does not live under the restraint of another.”14 Free m en i n a ncient G reek s ociety te nded t o w ork o n t heir own. Where people were employed in groups they tended to be s laves. A c lassical A thenian d ragged i nto t he t wenty-f rst century m ight s truggle t o d etermine t he s tatus o f a c orporate employee working under managerial control – under the restraint of another. Are these free men and women, he might ask, or are they slaves to their jobs or to their employers? He would be even more f ummoxed t o di scover th at th ese people a re p aid f or t heir work, t hat t hey a re f ree t o l eave t heir employment, can live where they wish, and can possess a passport so that they can go where they please. They even have rights when faced wi th a rrest. Yet h e m ight, n evertheless, d ecide t hat t hey are s omething l ess t han t ruly f ree. P erhaps h e w ould re turn t o his c ontemporaries, c onf ding to them that “slaves have come a long way these past 2,500 years.” They h ad c ome s o f ar t hat e ven f reedom h ad t aken o n n ew def nitions. Franklin D. Roosevelt had a s tab at it in a s peech in January, 1941. He dreamed of a world founded on four freedoms: “The f rst is f reedom of speech a nd expression – e verywhere i n the world. The second is freedom of every person to worship God in his own way – everywhere in the world. The third is freedom from w ant – e verywhere i n t he w orld. T he f ourth i s f reedom from fear – anywhere in the world.”15 It was a n oble dream and, as yet, unfulf lled.

Fettered Lives Fear and want – are these not two of the biggest factors driving the m odern e mployee? I f t hese w ere re moved, t he e mployer would n eed t o revise h is re cruitment a nd ma nagement s ystems. We shall see i n f uture chapters t hat t hese conditions a re i ndeed disappearing, posing new challenges for those who need to secure the employment of people. In a s ociety d ominated by work, w here t he n eed for work i s greater than it has ever been, our liberty begins to be d ef ned by our wi llingness o r o therwise t o d o t hat work. St. P aul s aid: “I f any w ould n ot w ork, n either s hould h e ea t.”16 Thi s w ould s uggest that the option of working or not working is not at issue. We must work. We expect it of ourselves. The modern debate is not so much about the need for work but about the quantity and quality of work expected of the individual. In ancient Greece and Rome there were no great expectations of the common laborer. And yet the quality of some work continues to amaze us. The potter’s art, the sculptor’s skill, the mastery of masons and the Roman road maker still hold us in their thrall. The ac hievements o f t hese s ocieties w ere s o g reat; i t i s wi th reluctance that we must recognize their denial of basic freedoms to s o ma ny u nder t heir c ontrol. B randing t o t he f aces o f t hose slaves ordered to work in the mines or f ght in the arena was only outlawed by Constantine in ad 315. Branding, he decreed, should only be c arried o ut o n t he l egs o r h ands. S ome s lave o wners reacted by f tting t heir slaves with bronze collars inscribed with the names and addresses of their owners. It w as n ot u nknown f or s laves t o e scape. T hucydides e stimated that more than twenty thousand Athenian slaves f ed during the Peloponnesian War of 431–404 bc. But slave revolts were rare, e ven i n R oman s ociety.17 T he d egree t o w hich G reek a nd Roman slaves accepted their status is diff cult to discern but there is little evidence f rom co ntemporary acco unts i n t hese so cieties to characterize the plight of slaves as some kind of class struggle, as Karl Marx insisted in his Communist M anifesto. “ The history o f a ll h itherto e xisting s ociety i s t he h istory o f c lass struggles,” wr ote M arx. “F ree ma n a nd s lave, p atrician a nd plebeian, lord and serf, guild-master and journeyman, in a word, oppressor a nd o ppressed, s tood i n c onstant o pposition t o o ne another.”18

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The History of Work Marx was as wrong about these status relationships as Hobbes was a bout t he l ife o f p rehistoric h unter-gatherers. M arx s hould not have characterized either ancient slavery or those later working re lationships as a c lass s truggle. T here w as n othing o f t he oppressor about the habit of Greek estate owners sitting down at the table with their slaves after the harvest to share a celebratory meal. Tokenism it might have been; patronizing, maybe. But is it any more so than the invitation by modern corporate directors to an employee to share their lunch table? Having received and partaken of such i nvitations, I h ave found t hem m ildly p atronizing but harmless, hardly the stuff of oppression. It i s a p ity t hat M arx d id n ot l ook f urther i nto t he p ast t han Greek and Roman societies. He might have found some cause for optimism in Neolithic society, possibly even in Egyptian society. Although t he E gyptians p racticed s lavery w e d o n ot k now t he exact s tatus o f t he a rmy o f w orkers e ngaged t o w ork o n t he pyramids. P yramid b uilding ma y h ave be en a f orm o f n ational service, an obligation similar to military conscription. The pharaohs could certainly expect ample labor to be re leased from the land every year at the time of the Nile f ood. Construction of the pyramids ma y h ave u sed s ome s laves, b ut t he mas onry s kills needed t o crea te t he G reat P yramid a t Giza w ere t hose o f t he experienced a rtisan. L evers, n ot b rute s trength, w ere t he m ost likely method used in jacking up the individual blocks of stone, weighing a bout t wo a nd a h alf t ons eac h.19 Eac h h ewn b lock needed to b e d ressed to t he cor rect prop ortions. T his w as t he work of experts. Experts were a lso engaged on the building of the henge monuments across Europe in predynastic times. Gimbutas argued that henges, such as Stonehenge in England, were the products of communal efforts. Such large-scale work, she ma intains, had to be b ased o n a s ociety’s s ocial a nd religious s ystems. I ndeed, she identif ed the ability to organize communal work on a g rand scale as one of the chief characteristics of the culture of the megalith builders.20 There is no evidence that this work had anything to d o wi th o ppressors o r t he o ppressed. Q uite t he o pposite: the e vidence po ints t o a s ettled s ociety. I t i s d iff cult t o en visage t he completion of so a mbitious a n undertaking in a ny other circumstances.

Fettered Lives If t he G reek slaves described by Marx felt oppressed, awareness of their plight does not appear to have communicated itself to the loftiest of classical thinkers. Slavery was such a fact of life it was deemed hardly worth mentioning by some of the greatest philosophers of their age. Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle, the “big three” of Greek philosophy, saw it as their role in life to question, challenge, dissect, and criticize almost every aspect of the human condition. But they rarely mentioned slavery. Indeed, the Greeks had no def ning word for work. The word ponos, meaning something painful, was used to describe unpleasant work.21 Another word, ergon, described a task and tended to be applied to agricultural activities. The word for leisure, scholia, had its opposite in ascholia, literally “not leisure.” Scholia is t he root of our word “school.” It seems f tting that leisure and learning should be linked in this way. Edith Hamilton, a writer on Greek society, explained the Grecian philosophy that “given leisure, a ma n will employ it in thinking a nd f nding out about things. Leisure a nd the pursuit of k nowledge, the connection was inevitable – t o a G reek.”22 But the Greeks did not dignify work with a verb of its own. Prof table enterprise, the work of merchants and traders, was distrusted and their numbers were restricted. Priority in Greek society was extended to the warrior class a nd t he po litical d ecision-makers. A ll o ther m embers o f society were part of what Plato called “the multitude.” Wedded as he was to the notion of hierarchy, Aristotle believed that the highest form of existence was the rational being – someone like Aristotle himself in fact. No surprises there. Here was a ma n so sure of his intellect that he declared with certainty that women had fewer te eth t han men, without ever bothering t o c ount t hem. The function of lower beings, he argued, was to serve this rational man. Slaves, consisting mainly of barbarians, were, by their nature, best suited for the service of thinking man as “l iving tools.” This is the paradox of Greek society, that freedom and free thinking, as Moses Finley observed, walked “hand i n hand” with slavery. “The c ities i n w hich f reedom reac hed i ts h ighest e xpression – most o bviously A thens – w ere c ities i n w hich c hattel s lavery f ourished,” he wrote.23 Perhaps t here i s s omething i n t he a ttraction o f o pposites. Perhaps it has something to do with relativity – that it is possible

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The History of Work to pe rceive f reedom m ost c learly w here i t d oes n ot e xist. T he closer y ou c ome t o o ne c ondition, t he m ore read ily y ou a ppreciate a nd u nderstand its opposite. T his applies t o every walk of life. Every chef should know that the most vital ingredient of gastronomy i s t he a ppetite. W ithout h unger, t he g randest o f m eals is n o m ore t han a d istraction. B ut w hen t he a ppetite k icks i n, the m eanest s lice o f b uttered t oast c an s end t he t aste b uds i nto rapture. Certainly f reedom m ust be vi ewed as a re lative c oncept. Modern-day sports teams are made up of individuals whose loyalty and commitment are secured by a contract covering a period of time. They earn vast sums and yet they are traded for money just as s laves were t raded, a nd t hey a re expected to perform on the f eld l ike gladiators for t he ed if cation of crowds. They also live u nder t he re straint o f a nother – t heir c oach – a nd t hey a re f ned o r re primanded i f t hey c ommit a ny i ndiscretions i n t heir private l ife t hat m ight put t heir club i n a b ad l ight. I f t heir performance falters, then they go, often on free contracts but usually guided by agents working to a single axiom, immortalized in the f lm Gerry McGuire, as “show me the money.” In s pite o f s uch c omparisons I d o n ot i ntend t o s uggest here that there is anything akin to slavery in the contemporary e mployment c ontract. S lavery i s a p roduct o f s ubjugation, whereas t he long hours i n today’s off ce culture a re t he product of voluntarism born of habit. We a re l ocked i nto a s ystem, a m entality, t hat re gards h ard work a nd l ong h ours as vi tal for ma intaining o r e nhancing o ur standard of living. We have become slaves to work. The galley chains a re p sychological. We ma nacled ourselves a nd t hrew away t he k ey i n t he c onviction t hat w e s hould n ever d esire t o free ourselves. Did not Franz Kafka write in The Trial that “it’s often s afer t o be i n c hains t han t o be f ree”? B ut t he w ork h as proved u nrelenting, a nd doubts a re beginning to u ndermine our old certainties. Now, at last, as we look hopefully into the future, we are starting to analyze the mentality that binds us to our jobs. Freedom a nd s lavery, w e ma y c onclude, a re re lative f orces, t he yin and yang of work. The most enlightened employers now understand the need for freedom in the workplace and are releasing their workforces from

Fettered Lives the tyranny of set hours, the strictures of managerial control, and the l imitations o f t he f xed w orkplace. M any t raditional b usinesses are struggling under such conventions. The static business that persists with traditional management–employee relationships and contracts will not f ourish. Neither will t he static employee. The be st o f t hese b usinesses wi ll l inger, o f c ourse. T hey ma y even merge and linger, continuing the pattern of corporate development among the giants of the late twentieth century; merge and linger like persistent weeds, like slavery itself. But they will have to t ake t heir p lace as u nloved gi ants i n a n ew c orporate o rder, as t heir n imble o ffspring t ake wi ng a nd f y. T he a lternative i s to devolve t heir operations so t hat t hey resemble a f ederation of interests bound together by common values a nd a c ommon purpose. A n ew g eneration o f m ultiskilled m obile e mployees wi ll accept nothing less.

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CHAPTER 3

Job Creation The life so short, the craft so long to learn. (Hippocrates, 460–377 bc) On a vi sit t o B oston d uring t he l ate 1 990s I w as vi ewing a n exhibition o f m ummy po rtraits f rom t he F ayum a rea o f E gypt, spanning the f rst three centuries ad. Three of the pictures were mounted together. They were each painted about a hundred years apart a nd appeared t o show a s teady p rogression of t he skill of the artists, each one an improvement on the last. It was not until I examined the dates more closely, matching them to the pictures, that I realized the most accomplished portrait was the oldest and the m ost n aive w as t he m ost re cent. Ra ther t han p rogression i t appeared as if there had been some kind of regression in skills.1 The Fayum district had been settled partly by Greek soldiers, who h ad f ought f or s uccessive P tolemaic k ings, a nd p artly b y Egyptian l aborers. B y t he t ime E gypt f ell u nder R oman c ontrol the Fayum population consisted of a m ixture of Greeks and Egyptians at various stages of integration. The people of Fayum combined a be lief i n t he a fter-life – ce lebrated i n e laborate Egyptian funerary practices – with a G reek heritage and Roman administrative p ractices. F ayum m ummies w ere c omplemented by G reek-style po rtraiture, a nd t he po rtraits a re t ruly re markable. As E uphrosyne Do xiadis po inted o ut i n a re cent cr itique: “It i s n ot u ntil s ome f fteen ce nturies l ater, i n t he faces p ainted by Titian or Rembrandt’s depiction of his own features as he saw them ref ected i n a m irror, t hat t he same a rtistry t hat characterizes ma ny o f t he a nonymous p ainters o f t he F ayum w as wi tnessed again.”2 It i s as i f, a fter t he Fayum p aintings, t he a rtistry a nd k nowledge o f t he W estern w orld h ad be en s wallowed i n s ome gi ant barbarous c hasm. A t l east t his i s t he w ay i t i s o ften po rtrayed. But the gap of some hundred to two hundred years between the 28

Job Creation fall of Rome and the f rst surviving monastic writings in Europe, popularly k nown as t he D ark A ges be cause o f t he s carcity o f documented knowledge, should not be viewed as some black hole. I f writing was b arely p reserved i n t he m onastic o rders o n the western f ringes of t he old Roman Empire, t here was a c ontinuation of certain other skills. One need only look at the Alfred Jewel, fashioned for King Alfred, or the cloisonné work a nd t he armorial workmanship u ncovered i n t he s eventh-century Sutton Hoo A nglo-Saxon s hip b urial i n t he Eas t o f En gland t o u nderstand t hat s ome o f t he f nest of craft skills were maintained throughout this period.3 Ability n ever d eserted ma nkind, b ut s ome t hings w ere l ost. The u nderstanding o f form, mas tered i n p art by t he p rehistoric cave p ainters, t hen red iscovered a nd pe rfected b y t he G reeks, had a lready d iminished i n t ranslation t o R oman c ivilization. I t was n ever t ransferred t o t he Ce ltic i lluminators, w hose a rtistic skills i n a bstract f orms a nd k not p atterns a re u nquestioned. Techniques were also lost in other areas such as building and medicine. Em balming, f or e xample, w ould n ever a gain reac h the peaks of sophistication attained about 1,000 bc. Modern-day funeral d irectors c an o nly l ook b ack i n awe t o t he p rofessional skills of the ancient Egyptian embalmers, who were part of a professional elite that included builders, stonemasons, and architects such as Imhotep, the f rst named architect. Why have great skills been lost periodically throughout history? There seems to be a c onspiracy of obsolescence, usually involving a c ombination o f c ommon i nf uences – f ashion, i nnovation, and p rice. M ummif cation a nd a ll t he f unerary t rappings t hat went with it was a costly process, but this does not seem to have undermined t he p ractice. Q uite t he o pposite. S kills d iminish when a practice spreads out to a wider audience, where new practitioners enter the market and begin to compete on price. In these circumstances quality and artistry take a nosedive. This process was at work in ancient Rome, just as it is in television program making today. Quality only survives at the innovative fringe. The demands of the mass market reduce once-proud industries to the lowest common denominator. The real losers are those who take pride in their work, who are forced to speed up, cut corners, and use inferior materials. Their craft debased, they

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The History of Work feel the emptiness of lost satisfaction and some move on to other media in search of the intrinsic reward of a job well done. When workmen controlled their craft in guilds they could resist those market forces that tended to erode good workmanship with incessant d emands f or c heaper, s impler, read y-made p roducts. The workmen held the key to something precious – t heir skill – and it was jealously guarded. The guilds emerged at a time when most manual work was organized within the feudal system, when most a gricultural w orkers h ad t o c ontent th emselves w ith th e status of peasants. But their work was beginning to be d ignif ed within th e C hurch in th e thir teenth c entury. Th omas A quinas drew up a hierarchy of professions and trades, depending on their value to society. At the top was agriculture, then the handicrafts. He placed commerce at the bottom of the list.4 The guilds were merely consolidating and developing this newfound s tatus, p rotecting t heir m embers a nd e stablishing a ra te for t he j ob. P art t rade u nion, p art t rade o rganization, t he g uild derived its n ame f rom t he S axon verb gi ldan: t o p ay. A lthough the g uild ac hieved i ts m ost e laborate d ef nition i n m edieval London, the banding together of workers by specialism was common across many Western European towns and cities during the same period. Guilds in one form or another continued to play an important role in regulating work and trade in many other parts of the world. In Turkey, for example, they were known as Esnafs. Even today tradesmen and women in China and India would be familiar with the guild structure. Guilds w ere a n i mportant g rouping i n t he e volution o f w ork because they regulated not only the work itself but also the particular enterprise, helping to keep wages steady and maintaining standards where otherwise commerce and trade would have been bedeviled by s hoddy workmanship a nd c heating. C onsignments of t hirteen, t he s o-called “b aker’s d ozen,” e manated f rom t hese concerns for fairness.5 Craft s kills ne ed to b e t ransferred f rom expert to appren tice. Only so much of any manual technique can be communicated in textbooks and diagrams. Shape, form, sound, texture, the characteristics of light, appeal to our emotions in a way that is diff cult to emulate in the written or spoken language. Wine tasters drain the dictionary o f every ad jective i n a n a ttempt t o c ommunicate t he

Job Creation difference be tween o ne vi ntage a nd a nother. T heir d escriptions are a poor substitute for the human olfactory sense. Only a mas ter o f t he cra ft c an e ffectively c ommunicate t he mystery of his or her talent. That word, “mystery,” is introduced deliberately be cause i t d erives f rom t he La tin w ord misterium, meaning p rofessional s kill. I t w as u sed as a n a lternative w ord when referring to the guild.6 In London’s liveried guilds, a seven-year apprenticeship would enable a n i ndividual t o c onsider h imself a j ourneyman, l eading to the most sought after status of freeman. A f reeman could work i n c omparative s afety, p rotected b y r ight f rom i mpressment into the armed forces. But he might still be i n trouble if he were to return to the town or village of his birth. Simon of Paris, a f ree c itizen o f L ondon, s o re spected wi thin t he c ity c onf nes that he had served as a c hamberlain and alderman, even Sheriff in 1302–03, found t hat h is reputation d id not extend to Norfolk and his home village of Necton. When he returned there in 1308 he was arrested and jailed by the bailiff, acting on behalf of the local l andowner, w ho c laimed t hat P aris w as a r unaway s erf. It took Paris four years to secure his release and extract damages from his accusers.7 The c ase was n ot i solated. F or t he be st p art o f four h undred years a fter t he Norman Conquest i n 1066, t he English persisted with a f eudal s ystem t hat re stricted t he r ights a nd p rivileges o f ordinary working people. I n Russia such a s ystem continued up to the Bolshevik Revolution of 1917. The feudal s ystem t hat g radually re placed slavery i n Western Europe between t he fall of Rome a nd t he re -emergence of state administration was simply another way of controlling and maintaining a pool of manual labor. People did not get up in the morning with a burning desire to till the f elds. They did it because they had no choice but to do it. The Julius Work Calendar, a monastic manuscript created in Canterbury some time around 1020, outlines in pictures, month by month, the agricultural chores of the average vi llage l aborer s hortly be fore t he N orman C onquest i n England.8 T he chores d id not change with t he c onquest, b ut t he lowly status of the peasant was conf rmed and institutionalized. There were differences of status in pre-Conquest England. The Domesday Book, the methodical village-by-village record of

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The History of Work the spoils of the Norman victory, sometimes refers to slaves and at other times mentions serfs and villeins. Serfs were not traded as slaves, and the true slave was becoming a ra rity in England at the t ime o f t he C onquest.9 T he vi llein a nd t he s erf were e ffectively one and the same. Both serfs and villeins were tied to their estate or manor in the service of a l ord, and to obtain the status of freeman they had to pay for it. But for hundreds of years the strictest control over most people’s lives continued and, however eff cient a peasant farmer became, as long as his status remained that of the villein, he had to pay through the nose. He paid money to the landlord when he wanted to marry off his daughter and he paid for the right to plow his land. His family paid with their best animal when he died. The second best beast went to the parson.10 The vi llein w as t he l owest o f t he l ow. T hat t he w ord f or a criminal – vi llain – s hould be d erived from the name applied to the medieval tied worker demonstrates that the sort of work that might dirty the hands was throughout this period associated with people of the basest nature. (The distinction was so important in China that the ruling and merchant classes grew their f ngernails – often p rotected b y e laborate c asings – i n o rder t o d istinguish themselves f rom t hose w ho n eeded t o c arry o ut ma nual l abor.) A d ocument o utlining t he l aws o f H enry I o f En gland, wr itten around 1120, describes the villein as a “ viles et inopes persone,” a d espised a nd s ubordinate c lass, re garded b y F rench c ourtly writers, at least, as the antithesis of the code of chivalry.11 The evolution in the status of work was slow, at times almost imperceptible, i n t he m edieval En glish l andscape. S erfdom a nd villeinage d id n ot e nd overnight. T hey f aded away. As s erfdom gradually d isappeared i n t he f fteenth a nd si xteenth c enturies there were frequent attempts by landowners to make money from this c hange o f s tatus, b ut t heir po wer o f c ontrol w as w aning.12 While there remains some debate over the demise of serfdom and its causes, the rise of the towns, whose inhabitants were protected by c harter f rom o utside i nterference f rom o ther l andowners, played a signif cant role. The landowner needed to weigh the risk of too draconian a form of control against forcing a worker to up sticks and move to a t own. The inf uence of self-interest, one of the most enduring human traits across the ages, should never be underestimated.

Job Creation The g radual a bandonment o f t he s ystem a nd t he s ubstitution of fees, f nes, and levies for rents paid by tenant farmers was the better o utcome f or a ll.13 Land was farmed more eff ciently and the landlord could free himself from managerial responsibilities. There was never much evidence, anyway, with one big exception, that most medieval landowners had either the interest or skills in estate management. The big exception, the huge exception, was the Church. Church estates w ere n ot o nly e xtensive, t heir ad ministration w as e ffective a nd k nowledgeable. A dministration in th e R oman C atholic Church survived in far better shape after the collapse of the Roman Empire t han R oman ad ministration e lsewhere acr oss E urope, where it persisted for a t ime i n pockets but never re covered a ny cohesion. The Ch urch n ot o nly ma intained t he l inguistic l inks wi th ancient civilization, including many of the most important works of Roman and Greek literature, it preserved and developed skills, such as vi ticulture and building, that might otherwise have been lost. Church building continued in land occupied by the Visigoths and t he F ranks, w ho h ad bo th c onverted t o Ch ristianity. T he Cathedral of Lyon, for example, founded around 470, was said to have been supported on a f orest of columns with gilded paneled ceilings. The surviving church of San Juan Bautista at Banos de Cerrato was built in 661 during the Visigoth occupation of Spain. In t hese b uildings, t he c ommon R oman s tructural f orm o f t he basilica was preserved, indicating that many of the most complex architectural skills were maintained. The monasteries be came oases of learning. At t he same t ime they w ere s tructured ce nters o f o rganized l abor, w hose l eaders ma intained t he ad ministrative s kills a nd d isciplines o f t he Roman o ff cial. T he Ch urch h ad s ensibly re tained t hese v aluable aspects of Roman society (as a memorable scene in the f lm, The L ife of B rian, ac knowledges b y po sing t he q uestion: W hat have t he Romans ever d one for u s? N ot everything Roman h ad been rotten). The monasteries represented not only an intellectual elite, but a lso a n employing elite. T hey were t he McKinsey, t he J. P. Morgan, and the Goldman Sachs of their day. Unlike these latter-day i nstitutions, t he m onasteries d id n ot o ffer i ndividual wealth but spiritual wealth to those who were willing to combine

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The History of Work learning a nd w orship wi thin a s trictly d isciplined p attern o f living. Life for the monks living under St. Benedict’s Rule was and still is highly structured. The f rst Benedictine monastery, established at Monte Cassino in Italy in 529, was run to strict written guidelines governing times and types of work and prayer that are still in use today. A typical monastic day would start at 2 a.m. in winter (1 a.m. in summer), beginning a stringent timetable of periods for read ing, worship, a nd work.14 T he read ing would be b iblical and t he w orship, u nder t he La tin h eading, Opus De i, c ould be draining.15 Much of the work at that time is likely to have involved writing, translation, or artwork, so the opportunity to do some physical w ork m ust h ave c ome as a w elcome re lief. E ven t he abbot could take pleasure in such work. This is made clear in an assessment of Bede, written by Eastorwine, a young abbot in the monastery at Jarrow i n Northumbria, where Bede was ordained as a priest in 703: He re mained s o h umble a nd l ike t he o ther b rethren, t hat h e took p leasure i n t hreshing a nd wi nnowing, m ilking t he ewes and cows, and employed himself in the bakehouse, the garden, the k itchen, a nd i n a ll t he o ther l abors of t he m onastery . . . Often, when he went out on the business of the monastery, if he found the brethren working, he would join them a nd work with th em, b y ta king th e p lough-handle, o r h andling th e smith’s hammer.16 Bede’s f raternal a pproach t o h is f ellow m onks, h is l ove o f physical l abor a nd h is wi llingness t o ea t wi th e veryone o n o ne level without a ny c onsciousness of station, were as ra re t hen as they a re n ow. F or a ll t he m oves t oward s ingle s tatus w orking these issues remain valid today. Bede would have recognized the cell-like work style of Andy Grove, the chief executive off cer of Intel, t he c omputer c hip c ompany, w ho i nsists o n working i n a cubicle among his fellow employees, even if there may have been a gulf in the gentleness of their respective approaches. Indeed, t here a re ma ny s imilarities be tween t he w ork s tyles of those early monasteries and those of the businesses in Silicon

Job Creation Valley, California. They share a passion for the storage, generation, and d issemination o f i nformation, a nd n either w as t oo w orried about o stentation i n t he w orkplace. I f B ede c an teac h u s a nything today it is that real authority comes from within, not from badges or titles or the size of your desk, your off ce, or your company car. The ea rly Ch urch l eaders w ere t ough a nd re sourceful. T hey had to be, or t he Church would not have survived. I n a d ivided and crumbling Roman Empire the Church moved like an acquisitive conglomerate in a corporate bear park, as it sought to establish s ome u nity a mong its d isparate b ranches. W hen Augustine came t o En gland i n 5 97 h e re -established c ontact wi th t he monastic t radition t hat h ad s urvived i n W ales, C ornwall, a nd Ireland, had moved into Scotland, and would soon be established in Northumbria. These I rish and Roman traditions were not formally unif ed until t he Synod of W hitby in 66 4, when t he most pressing items o n t he a genda were t he da ting of Easter a nd t he monastic h airstyle. A ugustine m onks h ad t he f amiliar b anded tonsure, while the Celtic monks preferred to shave the front part of their heads from ear to ear, leaving the rest to grow long. Church advances suffered from periodic invasions and consequent reversions to paganism, but no single group of Norse or Germanic people succeeded in dominating Europe persistently enough t o s nuff o ut Ch ristianity. T he H uns c ame c losest w hen their l eader, A ttila, reac hed as f ar w est as O rleans, i n p resentday F rance, i n 4 51. A ttila w as t he a rchetypal m obile l eader, never staying i n o ne place for long. I n t oday’s ma nagement te rminology he was a typical virtual worker, hot-desking – or rather hot-tenting – h is w ay acr oss E urope, d ismissing t he t rappings of power i n a w ay t hat would be a pplauded by m ost o f t oday’s technology e ntrepreneurs. A lthough t he N ot-so-Dark A ges a re characterized by images of invading hordes from the North, pagan beliefs, supported as they were by an oral tradition, proved unsustainable against the power, learning, literature, a nd culture of Christendom. Just how potent this power could be is illustrated by the Viking inf ltration o f F rance. B etween 8 85, w hen N orse l ongships f rst sailed u p t he r iver S eine t o P aris, a nd 1 066, w hen W illiam o f Normandy arrived in England, the Normans had been completely

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The History of Work Francif ed. Fierce and warlike they may have been, but they were French-speaking c onverts t o Ch ristianity. A nglo-Saxon c ulture was equally sophisticated. The Bayeux Tapestry, one of the most extraordinary p ictorial re cords of a ny e ra, was a lmost ce rtainly created by English seamstresses. By t he t ime t hat Ch arlemagne be came k ing of t he F ranks i n the e ighth c entury, th e C hurch h ad gr own a s p owerful a s an y Roman emperor. Its power was not absolute but its inf uence was undeniable in binding the peoples of Europe together in a common religion. W hen Ch arlemagne k nelt i n St Peter’s, Rome, o n Christmas Day 800 to take mass, he was approached, apparently quite unexpectedly, by Pope Leo III and proclaimed Emperor of the H oly R oman Em pire. H ow c ould Ch arlemagne re fuse? T he gesture was charged with meaning, signifying t hat t he t itle was in t he gi ft o f t he po ntiff. L eo h ad u nilaterally e stablished t he patronage o f te rritorial r ule i n t he p apacy. I t h ad be en i mplied, of course, from the time of Constantine, but here it was demonstrated in full public view. The Roman Catholic religion had assured its ascendancy as the off cial religion of Western Europe. But it did not yet have all the trappings of ideology. It was very much a t ool of control. W hen William o f N ormandy l anded o n t he En glish c oast a t P evensey in t he a utumn o f 1 066, h is a rmy as sembled be hind t he p apal banner. He secured control of the English throne by force but it was underpinned by papal support. The Church commanded respect in England but often attracted resentment a mong t hose w ho c ame u nder i ts c ontrol. T his resentment s immered f or ce nturies, a nd s ometimes bo iled o ver into op en d issent, e ven r ebellion. W hen W at Tyler he aded t he Peasants’ Revolt in 1381, ma ny of h is g rievances were a imed at the Ch urch a nd Ch urch e state ma nagement, w hich ma intained the feudal system of villeinage as strongly as any English peer. Tyler’s d emands for t he c onf scation of Church lands, indeed all h is d emands, w ere acce pted i n a f ace-to-face m eeting wi th Richard I I wi thin t he w alled C ity o f L ondon. B ut t he w hole negotiation was a sham. The meeting had lured Tyler away from his fellow workers and he was provoked into a f ght by the king’s supporters. A rmed wi th n othing m ore t han a da gger, h e w as fatally wounded by the Lord Mayor’s sword thrust and, although

Job Creation he w as t aken t o h ospital b y h is f riends, t he ma yor h ad h im dragged o utside a nd be headed s hortly a fterwards.17 Th e p rivileges a ttained by L ondon’s m erchant a rtisans were n ot a bout t o be usurped by a common laborer, even if many in the rising, like Tyler, as his name implies, were tradesmen themselves. The revolt may have had most of the hallmarks of armed insurrection but it was not a re volt in the proper sense of the word. It was not an attempt to oust the king. It was a determined effort to force reforms. Up to that point, the peasant had been regarded as an i nconsequent i ndividual w hose o pinion c ounted f or n othing. His ea rnings h ad r isen a fter t he Black Dea th i n 1348 when t he English population was severely reduced – possibly by as much as a half – b ut labor laws were quickly introduced to curb wages.18 The f nal straw was a tax levied on every individual over the age of f fteen to raise money for the king’s military campaigns.19 The disproportionate effect of the tax on those who earned very little was contrasted with its insignif cance for the wealthier classes. Just as t here were poo r farmers, t here were poo r p riests, a nd one of them, John Ball, became the spokesman of the revolution, articulating popular resentment in the slogan: When Adam delved and Eve span, Who was then the gentleman?20 Ball, t he a gitator, e mphasized t o peo ple t hat t heir t ied s tatus was little better than slavery, particularly when their standard of living was compared to that of the rich.21 The insurrection failed to a lter t he s ystem b ut i t d id ma ke t he r uling c lass a ware t hat working people were not happy to maintain the status quo. The demographic impact of the Black Death cannot be ignored either, because it increased demand for people to work the empty f elds. It also meant that the serf who ran from the village to the city was not going to be q uestioned by those city-based employers who were desperate for his services. In the long run the competition for workers from the growing towns and the organization of trades perhaps did more than anything to erode the feudal status of the English peasant. The shift in the balance of economic power to the towns was not smooth. The towns suffered a setback with one of the earliest

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The History of Work forms o f m edieval m echanized i ndustry – the f ulling m ill. Fulling, the process of pummeling cloth by hand or foot in water as p art of t he f nishing p rocess, was m echanized i n t he t welfth century, using a wooden roller with protruding blocks that proved more effective than muscle power in kneading the cloth. The use of waterpower to turn the rollers led to the adoption of the term “mill” f or m echanized i ndustry. T he te rm h ad be en as sociated previously with grinding f our between stones. It also meant that the m ills were s et up i n r ural a reas a t t he h eadwaters of r ivers. These w ere n ot po pular d evelopments a mong w orking peo ple. The people whose livelihoods depended on hand fulling pleaded for some k ind of restraint against t he new te chnology. But t heir pleas were ignored.22 So cr ucial was t he p rocess t hat ma ny weavers were a ttracted out of the swelling towns and began to cluster around the mills. It was the beginning of the textile mill communities and it weakened the town-based weaving guilds. It did not break the power of the Church, s ince t he m onasteries re mained p rominent l andowners. Indeed, s ome of t he f ulling m ills were o n m onastery l and. T he monasteries w ere b ig e mployers, c alling o n a rmies o f peas ants to s ervice t heir way o f l ife. T he t raditional l andowners, i ncluding the Church, enjoyed the spoils of the growing textile industry, and many monks forgot their monastic ideals and lived in “lazy comfort.”23 However, the concentration of skills, shared both by free people a nd serfs, fostered a g rowing i ndependence of character among the weaving communities. It is not surprising, therefore, to f nd these centers receptive to religious N onconformism w hen i t be gan t o e merge as a d octrinal f orce a fter M artin L uther d elivered h is f rst re formist c hallenge to the Roman Catholic hierarchy in the form of ninety-f ve theses launched in Wittenberg in 1517. Whether or not, as legend has i t, t hey w ere p inned t o t he c hurch d oor, t he acc usations o f f nancial, doctrinal, a nd religious abuses found ready support in like-minded clerics and intellectuals across the continent. Luther’s l ater a ppearance a t t he Diet of Worms t o stand face to face with the Emperor Charles V, and refute charges of heresy with a lengthy, impassioned, and eloquently argued speech, must have been one of the most dramatic scenes of the Middle Ages. Luther was the face of the working man, a son of toil, commanded

Job Creation like Adam to work in the sweat of his brow. The emperor was the potentate acc ustomed t o s ubservience i n e very l ayer o f s ociety. To witness the intellect of this ultimate personif cation of the turbulent priest must have chastened those whose faith in the divine right of kings had been unshakable. There was, however, an ugly side to Protestantism that did not h ave L uther’s b lessing. H is d issent u nleashed o utbreaks o f thuggery an d v iolence dir ected a t th e c hurches an d c athedrals. Stained glass windows and woodcarvings were wrecked as bands of P rotestants v ented t heir a nger o n R oman Ca tholic i magery. The t oiling peas ant c ould re late t o a God w ho, t he B ible s aid, had demanded work in atonement for the original sin. How else could P aradise be re gained? S urely n ot b y h onoring t he r iches and gilded purple robes of the Roman Catholic Church. A b roader u nderstanding o f t he B ible w as p romoted b y Luther’s t ranslation o f t he N ew T estament i nto Ge rman, J ohn Calvin’s t ranslation i nto F rench, a nd W illiam Tyndale’s t ranslation into English. At the same time there was the opportunity of exploiting the ability to disseminate the printed word in volumes that ha d b een i mpossible b efore J ohannes Gu tenberg’s de velopment of interchangeable metal type in 1450. The ground had been prepared for a new type of religion, one that re vered t he teac hings o f t he Bible, t hat c ombined re ligious devotion wi th a c ode o f e thics, re voking e xcess a nd e xtolling the virtues of hard work in devotion to God. “Luther placed a crown on the sweaty forehead of labor,” wrote Adriano Tilgher.24 If Luther opened the door to this new Christian ethic, then John Ca lvin mad e i t p alatable t o t he w ealth crea tors. S horn o f the c ondemnation o f u sury a nd d istrust o f c apitalism, Ca lvin’s Protestantism, acc ording t o t he h istorian R . H . T awney, w as “perhaps t he f rst s ystematic bod y o f re ligious teac hing w hich can be s aid t o re cognize a nd a pplaud t he e conomic vi rtues.”25 Here i s t he d ifference as T awney s ees it: “ The Roman Ch urch, it w as h eld, t hrough t he e xample o f i ts r ulers, h ad e ncouraged luxury a nd o stentation: t he m embers o f t he R eformed c hurch must be e conomical a nd m odest. I t h ad s anctioned t he s purious c harity o f i ndiscriminate a lmsgiving: t he t rue Ch ristian must repress mendacity and insist on the virtues of industry and thrift.”26

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The History of Work This was the key to its social acceptance across the entrepreneurial classes of northern European society. Within Calvin’s doctrine it was possible to both pray and prosper, as long as you were p repared t o f orgo t he f rivolities a nd c orruption pe rmitted in Catholic circles, and as long as you were prepared to reinvest your wealth for th e b enef t o f s ociety. O nly a s elect f ew – T he Elect – w ould ma ke i t t o p aradise, h ence t he h olier t han t hou approach of competing sects, each vying to be purer than the others.27 Today we can see this same competition in the workplace, where the secular goal is a seat on the board or a year-end bonus. The Is lamic w orld s eems t o h ave reac hed a s imilar d ogmatic stage of the cycle, as m oderate and orthodox strains struggle for ascendancy. In sixteenth-century England t here was cant on both sides of the religious divide, not least that displayed by Henry VIII. Henry had always regarded himself as a g ood Catholic, and in 1521 he was a warded t he t itle “De fender o f t he F aith” b y t he P ope f or putting his name to a book defending the seven sacraments of the Catholic Ch urch a gainst L uther’s d octrinal a ttack. Ra rely h as a title been so ill deserved. In order to divorce his wife, Catherine of Aragon, he was prepared to break with Rome and sanction the formation of a Church of England. Some, like Thomas More, himself a cr itic of the papacy, were not prepared to renounce their Roman Catholic faith and died for their beliefs.28 Protestantism may have def ned a work ethic but it was never conf ned to Protestants alone. Few could match More’s fervor a nd c ommitment t o h is c hurch a nd h is w ork. Yet M ore sought to def ne a s ociety w here t he da ily r outine o f l abor d id not dominate people’s lives. In his Utopia there were n o s ocial classes and no idle people. All men took turns at different kinds of work, f nishing the necessary tasks of the day in six hours and spending the rest of their time pursuing their personal interests. Roman Ca tholics w ere q uite c learly c apable o f s trenuous work a nd c ommitment, b ut t heir worldview d iffered f undamentally f rom t hat o f t he P rotestant. “ The t rue Ca tholic c an n ever feel a m ission t o c hange by h is work t he face of t he Ea rth a nd of society,” wrote Adriano Tilgher, “for is he not already in this life a member of a society which cannot be changed because it is already perfect and divine?”29

Job Creation There was no divine assumption in Protestantism. This religion def ned a w ay of l ife a nd it was not about to relinquish its hold on English society. However, the Church of England was seen by some as no more than a watered-down version of the Church of Rome. Bishops still wore miters and gaudy, gold-threaded robes. The t rue Nonconformist demanded a m uch simpler communion between h umanity a nd God . Of a ll t he N onconformist s ects t o emerge i n En gland, i ncluding t hose o f C ongregationalism a nd Presbyterianism, T awney i dentif es P uritanism – a n i deal t hat was not conf ned to any particular sect – as t he most inf uential movement of the seventeenth century.30 “Puritanism, not the Tudor secession from Rome, was the true English R eformation, a nd i t i s f rom i ts s truggle a gainst t he o ld order t hat a n England which is u nmistakably modern emerges,” he writes. Tawney’s prose borders on the lyrical when he goes on to say: Immense as w ere i ts acc omplishments o n t he h igh s tage o f public affairs, its achievements in that inner world, of which politics a re b ut t he s qualid s caffolding, w ere m ightier s till. Like a n i ceberg w hich c an a we t he t raveler b y i ts t owering ma jesty o nly be cause s ustained b y a v aster mas s w hich escapes h is e ye, t he re volution w hich P uritanism wr ought i n Church and State was less than that which it worked in men’s souls, a nd t he watchwords which it t hundered, a mid t he hum of Parliaments and the roar of battles, had been learned in the lonely nights when Jacob wrestled with the angel of the Lord to wring a blessing before he f ed.31 This is passionate stuff. It begins to explain the psychological grip that the Protestant work ethic would sustain for the next four h undred y ears, a g rip t hat h as be come s o po werful i n t he psyche of the Western industrialized world that it is beginning to take o n t he c haracter of a s tranglehold, n o longer s imply c oloring our views but choking our judgment. It remains the surviving omnipresent altar in a secular world to which we make our daily sacrif ce o f u nremitting t oil. L uther w ould be s hocked a t s uch secularism b ut h e m ight d raw s ome c omfort f rom i ts B iblical antecedents.

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The History of Work Today we work as i f o ur s ouls a re re sponding t o s ome i nner program. The software for this program was conceived in earlier generations, back in the Reformation, and it came in a large black book – B ible black. Its message was profound and apparently in conf ict with t he mysticism a nd majesty of t he Roman church – but i ts i nf uence o n n orthern E uropean s ociety c annot be o verstated. The Bible was learning, it was instruction, it was political and potentially seditious; and it was much, much more. It was a “must h ave” po ssession for t he c hattering classes. It was t rendy and hip. It was cool.

CHAPTER 4

The New Religion of Work All true work is religion.

(Thomas Carlyle, 1795–1881)

Throughout the sixteenth century the Bible became the intellectual b read a nd b utter o f n orthern E urope. Translations i nto t he vernacular, s pread b y t he n ew m edium o f p rinting, crea ted a Bible c ulture t hat d ominated e veryday l ives. I n En gland H enry VIII complained to Parliament that it was “disputed, rhymed, sung, and jangled in every ale house.”1 The v ernacular B ible w as l ike t he M icrosoft W indows o f i ts generation. W ithin a h undred years o f t he En glish R eformation you could have found a B ible in every home. People opening its pages m ight w ell h ave as ked t hemselves, “ Where d o I w ant t o go t oday?” B ut i ts i ntellectual i mpact w as f ar m ore s ignif cant because, u nlike c omputer s oftware, u nlike th e In ternet w ith i ts amorphous and disparate content, the new medium of the printed page was delivering an extensive body of instruction, a moral ideology, previously modif ed for most people who had been forced to s ettle f or t he c lergy’s s elective i nterpretations. I n i ts La tin form, t he Bible was t he i nstrument of a uthority. I n its vernacular form, throughout Europe, it became an instrument of debate, dissent, and, ultimately, conf ict. There was a nother s ide t o i ts a ppeal. T he f rst versions were banned. It was forbidden fruit. But once tasted, its message was so seductive t hat some would go to t he stake rather t han re cant their opposition to the Catholic hierarchy. Secret g atherings in o pposition t o th e C hurch o f R ome h ad existed in England since the late fourteenth century, when John Wycliffe, the f rst man to translate the Bible into English, began to outline a t heological approach that would inspire the declarations of Martin Luther. T hose who followed Wycliffe’s l ine, t he Lollards, w ere ac tive i n t he p rofessional, m erchant, a nd a rtisan 43

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The History of Work classes. T he L ollards, w ho t ook t heir n ame f rom a pe jorative Dutch term for mumbling, were as much a political movement as they were religious. They shared the same distrust of the Church that had been apparent in the Peasants’ Revolt and earlier in the writings of Geoffrey Chaucer and the fable of Piers Plowman, but their movement was secretive in the face of suppression throughout the f fteenth century. As Christopher Hill, the historian, points out: “In the f fteenth century the mere fact of owning and reading t he B ible i n En glish w as p resumptive e vidence o f h eresy.”2 When W illiam T yndall’s En glish t ranslation o f T he N ew Testament appeared i n t he next century – a p rinted publication, not scripted like Wycliffe’s – i t added to the fermenting opposition to Catholic doctrine. Lutheran a nd Ca lvinistic teac hing b rought L ollardy o ut i nto the open, and the dissolution of the monasteries left the way clear for i ts d issemination wi thin v arious f orms o f N onconformism, including P uritanism. T he dissolution of t he monasteries, begun in 1536, legitimized Protestant dissent. It also created an opportunity f or t he e xisting l andowning g entry a nd t he m oneyed merchant class to buy up tracts of land conf scated f rom t he monasteries. While t he s ocial o rder w as s hifting a t t he h ighest s trata o f society, t he birth of English P rotestantism was a h esitant a ffair. No s ooner h ad c hurchwardens r id t heir c hurches o f a ll t heir imagery and ostentation in the reign of Edward VI – Henry’s only son a nd s uccessor – t han t hey w ere c ommissioning n ew i cons and decorations under the succeeding reign of Edward’s Catholic sister, M ary. W hen s he d ied a fter e ight years o n t he t hrone t he churchwardens be gan t he p rocess o f re moving t he i magery a ll over again under the Protestant rule of Elizabeth I. Reform was moving too slowly for the Puritans, who continued to re ject s urviving A nglican p ractices. T aking t he s acrament at an altar, baptizing babies with the sign of the cross on their foreheads, t he w earing o f v estments, l ighting o f ca ndles, a nd veneration o f c rucif xes w ere a ll c onsidered t o be f ounded o n superstition and idolatry. Almost every facet of life was subjected to rigorous biblical interpretation. T his would culminate i n t he formal challenge by Parliament to the hitherto self-perpetuating “divine right” of kings.

The New Religion of Work In the meantime Puritan thought began to establish itself among the g eneral po pulation, i f n ot a lways a t c ourt. As H ill p uts i t: “It was a cultural revolution of unprecedented proportions, whose consequences are diff cult to overestimate.”3 The Bible was not protected by copyright. In this sense Bible study, t ranslation, a nd i nterpretation were f ree for a ll, a ma gnet for i ntellectuals, t he I nternet o f i ts t ime – wi thout ad vertising. Its distribution, however, was subject to commercial factors. The popular Ge neva B ible o f 1 560, a n En glish t ranslation b ased o n Calvin’s i nterpretation a nd i ncluding a p reface b y h im, h ad a widespread a nd pe rvasive i nf uence p artly be cause it was m uch cheaper t han o ther v ersions. I nitially s muggled i nto En gland, it w as s ometimes re ferred t o as t he B reeches B ible be cause i t told readers that Adam and Eve made “breeches” to cover their nakedness. It was not so much the textual passages that worried the established Church but t he political d issent contained i n t he marginal analysis. The word “tyrant,” for example, was used frequently i n t he Geneva Bible but c ould be f ound nowhere i n t he Great Bible t hat had be en ordered by Henry V III a nd approved by the bishops. The Bible created popular debate about the nature of worship but this was not welcomed by the Establishment. Henry VIII had a statute passed t hat abolished “diversity of opinions.” O rdinary men a nd w omen w ere f orbidden t o read t he n ew B ible. T he only i mpact o f s uch l aws w as t o d rive t he d ebate u nderground and increase its potency. Religious discussion had never been so fashionable. While Calvinism took root in Scotland under the guidance of John Knox, the English Puritans were regarded with some suspicion throughout the Elizabethan era. With little prospect of overturning A nglican society in England the opportunity to create a Protestant Utopia, free from oppression, in the New World began to attract some of the most orthodox followers of Puritanism. The earliest attempts at colonization met with mixed fortunes. The f rst En glish c olony – o n R oanoke Is land, A merica, f rom 1584 to 1587 – was abandoned; the second to arrive there was lost without t race. T he 1 50 c olonists, a bandoned f or t hree y ears because o f t he En glish P rivy C ouncil’s re fusal t o s pare s hips needed t o f ght t he S panish A rmada, h ad d isappeared b y t he

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The History of Work time relief a rrived. T hese ea rly c olonists were a d ifferent b reed to the Puritan families who arrived later. They were adventurers and speculators lured by the prospect of f nding gold. They knew little of farming. Later groups, like the Jamestown colonists sent out in 1607 by the Virginia Company, were established with the intention of creating tobacco plantations. Many d ied. Some have pointed to t he absence of farming skills or of any desire to work hard among the Jamestown colonists, but t he conditions t hey were facing would probably h ave o verwhelmed t he m ost d etermined o f s ettlers. There is evidence from tree ring studies that Virginia experienced s evere d roughts i n t hose ea rly y ears o f c olonization.4 In spite of these hardships there was some tobacco planting, and the f rst shipment was sent back to England in 1616. Three years later colonists were buying black Africans from Dutch slave traders. So, a t a t ime w hen s erfdom w ould s till h ave be en i n t he memories o f s ome o lder En glish f arm w orkers, t he f amiliar experience of t ied l abor was re newed. It was n ot yet slavery, i n theory. It never would emerge as slavery for white settlers, many of whom began their life in the colonies as i ndentured servants, working off their passage. Some of the f rst black settlers had the same status initially and should have been released from their obligation after a f ve-year period. In practice many had taken on new f nancial burdens and could not afford to become free landowning f armers. S ome w ho s ecured l and s uffered re versals i n their fortunes as rac ial a ttitudes began t o h arden. W hatever t he original i ntentions o f t he w hite f armers t he ea rly e mployment practice of indentured labor soon slipped into slavery, with black workers bought and sold as chattels. But another kind of colonist would soon arrive to the north at New Plymouth where a group of plainly dressed families stepped down o ff t he Mayf ower on De cember 1 1, 1 620. T hese w ere Puritans, zea lous Ca lvinists, s ome o f w hom h ad be en l iving i n exile in the Netherlands. They were not welcome in England, not by the Church establishment anyway. Their intention was to create their own Christian Utopia in New England. They had come to work because the Bible had told them how God had worked to create Heaven a nd Ea rth. T hey had come, i n t he words of John White, a Do rset c lergyman w ho h elped o rganize a s ubsequent

The New Religion of Work expedition, t o “ propagate” re ligion.5 J ohn W inthrop, o ne o f t he most p rominent o f t hese ea rly P uritan s ettlers, c ompared h is voyage with the f ight from Egypt to the Promised Land. Idleness would not be tolerated. Indeed it was made a punishable crime by legislation passed in Massachusetts in 1648.6 This w as a n ew a ge o f c olonization a nd m ost o f t he c olonists were po ssessed o f t he P rotestant e thic t hat would s hape a continent. A s imilar s tory w as u nfolding a t t he s ame t ime i n Ulster, where thousands of Presbyterian Scots accepted an English invitation t o c olonize t he north of I reland. T here s eems t o be a marked difference between the industry of these Nonconformist colonizing s treams a nd t hose t hat be gan e lsewhere as pe nal settlements. Although t he c olonists m ight n ot h ave s een it t his way ( such was t heir a ntipathy t o t he R oman Ch urch), t hey c arried wi th them the same spirit that drove the monastic pioneers of the Dark Ages. T he b ig d ifference i s t hat t heir c onvictions w ere u nderlined with a latent power. They had the technology, organization, and strength of arms to be the top dogs in this vast new territory. Before t hem were u ncounted m iles of forest a nd plain occupied by people who were i ll e quipped to resist. But t aming t his land would n ot be eas y, a nd t he f rst s ettlers f aced a s imilar s truggle for survival to that of the early Church in a war-ravaged and fading Roman Empire. T he supplanting of a m oral, ethical, a nd religious code born out of resistance and dissent would give this new American society the backbone it needed to prevail. If T awney b elieved th at P uritanism’s s truggle w ith th e o ld order p rovided t he n ucleus o f m odern En gland, w hat w ould h e have mad e o f t he i mpact o n t he U nited S tates o f t he P ilgrim Fathers in New England? My own belief is that Puritan inf uence in the modern American psyche is immense. Historically it created a d istinct, powerful s tream of i ntolerant P rotestantism t hat was n ot m irrored b y t he e xperience o f n orthern E urope. T his radical Nonconformism continues to def ne the North American work ethic today. Most o f E urope d eveloped s ome re ligious t olerance a fter a period of c onf ict, i nquisition, a nd bloodletting. T his spirit tempered zealous behavior on both sides of the religious divide. The Counter-Reformation i n En gland, i n w hich t he Roman Ca tholic

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The History of Work Church sought to reform itself, helped to mend fences, but there was little hope of reconverting Protestant England. Not even force o f a rms c ould d islodge t he P rotestant e stablishment t hat f nally c onsolidated i tself i n t he 1 689 B ill o f R ights. A mong other m easures, t he b ill d ebarred R oman Ca tholic c laimants t o the t hrone. T he En glish Cul tural R evolution w as c omplete. I n England t here w as t he C ounter-Reformation, b ut t here w as n o reversion to the Church of Rome. It i s as i f a c ulture, t o be a ll pe rvasive, n eeds e ither t he f ull commitment of its adherents or some colloquial recognition. This popular appeal, t hat m ight lend a c omfort factor to t hose l iving under the cultural inf uence, has extraordinary powers of conversion. T he s peed o f c onversion c an be a larming a nd po tentially devastating, as the German people discovered in 1933. In most circumstances, h owever, t he c hange is p ositive a nd de cisive. It worked with the Vikings in northern France in less than 200 years. It worked again in medieval England when the English language e clipsed t he u se o f F rench, a lthough t here w as s ome marrying o f t he t wo. T he En glish peas ant c ontinued t o f arm his cows, pigs, and sheep, while the French-speaking master ate beef, po rk, a nd m utton.7 T he po wer o f f amiliarity w orked a lso on the English in Ireland during the Elizabethan era, when laws were passed to deter English settlement beyond a boundary – the “Pale.” The I rish way of life had been found to be s o appealing that many English families had “turned native.” This d id n ot h appen i n U lster a mong t he c olonizing Presbyterian S cots, be cause t heir f aith d emanded f ull c ommitment. R eligion i n i tself, o f c ourse, o ften h ad bo th o f t hese constituents – c ommitment and colloquial appeal. W hen backed by t hese po werful m otive f orces i t m ight be s aid t hat t he o nly force strong enough to stop the spread of Christianity was that of another great monotheistic religion such as Islam. Where the moral argument, a s ense of commitment and colloquial a ppeal c oincide s trongly, as t hey d id i n P rotestantism, founded on moral and ethical opposition to practices which the new Bible readers believed had gone beyond the original teachings o f Ch ristianity, t here i s a d uality o f po pular be lief a nd pragmatism. It is religion with its sleeves rolled up.

The New Religion of Work We c an be gin, t hen, t o s ee t wo o f t he d ef ning e lements i n the P rotestant w ork e thic. T here i s t he i deology, t he B iblical guidance, a nd t here is t he practice, t he example, t he determination to pursue a moral code, to f nd salvation through work. Some of t his f eeling w as a pparent i n t he l ifestyle o f t he V enerable Bede, men tioned e arlier. I n B ede’s ca se t he pr actice ca me f rom within. He did what he did without thinking, because he knew it to be r ight. He enjoyed t he f reedom of ma nual work, a nd t hose who worked with him enjoyed his presence. It was demonstrating what Robert Greenleaf, the management writer, would call “the Power of Servant Leadership” in his book of the same name.8 The Puritan ethic, however, had lost Bede’s gentleness. It was a s evere, f ormal, a nd p ious c ode p ursued wi th t he u tmost c onviction a nd ce rtainty. B y t he e nd o f t he En glish C ivil War a nd the beheading of K ing Ch arles I i n 1649 it was ma nifest i n t he extreme. The celebration of Ch ristmas was proscribed, churches were vandalized, and the stern face of Puritanism became as s et as stone in the Gorgon’s glare. No wonder t he En glish b reathed a c ollective s igh o f re lief a t the re storation o f t he m onarchy. T he N onconformists l ost t heir grip on government, and the reformed Anglican church grew in conf dence u nder Ch arles I I. T he n ew s pirit o f t olerance i n t he Reformation should not be o verstated. T he more extreme of t he Nonconformist radicals found little freedom to practice their religious beliefs. But that did not deter all of them. If anything it provoked g reater certainty a nd def ance a mong ma ny of t hose who were driven by their convictions. This is because there are other def ning elements in the Protestant ethic: it strengthens in adversity a nd it celebrates t he t riumph of t he h uman s pirit. Nowhere is t his mor e appa rent t han i n John Bunyan’s Pilgrim’s Progress, an allegory that relies wholly on the colloquial and unashamedly identif es with the little man. Protestantism w as a c ultural a nd i ntellectual re volution o f a power and intensity every bit as great as that recognized in industry and innovation during the eighteenth century. The latter could not have occurred without the former. The change was on a scale unknown, even i n classical G reece a nd Rome, be cause it was a revolution o f t he mas ses, a t riumph o n be half o f, a nd exploited

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The History of Work by, t he masses. T he vernacular Bible stimulated greater literacy. It was as if a whole nation had been captivated by the Holy Spirit of the Bible, and its inf uence was all pervasive. The f rst Sunday schools relied h eavily o n b iblical p assages for b asic i nstruction. The r ote l earning o f t he a lphabet, f or e xample, u sed b iblical references: A is an angel who praises the Lord, B is for Bible, God’s holy word, C is for Church where the righteous reside . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . G is for Goshem, a rich and good land, H is for Horeb where Moses did stand.9 Biblical instruction was even included in mathematical problems: There were seven days between the birth of Jesus and his circumcision, a nd f ve days f rom t he event t o t he E piphany, t he time when the star led the Gentiles to worship the Holy Child. How long was it from the Nativity to the Epiphany?10 The t hirst for l iteracy – s o t hat you, too, could read t he Bible – took a g reat leap forward in the mid-sixteenth century, when the f rst cheaper versions of t he Bible be came available. Even t hose who c ould n ot read i mmersed t hemselves i n B ible d iscussion, as Henry V III noted i n exasperation. A mong t he most despised of t he n ewer s ects i n t he s eventeenth ce ntury w as t he S ociety of F riends, n icknamed Q uakers b y a ma gistrate w hen h e w as advised b y Geo rge F ox, t he m ovement’s f ounder a nd g uiding spirit, that he should tremble at the name of the Lord. The powder h ad h ardly d ried o n t he f intlocks of Cromwell’s victorious New Model Army at the end of the English Civil War before Fox began his mission among the hardy farming communities of northern England. He was an extraordinary individual, described by those who admired h im as a g enuinely good ma n; but he was a good man with attitude. His preaching was confrontational a nd d isruptive. Of ten h e w ould s tand u p i n h is pe w t o contradict s ome po int i n a nother p reacher’s s ermon. I t w as t he riskiest f orm o f p rotest. D isturbing t he st atus quo , p articularly

The New Religion of Work during a c hurch service, was ra rely welcomed a mong congregations who valued order a nd custom a bove a ggravation. Fox was beaten up by one mob after another. He stood up and invited the blows with almost foolhardy courage. His e xample w on c onverts b ut i t a lso i nvited n ew w aves o f persecution. “ They g o l ike l ambs wi thout a ny re sistance,” wr ote Samuel P epys i n h is d iary. N ot u ntil t he Toleration A ct o f 1689 were the Quakers left to worship unhindered. Even then they were barred from many areas of employment. They were prevented by statute f rom e ntering t he u niversities a nd p rofessions a nd f rom engaging in traditional trades or crafts in the older corporate towns that had independent charters allowing them to regulate trades. Their s tance a gainst f ashionable c lothing m eant t hat f ashion trades, tailoring, and lace making could not be considered potential careers for a Quaker in the movement’s formative years. The clergy was also out, because Quakers refused to pay tithes – t he church t ax t hat d emanded a te nth o f a p arishioner’s i ncome i n money o r k ind. T hey re fused t o t ake t he o ath i n c ourt, s o t hat ruled o ut t he l egal p rofession. F or t he s ame reas on t hey c ould not e nter t he m ilitary o r po litics. Ot her j udicial a rrangements were d enied t hem: t hey c ould n ot s ue f or t heir d ebts, d efend themselves, or give evidence in a court of law. All i n a ll t he Q uakers had made t hemselves well-nigh u nemployable. Yet s o ma ny o f t hem p rospered i n p roportion t o t heir numbers, even w hen t heir g rowth i n En gland was be ginning t o recede. The extent to which Nonconformists prospered in relation to th e r est o f th e p opulation h as b een m easured r etrospectively by academics. Everett Hagen compiled a table from the names of inventors listed in P rofessor T. S. Ashton’s book, The Industrial Revolution 1 760–1830.11 A fter re searching t he re ligious b ackground of the inventors, Hagen found that while Nonconformists comprised 6 pe rcent o f t he c ombined po pulation o f En gland, Scotland, and Wales, they were responsible for more than a third of t he i nventions l isted i n t he boo k. As D avid M cClelland, t he psychologist, po inted o ut l ater, o ne i n te n o f t he i nventors o n Hagen’s list were Quakers, suggesting a mini-sphere of industrial excellence and invention.12 The Q uaker a bility t o p rosper i n b usiness w as e ven m ore apparent i n P hiladelphia. Q uakers mad e u p a s eventh o f

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The History of Work Philadelphia’s population in 1769 but accounted for half of those who p aid m ore t han £ 100 i n t axes t hat y ear. Of t he s eventeen wealthiest individuals, eight were Quakers of good standing, four had been ra ised as Q uakers, a nd a nother owed h is business fortune to a Quaker grandfather. So more than three-quarters of this wealthy elite had Quaker backgrounds.13 How was it t hat t he m embers o f t his m inority extremist s ect did s o w ell i n i ndustry a nd b usiness? T hey w ere h ardworking, but that was true of most Protestants; it was part of the Protestant ethic. H ard work by itself would n ot ma ke t heir fortunes. T hey ran a t ight o rganization a nd w ere w ell s tructured. T hey w ere great bookkeepers, making records of all the judgments that went against them and perceived wrongs done toward them. In a way it was their alienation, as a society within a society, that created the conditions for commercial success. They h ad a u nif ed be lief s ystem, t hey w atched eac h o ther’s moral progress, and they founded schools for their children. They supported t heir f ellows g enerously i n t rouble a nd s pent t ime i n each o ther’s c ompany, f orming b usiness p artnerships, o ften cemented by marriage. In modern management parlance they were great networkers, but it was not networking born out of the desire to exploit another’s usefulness. There was a strong vein of mutuality and self-help that made virtues of trust and fairness in their dealings. These carried over to their business activities outside Quakerism. This last point cannot be stressed too strongly. This was a period when trust among tradespeople generally was not high. The guilds, formed t o re gulate t heir re spective t rades, h ad be gun t o a ttract criticism from rank and f le tradesmen, who argued that they had become f ocused o n t he i nterests o f t heir w ealthiest c ontrolling members, many of whom had given up practicing their particular trade in order to concentrate on various speculative ventures. In one case, silk-weavers were forbidden by London’s Guildhall to se ll t heir pro ducts i n C ity i nns a nd f orced i nstead to ma ke deals with shopkeepers, who, together with the merchants, were determined to maintain their grip on city trade. Such restraint of trade and the poorer economic conditions at the end of the Civil War forced hundreds of craftsmen into lower skilled work such as laboring, portering, or chimney sweeping. The rank and f le guild

The New Religion of Work members attempted to overturn the constitutions of their liveries to make the organizations more democratic but they met with no success. I n the latter half of the seventeenth century they began to form t heir own s eparate o rganizations t hat were t he forerunners of the trade unions.14 The very success of the merchants heading the London liveried guilds h ad crea ted c lass d ivisions. N ow t hese r uling e xecutives were pe rceived by ma ny of t heir m embership not as c hampions of t heir t rades but as a m erchant oligarchy controlling t he companies, f xing wages, prices, a nd conditions, often to t he advantage of their individual businesses. Ordinary tradesmen who had fought on the side of Parliament in the Civil War were attracted to the Leveller manifestos of pamphleteers like John Lilburne, who began to def ne t heir demand for voting r ights for a ll men, with calls for “sovereignty of the people,” as a class struggle. The s elf shness a nd d istrust t hat be gan t o c haracterize t he established t rade o rganizations p roved a b ig ad vantage f or t he f edgling Q uaker b usinesses. Even i f peo ple d id n ot a gree wi th their re ligious vi ews t hey k new t hey c ould re spect t hese peo ple a nd t he m oral c ode t hat pe rmeated t heir b usiness d ealings. If t he l ist o f e xclusions f or po tential ad vancement l ooked c omprehensive, t he Q uakers found plenty of possibilities i n t he new industries that had taken root in the one hundred years before the Civil War. Paper m illing, gunpowder production, cannon founding, b rass ma king, s ugar re f ning, a lum a nd c opper s melting, and the mining of zinc ore and copper had all become organized industries during this period.15 T his, remember, was a n era t hat began s ome t wo h undred years before t he 1760s, t he da te m ost academics seem to agree marked the beginning of the Industrial Revolution. The 1 760s, i n f act, s aw m ore o f a te chnological re volution, which acce lerated t he g rowth o f i ndustry; t hough i t h ad be en growing steadily since the Elizabethan era. It is no surprise, then, to f nd Q uakers e stablishing t hemselves i n t he met alworking and smithing industries. One family, the Lloyds of Birmingham, became so entrenched in ironworking that they could afford to run lines of cred it for t heir c ustomers t hrough t heir own b ank. T he provincial or igins o f Ll oyds B ank pro vided a co mpetitive a lternative to City f nance. So did the bank set up by David Barclay,

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The History of Work another Quaker. The English Quakers built successful industries in i ron founding, f nance, c hemicals, a nd c onfectionery. Not a ll industries were open to Quaker exploitation – arms manufacturing was out because of t heir g rowing pacif st beliefs. But t he fashion for c hocolate f rom t he A mericas was t oo n ew t o crea te any l ine o f d issent, a nd s ince t he ea ting o f c hocolate w as j ust about t he o nly vi ce t hat d id n ot m eet wi th Q uaker o pposition it w as vi rgin te rritory f or t heir c ommercial d evelopment. T hus Fry & Sons, Cadbury, Rowntree, and Huntley & Palmer all owed their origins to Quaker development. Quaker sons a nd daughters moved into industry with remarkable success. Here was the birth of industrial man and woman in mind a nd s pirit. It was n ot t he b irth of ac hievement. Humanity had accomplished so much already without this Protestant ethic. The Pyramids, for example, stand testament to human willpower, discipline, a nd m ethod. B ut t he w ork o f b uilding p yramids, castles, a nd c athedrals w as d ifferent i n t his re spect: i t w as n ot guided by any belief in the work per se but by the product of the work. This new ethic celebrated work in its own right. Nowhere was this more evident than in North America, and it contributed signif cantly to molding the embryo of a n ation. The opportunity for this inf uential involvement in the beginnings of modern A merican s ociety a rose u nder William Penn, successor to George Fox in the Quaker movement. Penn had the advantage of a u niversity ed ucation. T he s on o f o ne o f O liver C romwell’s admirals, P enn w as as ked t o l eave Ch rist Ch urch C ollege, Oxford, be cause o f h is re ligious l eanings. U nlike h is f ellow Quakers, however, he was accepted at the court of Charles II, who granted hi m Am erican l and s eized fr om th e D utch.16 Wh ether this was in appreciation of his father’s achievements or whether it was a po litically motivated gesture to r id England of Quakers is not k nown, but it is k nown t hat t housands of t hem a nd other Nonconformists f ocked to the new lands. Philadelphia, t he c apital of t he state t hat t he k ing a nnounced would be c alled P ennsylvania, q uickly be came t he l argest c ity in North America, an entrepôt of displaced people from all over Europe. T he Q uakers w ere j oined b y H uguenots f rom F rance, Baptists f rom W ales, Du tch a nd Ge rman P rotestants, e ven persecuted Roman Catholics from Maryland, all attracted by the

The New Religion of Work state’s “liberty of conscience,” a declaration that allowed freedom of worship.17 No wonder Samuel Adams described his country as the “last asylum.”18 The Quakers were only a single grouping in the mostly Protestant ethnic mix whose rights were enshrined in the Declaration of Independence, signed on July 4, 1776 and proclaimed in public four days later in Philadelphia’s State House Yard, as the Liberty Bell was r ung d ef antly for t he f rst t ime. But t heir i nf uence in shaping t he A merican w ork e thic i s i mmense. T he Q uakers and t heir Nonconformist c ousins e nsured t hat h ard work would be v enerated, e mbodied wi thin t he A merican d ream i n a s elfgenerating virtuous cycle of industry and toil. Not even invention could deny the contribution of honest-to-goodness hard work in the A merican m ind. As T homas E dison would i nsist a h undred years l ater: “ Genius i s n inety-nine pe rcent pe rspiration a nd o ne percent inspiration.”19 After independence the Americans would need to look to their own i nventiveness a nd i ndustry. T here would be a g ap be cause the s park w ould be i gnited i n En gland. J ust h ow i t h appened, how this revolutionary work ethic created an industrial spirit that would t raverse t he w orld, c an be s tudied i n m icrocosm a mong the Quaker community. Max Weber, i n h is work The P rotestant Ethic a nd th e Spi rit of Capitalism, concentrated on stressing the causal links between Protestantism a nd c apitalism. H is c laim t hat c apitalism w as based o n P rotestantism i s s ound e nough, b ut i t ma y be m ore accurate to say that modern capitalism was based indirectly on religious intolerance. T he adversity created by intolerance d rove many of t he ea rly ac hievements of t he P rotestant e thic. A mong Quaker businesses c apitalism was employed a s an eff cient tool of the work ethic, lubricating industry, making the virtuous cycle spin m ore ra pidly. Ca pitalism w as a l ogical e xtension o f i ndustrial e ff ciency. I t w as a m eans t o a n e nd b ut w ealth crea tion was n ot t he e nd i n t he f ormative P rotestant e nterprise. Wealth was a welcome by-product, useful only in as much as it could be invested i n extending t he enterprise. Its meaning would change, but i n t he h ands of t hese P rotestant b usiness p ioneers it was as yet subordinate to the religiously inspired values that shaped the body corporate.

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The History of Work The w ay t hese v alues w ould ma nifest t hemselves i n a s mall Shropshire c ommunity a nd i n f actory s ystems o f e mployment would soon become apparent. Religion created opportunities for men and women to earn their daily bread, not only by the sweat of their brows, but in a way that would be organized and systemized t o t he advantage m ostly of t hose t hey s erved. It h ad t aken the p arcels o f w ork c alled j obs a nd s tructured t hem i n s hifts, controlled by employers, promising regular wages a nd t he prospect o f c ontinuous e mployment. T he j ob w e re cognize, t he j ob our parents knew, was taking shape.

CHAPTER 5

The Most Important Pile of Bricks in the World A trade is not learned through words, but by experience. (Richard Sibbes, 1577–1635) Most religions have their altars, the focus of worship and contemplation, and there is no more f tting altar for the religion of work than A braham D arby’s f orge a t I ronbridge i n C oalbrookdale, an u nassuming vi llage s et i n u ndulating f armland n ot f ar f rom England’s bo rder wi th Wales. P rotected t oday b y a c anopy a nd bathed in f oodlights, this crumbling brick structure is the womb that g ave b irth t o i ndustry o n a s cale t hat w ould t ransform t he way people lived and worked. Industry was advancing across Europe by the turn of the eighteenth ce ntury w hen D arby u sed t he re built f orge t o ma ke i ron using c oking c oal f or t he f rst t ime. T hroughout t he ce ntury, British businessmen and inventors would create or develop knowhow or i nnovations d rawn f rom t he European well of ideas a nd knowledge. Why was it happening in Britain more than anywhere else? A t wentieth-century c omparison m ight be mad e wi th t he advances in Japanese manufacturing since the end of the Second World War. The Japanese may not have led the way in inventions, but the way they exploited and built on innovation propelled their economy beyond most of those in the West. The Japanese people had a work ethic of their own, not one that relied on the individualism of Protestantism but one that could harness social cohesion in the Confucian tradition. Like C onfucianism, P rotestantism e xpected i ts ad herents t o observe a c ode o f be havior, n ot s o m uch o n t he s piritual p lane as i n da ily l ife. T he r ules w ere d ifferent i n Ca tholicism. T hey were t here t o be b roken – a nd t hey were b roken, b ut t here was always t he s afety n et o f t he c onfessional a nd a bsolution. T he 57

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The History of Work wonder and otherworldliness of Catholicism tended to stif e innovation. The scientists, Copernicus and Galileo, for example, were censured for suggesting t hat t he Ea rth was not t he center of t he universe. In 1 642, t he y ear t hat Ga lileo d ied, a nother g reat s cientist was bo rn, t his t ime i nto P rotestant En gland – Is aac N ewton. The contrast between the treatment meted out to Galileo and the way Is aac N ewton a nd h is f ollowers were a ble t o d evelop t heir science is striking a nd signif cant. Ga lileo had be en i mprisoned within h is o wn h ome b y t he I nquisition. N ewton, o n t he o ther hand, was allowed to pursue science and mathematics for its own sake. Protestants wanted applications. Newtonian theory was f ne because it was useful. It allowed people to make things that could be sold for prof t. It fostered progress. The business driver in Protestantism left little time for wonder and theory. It required application, not just of individuals but of the t ools, s ystems, a nd i deas t hat c ame i nto t heir h ands. T hey may h ave ad mired t he c uriosity o f L eonardo da V inci, b ut t he Protestants had a duty to improve the human condition. The economic and cultural root system of Europe was becoming h ighly d eveloped a nd d ivergent, t apping a nd n ourishing different w ells. T hose t wo g reat t rading ce nters, F lorence a nd Venice, bo lstered b y a s trong F lemish t radition t hat i n p ainting p ursued i ts o wn m ethods, f or c limatic reas ons p referring tempera t hen oils to f resco, had stimulated a R enaissance in a rt and a rchitecture t hat f red E uropean c ulture a nd ae sthetics f or hundreds of years. Spain, Portugal, the Netherlands, and England (with France playing catch up) had used their maritime traditions to p ush o ut t he f rontiers of d iscovery, l aying t he foundations of empire t hat would i mpose European culture, not necessarily for the better, on the lands they claimed for their respective crowns. The s ecrets o f p revious g enerations, p rotected b y e stablished organizations – t he Ch urch a nd g uilds – c ould n o l onger be maintained in th ese c ommunities o f s elf-interest, a s pe ople l eft them, t aking t heir k nowledge wi th t hem, o r as s tate l egislation eroded t heir i ndependence. P eople l ike M arco P olo, S ir Walter Raleigh, and Hernan Cortéz had extended Europe’s reach. There was an internationalization of interest, and ideas and discoveries began t o t umble o ver t hemselves. T he acc umulation o f n ew

The Most Important Pile of Bricks in the World knowledge a nd t he red iscovery of o ld k nowledge were s o overwhelming t hat no c ountry, no g overnment, no i nstitution c ould hope to keep a lid on it. This was not for the want of trying, especially outside Europe. In t he m id-seventeenth ce ntury Japan a ll b ut closed its d oors on the outside world for three hundred years, maintaining a single trading outlet with the Dutch. Elsewhere in the world there were too many avenues, too many possibilities, too many connections for secrecy to prevail. The tree of knowledge is aptly named. Like the spreading roots of a f ourishing plant, determined to seek out the r ichest source of nutrients, people were dividing a nd exploring different paths, and those paths that found some opportunity for learning or prof t – or both – divided and spread most rapidly. Religion, politics, claims and counterclaims, led to wars, stimulating d evelopments i n t actics, o rganization, a nd te chnology. “War is nothing more than the continuation of politics by other means,” said Karl von Clausewitz, the military strategist. He was wrong. War is much more than politics by other means. It was, and s till i s, a n i nstrument o f i nnovation, w hose f ruits ma y be applicable in many f elds. Advances in metallurgy, shared across Europe in the 1556 publication o f A gricola’s De r e me tallica, a n i nf uential b ook t hat outlined ma ny h itherto-secret pro cesses, were exploited n owhere more effectively than in England, and by no one more inf uentially than A braham D arby a nd t he D arby d ynasty o f i ronfounders.1 Darby w as a gi ant o f e ighteenth-century i ndustry a nd, a lthough there i s l ittle e vidence t hat h e d evised re volutionary systems o f employment, his contribution to the means of production and his Quaker ideals, shared by others who would inf uence the f eld of workplace human relations, should not be minimized. Rarely c an a nyone c laim i nnovation i n i solation, a nd D arby was not a ma n a lone, b ut h is work embodied t he spirit of what would be come k nown as t he I ndustrial R evolution. I f anyone deserves the mantle of father of this Revolution it is he, even though th ere a re p ersuasive a rguments th at th e “ Industrial Revolution” i s s omething o f a m isnomer i f i nterpreted as s ome great l eap forward i n t he h istory o f ma nkind. We h ave a lready noted t he i ndustrial s trides mad e d uring t he El izabethan era. Should they be considered part of the Revolution? Some

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The History of Work historians h ave po inted t o t he y ears be tween 1 760 a nd 1 830 in Britain, the years often quoted as spanning the Industrial Revolution, as a period of low economic growth.2 This should not be so surprising. Change is never easy. It involves experiment and failures. There is an argument that the benef ts of t hese changes might h ave be en enjoyed more p rof tably by others who h ad no experience of the birth pains. But does this mean we should rid ourselves of the popular images of the Industrial Revolution, the images of mills and chimneys, belching smoke, punching pistons, f ywheels, and the hiss of steam? Historians have given us labels for certain periods – t he Dark Ages, t he R eformation, t he R enaissance. I t i s n ot u nreasonable for another generation to challenge such labeling, to suggest that progressive change should not be put in boxes. But history is punctuated b y e vents. L uther ma y n ot h ave s tarted t he R eformation, but he pointed out to us that there was something in the air. We experience this same recognition when we look at the work of Raphael, Michelangelo, and Leonardo da Vinci. It was as if these men, in their own way, had experienced moments of understanding just as profound as the one that provoked Archimedes’ excited leap from his bathtub, exclaiming “Eureka” when he realized that his body displaced water. We know, too, that there was something in t he a ir when we look at t he developments of James Watt a nd the i nventions – a nd t heir a pplication – o f t he textile i nnovators such as John Kay, Richard Arkwright, and James Hargreaves. What was that something? It was change, so palpable you could sniff i t, f eel i t, a lmost s hape i t i n y our h and. I t w as e motional, exciting, a nd f rightening. I t p ut peo ple o n t he m ove, i t w orried governments, and it made men kill. The historian G. M. Trevelyan epitomizes the resistance to change in his English Social History, where h e d escribes t he England of t he e ighteenth ce ntury as “ a land of elegance” where “as yet t here was no great development of f actories, p roducing g oods w holesale, r uining c raftsmanship and taste, and rigidly dividing employers from employed.”3 Trevelyan does not appear to be a great fan of mass production. This is the scene he portrays of a land before factories: Under these happy conditions, the skilled hands produced, for the ordinary, ma rket goods of such beautiful design a nd execution

The Most Important Pile of Bricks in the World that they are valued by connoisseurs and collectors today: china, glass, and other ware, silver plate, books beautifully printed and bound, Chippendale chairs and cabinets, all sorts of articles for ornament and use. Even the commonest type of grandfather clocks that told the time in farmhouse kitchens were simple and effective in design, the outcome of a tradition followed with individual variations by innumerable small f rms. Architecture was safe i n t he plain English style now k nown as “ Georgian.” In t hose da ys a ll b uildings e rected i n t own o r c ountry, f rom town h alls a nd r ural ma nsions t o f arms, c ottages, a nd g arden tool-houses, were a pleasure to the eye, because the rules of proportion, in setting doors a nd windows in relation to t he whole, were u nderstood b y co mmon b uilders. T hose s imple f olk, b y observing t he r ules of proportion laid down for t heir g uidance in Gibbs’s h andbooks kept h old of a s ecret, a fterwards lost by the pretentious architects of the Victorian era who deserted the plain English Georgian style to follow a hundred exotic fancies, Greek, Medieval, or what not, and were book-wise in everything concerning their work, except the essential.4 Trevelyan, writing with hindsight, is suggesting that the English were a bout t o “lose it,” j ust as o ther s ocieties h ad lost it before them. It is a d ifferent perspective from that of the rags-to-riches entrepreneurial elite who would view every new industrial development as “progress.” Trevelyan’s portrait may be c olored somewhat by the nostalgia of the time – h e is wr iting just before the Second World War – but clearly he is unimpressed by the march of i ndustrialization. He wr ites of a g reat a ge of a rtisanship t hat had reac hed i ts ze nith. H e wr ites o f a rt a nd a rchitecture t hat collapsed i nto V ictorian ma nnerism. F ew o f t hose undergoing these c hanges c ould h ave u nderstood t heir c ollective ma gnitude th roughout th at c entury, b ut th ey u ndoubtedly k new th at change was happening at a rate impossible to control or calculate. So w hen t he h istorian A rnold T oynbee po pularized t he te rm “Industrial Revolution” i n a s eries of lectures i n 1884, h e k new he was dealing with something that had indeed the sniff of revolution. No wonder the label stuck. All revolutions h ave a g enesis, s ome s park o r event t hat t riggers a s eries of other t ransformational events. H istory is littered

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The History of Work with w ars, t reaties, c oups, a nd c ountercoups, b ut s ome o f t he most lasting inf uences on civilization – the birth of Christianity, for example – h ave humble origins. So it was with the Industrial Revolution, w hose o rigins c an be t raced t o o ne ma n’s d esire t o make a better cooking pot. The brick-built forge in Ironbridge is a f ttingly humble shrine at which we may pause and contemplate the events that would change the l ives o f s o ma ny peo ple, t hat w ould c hannel t hat P rotestant energy a nd de f ne the industrialized world. We f nd t he qu alities of humility and honest endeavor, and more, in this forge, the culmination of Abraham D arby’s d etermination t o ma ke a c heap and s erviceable c ooking po t. D arby w as a po t ma ker, p ure a nd simple, yet the discoveries and processes he began, further developed b y h is s on a nd g randson, w ould h elp t o c hange t he w orld. Darby would be come a mas ter f orger – the m aster f orger o f t he eighteenth ce ntury – f ather o f a n ew I ron A ge. H is f rst breakthrough i n po t ma nufacturing w as t o t ake a m ore e conomical form of brass molding used by the Dutch and adapt it for molding iron. The Dutch method used sand for the molds. These were reusable and therefore cheaper than the loam or clay molds in general use a t t he t ime. Ch eapness w as t he k ey. T he p roblem w as t hat molten i ron – f ar h otter t han b rass w hen po ured i nto t he s and molds – c aused a b uildup o f g as t hat w ould b urst t hem a part. Darby’s as sistant, J ohn T homas, s uggested ma king a ir h oles i n the sand to allow for the greater heat of the iron. The work was so secret that Darby blocked up the keyholes to the doors of t he forge.5 Rivals offered to double John Thomas’s wages i f h e j oined t hem, b ut h e s tayed l oyal t o D arby. W hile there is no doubting Darby’s desire to make money, it is worth noting t he w ording o f h is 1707 p atent f or c asting i ron po ts. I t reveals a social consciousness in line with the Quaker ethic while at the same time stressing the potential importance of the process for the nation in foreign exports: A new way of casting iron bellied pots and other iron bellied ware in sand only, without loam or clay, by which iron pots and other ware may be cast f ne and with more ease and expedition and ma y be a fforded c heaper t han t hey c an be b y t he w ay

The Most Important Pile of Bricks in the World commonly u sed a nd i n re gard t o t heir c heapness ma y be o f great advantage to the poore of this our kingdom, who for the most part use such ware, and in all probability will prevent the merchants of England going to foreign markets for such ware, from whence g reat q uantities a re i mported a nd l ikewise may in t ime s upply f oreign ma rkets wi th t hat ma nufacture o f o ur own dominions.6 Was t his t he g reatest s tride f orward i n c ivilization s ince Gutenberg’s development of the printing press? There were similarities. G utenberg’s i nvention was a re f nement o f pr inting t hat allowed interchangeable metal type. It made printing cheaper and much m ore ef f cient, l eading t o a n e xplosive s pread o f p rinted knowledge a nd s timulating a n u nheralded d esire f or l iteracy among the populations of Europe. Most great inventions, in fact, tend to be ref nements. Watt’s steam engine was a re f nement on earlier machines, and he would ref ne it further to deliver rotary power. D arby’s d evelopment crea ted t he raw ma terial for a n ew age o f i nvention. I t w as j ust t he f rst o f a s eries o f m omentous strides i n i ronworking mad e b y m embers o f h is f amily. W ithin two y ears D arby h ad m oved h is o perations t o C oalbrookdale, taking advantage of a d erelict forge i n a t raditional i ronmaking area. Hitherto, c harcoal h ad be en t he f uel u sed i n i ron a nd b rass forging. T raditional i ron f orges s cattered a round t he En glish Midlands relied o n l arge swathes of c oppiced woodland. About 2,500 acre s of woodland were n eeded t o s ustain a s ingle forge. This p revented t he c oncentration o f i ron p roduction, be cause charcoal c ould n ot be t ransported i n b ulk wi thout cr umbling. The g eology o f C oalbrookdale, wi th o utcrops o f c lay, i ron o re, coal, and limestone, offered resources on the doorstep. The only restriction t o e xpansion w as t he s upply o f c harcoal, b ut D arby had i deas f or i mprovements t o t he f orging p rocess t hat w ould overcome t he pro blem. Co ke is ma de f rom co al, co vered a nd heated at high temperatures to change its structure. Its advantage over c oal i s t hat i t a lso b urns a t h igh te mperatures. T he vi tal component was coke. Darby began smelting iron ore in January, 1709. If this was the birth of t he I ndustrial Revolution, a nd it may be as g ood a da te

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The History of Work as a ny, i t w as a re volution t hat s tarted q uietly. T he f rst smelting was carried out using the conventional charcoal fuel, but the scarcity of wood for charcoal led Darby to experiment with other fuels. He tried coal, but it burned too quickly and not hot enough. It may well have been some earlier experience with malt mills that led him to experiment with coal and coke in forging, since brewers h ad pe rfected t he way of ma king c oke.7 At s ome s tage in that year – we don’t know when – he had some coal coked into cinder. What was good for drying malt, he reasoned, might work with iron. 8 He f ound t hat l ocally m ined c oal, l ow o n s ulfur c ontent, worked be st. T he l ocal i ron w as a lso g ood f or c asting be cause it was high in silica and low in phosphorus. Although Darby did not u nderstand t he c hemistry, h e rea lized h e w as ma king f ne cast i ron t hat c ould ma ke po ts wi th f ar t hinner w alls t han a ny made previously. Within a y ear t hese c heap “bellied” po ts – t he s ort we as sociate with witches’ c auldrons – w ere t ransforming t he d omestic market for cookware. People who might have previously scraped enough t ogether t o b uy a s ingle po t c ould n ow o wn m ore t han one. T he t rade s hould n ot be t rivialized. T here w as a t ime i n England when the habit of boiling a pot in one place was a symbol o f re sidence a nd f reedom. I t w as p art o f En glish l aw.9 Th e Quaker business ethic meant that Darby did not set a price for his pots but asked a buyer to name a fair price. This underlying fairness i n t he way t he Q uakers d id business is one of t he def ning characteristics of their success, establishing a strong link between honesty and customer loyalty that remains as valuable today as it did in Darby’s time. Darby o pened m ore f orges n earby a nd b uilt c ottages f or h is workers. T hese w ere a mong t he f rst r ow h ouses as sociated with i ndustrial p roduction. W hen Abraham D arby d ied i n 1717, his p artners c arried o n t he w ork u ntil A braham D arby I I t ook control. T he son was as i nventive as h is father, g radually building h is u nderstanding o f t he p rocess a nd d eveloping a n ew ironworking m ethod t hat w ould p ropel t he re volution e ven f urther. This was wrought iron. Cast iron was strong but brittle. Wrought iron, made by elongating a nd ma ngling t he h ot m etal a nd bea ting o ut t he c arbon

The Most Important Pile of Bricks in the World responsible f or c ast i ron’s f ragility, w as be ndable a nd f exible. Coalbrookdale continued to ma ke cooking pots, but soon it was also ma king i ron ra ils a nd w heels f or t he n ew l ocomotives. It mad e s team bo ilers a nd t he f rst iron frames used in factory buildings, allowing the owners to concentrate their production in far larger multistoried factories. By t he m id-eighteenth ce ntury t here were o ther i ron p roducers. Hundreds of people were exploring the potential of this new product that had allowed steam power to come of age. How had something l ike a s imple c ooking po t d one s o m uch t o l iberate the almost explosive inventiveness of the age? The answer is quite simple – because it was cheap. The f rst steam engines, like the f rst computers, were complex, expensive machines. Many of their working parts were made of brass, and brass was expensive. Iron w as m uch c heaper, a nd t he D arbys’ q uality i mprovements made it viable in steam engine construction. Ref nement of innovation a t l ower c ost was t he k ey t o t he wi despread ad option o f steam power. T his combination of factors has proved itself time and again in the marketplace. Innovation is moribund without it. Abraham D arby’s i ron s melter w as as cr ucial t o d evelopments in t he e ighteenth ce ntury as t he s ilicon c hip w as t o c omputing nearly three hundred years later. The forge itself is not much to look at. Its history is inscribed in l intels s et i n t he b rick s tructure a t d ifferent da tes. T he f rst, dated 1 638, w as p laced t here b y t he B rook f amily w ho e stablished the charcoal furnace. Later lintels were added by Abraham Darby III, when he enlarged the structure to manufacture the cast iron for the bridge that gives Ironbridge Gorge its modern name. Otherwise t he s tructure l ooks l ittle m ore t han a p ile o f b ricks. David de Haan, deputy director of the Ironbridge Gorge Museum Trust, puts it into perspective: “Essentially it’s the most important pile of bricks in the world.”10 Some ma y a rgue d ifferently, i nspired pe rhaps b y e xcavated walls, s uch as t hose o f b iblical J ericho ( now e qually d ecrepit) or t he G reat Wall o f Ch ina; g reat s tructures bo th, b ut t hey d id not c hange peo ple’s l ives i n t he s ame w ay as t his n ew a ge o f iron a nd s team. I n t his s mall S hropshire v alley a t t he be ginning o f t he e ighteenth ce ntury, t he s mell o f c hange w as o nce more in the air. It was a sulfurous smell borne on choking fumes

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The History of Work that constricted the lungs and stung the eyes. It was the smell of progress. We can see change happening in Abraham Darby’s lifetime. H is daughter-in-law, A biah D arby, c ontrasts t he e conomy of Coalbrookdale before and after the arrival of her family: “This place a nd i ts e nvirons w as v ery b arren, l ittle m oney s tirring amongst t he inhabitants. So t hat I h ave heard t hey were obliged to exchange their small produce one to another instead of money, until h e c ame a nd got t he works t o bea r, a nd mad e m oney c irculate a mongst t he d ifferent p arties w ho w ere e mployed b y him.”11 Something e lse was h appening i n t his pe riod. D arby a nd h is industrial s uccessors we re c reating t he j ob, a s we wo uld r ecognize it for the next three centuries. The job was changing, almost imperceptibly, from a piece of work that needed doing, to something that began to be pe rceived as a c onstant source of employment a nd i ncome pa ckaged by t he pa rameters of t ime. L ooking at D arby’s c ashbook i n t he f rst y ear o f t he f orge’s o perations, you can see it developing. Much of t he ea rly work is bought i n. Individuals a re c ontracted f or s pecif c t asks. S ometimes t hey bring t heir ma terials wi th t hem as t rader-contractors. B ut v ery quickly you begin to discern a s mall core of regularly paid individuals, f ve at f rst, growing to a dozen or more by the end of the year.12 There is no clue to their working conditions, although the amounts they are paid usually (but not always) correspond week by week. This is still a long way from uniformity, but it is beginning to look like regular employment. Some r egular employment at t his t ime, m ine work for example, was contracted out, typically using middlemen called charter masters. I t would be wr ong t o d escribe t hese peo ple as p rofessional re cruiters, be cause t hey w ere q uite u nprofessional. T hey often ra n p ubs a nd s tores c alled t ruck s hops, a nd o n p aydays their tardiness in distributing the wages was legendary. The idea was to keep the workers hanging around long enough to chalk up some credit in the pub or to buy some of the overpriced goods in the shop.13 The mine owners were slow to realize that they should “have no truck” with these people.14 In spite of these abuses, employment was settling into a da ily pattern. I nstead o f w orking f rom da wn u ntil d usk f or i ntensive periods def ned by a s pecif c project such as t he harvest, people

The Most Important Pile of Bricks in the World would re st a t t he e nd o f t heir s hift. T he n ext da y t here w ould be a nother s hift. T he w ork w as a c onstant i n a mushrooming economy where demand fueled production and production fueled demand. I t w ould be a m istake, n evertheless, t o s ay t hat t he Industrial Revolution created “the job.” It changed the job, making it the most recognizable feature of employment and the handiest o f w ords t o d escribe a n i ndividual’s e mployment. B ut t he word “job,” like most of the words describing employment, has a long and evolving history, sometimes obscure in origin. The Oxford E nglish D ictionary suggests t hat “job” m ay share its origin with t he word “gob,” meaning a s mall parcel of something i n t he m outh. G radually it c ame t o m ean a h eap of ma terial, specif cally so i n t he m ining i ndustry, where it was used to describe both a m ining cavity a nd t he pile of m ined material. It does n ot t ake a g reat s tretch o f t he i magination t o s ee h ow t he act of creating the pile and the cavity could become a “gob” or a “job.” T he words c overing occ upation ( even “ occupation” i tself) began t o t ake o n t heir m odern m eaning d uring t his pe riod. T he salary – from the Latin salarius, a word that had f rst been applied to t he p ayment given t o Roman s oldiers for t he p urchase of s alt (sal) – had come to be used as a term for a priest’s stipend but was not yet in general usage. Words like “recruitment” and “wage” had military origins. “Work” had Teutonic origins and “trade” evolved from its original Old German meaning of following a path. Workers did not yet “clock in,” but the clock began to increase in i mportance, both i n governing t he length of t he working day and i n p roportioning p ay. T he ma rine c hronometers o f J ohn Harrison, a c ontemporary o f t he D arbys, h ad g reatly ad vanced the acc uracy o f t imekeeping i n t he f rst h alf o f t he e ighteenth century, but telling t he exact t ime was not necessarily t he most important feature of early factory timekeeping. Mills relying on water t o d rive t heir machinery would sometimes use a t wo-faced clock.15 One face would tell the real time and the second face would tell the time for which a n individual would be p aid. This “factory time” was governed by the f ow of the r iver t hat worked t he mac hinery. I f t he f ow s lowed, s o d id production. The elongated hours measured by the clock geared to the water f ow were used, therefore, to calculate the excess hours that employees would need to work to make up their pay.

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The History of Work It was a n ovel form of f exible working, allowing manufacturing employers a nd employees t o plan more eff ciently for peaks and troughs in production – not so very different from the “hours banks” in troduced in th e l ate-twentieth c entury, w hich all ow workers to save up hours worked as overtime, so that they can be taken later, ideally during a slack period. Unlike hours banks, however, t he sy stem o f emp loyment g overned b y w ater c locks was wholly one-sided. This form of variable factory time meant that t he w orker w ould be i n p lace w hether t he w ater, a nd t hus production, f owed or not. In the early factory system, time was in the power of the factory master, often the only individual in possession of a w atch. According t o t he h istorian E . P. T hompson, factory masters would sometimes cheat their workers by putting the clocks forward in the morning and back at night. One worker with a w atch h ad it t aken f rom h im be cause h e was te lling h is fellow workers the time of day.16 The introduction of clocking on by workers using a recording clock i n t he ea rly 1 800s p revented e ither w orkers o r e mployers t aking ad vantage o f w ork-time e xpectations. A ccording t o Lewis M umford, t he A merican s ociologist w ho d ied i n 1 990, this p recise c ontrol of t ime i n factory p roduction was a n atural progression f rom t he re gulated s trictures o f S t. B enedict’s r ule. The monasteries, said Mumford, had helped to give enterprise the “ regular c ollective bea t a nd r hythm of t he mac hine; for t he clock i s n ot m erely a m eans o f k eeping t rack o f t he h ours, b ut of s ynchronizing t he ac tions o f m en” s o “ time-keeping p assed into time-serving and time-accounting and time-rationing.” Thus, he c oncluded, “ the c lock, n ot t he s team e ngine, i s t he k ey machine of the industrial age.”17 The f actory, i n t he s ense of a b uilding i n w hich ma nufacturing w ork w as c oncentrated, h ad c ome o f a ge. T he w ord w as originally a pplied t o t he p lace u sed b y m erchants o r f actors t o carry o ut t heir f oreign t rade. U nlike t he m ill, w hich w as as sociated wi th a m echanical f unction, t he f actory w as as sociated, f rst a nd f oremost, wi th t he bo ss, t he c ontroller o f p roduction. Mill and factory would become synonymous. But it is signif cant that the factory was the place where the manufacturing entrepreneur would c oncentrate h is p roduction. Its ma in advantage over home-based production, at least until economies of scale became

The Most Important Pile of Bricks in the World apparent, was probably that of concealment and protection of the new machinery from those who might imitate or destroy it.18 The t heft o f i ndustrial s ecrets w as be coming a n i nternational issue. W hen J ohn L ombe t ook a j ob i n 1717 a t a s ilk f actory i n Livorno, I taly, h is e xpress i ntention w as t hat o f c opying t he s ilk spinning machine on which he was working.19 He worked by day, and by n ight he copied every single detail of t he machine, before hiding t he p lans i nside a b ale o f s ilk bo und f or En gland. W ithin four years John and his brother, Sir Thomas Lombe, had established a factory on an island in the middle of the River Derwent in Derby. The Italians had been using these machines for at least three centuries before the secrets were brought to England, but the Italian enterprises were conf ned to relatively small mills. The Lombes built a f ve-story factory, employing some three hundred people, including skilled female Italian o perators re cruited f rom t heir h ometown of Livorno. A warrant was issued in Italy for John Lombe’s arrest, but he was well away f rom Italian jurisdiction. He may not, however, have be en out of t he Italians’ reach. He d ied t hree years a fter h is factory went into production, and there is a s tory that he was poisoned by an Italian assassin, possibly one of the women operators.20 The espionage game, then as now, was a perilous business. Silk s pinning would r emain a s pecialist in dustry in E ngland. The po tential f or w ool a nd c otton w as f ar g reater. N o w onder then that the most ambitious of individuals applied themselves to improving t he ma nufacture o f t hese m ore s erviceable te xtiles. One o f t he f rst i mportant b reakthroughs w as mad e b y J ohn Kay, who i nvented t he f ying shuttle. T he shuttle could work so quickly t hat t hread ma nufacture c ould not keep up with it u ntil Hargreaves re sponded b y i nventing h is s pinning j enny i n 1767. Within the space of about f fteen years the technology of the textile industry was transformed in a series of logical leaps. The jenny could only make thread strong enough for the weft – the s hort t hread c arried b y t he s huttle. T he n ext b reakthrough would be t o ma ke a mac hine c apable o f s pinning t he s tronger warp, which stretched over the length of the loom. Kay, a c lockmaker, would give his assistance to Richard Arkwright, a barber turned wi gmaker a nd i tinerant t rader i n h uman h air, w ho w as intent u pon ma king a p erpetual m otion mac hine. A ccording to h is l andlord h e w as s eeking t o wi n t he p rize o ffered b y t he

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The History of Work British Parliament to anyone who could f nd a reliable way of calculating longitude.21 Perpetual m otion e luded A rkwright, b ut wi th Ka y’s h elp h e did design a u seful spinning frame that could make the stronger warp t hread. W hen he exhibited t he f rame at P reston Grammar School it was not well received by self-employed weavers worried about its po tential t o d estroy t heir j obs. Ot hers po ssibly s aw a n opportunity t o s teal t he i dea a nd p ursue t heir own ma nufacturing operations. T his was t he textile entrepreneur’s d ilemma a nd remains t he i nnovator’s d ilemma t o t his da y. H ow d o y ou d isplay your i nvention to potential backers a nd yet conceal it f rom imitators? Who can you trust? The danger is that in business the gamekeeper can sometimes turn poacher. Arkwright’s f rst s pinning f rame u sed h orsepower, b ut h e soon switched to waterpower i n a p urpose-built cotton-spinning factory e stablished i n 1771 by t he side of t he R iver De rwent i n Cromford, De rbyshire. T he mac hine w as re named t he w aterframe. B y th e l atter h alf o f th e e ighteenth c entury th e B ritish textile i ndustry w as a wash wi th i nventions. S amuel C rompton’s Mule (1774) was devised as a h ybrid of the water-frame and the spinning jenny, and Edmund Cartwright’s power loom (1785) took advantage of James Watt’s improvement in steam power. By 1780 the UK had 120 textile factories, mostly in Lancashire and Yorkshire. But they far from dominated the trade. This was still a l abor-intensive, h ousehold a rtisan i ndustry. T he po wer l oom did n ot work well a t f rst, a nd h andloom weaving p revailed for a while. But the bargaining power of the handloom weavers had been d estroyed by t he yarn ma nufacturers a nd cloth m erchants. The days of relative prosperity and independence for the artisan weaver were coming to an end. Only when mechanization began to impact on wages, as it did after the turn of the century, did worker resentment of textile machinery boil over into violence and outbreaks of frame breaking. There was similar unrest in France when Joseph Jacquard invented an improved loom in 1804. He was mobbed and almost drowned by t he w eavers o f Li lle, w ho d estroyed h is n ew i nvention. T he destruction, w herever i t occ urred, w as s hort-lived, s poradic, a nd organized. The British government response to frame breaking was that of a nervous administration, reeling still from revolution in the

The Most Important Pile of Bricks in the World American c olonies. F earful o f a ny re peat o f t he e vents t hat h ad led to revolution in France, suspicious of anything that smacked of insurrection o n its own s oil, t he British government e nsured t hat the N orth o f En gland t owns w ere g arrisoned a gainst a po tential threat fr om w ithin. Troops would f re i n a nger. M en would f ght and d ie f or t he r ight t o w ork. T he e thic t hat d ef ned a s pirit o f endeavor was pumping the heart and boiling the blood. Something would have to give.

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CHAPTER 6

Secrets of the Dumb Steeple Man is a worker. If he is not that he is nothing. (Joseph Conrad, 1857–1924) John Booth was dying. The loss of blood from his leg, shattered by a m usket ball, had been too great. He was a y oung man, just nineteen, a h arness ma ker f rom H alifax i n t he West R iding o f Yorkshire. It hadn’t even been his quarrel, but passions were running high, and when volunteers were sought to f ght o n be half of t he hand shearers John Booth was with t hem. H is father had been a shearer before joining the priesthood and still did the odd shearing job. It was a good job and had been well paid before the machines arrived. Machines did not put food on the Booth family table. The issue was that simple. But was it worth dying for? As B ooth’s life ebbed away, a c lergyman called Hammond Roberson stooped over him, eager to hear him s peak. R oberson w as n ot m inistering a bsolution. H e w anted information. He wanted names. Who were Booth’s accomplices? Who were these so-called Luddites who thought they could terrorize manufacturers into abandoning their wage-saving mechanization? This was the North of England, April, 1812. Britain was at war with France and America. Its best troops were abroad, and unrest had b roken o ut i n t he ma nufacturing ce nters o f N ottingham, Lancashire, and Yorkshire. The Luddites at the heart of the trouble were named a fter a N ottingham apprentice, Ned Ludd, who set a bout h is s tocking f rame wi th a h ammer w hen t hreatened with a whipping for working too slowly. Their tactic was to send threatening letters in “General” Ludd’s name to potential victims. If machinery was not dismantled by its owners, the Luddites did the job themselves. First it had been the stocking-frame breakers in Nottingham, then the weavers in Lancashire, then setting f re to m ills in protest over the threat posed to work a nd pay by the new power looms at a time of sharply rising food prices. 72

Secrets of the Dumb Steeple Finally i t w as t he Yorkshire s hearers, a w ell-paid i ndustrial elite whose job was to crop the newly made cloth with large and heavy steel shears. Their work was becoming scarce and poorly paid. W orker h ostility w as d iscriminatory, a imed n ot a t a ll a t the mill owners who installed machines, but at those who did so while lowering their rates of pay. William Ca rtwright, t he o wner o f Ra wfold’s M ill i n t he Yorkshire vi llage o f Li versedge, h ad d one j ust t hat. H e w as a determined ma n – h is c haracter w as t he i nspiration f or R obert Moore, the hero of Charlotte Bronte’s second novel, Shirley, based around the events of April 12, when perhaps between a h undred and two hundred men, including John Booth, met in darkness at a local l andmark, t he Du mb S teeple, a bout t hree m iles f rom t he mill. T hey w ere d esperate m en, f ortif ed b y t heir c onvictions. They were not poor. They were not starving. Not yet anyway. But they had plenty to lose. The West Riding Luddites had already claimed a victory against Cartwright when they intercepted and destroyed a batch of shearing frames on their way to the mill from the manufacturer, Enoch and J ames T aylor. T he c ompany n ot o nly mad e t he f rames, i t also made the hammers that were used to smash the frames. For one business, at least, t he Luddite r isings were a h ealthy source of prof t all round. The m en w ho m et a t t he Du mb S teeple w ere o rganized a nd probably well drilled. They marched with hammers, clubs, and a few small a rms. But Ca rtwright was waiting with f ve soldiers, assigned to protect the m ill, a nd four of h is own men, all a rmed. The mill had been reinforced in case of attack and the raiders could not g et i n. T he b attle l asted t wenty m inutes. W hen t he L uddites gave up and dispersed they left two of their group, John Booth and Samuel Hartley, lying, mortally wounded, in the mill yard. The t wo m en were t aken t o a n earby public house a nd questioned, b ut t hey be longed t o a g roup w here t he i mposition o f secrecy was vital. All its members were under oath to keep silent. The l ocal p arson, H ammond R oberson, w as o n t he s ide o f t he owners a nd h oped t o wi n t he d ying m en’s c onf dence. When Booth beckoned him closer, he knelt to hear his confession. “Can you keep a secret?” asked Booth, his voice beginning to falter.

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The History of Work “Yes,” said Roberson. The p riest b rightened u ntil B ooth re plied wi th h is d ying breath: “So can I.”1 Charlotte Bronte’s m ill owner hero was foreign-born, t he son of a F lemish te xtile f amily t hat h ad f allen o n h ard t imes. B ut the rea l Ca rtwright w as f rom t he s ame s tock as t hose w ho opposed him. In different circumstances you could imagine him leading the riot. Owners and employees possessed the same ethic but w ere c apable o f d irecting i t d ifferently, d epending o n t heir position. Class d istinctions h ad be come ac ute b y t his t ime. Ch arlotte Bronte acknowledges as much when her heroine, Shirley Keeldar, turns on some local gossips: “Fine, rich people that have nothing to do, may be partly excused fo r t rif ing t heir t ime away: you who have to ea rn your bread with the sweat of your brow are quite inexcusable.”2 At which section of society is Bronte’s rebuke directed – r ich or poo r? Perhaps it i s a t bo th. T he t rack of h er m ind i s f urther revealed by a question from one of the villagers: “Should we never have a holiday because we work hard?” “Never,” says Shirley, “unless you knew how to make a be tter use of it than to get together over rum and tea, if you are women – or over beer and pipes, if you are men, and talk scandal at your neighbours’ expense.” The Protestant morality comes shining through, governing the way t hat peo ple a re expected t o work a nd t he way t hey s hould spend their leisure time. The clergyman in the novel and his f ctional parish was drawn from t hat o f S t P eter’s Ch urch, H artshead, w here t he B ronte sisters’ father, Patrick, had been curate at the time of the Luddite attack. The Luddites would have marched close by the church, as they do in the novel. The Rawfold attack was a t urning point in the Luddite unrest. The killings demanded tit for tat revenge, and a m ill owner was waylaid and murdered near Huddersf eld soon afterward. Luddites were rounded up a nd tried. Executions a nd transportations were carried o ut acr oss t he i ndustrial N orth. L uddism h ad f ailed b ut the name would continue in the language to refer to anyone unsupportive of new technology.

Secrets of the Dumb Steeple Resistance o ver, t he m ill o wners c onsolidated t heir po wer, installing s team po wered mac hinery i n t heir f actories. W ithin the n ext f fty y ears t he i ndependent a rtisan/traders a ll b ut d isappeared from the industrial scene, although they continued to thrive in the growing service industry and in general trade. Handloom w eavers, w ho h ad n umbered a lmost a q uarter o f a m illion i n 1820, h ad d windled t o n o m ore t han t wenty-three thousand in 1856. The great piece halls – large, square, refectorysized buildings c onsisting of small off ces where merchants and manufacturers m et t o t rade p ieces o f c loth – w ere t ransient constructions whose productive life was f nished within twenty or thirty years. As an experiment in small-owner capitalism it failed, swept away by mechanization and the concentration of production in mills. This w as t he B ritish e xperience a t a ny ra te. I n I reland t he industry o utlook w as q uite d ifferent, as a B ritish g overnment inspector d iscovered w hen h e i nterviewed I rish c ottage-based textile workers to ma ke comparisons in a p arliamentary inquiry into the demise of handloom weaving in England. The inspector estimated t hat t he I rish weaver’s year c onsisted of t wo h undred days. The 165 days off were made up of f fty-two sabbaths, f ftytwo market days, twenty-six days for wakes and funerals (calculated on the basis of half a da y per death and the assurance that “it’s a poo r n eighborhood t hat t here wasn’t o ne d eath a w eek”) and sundry days for holidays, birthdays, and saints’ days.3 Although the Irish cottage workers lived in “f lth and squalor,” said t he i nspector, “ they were contented.” He added: “ The I rish weavers as a body seem to love freedom and a potato rather than factories a nd be tter f ood.” 4 T he re mark w as p ublished j ust t wo years be fore t he I rish po tato f amine, w hen s uch observations would have been unthinkable. But it demonstrates the gulf in attitudes i nformed ma inly b y d ifferences i n re ligious d ogma. It h as l ittle t o d o wi th t he d ifference be tween Ce lt a nd A ngloSaxon. T he rea l d ivide i s re ligious i n i ts a ncestry. I ts po wer i s inescapable, shaping the values of generations, however they may frame t heir i ndividual be liefs. T he U lsterman, w hether g odly or atheist, carries h is unshakable P rotestantism, not as a b urden but s houldered p roudly a nd p araded i n t he c onf dent assurance that his iron will has been hammered on the anvil of hard work.

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The History of Work In the same way the Methodist miners of South Wales love to celebrate their unity, strength, and comradeship in poetry and song. Work for these communities is not a curse but a birthright. By the turn of the seventeenth century mass employment had become a privilege to be dispensed as such by the new industrialists who began to dominate the everyday existence of those who worked in their mill communities. At Cromford Mill, Richard Arkwright’s workers were urged to sing in his praise: Come let us here join in one, And thank him for all favours done; Let’s thank him for all favours still Which he hath done besides the mill.5 The m ill o wner n ow h ad t he w hip h and a nd ma ny w ere p repared t o u se i t. M uch o f t he m echanized work c ould be c arried out by women and children, whose labor came more cheaply than men’s. Women, by t radition, ha d b een spi nners, us ing he arthside wheels or the distaff, a stick full of wool from which the operator could spin the yarn onto a hand-held spindle. Typically the distaff stick would be secured with one end stuck into the woman’s girdle. The e arliest s pinning m achines, o perating tw elve s pindles, were incorporated alongside the domestic textile trade, supplying yarn to handloom weavers. T his is t he t rade t hat was still prospering as the Luddites moved to protect their improved status and incomes in t urn-of-the-century w eaving. L ater, l arger, f actorybased machines allowed one woman or child to control spinning on a hundred machine-mounted spindles at any one time. By then the cottage industry was in decline. Children were brought f rom poorhouses to work in t he m ills. They were sent to the silk mills as young as f ve y ears o ld, because their hands were perceived as potentially more dexterous in handling the f ne silk yarn. W hy were children used a rbitrarily i n t hese n ew f actories? I n Centuries of Chi ldhood, P hilippe Aries suggests that childhood is a comparatively modern concept, and that children used to be pe rceived as young adults.6 But this cannot alone explain the attitude to child employees. The British Factory C ommission re ports o n t he n ew i ndustries s uggest t hat there were serious concerns about child labor in some quarters in

Secrets of the Dumb Steeple the 1830s, when factory owners were building up their businesses. But i n t he places where it mattered, i n t he factories t hemselves, across the industrial belt of northern England, commercialism appears to have blinded t hose who controlled t hem to a ny great social concern. The new employers, often former laborers themselves, had little to l ean o n i n te rms o f c ustom a nd p ractice. Dea ling wi th l arge numbers of people, usually women and children, working together in a systemized fashion and in a conf ned space was alien to both manager and employee. This is not offered as j ustif cation for ill treatment but it does help to explain how ill treatment could arise. The mill-owning families, such as the Arkwrights and the Strutts, were considered good employers a mong t heir peers. T he Strutts, who s tarted t heir te xtile e mpire i n t he N ottinghamshire h osiery business, m oving l ater i nto c otton s pinning, t ook c hildren f rom the age of seven, which was considered more than reasonable in the second half of the eighteenth century. A glance at the records kept by these mill owners, listing reasons for f nes (the Strutts d id not a llow c orporal punishment i n their mills) imposed on employees, shows the extent to which the factory f oor discipline and behavior could relate to that found in some of the earliest schools. Fines were imposed, for example, for such m isdemeanors as “i dleness a nd l ooking t hrough window,” “riding o n eac h o ther’s b ack,” “ terrifying S . P earson wi th h er ugly f ace,” “ sending f or a le i nto t he r oom,” “ neglecting h is work to talk to people,” and “rubbing their faces with blood and going about town to frighten people.”7 These were neither model employers nor model workers. The long lists of f nes demonstrate the parameters of the work ethic. It was there in the industrialists, but in many of the workers it was barely skin-deep, often because the workers were children, who needed to play, not work. Finding peo ple t o work t hese ea rly De rbyshire m ills was n ot easy. Some of the job advertisements emphasized the rural charm of t he De rwent V alley i n t he h ope t hat t hey w ould s tir s ome nostalgia for the countryside among f rst generation townies. One newspaper advertisement placed by the Darley Cotton Mill said: “Wanted, f amilies, p articularly w omen a nd c hildren t o w ork the s aid m ill. T hey ma y be p rovided wi th c omfortable h ouses and e very n ecessary c onvenience e ither a t D arley o r A llestry;

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The History of Work particularly a milking cow to each family. It is a very good neighbourhood for the men getting work who are not employed in the manufacturing.” The lure of a milking cow to a former farm laborer h ad t he s ame a ttraction as a c ompany c ar would h ave t o a traveling salesman today. Other popular incentives included allotments or potato plots. The concept of a piece of land for personal subsistence is an ancient one. Finding separate work for men, often constructing or r unning properties o n t he m ill owners’ p rivate e states, was a nother way in which these entrepreneurs f lled their mills with the wives and children of tradesmen. The whole family then could be conceived as a n e conomic u nit. F or t his reas on, A rkwright’s m ill h ouses were built on three stories, to allow a man to work a single loom in t he t op r oom. S o ma ny o f t he n ecessities o f l ife – h ousing, groceries, c oal – w ere p rovided b y t hese m ill e mployers t hat employees often received no more than a s ixth of their wages in cash. It meant that families became as tied to their place of work as their ancestors had been in service to the Lord of the Manor. Richard Arkwright lost his earliest attempt to protect his patent, and t he spinning business be came a f ree-for-all. As t he te chnology spread, and steam power allowed the machinery to move into towns a nd cities, t he reasonable l iving conditions for t he earliest mill workers were not sustained. Parliament was forced to intervene in a bid to regulate the textile working regime. Factory C ommission re ports f rom t he pe riod quote one spinner saying that, but for the Factory Acts, the competition among mill owners was severe enough to force round the clock working with no breaks other than for meals. Even Quakers, often lauded as h umanitarians, w ere c apable o f p ushing t heir w orkers t oo hard. I n t he f rst volume of Capital, Ka rl M arx quotes a re port of a p rosecution i n J une, 1836 a gainst s ome Q uaker m ill o wners in Batley, Yorkshire, who kept boys aged between twelve and f fteen at work f rom six in t he morning on a F riday until six in the evening o n t he Saturday, with no re spite except a n h our for sleep and some breaks for meals. The Quakers were f ned £20.8 Objections to child labor ne eded to overcome widespread i ndifference in general society. This seems clear from an examination of one specif c area of child employment – the climbing children used to clean out the chimneys of large houses.

Secrets of the Dumb Steeple The employment of climbing children had begun as a s olution to a problem caused by an increasing use of coal in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. House chimneys began to appear in s ixteenth-century En gland, w hen t he i dea o f u sing e nclosed chimney b reasts t o t ake s moke f rom a h earth s et a longside a wall was introduced from Italy. Coal began to be seen as a viable alternative heating fuel as mining techniques improved and wood became sca rce. B ut c himneys ne eded c leaning.9 T he w ork w as originally done by servants, but dedicated chimney sweeps began to appear in the Elizabethan era. Large wood-burning f replaces with t heir b road c himney b reasts w ere n ot w ell s uited t o c oal burning, which required a strong air f ow and a good draw on the f re to work effectively. This meant that in later centuries openings for old chimneys were contracted in size, and new chimneys were built altogether narrower to prevent the discharge of smoke into people’s living rooms.10 The chimney sweep’s solution to the physical diff culty of tackling narrow f ues was to use children, some apprenticed as y oung as four a nd f ve. O ne sweep, T homas A llen, told a p arliamentary inquiry t hat h is c areer h ad begun when h e was a ged t hree a nd a half.11 Boys and girls were used for the job. Two girls, the daughters of a sweep called Morgan, were employed to clean the chimneys of the Royal Family at Windsor Castle.12 Some f ues were quite spacious but some were so narrow – as t ight as s even inches square – that o nly t he t iniest o f c hildren, o ften s tripped n aked, c ould be used to squeeze through the gap. They had to move with their arms extended. One slip and they could f nd themselves jammed. The sweeps used a variety of methods to persuade their young charges to do the job. Sometimes it was the promise of plum pudding when t hey reached t he t op, s ometimes it was t he t hreat of a beating. More extremely, some of the most brutal of the master sweeps were k nown t o s et s traw o n f re i n t he g rating o r t o prick t he f eet o f t he c hildren.13 T he c ompeting o ptions o f s tick and carrot in their many guises have been an enduring form of motivation t hroughout h istory. B ut w hen t he j ob i s as u nremittingly punishing as that of the child sweep the discussion of motivation seems redundant. There w ere s tories o f c hildren s tolen f rom t heir p arents. S ome were s old b y t heir f amilies. Ot hers w ere t aken f rom w orkhouses.

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The History of Work The word a mong mas ter sweeps was t hat i n Liverpool you c ould f nd any quantity of children you needed. The trade in people had re-emerged on Britain’s streets, even if transactions were made quietly beyond public scrutiny. The evidence was strong enough to convince a magistrate in Leicester. “I am satisf ed,” he wrote, “that great numbers of these children a re regularly bought a nd sold; a nd that practically they are as complete slaves as any negro children in South Carolina.” This statement would have some resonance in court. The treatment of black slaves in the former colonies was a hotly debated issue i n t he U K a bolitionist m ovement i n t he ea rly n ineteenth century, a fter B ritain h ad t aken t he l ead a mong t he s lave-trading nations b y b anning s lave t raff c i n 1807. B ut t he ma gistrate w as right, if he believed that self-righteousness would be misplaced so long as British children continued to be exploited as chimney sweeps. Chimney p assages ra n t hrough t he s uperstructure o f l arge houses like a ma ze feeding into f replaces throughout the house. This explains how young Thomas Allen came to lose his way and f nd himself in an unfamiliar bedroom. It also helps to explain why it took the best part of a century to pass legislation effective enough t o b an t he u se o f c hildren. T ime a nd a gain t he o wners of these large houses, many of whom sat in the House of Lords, would obstruct attempts to legislate. Humanitarian pleadings were not strong enough to move the legislators, one reason why The Society for the Necessity of Superseding C limbing Boys t ook a d ifferent t ack by of fering a r eward for anyone who could produce an effective cleaning machine. The society b elieved th at th e p rospect o f f nancial g ain w ould p rove the m ost effective d river of i nnovation i n t he c himney s weeping business. Tests on one m achine p roved pa rticularly e ffective.14 O ne o f its few d rawbacks was t hat it s truggled t o re move t he s oot t hat accumulated i n h orizontal f ues. This kind of f ue w as q uite commonly u sed a mong t he gentry t o p reserve t he symmetry of their elegant rooms. Members of the House of Lords, faced with altering t heir h ouses o r p reserving t he s tatus q uo, p referred t he latter option and continued to resist reforming legislation. They had the master chimney sweeps on their side. Fearful that mechanization w ould e ither p ut t hem o ut o f w ork o r i ntroduce unwelcome competition, the sweeps were assiduous in collecting

Secrets of the Dumb Steeple evidence t o s upport t heir c ause. N ot a ll t his evidence, h owever, was s o h elpful. O ne s weep s tressed t he i mportance o f boys f or extinguishing c himney f res. If the boys knew what they were doing and protected their heads with clothing, he said, there was no reason why they should be burnt.15 But boys were burnt. Deaths a mong t he chimney sweep children from f re or suffocation were not u ncommon, neither were debilitating illnesses such as “chimney sweep’s cancer” and physical d eformities o f t he k nees a nd a nkle j oints. S weeps r ubbed brine i nto t he b leeding k nees a nd e lbows o f t heir n ew c harges until the skin had hardened.16 Many children were forced to sleep in the sweeps’ cellars alongside bags of soot. Some children, and their masters for that matter, contracted scrotal cancer, caused by ingrained s oot. Ch imney s weep’s c ancer, i dentif ed b y P ercival Pott, was the f rst recorded occupational cancer. Often young sweeps were not washed from one year to the next, but a t l east t hey s aw t he da ylight. T hose w ho t oiled b lindly i n the mines often saw little or no daylight for weeks on end. Some were e mployed as “ trappers,” o pening a nd c losing t he a ir p assages into the mines. The trapper children often sat in the darkness in a hole hewn into the side of the passage by the trap doors which i t w as t heir j ob t o o perate f or t welve h ours a t a s tretch. Other children were used to f ll skips with newly mined coal, and some e ither p ulled o r p ushed t he m ine c ars a long t he g alleries. Those who pulled were often harnessed by the waist like huskies tied to dog sleds. A girdle was passed round the naked waist and a c hain ra n f rom t he c arriage, be tween t he boys’ o r gi rls’ l egs, allowing them to drag the skip along. One e ight-year-old gi rl d escribed h ow s he w ould s ometimes sing if one of the miners had been kind enough to hand her a scrap of candle for some light, for in the dark “I dare not sing then.” 17 This then was the legacy of Abraham Darby and James Watt. The revolution that had unfettered capital, sparked invention, and unleashed a t ide of industry that transformed the Western world was not created without a p rice. The indifference to such suffering was not universal, but the displays of callousness among the established hierarchies were breathtaking. It was not just callousness. There were some among the Lords who w ere c onvinced o f t heir o wn r ighteousness i n re sisting

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The History of Work reform. L ord La uderdale, one of t he m ost vociferous o pponents of legislation to stop the use of child chimney sweeps, urged that reforms should be l eft “entirely to the moral feelings of perhaps the m ost m oral peo ple o n t he f ace o f t he ea rth.”18 W ho w ere these peo ple? H e w as re ferring, i n f act, t o t he B ritish a nd, b y implication, the ruling gentry in British society. Repeatedly, the cause of vested interest, be it the gentry or the artisans t hemselves, o verruled t he p light o f s ociety’s w eakest members. It wasn’t even as if the coal industry was threatened by cheaper imports. Market forces did not help the child laborers and n either d id i nnovation. I t w as t he pe rsistence o f re formers like W illiam W ilberforce, L ord S haftesbury, a nd o thers, o ften those w ho h ad s urvived c hildhood m iseries u ndertaking s uch work, that f nally held sway. The use of chimney sweep children was ra re outside the UK. No other nation dallied as long as Britain in its efforts to outlaw the p ractice. Ch ild l abor w as a c heap a nd e ffective re sponse t o a problem posed by one of the new technologies at a t ime when society was ill equipped to respond to the social implications of such change. But this was not the f rst time, nor the last, that society and legislators would respond either slowly or inadequately to the social upheavals resulting from technological change. The piecemeal advance of labor regulation relative to national social and economic factors has assumed a f resh signif cance in the so-called “global ma rketplace” of today, where mass-selling fashion items might be made by sweatshop labor and child labor working in conditions that do not conform to Western regulations. The p ractice o f c hild l abor c annot a lways be j udged a gainst Western c ultural e xpectations. S hould w e, f or e xample, bo ycott t he i mport of Persian r ugs handmade by children, k nowing that the creation of the rug is a f amily affair, in which the skills are p assed d own f rom g eneration t o g eneration? Is t he y oung weaver learning his craft at the loom in some way disadvantaged when compared to h is Western counterpart, or is he simply taking his place in the world? The judgment will probably rely on the strength of world opinion. I f t he ma rket re jects N ike t raining s hoes be cause o f allegations that some of them have been made by child labor, then N ike m ust ad dress i ts l abor s ourcing. A nd ma rket f orces

Secrets of the Dumb Steeple are beginning t o s hape c ompany po licies. M anchester U nited supporters, f or e xample, e xpressed s ome u nease a t t he c lub’s £302.9 million ($450 million) kit supply deal with Nike in 2002 precisely be cause o f t he p ast a llegations a gainst t he c ompany. Manchester United has a po licy of not dealing with any country that allows breaches of child labor regulations. The rule of cause and effect is beginning to replicate change that was o nce c onf ned t o a n ational s tage. T he s tage where Britain’s Industrial R evolution w as p layed o ut w as a m icrocosm o f e conomic acceleration. The surge in economic activity had increased the ne ed for i ndustrial labor at t he sa me t ime t hat me chanization in agriculture had reduced demand for farm work. Land enclosure was a lso d epriving vi llage l aborers o f t heir o pportunity t o f arm their own animals on common land. As E. P. Thompson put it: “In village after village, enclosure destroyed the scratch-as-scratch-can subsistence economy of the poor.”19 Enclosure did not happen overnight, but it became an escalating p ractice in th e e ighteenth c entury, a s l andowners s ought t o limit, even remove, the rights of tenant farmers and cottagers that had been established over the long history of the manorial feudal system. Common land had in many cases been farmed for centuries by the same families, often working at their own pace. The transformation o f t heir s ocial c ontract f rom o ne o f s ervitude t o subsistence f arming, t hen w age l abor, w as p robably t he b iggest inf uence o n t he e nclosure m ovement. T he l andowners w anted to formalize their ownership of the land out of self-interest, and their domination of the parliamentary system, whether as Tories or Whigs, allowed them to pass hundreds of private enclosure acts th roughout th e e ighteenth c entury b efore th e s ystem w as simplif ed in the General Enclosure Act of 1881. Enclosure o f l arge t racts o f l and, a longside f arm m echanization b rought a bout b y i nventions s uch as t he t hreshing mac hine and J ethro Tull’s s eed d rill, w hich h ad be en i n u se s ince 1 701, allowed signif cant economies of scale. Rents rose and farm profits increased in this industrialization of the land, but small farmers often lost their independence. Those who were enclosing the land regarded this as a good thing, noting that independence had enabled some of these small farmers to work less. They had their small house and a piece of land, and they were comfortable. This comfort

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The History of Work was destroyed by enclosure, as a 1794 report looking at Shropshire observed f avorably. W ith e nclosure o f t he c ommon, wr ote i ts author, “ the labourers will work every day in the year, their children wi ll be p ut o ut t o l abour ea rly,” a nd “ that subordination o f the lower ranks of society, which in the present times, is so much wanted, would be thereby considerably secured.”20 The subordination was “so much wanted” because the English landowning class had been horrif ed by the French Revolution of 1789. The further impoverishment of people who were already struggling to supplement their meager earnings with what they could eke out of the land was bound to create discontent. The laborers who l ived i n t he t iny Do rset vi llage o f Tolpuddle w ere h ardly brimming with seditious intent when they met under a sycamore tree in March, 1834 to discuss their grievances against the local landlords. But that is not how the law saw it. The w ages f or f arm l aborers i n Tolpuddle h ad be en red uced from nine shillings a week in 1830 to eight shillings, then seven. One of the villagers, George Loveless, called a meeting of fellow workers. Firstly they approached the vicar to act as an intermediary with their employers to seek some assurances over their wage rates. When that failed they turned to the recently formed Grand National Consolidated Trades Union, a body set up by Robert Owen, the textile entrepreneur turned social reformer. Two of its members c ame t o Tolpuddle a nd s hortly a fterwards t he Do rset men established t heir own organization, t he Friendly Society of Agricultural Labourers.21 The la ndowners to ok f right a nd sou ght he lp f rom L ord Melbourne, the then home secretary. Trade unions had been legalized ten years earlier, so the employers pursued a different course. The n ew m embership h ad bo und t hemselves t o t he u nion wi th oaths, a c ommon practice at the time, when organizations sought to p reserve s ome s ecrecy o ver t heir d iscussions. T he M utiny Act o f 1797, w hich forbade t he t aking o f “ unlawful o aths,” was invoked to arrest and charge Loveless and f ve others. T hey were tried t he n ext m onth a nd eac h re ceived t he ma ximum s entence possible – seven years’ transportation to Australia. The case was a cause célèbre. In response, Owen mustered a “Grand Meeting of the Working Classes,” which drew ten thousand people. This was just fourteen

Secrets of the Dumb Steeple years a fter c avalry h ad c harged a n o pen g athering d emanding franchise reforms i n St Peter’s Field, Manchester, k illing f fteen people. The government-sanctioned action was forever afterwards known as Peterloo. There would be no overreaction a second time. Another m eeting i n L ondon s welled t o t hirty-thousand, a nd a delegation pe titioned t he g overnment. M elbourne re fused t o accept t he pe tition b ut h e w ould re ceive f urther n otice t hat h is strategy had seriously misjudged the mood of the nation when the protest began to grow. William Cobbett, the social commentator, and several members of Parliament took up the campaign for a pardon. Melbourne’s successor, Lord John Russell, proposed a conditional pardon that would require the men to remain in the colony for various periods. Finally, he bowed to pressure and granted a full pardon in March, 1836, two years after the men’s arrest. Some did not get back home until the fourth a nniversary of t heir t rial. T he men were hailed as ma rtyrs and still are by the trade union movement. Tolpuddle remains as a piece of h istorical g rit, never buried a nd never forgotten by t hose who continue to press the cause of freedom of association. The t rade u nion m ovement was formed i n re sponse t o wi despread a buses i n w orking c onditions a nd p ay acr oss t he oldest and n ewest s ectors o f e mployment. Ka rl M arx a nd F riedrich Engels believed it would be only a matter of time before the working classes repeated the pattern of the French Revolution in Britain. Engels had witnessed conditions i n t he Manchester cotton factories at f rst hand. But the poverty of Britain’s nineteenthcentury city-dwelling working class was highlighted nowhere more graphically than in the Morning Chronicle articles on the London poor written by Henry Mayhew. Among a wide range of working people interviewed and surveyed by Mayhew, few were as d estitute as women needleworkers, who routinely resorted to prostitution i n a n effort to survive. O ne woman told h im how her baby son’s legs had frozen to her side as s he sat with him throughout the n ight o n a d oorstep. E ven t he w orkhouse h ad re jected h er without a n order for ad mission.22 Work for many people among the London poor offered no hope of salvation, no future. Wages in far t oo ma ny c ases were i nsuff cient t o a llow a ny reas onable standard of living. The levels of exploitation in the frantic search for prof t had sunk beyond any recognition of human decency.

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The History of Work The m ill-owning c lass, w hich i n ma ny c ases h ad r isen f rom the very people it now sought to suppress, is often portrayed as heartless a nd uncaring, a nd justif ably so, but t here were exceptions whose concern for their workforces would inf uence a vein of h umanity i n f actory ma nagement. I n i ts ea rliest ma nifestations i t o ften t ook o n t he f orm o f p hilanthropy, t he g enerous owner b asking i n t he gl ow f rom h is m unif cence. B ut i n s ome, like R obert Ow en, e ntrepreneur, s ocial re former, a nd u topian dreamer, t here w as a g enuine p hilosophy, a g enuine d esire t o build a be tter world from the success of their enterprises. Owen, like Benjamin Franklin, was an internationalist. From a p romising start in a s mall Scottish community he pushed out his ideas across the Atlantic, where the spirit of hard work, individualism, and t olerance h ad be en bo und t ogether wi th t he t win p illars o f democracy and meritocracy in an eloquent constitution. The U nited S tates w as n ot y et o ne n ation a nd c ould n ot be while peo ple were s ubjugated i n t he S outh; b ut w hen t he i nternal reckoning was over, destructive as it was, the pace of change would pick up so dramatically that the quarreling states of Europe would be s taggered by America’s economic transformation from an agricultural and slave-plantation base to an industrial powerhouse. The hardworking Protestant immigrants who played such a pivotal role in America’s transformation were gradually making an impact as they pushed westwards in search of Utopia. Some would f nd their Utopia, planting the seeds of communism in the swelling belly of the capitalist state. This communist experiment would enjoy a brief yet extraordinary success i n a q uiet r ural backwater by t he Wabash R iver i n southwest I ndiana. T he s mall t own e rected h ere would be come inextricably linked with the ambitions and ideals of Robert Owen. A t housand m iles o f l and a nd t hree t housand m iles o f ocean s eparated t he r ugged S cottish v alley a t N ew La nark, where Ow en mad e h is f ortune, a nd t he p ioneering c ommunity of German Lutherans, creating their tiny version of Eden on the fringe of the Great Plains. Their town was called Harmony, and it captured Owen’s imagination. So much so, that he bought it.

CHAPTER 7

The Silent Monitor The object of human existence, as o f a ll t hat has l ife, is to be happy. (Robert Owen, 1771–1858) Walking a long t he c arpeted c orridors o f t he s mart n ew h otel conversion i n t he ce nter o f N ew La nark, a s mall c ommunity nestled o n o ne s ide o f t he u pper Cl yde V alley i n t he S cottish Lowlands, it i s diff cult t o be lieve t hat it o nce h oused b anks o f textile machines. Only the smell of oil-soaked cloth that permeates t he very fabric of t he building reminds you of t he i ndustry that t hrived wi thin i ts w alls, w here w omen a nd c hildren o nce stood barefoot, minding their spinning mules. But t his w as n o o rdinary m ill c ommunity. N ew La nark w as different, so much so that poets and potentates f ocked t o i ts gates. T he W ordsworths c ame h ere. S o d id t he poe t R obert Southey, and so did the Grand Duke Nicholas, soon to be Tzar of Russia. T here w ere o ther m ills wi th s tate-of-the-art mac hinery, and t he w orkers’ d our s andstone te nement h ouses w ere h ardly out of the ordinary. They had no sanitation and no running water. Water was drawn from wells, and chamber pots were slopped out in c ommunal m iddens. T he c onditions, n evertheless, w ere f ar better t han t hose i n t he s lum-ridden c ities. B ut t he vi sitors h ad come f or s omething e lse. N ews h ad s pread o f w hat w ould be hailed as a pioneering experiment in social engineering. The real exhibits were the workers themselves. The vi llagers worked long days b ut i n t he evenings t hey h ad the o pportunity t o s tudy i n t he m ill-based s chool. Ch ild l abor had be en p hased o ut f or a ll u nder t he a ge o f te n, a nd c hildren were schooled from the moment they were able to walk. New Lanark was t he e mbryo o f a s ocial m odel t hat would i nf uence educationists and organizational thinkers the world over, the blueprint f or a s uccession o f c ommunities i nspired b y i ts example. 87

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The History of Work Some four thousand miles away in Harmony, Indiana, the social ideas would be d eveloped f urther b ut n ever o n t he s cale e nvisaged by their originator, the Welsh-born entrepreneur and social idealist, Robert Owen. Long s ince c laimed b y t he i nternational l abor m ovement as one of its founding fathers, Owen has been neglected by business theorists, dismissed as a runt in the capitalist litter. In the roll call of g reat i ndustrialists – A rkwright, B runel, Ca rnegie, Du P ont, Ford, Sloan – t here seems l ittle room for Robert Owen, a nd yet his rise to prominence was as impressive as that of any of these illustrious entrepreneurs. The difference that marks him apart is that h e b roke a ll t he r ules. F or years h e h ad p ursued t he acc umulation o f wealth w hile r evolutionizing m anagement p ractices and proving that it was possible to run a textile business without wringing out every ounce of sweat from the workforce. Then he sold up and turned his back on the UK to concentrate his efforts on t he s mall c ommunity o f H armony h e h ad p urchased i n t he southwest corner of Indiana, renamed New Harmony. This second, more fundamental experiment in the United States exposed t he l imitations of i ntellectuals – t oday we would p robably call them knowledge workers – left to work alone, as if in a vacuum. It highlighted the imbalance that occurs when knowledge is not harnessed to purposeful, practical production. T here are two views of Owen’s New Harmony experiment. One points to the community’s many f rsts – i t had the f rst kindergarten in the USA, the f rst elementary school, the f rst free public library, and t he f rst c ivic d ramatic s ociety. T he s econd vi ew, as sessing its success as a utopian society, must conclude that it f opped – a grandiose i dea o n p aper t hat s imply d id n ot w ork, be cause t he brainpower o f i ts i ntellectuals c ould n ot t ranscend t he ac hievement of the honest graft and piety that had established this hitherto thriving rural community. The a rchitect’s plans for a H arvard-style campus with a l arge quadrangle of Go thic p roportions were n ever rea lized.1 Fr ankly there was no one capable of building it. The irony is that before it was renamed and remodeled, Harmony had harbored a successful, hardworking community. When Owen bought the town for about £75,000 ( $119,000)2 h e acq uired a t wenty-thousand-acre es tate, later extended to thirty thousand acres, that had been a thriving

The Silent Monitor settlement o f d issenting L utherans – i ndustrious s ouls, d riven from their native Germany by religious persecution. Harmony was the second town established by the followers of George Rapp, a s elf-styled prophet who had pursued a s eparatist strain of Lutheranism in his native Württemberg. Rapp was preparing his followers for the Second Coming of Christ and wanted, therefore, t o m odel t heir be havior o n ea rly Ch ristian p ractices. The idea, shared by other religious separatist g roups such as t he Shakers a nd t he Moravians, was to l ive in t he purif ed state outlined i n t he A cts o f t he A postles: “And a ll t hat be lieved w ere together, and had all things common” (Acts 2:44). He was particularly inf uenced by Johann Valentin Andreae’s Christianopolis, a seventeenth-century novel that envisaged a Christian republic based on c ommunal l iving.3 P ut s imply, t he Ra ppists w ere Ch ristian communists. The freedom of worship promised by the United States’ Declaration of Independence offered an escape from the civil censure of Württemburg. Rapp’s f rst community in Pennsylvania, established i n 1 804, w as a s topgap. H e w anted s omething be tter, something that could deliver the ideal conditions for farming and viticulture. Not until he discovered the land abutting the Wabash River o n t he f ringe o f t he as -yet-unexplored G reat P lains, te n years later, did he believe he had found the perfect place to create a balanced and self-suff cient economy. By that time the community was f ully i ncorporated, i ts m embers poo ling t heir f nances and property in accordance with its Articles of Association. In return f or t heir l abor, c ooperation, a nd a n ad herence t o t he rules, t he Harmonists would benef t f rom educational provision, food, c lothing, a nd o ther g oods t hey would n eed t o ma intain a simple lifestyle. Harmony could draw on a useful mixture of practical skills and trades. The town had smiths, masons, carpenters, coopers, brewers, and f armers, s upplemented b y s pecialists i n te xtiles, d yeing, printing, a nd e ngineering. I n f act t here w ere peo ple s killed i n maintaining every facet of healthy village life. They worked cooperatively, building each other log cabins at the new site and later replacing t hese t imber h ouses wi th b rick-built d wellings mad e to a d ef ned s tandard a nd s ize a nd s ituated wi thin a g ridironstyle town plan. Harmony was a p lanned community, a nd as a n

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The History of Work economic unit it was a re sounding success. The Harmonists had orchards under glass to grow exotic f ruits a nd they had a s team engine that operated a cotton mill and threshing machine. The workers were roused by the blowing of French horns. They would go outside to fetch their milk from a cart touring the street. Pinned o n t he c art w ere w ork as signments f or t he da y. S ome work was routine. W here work demands varied, some would be assigned to help others in a particular task. People would sing as they worked, and the town band would sometimes play to accompany their labors. Freshly cut f owers would be arranged in vases placed on workbenches to brighten up workshops. This was communism f ourishing i n t he h eartland o f n ineteenth-century America. W ithin a f ew s hort y ears t he H armonists h ad e stablished a standard of living that was superior to that of almost any community in the country. It was k nown as “ that wonder of the West.”4 When the Indiana State Legislature ran into f nancial diff culty it was bailed out by a loan from Harmony. The Harmonists exported many of their goods, f nding markets overseas. But there were internal strains within George Rapp’s community. In 1 807 i ts m embers h ad c ommitted t hemselves t o l ives o f celibacy. When children reached the age of fourteen, their parents were en couraged to a llow t hem to l ive sepa rately i n co mmunal dormitories. Some of the people rejected this idea, and Rapp continued to perform marriages, acknowledging that celibacy might be c onsidered a s tep t oo f ar, b ut t here w ere s ocial p ressures t o conform. Behind this conformity, bonding the society, underlying its unity, was a re ligious communion anchored by a d eep-seated faith that Christ would be coming any day. Christ did not come, and Rapp, partly, perhaps, responding to some g rowing communal d isillusionment a nd partly i n re cognition of the better prospects for trade to the north, decided to move his community once again, this time to the village of Economy, just north of P ittsburgh. T he town of New Harmony was advertised i n t he E uropean p ress, a nd R obert Ow en bo ught i t. M ost of the Rappists had packed their bags and left by the time Owen arrived i n 1824 with a re tinue of i ntellectuals a nd ed ucators o n the keel boat Philanthropist, popularly described as “the boatload of knowledge.” Most of them were teachers, inf uenced by Johann Pestalozzi, t he S wiss ed ucator a nd ad vocate o f “l earning b y

The Silent Monitor doing.” P estalozzi’s boo k, Leonard a nd G ertrude, p ursued t he idea that education should be shaped for each individual child. It rejected the widespread practice of rote learning to re inforce the memorization of facts. Life in the keelboat offered Owen’s band of academics plenty of scope for learning by doing. At one stage the bo at h ad be en icebound i n t he Oh io R iver, just s even m iles from t he n ew c ommunity o f E conomy. T he p ractical Ra ppists came over to pull it free. Few w ould h ave d isputed t hat Ow en h ad b rought wi th h im some of the sharpest intellects of the age, but in practical terms they were useless. So were many of the other newcomers, who often came either as speculative settlers or as freeloaders, dazzled by t he i dea o f j oining t he Ow enite e xperiment. F ew o f t hem knew how to brew beer or how to weave or turn a p lough. This so-called P reliminary Society consumed more than it produced. Few cr ops were h arvested a nd housing was i n short supply a nd badly maintained. Owen had sold half the town to his partner in the v enture, t he S cottish-born g eologist, W illiam M cClure, b ut the two men soon disagreed about the way the community should be organized. After i nvesting m ost o f h is f ortune o n t he N ew H armony experiment, Owen began t o s ell parcels of land t o other g roups who formed splinter communities. Beset by f nancial squabbling and s tarved o f p ractical l abor, t he c ommunity m ight h ave d ied on its feet, yet its social a nd intellectual life actually f ourished. Three schools, headed by Pestalozzian teachers, were educating some four hundred children. Lectures, balls, and concerts continued unabated, but within t hree years Owen had left, d isaffected with his partners, proclaiming the experiment a failure. New H armony c ontinued, h owever; n ot, pe rhaps, i n t he w ay that Owen had envisioned but in a way that suited its inhabitants. Today t he t own h as a m odest t ourist i ndustry based on t he t wo consecutive u topian experiments. Owen h imself re turned t o t he UK, c hastened b ut u ndef ected i n h is be liefs. I f N ew H armony was thousands of miles from New Lanark, the intellectual ideals of its inhabitants were light years away from those of the Scottish mill workers. The Scots were not idealists but economic migrants. Some had arrived in New Lanark destitute, turned out of their smallholdings

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The History of Work in t he H ighland c learances. I n ma ny w ays t heir p light w as n ot so d ifferent f rom t hat of t he i mmigrant Rappists. T heir story at New La nark be gan n ot wi th Ow en b ut wi th h is f ather-in-law, David Dale, who established the New Lanark Mills in 1785 as a joint venture with Richard Arkwright, whose Cromford Mill had already d emonstrated t he po tential for c oncentrating p roduction in purpose-built factories. Dale was keen to exploit the new technology in Scotland and believed the fast-f owing w ater be neath the Falls of Clyde would provide the perfect power source. The p artnership d id n ot l ast l ong be yond t he e nd o f a p atent d ispute t hat l ed t o A rkwright l osing t he s ole r ights t o h is invention. Some of the New Lanark workers were trained on the Arkwright machines in Cromford before they were joined by the n ew workforce, which i ncluded h undreds of young c hildren procured f rom t he G lasgow poo rhouses. T he t ransaction s ecuring t heir e mployment c onsisted o f a p romise o f w ork, h ousing, clothing, and education for the children in return for their labor. Such promises were widely abused by mill employers but not by Dale, w ho w as c oncerned f or t he w elfare o f h is e mployees. S o the New Lanark that Robert Owen took over on January 1, 1800 could already boast employment conditions somewhat better than those in the emerging northern English textile belts of Lancashire and Yorkshire. Some i mpression o f j ust h ow b ad c onditions w ere f or m ost factory children at the time can be obtained from a visit to Kirkburton p arish chu rchyard n ear H uddersf eld i n West Yorkshire. A spartan column contains the names of twelve children between the a ges o f f ve a nd s ixteen w ho pe rished t ogether i n a n earby mill f re. The mill owner had locked them in – a c ommon practice u sed t o e nsure t he workers would s tay a t t heir l ooms. T he f re s tarted w hen a c andle w as k nocked o ver. T he n ewspaper report of t he t ragedy mentioned t he da mage to t he m ill owner’s business be fore i t m entioned t he d eaths. F actory a nd p lant w as expensive. Life was cheap.5 Robert Owen was well acquainted with such callous and singleminded p ursuit o f w ealth i n t he n ew i ndustries. H e h imself had be en a pprenticed as a te n-year-old t o a Li ncolnshire-based dressmaker. W ithin te n y ears h e h ad r isen f rom s hop as sistant t o m ill ma nager, a fter w orking f or a t ime ma nufacturing

The Silent Monitor textile machinery. The machine was the spinning mule invented by S amuel C rompton. T he m ule c ombined t he be st f eatures o f Arkwright’s w ater-frame a nd H argreaves’s s pinning j enny. T he machinery-making b usiness l asted n o m ore t han a f ew m onths, but it gave Owen some vital exposure to the most advanced industrial technology of the age. This, more than any other experience, would h ave i ncreased Owen’s s tock i n t he e yes o f o lder industrialists. Here was a young man, not yet twenty, who had a complete familiarity with the new technology that was transforming te xtile p roduction. T he c hoice w as s tark f or i ndustrialists – they either mastered the technology or they went under. In s pite of h is d emands for a s alary of £ 100 a y ear when h e applied for t he ma nager’s job at Drinkwater’s Bank Top M ill in Manchester, Ow en s oon d emonstrated h is w orth. N ot o nly d id he p rove h imself c apable o f h andling f ve h undred w orkers, h e sought out the best quality cotton for spinning. He also began to exchange ideas with some of the most formidable brains in the North of En gland as a m ember of t he M anchester Literary a nd Philosophical Society. Hopes of a partnership in Drinkwaters did not materialize, so he left to form another business, the Chorlton Twist Company, with a group of established businessmen. On a business trip to Glasgow, Owen met Caroline Dale, David Dale’s da ughter, w ho t ook h im t o s ee t he c otton m ills a t N ew Lanark. “It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune must be in want of a wife,” wrote Jane A usten i n t he o pening p assage o f Pride a nd P rejudice. Another universal truth, she might have noted, is that one of the fastest ways to a fortune for any single man is to marry the boss’s daughter. I n Ow en’s c ase t he ma rriage w as acc ompanied b y a £3,000 dowry. Owen married Caroline in September, 1799. Within four months he a nd h is partners had bought New La nark m ills f rom David D ale, a nd h e w as m oving i nto t he vi llage.6 Ow en h ad already pursued c oncerns for t he welfare a nd h ealth of workers at B ank Top – h e was a c ommittee m ember o f t he M anchester Board o f H ealth. N ow h e w ould be gin t o p ut h is i deas i nto practice on a much larger scale. First, however, he moved to improve eff ciency, sacking the existing management and installing a n ew manager brought in from Bank Top. The new regime

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The History of Work imposed s trict c ontrols o n c osts a nd q uality, c lamped d own o n bad timekeeping, and dismissed workers who had reputations for drunkenness, persistent absenteeism, or dishonesty. Frederick T aylor, t he ma n w hose i deas w ould s tructure t he workplace in a way inconceivable to Britain’s early textile barons, would h ave s miled s ublimely a t Ow en’s re cordkeeping, w hich measured input, in terms of hours worked and wages paid, against output. Owen also introduced a l ittle gizmo, his “Silent Monitor.” This c onsisted o f a f our-sided re ctangular b lock o f w ood s uspended near every worker. Each side was painted a different color – white, yellow, blue, and black. Whichever color was turned to the front re presented a n as sessment of t he c onduct of t he i ndividual on t he p revious da y. W hite d enoted “ super e xcellence” i n c onduct, y ellow e quated t o “ moderate g oodness,” b lue re presented “a neutral state of morals,” and black stood for “excessive naughtiness.” T he p revious day’s c onduct, h ighlighted o n t he m onitor, was also noted in a “book of character.” The most marked difference between this signposting and the much later time-and-motion practices of scientif c management is that the Silent Monitor was never i ntended t o m easure pe rformance o r o utput. I t a ppeared instead to be a re cord of temperament or behavior, a n ea rly psychological bellwether. I f you kept your n ose clean, t he least you could expect was a blue. You also had a r ight of appeal against a supervisor’s assessment. The Silent Monitor’s concern for behavior recalls the overriding Roman concern for loyalty and obedience. Behavior, or what schools would c all “conduct,” h as be en e mphasized pe rsistently in any workplace where control has been a p rominent feature of management. Modern parallels with t he Silent Monitor can a lso be drawn with the way some call-center operatives are monitored in te lephone c onversations wi th c ustomers. T he m ore s ophisticated f orms o f c all-center m onitoring i nvolve “l istening i n” b y supervisors who will make behavioral observations, checking for tone, delivery, f riendliness, a nd helpfulness as m uch as t hey a re measuring the time of the call and eff ciency. The S ilent M onitor w as a po werful p sychological t ool. F ew people would enjoy seeing their behavior recorded in something that might be interpreted by the religiously inclined as a boo k of

The Silent Monitor atonement. Owen himself professed no religious beliefs. In fact he was a strong critic of the many competing sects, denouncing religions as “ the g reat re pulsive powers of s ociety . . . ever-burning f rebrands w herever t hey e xist.”7 S uch vi ews w ould ul timately alienate him from the governing Establishment in Westminster. At v arious s tages d uring h is ma nagement o f t he m ills Owen cut t he w orking da y f rom t welve t o te n h ours, a nd f rom t he very be ginning o f h is te rm a t N ew La nark h e s tarted t o p hase out t he “ pauper a pprentices.” A s chool h ad a lready be en e stablished by David Dale before Owen arrived. Dale’s intention was to ensure that the children received an adequate education while at the same time laboring in the factory. Owen’s ideas were far broader. In his plan education would replace any commitment to undertake physical labor. His theory was that education was the key t hat c ould re lease s ociety f rom po verty a nd cr ime. To t his end i n 1809 h e u nveiled p lans for a s chool o n w hat h ad ea rlier been envisaged as a v acant m ill plot. A nother plot he sought to use was for the construction of his “Institute for the Formation of Character.” The social experiment was about to begin in earnest – but not without opposition. Owen’s partners were horrif ed t hat h e was p roposing t o build schools o n p lots t hat c ould o therwise e nable p roduction c apacity to be e nlarged b y 5 0 pe rcent. T here w ere f our m ills o n t he s ite and e nough p lots f or s ix. B ut t he l imited b uilding s pace wi thin the c onf nes o f t he s teep-sided v alley w ould n ot a llow r oom f or both schools and extra m ills. New La nark was a p rof table enterprise, but the partners argued there was scope to make it far more prof table. They removed Owen from the mill management and decided they would seek to buy him out. None had accounted for his single-mindedness. Owen was t hat ra re i ndividual, a c unning businessman wi th s ocial i deals. A rmed wi th a p amphlet s etting out h is i deas o f b uilding a b usiness t hat w ould p ursue c oncerns for the social, moral, and educational welfare of its workforce, he succeeded in attracting new backers, most of them Quakers, who agreed to take no more than a 5 percent return on their investment. Prof ts hitherto had been in the region of 15 percent – t he sort of shareholder v alue t hat w ould be d emanded b y ma nagements o f large public companies in the latter days of the twentieth century.

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The History of Work Owen and his Quaker partners outbid his former backers when the m ills w ere p laced o n t he o pen ma rket, a nd h e re turned t o New La nark in 1814. H is speech on t he opening of t he institute two y ears l ater re veals t he e xtent t o w hich h is t hinking w as taking shape. Like many people at the time he was intrigued by Millenarian c oncepts – t he i dea o f ac hieving a l engthy pe riod of g ood g overnment e nsuring h appiness a nd p rosperity f or a ll. “What i deas i ndividuals ma y a ttach t o t he te rm ‘ Millennium’ I k now not,” he wrote, “but I k now t hat society may be f ormed so as to exist without poverty, with health greatly improved, with little, i f a ny, m isery, a nd wi th i ntelligence a nd h appiness increased a h undred fold: and no obstacle whatsoever intervenes at this moment except ignorance to prevent such a state of society from becoming universal.”8 These were heady words backed up by employment policies and an attitude to education that were as revolutionary as the factories themselves. Owen’s declaration that children would attend school rather t han w ork w as n ot i nitially w elcomed b y h is w orkforce, who viewed the family as an economic unit. Children in school could not be w age earners. But those were the terms. The school became a s hop wi ndow f or Ow en’s i deas. Ch ildren, d ressed i n white gowns, laundered communally every three days, would drill in the work yard and dance and sing in the institute, often in front of i nvited a udiences. S uch w as i ts f ame t hat a ny y oung g entleman embarking on a grand tour of Europe would make sure New Lanark was somewhere on his itinerary. Owen’s p rogressive ed ucation e schewed t he u se o f boo ks. H e wanted learning to be enjoyable, one reason why he advocated dancing a t t he be ginning o f c lasses. Cyn ics m ight c onclude t hat without book learning, New Lanark’s mill children would be deprived of the breadth of education that might give rise to subversion. Owenite society preserved the status quo to a great extent. The ma nagement wr iter, Lyndall Urwick, d escribed Owen as “the pi oneer o f p ersonnel m anagement.”9 Ur wick’s o bservation was b ased p artly o n Owen’s c onviction t hat p aying a ttention t o employees was as vi tal as ma king sure that the plant and equipment w ere i n pe rfect w orking o rder. “M any o f y ou h ave l ong experienced in your manufacturing operations the advantages of substantial, well-contrived, and well-executed machinery,” wrote

The Silent Monitor Owen i n a n e ssay d irected a t f actory ma nagers. “I f t hen, d ue care as to the state of your inanimate machines can produce such benef cial results, what may not be e xpected if you devote equal attention to your vital machines, which are far more wonderfully constructed?”10 C olumella, t he R oman e xpert o n a gricultural work p ractices, w ould h ave a pplauded h is l ogic. T his b usiness argument for the humane treatment of employees would seem as pertinent in the third millennium as it was in Owen’s time and in the era of Imperial Rome nearly two thousand years earlier. Had Ow en c ontinued h is i nvolvement wi th N ew La nark as a c ommitted i ndustrialist, d riven b y t he p ursuit o f w ealth, i t i s arguable t hat h is i deas m ight h ave g ained f ar g reater c urrency with other factory owners – but the pursuit of wealth came to be of secondary importance to the pursuit of a be tter way of living for the whole of society. Robert Owen and George Rapp were like the captains of distinctive s hips s ailing i n d ifferent d irections. As t heir p aths crossed in New Harmony each scrutinized the other with a keen attention to detail, then each collapsed his telescope and continued on an unaltered course. Neither of their societies was perfect, yet each has lessons for the workplaces of today. The Harmonists showed t hat c ommunal working a mong s killed peo ple, c oncentrating e fforts e ff ciently w here t hey w ere m ost n eeded, c ould reap strong economic benef ts. This small-scale communism, however, c ould o nly s ucceed w hen t he o rganizational g round r ules were clear a nd fair, a nd where t here existed a po werful, uniting belief system. Rapp’s o wn be lief s ystem h ad a l imited t ime s pan, f nitely governed by the practice of celibacy. When the Harmonists died their society died with them. Their hard-earned wealth – millions of dollars – w as squandered by a s peculator who engineered the liquidation o f t heir f unds.11 Ow en n ever ac hieved h is o wn i dea of Utopia. He was n ever p repared t o acc ommodate t he ideas of others. But h is experiment showed t hat a c oncentration of i ntellects could spark social innovation and transfer learning across a constituency. Its unity, however, could not be re tained without a strong and bonding value system common to all those involved. Owen w as n ot t he f rst t o e xperiment wi th u topian s ocieties, and he would not be the last, but he was the f rst among the new

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The History of Work breed o f e ntrepreneurial i ndustrialists t o crea te a ra tionale f or socially concerned capitalism. He was the f rst social entrepreneur. He was also an autocrat. It was not all sweetness and light in his rural mill village. But the residents of New Lanark were willing guinea pigs. In the early days of the mills, labor had been in short supply. W hen a s hipload o f m igrants bo und for N orth A merica from the Isle of Skye were forced into Greenock by storms, David Dale had offered them alternative employment in his mill. Dale was dismayed that this rich source of labor for the emerging industries was being lost to the New World. But the Highlanders found it diff cult to settle in the cramped living c onditions o f N ew La nark. M any c ontinued t o s peak Gaelic a nd some left, unable to conform to t he r igid regimes of factory work, overburdened p erhaps by “excessive naughtiness.” Owen was concerned for the happiness of his workers, but some social historians have interpreted this as a c oncern for docility,12 just another version of f des in obsequium. New La nark a nd New Harmony were followed by other attempts at Owenite Utopias, none of which f ourished. But Owen’s seed o f i ndustrial a nd s ocial i ntegration w as r obust e nough t o inf uence o ther i ndustrialists. T itus S alt, t he w orsted ma nufacturer, was well established as a wool magnate by the time he conceived the construction of the model industrial village of Saltaire, near Bradford in the North of England, in 1850. House construction close to t he factory had be come essential to ensure a reliable pool of labor. Eff cient f actory operations required n ew w ork d isciplines a nd a m ore r igid ad herence t o timekeeping. T he d emands o f t he n ew i ndustries a lso crea ted peculiar jobs. T he “k nocker upper,” whose job it was to rap t he bedroom wi ndows of shift workers with a l ong pole i n order t o get people out of bed, was unknown in the agrarian economy. Like his fellow paternalist, John Grubb Richardson, who built the vi llage of Bessbrook i n Northern I reland to support h is f ax mill, Salt’s religiously governed brand of paternalism – he was a member o f t he nonc onformist Con gregational chu rch – b ecame evident i n t he vi llage l ayout. N either Salt n or R ichardson mad e any room for a public house or pawnshop. These p lanned m odel vi llages were a ma rked c ontrast t o t he crowding of mills and housing in the growing cities, where mill

The Silent Monitor workers l ived i n u nsanitary c onditions e xacerbated b y d isease and factory pollution. I f t he h ousing was poo r i n t he c ities, t he mills were often architectural masterpieces, ref ecting the pretensions of their owners, who viewed themselves as t he nineteenthcentury inheritors of the traditions of the great class of merchants in Renaissance Italy. Florentine a nd V enetian a rchitectural f eatures w ere c opied throughout t he textile belt. I n L eeds, a f ew m iles t o t he east of Bradford, m ill o wners c ommissioned c himneys re plicating I talianate towers. A scaled-down replica of Giotto’s campanile at the Duomo in Florence was built as a d ust extraction unit at Colonel Thomas H arding’s T ower W orks, w hich u sed t o ma ke s teel pins for wool-combing e ngines. A s econd c himney a longside i s modeled on another tower in northern Italy. One of Salt’s chimneys was based on t he c ampanile of t he church of Santa Maria Gloriosa in Venice. The g randeur d id n ot s top a t I taly. A h undred y ards f rom Harding’s Tower Works is Marshall’s Temple Mills, a masterpiece in classical revivalist architecture, which would look more in place on t he b anks of t he N ile a t L uxor t han i n t he b ack s treets of a n English industrial city. Huge blocks of millstone grit were used to construct t his f actory, c overing t wo acre s, i n t he s tyle o f a ncient Egypt. W hile Ignatius Bonomi, t he a rchitect, t ook g reat p ains t o model it o n t he Temple of Horus a t E dfu, h e h ad t o i nsulate t he roof to ensure the correct humidity inside for f ax spinning. A layer of plaster was covered in pitch. Earth was shoveled on top to prevent t he p itch crac king, a nd g rass w as s eeded t o b ind t he ea rth together. T he f nal e ccentric b ut p ractical i ngredient e mployed t o keep the rooftop grass in check was a small f ock of sheep.13 If w ealth i s a m easure o f gr eatness, th e in dustrialists o f th e northern En glish te xtile t owns w ere w orthy i nheritors o f t he Florentine m ercantile t radition. F or m any, h owever, t heir exc essive w ealth w as o nly ma tched b y t heir c allousness. B enjamin Gott, a L eeds m ill owner who built h is m ill upwind of t he city in 1824, driving out the wealthier residents with the smoke from his c himneys, a massed w orks b y T itian, R ubens, Ca ravaggio, Poussin, Canaletto, and Brueghel at his manor house. The gaudy juxtaposition o f t he s qualid m ill a nd a rtistic bea uty i s t ypical o f t he b linkered p riorities o f Go tt a nd h is f ellow te xtile

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The History of Work entrepreneurs. Gott’s Bean Ing Mills heralded a g rimy industrial epoch for the textile belt of northern England, where generations of millworkers’ children would grow up in the belief that all stone was black.14 By t he m id-nineteenth ce ntury t he U K w as i ndisputably t he world’s r ichest nation by head of population. At t he t ime of t he Great Exhibition of 1851 in London, only a handful of the exhibitors w ere U S c ompanies. B ut t he i ndustrial t ilt h ad a lready begun. By 1870 the UK had been overtaken by the United States in its overall gross domestic product. America was growing rich on c otton. El i W hitney’s c otton gi n, i nvented i n 1 793, h ad, i n the words of P rofessor W. W ilson, “enabled even t he u nskillful slave to cleanse a thousand pounds of cotton of its seeds in a single day, instead of f ve or six pounds formerly.” In one bound the American South had become the cotton f eld of the world. The extent to which cotton production had enabled the United States t o l eap f orward e conomically c an be g auged i n t hese statistics. I n 1792, t he year before W hitney’s i nvention, US c otton e xports t otaled 1 38,328 po unds. B y 1804 t hey h ad r isen t o 38 million pounds, and by the time of the Missouri Compromise of 1820, w hen t he s tate was a llowed t o p reserve its p ro-slavery majority b y p rohibiting b lack s ettlers, t hey h ad r isen t o c lose on 1 28 m illion po unds. B y t hat t ime t he N orth a nd S outh were evenly d ivided over t he Mason–Dixon Li ne, t he boundary between freedom and slavery. The United States lost no time in exploiting the European textile te chnology. I n a n a ttempt t o s ubvert A rkwright’s s pinning machine patents, brass models were made of his machinery. The plan was to have t hem shipped out t hrough France, but t he models were seized in England and the agent involved was placed under bo nds t o re main i n En gland f or t hree y ears. N ot t o be deterred, the Pennsylvania Society for the Encouragement of Arts and Domestic Manufactures offered a reward for the introduction of the new machinery in the US. The advertisement in an English journal prompted Samuel Slater, a f ormer worker at Arkwright’s Cromford M ill, f amiliar wi th t he w ater-frame, t o l eave t he U K and set up a cotton mill in Pawtucket, Rhode Island, in 1793. The secret was out. Cotton production and the mechanization of cloth manufacturing, coupled with improved transport, were

The Silent Monitor putting c otton g oods wi thin reac h o f a wi der ma rket t han e ver before. T he De ep S outh, w hich h ad h itherto pe rsisted wi th slavery as m uch o ut o f h abit as a nything, n ow h ad a po werful economic incentive to preserve its pool of slave labor. It was Roman civilization repeating itself. As t he N ew World w as e mbracing s ervitude, t he O ld World was l eaving it be hind. T he F rench h ad formally a bolished s erfdom and its feudal system in 1789. That aside, the US was poised to absorb t he progressive ideas on e conomics outlined i n Adam Smith’s Wealth o f N ations. Here was a f edgling nation, eager to investigate the most innovative thinking of the age. For a peo ple bred on the purity and sanctity of honest toil, the soundly argued justif cation o f pro f t in the Wealth o f N ations was n othing l ess than manna from heaven, a blueprint for industry and commerce and a g uiding text for the fulf llment of the American dream. It was no less important to those engaged in business than the Declaration of Independence had been to American republicanism. People of t he stature of Benjamin Franklin were casting off t he puritan ma ntle t o e njoy t he ma terial be nef ts o f w ealth. “Is n ot the h ope o f o ne da y be ing a ble t o p urchase a nd e njoy l uxuries a spur to labor and industry?” he wrote. All the constituents for unprecedented ec onomic g rowth w ere s lotting in to p lace; a ll except o ne. N ot u ntil t he U nited S tates w as t ruly u nited, wi th slavery c onsigned t o h istory, c ould it as sume t he m oral as cendancy that would help to make it the most powerful and inf uential nation on the globe. Slavery w as a g rowing i ssue o n bo th s ides o f t he A tlantic. The t rade, w hich h ad g rown u p as p rivate e nterprise be tween seafaring traders and plantation owners, was coming under threat from a n ew intellectual class, often bolstered by private incomes from inherited wealth. Inf uential works such as T homas Paine’s Rights o f M an (1 791–92), V oltaire’s Candide (1759), a nd J eanJacques Rousseau’s Social Contract (1762) were outlining a l iberal philosophy that would transform the social order. The P uritan w ork e thic t hat h ad u nderpinned t he i nstitution of s lavery w as u nder t hreat f rom t his l iberal e lite w ho, b acked by n ew s cientif c a nd n atural d iscoveries, w ould ul timately g o so far as to question the most fundamental of biblical tenets surrounding the origins of humanity – C reation itself. The body

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The History of Work of learning that would overturn this most precious of human beliefs developed in Victorian society, as o ne nation reached the pinnacle o f i ts i nf uence a nd a nother, l ike a p recocious s tarlet brimming with talent and promise but as yet unsure of her audience, took its f rst tentative steps into the international spotlight.

CHAPTER 8

The Last Puritan in a Nation of Amateurs Work is the grand cure of all the maladies and miseries that ever beset mankind. (Thomas Carlyle, 1795–1881) London’s N atural H istory M useum i s o ne o f t he c ity’s f nest examples o f V ictorian a rchitecture, i ts n eo-Gothic f acade a nd interior e laborately d ecorated wi th c olored s tone i nlays o f f ora and fauna. Conceived and commissioned by Sir Richard Owen – the ma n w hose Dinosauria, p ublished i n 1 842, i ntroduced t he world t o a g enus o f b ird-hipped re ptiles t hat w alked u pon t he earth be fore t he A rk – t he m useum i s a te mple t o t he A ge o f Enlightenment. T hrough i ts h alls w alked t he g reatest m inds o f their da y, m en o f s tature, re vered a nd h onored f or t heir k nowledge alone. Hung prominently on the walls are two of the museum’s most treasured p ossessions, f rom O wen’s p ersonal c ollection. T he fossilized i chthyosaur i n o ne f ramed c ase a nd t he p lesiosaur i n another m ust h ave c aused a s ensation w hen t hey f rst went on exhibition. U p t o t he m id-1990s a vi sitor c ould read o f Ow en’s munif cence o n a n i nscription n ear t he f oot o f eac h c ase. M ost would p robably h ave as sumed t hat t he g reat ma n h ad f ound them h imself be cause t here was no mention of a ny other f nder or of the circumstances in which they were uncovered. This is because t he f nder was a w oman with n o extensive formal ed ucation w ho ea rned h er l iving b y t rading i n f ossils. H er n ame was Mary Anning, described by the American biologist Stephen Jay Go uld i n h is book, Finders K eepers, as “ probably t he m ost unsung (or i nadequately s ung) c ollecting force i n t he h istory of paleontology.”1 O utside p aleontological c ircles A nning i s n ot well known, and yet as children we have probably all recited her 103

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The History of Work exploits in the popular tongue twister, “She sells sea shells on the sea shore,” without knowing the origin of the words.2 Today her name is included in the exhibition reference, and her po rtrait h angs on t he wall. W hy d id it t ake t he be st p art of 150 y ears f or t he m useum a uthorities t o re cognize A nning’s work? We n eed l ook n o f urther t han t his o ne example t o d emonstrate t he pe rsistence a nd ra nge o f p rejudices i n a s ociety that ha s b een con tent to s tif e so much latent t alent. How much human po tential h as l ain u nexploited a nd i gnored b y a p rivileged e lite w hose f agrant s elf-interest h as be en s erved b y t he preservation o f l ong-standing r ights a nd t raditions? E ven t oday in B ritain’s H ouse o f L ords w e c an f nd l iving p roof o f t he power o f b irthright o ver i ndividual m erit. N ot u ntil 1 999 w as the h ereditary p rivilege o f B ritain’s pe erage t o i nf uence the legislature f nally a bolished, a nd t hen n ot f ully, s ince a r ump of t he m ost po pular o f t he h ereditary pe ers a mong t heir f ellow s itting m embers w as a llowed t o re main f or a t ransitionary period. Mary A nning w ould n ever h ave s ought o ut s uch po mp. S he was a true misf t, a square peg unf tted for the self-serving round holes o f ac ademia, crea ted f or t he p urpose o f p romoting a nd protecting ac ademic i nterests a mong ac ademics. A nning w as a self-taught p rofessional l iving a nd w orking i n r ural Do rset y et moving con f dently a mong t he g randest o f a mateurs i n t he s ocalled A ge of En lightenment. She was a m odern woman s o far out of her time that it is impossible to align her with other prominent w omen o f t he a ge. A lthough s he l ived i n L yme R egis a t the same t ime as J ane Austen, t here is no re cord of t heir being acquainted. F or a ll t he power o f h er wr iting, Austen was mad e for h er t ime, a s ubtle c ommentator o n t he l ives a nd v anities o f her contemporaries in genteel society. Anning was a country woman, lacking elegance or ref nement, working either alone, chipping away with her hammer at rocks on the beach, or supervising workmen i n t he extraction of some of her most spectacular f nds. She made, said Gould, “an astounding series o f d iscoveries, i ncluding s quidlike crea tures wi th as sociated inkbags, a plesiosaur in 1824, and a pterosaur (f ying reptile) in 1828. S he d irectly f ound o r po inted t he w ay t o n early e very specimen of importance.”3

The Last Puritan in a Nation of Amateurs Owen w as n ot t he o nly n aturalist t o bea t a p ath t o h er d oor. Almost every aspiring expert in this f edgling f eld of a cademia appeared to have cause at some stage to wander down to Lyme Regis t o vi ew t he “ curiosities” i n A nning’s s hop: W illiam Buckland, t he Ox ford g eologist w ho h ad t he d istinction o f p roviding t he f rst d inosaur n ame – m egalosaurus; Gideon Mantell, the GP whose f nd of iguanodon te eth ( his wi fe was given t hem by w orkmen) l ed t o t he s econd d inosaur n ame; S ir R oderick Murchison, a military man and self-styled “Silurian King”; Henry De la Beche; and William Conybeare – all were recognized paleontologists a mong aca demic ci rcles. I n f act t hey formed th ese very same circles, each adding to the others’ repute. But rarely did they give a n od of re cognition i n t he d irection of Mary A nning. One w ho d id, De l a B eche, d elivered a e ulogy a fter h er d eath in h is p residential ad dress t o t he Geo logical S ociety i n 1848, t o “one w ho h ad t o ea rn h er da ily b read by h er l abor, yet c ontributed by her talents and untiring researches in no small degree to our k nowledge o f t he g reat En alio-Saurians a nd o ther f orms o f organic life entombed in the vicinity of Lyme Regis.” 4 Beyond h er s ex, be yond h er r ustic a ntecedents, t he m ost s ignif cant difference between Anning and her peers was her professional or academic status, or lack of it. She was a t rader. Unlike the re st o f t hem, s he h ad t o w ork f or a l iving – “ she s ells s ea shells,” went the rhyme. The academic and professional classes did not relate their work so directly to payment. They did not tend to do the type of work that required them, at the end of it, to extend their h ands for p ayment. T his was far t oo g rubby a n otion. O ne Victorian c ommentator, T . H . S . Es cott, t hought t hat re ceiving money d irectly f rom c lients was a s uff cient d istinction t o p lace the professions of the solicitor and the doctor on a lower plane than those o f b arristers a nd t he c lergy, w ho f aced n o re quirement t o undertake such “vulgar” commercial transactions.5 An i mportant b y-product o f i ndustrial a nd co mmercial prosperity was the increasing comfort enjoyed not only by the wealth earners but also by those who aligned their own careers or lifestyles t o t he s pending po wer o f t hose w ho c ould a fford t heir services. T hese w ere p rosperous da ys f or c lergymen w hose congregations were s welled by p rominent l andowners a nd b usinessmen, d octors w hose c urative po wers w ere l imitless i n t he

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The History of Work service of the well heeled, or lawyers who provided the necessary legal ad ornments, ad vice, a nd s afeguards t o t hose w ho n eeded to p rotect t heir p atents a nd t ransact b usiness i n a c ut-throat environment. The professional classes were coming of age. Their alliance with the i ndustrialists was a ma rriage of c onvenience. Each po ssessed something the other craved. The professional had status and, almost inevitably, the benef t of a classical education. The industrialist had wads of money. Devoid of any common social circles, they created new ones, such as the Royal Society for the Encouragement of Arts, Manufactures a nd C ommerce ( RSA), founded i n 1754, a nd Birmingham’s Lunar Society, founded in 1764. On o ne l evel t hese s ocieties were a ttempting t o f ll a gulf in understanding o f t he s ciences a nd s ocial c hanges a rising o ut o f industrialization. The universities were so wedded to the classics and the merits of a classical education that the dons of Oxford and Cambridge might as well have been living in the clouds on Mount Olympus. As a w ay of i llustrating t he extent of t his i ntellectual insularity, T homas H enry H uxley, t he c hampion o f D arwinism, told a B ritish p arliamentary s elect c ommittee o f a q uestion h e posed at a d inner party of Oxford academics. “Would it be fair,” he asked his fellow diners, “to say that anyone might have taken the h ighest honors at u niversity a nd yet m ight never have heard that the Earth went round the Sun?” As one they replied, “Yes!”6 On another level, the societies were meeting places where likeminded individuals could keep abreast of each other’s work. This was certainly t rue of t he short-lived Lunar Society, where practical m en l ike M atthew B oulton a nd J ames W att c ould c onsider business applications for some of the most important new discoveries. The RSA, on the other hand, had a m ore eclectic approach, seeking solutions to problems as diverse as the synthetic production of a lkali a nd t he s tandardization o f w eights a nd m easures. B oth of these societies, however, were more practical in their approach than the Royal Society, which always had patronage at its base. No matter h ow i gnorant t he m ember o f t he a ristocracy, h is t itle a nd patronage alone would be suff cient to earn society membership. Connections c arried far g reater weight t han vocational q ualif cations among those seeking preferment, recognition, and prestige a mong t he Es tablishment o f e ighteenth-century En gland.

The Last Puritan in a Nation of Amateurs As K enneth Cl ark wr ote i n Civilization: “ Eighteenth-century England was t he p aradise o f t he a mateur; by w hich I m ean, o f men rich enough and grand enough to do whatever they liked, who nevertheless d id t hings t hat re quire a g ood d eal o f e xpertise.”7 Among t hese gi fted a mateurs w ere S ir Ch ristopher W ren, t he architect, S ir J oseph B anks, t he bo tanist, a nd S ir W illiam Herschel, t he as tronomer, a ll p rominent m embers o f t he R oyal Society. Fluttering butterf y-like between each of t hese organizations – the l ofty R oyal S ociety a nd t he m ore d own t o ea rth RS A a nd Lunar Society – ( at least in his correspondence) was the Bostonborn B enjamin F ranklin, o ne o f t he f rst g reat i nternationalists, as comfortable in his London home as he was in his adopted city of Philadelphia. It is to Franklin we owe what might be considered t he f rst o f t hat pe culiarly A merican g enre o f ma nagement books that promise to reveal some secret path to prosperity, when the real secret is in writing and selling the book. The Way to W ealth featured a series of extracts from his Poor R ichard’s Almanac, a n a nnual c alendar-diary with t idbits of ad vice, j okes, and colloquial wisdom, appealing to the potential of the self-made man. “Remember that time is money,” was one of its aphorisms. Its t win-pronged a pproach, s tressing f rugality a nd i ndustry, w as tailor-made for a peo ple who had been weaned on the Protestant work ethic. It sold a quarter of a m illion copies in Franklin’s lifetime, the second most popular book in the New England colonies after t he B ible, a nd i t mad e h im r ich e nough t o d evote m ost o f his time to the acquisition and transference of knowledge from the Old World to the New. His f amiliarization wi th c ontemporary s cience i n B ritain a nd Continental E urope, c ulminating i n h is o wn ce lebrated e xperiments wi th e lectricity, t ook h im i nto t he m ost e xalted s cientif c circles. H e w as a warded d egrees f rom H arvard, Yale, W illiam and M ary, Ox ford, a nd S t A ndrews; h e w as mad e a F ellow o f the R oyal S ociety; a nd h e w as a m ember o f s ome t wenty-eight other l earned s ocieties. H e e stablished a boo kshop i mporting scientif c a nd ac ademic p amphlets f rom En gland. “L et m e h ave everything, good or bad, that makes a noise and has a run,” he told his L ondon c ontacts.8 T his c onduit for t he t ransference o f i deas cemented relations a nd contacts at a n i ntellectual, scientif c, and

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The History of Work industrial level that would defeat the best attempts of the British government to prevent the leakage of manufacturing know-how. The B oston T ea P arty i n 1 773, w hen c olonists d ressed as Indians h urled tea c hests f rom B ritish s hips i nto B oston h arbor in a dispute over the importation of tea, may have caused outrage in England at a political level. It may even have caused outrage in the s treets. B ut t he s ubsequent A merican War o f I ndependence did n ot p ut a n e nd t o B ritish a nd A merican c ollaboration. T he dissenting tradition in Britain was alive and well in the eighteenth century, a nd t he p romise o f a n ew l ife a way f rom t he re strictive l aws, p roscriptive Ch urch, a nd c laustrophobic c onf nes of the B ritish Is les w ould n ot a llow a n as -yet m uted p atriotism t o prove too great an obstacle to emigration. What patriotic British fervor t here m ight h ave be en w as t raditionally re served f or t he French, and it was a long time since the English archers had def antly ra ised t heir two bow-string f ngers to t he massed ra nks of French knights at Agincourt.9 The alternative to emigration for those who had elevated themselves above the bread line was entry into one of the professions, increasingly developing themselves into a c lass apart from those who w ould w ork b y h and a nd m uscle. B ritain’s R oyal C ollege of S urgeons w as e stablished i n 1 800. I n t he n ext f fty years, barristers, solicitors, civil engineers, architects, pharmacists, and actuaries would all form professional bodies in England as t heir ranks swelled.10 The p rofessional c lass c onveniently b ridged t he g ap be tween the o lder l andowning a ristocracy a nd t he s elf-made capitalists. These social divisions were far less prominent in the New World, to the great relief of those who settled there in search of a better life. T he N ew En gland e lite w ere d oing t heir be st t o e stablish such d ivisions, b ut t hey w ould n ever e mulate t he i ncreasingly stif ing c lass s ystem o f t he o ld c ountry. T hey w ould n ever, f or example, t urn t heir b acks o n i nnovation a nd i ndustry. N ot s o in England. By the nineteenth century some English commentators w ere be ginning t o v oice re servations a bout t heir n ewly industrialized s ociety. A nthony T rollope a nd Ch arles Di ckens both harbored doubts about the way in which industry and commerce was heading. “Buying and selling is good and necessary,” wrote Trollope i n Doctor T horne, published i n 1858. “It is very

The Last Puritan in a Nation of Amateurs necessary, and may, possibly, be v ery good; but it cannot be t he noblest work of man; and let us hope that it may not in our time be esteemed the noblest work of an Englishman.”11 John Stuart Mill crystallized these doubts when he pointed the f nger a t T homas Ca rlyle’s g ospel o f w ork t hat h ad be en outlined i n a c ollection o f e ssays p ublished u nder t he t itle Past and P resent i n 1843. Ca rlyle h ad e ulogized work as s omething venerable. “All true work is sacred; in all true work, were it but true hard-labor, t here is something of t he divineness,” he wrote. Mill t hought Ca rlyle was wr iting nonsense a nd s aid s o: “ Work, I i magine, i s n ot a g ood i n i tself. T here i s n othing l audable i n work for work’s sake. To work voluntarily for a worthy object is laudable; but what constitutes a worthy object?” “Carlyle,” wrote Mill, “revolves in an eternal circle round the idea of work, as i f turning up the earth, or driving a shuttle or a quill, were ends in themselves, and the ends of human existence.”12 Mill had identif ed correctly the focus of the Protestant universe. It w as n ot God o r t he B ible o r w ealth o r po wer, i t w as t he i lldef ned and by this time signif cantly secular ethic of work itself. Work w as a t t he very c ore o f h uman e xistence, s omething f rom which a ll m en a nd w omen c ould d erive s ome m eaning. I n t he space of 150 years its i nf uence would so dominate t he everyday lives of most people on the planet that to defy its expectations and demands would be to invite the severest censure and opprobrium. It would be t oo s imple t o s uggest t hat Ca rlyle was a d efender of t he downtrodden, a lthough ea rly i n h is c areer some may h ave thought so. Reading his later pamphlets, it is diff cult to conclude that he was ever their champion at all. But Carlyle’s sanctif cation of manual labor had appealed to the thinkers among the disenfranchised mass of working men and women who felt alienated from the ruling class. He was as condemnatory of the idle rich as he was of the idle poor. Carlyle’s concerns cut through the class lines. His was a w orld o f po larities – g ood a nd evil, s trong a nd weak, silence and chatter, honest endeavor and idleness. His views were so bound up with the work ethic and how it came to be pe rceived by the Victorians that they demand attention even today. Born in Ecclefechan, Scotland, of staunchly Calvinist parents – his mother urged him to read a c hapter of the Bible every day – Carlyle was probably the last of the Puritans and the f rst among

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The History of Work Victorians. T here w ere n o i ntermediaries be tween Ca rlyle a nd his God. His faith was absolute and did not require translation or interpretation. His uncompromising views, delivered in a cutting, discomforting, o ften b rutal wr iting s tyle, w ere l aced wi th l anguage of s parkling o riginality. Morose in h is pe rsona, p rovocatively insensitive in his invective, Carlyle could offend just about everyone, a V ictorian L enny Bruce who ultimately went too far with his audience. Ralph Waldo Em erson, w ho h ad i ntroduced Ca rlyle’s w ork t o an enthusiastic American readership, felt betrayed when Carlyle in one of h is l ater p amphlets re ferred t o A merica as a c ountry t hat had “begotten, with a rapidity beyond recorded example, eighteen millions of the greatest bores ever seen in the world before.”13 This was just Carlyle being Carlyle. As Mark Twain observed: “At bottom he was probably fond of t hem, but he was a lways able to conceal it.”14 (Carlyle was consistent in his criticism. He dismissed the British population of twenty-seven m illion as “ mostly fools.”) He had not meant h is d isdain toward A mericans to be t aken too seriously, but it was. No wonder Emerson decided it was high time his fellow Americans should learn to go their own way and “extract the tape-worm of Europe from America’s body.”15 Earlier i n h is c areer i t h ad s eemed as i f Ca rlyle w as o n t he side o f t he mas ses, r idiculing, as h e d id, t he “ thousand cr own, coroneted, s hovel ha tted q uack-heads”16 w ho h ad s upported King Ch arles I a gainst Parliament a nd Oliver Cromwell, one of Carlyle’s g reatest h eroes. Ca rlyle h ad c ondemned t he mas sacre of Peterloo and had railed against the workhouses and the growing inequality between rich and poor. Whereas Mill poured scorn on t he n otion o f w ork f or w ork’s s ake, Ca rlyle c omplained o f industry for i ndustry’s s ake. H e s aw n othing s alutary a bout t he headlong r ush i nto production. “ The world has be en r ushing on with such f ery ambition to get work and ever more work done, it has had no time to think of dividing the wages; a nd has merely left t hem to be s crambled for by t he law of t he stronger, law of supply and demand, law of laissez-faire, and other idle laws and un-laws – s aying i n its own haste to get work done, t hat is well enough.”17 To t he “ Captains o f I ndustry” ( a te rm, l ike s o ma ny n ow i n common usage, coined by Carlyle) he put an awkward question

The Last Puritan in a Nation of Amateurs made f or t he n ew s cience o f e conomics: “ What i s t he c ase o f your spun shirts? They hang there by the million, unsalable; and here, by the million are diligent bare backs that can not get hold of t hem.”18 It was Ca rlyle who f rst pointed to t he “cash nexus” that had come to def ne transactional relationships in society. “We have profoundly forgotten everywhere that cash-payment is not the sole relation of human beings; we think nothing doubting, that it abso lves a nd l iquidates a ll en gagements o f ma n,” he w rote.19 But money, as Ca rlyle u nderstood, h ad its l imitations: “L ove of men cannot be bought by cash-payment.” How could a ny of t hese defective t ransactional a rrangements, he wondered, compare with the “blessed glow of labor”?20 Work, with i ts “p erennial nob leness; a nd e ven sa credness,” a rgued Carlyle, c ould p rovide h umanity’s s alvation. “ Were h e n ever s o benighted, f orgetful o f h is h igh c alling, t here i s a lways h ope in a ma n t hat ac tually a nd ea rnestly w orks: i n I dleness a lone is t here pe rpetual d espair.”21 T here w as m ore: “La bor i s l ife. From the innermost heart of the worker rises his God-given force, the s acred celestial l ife e ssence b reathed i nto h im by A lmighty God.”22 It was as if his Calvinism had been hammered into a single oaken pillar – t he work ethic – which formed the support for the Carlylean universe. It set the moral tone of Victorian society and industry and underpinned the Victorian concern for self-help, the idea that men and women were bodily equipped with the key to their salvation – their labor. Not everything that Carlyle said angered Mill. In fact the two men w ere f riends f or t wenty y ears. T heir re lationship s urvived the m ost te sting o f i ncidents be tween l iterary f gures. Carlyle had e mbarked o n wr iting a n acc ount o f t he F rench R evolution, and M ill h ad l oaned h im bo th boo ks a nd m oral s upport. F ive months’ hard graft brought Carlyle to the end of the f rst volume. With a sense of unmitigated relief and elation at its completion he asked his friend to look over the manuscript. Mill read the manuscript by his f reside. After reading a while, he p ut i t d own c lose t o t he f replace an d, for want of anything better, his housemaid had picked it up and used it to light the f re. All that remained were the scraps of four or f ve pages. Mill was mortif ed. S o was Ca rlyle. “I re member a nd s till c an re member less of it than anything I ever wrote with such toil: it is gone, the

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The History of Work whole world a nd myself backed by it could not bring t hat back: nay t he o ld s pirit t oo i s f ed. I f nd that it took f ve m onths o f steadfast occ asionally e xcessive a nd a lways s ickly a nd p ainful toil. It is gone; and will not return.”23 Had a nyone be en i nsensitive o r m ischievous e nough a t t hat moment to console Carlyle with the prospect of f ve more months of spiritual bliss, basking in the blessed glow of labor, he would probably h ave ea rned a p unch o n t he n ose. T he g reat t houghts of the philosopher could soon dissolve in the cold face of reality, when suddenly work could be conceived as “sickly and painful.” It was tough for Carlyle, embarrassing for Mill, but the newspapers loved the story. Mill sent Carlyle a c artload more books. Carlyle set to and wrote the book again. He even asked Mill if he wanted to read t he new draft but Mill declined, waited until it was published, and gave the work a good review. It was the least he could do. He also sent Carlyle £200 in compensation, but Carlyle would only take half and later regretted keeping it after the two of them had fallen out. That their views should diverge so markedly – Mill was a committed l iberal, Ca rlyle w as n ot – s eems s urprising i n t hat bo th men had been appalled at the suffering of the working classes in the new industrialism. In criticizing Carlyle’s gospel of work, Mill was equating work with i ndustry a nd t he i mpact o f f ree e nterprise. Ca rlyle, o n t he other h and, was p utting work o n a ped estal, elevated a bove t he machinations of industry, which he held in just as much contempt as h is erstwhile f riend. M ill was more t he pragmatist a nd a rguably the more humanitarian. In his own way Mill, too, was challenging t he ideas of e conomic g rowth t hat Adam Smith h ad s o successfully p lanted i n i ndustrial s ociety. T he e nd o f e conomic growth, t hought M ill, w ould be a n i mprovement o n a s ociety scarred by Victorian working conditions. He believed that “the ideal of life held out by those who think that the normal state of human beings is that of struggling to get on” was nothing more than “the disagreeable symptoms of one of the phases of industrial progress.”24 He looked forward beyond this stage of Protestant-driven industrialism to a New Age where concerns f or q uality, n ot q uantity, w ould be p aramount, “w hen minds cease to be engrossed by the art of getting on.”25 Had Mill

The Last Puritan in a Nation of Amateurs arrived a t t he t urn o f t he t wentieth ce ntury h e m ight well h ave wondered whether this New Age was almost upon us, but he may have been saddened, even angered, at the continuing overbearing presence of the Protestant work ethic, still planted at the center of the human u niverse, not d immed but glowing ever brighter l ike an overheating star. Mill e nvisaged a w orld w here p leasure a lone, n ot t he i ntrinsic joy in work, would motivate human endeavor. From one angle the prospects looked promising during Voltaire’s Age of Reason, which h ad wi tnessed a t ransformation i n t he a rts, a rchitecture, and innovation. But the world looked very different to the infant chimney sweep, weaver, and m ineworker, and to those who still suffered the ugliest form of human exploitation in the slave trade, which h ad n ever p rospered s o m uch as i t d id i n t he e ighteenth century, f eeding t he g rowing w ealth a nd p rominence o f po rts like Liverpool, Bristol, Lisbon, Nantes, Cad iz, Havana, a nd R io de Janeiro. Liverpool w as t he l argest s lave po rt i n E urope, s ending f our thousand slaving voyages to Africa between 1700 and 1807. Anyone visiting a Liverpool chandler’s shop in the eighteenth century would have se en ha ndcuffs, l eg s hackles, i ron co llars, a nd res training chains d isplayed i n t he wi ndow.26 Britain had prospered f rom t he international trade in people and America had been one of its most eager customers. Not a ll t he slaves i n A merica were black. Many of the European immigrants were redemptioners, poor settlers who forfeited t heir f reedom t o p ay f or t heir p assage. O n reac hing t he colonies they were sold into a form of slavery where they were indentured to work for a number of years until the cost of their passage had been redeemed.27 But distinctions arose very quickly between the status of black and white workers. A tiny minority of the f rst black settlers was freed. Two o f t hem – A nthony J ohnson a nd h is wi fe, M ary – worked t heir way out of t he i ndentured term a nd acquired t heir own farm. In Africans in America, Charles Johnson and Patricia Smith w rite t hat “ the f rst V irginian c olonists t hought o f t hemselves as Ch ristians or Englishmen, not white people. T he word white was not yet used to refer to a type of person . . . Black and white servants were oppressed equally.”28 As Johnson and Smith put it: “Sometime i n t he m id-seventeenth century, t hat changed.

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The History of Work Darker b ecame w rong.”29 I t s eems t hat w hite s ettlers i nitially used t he l ack of Ch ristian belief a mong black A fricans t o d eny a r ight to freedom. W hen blacks converted to Ch ristianity, their lower status be came def ned by t he color of t heir skin. I n 1639, the M aryland c olony s pelled o ut t hat a s lave’s f reedom c ould not be ac hieved t hrough Ch ristian b aptism.30 B lack s lavery i n America had now been institutionalized. This re turn t o c hattel s lavery, t he o wnership a nd t rade i n people, m eant t hat A frican s laves, i f t hey s urvived t he te rrible rigors of the ocean journey, tended to be kept in better conditions than t he red emptioners, s ince t hey h ad a h igher t radable v alue. A redemptioner w orking f or a s et te rm w ould be p ushed h ard by h is owner, who wanted to extract the ma ximum labor before the term expired.31 The living conditions of African slaves, however, have been a contentious issue. In his book, Slavery, Stanley Elkins c hallenged a l ong-standing a rgument t hat a ntebellum slaves w ere “be tter f ed, be tter c lothed, a nd be tter l odged” t han northern laborers, highlighting the degradation suffered by many African women importuned by plantation owners and their sons.32 But i t w as t he o ratory o f e scaped s laves l ike F rederick Douglass, speaking to Northern audiences, that most powerfully exposed the cruelty of the slave system. One former slave, Josiah Henson, re called s eeing h is father s oaked i n blood. H is father’s right ea r h ad be en c ut o ff, a nd h is b ack was s everely l acerated from a hundred lashes. The whipping and mutilation had been his punishment for beating a n overseer who had assaulted Henson’s mother. This was reality for the African slave in America. The trade in black African slaves had settled into a s teady and prof table barter trade since the f rst slave ship, Treasurer, a Dutch ship, h ad s ailed i nto J amestown i n A ugust, 1 619 wi th t wenty slaves on board. A t ypical trade recorded by the master of a s hip called t he Fortune i n 1630 e nabled t he exchange of its c argo of African s laves f or e ighty-f ve b arrels o f r um a nd f ve b arrels o f tobacco. Slavery, then, was promoting the production and trade in goods t hat peo ple d id not n eed a nd t hat a rguably c aused peo ple more harm than good. It was a squalid equation in a squalid trade. By 1 863, j ust be fore t he A merican C ivil W ar, t here w ere 4,442,000 A frican slaves in A merica,33 But t he slave t rade was almost at an end. Britain’s increasingly liberal middle class,

The Last Puritan in a Nation of Amateurs united i n s entiment wi th t he e galitarian i deals o f t he N orthern American s tates, w hose l abor ma rket w as b ased o n t he c ash nexus a nd t herefore i mmune t o t he e conomic p ain of a bolition, had swayed the rest of Europe into passing laws banning the trade in slaves. Even after abolition in Britain, however, some English slavers s till t ried t o c ontinue t heir t rade. O ne s lave s hip, t he Brillente, mad e te n i llegal ocea n cr ossings, c arrying f ve thousand s laves t o Cu ba. O nce, w hen s urrounded b y w arships, t he captain ordered on deck the six hundred slaves in his cargo. They were chained to each other by the neck. An anchor was attached to the chain and cast overboard, pulling every slave with it.34 In t he k nowledge t hat t he t rade w as c haracterized b y s uch inhuman be havior, h ow c ould a nyone j ustify t he c ontinuation of a s ystem i n which o ne h uman be ing re mained t he c hattel o f a nother? Ca rlyle c ould a nd d id s o i n a p amphlet o n t he “Nigger Question.” (The f rst version had referred to the “Negro Question,” but Ca rlyle t hought it not quite offensive enough.) I n this work he laments the breakdown of order in the West Indies after the British abolished slavery throughout its empire in 1834. Using a rationale that is driven by his f xation on the work ethic, Carlyle wr ites of former slaves sitting a round on t he plantations eating p umpkins w hile t he s ugar cr ops a re l eft u ncut be cause labor c annot be h ired. “So cheap a re t he p umpkins,” h e wr ites, that “a Blackman, by working about half an hour a da y (such is the calculation), can supply himself, by aid of sun and soil, with as much pumpkin as w ill suff ce . . . Supply a nd d emand which, science s ays, s hould be b rought t o bea r o n h im, h ave a n u phill task of it with such a man. Strong sun supplies itself gratis, rich soil in those unpeopled, or half-peopled regions almost gratis; t hese a re h is ‘ supply’; a nd h alf a n h our a da y d irected upon these, will produce pumpkins which is his ‘demand’.”35 If o nly Ca rlyle h ad a pplied a l ittle c ultural u nderstanding h e may h ave c oncluded t hat t he f ormer s laves h ad red iscovered Marshall S ahlin’s o riginal a ff uent s ociety. T he i dea, h owever, of ma n f nding con tentment i n f ulf lling a s imple n eed w as anathema to a n ideal t hat t reated idleness as a s in. A ma n, said Carlyle, s hould be “ emancipated” f rom i ndolence a nd w hipped, if necessary, into doing the work he is f t for.36 This was the line that forced Mill’s trenchant rebuttal. If this had been an isolated

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The History of Work exchange between two men of ideas it might have been ignored, but Ca rlyle was d rawing f rom a d eep well o f c onservatism. As Asa Briggs remarked in A Social History of E ngland: “Carlyle’s prophecies had been most welcomed when they were in harmony with existing prejudices.”37 Carlyle w as n ot o nly pe rpetuating w hat S yed F arid A latas would call “the myth of the lazy native,” he was def ning laziness as a d isinterest i n s upporting t he d emands o f c apitalism, even t hough h e h imself, s ome y ears ea rlier, h ad po inted t o t he folly of m isdirected p roduction. Some of Ca rlyle’s ideals would re-emerge i n Ge rmany, b ut even as h e wr ote t here was a nother man in another part of London framing a d ifferent proposal that would change the world: “From each according to his abilities, to each according to his needs.” The i deas o f Ka rl M arx h ad l ittle i nf uence i nitially i n t he country he had made his home. The impact of his thinking was stronger i n Ge rmany a nd a mong t he Ge rman m igrants w ho f ocked to the United States in search of work. Some of the earliest struggles between socialist idealism and the interests of capital would be fought out among the emerging industrial regions of the Midwest. The f ash points were the railroads.

CHAPTER 9

The Yellow Dog Unleashed The w orker w ho s trikes f or h igher w ages d oes n ot d o s o simply because he is greedy and wants all the material comforts he can get; instead he seeks economic justice in which his l abor i s c ompensated f airly i n re lation t o o thers – i n other words that it be recognized for its true worth. (Francis Fukuyama, b. 1952) Pittsburgh, Saturday, July 21, 1877, t he n ight t hat t he A merican Dream l ay s hattered a mong t he b roken gl ass a nd r ubble o f t he city’s burning goods yards, t he n ight t hat t he spirit of e ntrepreneurialism an d u nrestrained c apitalism c lashed h eadlong w ith the demands of railroad workers for a fair day’s pay. People were dying, caught up in the ugliest labor disturbances that America had experienced. T he d isturbances were put d own by federal t roops ordered to turn on their countrymen for the f rst time, just twelve years a fter t he c ountry h ad e merged f rom c ivil w ar. F rom t he start o f t he d ispute f ve da ys ea rlier t o i ts e nd n ine da ys l ater, more t han a h undred peo ple, s ome o f t hem b ystanders, w ould be killed in street f ghting centered on Baltimore, Cumberland, Pittsburgh, and Reading. The s trike h ad s tarted s pontaneously a mong cre ws o f t he Baltimore and Ohio Railroad and quickly spread to other railroad companies, who demanded military protection. Unrest had been simmering for weeks, a fter ra il companies had begun to reduce wage rates in response to a falloff in trade. Workers in other companies had accepted pay cuts, but when the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad followed the trend its workers rebelled, prompting those from o ther c ompanies t o j oin t hem. T he p rotests e scalated i nto rioting when strikers were confronted by the often heavy-handed deployment of troops. In 1 830, w hen P eter C ooper’s l ocomotive, T om T humb, traveled t hirteen m iles o n t he B altimore a nd Oh io Ra ilroad, i t 117

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The History of Work opened a n ew era of American industry. Wooden rails gave way to rails made of iron, and iron rails gave way to steel as t he rail network grew outwards like a widening web. By 1850 there were nine thousand miles of track, by 1860, thirty-one thousand miles. At the time of the 1877 strike the Baltimore and Ohio Company ran freight trains on a hundred miles of track between Baltimore and M artinsburg. I ts s chedule f or c overing t his d istance o n a one-way trip was six hours. So the train crews were paid for six hours’ w ork an d n o m ore, e ven th ough th e j ourney in variably took longer, because of delays along the route, and could at times take forty hours to complete. The company had been running crews of f ve men – a f reman, engineer, conductor, and two brakemen. This was regarded by most operators as t he b are m inimum. T he N orthern Ce ntral Ra ilroad added a f agman to make a crew of six. The poorest-paid crewmen earned be tween $ 1.17 a nd $ 1.58 a da y, a lthough t he e xtra h ours forced on crews meant that some workers were receiving less than a dollar a day and very often were averaging no more than fourteen days’ pay a m onth. T he company made other savings by denying sleeping quarters to the crews on the return journeys. It also dispensed with hostlers, men who would prepare the engine for departure and clean it up after it had reached its destination. These tasks were passed on to the f reman, ad ding a nother t wo h ours’ w ork for every journey, but again with no extra pay. A group of f remen went to the company management to protest. All were summarily dismissed. In another cost-cutting move the company removed one of the brakemen, paring down its crews to four.1 When the management decided, therefore, to cut pay rates by ten pe rcent, i n l ine with other operators, t he crews h ad reached breaking point. As the f rst t rain a rrived a t Ca mden s tation i n Baltimore on July 16 its f remen stepped off and refused to continue their duties.2 The f remen of later trains followed suit, and groups o f m en be gan t o p icket t heir c o-workers, u rging t hem to j oin t he s trike. T he m en w ere n ot u nionized, n ot e ffectively anyway. A rail union did exist but its members met in secret, fearful o f l osing t heir j obs a nd be ing b lacklisted i f t heir e mployers found out. The strike at Camden junction began with a m inority of d issenters whose action was quickly supported by others a nd spread like brush f re through rail companies in eleven states.3

The Yellow Dog Unleashed The whole ra il n etwork was p aralyzed within four days. T he Baltimore and Ohio management demanded military intervention when a m ob began to gather in Cumberland on the Friday a fter the strike began, a nd t he Maryland governor, John L ee Ca rroll, ordered t he mobilization of state t roops. A larm bells, r ung only in t imes o f e xtreme e mergency, w ere s ounded i n B altimore t o alert a nd muster t he t roops. But t he bells a lerted everyone else, and crowds poured into the streets. As soldiers pushed through people to reach their assembly point and armory at the corner of Fayette Street and Fort Street the mob turned angry and began to stone t he building. T he t roops broke out a nd headed for a t rain that would take them to Cumberland. Nine people were killed and s ixteen were i njured as t he s oldiers t ried t o f ght t heir way through the crowd. Many of the troops abandoned their weapons and f ed, as t he r ioters began to set f re to coaches on t he t rain. Order had broken down so completely in Baltimore that the government decided that troops were more urgently needed there than at Cumberland. President R utherford H ayes, a f ormer U nion g eneral, s anctioned t he u se o f f ederal t roops s ent o ut f rom W ashington t o bring o rder t o B altimore. T he da y a fter t he B altimore c lashes, confrontations be tween t roops a nd s trikers i n P ittsburgh bo iled over into open f ghting when rioters armed themselves with rif es and cannon. At the height of the disturbances some 30,000 people a mong P ittsburgh’s 1 20,000 po pulation s pilled o ut o nto t he streets. Some were strikers, some were onlookers, and some were sympathizers with the strike who relished an opportunity to challenge m ilitary a uthority. Th e Am erican c onstitution’s e ndorsement of the right of its citizens to bear arms would rebound, not for the last time, against the efforts of state control. Private gun stores were looted, and some two thousand rif es and pistols were distributed a mong t he p rotesters. A bout f our t housand s trikers and s ympathizers, a rranged i n m ilitary o rder, w ere ma rched i n separate columns along Pennsylvania Avenue and Liberty Street as f ar as T wenty-eighth S treet, w here t roops w ere p rotecting a railroad crossing.4 Bayonets w ere f xed a nd s hots f red i nto t he s tone-throwing crowd before a body of the troops retreated into a railroad roundhouse n earby. T he a rmed r ioters l aid s iege t o t he roundhouse

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The History of Work with tw o c aptured f eld guns that they used to create a breach in the walls. Coal wagons, their contents soaked in oil, were pushed a gainst t he w alls a nd s et a light i n a n a ttempt t o b urn out t he t roops inside. Across t he road under t he illuminated letters of the YMCA building, the sign said “Prepare to Meet your God.”5 In an act of restraint that probably saved the lives of most of t hem, t he t roops d id n ot f re o ut a t t he r ioting mas s o utside the roundhouse. The scene must have made the Luddite attack on Rawfold’s mill in England look like a m inor altercation in comparison, but everything about t his big c ountry d emanded action on a g rand s cale. T he t roops t ook advantage of t he m ob’s b rief distraction elsewhere to make a break from the building, leaving f fteen men dead behind them in the burning roundhouse. More were k illed w hen r ioters p ursued t he s oldiers d own s treets a nd alleyways to the Allegheny R iver. More than forty civilians and troops were k illed i n t he lawlessness, which ended t he next day when the rioters were persuaded to give up their arms. Some 1 20 l ocomotives w orth $ 3 m illion w ere b urned, a nd railroad property valued at about $4 million destroyed along f fty miles of track.6 Overzealous reaction by troops in Reading led to more deaths, sometimes of people who were not involved in the dispute. A s tray b ullet k illed o ne woman as s he s at a t h er s ewing machine.7 In the ten-day duration of the strike, before troops restored order across the rail towns, the disturbances claimed the lives of more than a hundred people, with f ve hundred injured. It was the most violent industrial action in American labor history. It was more like insurrection than industrial action. Life was cheap among the laboring masses, particularly among the gangs of Chinese engaged to lay track for the Central Pacif c Railroad i n t he f nal p ush t o crea te a t ranscontinental ra ilroad. The Ch inese w ere u npopular a mong t rack-laying g angs mad e up of European i mmigrants, because t hey worked for a d ollar a day, f fty ce nts l ess t han a E uropean. T hey would a lso work i n the harshest of conditions. Thousands of them died. The Chinese, like b lack A fricans, were d ebarred f rom be ing m embers o f t he f rst t rade u nions, w hich were rea lly s elf-interest g roups, i n t he main representing white Anglo-Saxon artisans. Growing u nion m uscle w ould be a t t he h eart o f t he n ext great railway strike, seventeen years on from the Pittsburgh and

The Yellow Dog Unleashed Baltimore r iots. T his s trike w ould s et t he t rend f or e mployer– union relations for years to come. Again the action was sparked by pay cuts, this time at the Pullman Palace Car Company. Pullman is a name that has become synonymous with traveling luxury. T ravel w as a s erious p roblem f or A mericans ea ger t o share in the wave of expansion after the Civil War. It took three and a h alf da ys t o t ravel f rom N ew York t o Ch icago b y ra il, a tortuous roundabout journey of thirteen hundred miles. The f rst sleeping c ars l acked p rivacy a nd h ygiene. P ullman’s i dea w as to i mprove t he sleeper a nd i ntroduce g reater levels of luxury t o make the journey more comfortable for the increasingly wealthy business people moving between the cities. Chicago i n t he m id-nineteenth century was a boo m t own. Its population h ad g rown f rom 350 a t t he da te o f its i ncorporation in 1833 to 334,000 by 1871, the year of the Great Fire that killed nearly three hundred people and left a t rail of devastation a m ile wide a nd n early f ve m iles i n l ength, e ngulf ng seventeen thousand buildings. Days a fter t he f re, t he g ritty spirit of Ch icago’s people was shining through. Wooden shacks sprang up to continue b usiness. O ne rea l-estate t rader p ut u p a s ign s aying “All Gone but Wife, Children and Energy.”8 In the space of three hundred w orking da ys s ome t hree t housand b rick a nd s tone b uildings had been erected, and in a f urther year Chicago had almost completely re-emerged from the ashes. By 1890 it was the United States’ second largest city, with one million people. George P ullman h ad be en t here i n t hose ea rly h eady da ys of e xpansion. H is f ather h ad a b usiness t hat m oved b uildings physically – t he w hole b uilding – f rom o ne p lace t o a nother. George P ullman c arried on t he work. He a lso s ecured big c ontracts to lift buildings in Chicago when the city council decided it needed to lay sewers and drainage pipes and pave over the roads. The job would mean raising the roads, and the adjoining houses and stores would have to be lifted too. In one of Pullman’s biggest j obs, h e ra ised M atteson H ouse, a c ity-center h otel, u sing 800 s crewjacks i n a c oordinated l ift.9 As t he j acks ra ised t he building the resulting cavity was packed with timber supports. When t he l ifting work came to a n end, P ullman looked elsewhere a nd mad e m oney f or a t ime r unning a h ardware a nd food store for prospectors in the gold rush of 1859. But the most

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The History of Work successful business was palace cars.10 He built them and he ran them, prof ting f rom t he s urcharge h e mad e o n t op of t he o rdinary fare that went to the railroad. Pullman crea ted m ore t han a b usiness. H e crea ted a t own of twelve thousand people just south of Chicago, dedicated entirely to t he c onstruction o f h is c ars. H e r uled h is t own, n amed a fter him, like a feudal landlord, the omnipotent industrialist who laid down the regulations governing the way his society would be run. According t o o ne e mployee, “ We a re bo rn i n a P ullman h ouse, fed f rom t he P ullman shops, t aught i n t he P ullman s chool, c atechized in the Pullman church, and when we die we shall go to Pullman Hell.”11 It f ollowed s imilar l ines t o – a lthough acc ording t o P ullman it w as n ot i nspired b y – t he B ritish m ill c ommunities o f N ew Lanark a nd S altaire. Li ke t he l eaders o f t hose c ommunities, Pullman was a committed Nonconformist. His father had been a Baptist, his mother a P resbyterian. Both parents had turned their backs on the hellf re preaching that emphasized the wrath of God and p laced t heir f aith i n a U niversalist be lief i n a l oving God . They were strict and conscientious Bible readers who taught their children a moral code gleaned straight from its pages. It stressed the i mportance o f h onesty, t hrift, f rugality, i ndustry, a nd u niversal salvation. It also taught charity. But St. Paul’s letter to the Corinthians did not appear to leave a d eep impression on young George Pullman. If charity indeed was the greatest of all virtues it be gan w here S ir T homas B rowne, t he s eventeenth-century Puritan writer, said it should begin: at home. George P ullman’s m orality b elonged w ith th e N ew E ngland radicals whose values were aligned with those expounded by John Dod and Henry Cleaver. Dod and Cleaver’s explanatory books on the B ible e spoused t he d uty o f v ocation a gainst t he s in o f i dleness.12 T he poo r, t hey a rgued, s hould as k t hemselves w hether their po verty w as t heir o wn f ault. T his w as P ullman’s a ttitude when later he was asked to be charitable toward his workers. Dod and Cl eaver h ad a rgued t hat s ervants s hould o bey t heir mas ters as if th ey, th e m asters, w ere th e gr eatest p rinces in th e w orld. Pullman, as o ne o f h is b iographies s uggested, w as “ The P alace Car P rince.”13 He lacked the sense of philanthropy that underlay the c ommunities o f N ew La nark a nd S altaire. H e mad e m oney

The Yellow Dog Unleashed out of h is townspeople at every t urn. He bought t he 4,300 acres of land on which building work started in 1880 for $800,000. By 1892 the land was valued at $5 million. He even prof ted from vegetables fertilized by the sewage from his workers’ homes.14 In t wo short years he h ad created what William Ca rwardine, the M ethodist m inister i n P ullman, w ould l ater d escribe as a “civilized re lic o f E uropean s erfdom.” P ullman a rranged wi th the nearby community of Hyde Park to take water from its reservoir. Hyde Park charged 4 ¢ for a t housand gallons; but Pullman charged h is te nants 1 0¢ f or a t housand g allons – o r $ 3,000 a m onth f or w ater t hat c ost h im $ 1,200.15 Hi s ann ual p rof t on water alone was $21,000. For gas he paid 33¢ per thousand cubic feet, b ut c harged h is te nants $ 2.25.16 H is h ouse re nts b rought in $ 500,000 a y ear, a n 8 pe rcent re turn o n h is i nvestment.17 Cheaper rents could be obtained in other towns, but anyone who moved out was more likely to lose his job. Preferment was given to P ullman res idents. T he sa me pract ice app lied to pro motion opportunities. The Reverend Carwardine knew one worker who, after d eductions f or re nts a nd o ther o verheads, re ceived a p aycheck of just 2¢. Pullman n ever c laimed a ny e lement o f p hilanthropy i n h is decision to create his model community. He was guided by ideas designed to prevent the breakdown of relations between labor and capital. Specif cally he was inf uenced by a V ictorian novel, Put Yourself in His Place, by Charles Reade, which he read over and over again. Reade wrote of the industrial squalor in Hillsborough, England, a t own, h e wr ote, w hich “i s poc k ma rked with p ublic houses a nd b ristles wi th h igh c himneys . . . s tuck a ll o ver t he place like cloves in an orange.”18 Reade wrote of the callous treatment of labor by employers so typical of Victorian English mill communities. In his stories the employees respond by organizing secret trade unions and terrorizing f actories a nd f ellow w orkers i n bo mb o utrages. P ullman read t he boo k f rst in 1872 on a voyage over to England. Five years later the story must have returned to haunt him during the rail strike of 1877 when thirteen people died in Chicago over four days o f r ioting. O ne o f R eade’s c haracters i s a be nevolent a nd learned doctor who urges the entrepreneurial inventor hero to put himself in the place of the worker, hence the book’s title.

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The History of Work According to R eade, app lying sci entif c pr inciples to pro duction could have a t hree-pronged effect – delivering higher prof ts to o wners, s afer a nd m ore p leasant c onditions f or t he w orker, and a n i mproved p roduct f or t he c ompany’s c ustomer. P ullman was convinced by the novel that the cooperation between capital and labor was to their mutual benef t. But how was he to set the working man on a path lit, as his had been, by the Protestant virtues of industry and thrift? Pullman’s idea was to take his workforce o ut of a n e nvironment “ pock ma rked with p ublic h ouses” and p lace t hem i n a c lean, o rdered c ommunity w here e veryone dressed respectably, everyone behaved respectably, and everyone knew and accepted their place in society. He e ven a pplied d iscretion i n h is re cruitment. J ob a pplicants were s et a wr itten e xamination a nd h ad t o d isclose pe rsonal details – w hether t hey w ere d ivorced o r i n d ebt, w hether t hey drank a lcohol or gambled – a nd explain why t hey had left t heir previous job. Pullman wanted a business staffed by model workers living model lives in his model community. Investors would have no problem with t he idea i f it i mpacted encouragingly on the bottom line, but they were suspicious of any hint of philanthropy. P ullman believed, t herefore, t hat returning a r easonable ra te o f p rof t f rom t he r unning o f t he c ommunity was vital in retaining the support of shareholders in the Pullman Palace Ca r C ompany. H e w as p ioneering a n i deal i n c orporate labor relations, and like many new ideas it did not meet with universal approval. I n t he hard-nosed t rading pits of t he New York Stock Exchange it was not u nusual for a t rader selling P ullman stock to shout “How much for f ower beds and fountains?”19 Pullman d efended t he p ark-like a tmosphere: “ With s uch s urroundings a nd s uch h uman regard for t he n eeds of t he bod y as well as t he s oul, t he d isturbing c onditions o f s trikes a nd o ther troubles t hat periodically convulse t he world of labor would not be found h ere,” h e a rgued. O utlining h is idea, h e s aid: “A ma n who c an b ring h is m ind d own t o u nderstand t he s implest b usiness p roposition c an fathom t he P ullman s cheme very easily. It is simplicity itself – we are landlord and employers. That is all there is of it.”20 T his i ndeed was t he nub of P ullman’s s cheme. But it would turn out that the role of landlord and employer created tensions that he had never envisaged. When he introduced

The Yellow Dog Unleashed a p iece-rate s ystem i n 1886, t he workers went o n s trike. I t was short-lived, associated, like other strikes at the time, with a claim for a n e ight-hour day. But it s erved n otice o n t he c ompany t hat there were potential f aws in Pullman’s social experiment. According t o P ullman’s own c ounsel, Judge A . O. L ochrane, “People imagine that the town of Pullman is a white elephant to the company . . . that eats up the earnings.”21 The perception was mistaken when business was good a nd employees were ea rning enough to pay t he h igher t han average rents. But when business faltered P ullman was l eft i n a d iff cult po sition. H is r ival f rms could s hut u p s hop a nd l ay o ff w orkers u ntil t imes i mproved. Continuity of labor was an ideal to which the see-sawing fortunes of those engaged in capitalist enterprise could not yet aspire. But Pullman needed continuity of labor to fund the community he had established. How else would rents be paid? How else would shopkeepers ma intain t heir b usinesses? H is w orries h ad be come those of the social entrepreneur responsible for a f ar larger family than h is own, w hile a t t he s ame t ime be ing re sponsible t o s hareholders who cared only for t he returns t hey could obtain on t heir capital. When the general economic depression of 1893 caught up with the company and business began to dry up, Pullman’s solution was to continue competing for what few orders there were, even if he was taking orders at a loss. To minimize the impact to the company shareholders he cut the wages of his craftsmen and laborers. This might have succeeded without industrial action, had he cut the wages of t heir supervisors a nd h is own i ncome accordingly. Another option was to tap the company’s substantial reserves. But management salaries and those of the directors were maintained and, in the event, the reserves allowed the company to defeat its striking w orkers. A f urther p roblem w as P ullman’s a loofness from his workforce. He lunched with his fellow tycoons, people like Ma rshall Fie ld, t he d epartment st ore owner, a t t he m illionaires’ t able i n t he d ining r oom o f t he Ch icago Cl ub. T he work ethic a nd t he p rof t motive were closely welded together in this society, and they were underpinned by the concerns of selfinterest. They did not lend themselves to personal sacrif ce or disinterested charity. Andrew Ca rnegie, t he S cottish-born ra ilroad p ioneer a nd s teel magnate was made in the same mold. Carnegie’s thinking ref ected

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The History of Work the work ethic coated with a veneer of capitalism. His career could have been plucked from the pages of a Horatio Alger novel. Alger wrote m ore t han a h undred boo ks f or bo ys, a ll wi th t he s ame theme of hardworking poor boy makes good. With titles like Fame and Fortune, Bound to Rise, and Up the L adder, their message of riches within the grasp of anyone prepared to graft was absorbed by millions of teenage American boys.22 While Carlyle had preached the gospel of work, Carnegie delivered h is pe rsonal Gospel o f Wealth,23 a rguing th at th e wealthy had a moral obligation to serve as stewards for society. This was Carnegie’s way of accommodating his great wealth with the idea of social responsibility. He didn’t believe in inherited wealth, and before he died in 1919 he distributed more than $350 million, the biggest part of his fortune, to good works, such as funding education, libraries, and hospitals. Everything he did, from building his business empire to distributing the spoils of his entrepreneurship, was g uided by a s olid c ommitment t o t he work e thic. His idea was to help the industrious, “the best and most aspiring poor,” not those who were “irreclaimably destitute, shiftless, and worthless.”24 Even in his philanthropy, Carnegie was a ma n who expected to get his own way. Carnegie ad mired P ullman, b ut bo th m en k new t hey w ould put one over each other if they could a nd delight in doing so. It was easy for them to believe that all people behaved in this way. If P ullman h ad m ixed with h is workforce, h ad s pent t ime with the families who lived in his town, he may have begun to appreciate their problems. He might have put himself in their place and found that their ideals were not so far removed from his own. But he had allowed his wealth to elevate his concerns beyond those of employees. To the rank-and-f le worker it seemed as if there was one law for the rich and another law for the poor. (Pullman, like many others of his rank, including Carnegie, had fought the Civil War by proxy, hiring a substitute to f ght for the Northern Union in his place.)25 He claimed to understand his workers when he built the town. He t old t he Cincinnati E nquirer t hat “ no q uestion w as m ore important t o A merican s ociety t han ( that o f t he) t aste, h ealth, cheapness o f l iving, a nd c omfort a mong t he a rtisan c lass.” However, his system of house rents denied them the opportunity

The Yellow Dog Unleashed to h ave a h ouse o f t heir o wn. H e s eemed t o ac knowledge t his when h e a nnounced p lans f or a n o wner-occupied c ommunity nearby, but they never materialized. Over f ve years, from 1888 to 1893, the wages paid to Pullman’s workers were in many cases cut by 30 percent.26 By the time the workers went on strike i n t he face of a w age cut i n 1894, ma ny had j oined t he re cently f ormed A merican Ra ilway U nion. T he union came u nder pressure to escalate t he action, a nd about six weeks i nto t he s trike i t c alled o n i ts 1 50,000 m embers t o bo ycott Pullman railcars. Since Pullman cars were present in almost every p assenger t rain i n t he ra il n etwork, t he ac tion t hreatened to spread across the industry, particularly since the rail company owners ra llied i nitially i n s upport o f P ullman. T he bo ycott b y other rail workers did not begin as a strike, but as each employee refused to handle a P ullman car he was d ischarged. Financially the i ndustrial ac tion w as a lways a l oser. I n 1893 P ullman w as capitalized a t $ 30 m illion, wi th $ 18 m illion i n c ash re serves. It h ad re turned d ividends of 9.5 pe rcent t o its s tockholders t hat year.27 A cr owd t urned o ut t o s ee t he f rst p assenger t rain t o l eave Chicago a fter t he bo ycott h ad be en c alled. T he t rain m oved out wi thout i ncident, as d id t he s econd a nd t hird t rains. B ut any h opes t hat t he ac tion h ad be en a bandoned were p remature. Within three hours, the network was frozen. By the fourth day of the boycott some twenty-nine railroads were tied up by the ban, losing s ome $ 250,000 a d ay.28 T he ra ilway c ompanies p ublicly supported Pullman but behind the scenes some were angered by his i ntransigence. O ne owner acc used h im o f l osing t ouch with his workers.29 American unions were only just beginning to f nd t heir f eet at t his t ime, e merging f rom a lliances o f cra ft i nterests, p roducer c ooperatives, a nd a d esire for mutual i nsurance. T he f rst American t rade u nion w as c alled, s omewhat r omantically, t he Knights of Labor. Formed in 1869, it later amalgamated with the American Federation of Labor led by Samuel Gompers. Neither of these unions could be described as rad ical. The Pullman boycott was led by the American Railway Union’s president, Eugene Debs, who was a nxious t o s top t he d ispute b reaking d own i nto anything resembling the unrest and rioting of 1877. The anarchist

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The History of Work bombing i n Ch icago’s H aymarket S quare i n 1886 – s parked b y unrest a t t he M cCormick H arvester C ompany – h ad s ent j itters through b usiness a nd g overnment a nd h ad n ot be en f orgotten. A bomb had been thrown at police as they tried to break up an evening meeting held to support demands for an eight-hour day. In t he c onfusion t hat f ollowed, e ight po licemen w ere m ortally wounded, some of them apparently shot by their own men, who f red indiscriminately into the crowd.30 An unknown number of protesters w ere a lso k illed. F our o f t he ra lly’s o rganizers w ere tried a nd e xecuted f or c onspiring t o o verthrow t he r ule o f l aw. Three others who were jailed were later pardoned when the governor decided their convictions had been unsafe. It was i n a c limate of nervousness a mong Ch icago’s business elite, t herefore, t hat t he P ullman workers went o n s trike. O rder was ma intained a t t he s tart o f t he d ispute, b ut r iots d id b reak out later. Three men were killed and seven injured when strikers damaged cars on the Baltimore and Ohio railroad. Another seven people were killed in Chicago. The s trike o f 1877 h ad be en p ut d own b y t he m ilitary. T he 1894 ac tion w as e nded b y t he c ourts. De bs w as s erved wi th a restraining in junction e ffectively p reventing h im f rom s ending out telegrams t o u nion activists a nd c oordinators. W hen he a nd other off cers continued to do so they were held to be in contempt and jailed. Without leadership, the action broke down. If t he P ullman w orkers t hought t hat t hey w ould be f orgiven they were wrong. George Pullman refused to reinstate the strikers, even t hough f amilies i n h is s o-called m odel c ommunity w ere beginning t o starve. John A ltgeld, t he governor of I llinois, who visited the community and saw how the families were suffering, urged Pullman to cancel house rents for the period of the strike. He po inted o ut t hat i t h ad c ost t he s tate $ 50,000 t o p rotect Pullman’s property during the dispute.31 Pullman was immovable. “I do not doubt there are many cases of need caused by the refusal of t he e mployees f or t wo-and-a-half m onths t o ea rn o ffered wages o f m ore t han $ 300,000,” h e w rote i n r eply.32 In o ther words, the plight of the workers and their families was their own fault. Every word was wrapped in Puritan philosophy. Work was a divine gift and those who refused it were sinners. Pullman said in h is n egotiations with t he workers t hat h e t hought of t hem as

The Yellow Dog Unleashed his children. It was a patronizing remark, ref ecting his own misguided self-aggrandizement. George P ullman, a ma n w ho A ndrew Ca rnegie d escribed as a “ typical A merican,”33 h as be en d emonized i n t he e yes o f t he American l abor m ovement a nd i n t he e yes o f ma ny o thers, b ut there w ere u nderstandable reas ons f or t he s tance h e t ook. H e headed a joint stock company. Any action that was not perceived to be i n t he i nterests of shareholders could lead to a po tentially damaging s ale o f s hares o r s tocks o n t he s tock ma rket. O n t he other h and t he c ompany w as p robably m ore re cession p roof than h e m aintained, in th at m uch o f its in come c ame f rom th e surcharge he levied on the ticket prices of other rail operators. In spite of his aloofness, in spite of the wage cuts, the strike might still have been averted had there remained any trust between managers a nd workers. I n t alks between a c ommittee of workers a nd Pullman, t he c ommittee h ad be en as sured t hat n one of its m embers would be victimized. But the next day three of the men were laid off. The layoffs appear to have been ordered at shop-f oor level by a f oreman who h ad no pe rsonal k nowledge of t he a greement. It looked quite different to the workers and was suff cient to spark a strike. Even then it was not like other strikes. There was no rampant m ob. T he w orkers p layed b aseball o n t he g reen, a lthough some mounted pickets in case the company should try to draft in strike-breaking l abor. O ne n ewspaper j ournalist wr ote: “P ullman is called a model town. It now has on its hands a model strike.”34 The s trike d id n ot s tay t hat w ay, a nd P ullman’s i deals w ere buried in the acrimonious dispute that conf rmed the investment community’s distrust of such social experiments. The workers h ad as ked for t heir p ay t o be re stored t o t he l evels of t hree years ea rlier o r f or t heir re nts t o be red uced. P ullman i nsisted that th ey c ould n ot lin k th eir h ouse t enancy a greements w ith their employment contracts. But the workers were right to do so, and he was wrong to see the issues separately. His original concept had linked living conditions with those of employment. How could he then insist they were divorced in negotiation? In fact they were more seriously intertwined than he cared to acknowledge. Without ea rnings, without other disposable assets, with s avings d epleted, a nd wi th cred it d enied t o t hem b y l ocal storekeepers, f amilies q uickly be gan t o g o h ungry. P ullman

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The History of Work did n ot t ry t o e nforce re nt a rrears o r e vict h is f amilies u ntil the s trike h ad e nded, b ut b y t hat t ime ma ny h ad d eserted t heir homes, l eaving t he c ommunity i n t heir h undreds t o f nd work elsewhere. The Pullman strike was a watershed in the relationship between capital a nd labor i n t he United States. With a f ew notable exceptions s uch as t he H ershey Ch ocolate C ompany, e stablished b y a Mennonite family, s ocial e ntrepreneurship would be vi ewed with suspicion a nd d ismissed by most i nvestors as a n onrunner. T here would be f ew o ther e xperiments i n c ompany-run c ommunities. The w orkers w ould be u nionized t o p rotect t heir i nterests a nd would c onduct t heir n egotiations wi th ma nagement i n a s pirit o f mistrust. Em ployees a nd t heir l abor w ould be re garded as c ost items, a s u nits o f pro duction t hat co uld b e i mproved a nd op erated in the same way as a machine. Pullman himself was so hated a f gure a t t he t ime of h is d eath i n 1897 t hat h is c off n was buried encased i n a t hick slab of c oncrete, lest a nyone should t ry t o desecrate his grave. The idea of a c ommunity of interest between capital a nd labor, of t he social enterprise, of mutuality, h ad be en abandoned in the burnt-out wreckage of Pullman’s railcars. Confrontations be tween u nionized m obs a nd e mployerrecruited t hugs o r P inkerton g uards be came c ommonplace.35 Industrial an archy h ad t errif ed e mployers s ince t he s o-called Molly Maguires, a secret society of Irish immigrant mine workers, had used terrorist tactics against mine owners in the Pennsylvania coalf elds f rom t he 1850s t o t he ea rly 1870s. T he wi dow M olly Maguire had ea rned a re putation in her native I reland for a rmed resistance to landlords and bailiffs. She is said to have carried pistols strapped to her thighs beneath her petticoat.36 Her followers, a ll I rish born Roman Catholics, were blamed for a s eries of assassinations o f m ine b osses i n t he A merican coa lf elds. The attacks ended when ten of the “Mollies” were tried and executed in 1875. T he fear of o rganized a rmed re sistance a mong workers meant that the criminal law of conspiracy was often used against striking l aborers. La ter, e mployers re sorted t o c ivil i njunctions, arguing that strikes were a restraint of trade. Finally, as employers consolidated their power after the turn of the century, they began to insist that newly recruited workers sign so-called “yellow-dog” contracts that forbade union membership.37

The Yellow Dog Unleashed A few employers made genuine efforts to understand the needs of manual workers. Whiting Williams, a vice president and director o f pe rsonnel f or t he H ydraulic P ressed S teel C ompany o f Cleveland, donned overalls and joined the ranks of working men for a while to experience their life at f rst hand. For seven months he worked in a variety of jobs – in steel mills, coal mines, a shipyard, an oil ref nery, and a railroad roundhouse. Williams noticed how a man’s job impacted on his social standing. He did not f nd much evidence that pay made a big difference to the way people worked. “B eyond a ce rtain po int,” h e d ecided, “ the i ncrease o f wages is quite likely to lessen as to increase effort.”38 Wi lliams believed t hat m oney, l ike work, c arried s ocial value. T he workers d rew t heir strength f rom a f eeling of togetherness, f rom t he “wish to enjoy t he feeling of our worth as pe rsons a mong other persons,” he wrote.39 But f or e very W hiting W illiams w ho t ook t he t rouble t o investigate s hop-f oor w orking c onditions t here w ere t housands who d id n ot. W hen i mprovements w ere mad e t hey c ould o ften be costed in lives. Nowhere was this more apparent than in the cramped working conditions of the garment factories in turn-ofthe-nineteenth-century N ew York. T he te n-story As ch b uilding on t he c orner o f G reene S treet a nd Washington P lace i n l ower Manhattan w as t ypical o f t hose t hat mad e t his a rea a nd t he adjoining SoHo d istrict t he i ndustrial center of t he c ity. Dozens of clothing businesses were interspersed among the Greene Street blocks. Cramped i nto t hese layers of i ndustry were hundreds of women working at long rows of sewing machines. Some f ve hundred women worked in the top three f oors of the Asch building at the Triangle Shirtwaist Company, run by Isaac Harris and Max Blanck. The air in the machine rooms was dense with tiny particles of cotton. Offcuts were strewn across the f oor. O ne s park was enough to send a f ash f re th rough this highly combustible atmosphere. When it happened on March 25, 1911, the f re spread so swiftly through the eighth and ninth f oors that many women were engulfed in f ames where they stood. Some ran to the door on t he n inth f oor, b ut i t h ad be en l ocked t o s top gi rls s tealing cloth, j ust as t he d oor h ad be en l ocked n early t wo h undred years ea rlier i n t he H uddersf eld m ill f re. T he i ssues w ere t he same – g reed, n eglect, ignorance. T here were elevator c ars, b ut

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The History of Work they were too small to handle the crush and broke down. Young women, their dresses on f re, hurled themselves from windows in the panic. The horror of this f re, which killed 146 people, led to large-scale reforms in American labor and safety laws. Reform rarely came from the top, but wealth was accumulated on such a scale amid this frenzy of nineteenth-century American expansion that some employers did f nd themselves wrestling with their c onsciences. A ndrew Ca rnegie, t he s teel b aron, d efended the r ight of e mployees t o o rganize i n u nions, d rawing, pe rhaps, on m emories o f h is f ather, a s truggling Ch artist w eaver be fore the family emigrated from Scotland. But when it came to workers s triking a t h is H omestead p lant i n 1892, h is ma nagers s ent a b arge f ull o f a rmed P inkerton g uards t o b reak t hrough t he picket lines. Seven civilians and three of the guards were killed. The t ragedy w as t hat t he P inkerton m en be longed t o t he s ame working c lass as t hose t hey f ought. Eac h ma n i n h is w ay w as trying t o ea rn a l iving. T his w as re cognized b y e mployers, b ut some betrayed no hint of conscience in their understanding of its implications. “I can hire one half of the working class to kill the other,” said Jay Gould, president of Western Union, the telegraph and railroad company.40 Men w ere prepa red to f ght f or t he r ight t o be re warded f or their skills. Their skills were precious, built up over many years, sometimes passed down from father to son. Employers might take away t heir j obs, b ut t hey c ouldn’t t ake t heir s kills. S urely n ot. The employers, however, had other ideas. Suppose t hey found a way to dispense with skills altogether? Suppose they could create a standardized worker? Maybe what was needed was the application of science.

CHAPTER 10

The Philadelphia Catechism The o nly s afeguard o f o rder a nd d iscipline i n t he m odern world is a standardized worker with interchangeable parts. That would solve the entire problem of management. (Jean Giraudoux, 1882–1944) Henry Dana, Jr. was a raw Harvard law graduate in 1834 when he walked up the gangplank of the Pilgrim, a b rigantine sailing out of Boston on the hazardous voyage around Cape Horn that would bring h im f ve m onths l ater t o Ca lifornia. D ana h ad j oined t he ship a s an ordinary s eaman i n an a ttempt t o r ecover his h ealth and e yesight. R eading t he l aw h ad be come i mpossible a fter a n attack of measles, a nd the doctor’s somewhat d rastic advice had been to spend some time at sea as a curative. Dana’s e xperience, re counted i n h is boo k, Two Y ears bef ore the Mast, is a c lassic account of on-the-job learning. Here was a young ma n, h is education h itherto relying on t he lecture t heater and t he te xtbook, s uddenly f nding h imself i n t he h arshest o f environments wi th n o o pportunity t o w alk a way. T here w as a new l anguage t o l earn be cause a bo at h as its own te rminology. There were the unusual working patterns of watches to maintain a t wenty-four-hour w ork re gime, a nd t here w as s easickness, a physical threshold that must be overcome if an individual is to be an effective sailor. He s oon d iscovered t hat t he o n-board work was u nremitting. He quotes what he calls the “Philadelphia Catechism”: Six days shalt thou labor and do all thou art able; And on the seventh, holystone the decks, and scrape the cable.1 Although D ana c omplains o f t he c onstant re petitiveness o f the s hipboard j obs, h is s ense o f p ride i n h is s eamanship, as h e f nds h is sea legs a nd g radually masters t he on-board t asks a nd 133

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The History of Work routines, is palpable, particularly when he compares the conf dent labors o f h is f ellow s eamen a nd h imself, f urling s ails i n h eavy seas, with the anxiety of the passengers. “I wi ll own,” he wrote, “there was a pleasant feeling of superiority in being able to walk the deck, and eat, and go aloft, and compare one’s self with two poor, m iserable, p ale crea tures, s taggering a nd s huff ing about decks or holding on and looking up with giddy heads, to see us climbing the mastheads, or sitting quietly at work on the ends of the lofty yards.”2 The curative worked for Dana. After two years he returned to Harvard a nd p ursued h is c hosen c areer as a p racticing l awyer. Forty years later a nother young ma n who was forced by failing eyesight t o t urn h is b ack o n a H arvard ed ucation m ight h ave sympathized wi th t he s hip p assengers, as h e f ound h imself t he butt of a s killed worker’s scorn. The eighteen-year-old Frederick Winslow T aylor w as a l iving e mbodiment o f t he P hiladelphia Catechism – h ardworking, ea ger t o l earn, a nd f ascinated b y detail. As a n apprentice to a s team pump ma ker in Philadelphia he was asked by a f oreman on joining t he company i f he k new “the r ule.” T he r ule was t he foot r ule used on t he shop f oor. It was a r ule with no numbers, only l ines engraved on its surface. The s killed w orkman c ould re late a m easurement i nstantly t o one o f t he l ines, j ust as a g ood f sherman wi ll te ll y ou a h ook size at a glance. Taylor did not know the rule. As Robert Kanigel points out in his biography of Taylor, The One Best Way, if he did not k now t he r ule, “so far as a ny s elf-respecting m echanic was concerned, he knew nothing.”3 Taylor was a ma n bo rn for h is t ime a nd for h is c ountry. T he United S tates h ad q uickly l earned t he s ecrets o f te xtile ma nufacture a nd a ll t he o ther te chnologies e merging i n E urope’s Industrial Revolution, but it was the processes developed midway through t he n ineteenth century t hat would power t he country to a position of world industrial leadership that it would occupy for the whole of the next century. No m ore th an a h andful o f Am erican c ompanies w ere r epresented i n B ritain’s G reat Ex hibition i n 1 851. B ut t hey mad e a s trong i mpression o n t he B ritish p ublic, w ho i n t he re ign o f Queen V ictoria w ere wi tnessing t he e xtension o f t heir e mpire across a t hird of the globe. T hat the upstart colonists across the

The Philadelphia Catechism Atlantic could invent as well as copy the innovation of others was o ne of t he s ensations of t he exhibition, d rawing p raise a nd admiration f rom t he British press. W hat t he press did not k now was t hat Britain was a bout t o h and over t he b aton of i ndustrial innovation a nd p roduction t o its c ousin on t he o ther side of t he ocean. T he t ransfer w as i nvisible a nd s eamless. B ritain w ould continue i n t he belief t hat its i ndustrial m ight was u nassailable, while t he A merican dynamo f zzed into life, creating an industrial giant so concerned with its own affairs that it could afford to look benignly, a lmost naively, at t he agitated nations of Europe, like Gulliver musing over the anxieties of the Lilliputians. Among t he G reat Ex hibition’s A merican c ontributions t here were Eras tus B . B igelow’s po wer c arpet l oom, A lfred H obbs’s locks p roduced b y D ay a nd N ewell, a nd t he s ewing mac hine invented by El ias H owe b ut p roduced by Is aac Singer, w ho h ad stolen Howe’s patent. Howe had to f ght in the courts for royalties, but i t w as S inger’s n ame, n ot H owe’s, t hat be came s ynonymous with a mac hine t hat would t ransform d omestic clothing pro duction. T here were S amuel C olt’s re peating p istols a nd t he S harps rif e of Robbins and Lawrence, and there was Cyrus McCormick’s grain rea per a nd El i W hitney’s c otton gi n. W hitney w as o ne of the most prominent industrial pioneers in the use of interchangeable parts, securing a contract from the American government as ea rly as 1 798 for t he s upply of muskets. But W hitney’s ea rliest at tempts at i nterchangeability w ere o nly pa rtially s uccessful. The p rocess was re f ned a nd i mproved by C olt, w hose g un f actory a t H artford, C onnecticut, w as f tted w ith f our h undred machines p roducing s ome t wenty-four t housand p istols pe r y ear by the 1850s.4 The Great Exhibition was held in the Crystal Place, a huge edif ce of steel and glass covering eighteen acres of London’s Hyde Park. Among the exhibits was the f nest wrought ironwork from the I ronbridge foundry. But t he D arbys’ i ronwork, as w ondrous as it may h ave be en, would be o bsolete as a c onstruction p roduct within four years, a fter a n engineer called Henry Bessemer, working in the Yorkshire city of Sheff eld, perfected a process for making hardened steel.5 The s ecrets o f f ne s teelmaking h ad be en k nown t o t he Japanese for hundreds of years, but t he Japanese manufacturers

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The History of Work concentrated their methods on sword production. It was a long and laborious process i n which d ifferent qualities of steel were hammered t ogether a nd t reated i n s uch a w ay t hat t he s word ma intained a hard cutting edge, combined with f exibility and durability. This artisan construction of a Samurai sword, immersed in tradition and spirituality, was far removed from the mass production of steel in a s ociety that had launched itself headlong into industrial development. The m ost i mportant as pect o f t he B essemer p rocess i s t hat it w as c heap – l ike A braham D arby’s w ay o f ma king c ooking pots – a nd could handle steel i n bulk. Bessemer had found t hat blasting a ir t hrough m olten pig i ron c ould burn off m ost of t he carbon. C ontrolling t he a ir blow a llowed a m easurable q uantity of carbon to remain in place, inf uencing the quality of the steel. Too much carbon and the metal was brittle, while burning off all the carbon – as Abraham Darby II had discovered – could, if the metal w as re heated a nd bea ten w hen h ot, p roduce a ma lleable wrought iron. Bessemer’s d evelopment was just o ne of a s eries of i mprovements i n steel ma nufacture within t he space of a f ew years t hat made bu lk st eel p roduction i ncreasingly e conomical a nd m uch easier to control. The open hearth method of production devised by F riedrich a nd W illiam S iemens i n B ritain a nd P ierre a nd Emile M artin i n F rance, a nd t he d evelopment o f B ritish-born Robert M ushet’s ma nganese a nd t ungsten s teels, b rought t he steelmaking process under precision control. These d evelopments c ould n ot h ave be en be tter t imed f or American expansion. As t he C olt a nd t he W inchester, d eployed with m urderous ca llousness, he lped t o ob literate t he hu ntergathering w ay o f l ife t hat h ad e xisted o n t he G reat P lains f or thousands o f y ears, t he ra ilroads p ushed w estwards, t heir progress swiftened by the new hardwearing steel rails. Steel barons like Andrew Carnegie would accumulate personal wealth on a scale unsurpassed in the twentieth century. Just as textiles became a transformational industry when Richard Arkwright and his contemporaries mastered the mechanics and organization of the factory system in yarn spinning, steel had become the i ndustry t o be i n w hen F rederick W inslow Taylor m oved h is apprenticeship to the Midvale steel works on the industrial outskirts

The Philadelphia Catechism of Philadelphia in 1878. In doing so he was joining one of the technological p ioneers o f h is t ime. T he c ompany h ad c ome i nto t he ownership of William Sellers, whose machine tools had dominated Machinery Hall in the Philadelphia Centennial Exhibition of 1876. Sellers was the epitome of the Philadelphia Protestant, with an austere, functional approach to production. In Frederick Taylor he could not have found a better lieutenant. Taylor’s father was a Quaker. His mother could trace her roots to a Puritan émigré who came over to Plymouth in 1629. Few Americans could be more imbued with the Protestant work ethic than Fred Taylor, described by one observer as a “whale of a New England conscience.”6 He neither smoked nor drank and he avoided coffee and tea, which he regarded as u nnecessary stimulants. Midvale workers were paid by piece rate. The more work they completed, the faster they earned, in theory. In practice, however, the piece ra te system was a bused on both sides. W hen t he men began t o ea rn t oo m uch, i n t he o pinion o f t he e mployer, t heir rate w ould be c ut. S o, as o ften as n ot, t he m en w orked wi thin themselves knowing it would not prof t them to work any harder. This p ractice w as k nown as “ soldiering,” a te rm u sed b y n aval ratings i n re cognition o f t he e xemptions f rom c hores a llowed their soldier passengers. The idea was to look as if you were busy while actually doing very little. Taylor noticed that workers were devoting tim e, expertise, even th eir intellectual a bilities, t oward achieving this aim. He should not have been so surprised. Pacing yourself in the workplace has an ancestry even older than that of the Protestant work ethic and the capitalist ideal. Many industries accepted that peo ple l iked t o w ork wi thin t hemselves. P ractices s uch as “Saint M onday” w hen workers d id l ittle work, i f t hey bo thered to show up at all, were commonplace. Men would work in bursts, then rest a l ittle or have a b reak for d rinking a nd conversation.7 Work was still seen as a f orm of subsistence for those involved, rather than an acceleration of economic output in pursuit of everhigher production levels and ever-higher prof ts for someone else. Soldiering might have been frowned upon, but it was accepted by many employers. However, t he s oldiering c ulture was a lien t o Taylor’s p sychological make-up. He determined to end the practice when he was

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The History of Work given some responsibility over fellow machinists in the Midvale tire-making shops, where steel tires for trains were made. These were m etal c asings f tted a round th e w heel s o th at w hen th ey wore o ut t hey c ould be re placed wi thout a ny n eed t o c hange the w hole w heel. T aylor f red peo ple w ho w ouldn’t w ork h ard enough, but t heir replacements adopted t he same easy pace. He threatened to cut pay rates, which only increased resentment, and when he speeded up machines some resorted to sabotage in order to slow them down again. Finally he imposed f nes o n t hose whose machines broke down. Taylor’s concern for an individual’s output was already bordering on obsession, but this was only the start. The biggest obstacle to h is attempts at ma nagement was h is lack of technical k nowledge, h is i nability t o c ontradict a n as surance by t he “old h and” that a n i dea w ould n ot w ork. T he o nly w ay t o o vercome t his obstacle was to understand the metalworking process more intricately than those he was trying to manage. Taylor decided that the solution was to concentrate on the tool. Machinery doesn’t answer back. S ellers a greed t o Taylor’s re quest t o c arry o ut a s eries o f experiments on cutting t ools. T he experiments were u ndertaken with scientif c r igor, ad opting c ontrols a nd avoiding t he k ind of assumptions and bias that can occur when searching for evidence to reinforce a particular theory. He not only found the most eff cient way of cutting metal but was able to support this with measurements and the essential calibrations t hat c ould be p assed o n t o u nskilled mac hinists. T his broke the cabal. No longer could a skilled engineer pride himself on k nowledge a nd a bility t hat h ad be en h oned o ver a l ifetime. Machining had been standardized. Unlike the machines that had wiped out the skills of the English shearers, Taylor’s discoveries had no physical embodiment that could be s mashed with a l arge hammer. His ideas were beginning to concentrate on method, on process – a way of working that could surpass all others. If Taylor was aware of the psychological damage he was inf icting a mong t he a rtisan w orkforce o f M idvale i t i s n ot a pparent in h is lectures o r p apers. But h is l ifestyle d id not i nclude much capacity for ref ection on such matters. He worked hard and studied hard six days a week, and on the seventh day he played hard. His da ily re gime w as t o r ise a t 5 a. m., w ork a t M idvale f rom

The Philadelphia Catechism 7 a. m. t o 5 p .m., w alk h ome, h ave d inner, s tudy u ntil 11 p .m., then go for a r un before sleeping for about f ve hours. This was a ma n i n a h urry, n ot s omeone w ho c ould eas ily acc ommodate the i dea o f s edentary re laxation. H is b usy r outine s till a llowed him suff cient time for playing tennis to a level that enabled him and h is m ore t alented d oubles p artner, Cl arence Cl ark, t o wi n the inaugural national championship of the newly formed United States Lawn Tennis Association in 1881. During his earliest days as a f oreman in 1880 he began making observations on the timing of jobs in his “Book Containing Notes of I mportance.”8 This was an important feature for anyone in his position w hen f xing p iece ra tes f or j obs. T he i dea o f re cording worktimes i n a f ar more detailed way g rew during t he next year, as h e be gan t o t ransfer t he p rinciples o f m easuring a mac hine’s capabilities t o m easuring h uman c apability. H e u sed t he s ame measurements – f oot-pounds pe r m inute, ad opted by James Watt when measuring the horsepower of his steam engines. Taylor’s f rst measurements on two workers asked to work at their full capacity on a variety of tasks for double pay produced inconsistent f ndings. Some jobs were performed far more eff ciently than others. The experiments were abandoned for a time, but in 1883 Taylor decided to take an even more detailed approach, timing specif c elements of a task. This idea of breaking down work into its component parts is at the core of scientif c management. Taylor understood t hat t he c omponent t imes c ould be ad ded t ogether t o f x piece rates for many different jobs. But Henry Ford, the car maker, and h is tea m o f e ngineers rea lized t hat t hese “ component j obs” could be j obs in themselves, and thus the turning of a s crew on a moving assembly line could be an individual’s sole job. It was this combination of a simplif cation of tasks, through work study, with moving assembly that created a ma nufacturing revolution while at the same time laying waste human potential on a massive scale. Taylor w as n ot t he f rst to co nsider sci entif c m ethod in th e study of work. Baron Charles Dupin, the founder of several French mechanics’ institutes – educational schools for workers that began to spring up in the United States, Britain, and France during the 1820s – had h ighlighted t he n eed for work s tudy i n 1829. “ We h ave be en very much occupied in perfecting the machines and the tools which the worker uses in the economic arts. We have hardly attempted

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The History of Work to i mprove t he w orker himself,” h e wr ote. 9 I n t he mac hinery o f production, s aid Du pin, t he w orker w as i n t he f rst ra nk, “ since he h as t he i mmeasurable ad vantage o f be ing a n i nstrument w ho observes a nd c orrects h imself, a s elf-stopping m otor w hich f unctions with the motivation of its own intelligence and which perfects itself by thinking not less than by work itself.”10 Dupin was introducing two concepts, both of which had profound consequences for manufacturing businesses and the people who worked in them. The f rst of these concepts was the worker as a n automaton, the worker as a h uman mac hine; t he s econd was t he a pplication of s cientif c study to the functions of work. It i s n ot k nown w hether T aylor w as f amiliar wi th Du pin’s observations, b ut t he i deas c ould po ssibly h ave f ltered through to h im f rom P hiladelphia’s F ranklin I nstitute, w here W illiam Sellers, the head of Midvale, had served as president, or he may h ave be en d rawn t o t he m ethods i ndependently. T here i s a re markable s imilarity i n t hinking be tween Taylor a nd Du pin. Improving the worker was central to Taylor’s philosophy, and the idea that the worker could run almost like clockwork was apparent in Taylor’s approach. In f act c lockwork w as a n e ssential c omponent o f T aylor’s research. H is p rincipal te chnique o f t aking p recision t imings had only be come te chnically possible i n t he n ineteenth century. Although pocket watches have been dated back to the ea rly sixteenth century, it was not until the eighteenth century that manufacturers be gan t o e xperiment wi th ma king s topwatches.11 Th e earliest s topwatches u sed a l ever t hat s topped t he s econd h and. They could not count elapsed time of any greater duration than a minute and did not have a reset device to bring the hand back to zero. It was not u ntil 1842 t hat t he Swiss watchmaker, Adolphe Nicole, p atented a re set s ystem. T he m ore wi dely u sed t hreepress button system was patented in 1862.12 So when Fred Taylor began to make stopwatch timings of work at Midvale in 1881, he was taking advantage of the latest technology. When h e p assed o n h is ideas t o o thers h e h ad t o explain t he workings of the stopwatch and how to use it, such was its novelty. In advising one of h is c ollaborators, Sanford T hompson, on t he choice of a s topwatch i n 1895, he describes t he watch i n detail, although h e h imself w as s till q uite v ague a bout i ts w orkings.13

The Philadelphia Catechism The t iming of work was so d istrusted t hat T hompson devised a way of concealing watches i n a boo k so t hat t hey would not be noticed by people engaged in their work. The book concealment is displayed in a diagram in Shop Management, the 1903 work in which Taylor f rst outlined his methods.14 Midvale w orkers c omplained t hat T aylor’s i deas p ut t heir nerves on edge, making many of them irritable. Taylorism had increased stress in the workplace way before anyone came to use this t erm. Taylor t old th e workmen s quarely th at th ey were n ot being employed to use their brains. “I have you for your strength and mechanical ability, and we have other men paid for thinking,” he t old C harles S hartle, o ne o f t he e ngineers.15 S hartle n ever accepted this argument and in time found personal success as an inventor and manufacturer. Shartle would never f t the mold of Taylor’s perfect workman. Only w hen T aylor’s i deas w ere a ttracting t he i nterest o f o ther manufacturers d id h e f nd h is i deal w orkman i n H enry N oll. Noll w as s een as t he m odel l aborer. H e ma y h ave be en t he most i mportant l aborer w ho e ver l ived, t hanks t o t he S panish– American War that in the winter of 1899 led to rising prices for pig i ron. Bethlehem Steel Works, Noll’s employer, had a gl ut of the stuff. Some eighty thousand tons of it were stockpiled in a yard at t he company’s sprawling site in South Bethlehem, about f fty miles north of Philadelphia. The time was ripe to sell. A te n-thousand-ton b atch w as q uickly s old, a nd F rederick Taylor assumed the job of working out the best way of shifting it. Each “pig” or iron bar, just less than a yard in length, weighed ninety-two po unds. L oading t he p igs o nto ra ilroad f reight c ars was b ackbreaking w ork. B ut B ethlehem h ad e ngaged T aylor as a c onsultant to achieve for t he company t he k ind of eff ciencies h e h ad crea ted a t M idvale. Taylor as signed t wo ma nagers, James Gillespie and Hartley Wolle, to help f x a piece rate for the job, based on an estimation of the time necessary to do the work. The s eventy-f ve laborers in the pig-iron gang were working as well as h andlers i n a ny c ompany. Eac h ma n w as da ily l oading about twelve and a h alf tons of pig iron onto freight cars. Taylor believed they were capable of loading much more than that. Stopwatch t imings w ere c arried o ut o n a g roup o f t welve workmen, h andpicked f rom t he p ig-iron g ang. S ometimes t he

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The History of Work men were asked to work steadily, and sometimes they were urged to w ork f at o ut for s hort pe riods. F lat o ut, o ne g roup l oaded a car – s ixteen and a h alf tons of iron – i n fourteen minutes. This worked o ut t o s eventy-one t ons pe r ma n pe r day, b ut it d id n ot allow for rest periods.16 T here was l ittle science i n t he a rbitrary way t hat Gi llespie a nd Wolle d ecided t he m en w ere c apable o f loading s eventy-f ve t ons a da y, i f p ushed. T he ma nagers t hen installed a 40 pe rcent allowance for resting, so that a da ily level of forty-f ve tons per man was deemed achievable. It was guesswork, but Taylor made no objection. This was t he f gure Taylor used to set t he piece rate of 3.75¢ per t on. A nyone ac hieving t he f orty-f ve-ton t arget w ould ea rn $1.69, 50 percent more than most Bethlehem laborers received for a day’s work. But there was a b ig drawback. Under the new system the average work rates achieved before the study would earn less than 50¢ a day. The men were onto a loser and they knew it. To achieve the target they would need to lift a n inety-two-pound iron bar and carry it up a plank into the car every thirty seconds – eleven h undred t imes a da y.17 I t w as a r idiculous e xpectation. When ten of them were picked to work under the new rate they refused, so Taylor f red them. A number of concessions were made. Even so, the few loaders engaged to do the work rarely maintained the punishing rate for more than a day. Invariably they would fail to show up for work after more than a da y or two. There was one exception – H enry Noll f rom t he P ennsylvania Du tch c ommunity. F or da y a fter day he met the target, thus, in Taylor’s eyes, vindicating the chosen ra te. N oll was n ot feted, s imply c ited, i n Taylor’s s peeches, and even t hen n ot by h is rea l n ame, b ut as t he f ctional worker “Schmidt.” Schmidt was t he a rchetypal laborer, a u nit of p roduction t hat could be m easured, regulated, systemized, a nd i ncentivized. He was the only worker to see the loading job through and averaged between $1.35 and $1.70 a da y, not quite the f gure proposed by Taylor but not far off. Schmidt was never represented by Taylor as anything more than a l aborer and then only as a “ mentally sluggish type.” Henry Noll, on the other hand, was just a man, doing his best, sometimes excelling himself, while building his house in his spare time on a small plot close to the mill, and at other times

The Philadelphia Catechism falling into drink.18 But it was Schmidt, not Noll, who excited the new Taylorist breed of management. Scientif c ma nagement h ad changed t he ma nufacturing workplace f or g ood. T he t rade-off f or acce pting s uch m echanized working conditions was the better pay rates that could be offered from t he s avings i n p roduction c osts. T aylor s uggested t hat a worker needed to be offered a rise of a least 30 percent to accept this c ontrolled f orm o f w orking, in w hich th e in dividual s uppressed h is normal working rhythms, adopting i nstead t he r igid practices laid down by a ma nager u nder t he principles of scientif c management. But j ust h ow re volutionary w as t his s cientif c management? The m ilitary w ould n ot h ave f ound i t s o f ar re moved f rom t he types of drill that had been in existence since Roman times, when rigid discipline and close-order maneuvering so often gave armies a decisive advantage. T he best-drilled crews i n a ma n-of-war of the Napoleonic era were timed and worked until they carried out their actions like automatons. Equally the movements of loading and f ring a musket were well understood and had been practiced to perfection by infantrymen since the sixteenth century. Neither w as t he b reakdown o f w ork i nto s pecif c t asks o n a kind of assembly line particularly new. A division of labor in this way was n oted by D ante a nd M arco P olo w hen t hey witnessed the c onstruction a nd f tting o ut o f w arships in Venice in 1 260. Each galley was towed down a canal between rows of windowed buildings. Workers stood at the windows handing out equipment and supplies as the vessel moved past. Pero Tafur, who described the process in his book, Travels and Adventures, said: “I k now not how to describe what I s aw there, whether in the manner of its construction or in the management of the work people.”19 Not until the giant US program for the production of Liberty ships in the Second World War, when production lines ran a mile to the slipways, was there anything to match this p rocess i n s ophistication. I t i s a p ity t hat T afur c ould n ot have created a handy label like “f ow line” or “assembly line production.” Had he done so, the penny might have dropped sooner among other manufacturers. If t he pe nny h adn’t d ropped, t he p in h ad ce rtainly d one s o for A dam S mith, w ho d emonstrated t hat h e w as f amiliar wi th

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The History of Work the d ivision o f l abor i n ma nufacturing w hen, i n The Wealth of Nations i n 1746, h e d escribed t he way t hat p ins were p roduced in N ottingham u sing a bout e ighteen d ifferent o perations. S mith understood t he i mplications for mas s p roduction i n t he p rocess. One workman, he wrote, would struggle to make one pin a da y, but a g roup of ten workmen, dividing the task into separate and distinct j obs, c ould ma ke a mong t hem m ore t han f orty-eight thousand pins in a day. Pins were not the only products to involve a d ivision of labor in t heir ma nufacture. H atters w ould s tand a round a n oc tagonal bench, each engaged on one of t he d ifferent jobs – w etting, rolling, pressing, r uff ng, a nd blacking – t hat went i nto working the steamed felt in hat making.20 Button manufacture, which saw an u psurge in d emand d uring th e e ighteenth c entury w ith th e demise in fashion of the buckle, was another example. According to Lord Shelburne, describing the Birmingham toy trades in 1766: “There a button passes through f fty hands, and each hand passes perhaps a thousand in a day.”21 The ma nufacture of buttons a nd pins seemed to lend itself to these arrangements. There was a mas s demand for such objects, so any business that could churn them out in large quantities was going to have a c ompetitive advantage. It was a lso i mportant to make and sell such utilitarian products cheaply, so the economy of scale was vital to the success of the industry. Time and again with i nnovation, c heapness h as be en a vi tal c onstituent o f t he enterprise. I nventors s ometimes w ail a t t he w ay t heir i deas a re exploited b y o thers, w hile f ailing t o u nderstand t hat t heir i dea is o nly a s tep i n t he p rocess. It m ight n ot even be d escribed as the f rst step, because t he f rst step is t he recognition of a n eed. The Victorians were masters at producing inventions that nobody wanted because, too often, they failed to understand this f rst step. J ohn H arrison’s s uperb n autical c locks w ould n ever h ave been mad e wi thout t he B ritish P arliament s tressing t he i mportance o f f nding l ongitude a nd re inforcing t his d esire p ublicly with the offer of a lucrative reward. Smith re cognized t he i mportance o f a “ need” t o t he s uccess of any enterprise. A sixteenth-century proverb held that necessity was t he m other o f i nvention. B ut S mith w ent f arther, s uggesting that it was possible to create a need, to create demand where

The Philadelphia Catechism none had existed previously. This was a signif cant feature in the success of Henry Ford’s approach to manufacturing. He made his cars e ff ciently, he made them cheaply, and he made a product that had be come a ffordable to large numbers of people be cause the e ff ciencies h e ac hieved a llowed h im t o p ay h is p roduction workers far better than any others. The wage packet of Ford workers alone would not have been suff cient to support volume car production. But the knock-on effect of these higher pay rates throughout other industries raised the overall wealth of t he g rowing mas s of peo ple working i n t he factory system. T he s o-called “w orking c lasses” h ad be en s upplied wi th the most important ingredient of consumerism – m oney to spare, or what economists prefer to call “disposable income,” as if it was created to fritter away. (Some would argue that this is exactly what should happen to it in order to fuel the market economy.) The consumer society had been born. Singer was supplying it with sewing machines and Ford was supplying it with his ubiquitous Model T.

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Modern Times The working m en h ave be en e xploited a ll t he w ay u p a nd down the line by employers, landlords, everybody. (Henry Ford, 1863–1947) In 1 909 a f ully e quipped M odel T F ord t ourer c ost $ 950. I n 1914 it cost $490, and in 1916 it cost $360. The earliest of these cars were produced by tea ms of assembly workers putting t hem together in one spot. In that f rst year the company made 13,840 cars. In 1914, when the car had begun to move along an assembly line, Ford made 230,788, and in 1916 it made 585,388. In seven years the motorcar had come of age. So had the conveyorbelt system of production that would be lampooned so effectively by Ch arlie Ch aplin i n t he o pening s equences o f h is 1 936 f lm Modern Times. The f rst M odel T s, mad e b y s tationary as sembly, w ere p ut together at the company’s Piquette Avenue Plant in Detroit. Output increased and costs began to fall when Ford expanded into a n ew plant a t H ighland P ark, b ut p roduction w as s till l abor-intensive, until F ord’s e ngineers be gan t o e xperiment wi th a c onveyor-belt system. T he i dea w as t o k eep t he w orkers i n p lace a nd l et t he machinery do the moving. William Klann, one of Ford’s engineers, had seen something similar in the Chicago meat-packing business, where w hole c arcasses h ung f rom a m oving l ine w ere p rogressively butchered as t hey were moved along. “If they can k ill pigs and cows that way, we can build cars that way,” said Klann.1 A m oving as sembly l ine w as i nstalled i n t he ma gneto d epartment of H ighland Park in the spring of 1913. A ma n would d raw a c omponent o ut o f a b in, ad d i t t o t he ma gneto, t hen s lide t he magneto along a waist-high shelf to a man at his side who added a different component. W here previously workmen had been familiar wi th t he w hole t wenty-nine-component as sembly, n ow eac h man’s personal involvement was limited to one or two stages of the 146

Modern Times assembly. Workers could learn these simple tasks quickly and could rapidly be come h ighly ad ept a t c arrying t hem o ut. T he j ob h ad become less skilled and could be done in a shorter space of time. Previously i t h ad t aken a bout f fteen m inutes t o p ut t ogether a ma gneto. T he n ew m ethod red uced t he as sembly t ime b y almost two minutes. Average production time fell farther when a motor-driven conveyor belt began to move the magnetos past the workers a t a s et p ace. W ith ref nements t o t he d ivision of l abor the a verage as sembly t ime w as b rought d own t o f ve minutes, a t hird of t he o riginal t ime. T he i mplications for s taff ng levels were obvious. Soon conveyor belts were moving throughout these sub-assembly d epartments. T he n atural n ext s tep w as t o i ntroduce the system to the whole chassis. The f rst moving chassis was wi nched slowly across t he f oor by rope, a tea m of six assemblers keeping pace with it and picking t heir p arts f rom b ins p laced a long i ts r oute. T he chassis assembly time fell from twelve and a h alf man-hours before the installation o f t he wi nch t o f ve h ours a nd f fty m inutes, a nd the time fell even more when workers were asked to stay in one position as t he chassis approached them at waist height. Taylor’s idea of breaking a task down and timing each element of the task was pursued to extremes by Ford engineers.2 T he fastening of a nut a nd bo lt m ight be u ndertaken b y t hree d ifferent w orkers – one to put in the bolt, one to put on the nut and one to tighten the nut on t he bolt. I n t his way t he average t ime needed t o ma ke a chassis fell to ninety-three minutes. In 1911–1912 some 78,440 Model Ts were made by 6,867 workers. In 1 912–13 a w orkforce t hat h ad d oubled p roduced d ouble t he number o f c ars. B ut t he ra tio o f n ew c ars t o workers would f all dramatically t he f ollowing y ear, w hen t he m oving as sembly l ine was i ntroduced. P roduction d oubled a gain, b ut t he s ize o f t he workforce did not increase. In fact it fell from 14,336 employees to 12,880. This was the year that a new car could be bought for under $500 for the f rst time. For t he worker t he c hange was i ncalculable. At work h e was rooted to the spot, but outside work he and his family could move around at forty miles per hour in their new Model T. They could live outside town if they felt like it, free from the necessity to live in rows of worker housing close by the factory. But such freedom

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The History of Work was illusory. The employee came to work at a set time, he worked to a set pace that could be increased at the employer’s will, and if he thought at all while working, it was of other things, far beyond the workplace. Some have sought to differentiate Fordism from Taylorism.3 David Hounshell, a h istorian of mass production, says t hat Taylorism was t rying to improve the eff ciency of workers, whereas Fordism was t rying to eliminate labor, where it could, by using machines. “ Workers f ed a nd te nded t he F ord mac hines. F or Taylor t he w orkers w ere t he mac hines,” h e wr ote.4 Ei ther w ay these s ystems, working i n u nison, a mounted t o a gh astly s ublimation of the human spirit. That people could take pride in such an “ achievement” o nly c onf rms t he w ay m oral p riorities w ere distorted by competitive industrialism. No wonder that these systems created distaste among intellectuals. Henry Ford d id n ot s ee t hings t his way. H e was t he e mancipator, t he vi sionary w ho h ad s een t he c ar as a p roduct f or t he masses, n ot j ust f or t he r ich. Ot her c armakers w ere po sitioning t heir m odels u pmarket. Ra nsom E . Olds, who h ad s old f ve thousand of his popular “Merry Oldsmobiles” in 1903, had been forced b y h is b ackers t o s teer a way f rom t he mas s ma rket a nd pitch h is models at the same wealthy people who bought Henry Leland’s Cad illacs. Ford, however, was convinced t hat t he mass market co uld b e breac hed i f pro duction cos ts co uld b e re duced suff ciently to make an affordable car. His $600 Model N of 1906 had shown that it was possible to make a strong and powerful car delivering better value than other makes. The c ar h elped p ush F ord p rof ts a bove $ 1 m illion i n 1 907, creating f nance f or t he e xperimentation a nd d evelopment t hat would make the Model T n ot only a c ar that was inexpensive to buy, but one t hat was packed with i nnovative features. T he four cylinder engine had the upright cylinder conf guration pioneered in the Model A. But in the Model T, this robust little engine had been r ef ned with a c ylinder h ousing t hat c ould be s plit i n t wo, creating a re movable cylinder head, a llowing easy access to t he internal moving parts. Ford w as a lways t he e ngineer, n ever h appier t han w hen h e was in the workshop, tinkering alongside able assistants like the engineer, H arold W illis, w ho h elped h im d evelop t he v ertical

Modern Times cylinder engine. He left the sales and cash f ow side of the business in t hose ea rly days t o James C ouzens, a f ormer c oal yard clerk whose bookkeeper’s discipline was essential in keeping the business on an even keel. It may well have been Ford’s engineering obsession that blinded him to the dehumanizing aspect of assembly line work. Ford s aw h imself as a w orker-entrepreneur who h ad founded his b usiness o n h is o wn a bilities. T here i s s ome t ruth i n t his, but h is f rst job, l ike t hat of Taylor, was secured t hrough family connections, a b iographical d etail t hat F ord l ater t ried t o h ide.5 Neither T aylor n or F ord po ssessed s uff cient personal humility for m utual re cognition. Taylor h ad gi ven a f our-hour s peech i n Detroit to the management of the Packard company in 1909 heralding a f ashion for work s tudy i n f actories acr oss t he c ity, b ut Henry F ord was l oath t o give Taylor a ny cred it for t he m oving assembly line. In fact he disclaimed “any dependence on scientif c ma nagement,” according to one of h is engineers.6 But Ford would s ay t hat. H e w as a n e goist, l ike T aylor. B esides, t here was always the risk that admitting to have borrowed an idea might land a business with a royalties suit. It would be absurd to believe that Ford engineers did not exploit the ideas of scientif c management. T he a pplication o f s topwatch t imings t o as sembly work was in widespread use at t he time.7 One of the Ford engineers later conf rmed t hat t ime-and-motion st udy was employed in establishing the assembly lines at Highland Park.8 Eve rybody was doing it. Taylor s eemed equally unwilling t o give much cr edit t o Ford, referring o n o ne occ asion t o h is “ cheaply a nd r oughly mad e cars.”9 And yet, in spite of their apparent indifference toward each other, the two men were so alike. Ford did not share the Puritan/ Quaker b ackground o f T aylor, a nd T aylor d id n ot s hare F ord’s notorious a nti-Semitism; b ut F ord w as f rom s trong s outhernIrish P rotestant s tock, a nd h is f amily s hared t he s ame v alues and the moralistic education that molded Taylor. As a y oungster, Ford, like most American children of his era, had been reared at school o n “M cGuffey R eaders.” T he boo ks o f W illiam H olmes McGuffey w ere a “ reminder t hat t his w as a n ation f ounded b y Puritans,” according to Robert Lacey in his book, Ford: The Men and the Machine, a history of the company. “Filled with dramatic

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The History of Work illustrations and simple moral tales in which bad boys came to bad ends and good boys ended up president, they were used by schools in practically all thirty-seven states in the 1870s,” he writes.10 Whether you were Henry Ford or a wre nch-wielder at the end of t he l ine, i f you were a s econd- or t hird-generation A merican citizen i n t he 1 900s, t he c hances w ere t hat y ou w ere f amiliar with M cGuffeyland. H ow well t hese ideals c orresponded t o t he work d isciplines e xpected u nder t he u nsanctif ed m arriage o f Taylor and Ford is diff cult to judge, but workmen came and went in their droves during that f rst year of assembly line production at H ighland Park. Its labor t urnover ra n at 380 percent i n 1913, exceeding 900 percent toward the year-end, forcing the company to re cruit f our t housand peo ple a y ear f or eac h t housand j obs. Many of them were the work-hungry immigrants from Europe f ooding through New York’s Ellis Island. Ford quickly swallowed Taylor’s d ictum t hat “men wi ll not do an extraordinary day’s work for a n o rdinary day’s p ay,”11 and on January 5, 1914 he made t he unprecedented gesture of promising to return $10 million of prof ts to his workforce by raising wages to $5 for an eight-hour day, replacing two daily nine-hour shifts with a three-shift, twenty-four-hour, nonstop rotation. This was at a time when industrial workers were averaging $11 a week. It meant that thirty-six weeks’ work would buy a c ar, not far from the purchasing power of a modern American automobile factory worker. The publicity generated by the f ve-dollar day was phenomenal. The New York Evening Post called it a “ magnif cent act of generosity,” t he Wall S treet J ournal c ondemned i t a s “ the mo st foolish thing ever attempted in the industrial world,” and Henry Ford described it as “one of the f nest cost-cutting moves we ever made.”12 What F ord k new, a nd w hat t he Wall S treet J ournal d id n ot, was t hat t he c ompany h ad mad e e nough p rof ts that year as a result of cost reductions achieved by the moving assembly line to have paid each worker $ 20 a da y. Instead some $11.2 m illion was p aid t o s hareholders i n d ividends. N ews of t he ra ise l ed t o f fteen-thousand-strong cr owds o f j obless m en s tanding o utside the f actory g ates da y a fter da y t hat J anuary, h oping f or w ork. Resentment led to rioting that was only broken up when Highland Park police trained f re hoses on the job seekers.

Modern Times Ford would surprise the world again when in November, 1929, a month a fter t he Wall Street Crash, he again a nnounced a p ay increase f or h is workforce, i n a nother a ttempt t o e ngineer c onsumerism on a scale broad enough to allow the country to spend its w ay o ut o f t he t hreatening s lump. B ut w hen t his f ailed, h e cut w ages t o l ess t han t hose o f h is c ompetitors. F ord w as n o paternalist. Acceptance o f F ord’s te rms t hat J anuary i n 1 914 w as t he equivalent of a F austian p act for t he as sembly l ine worker, s acrif cing h is i ndividuality f or t he m eans t o i mprove t he ma terial existence of h is family a nd h imself. T his was a d ifferent i mage of the Promised Land than that created by the Pilgrim Fathers. It amounted to a stif ing of what the philosopher, George Santayana, described as t he “hereditary spirit” – t hat of the Pilgrim Fathers and other hardworking immigrants and pioneers – that differentiated the American people from those of the Old World. If ma ny working people t urned their backs on the production line, those who acquiesced were fulf lling the Taylorist dream of a pe rfect ma nual w orker f tted f or t he m odern i ndustrial w orkplace. T he Taylorist m essage, i n t he form o f s cientif c management, w as s preading acr oss t he i ndustrial w orld, crea ting n ew tiers o f a dministrators w ho w ere ne eded to p ut i t i nto pract ice. Taylor himself argued the need for a tea m of work-study experts to carry out his studies at Midvale, using the talents of people like Carl Barth, one of his collaborators, who invented a slide rule to help him make his calculations. Others, like Frank Gilbreth and his wi fe, Li llian, pe rfected t he s tudy of m otion. F rank Gi lbreth was so obsessed with eff ciency he used it in his family life. He f lmed h is c hildren w ashing d ishes s o t hat h e c ould w ork o ut how they could perform the task more speedily. He fastened his vest buttons from the bottom up because that took three seconds instead of t he seven seconds it took to go f rom top to bottom.13 He applied shaving foam with two brushes to save time but abandoned an experiment with two razors when he lost time dealing with cuts to his chin.14 His children – t he Gilbreths had six boys and six girls – were expected to submit sealed bids for odd jobs that might enable them to earn some spending money. The lowest bid received the contract. The extent to which this way of thinking became an

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The History of Work obsession was apparent also in the last years of Frederick Taylor’s life, when he spent much of his time watching the grass grow. He didn’t s imply watch t he g rass, h e c ounted t he i ndividual b lades per s quare i nch i n a s eries o f m ore t han e ight h undred e xperiments designed to create the perfect lawn. Within a year or two, what Taylor d id n ot k now a bout g rass w as n ot worth k nowing. Whether they were blades of grass or people, it made no difference to Taylor. His focus was almost entirely on process. But process was cr ucial in creating new tiers of management, where inspiration and leadership became subordinate to method. In France Henri Fayol found that scientif c management complemented pe rfectly h is o wn ad ministrative t heories. I n Ge rmany they a dopted th e Taylor i deas w ith gu sto, b ut th en th ey would. Management w as n o l onger a te rm u sed b y M rs B eeton t o describe a w ay o f l ooking a fter t he h ousehold, n or w as i t s imply a c hain of command. Management had be come a s ystem of mass co ntrol i n pro duction b y pro cess, me thod, a nd t extbook, something that had enduring appeal to the military mind. When British soldiers embarked at walking pace side by side across no-man’s-land o n t he S omme i n J uly 1916 t hey w ere c onforming t o m ethod, s uppressing t heir i ndividuality f or t he g reater good o f t he e nterprise. T heir s acrif ce h ad be come s ubordinate to t he s earch for vi ctory. War a nd s acrif ce h ad a lways be en as disciplined as t he as sembly l ine. N ow t here w as c onsistency i n factory a nd f eld. Lines of moving magnetos had been replaced by rows of graves marking lost lives and buried aspirations. The consumer society was consuming itself in the greatest conf agration the world had known. By the end of the First World War, the Taylorist doctrine had spread acr oss E urope, t hrough F rance, Ge rmany, a nd R ussia. The R ussians s wung f rst o ne w ay a nd t hen t he o ther as t he Revolution of 1917 trampled the last vestiges of Czarist feudalism into the soil and seeded an ideology that venerated the efforts of working m en a nd women. V ladimir I lyich L enin h ad be en i nitially suspicious of Taylorism, describing it before the First World War as t he “ enslavement o f h umankind t o t he mac hine.”15 By 1918, after Lenin had led the Russian Revolution, he was urging its in troduction in to in dustry. H e wr ote in Pravda, “ We s hould immediately i ntroduce p iece w ork a nd t ry i t o ut i n p ractice.

Modern Times We should t ry out every scientif c a nd progressive suggestion of the Taylor system.”16 Unlike Taylor, w ho u sed a p seudonym for h is i deal workman, Henry Noll, to stress the attributes of the system rather than those of the individual, Joseph Stalin, Lenin’s successor, saw the potential in scientif c management to glorify the worker in contrast to the ruling elite who h ad be en overthrown i n t he revolution. It s eems curious that the United States, a country that upheld the rights and freedoms of the individual, should be re ticent to endorse the productive accomplishments of one of its working class. Under Stalin the m ost p roductive workers h ad be come t he i cons of t he S oviet system. T he chosen few were elevated to hero status a nd handed many of the comforts, perks, and trappings of the ruling Politburo. The downside, for some, was the accompanying fear of the secret police that came with the special status package. There c ould be n o g reater c ontrast t o t he F ord h omestead, evoking r omanticized m emories o f a p ioneering s pirit, t han number 2 S eraf movich Street. This large block of luxury apartments o n t he e mbankment o f t he M oscow R iver, c ommanding unrivaled vi ews o f t he K remlin, w as h ome t o t he S oviet e lite under c ommunist r ule. H ere it was t hat S talin h oused t he m ost favored individuals in Soviet society. Here it was that a knock on the door in the early hours conf rmed his f ckleness, as t he pendulum swung from patronage to purge. To be a llocated a S eraf movich apartment was to have arrived in c ommunist Russia, but t he p rice of success was a p recarious existence, always living in fear, always looking over your shoulder. As p eople st ruggled t o f nd enough to exist on in much of the country, t he Sera f movich res idents were p ampered i n co mparison, with their private canteen, store, garage parking, nursery, and te nnis c ourt. T hey a lso a ttracted t he c lose a ttention o f t he NKVD, Stalin’s secret police, who had spy holes i n every wall. Some of the biggest names in the Soviet administration came and went from this address in the 1930s. Those who went were rarely heard o f a gain. S ome s ix h undred o ff cials w ere d ragged a way and shot in successive purges during the 1930s.17 The o nly o nes w ho c ould l ive i n re lative s afety w ere t hose whom e ven S talin c ould n ot c onceive as a t hreat, peo ple l ike Alexei Stakhanov, the Ukranian coal miner and worker-hero, who

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The History of Work at t he age of t wenty-nine was feted for h is prodigious efforts i n cutting 102 tons of coal in a single six-hour night shift in August, 1935. This was f fteen times more than a worker might cut away on an average shift. It has been stressed subsequently that this was no ordinary shift b ut a d eliberate, p arty-organized a ttempt t o g ain p laudits from the Soviet leadership. Stakhanov was also helped in removing the coal by two co-workers whose role was not fully revealed until the late 1980s. The admission delighted some modern writers who reveled in exposing the fraud.18 The lie did not need to be exposed. S takhanov’s o wn acc ount i s c omprehensive e nough to leave the reader in no doubt of the phoniness of the claims. But these writers should be permitted their cynicism. Given a shovel, they could not shift a ton of coal in a month of Sundays. The S oviet p ropaganda mac hine m oved i nto o verdrive t o portray S takhanov as a n i conic f gure for t he S oviet worker. I n a book, The Sta khanov Movement E xplained, said to be “b y its initiator, A lexei Stakhanov,” t he young m iner, t hen a ged t hirtythree, describes his experience, f rst as a f armhand, then a s hepherd, a nd f nally a c oal m iner a t t he Ce ntral I rmino c olliery i n the Dombas region of t he U kraine. Using a p neumatic pick, h is standard daily production rate in his earliest days amounted to about f ve tons of coal on an average shift, eight tons on a good day. A fter u ndergoing a c ourse i n u sing t he p ick, h e ra ised h is output t o te n t ons a s hift. B ut t here w as s till a b ig o bstacle t o better production levels. The coal hewers were packed too closely together, a llowing i nsuff cient elbow-room. M iners were getting in each other’s way. Another problem was a lack of specialization. The hewers were using their picks for not much more than half a shift since they were also required to f x their own timber props to stop the roof from collapsing.19 Removing t hese handicaps, he wrote, a llowed h im to achieve the feat of 102 tons of coal in a shift. It seems self-evident from his earlier remarks that he had help in propping and coal removal. The most curious part of the account is that passing the hundredton mark was not enough. If we found that f gure hard to believe, what s hould w e ma ke o f h is as sertion t hat a nother w orker t he very n ext da y ac hieved 1 15 t ons, a nd a nother s oon a fterwards cut out 119 tons? But this is only the start, as a nother miner cuts

Modern Times 125 t ons be fore h is re cord i s q uickly o vertaken b y a d ifferent w orker wi th 1 51 t ons. B efore w e k now i t, S takhanov h imself h as reac hed t he t wo-hundred-ton ma rk. Doe s h e c all i t a day a t t his s tage? Well, n o. S omebody e lse c uts 2 40 t ons, t hen a worker c alled A rtyukhin s hifts 310 t ons, e ventually be ttering this f gure wi th 536 t ons.20 “N o m ore t han a f ew weeks e lapse before miners hewing two hundred, three hundred or even more tons o f c oal wi th e very s hift c ould be c ounted b y t he d ozen,” writes Stakhanov.21 By this time the newly created mythical status of the Dombas miner has reached farcical levels. Why did the Russians persist with such nonsense? Did they really believe that people in the West were going to believe it, or did they simply get carried away with the need to fabricate and exaggerate? The great sadness of these ridiculous f gures is that Stakhanov makes s ome po ints a bout t he f ront-line p roduction w orker t hat would f nd f avor s ome s ixty y ears l ater a mong ma ny o f t he most p rogressive ma nagements i n Western i ndustry. S takhanov explains h is m ethod: “I t re quires o nly a p ublic s pirited a ttitude towards one’s work and a thorough study of one’s machinery and technique. Stakhanovite work is a combination of manual and mental work. It enables the Stakhanovites to show their mettle, to display their faculties, to give free reign to their creative ideas; it signif es the victory of man over machine.”22 Compare this with Frederick T aylor’s e xhortations t o t he s hop-f oor w orkers a t Midvale t o s peed u p a nd w ork h arder, e choed i n t housands o f management–worker confrontations the world over. Meanwhile t he te rm “S takhanovite” h as g one i nto t he l anguage, meaning someone intensely committed to sustained hard work. B ut t hat i s n ot t he w ay t hat S takhanov s aw i t. H is o wn interpretation was a kin to what would come to be k nown in the trendy pe rsonnel ma nagement c ircles o f t he l ate t wentieth ce ntury as “empowerment,” outlined in great detail by the Harvard professor an d m anagement thin ker, R osabeth M oss K anter.23 It looks l ike t he Russians got t here f rst. Unfortunately t hey never practiced what Stakhanov was preaching. The idea of worker initiative was a s ham. T he i dea of a ny k ind of i nitiative i n S oviet life was stif ed by the reality of an oppressive regime where staying i n f avor c ould m ean t he d ifference be tween l ife a nd d eath. The working mas ses were t he l ittle peo ple as f ar as S talin was

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The History of Work concerned. He referred to them as vintiki, meaning “little screws” and thought of them as nothing other than “cogs in the great state machine.”24 Stakhanov was the f gurehead of the vintiki. The h ero t reatment for Stakhanov rewarded h im with a n a iry apartment in Seraf movich Street, so that everyone could see how communism ce lebrated t he be st e fforts o f b rawn a nd m uscle. Beyond h is boo k h e be came t he s ubject o f a “S takhanovite” conference, attended by Stalin and three thousand other “workerheroes.” Stakhanov could never cope with his celebrity status and lapsed into alcoholism. He died in 1977. But, unlike many of his neighbors i n t he S oviet e ra, h e o utlived S talin. T hat a lone m ust have been some kind of record. The bogey of Marxism so overshadowed the management systems o f T aylorism a nd F ordism t hat t he l eaders o f d emocratic capitalist governments were oblivious to any similarities between the way these methods were applied in the West and the way they were ad opted a nd m erged i nto t he S oviet s ystem. T he p arallels were n ot overt. M arxism s et o ut its s tall as a po litical i deology concerned wi th t he c onduct o f a s ociety i n i ts e ntirety. I t w as revolutionary i n i ts a ims, i n i ts a pproach, a nd i n i ts e xecution. Taylorism was never promoted as a nything other than a p rocess, a s ystem for t he ma nagement o f work i n t he p rivate e nterprise. And y et i ts i nf uence w as f elt a cross s ociety, d isturbing m any intellectuals c oncerned a t i ts po tential f or c ontrol a nd t he w ay that it stif ed ideas and ambition in the individual. The systemization of t he factory job across t he i ndustrialized world so appalled the writer Aldous Huxley that he envisaged in his futuristic novel, Brave New World, published in 1932, a future of standardized workers “hatched” i nto predestined social roles. The book described a future world of test tube babies and genetic engineering r igidly c ontrolled a nd e xploited b y a d ehumanizing industrialized oligarchy. The most basic workers in Huxley’s World S tate a re t he E psilons, w hose l abor i s u sed t o ma n t he industrial production lines. These are the little people, the downtrodden, although in Huxley’s story they know no better. Huxley elevates Ford to the status of a deity. The book is set in the year 632 AF (After Ford). It was not diff cult to portray Henry Ford in this way. His approach to business was like something out of the Creation as he developed an all-encompassing industrial

Modern Times empire with coal mines, iron mines, and forests in the United States a nd a r ubber p lantation i n B razil. I n o ne Ca nute-like experiment he tried to create a bird reserve on his farm, installing hundreds of birdhouses and freeing six hundred pairs of imported English songbirds at one go. They all f ew away.25 Unlike Ford’s workers, the birds had a choice. The US government woke up to the pervasive inf uence of scientif c ma nagement a fter a l abor s trike a t W atertown A rsenal – sparked by attempts to time workers by stopwatch – and launched a c ongressional i nquiry i n 1912. J ust t wo y ears ea rlier t he s ystem had been a relatively obscure idea known only among a few engineers, w hen a s tory k nown as t he Eas tern Ra tes c ase h it the headlines. Harrington Emerson, a T aylor d isciple, had given evidence t o t he I nterstate C ommerce C ommission i nvestigating resistance by eastern seaboard shippers to an application by railroad companies to ra ise their freight rates. Emerson a rgued that if the railroads adopted scientif c management they could save a million d ollars a da y o n t heir o perating c osts.26 T he claim was headlined in t he New York Times. Suddenly businessmen everywhere wanted to know if they could benef t from these ideas. Nor were the implications lost on the labor unions, who immediately perceived Taylorism as a threat to their members. Taylor’s i dealistic st ance b efore t he c ongressional c ommittee on Watertown was unconvincing. Even Taylor stalwarts must have been surprised at his insistence that “scientif c management is not an e ff ciency d evice, n or i s i t a ny b unch o r g roup o f e ff ciency devices; it is not a new system of f guring costs; it is not holding a stopwatch on a man, and writing things down about him; it is not time study; it is not motion study.”27 “No,” he said, scientif c management was nothing less than “a complete mental revolution” of workers and managers. If this was really Taylor’s belief, the world did not see much evidence of this revolution in attitudes. Taylorism was a ma nual for ma nagement c ontrol. Sometimes this c ontrol b ecame in timidating in th e e xtreme. T he w orkers w ho s et t hemselves a gainst F ord i n t he ea rly 1 930s k new only too well t he power t hey were confronting. T he heady days of 1913 had been replaced by a workplace as repressive as any in S oviet R ussia, re sembling a po lice s tate wi th s pies, c alled “spotters,” p lanted a mong t he workforce t o re port o n e mployee

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The History of Work code i nfringements s uch as k illing t ime i n t he w ashrooms o r attempting t o o rganize a t rade u nion. Ot her s noopers w ent t o the homes of workers, collecting data on their personal lives for Ford’s “S ociology De partment,” w hich d ecided w hether t hey were clean-living enough to deserve the bonus that made up part of the f ve-dollar day. The F ord h unger ma rch o n M arch 7 , 1 932 w as re miniscent of that occasion back in 1812 when the Luddites marched on Rawfold’s M ill i n t he North of England. A h undred a nd t wenty years later history was repeating itself, as three thousand protesters wi th l abor g rievances, w aving red f ags, ma rched o n F ord’s River Rouge Plant at Dearborn on the outskirts of Detroit. Unlike the Luddites, these hunger marchers were not armed. There was no d estructive i ntent. T hey w ere m et o n t he c ity bo undary b y armed Dearborn Police, and four of them were machine-gunned to d eath w hen f ghting b roke o ut. H arry B ennett, H enry F ord’s right-hand ma n, h ad be en re monstrating wi th J oseph Y ork, a nineteen-year-old o rganizer o f t he Y oung C ommunist L eague, when Bennett was h it on t he head by a roc k t hrown by a nother protester. B ennett p ulled Y ork t o t he g round, a nd w hen Y ork stood up he was fatally wounded in a hail of gunf re. Some Ford workers who later joined the mourners at the men’s funeral were dismissed when they came back to work.28 Taylorism a nd F ordism t ransformed f actory w orking s o c ompletely th at th e s ystems t ogether m ust b e v iewed a s p erhaps th e most enduring societal change of the twentieth century, arguably more i nf uential a nd wider ra nging t han t he competing ideologies of f ascism a nd c ommunism, a lthough t he d estructive i mpact o f these political ideologies is seared far more deeply on t he collective m emory o f t he h uman race . P eter D rucker, t he ma nagement writer, described scientif c management as “ one of the great liberating, pioneering insights,” adding that “altogether it may well be the most powerful as well as the most lasting contribution America has made to western thought since the Federalist Papers. As l ong as industrial society endures we shall never lose again the insight that human work c an be s tudied systematically, c an be a nalyzed, can be improved by work on its elementary parts.”29 Dr ucker might h ave t hought d ifferently h ad h e w orked o n a p roduction line.

Modern Times Unlike s lavery, th e F austian d eal w ith th e p roduction-line worker delivered cheaper products that became affordable to the working classes, who could indulge themselves in the novelty of disposable i ncome. T he c hoice w as o urs. We c ould s ave i n t he spirit o f V ictorian p arsimony o r w e c ould s quander o ur m oney on a g rowing variety of consumer goods. The luxury of an extra cooking pot in Abraham Darby’s day had made way for hundreds of household gizmos and devices aimed at saving labor that previously had been unnecessary. Buying the car was only the start. Soon you c ould s hampoo i t, h ose i t, vacuum t he i nterior, b lack its w heels, a nd s tick a n odding d og o n t he rea r p arcel s helf. Happiness came in boxes with a f ex attached. Like Walt Disney’s dwarfs in the f lm, Snow White, we could sing our merry way to work and whistle when we got there. Disney, l ike McGuffey, ref ected t he P rotestant vi rtues i nherent in hard wholesome work. The rhythmical ring of picks striking rocks was playing out an anthem to the values of industrious God-fearing A merica. T he da nger w as n ot i n w ork b ut i n t he temptation of reaching out for illusory delights that were not earned by work. So Snow White, like Adam, became one more victim o f t he te mpting a pple, o blivious t o t he po ison s tored inside. The Biblical curse on mankind was as potent as ever, and the only path toward redemption was to work, work, work. Work was good; work was uplifting. “There is joy in work,” said Ford. “There i s n o h appiness e xcept i n t he rea lization t hat w e h ave accomplished something.”30 I n work you could f nd f reedom, of a kind.

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Western Electric Discovers Motivation We can never wholly separate the human from the mechanical sides. (Mary Parker Follett, 1868–1933) National Geographic magazine published a ma p of the world in October, 1998 drawn from night-time satellite images. Scattered like i cing s ugar o ver a f reshly b aked c ake w ere t housands o f white dots, what the map called “human settlement lights.” Each white speck was itself made up of t housands of individual electric l amps. Li ght w as s o p rofuse i n t he i ndustrial c onurbations that t he white dots were f used t ogether, stretching l ike a M ilky Way of electrical luminosity across the planet. Had t he s ame p hotographic c omposite be en po ssible d uring the Ch ristmas o f 1 879 t here m ight h ave be en a f ew y ellowish dots f rom gas l ighting i n a s ea of blackness. But if t he cameras had be en able to i ntensify t heir magnif cation over Menlo Park, New Jersey, they would have found that one of these man-made pools of light was the genesis of the galaxy of electric lights that pepper our world today. T he forty light bulbs r un off a d ynamo were v astly o utnumbered b y t he t hrongs o f vi sitors. O n N ew Year’s Eve some three thousand people converged on the display, attracted by the promise of T homas Alva Edison that the whole of Menlo Park would be bathed in light. He didn’t quite make it, but there was enough to assure those who gathered there that humankind h ad mad e y et o ne m ore g reat s tride i n c ontrolling his environment. No one who witnessed t his ma rvel could have imagined that electric lighting would not only illuminate people’s homes and streets but would stimulate a n ew avenue of thinking in workplace motivation, raising afresh the old debate over stick and carrot and the psychological value of workplace recognition. 160

Western Electric Discovers Motivation That is precisely what happened. What became no more than a footnote in the story of lighting would open new paths of exploration i n ma nagement a nd p sychology. T he w ay i t h appened was a lmost accidental a nd, i n t he birth of t his new i ndustry, a n irrelevance. Edison d id n ot i nvent t he e lectric l ight b ulb, a ny m ore t han Abraham D arby i nvented i ron f orging o r t he c ooking po t. B ut, like Darby, he improved the existing technology, making something that was cheap and useful. It was no mere novelty. He told his visitors that soon they would be able to buy his light bulbs for 25¢ apiece and run them in their homes for a few pennies a day. The p revious Oc tober, a fter h undreds o f h ours experimenting with diff erent li ghting f laments, h e h ad w atched t he pe rsistent glow f rom a p iece o f c arbonized c otton be nt i nto a h orseshoe shape and sealed in an evacuated glass globe. Switched on in the early hours of October 22, it burned for thirteen and a half hours, into mid-afternoon. Later the same month he made an improved f lament from carbonized paper. Edison’s light-bulb invention was a ref nement of the incandescent lamp, but a cr ucial ref nement at t hat. W hat he sp ecif cally created i s a b it o f a m outhful, b ut t he a uthors J ohn W. H owell and Henry Shroeder t hought it worth def ning precisely i n t heir History of th e Incandescent Lamp. He had invented, they wrote, “a lamp with a high resistance f lament o f c arbon i n a v acuum contained i n a gl ass c ontainer c losed a t a ll po ints b y f usion o f the glass to the f lament.” As they pointed out, “this was the f rst incandescent l amp w hich w as s uitable f or t he s ystem o f g eneral multiple d istribution which s olved t he p roblem of t he ‘subdivision o f t he e lectric l ight.’ ”1 T he l ight-bulb re f nement was just one of the world-record 1,093 patents f led either personally by E dison o r jointly with o thers during h is l ifetime. H is Menlo Park laboratory was a hive of industrious invention. Edison’s collaborators were craftsmen and they called each other “muckers,” ref ecting t he way t hey a ll “ mucked i n” o r p itched i n t ogether.2 They worked long hours, late into the night, punctuated by sessions on t he organ at one end of t he laboratory a nd weekend drinking bouts. It was an informal, freethinking atmosphere and Edison was one of t he boys. “Hell, t here a in’t no r ules i n h ere! We’re trying to accomplish something!” he said.3

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The History of Work The power of this informal atmosphere in creative teams was highlighted by Warren Bennis and Patricia Ward Biederman in their boo k, Organizing G enius, w hich o bserved h ow tea ms o f specialists b rought t ogether f or crea tive p rojects f eed o ff eac h other. T he a nimators w ho w orked wi th W alt Di sney a nd t he nuclear p hysicists w ho w orked wi th J . R obert O ppenheimer o n the development of the atomic bomb were young and enthusiastic, “fueled by a n i nvigorating, c ompletely u nrealistic vi ew o f w hat they [could] accomplish.” 4 They did not need f ne off ces and had little time for hierarchies or dress codes. They thrived instead on a shared aim and the opportunity to work with a pioneer in their chosen f eld. Edison was j ust s uch a f gure. B ut h is crea tive j uices f ed o ff a conviction that hard work sparked creativity. “He believes that unf inching, un remitting hard work will accomplish anything. It was this genius for hard work that f red m e as a l ad a nd mad e Mr. E dison m y h ero,” s aid H enry F ord, w ho n ever f orgot t he inventor’s early encouragement for his work on the internal combustion engine.5 Ford had taken the opportunity to show Edison the plans for his engine in its early stages of development. Edison banged t he t able with h is f st a nd said: “Young ma n, t here’s t he thing. You have it.” Ford recalled later: “That bang on the table was worth worlds t o me. No ma n up t o t hen h ad given me a ny encouragement.”6 Edison w as n ever cred ited wi th g reat ad ministrative s kills. Running c ompanies w as n ot h is t hing, a nd h e q uickly bo wed out o f t he o perations o f Ge neral El ectric, t he c ompany created to e xploit t he l ight-bulb b reakthrough. B ut h e w as m ore t han a gifted inventor. He had the vision to grasp the implications of his work beyond the f ner points of the invention. Unlike many of his contemporaries – a nd t he f eld of ele ctric l ighting development was a lmost a wash wi th i nventors o bsessed wi th t he i dea o f prolonging t he gl ow t hey c ould crea te i n t heir cr ude e lectrical f laments – E dison k ept h is eye o n t he b ig p icture. A d urable l ong-lasting l ight b ulb w as a ll w ell a nd g ood, b ut i t w ould not w ork wi thout a po wer s upply. C onnected l ighting r un f rom a ce ntral s ource h ad be en p ioneered by t he gaslight d evelopers. Companies l ike En gland’s B oulton & W att, w hich i nstalled gaslights i n t he P hillips a nd L ee c otton m ills i n M anchester i n

Western Electric Discovers Motivation 1806.7 William Murdoch, an engineer, had found a way to distill coal gas, which he f rst used to light his home in 1792. Boulton & Watt had snapped up the man and his idea in the same way that an ambitious football club signs a promising young player for his potential. Only w hen t he c ompany d iscovered t hat P hillipe L eBon h ad plans t o l ight t he w hole o f P aris wi th h is g as T hermolamp d id it give Murdoch the backing he needed to push his development forward. Phillips and Lee reduced their annual lighting bill, spent on candles, by more than two-thirds and found that the gaslights saved l abor expended i n t he c onstant t rimming o f c andlewicks. The gaslight was a big step, but equally important was the delivery of gas through pipes from a central station. When the London and Westminster Ch artered Gas Li ght a nd C oke C ompany was established i n 1 812, i t w as t he be ginning o f a n i ndustry t hat would e xpand a nd p rosper f or t he n ext s ixty-seven y ears, u ntil the Menlo Park exhibition in fact.8 The gas companies sent their spies t o t he M enlo e vent a nd o ne o f t hem t ried t o s hort-circuit the display, but Edison had watchmen posted. The saboteur was caught and thrown out. Edison arrived late to lighting experiments, but he came with his M enlo P ark l aboratory – t he world’s f rst i ndustrial re search and development center – a nd he had powerful f nancial support from people like J. P. Morgan, the banker.9 B ut t he b ackers insisted o n evidence o f co mmercial pro mise for a ny o f E dison’s inventions be fore t heir f unds c ould be c hanneled i nto f urther development a nd p roduction. T hey w anted t o k now w hether this l ight b ulb w ould s ell. P otential p atent l itigation w as l ess o f an o bstacle t han i ndustry d omination, o r, i n t his c ase, i ndustry creation. Edison himself, already recognized as the inventor of the phonograph, was a big enough name to sell the new lighting, and his f edgling company, General Electric, promoted him heavily in its advertising as the “founding father” of the lighting industry. But the industry needed something else, some great benef t of electricity over gas. T he company was keen to hang its ma rketing on whatever evidence it could f nd to convince potential buyers t hat a n electric l ighting system was vi able. Ge neral Electric would c ome t o d evelop a ma rketing c ampaign b ased o n t he “science of seeing,” a novel idea, suggesting that electric lighting

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The History of Work made work easier.10 The science of seeing must have seemed at that time as attractive as t he notion of the paperless off ce would be in the 1980s, and it was just as u nrealistic. But if the concept was going to sell electric lighting to companies, nobody in the industry was going to quibble. Nevertheless, there had been quibbling in the lighting industry. More than quibbling. One apparently commercial decision amounted to outright censorship and helped to create confusion over a seemingly innocuous set of experiments that continues to this day. The focus of this industry displeasure was a s eries of studies centered on Western Electric’s Hawthorne factory in Chicago. Initially, at least, the supporters of scientif c management showed l ittle i nterest i n l ighting. B ut t wo o f Taylor’s f ollowers, Alexander Ch urch a nd F rank Gi lbreth, t heorized s eparately o n the possible benef ts to production work of well-placed artif cial lighting. Church believed t hat poo r l ighting c aused a “ strain o n the f aculties,” s uggesting t hat h igh-intensity l ighting h ad a n “inf uence upon the spirits” of the workmen.11 These are signif cant observations because they demonstrate a recognition that the well-being, m ood, a nd m orale of e mployees c ould c ontribute t o their work. Columella, the Roman agricultural writer, had sensed this h undreds o f y ears ea rlier, b ut c lassical l iterature d id n ot feature h ighly o n t he read ing l ist o f t hose e ngaged i n s cientif c management. I ts p ioneers w ere p ractical peo ple, n ot t heorists. Sometimes their work bore no more than a p assing resemblance to either science or management. There was much trial and error and n ot a l ittle s peculation. F rank Gi lbreth, f or e xample, w orried that glare and ref ection of lighting caused tiredness among workers. A ll w orkshop mac hinery, h e s aid, s hould be p ainted matt black. Later he changed his mind and said all workshop surfaces should be painted white.12 It should not be surprising that electric lighting found itself the subject o f s cientif c s crutiny. F rederick Taylor a nd h is d isciples had created a ma nia for measurement across industry. The craze had g athered m omentum i n N ovember, 1 910 a fter t he B oston lawyer Louis D. Brandies trumpeted his claim that the railroads could save $1 million a day in the Eastern Rates case if they were to a dopt scientif c ma nagement. Suddenly every business on t he block was buying stopwatches and notebooks.

Western Electric Discovers Motivation When T aylor p ublished hi s t echniques i n The P rinciples of Scientif c Management the f ollowing y ear, h e s et t he t one t hat would u nderpin p rocess-driven ma nufacturing ma nagement f or the rest of the century, so much so that “what can’t be measured isn’t w orth d oing” re mains a po pular ma xim acr oss c ompany boardrooms tod ay. S cientif c m easurement w ould gi ve w ay t o “benchmarking,” “ economic v alue ad ded,” “ six s igma quality improvement,” a nd a h ost o f o ther j argon f or c ontrolling a nd ref ning the productive process. This was clipboard management delivering f ascinating f gures a nd m easurable re sults, a llowing all k inds o f c omparisons a nd c alculations t o c onvince w hoever needed convincing of the merits associated with the scientif cally proven o ne be st w ay o f d oing t hings. I t w as bo ys p laying wi th numerical toys. Eff ciency d rives d uring t he F irst W orld W ar, l ooking f or ways o f im proving i ndustrial o utput an d q uality, s timulated renewed i nterest i n t he relationship between h igh i ntensity electric l ighting a nd p roduction. W illiam Du rgin, o ne o f E dison’s lighting s pecialists, c arried o ut s ome d etailed te sts i n 1 918 t o highlight t he l ink. T he p revious y ear a s urvey o f n inety-three Chicago companies using electric lighting found that workshops were operating in lighting far poorer than that recommended by the i ndustry. Du rgin f ollowed u p t he s urvey wi th te sts i n f our factories, w hich s uggested t hat be tter l ighting c ould i ncrease production b y b etween 1 0 a nd 3 5 p ercent.13 T he re sults w ere encouraging en ough to co nvince G eneral El ectric t hat i t s hould increase its efforts to promote factory lighting and strengthen its already d ominant po sition i n t he s ector. Part of t his d ominance was achieved by populating various lighting research bodies with its own experts. As Ge neral El ectric’s w arehouses be gan s tockpiling l amps during a po stwar d ownturn i n b usiness, t he i mpetus a nd f unding f or i ndustrial l ighting re search w ere s tronger t han e ver.14 Experiments were carried out in more factories, including t hose instigated i n 1924 a t t he H awthorne works of Western Electric. Chicago had changed some since George Pullman had jacked its buildings o ut o f t he m ud. T his w as t he Ch icago o f t he roaring twenties, a c ity o f g angsters, s peakeasies, a nd c ars wi th r unning bo ards f or g un-toting h enchmen, as r ival g angs vi ed wi th

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The History of Work each other for control of prostitution, extortion, a nd bootleg l iquor in def ance of Prohibition. The inf uence of some, such as Al Capone, even extended to the unions.15 But away from the headlines, g rabbed s o o ften b y f ast-living, f ast-talking, a nd s harply tailored g angsters, w as a nother po pulation, t he s ilent ma jority intent on making a living to support their families. Out on the two-hundred-acre site of the Hawthorne works run by Western Electric, some thirty thousand men and women were employed on a ssembly l ines m aking t elephone e quipment. T his small industrial metropolis, the equivalent of a good-sized town, was put together from sixty nationalities – a cr oss section of the new American labor force drawn from the millions of European immigrants. As the factory workers labored, the gangs were running t heir p rohibition-busting s chemes n earby, wi th Ca pone’s operations h eadquartered h alf a b lock a way a nd a c ouple o f his g ambling d ens j ust acr oss t he s treet. Joseph Juran, t he t hen Western El ectric s tatistician w ho, wi th W . E dwards De ming, went o n t o be come o ne o f t he h eroes o f t he J apanese q uality movement a fter t he S econd W orld W ar, w ould p ut h is ma thematical talents to use watching the actions of the roulette wheel operator in a gambling house ca lled “The Shop.” T he operator’s arm ac tion w as s o re petitive t hat J uran w on a h undred d ollars working out the resulting improvement in the odds favoring certain n umbers.16 H is m ethod w as o verlooked: o therwise J apan’s postwar m iracle, t ogether with o ne of its p rincipal g urus, c ould have ended up swimming with the f shes in Lake Michigan. The f uctuating fortunes of A l Capone were not t he only d istraction f or t he H awthorne w orkers. W ithout rea lizing i t, s ome two-thirds of the workforce would become the unwitting guinea pigs in pe rhaps th e m ost e xtensive in vestigations in to h uman motivation the world has known. The studies didn’t start that way. Production ra tes a nd Ge neral El ectric’s i nsatiable d esire t o s ell more lighting across manufacturing industry were at the heart of the f rst experiments. The psychology would come later, after the lighting i ndustry t ried t o forget a bout t he su rprise r esults of t he initial tests. Tests were r un i n s everal places, i ncluding Ge neral Electric’s Bridgeport Works and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. The most rigorous experiments, however, appear to have been

Western Electric Discovers Motivation conducted a t W estern El ectric’s H awthorne w orks, a nd i t w as these te sts – t hree s ets of experiments r un a t i ntervals be tween November, 1924 a nd April, 1927 – t hat caused t he biggest f uss. The f rst experiments appeared promising: lighting was improved in some departments and productivity went up. The problem was that p roductivity a lso went u p a mong tea ms w here t he l ighting was not i mproved. O ne tea m ma naged t o ma intain o utput even when lighting was dimmed to the level of moonlight. Western Electric’s ma nagement was i ntrigued by t he f ndings and wanted to know more. If it wasn’t the lighting that made people i mprove t heir o utput, w hat w as i t? Ge neral El ectric, o n t he other hand, saw no merit in continuing a program that was doing nothing to support its claim that better lighting delivered h igher prof ts.17 Q uite t he o pposite. A ccording t o Cl arence S toll, t he superintendent of the Hawthorne works who went on to become Western Electric’s president, the f nal report, if it was ever completed, w as b uried. S o t he wr itten re sults o f t he te sts w hich gave r ise t o w hat t he w orld w ould c ome t o re cognize as “ The Hawthorne Ef fect” w ere n ever p ublished.18 Geo rge P ennock, the engineer in charge of the program, told Stoll: “The project is being allowed to die and it is hoped that it will be forgotten.”19 Pennock was unhappy about the decision. He and his fellow managers had other ideas. Western El ectric w as n ot t he k ind o f c ompany t o o verlook something t hat m ight i mprove t he well-being a nd, m ore i mportantly, the output of its workers. Like many other large companies during this era, it pursued the concept of cradle-to-grave employment, rewarding long service and loyalty. It ran an evening school for workers called the Hawthorne University. It ran an employee benef t a nd i nsurance p lan a nd t reated i ts w orkers t o a nnual picnics. The picnic and the insurance plan were not supposed to be made for each other, but this was the way it turned out. In the summer of 1915, within two years of the plan’s introduction, the company chartered six steamships for the annual picnic. One of the boats, the Eastland, capsized a f ew feet f rom its dock, k illing 812 peo ple – e mployees, t heir f amilies, a nd f riends.20 Mo st of t he victims were ce ntral E uropean émigrés. T he be nef t plan was swamped, but the company paid an additional $100,000 for relief, a nd a c ollection a mong o ther Ch icago b usinesses ra ised

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The History of Work $350,000 m ore. Western El ectric s tood b y i ts w orkers i n g ood times and bad. The H awthorne plant mad e telephone e quipment for Western Electric’s p arent, A T&T. T he c orporate re lationship h ad d eveloped i n a r oundabout w ay f rom A lexander G raham B ell’s invention o f t he te lephone a nd Western El ectric’s a greement t o manufacture i t. T he b usiness a rrangement d id n ot ma ture q uite so simply, but after a pe riod of corporate jostling, early lawsuits over p atent inf ringements, q uarrels o ver m anufacturing a lliances, and the kind of posturing and skirmishing that tends to go with t he t urf when t he players struggle for dominance i n a n ascent f eld of industry, Western Electric sold out to the American Bell Telephone Company, which became American Telephone & Telegraph, or AT&T. As Chicago’s biggest employer, Western Electric was an obvious c hoice f or l ighting e xperiments. I t d id n ot f ace t he c ompetitive p ressures o f i ts p arent, s ince t he B ell s ystem bo ught everything i t mad e. I ts ma nagers, t herefore, w ere n ot p rone t o the s ort o f a nxiety a ttacks a nd d efensive re sponses t hat c an be induced b y f alling s ales. Li ke m ost c ompanies o f i ts s ize a nd stature it ad hered t o t he p rinciples of scientif c ma nagement, so it would have been perfectly comfortable with the features of the initial l ighting experiments. It sha red none of G eneral Electric’s discomfort with the ambiguous f ndings. Nor did it display GE’s disinterest i n t he i dea t hat t he e xperiments w ere c ausing s ome kind of psychological impact on employees. A potential link between lighting and behavior had been suggested by Hugo Munsterberg in 1914. He had wondered whether psychological techniques could be used to evaluate lighting eff ciency.21 Western Electric had dabbled with psychology itself in 1915, when it i nvited Walter Di ll Scott, a p sychology p rofessor at Northwestern University, to address its senior management in a s eries of lectures. Impressed by his arguments, the management asked Dill Scott to develop some tests that would look for creative po tential a mong t he c ompany’s e ngineers.22 Th at s ame year, i n what may well h ave be en t he world’s f rst occupational psychometric tests, Western Electric’s personnel director, Walter Dietz, u sed Di ll S cott’s m ethods t o as sess f fteen engineering graduates. S tanley B racken a nd H eine B eal, f ar a nd a bove t he

Western Electric Discovers Motivation highest scorers, went right to the top. Bracken became president of the company and Beal served as vice president.23 Most accounts of the earliest use of psychometric testing in recruitment and selection date its development to the US military after its entry into the First World War, but Dill Scott had introduced te sts a t Western El ectric t wo y ears be fore s election te sting was adopted on a b road scale in m ilitary recruiting in 1917. When the war ended, Western Electric began to broaden its use of te sting i n re cruitment a nd s election. I n 1 923 i t c arried o ut tests on a lmost 8 ,500 em ployees.24 A n A T&T de cision to co ncentrate group-wide research and development at Bell Telephone Laboratories, a p urpose-built d ivision s et u p i n N ew Y ork i n 1925, re inforced Western El ectric’s o wn c ommitment t o i ndustrial research. In 1927 Hawthorne had a mystery on its hands, and solving the mystery might provide another leap forward in the never-ending search for i ncreased productivity. T he company launched a n ew series o f s tudies d esigned t o e xplore t he po ssible c auses o f t he bizarre results of the lighting tests. Six women were drafted into the test a rea t hat had be en created for t he l ighting experiments. This R elay As sembly Test R oom w as p artitioned o ff f rom t he main as sembly f oor. T he re searchers s elected a s ample o f a ble and e xperienced e mployees t o a void t he po tential f or a ttributing a ny r ise i n t heir pe rformance t o s kill i mprovement as t hey learned the job. One of the women was designated a s upervisor. Sitting on tall stools at a long workbench, each woman took about a minute to assemble the thirty-f ve parts in a telephone relay unit and drop the unit into a chute. The n ew te sts w ere q uite d istinct f rom t he o riginal l ighting tests i n t heir d esign. T hese te sts w ere o bserving w ork p atterns and be havior. A mong t he questions t he i nvestigators were s eeking t o a nswer w ere: W hy d oes p roduction t raditionally f all o ff in t he a fternoon? Do e mployees get tired? A re rest periods or a shorter working day a good idea? What is the employees’ attitude toward t heir work a nd t he c ompany? W ill a c hange i n working equipment affect their performance? The w omen’s w ork w as m onitored c onstantly. T heir c onversations w ere n oted, t hey h ad f requent m edical e xaminations, and t he r oom te mperature a nd h umidity were a lso m easured t o

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The History of Work check for any possible variables in their conditions. Although the women h ad be en i n a g roup s cheme f or p iece w ork ra tes, t hey were put in a separate scheme and promised that they would be able to earn at least as much as they had done previously. They had o ther p rivileges d enied t o t heir f ellow w orkers. H awthorne had a t all tower that was off-limits to most people, but the relay test women were regular vi sitors as t hey po pped i n a nd o ut for research interviews.25 The second set of experiments i n t he relay room was a lready underway w hen Geo rge P ennock as ked El ton M ayo, a H arvard Business School professor, if he wanted to cast his experienced eye over t he various work tea m studies t he company had established. M ayo w as bo rn i n A delaide, t he s on o f a n e ngineer. Abandoning medical school, he worked for some time as a j ournalist be fore t aking u p a p artnership h is f ather h ad bo ught f or him in a printing f rm. He combined the business venture with a return to studies i n Adelaide, t his t ime i n psychology. H is work led him into the treatment of shell-shock victims returning from the First World War battlef elds. The experience in this relatively new area of psychotherapy inf uenced his thinking on the psychological adaptation of i ndividuals to u nfamiliar environments, be it the horrors of trench warfare or the more mundane but nevertheless wearing demands of the factory assembly line. A successful lecture tour of North America led to funding from the Carnegie Foundation for three years studying in Philadelphia. Part of this involved looking at the impact of people’s home lives and working conditions on employee turnover and productivity in various Philadelphia companies. Mayo had moved to Harvard in 1926, two years before receiving Pennock’s invitation. He recognized at once that Western Electric was what many would regard as a “ good e mployer,” d escribing i t as “ a c ompany d ef nitely committed to justice and humanity in its dealings with workers, and wi th g eneral m orale h igh.” T he workers t hemselves m ight not have been so glowing in their praise but they knew the wages were competitive a nd t he working conditions excellent. I n addition to the insurance a nd school, they had the use of a c afeteria shared by employees and management, and an in-house hospital. Industrial unrest had not been an issue since the turn of the century, w hen a g roup o f mac hinists h ad w alked o ut, d emanding

Western Electric Discovers Motivation union re cognition a nd a n ine-hour da y. T he ma nagement h ad stood f rm o n i ts re jection o f u nions b ut s ettled t he d ispute b y reducing i ts da ily s hift b y h alf a n h our t o t he n ine h ours t he workers had sought. Mayo a rrived, b uoyed b y a l arge g rant f rom t he R ockefeller Foundation and the sort of reception extended for a visiting company boss. He warmed to this red-carpet treatment, which included a room at one of Chicago’s swankiest hotels and a chauffeured doorto-door l imousine every morning. “ The door is opened a nd Elton Mayo, f ormerly o f S outh A ustralia, g ets i n a nd gl ides o ff t o h is alleged industrial researches,” he wrote in a letter to his wife.26 The all-women relay assembly team was studied for f ve and a half years in total, up to the summer of 1932. Other teams were also s tudied. A s imilar g roup was s egregated i n t he m ica s plitting room to look at the inf uence of individual rather than group piece-work i ncentives, a nd s ome t ime l ater a s ection o f ma le operatives i n a te lephone wi ring d epartment h ad t heir r outines monitored. S ide b y s ide wi th t hese e xperiments t he re searchers instigated an employee consultation program. Between 1928 and 1930 some twenty thousand employees were interviewed.27 The later i nterviews a llowed employees t o ra nge over t opics of t heir own choosing, and this led the company to adopt employee counseling from the mid-1930s until it was replaced by union consultation in the 1950s. By t he t ime t he w orkplace e xperiments e nded t he U nited States w as i n t he m idst o f t he G reat De pression, a nd W estern Electric was laying off thousands of workers. Mayo lamented the impact o f l ayoffs o n t he workplace c ommunity with s entiments that would be echoed by social commentators some sixty years later. Given the climate of mass unemployment and harder-edged managements, it is hardly surprising that he stressed the need for c ompanies t o re capture t he c ommunal s pirit t hat h ad c haracterized t he i ncreasingly p roductive w ork tea ms i n t he ea rlier Hawthorne experiments. It would be wrong, however, to conclude that the experiments had discovered a recipe for workplace Nirvana. The very creation of tea ms s ometimes l ed t o re sentment a mong o ther w orkers. This h appened a mong c olleagues o f t he re lay as sembly tea m, who complained t hat t hey were not getting t he special attention

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The History of Work meted out to the others. It also explains why one team had to be reabsorbed into the general workplace when other workers complained that it was getting preferential pay rates. (This short-lived relay assembly team was paid on the same individual basis as the mica s plitting tea m. T he i ncentives s eemed t o work, i ncreasing productivity by 12.5 percent.) The f nal study in the bank wiring room observed the working relationships among a g roup of male operatives. In this case the men were restricting their output with the knowledge and apparent approval of their supervisor. The experience seemed to echo Frederick Taylor’s c haracteristically b lunt as sertion t hat “h ardly a competent workman can be f ound who does not devote a c onsiderable amount of time to studying just how slowly he can work and s till c onvince h is e mployer h e i s g oing a t a g ood p ace.”28 The m en w ere s oldiering. T he c ompany re searchers i nterpreted the tardiness as a tactic arising from the suspicion of the workers that if they worked consistently faster their pay rate would be cut. Mayo a rgued d ifferently, suggesting t he go-slow was a n u nconscious g roup reac tion t o t he l ack o f a ny i ncentive f or t hem t o work harder. Like the Three Musketeers the men found strength in pursuing a united strategy as a social unit. These i ndividual f ndings soon lost their def nition under Mayo’s repeatedly voiced conclusion that the puzzling responses to l ighting changes h ad be en stimulated by a c onviction a mong the e mployees in volved in th e e xperiment th at th ey w ere p art of something special. They had been made to feel important, to feel wanted. T hey had a s ense of togetherness a nd t hey were consulted. T hey d id n ot f eel l ike na meless au tomatons or co gs in the machine. They had become a social unit and they enjoyed the attention t hey received. W hen t hey were t reated l ike human beings, a nything w as po ssible, e ven w orking i n m oonlight. This w as t he h omily M ayo re peated i n l ecture a fter l ecture. I t was re storing t he face of humanity t o i ndustrial ma nufacturing. Perhaps it was what people – managers and employees – whatever their c ommitment t o s cientif c ma nagement, rea lly w anted t o hear. But did they believe it? Mayo’s a rguments w ere g reeted wi th a s igh o f re lief b y those, l ike A ldous Huxley, who had feared t he consequences of production-line working across society. The myopia of scientif c

Western Electric Discovers Motivation management could focus only on production, sacrif cing richness and beauty to the cavernous hunger of eff ciency. Lillian Gilbreth, the wi fe of Frank, u nderstood t his. Li llian was as e xpert as h er husband in the f eld of motion studies. She also studied psychology t o c omplement t heir ma nagement work. Toward t he e nd of her life she wrote: The people who started t he scientif c m anagement movement did n ot h ave t he advantage of a n a rts a nd letters b ackground or training in philosophy, and they did not read or speak other languages f uently or t ravel a g reat deal. T hey were mechanical engineers, t rained i n t he fashion of t heir t ime. T hey went into industry and devoted their lives to making the best use of their o wn a nd o ther peo ple’s t ime, e nergy a nd m oney. T hey did not realize that management was something that had come down through the ages and was being practiced in some form or another in every country in the world.29 Hawthorne was the backlash against Taylorism. But it did not stop work-study. It tempered it with a timely warning that people were not machines, but it did not deliver a n eat formula or point in large neon letters to the one best way of people management. Across t he i ndustrial f rmament, w here s cientif c management had be en d elivered l ike c ommandments i n t ablets o f s tone, Mayo’s a rguments were received with caution bordering on suspicion. Scientif c management had taken the work ethic and converted it into the shop-f oor equivalent of a Gregorian chant. That was f ne wi th c ompany bo sses. A ll t hey n eeded w as a f ormula for p roductivity, n ot e ndless d ebates o n t he c orporate f amily. Industrialists l ike T homas G radgrind i n Ch arles Di ckens’ Hard Times we re s atisf ed t hat “ facts a lone a re w anted i n l ife.” T he attitude p revails t oday i n a c ontinuing o bsession wi th m easurement and benchmarking. The off cial account of the second series of Hawthorne experiments was wr itten not by Mayo but by two of h is collaborators, Fritz Roethlisberger, a Harvard academic, and William Dickson, a W estern El ectric e ngineer. B oth, n evertheless, w ere u nder Mayo’s inf uence. Mayo had strong concerns about the workplace long be fore h is i nvolvement a t H awthorne. H e w as c onvinced

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The History of Work that l ong h ours, poo r w orking c onditions, a nd b ad po sture cre ated f atigue, s tress, a nd po tential i ndustrial u nrest, a nd n othing h e s aw a t W estern El ectric pe rsuaded h im t o c hange h is mind. O n t he c ontrary h e be lieved h e h ad acc umulated i n t he Hawthorne e xperiments t he e vidence f or a c ounter-argument to Taylorism. H ere w as t he s tick wi th w hich h e c ould bea t t he eff ciency e xperts. C ompanies n eeded m anagers s chooled in human r elations, p eople w ith empat hy, l isteners, cou nselors. Companies needed t he collaboration of t heir workers. T he message was cooperation secured by recognition and job satisfaction. Hawthorne h ad s upposedly d emonstrated a ll o f t his. B ut h ad i t really done so? The management academics, Daniel A. Wren and Ronald G. G reenwood, s uggest i n t heir boo k, Management I nnovators, that Mayo’s strongly held views “shaded” Roethlisberger and Dickson’s acc ount.30 T hey po int o ut t hat M ayo c hanged h is interpretation o f t he s tudies be fore h is c ollaborators p ublished their book. The social needs of the relay assembly workers were brought to the fore and their moneymaking desires were pushed into t he b ackground. M ark P utnam, t he pe rsonnel ma nager involved with t he tea m, had told Business Week that the chance to earn extra money was the prime reason for workers’ increased output. I n a m emo t o M ayo, P utnam h ad s aid: “E conomic a nd f nancial factors are of considerable importance in the test room. The e mployees a re a nxious f or h igh ea rnings.”31 Ma yo chose to i gnore t his evidence, po ssibly for g ood reas on. A fter a ll, t he employees a nd t heir ma nagers w ould s ay t hat, w ouldn’t t hey? This was Marx’s cash nexus. More niggling still for Mayo, it supported Taylor’s c onviction t hat peo ple h ad t heir p rice. H owever well f ounded t hese a rguments ma y h ave be en, M ayo’s l ack o f objectivity, a nd t he nagging suspicion held by some t hat he was manipulating the experiment to support his opinions, exposed the work to skeptical analysis. Should we dismiss Harvard Business School’s most celebrated case study as a dud, a piece of f awed research reported by a team of Johnny-come-lately academics who threw their objectivity out of the window and who were less than rigorous in their methods? I think we should. Mayo had his own agenda and he cooked the f ndings to make it f t, i gnoring t he s ometimes c ontradictory

Western Electric Discovers Motivation conclusions of experienced c ompany re searchers. Eight years of research, t hat s oaked u p m uch o f t he $ 1.52m i n g rant f unding awarded to Mayo’s team, was wrapped up in a handy soundbite – “The Hawthorne Effect,” the surprise result of dimming the lights on ladies who just wanted to be loved.32 It sounded so appealing, so simple, so human. It had to be true, and the most damning point of all is that it probably was. Before the f rst te sts t he w omen i n t he re lay as sembly tea m h ad be en expressly ordered by their foreman not to talk to each other. This kind of autocracy disappeared as soon as they were engaged in the tests, which they greeted as a w elcome release from the normal shop-f oor regime. But it d idn’t d isappear for good. Two of the team were later dismissed for talking too much. Elton M ayo h ad h is o wn t heories a bout ma nagement–worker relations, and he used his interpretations of the Hawthorne experiments to reinforce a nd consolidate h is preconceived views. But he d id not establish t he l ink between t he new-found f reedom of the te st tea ms a nd h igher p roductivity, n ot be yond t he d oubts of t hose w ho po inted t o f nancial i ncentives. H awthorne occ upies a t ainted ped estal i n i ndustrial re search. F or t oo l ong i t was celebrated as a m ilestone in motivational studies – a nd perhaps it was – b ut in terms of convincing production managers it had b arely l eft t he s tarting b lock. As B ernard B ass a nd Ge rald Barrett pointed out in People, Work and Organizations, changes to working patterns and changes in team membership at various stages of the investigation, compounded by the lack of any control g roup, m eant t hat t he H awthorne studies h ad “ very l imited scientif c worth.”33 T he studies were i nf uential, nevertheless, i n the way t hat i nformation a bout t he experiments was d istributed through t he M arshall plan s et u p t o f nance po st-Second World War industrial regeneration in Europe.34 Hawthorne h ad d one e nough t o ma ke a c ase f or t he h uman relations s chool o f ma nagement, b ut w ould t he e vidence c onvince a s itting j ury be yond reas onable d oubt? S adly, a ll t hese years after, the jury still appears to be out. The question for those obsessed with output (i.e. production managers) still comes down to w hat m akes p eople w ork mor e pr oductively – mor e mone y, the attention of others, or both? T he failure to nail t hese points allowed t he “ us a nd t hem” s yndrome o f e mployee re lations t o

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The History of Work prevail t hroughout t he re st o f t he ce ntury. H uman re lations, nevertheless, had secured a foothold in the body corporate. The d ebate h ad be en j oined, a nd i t w ould ra ge n ever m ore f ercely t han i n t he 1990s, w hen c ompanies reac hed t he gl obal wall. T heir ma rkets w ere s aturated. T here w as n owhere e lse t o look but inward. Suddenly every company needed a shrink or the corporate equivalent – a ma nagement consultant. What were the implications of this introspection for work? The focus had turned full ci rcle f rom t he pro duct to t he pro ducer. P eople o nce more were viewed as t he po tential h eroes of t he workplace. How d id you f nd these heroes? Were they born or made? The debate has a lengthy history. It is the story of selection, nature versus nurture, and what makes people tick.

CHAPTER 13

Unnatural Selection ’Tis labor indeed that puts the difference of value on everything. (John Locke, 1632–1704) Frederick Taylor’s w ork-study a t B ethlehem S teel h ad d emonstrated the value of careful selection in the recruitment of workers. One of the fundamental responsibilities of scientif c management, he s aid, w as t o f nd t he s peediest a nd m ost c ompetent w orkers f tted for the job. Selection of the f ttest was doing a k indness to the o thers, h e t hought, s ince t hey w ould be m iserable i n a j ob they could not do so well. That they would have been even more miserable wi thout w ork w as h ardly a n i ssue f or Taylor’s i ndustrial D arwinism. B efore Taylor, j ob s election w as a rbitrary a nd crude. After Taylor it began to develop disciplines. The i nvestigations a t Western El ectric h ad s hown t hat s cientif c methods i n t he nascent d iscipline of psychology could a lso be applied to t he study of t he behavior a nd abilities of workers. Factory o wners h ad f ound t here w as r oom f or i mprovement in p hysical o utput. N ow t hey w ere f nding t here w as r oom f or behavioral i mprovement t oo. T he w orkplace w ould s oon be awash with a new army of silent monitors recording movements, watching, timing, interviewing. In the list of human rights upheld by the Constitution of the United States there may well have been the r ight to bea r a rms, but t here was no r ight of privacy, not i n the workplace at any rate. Workers were a rich source of interest. Scientists had learned to read t heir movements. Now they would try to read their minds. According to Morris Viteles, one of the pioneers of twentiethcentury occ upational p sychology, Walter Di ll S cott, t he N orthwestern U niversity p sychologist w ho s o i mpressed W estern Electric’s ma nagement wi th h is l ectures o n t he po tential o f psychological a ssessment t esting, d eserves st ar bi lling i n t he 177

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The History of Work history of occupational psychology.1 And yet his role in this f eld, perhaps because of his pioneering contributions to the advertising industry, i s o ften o verlooked, ac hieving n ot s o m uch as a f ootnote in some accounts. It is a serious oversight. Dill Scott was the f rst i ndividual t o c onsider t he u se of p sychology for increasing worker output, for improving the quality of work and for recruiting e mployees. I n a g roundbreaking v olume, Inf uencing Men in Bus iness, p ublished i n 1 911, Di ll S cott mad e s ome te lling re marks a bout t he i mportance o f peo ple i n b usiness. “ The greatest business problems of our day have to do with the personnel of i ndustry a nd t he a rts of g uiding a nd i nf uencing men in the achievement of business aims,” he writes. 2 To do this he advocates t he a pplication o f p sychology. “I t i s t he o nly s cience that can give us any sound information about human nature,” he says. These w ere bo ld s tatements a t t he t ime, mad e po ssible b y developments i n p sychological te sting i n Ge rmany, B ritain, t he United S tates, a nd F rance. T he f rst of t hese d evelopments w as a series of psychological experiments r un i n L ondon by Francis Galton, the half-cousin of Charles Darwin. Galton had been regarded b y h is p arents as s omething o f a c hild p rodigy. C oming from a Q uaker family who had converted back to t he A nglican faith, Galton was the f rst of his line to be eligible for university, and h is parents had h igh hopes of h is f uture academic achievement. Although he was accepted to study mathematics at Trinity College, Cambridge, he was never among the elite, a d evastating discovery considering the expectations of his family. Later, w hen h e vi sited a p hrenologist t o h ave h is “b umps” read, t he quack who carried out t he examination suggested t hat Galton’s intellectual capacities would be better exploited by doing some “ rough” w ork. Ga lton t ook a n o pportunity f or s uch w ork by heading a g eographical expedition to A frica, at a t ime when expeditions were exciting the Victorian public. Between 1850 and 1852 he had led an expedition that mapped a large area of South West A frica. H e c ould a fford t o ma ke s uch j ourneys, s ince h is inheritance ensured his f nancial security without the need to go out and earn a l iving. Galton was one of those f nancially secure new a mateurs w ho c ould p ursue t heir i nterests h owever t hey pleased, and he pondered at length whether to live the life of a

Unnatural Selection country gentleman or apply his talents in some creative way. He chose the latter course. After his return from Africa he began to show interest in human reac tion t imes. Ga lton t hought t hey m ight point t o i ndividual differences in thinking ability. The study of reaction times can be traced back to some astronomical observations made by Nevil M askelyne, t he As tronomer R oyal a t G reenwich i n 1795. Maskelyne had dismissed his assistant for having the temerity to record the times of stellar transits – the time it took a star to cross a set d istance in t he f eld of a te lescope – a lmost a s econd later than h is boss. T he error was simply a ma tter of t heir respective reaction times, but no one up to t hat point had given t he matter much t hought, a nd n either d id M askelyne be yond s acking h is slower-reacting aide. About t wenty y ears l ater t he Ge rman as tronomer F riedrich Bessel, w ho h appened t o be i nterested i n m easurement e rrors, found an account of the Greenwich discrepancies and began his own study of the differences in human reaction times. His intention was t o u se h is f ndings t o eliminate e rrors in a stronomical observations.3 Bessel became the f rst man to work out accurately the distance from Earth of a f xed star – 10.9 light years for a star designated in Flamsteed’s star catalog as 61 Cygni. But he didn’t do any more work on response times. Galton w as i nterested i n re sponse t imes f or q uite d ifferent reasons. He hoped that studying the way that they differed could help prove his theory that people inherited the behavior and intellectual c apabilities o f t heir p arents. Du ring h is t ravels i n A frica – still considered t he “Dark Continent” at t he t ime – Ga lton had noticed the ethnic diversity of different tribal groups. On his return he was consulted occasionally by missionary groups for advice about t he m ost s uitable peo ple f or c onversion t o Ch ristianity. There w as a d egree o f n ervousness a mong V ictorian m issionaries that tempered their enthusiasm for pushing out the borders of Christianity. T he n ative s tewpot, bo iling t he c aptured m issionary o ver a c ampf re, w as a po pular i mage i n pe nny ma gazines, not wi thout s ome f oundation. Ca nnibalism i n F iji i nspired s uch fear among Europeans that when David Cargill, a Wesleyan missionary, was selected by his mission society to go there, the meeting was held i n h is absence. A fter he had settled i n Fiji he went

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The History of Work mad watching the locals playing football with human heads.4 The circulation of stories like this in polite Victorian society did nothing to dispel the notion that Europe was occupied by civilized white supremacists surrounded by a world of savagery. This w as t he c ommon be lief u nderlying A dam S mith’s j ustif cation for c apitalism. Smith, di splaying little u nderstanding of other c ultures, h ad re ferred t o “ miserably poo r” t ribal s ocieties without appreciating, as Carlyle did, the simplicity of their needs or t he a bundance o f re sources t hat o ften e xisted a round t hem. Smith’s northern European society was the best society and there was nothing t he “civilized” world c ould learn f rom t he “savage nations of hunters and f shers.” It was the job of the educated to take civilization to the rest of the world. Galton shared this view and believed that selective human breeding would help to achieve this happy state. In his science of eugenics he looked forward to a w orld where a s ociety of i ntellectual a ristocrats could be b red like pedigree poodles. In 1884, in an attempt to gather data supportive of his theory, he set up a series of tests in what he called his Anthropometric Laboratory at the International Health Exhibition held in London’s South Kensington museums. Visitors paid threepence each to try out various e xercises i n Ga lton’s La boratory. Two re cords o f t heir performance were taken by tellers, one for the person undergoing the tests and a duplicate for the scientist. Galton w as t he f rst pe rson t o be gin c orrelating f gures – a practice t hat w ould be come e ssential as p sychologists s trove t o prove the validity of their tests. Validity – establishing that a test could m easure w hat i t c laimed t o m easure – w ould be a l ongrunning a rea of c ontention in p sychological t esting. Even t oday there a re q uestion ma rks o ver t he v alue o f s ome o f t he m ost widely s old pe rsonality te sts. T he s ignif cant question is not whether they can establish the personality traits of an individual undergoing a te st, b ut w hether t hey c an p redict f uture j ob pe rformance from these f ndings. Once Galton had collected his body of statistics it did not take a great leap to begin constructing the mechanics for their analysis. Galton was contacted by James Cattell, an American psychology student who had been studying under Wilhelm Wundt in Leipzig. Wundt h ad s et u p t he w orld’s f rst p sychological l aboratory

Unnatural Selection in 1879, and many of the earliest psychology students clustered there before taking the teaching back to their respective countries. Dill S cott h ad t aken h is d octorate i n p sychology u nder W undt before applying his ideas, f rst in advertising, then in selection. Moving t o En gland, Ca ttell s et u p h is o wn A nthropometric Laboratory a t Ca mbridge U niversity a nd l ater d evised h is o wn mental tests, consisting of various response indicators. In one test, the subject had to name various colors in order while being timed with a stopwatch; in another, a random set of letters had to be repeated from memory; and in another a h ard rubber tip was pushed against the subject’s forehead until the tip began to cause pain. S ensitivity t o p ain w as t hought b y Ga lton t o be re lated to i ntelligence. B ut i t w asn’t. T he te sts w ere a f ailure. O ne o f Cattell’s students was able to show that there was no link between the tests and academic performance. The pioneer psychologists were d isappointed but not deterred by such results. The French-born psychologist, Alfred Binet, carried out some tests of h is own, homing i n on one of t he Cattell tests, i n w hich a s et of d ividers with r ubber e nds o n t he po ints was a pplied t o t he s kin o f t he pe rson u ndergoing t he te st, w ho was then asked if he could detect the separation without looking. As t he points were m oved closer t ogether, t he “ twoness” of t he points became more diff cult to discern. Apart from observing the d ifferent d istribution of nerves i n t he body, t he experiments did l ittle t o ad vance m edical s cience a nd n othing t o ad vance psychology. But Binet be came hooked on t he subject. He began looking at the psychological theories of John Stuart Mill. The young John M ill h ad ploughed h is way t hrough m ost of the G reek a nd La tin c lassics b y t he t ime h e w as t welve, w hen he wrote a boo k-length history of Roman government. He was a brilliant child, in the academic sense of brilliance, but he would have made a poo r Artful Dodger, lacking social skills and basic practical know-how. He was hopeless at dressing himself and had still not learned how to brush his hair by the age of fourteen. Mill had been taught at home, sharing a d esk with his father, the p hilosopher J ames M ill, a nd h e p ut h is k nowledge d own to h is f ather’s teac hing. F rom t he l essons o f h is o wn e xperience h e w as a ttracted t o t he i deas o f J ohn L ocke, t he En glish philosopher, w ho h eld t hat t he m ind o f a n ewborn c hild i s a

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The History of Work blank slate t hat re ceives i mpressions f rom its s urrounding e nvironment and develops ideas by association with external inf uences. The associationist ideas of Locke and David Hume had held sway for m ost o f th e nin eteenth c entury. Th eir th eories u nderlined Adam Smith’s t hinking, i n t hat h e believed t he e conomic wand of c apitalism c ould t ransform t he l ess well d eveloped s ocieties, whose inhabitants he felt sure could be c onverted to the ways of civilization. “ The d ifference o f n atural t alents i n d ifferent m en is, i n rea lity, m uch l ess t han we a re aware o f,” h e wr ote i n t he Wealth o f N ations. “The d ifference between t he most d issimilar characters . . . s eems t o a rise n ot s o m uch f rom n ature as f rom habit, custom, and education.”5 Behind t hese i nf uences of habit, custom, a nd education were Locke’s a nd H ume’s i deas, e xpanded a nd d eveloped b y M ill. Contact with external stimuli mad e t hrough t he s enses, t hought Mill, c ould g enerate p articular t houghts. A f amiliar s mell, f or instance, c ould t rigger a m emory o r s trengthen o r ma gnify a n idea. H e s aw t he d evelopment o f i deas as t he f ormulation o f a recipe, a m ental c hemistry p ulling t ogether v arious i ngredients which c ould c ombine l ike a c hemical reac tion t o form w hat h e called a “complex idea.” This was a contrasting avenue of thought to that of Galton. These t wo d ifferent s trands o f t hinking f ormed t he be ginning of what has ever since be en referred to as t he “nature versus nurture” debate, a lthough people had been deliberating over the source and nature of the intellect for centuries. In 1637 René Descartes had famously declared cogito ergo sum – I think therefore I a m – concluding t hat i t w as t he power o f reas oning t hat set man apart from the animals.6 Cartesian dualism, the idea that body and mind were separate from each other, had been the stimulus for linking reactions to brainpower. The study of reactions was leading nowhere. If some measure capable of distinguishing intellectual ability were to be devised, it w ould ne ed so me ne w a venue o f e xploration. T his a venue was supplied by Alfred Binet, a French psychologist who, like Sigmund F reud, h ad s tudied u nder t he n eurologist J ean-Martin Charcot, director of the Salpétrière Hospital in Paris. Charcot had established the f rst postgraduate center for psychiatric education at S alpétrière. B oth B inet a nd F reud w ere d rawn t o Ch arcot’s

Unnatural Selection investigations of hypnosis and hysteria. Freud trotted back to his home city of Vienna to develop the art of psychoanalysis, which would s pread l ike a n ad diction, f eeding t he pe culiar n euroses and hang-ups of a re gressively P uritan A merican society. Binet, however, used the experience to broaden his associationist ideas, which h ad n ot h itherto a llowed f or t he i ndirectness a nd v ariation o f i ndividual t hinking. B inet mad e o bservations a bout t he difference i n peo ple’s a bility t o s ustain t heir a ttention i n s ome specif c a rea. Ex perimenting with t he reac tion t imes of h is t wo young da ughters, h e f ound t hat o n a verage t hey reac ted m ore slowly t han ad ults, b ut n ot a lways. F rom t his h e c oncluded t hat the a bility t o s ustain a ttention t o a t ask was i mportant a nd t hat children tended to have a s horter attention span t han adults. He also noticed that children made different distinctions than adults between words. Confronted with the word “snail,” an adult might say “ mollusk,” a ware t hat t he s nail c ould be d ef ned. But the young misses Binet said “squash it.” Had they said “eat it,” they might have taken their father’s thinking into the area of cultural differences, but they did not – so thinking about cultural impacts on individuals, society, and f nally on the workplace would have to wait a while. Binet’s o bservations o f h is da ughters h ad f urther v alue. H e noticed that each of them adopted a d ifferent approach to learning t o walk. O ne of t hem, M adeleine, m oved h erself c autiously from o ne s upport t o a nother, w hile t he o ther, A lice, w as m ore conf dent, “staggering l ike a d runken ma n” a f ew steps i nto t he middle o f t he r oom. M adeleine’s t houghtfulness, c ontrasting with Alice’s impulsiveness, led Binet to conclude that people differed in the way that they thought.7 People had different styles of thinking. He continued to devise tests for his daughters as they grew up. Madeleine he desc ribed a s l’observateur (the observer), while Alice w as l’imaginitif ( the i maginative one ).8 W hen as ked as a teenager t o d escribe a c hestnut l eaf, M adeleine re corded h er observations a bout t he c olor, s ize, a nd n umber o f t he f ollicles. She n oted t he “ ramif ed n ervures” o f th e l eaf th at e nabled h er to c lassify t he t ree as a d ocotyledon. A lice, o n t he o ther h and, wrote that the leaf had “fallen languidly in the autumn wind . . . Yesterday, h anging f rom t he b ranch it awaited t he f atal f ow of

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The History of Work wind that would carry it off, like a d ying person who awaits his f nal agony.”9 It is to Binet, then, that the modern personality test concentrating on thinking styles – the way that people approach their work – owes its development. It is to Binet also that we owe a t housand newspaper q uestionnaires o n t he l ines of: “Are you a n A lice o r a M adeleine?” De f ning t he d ifferent t ypes, o r d imensions, o f thinking style a nd devising a reas onably straightforward test for them was the next logical step, but the best efforts of Binet a nd his assistant, Victor Henri, working on a te st for schoolchildren, failed to de liver a nything t hat co uld b e use fully re lated to c hildren’s educational performance. With a d ifferent as sistant, T heodore S imon, B inet be gan t o look at ways of grading mentally subnormal children so that they could be ed ucated in g roups of similar ability. Binet a nd Simon developed a s eries o f t asks o f g radually i ncreasing c omplexity. The idea was that all children could complete the simplest tasks, but as t asks be came more d iff cult it was possible to arrive at a “normal” age for completing a p articular t ask. T his a llowed t he testers to determine that a child, for example, might be ten years old but, because of his or her performance in the test, might display the intellectual capabilities of a seven-year-old. These were the f rst true intelligence tests and formed the basis for the intelligence quotient, or IQ, devised by the US psychologist, William Stern. Stern suggested that the mental age of a child could be d ivided b y i ts c hronological a ge t o p rovide a “ mental quotient.” L ewis Terman, a S tanford p sychologist, p referred t o use the now familiar term, “intelligence quotient.” An American version of the test, developed by Terman and called the StanfordBinet test, would become the adopted measure of intelligence in the US school system for the next twenty years.10 The intelligence quotient was like a toy in the hands of psychologists. T hey c ouldn’t l eave i t a lone. O ne f avorite p astime w as t o work o ut t he po ssible IQs of long-dead ac ademics l ike M ill, who was estimated to have had an IQ of 190, while Galton’s childhood IQ was reckoned to have been 200.11 Whether it was IQ or eccentricity that drove him – pe rhaps they are related – Ga lton at times seemed a c aricature of t he mad s cientist. I n a n a ttempt t o i nduce behavior changes in himself he stuck a magazine cartoon on a wall

Unnatural Selection and c onvinced h imself o f i ts g odlike c apabilities, t reating i t wi th reverence. T he e xperiment w orked, a nd h e be came s uperstitious toward it, bestowing on it the power of reward and punishment. In an even riskier exercise he sought to investigate insanity by producing in himself a state of paranoia. He invested objects, whether living or inanimate, with the attributes of a spy. In a short space of time he was imagining t hat people a nd a nimals were watching him, intent on an act of espionage. Genius or oddball? This was a man who wanted to breed a race o f superhumans, and he was not alone. In t he m eantime, h owever, t he power of IQ te sting for s election, ra ther t han s elective b reeding, w as c onsidered important enough t o a rouse t he i nterest o f g overnment. T he e ntry o f t he United S tates i nto t he F irst W orld W ar l ed t o a c ountrywide recruitment d rive f or t he m ilitary. R obert Yerkes, p resident o f the A merican P sychological As sociation, d ecided t he S tanfordBinet test could be used not only for screening out educationally subnormal recruits but also for identifying the best performers for off cer training. The Stanford-Binet test was not ideal for assessing large groups of people, some of whom would be illiterate, so two new tests were devised – t he Alpha test for those who could read a nd t he B eta te st for t hose w ho c ould n ot. By t he t ime o f the Armistice in November 1918 some 1,750,000 men had taken either Alpha or Beta tests.12 T he w artime te sting d emonstrated the potential for testing on a commercial scale. If tests could f nd the be st re cruits f or t he m ilitary, w hy c ouldn’t t hey f nd future managers and business leaders? Walter Dill Scott had been making this very point at Western Electric i n 1 915, t wo y ears be fore t he U nited S tates e ntered the war. He had a lready begun to r un psychological tests at t he company b y A pril, 1 917, w hen h e w as d rafted o nto t he w artime committee that established the A lpha a nd Beta tests. A fter the war he devised the f rst off cer selection test for the US Army. Meanwhile Western Electric began to use t he a rmy’s A lpha test to assess men who were either applying for jobs or for t ransfers into clerical and production work.13 Dill S cott h as re ceived s cant a ttention i n t he s tory o f p sychological te sting a nd y et, wi th po werful reas oning, h is b usiness writing t ook t he a utocratic V ictorian b usinessman b y t he s cruff

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The History of Work of t he n eck a nd d ragged h im i nto a n ew a ge o f m ultifunctional management tea ms a nd s pecialist pe rsonnel. T he g rowth o f t he joint-stock c ompany m eant t hat i n t he p revious ce ntury even t he likes of George Pullman had been forced to heed the concerns of stockholders who wanted to be assured that the managers of their businesses were pulling out all the stops to improve eff ciency and competitiveness. Frederick Taylor had pointed the way to more eff cient methods of working, insisting that “a f rst-class man can, in most cases, do from two to four times as much as is done on the average.”14 Dill Scott recognized that such increases in output could not be engineered without f rst-class ma nagement. “Men who k now how to get ma ximum re sults o ut o f mac hines a re c ommon,” h e wr ote, but “the power to get the maximum of work out of subordinates or out of yourself is a much rarer possession.”15 As a n e xample o f h uman p hysical po tential c ombined wi th the pe rsonal wi ll t o p ush h imself t o t he l imit, S cott q uotes t he achievement of Edward Payson Weston, who at the age of seventy walked f rom N ew York t o S an F rancisco i n 1 04 da ys wi thout stopping. H is be st d istance o ver t wenty-four h ours w as e ightyseven miles. “We have a choice between wearing out and rusting out. M ost o f u s u nwittingly h ave c hosen t he r usting p rocess,” wrote Scott.16 After reading of Weston’s exploits we might be forgiven for deciding that r usting is better. But that would be i nexcusable in a society driven by Protestant fervor. There are shades of t he Reader’s D igest i n t he w holesomeness o f S cott’s ad vice. You c an f eel t he m otherhood a nd s mell t he a pple p ie. You c an visualize t he f gure of old Mr Weston marching ever onwards, like Forrest Gump, until he reaches the sea. Scott’s Increasing H uman E ff ciency i n B usiness p ulls a v eil over t he n ineteenth-century s weatshop a nd u nfolds t he p rospect o f a m ore re gulated, e nlightened e nvironment w here c are for h uman w elfare i s p art o f t he p roductivity e quation. H e writes of loyalty to t he company a nd of t he “love of t he game,” the idea that work itself must appeal to the individual as something important and useful. Here was something novel. This was placing t he emphasis not just on i ndividuals to enjoy t heir work because it was their duty to do so; it was expecting employers to ensure that the work they supplied had some meaning.

Unnatural Selection Edison h ad ac hieved t his a t M enlo P ark, b ut h e d id n ot r un a p roduction l ine w here t he u rge w as t o ma ke e ver-increasing volumes, where speeding up the line could antagonize employees into d isruptive action. T he g ulf between t he ideal a nd rea lity i n most workplaces remained as wide as ever. But people like Scott were beginning t o increase th eir inf uence i n t he relatively n ew discipline of personnel management. Hugo Munsterberg, like Cattell and Dill Scott a product of the Leipzig s chool, was a nother i mportant ea rly i nf uence on workplace p sychology. Munsterberg, who be came t he d irector of t he psychological laboratory at Harvard University, described a p rogram of industrial psychology when lecturing as an exchange professor at the University of Berlin around 1910 or 1911. Outlining the “big prize” that he believed was achievable in the study of occupational psychology, he envisioned a s ociety where “mental d issatisfaction i n t he weak, m ental d epression a nd d iscouragement, may be re placed in our social community by overf owing j oy a nd pe rfect i nner h armony.”17 There is no sweeter song than that from the mouth of an idealist. A h umanist c amp w as d eveloping s trength, l ed b y peo ple like El ton M ayo a nd M ary P arker F ollett. F ollett w as a head o f her t ime i n her c onviction t hat ma nagement a nd workers would need to cooperate more closely to move their companies forward. It didn’t come easy to management then, and it still doesn’t, but some c ompanies h ave be gun t o p ay m ore a ttention t o F ollett’s ideas i n re cent years. I n t he i nterwar years s he w as s ought o ut by businesses in an effort to improve their industrial relations. At that time, unions were becoming more organized and more politicized. The workshop had become a b attleground between management and labor. Manufacturing work on the Taylorized assembly line had lost the o ld p ride a nd e xperience a nd ma gic o f t he a rtisan’s s kill. Work o r t he c hance o f w ork h ad be en ra vaged b y d epression. Consumerism a nd t he c ash n exus w ere ma intaining o rder o f sorts, where work was in supply. In Germany, work or the hope of w ork h ad p ropelled t he s inister d ogma o f N azism t o po wer. Taylorist i deas i n J apan h ad be en s wept as ide b y t he m ilitarist regime that set itself against anything that declared itself a science. Work in every industrialized country remained the vital

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The History of Work component of production as ma n and machine combined, not in the p re-First World War a rtistic i deal of t he Fu turist m ovement but in a h ighly controlled and supervised atmosphere. Work and the promised deliverance of work were at the height of the political a genda t he world over. Work c ould l iberate. Work, s aid t he Nazis, could make you free.

CHAPTER 14

Arbeit Macht Frei Consider whether this is a man, Who labors in the mud Who knows no peace Who f ghts for a crust of bread Who dies at a yes or a no. (Primo Levi, 1919–87) Otto Ambros was one of Germany’s most outstanding talents in the production of synthetic rubber. In the winter of 1940 he was asked by t he head of h is company to evaluate t wo possible factory sites for a new European plant. Ambros had been the protégé of Richard Willstaetter, the Nobel laureate for chemistry who had been driven out of his native country because of his Jewish faith. Now the laureate’s former pupil was a board director of IG Farben, the c hemical c onglomerate a nd Ge rmany’s b iggest c ompany.1 Its s upervisory bo ard l eader, Ca rl K rauch, h ad a pproached h im to check out the two potential sites. One site was in Norway. The other was in Polish Silesia. The c ontract w as vi tal f or ra ising t he p roduction o f B una, the n ame gi ven t o s ynthetic r ubber, t o a l evel o f 1 50,000 t ons annually, a n o utput c onsidered e ssential i f t he Ge rman m ilitary was to be supplied with all its requirements for the planned attack on Russia. This would be the single largest project in the IG system, one to which the parent company would commit 900 million Reichsmarks, over $250 million at the time it was conceived. Walking o ver t he t wo s ites, A mbros c ould s ee t hat t he Norwegian p roposal h ad s everal d isadvantages c ompared t o t he alternative. The chances of sabotage in Norway were far greater, and any plant m ight be m ore easily hit by British bombers. The other s ite, c onversely, l ooked i deal. I t w as f at a nd f eatureless 189

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The History of Work scrub, p asture, a nd w oodland. T here w as a c oal m ine n ot f ar away and the site was close to the convergence of three rivers, the railway, and an autobahn. The biggest advantage of all, however, was a read y s upply o f l abor f rom a n earby c oncentration c amp which the SS had plans to expand.2 Yes, thought Ambros, this factory site on the outskirts of a small town the Poles called Os´wie˛cim would be t he perfect location for corporate expansion. The Germans had another name for the town. They called it Auschwitz. The IG Auschwitz division was formed to handle t he building a nd production, a nd A mbros was selected as director of rubber production alongside Heinrich Buetef sch, who would head up a synthetic oil plant on the same site. Krauch, a f ormer p rofessor o f c hemistry a t H eidelberg University, arranged with Hermann Goering, the Reichsmarschal, for t he l abor n eeded f or t he p lant’s c onstruction. Goe ring approached Heinrich Himmler in February, 1941, requesting that the “largest possible number of skilled and unskilled production workers . . . be mad e a vailable f rom t he ad joining c oncentration camp for the construction of the Buna plant.”3 The company estimated it would need between eight and twelve thousand construction w orkers a nd a greed t o p ay t he S S f our ma rks a da y for s killed c amp i nmates, t hree ma rks a da y f or t he u nskilled, and o ne a nd a h alf ma rks a da y for a ny c hild l abor. T he workers t hemselves w ould re ceive n othing. T he p roductive c apacity o f t hese f orced w orkers w as e stimated a t a bout 7 5 pe rcent eff ciency. When Himmler agreed to allocate an immediate contingent of te n t housand p risoners, A mbros wr ote t o a c olleague that “our new friendship with the SS is proving very prof table.”4 It was a marriage of Mammon and the Devil. As Jews stepped down from the cattle trucks into which they had been packed for transportation across Europe, they were met by guards with dogs at a n as sembly po int be tween t wo fenced a reas o f b arrack h uts at t he n ewly c onstructed Birkenau, a bout t hree k ilometers f rom the original Auschwitz concentration camp. Once inside, the new arrivals w ere p laced i n t wo l ines: t hose f t f or w ork, ma ny o f whom would be a llocated to the oil and r ubber plant, and those pronounced unf t, who would be led straight to the gas chambers. The S S l eaders h ad crea ted s ome c amps a nd re modeled others – Ch elmno, T reblinka, B elzec, M ajdanek, S obibor, a nd

Arbeit Macht Frei Auschwitz-Birkenau were the biggest – o n industrial lines where the machinery a nd operations were dedicated to t he obliteration of people. The gas chambers and crematoria they commissioned were conceived as if they were process plants, essential stages in a h ighly eff cient l ine of human d estruction e stablished with a ll the a ttention t o d etail d emanded b y t he p rinciples o f s cientif c management. Ulrich Wengenroth, a technology historian, described Auschwitz as “ the T aylorization o f t he k illing o f t he J ewish peo ple.”5 Auschwitz-Birkenau a nd t he o ther extermination c amps were t he alternate face of mass production, an industry dedicated to genocide that could only contract as it succeeded in its mission. As perhaps 2 m illion Jews a nd other prisoners were gassed i n t he Birkenau complex at Auschwitz, others were allocated as slave labor for IG Farben’s oil and rubber business. Slavery had emerged again almost midway through the twentieth century. But did it ever go away? The Nazis had not been the f rst o f t he ce ntury’s Ge rman ad ministrations t o e mploy f orced labor. Pressed by industrialists to meet their labor shortages during t he F irst World War, t he Ge rman H igh C ommand o rdered the army in November, 1916 to begin the forced transportation of Belgians to work in German factories. Men were loaded into cattle trucks at bayonet point. Some 66,000 Belgians were deported in this way, but the program failed when the Belgians refused to work i n spite of t hreats a nd p romises.6 T he Germans were p repared to bully but would not go to the extremes sanctioned later by the Nazis. Between t he w ars J oseph S talin h ad e stablished h is G ulags, the S oviet U nion’s v ersion o f t he c oncentration c amps, w here millions w ere t aken a nd n ever re turned d uring t he te rror of t he 1 930s’ p urges. T he G ulag, a n acr onym o f t he Ch ief Administration o f Cor rective L abor Ca mps, pa rt o f t he S oviet secret police, was, according to t he h istorian A lan Bullock, “an enormous n etwork o f pe nal i nstitutions, i nhabited b y a po pulation of slaves, who made up some 10 percent of the total Soviet workforce and who could be worked literally to death, at the cost of a t hird of t he average worker’s wages.”7 Somewhere between 2 a nd 4 m illion peo ple a re t hought t o h ave be en h eld i n t he camps at any one time.8

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The History of Work The new slave labor was different in one respect from that of classical t imes – t he slaves were not chattels to be t raded. T hey would only be preserved as long as they had some use. In many ways i t w as m uch w orse, be cause i n t he R ussian a nd Ge rman labor c amps t here w as l ittle i ncentive t o p reserve t he w orker. People w ere re placeable. T hey c ould be w orked a nd s tarved t o death. The Nazi a ttitude t o work a nd i mprisonment was a mbiguous. To gi ve p risoners w ork w as t o o ffer s ome h ope, be cause w ork was part of the Nazi ethos. Work was good. It was uplifting, energizing, t he p hysical e mbodiment o f t he s piritual i deal o f b lood and s oil. T he P rotestant work e thic, long s ince s ecularized, h ad been seized upon and refashioned as a ce ntral plank of Nazi idealism. I n t he new Nazi lexicon, t he word Arbeit, meaning work, was given an almost mystical status. It was combined with other constructs to create a new series of words. They are explained in Nazi–Deutsch, a d ictionary of Nazi words a nd phrases, compiled and published in New York in 1943. There is Arbeitertum – workerdom, Arbeitseinsatz – t he m obilization o f l abor, Arbeitsgemeinschaft – a pool or cartel of factories, Arbeitslager – a work camp for students, Arbeitsmann – a man in labor service, Arbeitsmaid – a w oman in labor service, and there is Arbeitsethos – the worship of work or ethics of work.9 Phrases such a s Arbeiter der St irn u nd Faust (workers of the head and of the f st) were created to demonstrate the notion that workers w ere acc orded a s pecial s tatus i n t he s ocial o rder, b ut they were not seen as a c lass in the Marxist sense. The idea was that the worker and workmanship had a permanence, a f xed and secure s tate – n either bo urgeois n or p roletarian – t hat d id n ot aspire e ither t o c limb t he s ocial l adder o r o verthrow t he s ocial order. It was a f olksy view of t he worker. I n t he s ame way, t he word Volk was q uite l iterally p resented as a f olksy vi ew o f t he populace. The Nazis had taken the concept of Arbeitsfreude – joy in work – and added t heir own gloss. Arbeitsfreude was t he g uiding spirit of the German Werkbund, a 1907 alliance of artisans, craftsmen, and i ndustrialists w ho a imed a t re vitalizing Ge rman c ulture b y combining i ndustry wi th a rtistry. T he i dea, s imilar t o t he cra ft movement in England inspired by William Morris, was to reject

Arbeit Macht Frei Victorian excess and revive the craftsmanship that had existed in medieval times. The Werkbund sought to improve the quality of design among German products and, in so doing, restore the satisfaction of the worker in a job well done.10 But work was far too important to belong to a s ingle cre ed. Work a nd t he promise of work were the interwar battleground of left and right. The religious basis of the work ethic mattered not to the Nazis, who drew their inspirations from many sources. In his book, Why Did the Heavens not Darken, Arno Mayer points out that Hitler styled ce rtain as pects o f t he m ovement o n Ca tholic t radition, arguing, for example, that the campaign against Russia was pursued as a h oly w ar a gainst “ Judobolshevism.” T he N azis w ere indiscriminate i n t heir i deological p lunder. T hey p ulled t heir imagery as m uch from paganism and classical antiquity as f rom Catholicism. In a c ountry whose industries had made a s pecialization o ut o f s ynthesizing ma terials, N azism w as a n “ ersatz” ideology f rom t he s tart, wi th e very c onstituent d esigned f or i ts appeal to t he most basic – a nd baser – i nstincts of humanity. It was acutely conscious of popular desires and popular feeling. The Nazi Party’s full name was the National Socialist German Workers’ Party. Work and the search for work were a preoccupation of t hose who l ived t hrough t he depression years during t he party’s embryonic stage. W hen t he slogan, Arbeit Ma cht F rei – Work M akes F ree – w as f ashioned wi thin t he wr ought i ron gateway of Dachau, the f rst of the concentration camps, in 1933, it was intended not as some cynical taunt, as some have suggested, but as a m essage holding out the prospect of salvation. It declared that freedom could indeed be obtained through work in a spiritual sense a nd m ight occasionally even be a ttained i n t he reality of a prisoner’s release.11 Uppermost i n t he m essage w as t he pe rsonal s piritual f reedom promised by the Protestant work ethic. The ideal must have seemed re mote a nd u nattainable for t hose re strained within t he camp systems. But it was, nevertheless, a c onstituent of the Nazi Valhalla to which, as f ar as t he party leadership was concerned, its c orrectional p risoners c ould as pire, e ven i f t heir as pirations would be, in most cases, hopeless. The s logan w as ce rtainly n ot i ntended f or R ussian w ar prisoners. Nor was it i ntended for t he Jews, few of whom were

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The History of Work being thrown into concentration camps in 1933. The f rst internees to walk past the sign were Germans, mostly socialists and other political opponents, rounded up when the Nazis f rst came into power. Some have argued that the positioning of the Arbeit Macht F rei s logan over t he g ates o f A uschwitz was p art o f t he deception m aintained t o c onvince th e n ewly a rriving d eportees that t hey w ere t o be p ut t o w ork. T he b road s cale o f t he N azi deception i s e vident i n t he l ayout o f t he e xtermination c amps, where the use of some buildings was concealed to hide the truth of t he f nal solution. But Arbeit Ma cht Frei was not part of t his deception. The vast majority of the Jews who died at Auschwitz were delivered straight to Birkenau and never saw the gate of the earliest Auschwitz camp. Even t oday, t here i s m uch c onfusion o ver t he Ge rman c oncentration c amp s ystem, be cause s o ma ny c amps h ad d ifferent uses and some were adapted for another role during the war. Dachau, the converted munitions plant, just ten miles to the north of M unich, t he s piritual h ome o f N azism, h ad be en t he f rst of the concentration camps, opened in March, 1933 by Heinrich Himmler, Munich’s t hen ch ief of p olice. D achau was t he p rototype, d escribed i nitially as a “ concentration c amp f or po litical prisoners.” T he i dea w as t o c oncentrate c ommunists, M arxists, and anyone else considered a threat to the state. The round up of Jews came later. Gas chambers were constructed at Dachau late in the war but were never used. O nly four camps – Ch elmno, Belzec, Sobibor, and Treblinka in eastern Poland – were specif cally conceived as extermination camps. None of these operated for more than seventeen months. At least 2 m illion Jews and 52,000 gypsies were murdered there. O nly 82 prisoners survived these four camps.12 Once the camps had served their purpose, the sites were cleared and planted with trees. Auschwitz-Birkenau w as a s eries o f c amps s erving d ifferent purposes. The IG Farben plant even had its own camp within the complex a t Monovitz. T he c amp was ad ministered by c ompany personnel instead of the SS, but it still had its gallows, and prisoners still died there in their thousands. Many of t he c amps i n Poland were close t o o thers o riginally constructed to hold Russian prisoners of war. The Russians could

Arbeit Macht Frei have be en w orked f rom t he s tart b ut t he N azi h igh c ommand preferred to let them starve. Forced labor was not considered initially as a u se for Germany’s prisoners of war. It is arguable that many m ore Russian p risoners of war m ight h ave s urvived t heir internment had the Nazis decided earlier to exploit their labor. Such e xploitation ma y h ave d one n o m ore t han d elay t heir deaths, b ut d elay w as t he o nly h ope f or m ost o f t hose c hanneled i nto t he c oncentration c amp s ystem. T he d ecision t o u se Russian l abor i n t he f all o f 1 941 w as mad e o ut o f n ecessity, after the German armies had been checked before Moscow, and losses were being replenished from the ranks of workers engaged in farming a nd i ndustrial p roduction. But by t hat t ime ma ny of Germany’s Russian prisoners had already perished. The Ge rmans t ook 3 ,350,000 R ussian p risoners i n t he f rst six m onths o f t he c ampaign be gun i n J une, 1 941.13 Of t hese, 2 m illion would d ie i n prison camps before t he end of t he war. The Ge rmans h ad d ecided be fore t he l aunch o f B arbarossa, the i nvasion of Russia, t hat a ny p risoners would be re garded as “useless mouths,” a nd could not expect adequate provisions. By December, 1941, 1,400,000 of them had died. As the Russians were being left to starve in their camps, German soldiers were also dying on the Eastern Front, and their replacements were leaving ever broadening gaps in the German workforce. At the start of the year there had been no great labor shortage, b ut b y S eptember t he l abor s hortfall w as 2. 6 m illion. The biggest shortages were i n metalworking (80 0,000), agriculture (500,000), and construction (140,000). This was in spite of the use of some 3 million foreign workers across the Reich. In m id-October, t herefore, H itler a bandoned h is p revious stance a gainst t he u se o f R ussian p risoners o f w ar f or l abor, declaring: “It is necessary to exploit this cheap source of labor, as we would have to feed the prisoners in any case, and it would be absurd for them to remain idle, merely useless mouths to feed in the camps.” Their d eployment was slow. By t he e nd of M arch, 1942 o nly 166,881 h ad be en p ut t o w ork. T his w as n ot o ut o f s ympathy for t he p risoners. “ The c urrent l abor s hortage w ould n ot h ave arisen,” declared Plenipotentiary for Labor Deployment, Werner Mansfeld, “i f a d ecision t o d eploy R ussian PO Ws o n a l arge

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The History of Work scale h ad be en mad e i n t ime. T here w ere 3 .9 m illion R ussians available; now only 1.1 m illion a re left. Just i n t he period f rom November 19 41 t o J anuary 19 42, 5 00,000 R ussians d ied.”14 Bu t in the camp system the Nazis were never prepared to provide suff cient rations for inmates. Plans were submitted to Himmler in April, 1942 for other work programs to b e es tablished i n t he ne twork o f t wenty-three co ncentration c amps. Forced l abor was d rawn f rom acr oss E urope. By the end of September, 1944 about 7.5 million foreign laborers had been pressed into service, working for the Third Reich.15 The Reich’s need for labor was so great that in the latter stages of the war it began to use Jews in armaments production. Some people were simply plucked off the streets or were caught in SS cordons as t hey a ttempted t o g o a bout t heir da ily l ives. Ot hers w ere known dissidents. John Dalmau, a Spanish Socialist, exiled from his own country at the end of the Spanish Civil War, was f ghting for the French when he was captured during the German advance in 1940. He and two thousand other Spanish captives were transferred to laboring duties i n t he Channel Islands. He was a mong f fty-nine of his countrymen to survive. In Slave Worker, a short account of his experience, he recalls the arrival of Russian prisoners in August, 1942. “Along the road to La Corbière a long column of crawling humanity came into the camp. T hey w ere R ussians, m en, w omen, a nd c hildren – t wo thousand of them, the remains of 150,000 who had walked across Europe, a t rophy o f t he Ge rman w ar mac hine. T heir f eet w ere bare. Only a few of them had rags as footwear. Without exception they were living skeletons, incapable of walking more than halfa-mile an hour.”16 How Hitler believed such individuals could be capable of constructing his Atlantic Wall def es explanation, but nothing about this s lave l abor re gime ma kes m uch s ense. T he d eath c amps showed t he extremes of cr uelty t hat ma n is capable of inf icting on his fellow man; more than that they showed that people were prepared to u tilize i ndustrial e ff ciency as a m eans o f h uman extermination a nd d isposal. T he f ate o f t he Ch annel Is land slaves, e ven t heir u sefulness, s eemed t o be i mmaterial t o t heir captors. S ome s tarved, so me w ere shot , a nd so me w ere pushe d off cliffs. In the sea wall on Alderney, one of the smaller islands

Arbeit Macht Frei of the group, several hundred Russian slaves are entombed in the concrete. Was t his rea lly w hat t he N azis m eant b y t heir s logan Arbeit Macht Frei? Too often we try to apply ordinary common sense to the Nazis, approaching Germany’s wartime dilemmas from a po int of view that might be expected in a balanced democratic society. It is the same mistake that elevates intellectual brilliance over other aspects o f t he h uman s pirit. We read ad miring acc ounts o f t he German war machine and the strategies of its generals, and historians play games of “what if?” as if they almost wished that Hitler’s t roops h ad cr ossed t he En glish Ch annel o r h ad t aken Moscow. They fail to recognize that an ideology so rotten, so corrupt as N azism was s et o n a c ourse of s elf-destruction f rom the beginning. The o nly o utstanding q uestion w as h ow m uch da mage t his virulent ideology could inf ict among all it encountered before it was consumed in the same f ames it had itself ignited. When all but Hitler among the Nazi leadership could see that the game was up, some began preparing their escape routes. Others, like Hitler himself, would continue inexorably toward the black hole of their own making, taking with them their enemies in their millions. Slave labor was used in Germany prior to Hitler’s agreement, but it was organized at a corporate level. When Fritz Sauckel was appointed P lenipotentiary Ge neral f or t he A llocation o f La bor, putting him in charge of the slave labor program in March, 1942, he w as s urprised t o d iscover t hat I G F arben h ad a lready be en “wildly re cruiting f oreign l abor.”17 As l ate as 1 943 t he R eich Minister o f E conomics w as wr iting t o t he c ompany’s o ff ces seeking suggestions about how to go about recruiting conquered workers. The Farben managers were considered the experts. In 1941 IG Farben had already assigned to its plants ten thousand f orced l aborers. I n 1942 t he s lave c ontingent h ad r isen t o twenty-two thousand, by 1943 it was f fty-eight thousand, and by 1945 it numbered well over a h undred thousand.18 Their method before 1941, when they were scouring the newly conquered territories of Western Europe, was to ask the laborer whom they were pressing into service to sign a c ontract. Those who refused were forced to go to Germany anyway. Failure to comply would result in t he re moval o f t heir ra tion c ards. T hey c ould w ork o r t hey

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The History of Work could s tarve. T he c onscripts w ere a lso t old t hat t hey w ould be refused further work in their homeland and that members of their families could face reprisals. Those who came to the IG Farben plants had no freedom of movement. If they escaped, the Gestapo were asked to track them down. As Josiah DuBois, the US prosecutor of IG Farben management at Nuremburg, put it: “Before Fritz Sauckel took over conscription o f l abor; b efore H immler c ommitted t he incredibly sadistic d eeds t hat f nally l ed h im t o s uicide; be fore H itler announced for the Jews an extermination that was to spread like an instant fever to Poland and then to the whole of Europe; before enforced l abor o f a ny k ind w as a R eich po licy, f oreigners a nd prisoners of war had already been enslaved . . . i n the IG Farben camps.”19 Historians have a rgued about the German motives behind the use of forced labor. Hans Mommsen has rightly pointed out that “the f ction behind which the ‘f nal solution’ was concealed was the m obilization o f l abor.” B ut t his f ction c ould o nly s ucceed where t here w as a g enuine n eed f or s uch m obilization. As w ar losses increased, there was an escalating need for substitute labor if the Germans were to push ahead with their grand plan. By the end of the Wannsee conference in January, 1942, there seems to ha ve b een co nsolidated a t hree-pronged appro ach to achieving Hitler’s objectives: f rstly, war as the means of conquest and acq uisition of te rritory; s econdly, extermination (with s ome resettlement of non-Jews) as the means of cleansing the occupied territories of undesirables; thirdly, construction programs, utilizing forced labor, to rebuild the most important cities in the image of the Aryan state. The Jews were to be annihilated. The skills of some would be exploited, but only as a stopgap. Some have argued that there was a po licy, w here J ewish l abor h ad be en s anctioned, t o w ork t he Jews to death – Vernichtung durch Arbeit, extermination through labor. Sometimes prisoners were asked to move stones from one pile to another, then to move them back again. This was work as a kind of torture, close to the notion of Vernichtung durch Arbeit. Whether or not this was a deliberate policy, there can be no doubt that t here was a d eep i ndifference a mong Nazis t o t he c ontinuing survival of a ny Jew. Using work as a f orm of extermination

Arbeit Macht Frei makes no more sense than using the labor of weakened and starving people. This seems to have been understood by Mansfeld who, when seeking t o o rganize s ome e ffective R ussian p risoner l abor, pointed out that it was “absurd to transport these workers in open or unheated freight cars, only to unload dead bodies at their f nal destination.” This was not said out of any humanitarian concern; it was the voice of managerial eff ciency, the voice of Columella calling down over the centuries from ancient Rome, that informed the remark. Mansfeld urged Reinhard Heydrich, head of the SD, the S S i ntelligence s ervice, t o i nstigate be tter t reatment a nd introduce s ome leisure t ime for t he Russian workers. “Ef fective treatment, n ot e xcessively h arsh, w as o f g reat a nd i mmediate importance,” wr ote M ansfeld. H e m ight h ave be en w histling i n the wi nd as f ar as H eydrich was c oncerned. T his was a re gime that h ad l ong s ince a bandoned a ny v estiges o f p redictability o r logic in its behavior. The w ork a t t he I G F arben p lant o ffered o nly t he s limmest chance of survival to those selected for labor. Of the thirty-f ve thousand prisoners taken into the synthetic rubber works, at least twenty-f ve thousand died. On average some ten thousand Jewish laborers were e mployed t here a t a ny o ne t ime. T he l ife expectancy of a worker was three to four months. The regime was described by one former inmate: We worked in the huge Buna plant, to which we were herded each m orning a bout 3 a. m. A t m idday o ur f ood c onsisted o f potato a nd t urnip soup, a nd i n t he evening we re ceived some bread. During work we were terribly mistreated. As our working place was situated outside the large chain of sentry posts, it was divided into small sectors of 10 x 10 meters, each guarded by an SS man. Whoever stepped outside these squares during working hours was immediately shot without warning for having “attempted to escape.” Often it happened that out of pure spite a n S S ma n would o rder a p risoner t o f etch s ome gi ven object outside his square. If he followed the order, he was shot for having left his assigned space . . . Very few could bear the strain a nd a lthough e scape s eemed h opeless, a ttempts w ere made every day. The result was several hangings a week.20

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The History of Work Germany u nder A dolf H itler n ever s eemed t o c ome t o te rms with its use of manual labor among prisoners. The concentration camp system would not have ended with the killing of every Jew in Europe. T here is no evidence t hat t he Nazis considered slave labor o r t he c oncentration o f p risoners as a te mporary re medy. There were plans t o d ouble t he size of M ajdanek, which would have made it capable of holding 200,000 people, almost twice the size of Auschwitz-Birkenau. Who would have been its prisoners? Russians? Poles? Germans? In Mein K ampf, wr itten i n 1923, H itler had characterized t he people of eastern Europe as a service population for the “superior races” of Western Europe. He envisaged a slave society – a Slavic society, indeed, if we recall the origins of the word – working for its Aryan masters. Those who would not or could not work would die. T he Nazi approach to forced labor was a c hilling reminder that t he as sociation o f w ork wi th t he re striction o f i ndividual freedom i s a re curring t heme t hroughout h uman h istory. I n a poem mad e famous a fter h is d eath, M artin N iemoller, t he F irst World War U-boat commander turned Lutheran priest, chided his countrymen for not speaking out. Business d id n ot s peak o ut. B usiness w ent a long wi th t he regime. Business, the capitalist employer of labor, did not earn a great reputation for maintaining the lives of slave laborers in the German Reich. This was what made the story of Oscar Schindler and t he ma intenance o f h is J ewish w orkforce s o s triking. Schindler’s factory i n K raków n ever mad e a nything u seful. H is enterprise, i f it had a ny a im at a ll, was t hat of saving l ife. T his may not have been the reason for its creation – Schindler was an entrepreneur a nd a N azi w ho k new h is w ay a round t he p arty apparatus – but the survival of his workforce became the focus of his ambition. Schindler’s imperative was absent in IG Farben, but its directors did not suffer too harshly for their crimes. No one from the company received a prison sentence longer than eight years. Four men, including Ambros and Krauch, were convicted of slavery and mass murder. Josiah E. DuBois, the chief prosecutor, described the sentences as “light enough to please a chicken thief.” It was no more than he had expected. “I was reliably informed that, even before t he t rial started,” he wrote, “one of t he judges

Arbeit Macht Frei had expressed the view that he didn’t believe it was ever intended that i ndustrialists be b rought t o acc ount for p reparing a nd waging a n a ggressive w ar.” I t i s as i f t he h ead o f l arge b usinesses are exempted from the motives and emotions that drive ordinary mortals. But i ndustry a nd i ndustrialists w ere i nvolved. T he te chniques for killing people employed in the extermination camps had been devised in the Nazis’ euthanasia program. The Zyklon B gas was made by Degesch, an IG Farben-controlled aff liate company. Degesch was reluctant to supply the gas to the SS; not because of its i ntended use, but because t he SS wanted it without a ny odor, and the odor, or “indicator,” to use the terminology of the chemist, was the only constituent to which Degesch held a patent. Degesch directors were not sickened at the end use; they were terrif ed that another manufacturer might steal the product. This was the morality of IG Farben and the companies under its control. 21 The N azis h ad i ndustrialized m urder, a nd t he i ndustrial s ystem was placed at their disposal. Sometimes the system was left wanting. A fter a ll t he d eaths a nd cr uelty a t I G A uschwitz, t he plant n ever s ucceeded i n ma king a ny s ynthetic r ubber. “B una Auschwitz was not only the most appalling failure in the history of m odern i ndustry – i t h ad n o p arallel a nywhere i n h istory i n the uneconomical exploitation of labor,” wrote DuBois. He might have saved h is breath. I n later years, Ot to A mbros continued to share his knowledge with executives in Western chemical companies, including some in the US. The IG Farben executives escaped too lightly. Anyone prepared to work his fellow man to death should be judged with the same severity as t hat m eted o ut t o t hose w ho s anctioned t he s ystem. “Never Again,” it says on the death camp monuments. But history has a h abit of repeating itself. How will business leaders react if it does? Is it within the nature of business to cultivate itself as the moral bastion of society, to speak out against despotism, or will it once more sink to the level of willing accomplice? This is a te st for the future.

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Whatever Happened to Homer Sarasohn? Had Deming and I stayed at home, the Japanese would have achieved world quality leadership all the same. (Joseph Juran, b. 1904) On the afternoon of November 21, 1949, in Osaka, Japan, a young radio engineer from Raytheon stood in front of a c lassroom full of J apanese te lecommunications e xperts a nd be gan t o l ecture them o n t he f undamentals o f b usiness ma nagement. T he e ngineer’s name was Homer Sarasohn. He and a f ew other electronics experts had been co-opted from their companies and assigned to the command headquarters of General Douglas MacArthur in Japan. The victors were teaching the vanquished. It w as n ot a da y t oo s oon. I mmediately a fter t he e nd o f t he Second World War in 1945 the big family corporations in Japan, the so-called Zaibatsu companies, had been dissolved by the US high co mmand, de termined to pre vent a ny re -establishment o f the k ind of economic a nd m ilitary cooperation t hat had characterized the Japanese military regime during the war. This anti-capitalist policy, however, had played straight into the hands o f s ocialist m ilitants a nd t rade u nions. S trikes a nd a gitation were commonplace in Japanese companies as they struggled to re build t heir i ndustries. C ommunism was d ominating Eas tern Europe and China, and by late 1948 the United States had changed its policy. If Japan was to see off the communist threat, reasoned Washington, it would need a strong capitalist base. The corporate sector needed to succeed, preferably in the American way. But just what was this American way? What were the Japanese to l earn? S cientif c ma nagement a ll o ver a gain? J apanese c ompanies w ere i n s erious t rouble. A s eries o f c ase s tudies i n t he telecommunications s ector c arried o ut b y a g roup o f A merican 202

Whatever Happened to Homer Sarasohn? engineers made dismal reading. Some 75 percent of Japanese telecommunications inf rastructure had been d estroyed by b ombing. Even w here i t s urvived i t w as n ot w orking t o c apacity. T hree years after the end of the war the telephone lines between Tokyo and Osaka were open twenty-four hours a day, but they were only manned for nine hours a day, the duration of a single shift.1 The companies, t he e ngineers re ported, w ere o verstaffed, a nd t heir management w as i neff cient a nd w eak. De legation o f a uthority was nonexistent. “The weaknesses of management were causing a tide of regression which, allowed to go unchecked, might well culminate in the collapse of the industry,” warned the engineers.2 The engineers, led by Frank Polkinghorn, a radar and communications design expert at Bell Laboratories, the research arm of AT&T, were attached to the headquarters’ Civil Communications Section (CCS). Their study led to a proposal for a series of seminars in Tokyo and Osaka, designed initially for the telecommunications industry. Not everyone among the occupation authorities was s upportive o f t he c lasses. Off cers i n t he E conomics a nd Social S ection ( ESS) w ere w orried t he s eminars c ould be t oo successful, gi ving t he J apanese a c ompetitive ed ge. M acArthur heard t he o pposing a rguments p ut b y H omer S arasohn, t he group’s radio adviser, and an ESS off cial. As t he meeting ended the general turned to Sarasohn and said, “Go do it.”3 With Charles Protzman, the telephone engineering adviser also seconded f rom W estern El ectric, S arasohn p ut t ogether a te xtbook for the seminars. Sarasohn covered the section on management philosophy, which he would use for the f rst lecture. When Sarasohn entered the wooden-framed lecture room to deliver his f rst class he was just thirty-three years old. In front of him was the crea m o f J apanese te lecommunications t alent, peo ple l ike Masaharu Matsushita, the adopted son of Konosuke Matsushita, the charismatic founder of Matsushita Electrical. It would not be an overestimation of the importance of the occasion to say that when this young American radio engineer mounted the podium, paper in hand, the hopes of Japan were assembled at his feet. An occasion of such signif cance d emanded s omething s pecial, b ut ma nagement te xts c annot n ormally be re lied u pon t o deliver a nything o ut o f t he o rdinary. T he c lass w as e xpecting an o utline o f ma nagement p rocesses s prinkled wi th te chnical

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The History of Work language. Sarasohn was an engineer and young to boot, with little experience of management. But perhaps he felt there was a n eed to approach the subject from its roots. He was, after all, working with an almost blank sheet. So Sarasohn’s lecture began with the most fundamental of questions: “Why does any company exist?” Pursuing the theme, he continued: What is t he reason for being of a ny enterprise? Many people would probably answer these questions by saying that the purpose of a company is to ma ke prof t. I n fact, i f I w ere to ask you t o wr ite d own r ight n ow t he p rincipal reas on w hy y our companies are in business I s uppose that most of the answers would be something of this sort. But such a statement is not a complete idea, nor is it a satisfactory a nswer, be cause it does not clearly state t he objective of the company, the principal goal that the company management is to strive for. A company’s objective should be stated in a way that will not permit of any uncertainty as to its real fundamental purpose. For example, there are two ways of looking at that statement about prof t. One is to make the product for a cost less than the price at which it is to be sold. The other is to sell the product for a price higher than it costs to make. These t wo vi ews a re a lmost t he s ame. B ut n ot q uite. T he f rst i mplies a c ost-conscious attitude on t he part of t he company. T he s econd s eems t o say whatever t he p roduct c osts, it will be sold at a higher price. There is another fault I would f nd in such a statement. It is entirely self sh and one-sided. It ignores entirely the sociological as pects w hich s hould be a p art o f a c ompany’s t hinking. A business enterprise should be b ased on its responsibility to the p ublic, upon s ervice t o its c ustomers, a nd upon t he rea lization that it can and does exert some inf uence on the life of the community in which it is located. These things are just as important to consider as is the prof t motive. The f ounder o f t he N ewport N ews S hipbuilding a nd D ry Dock Company, when he was starting his company many years ago, wrote down his idea of the objective – the purpose – of the enterprise. He put it this way. “We shall build good ships here; at a prof t if we can; at a loss if we must; but always good ships.”

Whatever Happened to Homer Sarasohn? This is the guiding principle of this company and its fundamental po licy. A nd i t i s a g ood o ne t oo be cause i n a v ery few words it tells t he whole reason for existence of t he enterprise. A nd y et i nherent i n t hese f ew w ords t here i s a w ealth of meaning. T he determination to put quality a head of prof t. A promise to stay in business in spite of adversity. A determination to f nd the best production methods. Every business enterprise should have as its very basic policy a simple clear statement, something of this nature, which will set forth its reason for being. In fact, it is imperative that it should have such a fundamental pronouncement because there are some very d ef nite a nd i mportant u ses t o w hich i t c an be p ut. T he most important use of basic policy is to aim the entire resources and efforts of the company toward a well-def ned target.4 Each m ember o f t he class was as ked t o g o away a nd d raft a corporate philosophy for the company, what later became known as a “ mission s tatement.” T he o nly m ember t here w ho h ad n o need of such homework was Masaharu Matsushita. His company was a lready r unning t o a w ell-def ned p hilosophy o utlined b y Konosuke Matsushita some years earlier. Matsushita’s b asic ma nagement o bjective i s w orth n oting, because it was drawn up in 1929 when Japan, like much of the West, was in the depths of depression. It was enough, at the time, for most companies to survive, never mind searching their souls for the meaning of their existence. Konosuke Matsushita thought otherwise. “ Recognizing ou r r esponsibilities a s i ndustrialists,” he wrote, “we will devote ourselves to the progress and development o f s ociety a nd t he well-being o f peo ple t hrough o ur b usiness ac tivities, t hereby e nhancing t he q uality o f l ife t hroughout the world.”5 There f ollowed t he c ompany cre ed: “P rogress a nd d evelopment c an be rea lized o nly t hrough t he c ombined e fforts a nd co-operation of each employee of our company. United in spirit, we pledge to perform our corporate duties with dedication, diligence, a nd i ntegrity.”6 N ot b ad for a c ompany t hat s tarted with a single simple product – a n extension connection to a l ight-bulb socket. Even today, with a p roduct range numbering in the thousands, t he o bjective, t he cre ed, a nd a n ad ditional s even g uiding

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The History of Work principles a re re cited eac h d ay l ike cor porate pra yers b y Matsushita employees as they begin work. Sarasohn was s urprised a nd i mpressed t o d iscover M asaharu Matsushita’s g uiding p hilosophy. “H e a lone a mong a ll t he students w ho a ttended t he C CS s eminar c lasses k new a nd understood t he e ssential i mportance o f t he b asic be liefs o f a n organization as t he starting point for the successful management of a ny c ompany,” S arasohn l ater re called.7 I n t he l ight o f s ubsequent d evelopments i t i s w orth e mphasizing S arasohn’s po int about qu ality, w hen he sp oke ab out t he “ determination t o put quality ahead of prof t.” These c lasses p re-dated t he l ecture t ours o f W . E dwards Deming a nd Joseph Juran t hat would bring both men fame a nd recognition in Japan for their contribution to the postwar quality movement. Sarasohn’s reputation, like that of his contemporaries schooled i n t he q uality d evelopments p ioneered i n W estern Electric, was eclipsed by the subsequent appearance of Deming. Deming became the f rst American to be honored with the Order of the Sacred Treasure, an honor later awarded to Juran but never to S arasohn. S o w hy h as S arasohn’s i nspirational c ontribution been so overlooked? The a nswer is partly related to Sarasohn’s age a nd status. He was a c omparatively j unior e xecutive, s econded i n m id-career. Deming was a n ac ademic t horoughbred, accustomed to ma king presentations and writing up research. He was certainly no management specialist. As a statistician his f rst visit to Japan in 1949 was to advise on the census. He received little cooperation at that stage from the Japanese. He returned in 1950 at the invitation of the Union of Japanese Scientists and Engineers (JUSE) to lecture on statistical methods for industry. Deming bl amed t he p roblems of i ndustry o n m anagement’s failure t o e liminate w aste. H is a nswer w as a p rocess-driven approach t hat pro ved bot h app ealing a nd u nderstandable to Japanese m anagements f amiliar wi th t he empha sis on me asurement s tressed in s cientif c ma nagement. M oreover h e h ad an i mportant s ponsor i n t he J apan F ederation o f E conomic Organizations, an association of Japanese chief executives known as Keidanren. He was speaking to the people who could make a difference in their companies.

Whatever Happened to Homer Sarasohn? Deming was strongly inf uenced by Walter Shewhart, a s tatistician at Bell Laboratories, and by Joseph Juran, one of the rising stars i n W estern El ectric’s c ommunity o f ma nagement e xcellence. Deming adapted his ideas to recognize the vital contribution of employees who, he argued, should no longer be treated as commodities. He set himself against performance-related pay schemes, w hich h e c alled “ fear s chemes,” a nd ad vocated c ooperative p roblem s olving i n tea ms. B ut De ming re mained f undamentally a ttached t o s cientif c ma nagement. H e h ad w orked brief y as an intern at Western Electric at the same time as Juran in t he 1 920s, a lthough t heir p aths d id n ot cr oss u ntil t hey m et in Washington during the war and, even though they were good friends, they never collaborated professionally. Unlike Deming, Juran had a c orporate background. He began looking a t q uality w hen h e w as as ked t o h elp e stablish a q uality i nspection tea m a t t he H awthorne w orks i n t he 1 930s. H e def ned t wo a reas o f q uality – q uality o f d esign a nd q uality o f conformance. The recognition of these distinctions became vital in the innovation and production of goods. Too many companies and too many standards – t he European ISO 9000 standard, for example – w ould c oncentrate o n c onformance w hile i gnoring design. C ompanies, t herefore, t hat p roduced a n average p roduct might be a ble to boast a h igh degree of consistency in the quality of their product, thereby achieving a quality standard, without necessarily h aving p roduced a ny g reat excellence i n t he quality of design. Juran explained these differences in his seminal work on quality, the Quality Control Handbook of 1951. When Deming drew the attention of Japanese companies to the work, JUSE extended an i nvitation t o J uran, w ho be gan t o o utline h is o wn i deas o n quality t o b usiness a udiences i n J apan. M uch h as be en wr itten o n t he d istinctions be tween t he work o f De ming a nd J uran but i t h as pe rhaps be en e xaggerated. T he rea l d istinction w as in their approach: Deming was the academic, leaning heavily on statistical m ethod; J uran w as t he c orporate ma nager, s chooled on c ost c ontrolling a nd t he p ractical e limination o f w aste. T he stronger recognition of Deming depended on two factors: he was the f rst to tour Japan, a nd he had a n award named a fter h im – the De ming p rize, i naugurated b y J USE i n 1 951. J USE, m ore

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The History of Work a p rofessional bod y t han a t rade u nion, w anted t he a ward t o increase i ts inf uence a nd ma rket i ts t raining p rograms i n Japanese companies. Juran has dismissed as a po pular myth the notion that he and Deming were together responsible for Japan’s success in driving quality standards throughout its industries. “In my view there is not a s hred o f t ruth i n s uch as sertions,” h e s aid. “H ad De ming and I s tayed a t h ome, t he J apanese w ould h ave ac hieved w orld quality l eadership a ll t he s ame. W e d id p rovide a j ump s tart, without which t he Japanese would h ave be en p ut t o m ore work and the job might have taken longer, but they would still be ahead of the United States in the quality revolution.”8 The M atsushita a pproach would u nderline t his belief. Japan’s postwar progress moved i n a s eries of steps. Quality circles, for example, were i ntroduced b y n either J uran n or De ming, b ut b y Japanese companies building on the earlier work on quality. By the 1 960s t he g roundwork o f t hese t wo i nf uential e xperts h ad been completed. So had that of the CCS under Polkinghorn. How d id J apanese c ompanies l eap a head u nder t he n oses o f US industrialists? Why didn’t American companies move so rapidly? The answer has everything to do with approach. As already noted, t he J apanese w ere s tarting f rom vi rtually a c lean s heet. They h ad be en h umbled b y d efeat. T heir i ndustries w ere s hattered. Just as B ritish trade unionists were able to create a m odel for industrial partnership in postwar German industries – but not in their own – the American engineers gathered in the CCS were schooled i n c ompanies t hat h ad d eliberately p romoted ma nagement i nnovation. T hey were given t he t ime a nd t he opportunity to p ut t heir i deas i nto p ractice. Ra rely a re i ndividuals gi ven s o much freedom in their working lives. These w ere young m en working a t t he c utting ed ge o f ma nagement thought. They weren’t sitting in the boardroom contemplating the realities of corporate and personal competition. They were able to create a blueprint, unrestrained by the individual foibles, b ickering, po litics, a nd e ntrenched a ttitudes re siding i n day-to-day company management. All of them proved capable of synthesizing the best aspects of contemporary American management and presenting them to the Japanese. They had the time to work out their plans and their ideas were refreshing, described by

Whatever Happened to Homer Sarasohn? Bunzaemon I noue, who became technical director of Sumitomo Electric, as “the light that illuminated everything.”9 The CCS lectures became famous throughout Japanese manufacturing. T hose w ho a ttended w ere s ent o ut l ike d isciples t o preach t he ma nagement m essage i n o ther s ectors. T heir n ames read, according to Forbes magazine, like a Who’s Who of Japan’s electronics industry; men like Takeo Kato of Mitsubishi Electric and Hanzou Omi of Fujitsu. Akio Morita and Masaru Ibuka, the founders of Sony Corporation, were schooled separately by Sarasohn.10 T he w ord f anned o ut acr oss i ndustry. I t m eant t hat Deming a nd Juran were a ble t o e njoy t he ad vantage o f p reaching t o t he c onverted w hen t hey f ollowed o n t he h eels o f t hese CCS pioneers. Sarasohn by that time had returned from what his company would have considered a u seful learning experience in Japan. But he did not go back to his old job building radars. He joined Booz Allen as a consultant.11 In the United States and Europe, the quality movement was stif ed by the concentration among top management on sales. Juran discovered this when he was invited by Rolls-Royce in the UK to deliver a training course for its managers during the 1960s. While touring the aero-engine factories he noticed high levels of waste. He told the then chief executive, Sir Peason Deming, that were he to invest as much energy in reducing waste as he did in the design and build of t he engines, he could cut t he cost of waste by half within f ve y ears. “I t w as a h uge o pportunity,” s aid J uran, “b ut they did nothing. In this company the way for a ma n to work his way to t he top was to i ncrease sales. Reducing costs i n t he factories was seen as a form of dry drudgery that wouldn’t interest most top ma nagers. I w as dealing here with a c aste system, a nd the Samurai at the top were the people able to identify sales.”12 Not everyone in US management had been asleep to the quality movement. S hewhart, De ming, a nd J uran h ad s hared a n o bsessive concern for waste that had been recognized, for example, at Western El ectric. H enry F ord, t oo, w ould h ave a pplauded t heir efforts i n a nother e ra. Q uality, a fter a ll, was nothing n ew – t he medieval g uilds had i ntroduced hallmarks to certify t he quality of their craftsmen’s work. But the quality movement, focusing on continuous a nd sy stematic i mprovements t hroughout t he w hole organization, had evaded the attention of Western management.

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The History of Work In 1980, against a backdrop of falling sales and performance in contrast with the success of its Japanese competitors, US industry was wondering where it had gone wrong. America’s own Samurai cadre w as s hocked b y t he a nswer d elivered i n a n N BC te levision d ocumentary: “I f J apan Ca n, W hy Ca n’t W e?” S uddenly America w oke u p e n mas se t o t he J apanese q uality re volution. While American companies had been locking horns in a struggle to sell, their Japanese counterparts, concentrating on continuous improvement a nd value for money, had shed t heir reputation for cheaply made shoddy goods, winning increasing consumer admiration f or d ependability a nd pe rformance. F or t housands o f U S companies the documentary was a revelation of Damascene proportions. And here was the irony – Americans, who had failed to f nd an enthusiastic response in their own country, had given the Japanese a ll t heir i deas. De ming’s p hone w as b uzzing c ontinuously the next day. The quality movement was not stamped on Japan in one easy lesson. It mad e its way g radually i n a s eries of steps, a nd t hese steps, pe rhaps be cause o f t heir g raduated ad vances, h ad be en overlooked b y W estern c ompanies. C ompanies lik e M atsushita and Toyota had been quality conscious before the Second World War. S cientif c ma nagement w as a lso u nderstood a nd p racticed in s ome J apanese c ompanies be fore t he w ar. B ut t he s piritual ethic of Bushido g uiding t he i mmediate prewar m ilitary regime denounced anything scientif c a nd viewed t he ideas of scientif c management with suspicion.13 After the war, therefore, Japanese companies w ere o bliged t o re learn t he s cientif c management principles that had contributed to their defeat. Polkinghorn’s tea m l aid d own t he po stwar g roundwork. Deming a nd Juran p reached it t o t he m ost s enior peo ple acr oss the J apanese ma nufacturing s ector, o utlining t heir m ethods o f statistical a nalysis, a nd b ig J apanese c ompanies re f ned and developed the ideas within their own production systems. Toyota, for example, had been looking at the idea of “just-in-time” delivery of parts as a way of reducing inventory and waste, before the outbreak of war, but it did not perfect the idea until Taichii Ohno outlined t he p rinciples i n t he 1 960s. I nspired b y H enry F ord’s concerns to keep his inventory to a minimum, Ohno redesigned the workplace so that workers manufacturing parts could access

Whatever Happened to Homer Sarasohn? several operations at once, and parts could be drawn down onto the assembly line as and when they were needed. Ford referred to the supply of p arts i n t ransit as t he “f oat.”14 Oh no, a ttracted t o the way supermarket shoppers pulled products from shelves that were quickly replenished, developed the Kanban wall at Toyota’s Nagoya plants in 1955. The pe rfection of t hese s ystems m eans t hat t oday t he Toyota production line is making cars to order. Instead of a line of uniform models, different models are worked on in succession, depending o n t he s equence i n w hich t hey w ere o rdered. T here may come a time soon when a car assembly line is an open process a llowing acce ss a nd i nput b y t he c ustomer, e ither d irectly or via a n Internet video link, affording greater customization as the manufacture is in progress. Assembly line work may change, but t he l ine i tself re mains t he m ost e ff cient w ay o f p roducing motorcars. The processes of scientif c management, including quality systems that would have met with the hearty approval of Frederick Taylor, w ere a rguably be tter f tted to t he J apanese pro duction mentality th an th ey w ere t o th at o f th e W est, al though th eir importance worldwide m ust be acce pted. As W ill H utton, h ead of Britain’s Work Foundation, recognized in The State We’re In, a po lemic o n t he p itfalls o f c ontemporary c apitalism, J apanese companies can be c haracterized by their reliance on “trust, continuity, r eputation, a nd c o-operation in ec onomic r elationships.” In spite of t hese relationships t he companies ma intain a h ealthy competition. T he Ja panese c all it kyoryoku s hi n agara ky osa – cooperating while competing.15 Herein l ie t he c lues t o t he s trength o f t he po stwar J apanese revival. But what l ies a t t he h eart of s uch c oncepts? Should we believe t hat Japanese workers a re somehow more dedicated a nd industrious t han t heir W estern c ounterparts? A re t hey i mbued with the one-company family spirit that cannot be replicated in the West? Is this the real secret of their success? The answer here is yes and no. The background to the Japanese work ethic is not so very different t o t hat o f t he W est. T here a re s trong p arallels be tween the r ise o f t he w ork e thic i n Western N onconformism a nd t he way t hat d ifferent social classes u nder t he Tokugawa Shogunate

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The History of Work drew on elements of Confucianism and Buddhism to deal with a strictly imposed social order. The work ethic in Zen Buddhism was u sed as a k ind o f c oping m echanism a fter 1603, w hen t he Tokugawa family, based in Edo (modern day Tokyo), seized the power they would hold for more than 250 years. The policies of the earliest Tokugawa rulers were designed to preserve their continuity and prevent the rise of an opposing local ruler among the feudal lords, the daimyo. The da imyo were forced to a lternate t heir t ime between t heir f efdoms a nd E do, w here t heir wi ves a nd c hildren w ere k ept. This re striction o f f amily m ovements w as d esigned t o re press rebellious i ntent. I eyasu, t he f rst Tokugawa S hogun, t hrew o ut Christian mi ssionaries a nd i ssued l aws p reventing J apanese people from leaving their country. Boat construction was limited to vessels no larger than f shing b oats. I eyasu encou raged t rade with Europe initially – particularly in f rearms – but he began to worry about the destabilizing impact of Christianity and Western politics a nd d ecided t o c urtail E uropean i nf uence. O nly one avenue for trade and contact with the West was left open: a Dutch trade m ission w as ma intained i n N agasaki. S ocial c lasses w ere narrowly def ned. Even the daimyo were split into three classes, depending on past support for the rulers. Peasants were required to surrender their swords. Tokugawan rule sought to stif e m ovement be tween s ocial classes. It also stif ed conf ict, n eutering t he S amurai w arrior creed. The more intellectual Samurai explored historical Chinese writings a nd re vived m edieval w arrior s kills s uch as a rchery and fencing. T heir Bushido code, derived f rom t he teachings of Zen B uddhism, e mphasized l oyalty, o bedience, c ourtesy, a nd the importance of learning. The strong moral ethic that emerged melded effortlessly with Confucian principles that stressed a natural o rder i n s ociety. T his m ixture o f C onfucian a nd B uddhist practices w as w elcomed b y t he m erchant c lass as a w ay o f accommodating its ambitions in Tokugawan society.16 “If it was the decree of heaven that they should remain within the merchant class a nd do t heir duty without jealous striving t o attain another rank, then their lust for life was, after all, divinely sanctioned a nd w as n ot m erely a n i mposition o f T okugawa,”17 wrote t he M IT e conomist, E verett H agen, w ho e xplored t he

Whatever Happened to Homer Sarasohn? similarity between this ethic and Western Nonconformism in his book, On the Theory of Social Change. Just as W estern s ociety c annot e scape t he P uritan s pirit, t he Japanese workforce retains powerful l inks with attitudes f ramed during t he s ame pe riod t hat Western N onconformist s ects w ere overturning t he existing s ocial m ores of n orthern E urope i n t he seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. The big difference between the Japanese work ethic and its Western counterpart is the absence of any accompanying Protestant guilt implied by the burden of religious devotion. On the other hand, traditional Japanese loyalty and acceptance of rank has a m uch stronger historical underpinning than that expected from the Protestant work ethic. There has also been the occasional Japanese rebel against the unquestioning acce ptance o f w ork. Ra rely h as t he f utility a nd purposelessness of an overblown bureaucratic system been outlined so p rosaically as i t was i n A kira Kurosawa’s 1952 feature f lm, Ikiru – Japanese for “to live.” Ikiru tells the story of Kanji Watanabe, a town hall department head who discovers he has terminal bowel cancer. Watanabe has a certif cate recording thirty years’ loyal service to the authority. But he concedes that in all that time he has been effectively dead, merely r ubber-stamping re ports a nd p assing t hem t o t he n ext department. The procedure is the same throughout the town hall – problems are passed from one department to another by unenthusiastic off cials. Watanabe w ants t o e xperience w hat lif e c an b e lik e b efore he d ies. H e i s g uided o n a d runken t our o f i mmediate po stwar Tokyo nightlife that can only offer short-term diversion. He sees one of his department swap her desk job for the sweatshop conditions of a t oy factory producing clockwork rabbits. At least here, she argues, she can imagine the joy the product gives to so many children. What j oy d o Watanabe o r h is c olleagues gi ve t o a nyone? I n the f nal p art o f t he f lm h e re turns t o h is d esk, b ut i nstead o f passing t he b uck h e i ntervenes pe rsonally t o h elp a c ommunity secure a p ark on a p rime development site where there are plans to b uild a n ightclub. E ven i n d eath, h owever, h is ac hievements go unacknowledged. The kudos is claimed by others, such as the deputy mayor who, but for Watanabe’s pleading and persistence,

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The History of Work would n ot h ave s anctioned t he p roject. F inally Watanabe’s c olleagues re cognize h is w ork a nd p romise t o re form t heir o wn approaches. The reality is quite different. Back at their desks they quickly return to the safety of the rubber stamp. Ikiru is a commentary on petty off cialdom everywhere. But it also ra ises q uestions a bout t he way we l ive o ur l ives. Is t his a ll there is? W henever people have questioned t he meaning of t heir existence, t he a nswers h ave be en s upplied t raditionally t hrough religion. Work adds a physical dimension to the spiritual meaning – the medium of the message. Luther’s belief in work as a “calling” had be en a s trong e nough ra tionale w hen peo ple d evoted t hemselves t o t heir cra ft. B ut i ndustrialization, wi th i ts re petitive actions, h ad, i n t he w ords o f S tuds Terkel, t he A merican s ocial commentator, “p erverted t he work e thic”18 i n its “planned obso lescence o f p eople.”19 T he m eaning of work for so ma ny peo ple had been lost in the search for industrial eff ciency. One of Terkel’s interviewees, Nora Watson, a n ed itor, put t he workers’ condition like this: “Most of us, like the assembly line worker, have jobs that are too small for our spirit. Jobs are not big enough for people.” The j ob c ould be e nlarged wi th a d egree o f s elf-management. Peter Drucker made the point at General Motors in the 1940s, but it would be l argely ignored for decades. In fact worker participation in production planning was still so rare among Western companies in the 1990s that Masaaki Imai, the Japanese management theorist, used the introduction of participative working at Leyland Trucks in the UK as a c ase study in progressive production methods.20 John Oliver, the head of truck production at the company, described the change in attitudes: “We used to expect our workers to hang their brains on the coat hook when they came into work. We didn’t want them to think. That’s changed. Today they get involved in planning new lines or improvements to the assembly process.”21 This inclusiveness in approach to the whole workforce dramatically c hanged e mployee–management re lations. B ut i t d id n ot occur wi thout s ome o ften-painful ad justment a mong ma nagers. It was ma nagement, n ot t he p roduction w orkers, w ho n eeded to re cognize t hat t he crea tive po tential of a l arge s ection of t he workforce had been wasted for years. Why d id it t ake so long for companies to respond to t he best ideas o f ma nagement t heorists? T he a nswer l ies i n t he l egacy

Whatever Happened to Homer Sarasohn? of m istrust a nd r esistance c reated b y a ssembly l ine e ff ciency and the blind faith that would be placed in management throughout the twentieth century. This was the century of management, a h undred y ears o f ma nagement d ominance i n b ig b usiness. Management’s be lief i n i ts o wn s uperiority h ad crea ted a seemingly intractable spirit of antagonism among production line workers. Management command and control produced results but it was a w asteful s ystem, wasting m ost o f t he h uman i ngenuity residing in the workforce. Tapping this ingenuity would become a lifelong mission for some who became committed to reviving the human spirit at work. I n t he meantime, only t he most t horough examination of the managerial role would create any momentum toward a solution.

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CHAPTER 16

Managing the Corporate State Men have become the tools of their trade. (Henry David Thoreau, 1817–62) The t ide o f t he S econd W orld W ar w as t urning a gainst t he Germans and Japanese in late 1943 when Peter Drucker, an independently minded economics professor at Bennington College in New En gland, re ceived a te lephone c all f rom Ge neral M otors. Donaldson B rown, t he vi ce c hairman, h ad be en i mpressed b y Drucker’s book, The Future of Industrial Man, and its conclusion that business enterprise had be come t he “constitutive i nstitution of industrial society.”1 Drucker w as s uggesting t hat t he w orkings o f t he l arge c orporation were be coming t he organizational model for t he whole of society. How a b usiness c ontrolled itself, its governance, a nd how t he i ndividual be haved a nd o perated wi thin t hat b usiness, had become the standard against which the rest of society could measure itself, said D rucker. It must have seemed t hat way i n a world where conventional institutions had been left wanting, turning to business management as the only system capable of handling the demands of what Drucker called an “industrial war.”2 The ge nerals h ad t urned i ncreasingly t o i ndustry d uring t he First World War, not just for munitions but for supply logistics and for innovation. Germany had come close to defeat in 1915 when its a rmies were r unning low o n g unpowder.3 T he Royal Navy’s blockade h ad s tarved Ge rman po rts o f s upplies o f s altpeter, a vital c onstituent o f g unpowder. T he s altpeter c ame f rom Ch ile. This was t he reason why t he Navy had encountered a f otilla of German warships near t he Falkland Islands i n De cember, 1914. The British had no idea why the Germans were there, other than to threaten their possession of the Falklands. Four German warships were s unk i n t he e ngagement. I n d esperation t he Ge rman government h ad t urned t o i ts g rowing s ynthetic c hemicals 216

Managing the Corporate State industry, ur ging th at i t f nd a s ynthetic p ropellant be fore i ts ammunition ran out. German i ndustry did m ore th an f nd a s ubstitute; it c ame u p with a n a lternative w eapon – s ynthetic g as. Gas w as a n i ndustrial w eapon. B y t he t ime o f t he S econd World War, Ge rmany had accumulated suff cient stockpiles of the nerve gas, Tabun, to have devastated the cities of its enemies. The only reason Hitler did not use Tabun was that he feared that the Allies had similar supplies. I n f act t here h ad be en l ittle ma nufacture o f n erve g as outside Germany. “It is terrible to speculate on the holocaust that would have resulted had Hitler known this and ordered a massive nerve gas attack on London, Moscow or Washington. Or worse, Hitler might have found a weapon to win the war,” wrote Joseph Borkin in The C rime a nd Pu nishment of IG F arben. I f a nyone was ever in doubt about the deterrent value of stockpiles of superweaponry, t hey ne ed on ly l ook at t he N azis’ d eliberations o ver the use of Tabun.4 Even in the darkest days of the world’s darkest regime its use was never sanctioned. Industry made the most terrible weapons, but business leaders could still retreat from the larger moral questions about their application. How long could business preserve t his detachment? It had been f ghting the war with the generals. Some companies – Ford, f or e xample – e ven f ound t heir ma nufacturing o perations exploited by the military in opposing nations.5 Business was centrally e ngaged, d riving t he i ndustrial juggernaut i n a w orld t hat had unleashed its most destructive forces as competing ideologies struggled f or s upremacy acr oss t wo c ontinents. T he c ustomary maneuverings dictated by national interest had been temporarily subsumed in a t hree-cornered f ght be tween t he c auses o f f ascism, communism, and democracy. The war was not portrayed in this way to the rank-and-f le combatants. The soldier in his trench was battling for Britain, f ghting for t he F atherland, o r d efending M other R ussia. B ut t he l eaders who gathered at Potsdam a nd Yalta were playing for h igher stakes. T hey k new t hat be hind t heir n ational i nterests t hey were f ghting f or a w ay o f l ife, a s ingle d ominating s ystem o f government a nd c ontrol t hat w ould be st e quip t he w orld t o g o forward. T he l arger s takes w ere i deological – c apitalism o r communism. W hich i deology w ould p revail a fter t he f reakish

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The History of Work phenomenon of National Socialism h ad be en re moved f rom t he stage? Each o f t hese c ompeting i deologies, a rgued D rucker, c ould be vi ewed as “ different c oncepts i n a B ig B usiness i ndustrial society.”6 H e pe rceived t hat t he p rivately f unded b usiness s ystem c ould s take a c laim f or t he o rganizational h igh g round in t he po stwar c limate. H e i nsisted t hat “ the f rst w ar rea lly t o be fought as an industrial war” should be settled in an “industrial peace – w here industry is at the center of peacetime social organizations.”7 The rhetoric (if not the reality) implied by such a statement was music to the corporate ear. No longer could those who ra n b usiness be d ismissed as p ariahs o r p rof teers. They were ready to take their place at the fulcrum of moral and social behavior. Most of them were not ready, of course, but it was f attering o f P eter D rucker t o p ropose t hat t hey w ere. I n d oing s o he had created a c ontext for corporations i n society. Companies could n o l onger d istance t hemselves f rom t he re sponsibilities borne by other institutions. Companies not only had to face up to their increasing international presence, they needed to understand their internal structure far be tter. A t Ge neral M otors D rucker w ould d ef ne this structure, identifying the constituent parts and the respective roles and responsibilities of corporate ma nagement.8 At t he t ime, t he idea that his study would become a management book seemed faintly ludicrous, even to D rucker. “Most ma nagers d id not rea lize t hat they were practicing management. The general public, while very interested in how the rich made their money, had never heard of management,” h e wr ote i n h is a utobiography, Adventures of a Bystander, adding: “A book on such esoteric subjects as organization and structure, the development of managers, and the role of foreman and middle manager, was surely going to go unread.”9 Drucker’s re trospective c omment o n ma nagement i s a d ebatable point. The public knowledge of management may have been limited, b ut e ver s ince t he j oint s tock c ompany, c ombined wi th the acceptance of the principle of limited liability, had allowed a scaling-up o f c orporate a mbitions, d irectors o f t he l argest c ompanies had become intensely interested in how best t o organize and run their businesses. Business was taught in business schools established as adjuncts to universities. The Wharton School at the

Managing the Corporate State University of Pennsylvania had been the f rst in 1881. Others followed i n Ca lifornia, New York, a nd Boston. M anagers were o n the ground, working inside companies. Their u nderstanding o f t he ma nagerial r ole w as i mproving, fed by different streams of organizational thinking. In the United States F rederick Taylor’s s cientif c ma nagement h ad crea ted t he need f or tea ms o f w ork-study peo ple w ho o rganized a nd t hen supervised t he w orkplace o n m ore e ff cient l ines. I n F rance Henri Fayol had applied himself ceaselessly in developing effective tiers of administration at the Commentry-Fourchambault and Decazeville mining company, where he began his career in 1866. In Germany Max Weber had outlined a bureaucratic ideal, where organizations were controlled by a mechanistic but eff cient chain of authority governed by rules and procedures. If company bosses were struggling to meld these ideas, particularly i n t he l ight o f c oncerns for ma intaining h uman re lations, they could call on outside help. T hose who had championed t he methods of scientif c management found they could earn freelance fees t aking t heir k now-how i nto co mpanies a s co nsultants. T he engineering c ompany A rthur D. L ittle found th ere was gr owing business in such consultancy. Academics were spotting the main chance t oo. El ton M ayo h ad s uccessfully t apped t he c offers o f business foundations to pursue h is studies of human behavior at Western Electric. James McKinsey, a p rofessor at t he University of Chicago, had used his knowledge of accounting to help the US Army handle its supply logistics in the First World War, establishing his own consultancy in 1925. There was already a strong body of understanding that companies needed a chain of command and specialist a reas o f e xpertise, a lthough t he s tyle o f ma nagement could vary enormously, from Edison’s creative collective at Menlo Park to Henry Ford’s autocratic generalship at River Rouge. The transfer of so many managers to war duties brought companies in to c loser c ontact w ith m ilitary-style c ommand c hains, but t he m ilitary i tself h ad be en e volving d uring t he i nterwar years, grappling with the science of logistics and supply in order to maintain operations that could stretch across continents. Scale was creating a d evolution of ma nagement a nd a n u nderstanding that management skills could be learned and applied in different businesses or organizations.

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The History of Work Academic institutions were already venturing into corporations. The w ork u ndertaken b y u niversity resea rchers at W estern Electric h ad d emonstrated t he po ssibilities a nd l imitations o f academic research inside companies. The idea of inviting a lone o perator l ike P eter D rucker i nstead o f a tea m o f re searchers who m ight cause too many waves appealed to Alfred Sloan, General M otors’ c hairman. H e ma y a lso h ave s een D rucker, a man wi th n o p revious b usiness e xperience, as l ess t hreatening t han a M cKinsey c onsultant. M arshall F ield, t he Ch icago department s tore f ounded b y i ts n amesake ( who h ad be en o ne of t he re gulars wi th Geo rge P ullman a t t he m illionaires’ d ining t able), h ad l earned t o i ts c ost t he c onsequences o f f alling t oo d eeply u nder t he c onsultant’s s pell. I n 1 934 t he bo ard had i nvited James McKinsey, t he h ighest p aid c onsultant i n t he United States at $500 a day, to study the company’s problems. A y ear l ater h e w as c hairman. Two y ears a fter t hat, s uccumbing to illness brought on by the pressure of work, the company’s declining fortunes, and the threat of forced resignation, he died. According to American Business magazine, “he died, as so many businessmen have died, as sacrif ce to a job that made impossible demands.”10 McKinsey, like George Pullman, had found that the work ethic demanded your every waking moment. He spent Saturdays at the off ce and brought work home on Sundays. His work regime consumed h im, l eaving l ittle t ime for h is f amily. “H e wasn’t m uch of a S anta,” wr ite J ames O ’Shea a nd Ch arles M adigan i n t heir book, Dangerous Company. “Toys and frivolous purchases were viewed as n onessential.”11 McKinsey was l iving t he ethic of h is Puritan forebears. H is h ome was h is church, a nd t oys a nd f rippery were unconscious reminders of pre-Reformation ecclesiastical decadence. The V iennese-born D rucker, s on of a s enior Austrian e conomist, had an eclectic enough upbringing to be inf uenced b y a variety o f m uses a nd m entors, b ut h e, t oo, c ould re f ect o n t he values of a Lutheran background in memories of Bertha Bond, his g randmother o n h is m other’s s ide. B ertha B ond h ad be en an acc omplished c oncert p ianist. I n h er l ater y ears s he w ould disguise her worldliness by pref xing statements with “I am only a stupid old woman, but . . .”

Managing the Corporate State This self-deprecatory remark was often combined with a f attering a pproach: “You l ook l ike a n i ntelligent young ma n,” s he would s ay t o d isarm h er vi ctim. A nyone o n t he re ceiving e nd of such remarks could be assured that they were in for a pummeling, often verbal, s ometimes p hysical. She was n ot a n i ntellectual, s ays D rucker, s he w as m ore t han t hat. S he w as wi se. Bertha Bond was a l egend in her own family. Her ancestors had been silk weavers, then merchants. Theirs w as a w orld o f s killed cra ftsmen, o f re sponsible g uild members; a s mall w orld b ut o ne o f c oncern a nd c ommunity, workmanship a nd s elf-respect. T here w ere n o r iches i n t hat world, but modest self-reliance. “I a m but a stupid old woman,” echoed the self-limitation of the skilled craftsman who did not envy the great ones of this world and never dreamed of joining their ranks; who knew himself to be as good as they, and better at his trade. It was a world that respected work and the worker.12 There is a lot of Bertha Bond in Peter Drucker, the f rst of the management g urus. He has rejected t he term “guru,” describing himself as a journalist or as a “bystander,” the word he uses in his autobiography. But h is rejection is d isingenuous. He goes t o some l ength in th e b ook t o di stinguish th e In dian t erm “ guru” from that of “teacher.” The best teachers at Bennington College, wrote Drucker, were not teachers but pedagogues, programmers of learning like Socrates, whose method was to point the way to learning, to mark out the path for his students to follow. This was Drucker’s w ay – p rodding, c ommentating, cr iticizing, p raising, inspiring, being insightful. He helped to def ne a new relationship between ac ademics a nd b usiness, crea ting a n overlap of mutual respect where each could appreciate the concerns of the other. The o verlap w as h ardly a ll e nveloping. B usiness w ould s till distrust ac ademia, a nd ac ademics w ould s till l ook d own t heir noses a t t he workings o f b usiness. W hen D rucker wr ote u p h is General M otors s tudy i n Concept of th e Co rporation, t he o nly deletions suggested by Sloan were two references to the General Motors technical institute in Flint, Michigan. The General Motors Institute, originally established for apprentices, had been converted by S loan i nto a n e ngineering s chool f or h ourly p aid w orkers.

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The History of Work But Sloan was afraid to publicize the school because of ingrained prejudice a mong s elf-made b usinessmen a t t hat t ime a gainst those with a college education. The e xclusion o f N onconformists f rom a cademic i nstitutions in s eventeenth- a nd e ighteenth-century En gland h ad c ome f ull circle, creating residual d istrust a mong t he descendants of t hose who prospered without the help of academia. It bred an antipathy toward academia in US entrepreneurs. American entrepreneurism was characterized by equality of opportunity, independent thinking, a nd t he ra gs-to-riches i mage o f t he s elf-made ma n. B ut b y the 1940s the world had moved on, and ingrained prejudices were fading, though still real enough. This meant that companies such as Ge neral M otors – w hich h ad be come c onvinced o f t he n eed for well-educated employees, particularly a mong its ma nagers – nevertheless approached the selection and development of a management cadre with some circumspection. The p rejudice w orked bo th w ays. A cademia w as as c autious and as prejudiced as business about cooperation. When Lord Nuff eld, t he B ritish c armaker, a pproached Ox ford U niversity with t he o ffer o f a n e ndowment t o e stablish a n ew c ollege, t he dons w ere d etermined n ot t o s oil t heir h ands wi th t he s tain o f commerce, s o t hey crea ted a s ocial i nstitution d evoted t o t he interests of the working ma n rather than the employer. Business and l earning were as d ivorced as wi ne a nd vi negar i n t he ac ademic mind. Concept of th e Co rporation d id n ot crea te b usiness ma nagement. N or d id i t re veal ma nagement’s e xistence t o a c urious world. U nlike B enjamin F ranklin’s Poor R ichard’s A lmanac, it would n ot be read b y t he p ublic. But it was read b y b usiness people, a nd i t d id m ore t han a ny p revious boo k t o po pularize ma nagement as a l earnable d iscipline. It elevated t he role of management i n s ociety. I n D rucker’s o wn w ords i t “ set o ff t he management boom” across postwar industry and beyond. By the 1970s, management was so accepted a p art of organizations that Drucker c ould wr ite t hat “w e e ven acce pt t he boo k’s as sertion that ‘management’ is not peculiar to business enterprise but is the specif c organ of all institutions of modern society.”13 It was another debatable point.

Managing the Corporate State The e ncroachment o f c orporate-style ma nagement i nto h ospitals, ed ucation, a nd t he c ivil s ervice a mong Western i ndustrialized n ations would be g reeted with re sistance a nd re sentment by some, particularly in Europe, where social reformers were far from c onvinced t hat t he b usiness m odel h ad be come o r s hould become t he “representative social i nstitution” to which a ll other institutions should pay due deference.14 Drucker’s organizational ideal was d rawn f rom a h istoric a nd specif cally A merican pe rspective, a nd t he i deological b attle between capitalism, communism, and fascism had hardly existed in the USA. Even in the troubled times of turn-of-the-nineteenthcentury A merica, w hen b usiness l eaders h ad h ired P inkerton detectives a nd s hop-f oor s pies t o roo t o ut a gitators a nd l abor organizers, t he c ause h ad be en o ne-sided. A merican l aborers wanted fair wages a nd reasonable working conditions. T hey d id not want to overthrow capitalism. Drucker w as c orrect i n h is pe rception o f t he g rowing i mportance of management teaching and the Master’s degree in Business Administration (MB A) a s a m anagement qualif cation. He was correct also in his reading of business organization, although there remains a f ragility i n c orporations c ompared t o, s ay, t he n ation state. T his ma y be n o b ad t hing. C ompanies s ettle t heir d ifferences not on the battlef eld or in diplomatic exchanges but in the marketplace, their future – or lack of it – dictated by the oftenf ckle re lationship be tween b uyer a nd s eller. C ompany ma nagements s ometimes f orget t his. T hey a re f ooled i nto t hinking t hat their relationship with the customer is a given, as if it is some kind of treaty between nations etched in stone or signed in blood. It is not. The seller–buyer relationship is like a living organism that has to be fed and nurtured every single day. Marks & S pencer, t he B ritish H igh S treet re tailer, p robably k new its customers as w ell as a ny business until it began to ignore them, neglecting its bedrock of loyal support, losing touch with their expectations. Once it had stopped treating its customers as s pecial peo ple, a re sidue o f g oodwill s ustained t he re lationship for a while. Then, quite suddenly, in 1998, like a partner who gi ves u p o n a ma rriage t hat h as be en g oing n owhere f or years, customers began to lose interest, and the Marks & Spencer

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The History of Work management was plunged i nto re criminations, wondering where things had gone wrong. Drucker was never a man to weep at corporate demise through its o wn i ncompetence. “ There i s n o l aw t hat s ays a c ompany has t o l ast f orever,” h e s aid. A fter a ll, J oseph S chumpeter, t he Austrian economist and friend of Drucker’s father, had promoted a theory of turbulent capitalism, where innovation and growth in one company could destroy a ma rket for others and in the process create a new market and yet more innovation. This process of “creative destruction”15 would become topical in the accelerated phase of growth, demise, merger, and rejuvenation that occurred in 2000. It was as i f the economy had become engaged in some sprightly Dance of Siva absorbing and pacifying every new horror that came its way. Meanwhile technology stocks were falling like mayf ies, conf rming Drucker’s self-evident observation. Peter Drucker was hailed as a corporate visionary. Henry Ford II, after read ing D rucker’s boo k, w ould s eek t o e mulate t he f ederated arrangements of Alfred Sloan (building, it should be said, on groundwork pursued by Sloan’s predecessor, Pierre du Pont) where GM d ivisions were a llowed t o r un t heir own o perations, g uided by a ce ntralized po licy-making c ommittee. F ord w as n ot a lone. According to Tom Peters, the management writer and consultant, Drucker could be cred ited with “moving 75 to 80 pe rcent of t he Fortune 500 to radical decentralization.”16 If this is true, it shows the extent to which companies are driven by the herd instinct. General M otors w as n ot d ecentralized be cause A lfred S loan thought it a g reat ma nagement m odel, but be cause h e c ould s ee no be tter w ay t o o rganize a nd c ontrol a c orporate e mpire b uilt from acquisitions. Once they were within the General Motors fold the independently minded founders running these acquired companies would continue to take exception to some higher authority telling t hem h ow t o g o a bout t heir b usiness u nless t hat a uthority could be clothed in the structure of federalism. This structure involved a n in terlinked n etwork o f di visions, c ommittees, a nd subcommittees in which everyone appeared to have some say but which ultimately always deferred to the wisdom of Alfred Sloan. Sloan’s style of leadership was Socratic, posing the diff cult question which, in the asking, suggested a solution. Beneath the theory it was the cussedness of the American entrepreneur that created

Managing the Corporate State the d ecentralized s tructure o f Ge neral M otors. A lfred S loan looked at what he had and developed a system that made it work. Drucker u nderstood t his. H e h imself was n ot p rescribing t he decentralization p ill, n ot f or h ealthy c ompanies, a nyway. B ut he re cognized i ts s trength, c omparing i t t o t he s tructure o f t he Catholic hierarchy and of the Prussian general staff between 1800 and 1870. Corporate imitation might not have been so enthusiastic h ad h e h ighlighted t hese examples i n a nything b roader t han a footnote. Only Drucker could have conceived such an unlikely triumvirate as Field Marshal Helmuth von Moltke, Alfred Sloan, and t he Pope. I n fact D rucker’s own ideas on c orporate o rganization w ent f urther t han t hose o f S loan. D rucker w as s eeking to i nf uence n ew s tyles o f f actory w orking t hat w ould o nly be adopted by the most progressive of manufacturing managements some f orty o r f fty y ears l ater. I n p articular h e w as p roposing “self-managed plant communities.” It was the concept of empowerment or, in his words, “the assumption o f m anagerial r esponsibility b y t he i ndividual emp loyee, the w ork tea m, a nd t he e mployee g roup a like f or t he s tructure of t he i ndividual j ob, f or t he pe rformance o f ma jor t asks, a nd for the management of such community affairs as shift schedules, vacation schedules, overtime assignments, and, above all, employee benef ts.”17 T he idea would evolve p artially a nd i ndependently i n quality circles developed by ma nufacturers in postwar Japan. But the principle was the same. Drucker envisaged a workplace where the worker was the master of his or her own job. It s eemed t hat n either ma nagers n or w orkers w ere read y for s uch e mployee a utonomy, n ot a t Ge neral M otors a nyway. Management viewed the idea as encroachment on to their turf. Likewise, labor unions were unenthusiastic. They wanted a “ visible bo ss” w ho c ould be i dentif ed as t he e nemy. B ut D rucker knew he was on to something. He had noticed how work tea ms covering wartime projects, when there were too few supervisors to go around, had assumed responsibility for their jobs, often with superior results. Why couldn’t this be replicated in peacetime? “Of all my work on management and ‘the anatomy of industrial order,’” he wrote later, “I consider my ideas for the self-governing plant c ommunity a nd for t he re sponsible worker t o be bo th t he most important and the most original.”18

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The History of Work The i dea ma y n ot h ave be en q uite as o riginal as D rucker suggested. I n h is boo k, Workers’ C ontrol i n A merica, D avid Montgomery re minds u s t hat u nionized tea ms o f i ron-rolling workers a t t he C olumbus I ron Works i n Oh io w ere n egotiating overall ra tes f or t he c ompany f or eac h o f i ts c ontracts be tween 1873 and 1876. The company management would propose a contract, a nd t he r olling tea ms would state t he p rice a t which t hey were p repared t o u ndertake t he w ork. T hey w ould t hen d ecide among themselves how much each worker would receive for his or her contribution. They also decided the workload on any particular da y a nd w orked o ut t he w ay w orkers c ould p rogress i n their jobs. “ To p ut it a nother way,” wr ote Montgomery, “all t he boss did was to buy the equipment and raw materials and sell the f nished product.”19 These n ineteenth-century i ron-working practices do not seem far re moved f rom s elf-managed tea ms. T he a bility of u nions t o organize such work may well have been a signif cant deterrent to companies such as General Motors accepting Drucker’s proposal. Managers were fearful of instigating anything that appeared to be h anding over power t o t he workers. N ot u ntil t he l atter p art of t he t wentieth ce ntury, w hen re -engineering be came t he b ig fashion, did companies begin to fall over t hemselves to h ive off whole areas of nonessential or “noncore” business on a contractual b asis. S horn o f i ts u nion as sociation, s elf-management was suddenly acceptable. The idea of the self-managed worker had appealed to Charles Wilson, Ge neral M otors’ c ompany p resident a nd c hief o perating off cer, who would succeed Sloan as c hief executive off cer. But Wilson d id not t hink it would be w elcomed i n a w orkplace characterized b y ad versarial re lations be tween ma nagement and e mployees. A fter t he e nd of t he war h e d ecided t o c anvass the workers to tap into their concerns. His staff came up with a competition, w hich th ey th ought w ould b e b etter r eceived th an a survey. Employees were asked to submit essays outlining “My Job a nd W hy I Li ke It” with prizes for t he best entries. A lmost 200,000 employees, two-thirds of the workforce, responded. The response was so great that the judges – Drucker was one of them – read n o m ore t han a f ew t housand. T he re st w ere l abeled a nd cataloged.

Managing the Corporate State Those e ntries t hat w ere read b y t he j udges re vealed t hat t he obvious rewards for work, such as p ay and promotion, were part of employee expectations. If these factors were not handled well they could demotivate workers. But they were not, in themselves, important incentives. Frederick Herzberg, another student of motivation, would l ater c all such i ssues “hygiene factors.” T he m ost powerful m otivators, s aid D rucker, we re a chievement, c ontribution, a nd re sponsibility. P eople, h e f ound, w anted t o f nd satisfaction in their work. “They resent nothing so much as not to be allowed to do the work they know they are being paid for, whatever it may be,” he wrote.20 The employees wanted t o respect t heir c ompany but believed there w as n o c onf ict be tween t his d esire a nd t heir m embership o f a t rade u nion a nd d id n ot s ee a n a llegiance t o bo th as mutually e xclusive. D rucker d escribed t he da ta as “ the r ichest re search ma terial o n e mployee a ttitudes a nd w orker v alues ever brou ght to gether.”21 W hatever t heir v alue, t he e ssays w ere boxed a way a nd f orgotten, n ot a t t he ma nagement’s i nstigation but a t t he i nsistence o f t he s tewards a t t he U nited A utomobile Workers. The union was so suspicious of the exercise, its off cials insisted that any further work on the data be s helved as a c ondition o f i ts p ay c laim i n 1948. A nother o pportunity t o teas e o ut the c onstituents o f e mployee m otivation h ad be en l ost. W ilson had f ound t hat t he o nly w ay t o ac hieve u nion acce ptance f or a management idea, even for something that would benef t employees, was for the union to perceive that it had won something for its m embers. W ilson, h owever, ma y h ave be en t oo pe ssimistic about union opposition a nd Drucker too ready to absorb t his pessimism. The i ncentive p lan d evised i n 1 938 b y J oseph S canlon, a union off cial at t he La P ointe Steel Company, h ad some of t he hallmarks of t he s elf-governing plant c oncept. I n t his c ase both company and employees were desperate to secure a formula that would s ave t he c ompany a nd i ts j obs b y i ncreasing p roduction. The S canlon p lan w as ce ntered o n a s uggestion s cheme a nd production c ommittees i n w hich w orkers a nd ma nagement d iscussed i deas t ogether. N o s ingle i ndividual be nef ted from a good s uggestion, b ut c ost s avings w ere re warded b y bo nuses paid acr oss t he w orkforce. T he S canlon p lan, w hich s aved t he

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The History of Work business, showed that something close to the self-managed plant was ac hievable w here t here was a m utual d esire t o b ring a bout management and worker cooperation, even during the 1930s. Drucker’s ideas on self-managed work groups would have to wait to f nd a m ore willing audience. But in every other respect, the timing of Concept of the Corporation was perfect. Only later would D rucker d iscover t hat s ome o f h is i deas h ad be en p ioneered q uite s eparately b y M ary P arker F ollett, a ma nagement prophet. Du ring h er l ifetime h er vi ews h ad be en s ought o ut b y business l eaders h ungry f or g uidance o n h uman re lations, a nd today she is revered by management academics, but her observations were forgotten a nd i gnored for d ecades a fter h er d eath i n 1933. Warren Bennis describes her as a “ swashbuckling advance scout o f ma nagement t hinking,” a nd f or D rucker s he i s “ the brightest star in the management f rmament.”22 Yet when Drucker began to grow interested in management in 1941 her work was overlooked by those he canvassed for references. Harry Hopf, an expert on m anaging i nsurance c ompanies, pa ssed on a r eading list that included the work-study pioneers Taylor, Fayol, Gantt and the Gilbreths, the humanists Owen and Mayo, and the psychologists Cyr il Burt a nd Hugo Munsterberg. But Follett’s name was omitted, even though her books were in Hopf’s extensive library. Drucker re jects t he i dea t hat s he w as o verlooked f or s o l ong because o f h er s ex. M any w omen h ad r isen t o p rominent po sitions i n t he United States by t he 1930s, h e points out. T he rea son that Follett had become, to use his phrase, a “nonperson,” he believes, is that the 1930s and 1940s ushered in an era of conf ict; not t he F ollett c oncept o f c onstructive c onf ict – a n a pproach to negotiation designed for the resolution of differences – but the notion t hat a ny f ght a t t hat t ime w as a f ght t o t he f nish. The right of might had overtaken any idea of negotiated settlements. That Follett was a head of h er t ime, far a head of h er t ime, i s signif cant, b ut D rucker i s t oo read y t o overlook n ot o nly ma le prejudice but business prejudice, too. Follett, like Drucker, had no business background. How could she know how to react when the competition decided to cut up rough? Surely only an experienced, hard-nosed businessman knew how to mix it with a rival when the gloves were off. A ndrew Ca rnegie k new t his. W hy else, he told himself, should he have respected and admired George Pullman

Managing the Corporate State so m uch? N either w as i t reas onable t o be lieve t hat w omen’s views on management were as respected as those of men. Lillian Gilbreth’s p ublishers u nderstood t he ma rketplace f or i deas a nd recommended that she use her initials, so that readers would be none the wiser about the sex of the writer. Follett was a s ocial scientist. Her interest was the behavior of people in groups, an interest shared by business leaders who were attracted to the idea of a workforce moving with a c ommon purpose i n t he s ame d irection as ma nagement. “La bor a nd c apital can never be reconciled as long as labor persists in thinking that there i s a c apitalist po int o f vi ew a nd c apitalists t hat t here i s a labor point of view,” she wrote in Creative Experience. “There is not. These are imaginary wholes which must be broken up before capital and labor can co-operate.”23 Follett was inf uenced by Max Wertheimer’s Gestalt school of psychology, w hich c onceived o f a n event vi ewed f rom d ifferent angles crea ting d ifferent i nterpretations o r “i maginary w holes.” The whole event was greater than these different interpretations, greater than the sum of its parts. Gestalt theory was the forerunner of group theory or the idea of a thinking mass. It helps to explain certain human behavior such as mass hysteria or what Charles Mackay called Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds in his book of the same name. Mackay t racked i llogical s peculative e vents s uch as T ulipomania i n t he s eventeenth ce ntury a nd t he S outh S ea B ubble i n the ea rly e ighteenth ce ntury. F ollett be lieved t hat g roup experience n eed n ot h ave s uch c alamitous c onsequences b ut c ould be channeled crea tively f or t he c ommon g ood o f a n o rganization. But it could only succeed, she argued, if managers were prepared to amend their approach to authority. Her idea was that those in authority should develop the idea of power with those they sought to inf uence rather than power over. As D rucker r ightly po inted o ut, wi th ra re exceptions s uch as the Scanlon plan, where managements were forced to look at any avenue that might save a f ailing company, business leaders were unwilling to accept a nything t hat co uld b e co nstrued a s p ower sharing in the 1930s. They did not reject Follett’s ideas outright, because they could appreciate there was something of substance worth pursuing, if only it could be made more tangible. The idea

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The History of Work of co nstructive co nf ict h ad s ome a ppeal. A nyone c ould re cognize t hat F ollett h ad a po int w hen s he a rgued t hat c ompromise was an unsatisfactory solution to a conf ict of interest, only postponing the issues that still needed to be resolved. Her idea was to pursue the differing interests by analyzing the premises on which they were built a nd seeking some common g round on which to establish a m utually benef cial outcome. It might not work every time, she conceded, but, she argued, “integration involves invention, and the clever thing is to recognize this, and not to let one’s thinking stay within the boundaries of two alternatives which are mutually exclusive.”24 Follett o verlooked t he o ne i ngredient t hat m ight h ave mad e her i deas m ore d igestible, a lthough p robably n ot a t t hat t ime – the idea of t rust. Without t rust t here c ould be n o exploration of a c ommon p urpose. B ut a ny i nitiative i nvolving t rust w ould be vi ewed as a w eakness wi thin t he ad versarial re lationships of b usiness o r, i ndeed, o f s ociety d uring t he 1930s, as D rucker understood. Admiration came f rom respect – Ca rnegie’s respect for Pullman, Stalin’s respect for Hitler, the Duke of Wellington’s respect for Napoleon Bonaparte – t he recognition by a po tential adversary that here was a smart operator, a sharp cookie (the language of the macho arena is studded with suitable descriptions), here was someone who would put one over on you if you let your guard d own. T he s ame m istrust was a pparent i n t he C old War. Equally it fed a ntagonism between t he U lster Unionists a nd t he Irish R epublican A rmy ( IRA), Is rael a nd t he P alestinians, a nd the Turks a nd t he G reeks i n Cy prus. As eac h s ide s truggled t o produce an inventive solution to these standoffs, trust was viewed as a weakness, not a strength. A g reat t hinker, t hen, w as l argely f orgotten a fter h er d eath. Even t oday F ollett’s i deas a re a ttracting t oo l ittle a ttention. B ut she a nd D rucker h ad c arried t he t orch t hat w ould i nsist t hat humanity remained at the center of human endeavor. Finding the key to human motivation had become a l egitimate area of study, a Holy Grail of management, def ning the growing f eld of occupational psychology. The stage had been set for Abraham Maslow and his lifelong determination to identify what it was that made people tick.

CHAPTER 17

The Wanting Animal We do what we are and we are what we do. (Abraham Maslow, 1908–70) The Second World War had created an upheaval in the way people worked. Millions of servicemen had moved out of full-time jobs into the a rmed forces. Millions of men and women in the occupied c ountries h ad be en s ubjected t o f orced l abor. M illions o f people h ad t asted s omething d ifferent i n t heir l ives t hat w ould change t heir a ttitudes i rreversibly. M en h ad l abored i n p rison camps a nd i n t he jungle, women h ad done men’s work a nd h ad done it well. After t he war e verything was s upposed t o re vert b ack t o t he prewar pattern, and many people, including thousands of women, did go back to t heir old way of l ife. But attitudes d id not revert so read ily. People were more conf dent a nd in ma ny cases more militant. They wanted change so badly in Britain that they were prepared t o v ote o ut t heir c herished w ar l eader, W inston Churchill, for a s ocialist government headed by Clement Attlee. People wanted to get back to work, to get on with their lives, but none would forget their wartime experience. There was so much work to do and plenty of willing hands. The Germans set about rebuilding their shattered and partitioned nation i n t he west with a vi gor t hat would a maze t hose n ations that h ad i nf icted t heir d efeat. T he s ame h appened i n J apan. It was as if in defeat they were determined to bury their past, wiping t he s late c lean t hrough s heer h ard g raft. S ome t hings had n ot c hanged. T he bo ss–worker re lationship w as as f ragile as ever in Britain, and its industries were soon beset by strikes. West Ge rman i ndustry, o n t he o ther h and, w as e xperimenting with s hop-f oor d emocracy, crea ting w orks c ouncils i n w hich trade u nions w ere re presented i n c ompany c ommittees a longside ma nagement. T he s ystem w as e stablished wi th t he h elp o f 231

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The History of Work British trade unions and had a lasting inf uence on German labor relations. Trade unions in the United States continued to set themselves against management, but managers were getting the upper hand in t he n ew, t op-heavy, d ivisional s tyle o f c ommand. S cientif c management, which t he larger companies had been introducing between the wars, was quickly consolidated in postwar management practices throughout the industrialized nations. The system operated on an arrogant and intellectually wasteful assumption t hat d emanded k nowledge a nd i nitiative f rom on ly one small s ection o f t he w orkforce – t he ma nagerial c lass. Worker eff ciency – t he worker as a vi tal but temperamental part of the machine – w as t he bed rock o n w hich ma nagement p ractices were founded. The increasingly complex combinations of people and machines in factory-based manufacturing led to a b roadening and elevation of management across industry. Economies w ere s trengthening o nce m ore, a nd ma ny c ountries were reaching full employment, or as near as damn it, in what s ome w ould l ater re gard as a g olden a ge o f p roductivity. The c onsumer s ociety w as s welling as f amilies be gan t o e njoy more l eisure t ime. P eople w ere b uying c ars, te levisions, a nd holidays. British Prime Minister Harold Macmillan told the public that they had “never had it so good,” while Dwight Eisenhower reminded t he A merican peo ple w here t he m oney w as c oming from: “This world in arms is not spending money alone,” he said. “It is spending t he sweat of its laborers, t he genius of its scientists, the hopes of its children.”1 The United States and the Soviet Union were beginning to believe they could reach for the stars. Others w ere w ondering w here t hey m ight c atch t he s tardust that made some people shine in business. The goal of managerial and c orporate excellence was creating new avenues of re search, supported b y t he p rof ts o f c apitalism. El ton M ayo a nd P eter Drucker, for example, had struck academic gold when they began to research the human equation that made corporations successful. But c ompanies w ere l ooking f or s omething t angible f rom s uch research. T hey w anted ma terial t hey c ould u se a nd e xploit f or competitive advantage: anything that could tease out some extra production on t he shop f oor o r d eliver s ome wi nning s trategy among the leadership was worth investigating. Academics did not

The Wanting Animal necessarily share these goals. Some, like Drucker, may have been in search of the perfect economic and social community. Others, like t he be haviorists, be gan s earching f or t he e lixir o f s uccess, studying t he re lationship be tween ac hievement, e ndeavor, a nd motivation. If psychologists had not yet identif ed the substance of achievement, t here were others, d riven more by t he i nstincts of t he g ut than by t he pursuit a nd extrapolation of statistics, who believed that they knew excellence in a person when they saw it. Military leaders h ad often be en d ismissed as d onkeys i n t he G reat War, but t he S econd W orld W ar, a m uch m ore f uid conf ict, had shown that leaders could make a difference, whether it was Erwin Rommel in North Africa, Bill Slim in Burma, Grigori Zhukov at Stalingrad, or George Patton in the Ardennes. In peacetime companies needed their own leaders. They wanted tough m en, y es, b ut n ot n ecessarily c harismatic e ntrepreneurs. The a nalytical approach bred by a c ollege education was beginning to be a ppreciated as a n asset rather t han a h andicap. T hey wanted builders, organizers, corporate stewards who could manage t he b usiness e ff ciently, de livering g rowth a nd d ividends to the stockholders. And the boards of these companies wanted help in f nding these people. The same people who were willing to offer management solutions were willing to f nd the managers themselves. Booz, Allen & Hamilton, t he ma nagement c onsultancy, h ad i ts o wn e xecutive recruitment d ivision. Sydney Boyden, one of its ea rliest ma nagers, w ould b reak a way t o s pecialize i n re cruitment a lone. J ack Handy, a M cKinsey ma n, d id t he same. Both of t hem were following in the path of Thorndike Deland. Deland, a f ormer p art-time ma gician, h ad r un a n “ executive placement b ureau,” f nding ma nagers a nd executives for b uying and merchandising members of the Retail Research Association. In 1926 he set up h is own re cruitment business, outlining a f ee basis t hat w ould be come t he m odel f or t he m odern e xecutive search industry.2 Deland charged a retainer for the search, which was d educted f rom a c ommission h e c harged o n t he re cruited executive’s f rst year’s salary. His business took off when he was asked b y t he U S War De partment t o re cruit e xecutives f or t he Army Services Forces. Headhunting had been born.

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The History of Work Top executives were f nding that they had a price, and the best of them seemed worth every penny. When Harold Geneen was brought in by Sydney Boyden to head the struggling International Telephone & T elegraph i n 1959 h e t urned t he b usiness a round. Geneen w as a n umbers ma n, a n i ntimidating bo ss w ho p inned down h is e xecutives wi th t he m ost s earching q uestions a bout their divisional f gures at the monthly f nancial meetings. It is not surprising that company bosses should have been valued f or t heir g eneralship d uring t he 1 950s a nd ea rly 1 960s. Capitalism w as, a fter a ll, e ngaged i n a n e conomic w ar t o t he death with those nations that believed socialism, combined with economic p lanning, w as a f airer s ystem, red istributing w ealth across society rather than concentrating prof ts among a wealthy elite. P eter D rucker w as ac utely a ware o f t he s truggle. H e had l ived t hrough i ts g estation a nd b irth a nd w ould wi tness i ts denouement. Abraham Maslow, whose ideas on motivation would inject a s tronger human d imension i nto D rucker’s t hinking, was also a child of his time. The e xperience o f t he V ienna-born D rucker, w ho l eft h is homeland a nd d id n ot g o b ack a fter t he b anning o f o ne o f h is books singled h im out as a ma rked ma n, was d irectly absorbed in t he e vents s urrounding t he r ise o f N azism. M aslow h ad n o such d irect e xperience, b ut as a B rooklyn-born J ew, wi tnessing from afar the depredations of the Holocaust, he felt a d eep emotional connection with concentration camp survivors. This helped to clarify his thinking on the psychological thresholds that must be surpassed if people were to achieve self-fulf llment. The idea of s elf-fulf llment on the part of an employee, be it the maintenance engineer or the boss, might not have been uppermost in the minds o f m anagers w ithin m ost m anufacturers. B ut th e n otion that different levels of psychological development could inf uence creative decision-making had its attractions. Maslow be longed t o t hat g roup o f m otivational t hinkers, along wi th Do uglas M cGregor, F rederick H erzberg, a nd D avid McClelland, who, while contributing to corporate philosophy, were capable o f d etaching t hemselves f rom t he p rof t-driven g oals o f competition and production. For the minority of psychologists in postwar A merica it was not so much socialism but concerns for the s ocial w elfare o f s hop-f oor w orkers a nd u nhappiness wi th

The Wanting Animal the m echanistic p rocesses o f T aylorism t hat m otivated a s mall number of them to search for better ways of working, associated wi th i mproving t he s elf-esteem a nd j ob s atisfaction o f t he production-line worker. Maslow d rew a l ink be tween p roduction a nd t he p roduct i n the mind of the worker. If employees could preserve the idea that their work was important, it could enhance their self-respect and self-esteem. “The more I think about it,” he wrote, “the more diff cult I f nd it to conceive of feeling proud of myself, self-loving and s elf re specting, i f I w ere w orking, f or e xample, i n s ome chewing gum factory, or a p hony advertising agency or in some factory that turned out shoddy furniture.”3 He argued that “if you take yourself something important into the world, then you yourself be come i mportant t hereby.”4 M aslow h ad n oticed t hat c oncentration c amp survivors h ad often be en d riven by some i nner purpose, “some duty to live for, or some other people to live for.” Those who gave up and sank into apathy, he said, had died without resistance. The wartime experience of Stanislaw Szmajzner, a Polish Jew, bears o ut M aslow’s point. Szmajzner, o ne of t hirty-two i nmates who s urvived a n u prising i n t he S obibor e xtermination c amp, owed his initial survival during the gas chamber selections to his skills as a goldsmith. Although a boy at the time, he carried tools in h is b ackpack a nd w as a ble t o f ashion s ome m etal t o p rove his abilities in front of the German selecting off cer. The possession of a s kill a nd t he t ools t o d o t he job were n o c oincidence. The l earning o f a s kill as s omething t o f all b ack o n, e ven i f i t were not needed as a primary source of income, was an important part o f t he k nowledge p assed o n t o a J ewish boy by h is f ather. “I knew that work was the only security we had,” said Szmajzner in a n i nterview wi th Gi tta S ereny. “ We w orked da y a nd n ight. The trick was to make oneself indispensable.”5 Prisoners worked t o s urvive. T heir c aptors claimed t hat t hey, too, worked to distract themselves from the business of killing. Franz S tangl, t he c ommandant o f S obibor, t old S ereny t hat to avoid t hinking a bout t he da ily g assing of Jews it was n ecessary “ to c oncentrate o n work, work, a nd work a gain.”6 In b oth cases, for the murderers and the murdered, work was invoked as a means of self-preservation.

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The History of Work This idea of harnessing t he psychological benef ts of work as a strategy for survival or as a m eans of screening yourself mentally f rom t he h orrors o f y our s urroundings w as e xplored i n Pierre B oulle’s c ontroversial n ovel, Bridge on th e R iver K wai, later mad e i nto a f eature f lm. T he ce ntral c haracter, C olonel Nicholson, played in the f lm by Alec Guinness, believes it is in t he be st i nterests o f m orale a mong h is m en t o work h ard t o earn t he re spect o f t heir J apanese c aptors. N icholson be comes obsessed with the bridge as a feat of engineering in its own right, to the extent that he is prepared to expose an attempt by Allied saboteurs to blow it up. The boo k w as c ontroversial, be cause t he f ctional colonel was b ased o n a g enuine c haracter, L t.-Col. P hilip T oosey, t he commander o f t hose B ritish p risoners w ho w orked o n t he c onstruction of the Kwai Bridge. T he bridge – i n reality there were two b ridges: a w ooden c onstruction a nd a l ater b ridge mad e from c oncrete a nd s teel – w as p art o f t he n otorious B urma– Thailand Ra ilway, b uilt b y A llied p risoners o f w ar a nd c ontracted M alaysian a nd B urmese l aborers. T hese s lave l aborers died i n t heir t housands f rom s tarvation, d isease, d ebilitating ulcers, and heat-exhaustion. The f lm was a d istortion of the real events. There had been no attempt at sabotage, and the idea that a ma n l ike Toosey would override h is duty i n t he way t hat was portrayed i n t he f ctional N icholson w as a g ross m isrepresentation of character. But the concept of work as a means of preserving d ignity, as a m eans of s urvival, was s hared by t he f ctional Nicholson and the real-life Toosey. “Toosey u nderstood f rom t he v ery be ginning t hat t he o nly real issue was how to ensure t hat as ma ny of h is men as po ssible s hould s urvive t heir c aptivity,” wr ote h is b iographer, P eter Davies. “H e a ppreciated t o t he f ull t hat t he b ridges w ould be built with or without his co-operation and set himself the task of mitigating the terrible conditions under which the work was to be completed.”7 Maslow u nderstood t here w as a re lationship be tween w ork and a n i ndividual’s p sychological h ealth. H is boo k, Eupsychian Management (r epublished a s Maslow o n Ma nagement), explores some of the thinking behind his most lasting concept – the hierarchy of needs. Maslow’s theory was inspired partly by the work of

The Wanting Animal Henry Murray, a psychologist who outlined a l ist of twenty needs that all people, he believed, strove to satisfy. Maslow ref ned and distilled the idea, identifying f ve categories of human needs: the physiological, such as hunger, thirst, and sex; safety; love; esteem; and lastly (at the top of the order) self-actualization. The satisfaction of the lowest of these needs allowed the pursuit of the next step in the hierarchy, and so on. When the most basic physiological n eeds h ad be en m et, h e a rgued, h uman c oncerns turned to those of safety, such as warmth, shelter, personal defense, and t he e stablishment o f f nancial s upports. T he “l ove” n eeds included the need for affection and acceptance by others, whereas esteem involved the recognition and praise of others and the freedom to work without external interference. The highest need identif ed b y M aslow, t he n eed h e c alled s elf-actualization, p ursued the idea that an individual can identify and then seek to fulf ll some inner need. “What a ma n can be, he must be,” he wrote, by working “to become everything that one is capable of becoming.”8 The o utplacement i ndustry t hat e merged d uring t he 1 980s drew on these ideas to encourage people to explore future career paths. Outplacement came out of corporate restructuring, when companies sought to cushion t he i mpact of layoffs a mong t housands o f t heir w hite-collar w orkers. T he o utplacement c ompany was engaged by t he employer, for a f ee, to help redundant managers a nd executives c ope wi th t heir j ob l oss a nd f nd new work. ( No s uch s ervice w as a vailable i nitially f or t he ra nk a nd f le worker.) For t he f rst t ime i n t heir l ives some peo ple would discover that the career they had followed from school or college had n ever s atisf ed anything more than their f nancial n eeds, o r what Maslow would call their safety needs, with perhaps some “esteem” peaks of recognition. The d emands o f t he w ork e thic d id n ot a lways pe rmit s elfactualization. T his h igher need m ight seem a p sychological luxury be yond t he u nremitting g rind o f h onest h ard w ork. Yet, as Maslow saw it, one could not be achieved without the other. The work ethic was very much an ingredient of the self-actualized individual. In fact it may have been the prime ingredient. There is a problem here that Maslow does not appear to have considered. If you don’t work, you wi ll never achieve s elf-actualization, but you may f nd yourself working s o h ard t hat you a re d enied t he

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The History of Work freedom t o fu lf ll y our d reams. I t i s J oseph H eller’s Catch 2 2, transferred t o t he w orkplace. “ The te st f or a ny pe rson,” wr ote Maslow, is “does he bea r apples? Does he bea r fruit?” But supposing the apples are crab apples, the stunted achievements of the work-obsessed environment? You could call it achievement of a sort, but hardly self-fulf llment. Maslow, nevertheless, saw no other route beyond the path that had bee n o utlined in K urusawa’s f lm, Ikiru.9 Ikiru, h e a rgued, outlined a path to “salvation via hard work and total commitment to d oing w ell t he j ob t hat f ate o r pe rsonal d estiny c alls y ou t o do.” Kanji Watanabe, the town hall off cial, does indeed f nd selfactualization, b ut o nly a fter h is te rminal c ancer a wakes i n h im the desire to use h is skills, connections, a nd previously unrecognized determination to achieve some public good – the creation of a children’s playground. H is f ull-time job had be come a d rudge, unappreciated a nd u nrewarded be yond h is p ay c heck; h e d isplayed no greater ambition than getting through the day. Ikiru was highlighting the unlikelihood of achieving self-actualization in a steady nine-to-f ve job. Watanabe needed to be released from the mental imprisonment o f m oribund ma nagement. T he w ork e thic a lone w as n ot enough. H e m ight h ave r ubber-stamped t wice t he a mount o f paperwork as h is n eighbor, b ut h e w ould s till h ave be en s hifting paper. The real apples, the apples worth eating, were not part of h is job description a nd demanded a n initiative t hat went way beyond t he re quirements of h is ma nagement job. Watanabe h ad become trapped in a stale system that would do all in its power to stif e any personal commitment to self-actualization. The h ierarchy of n eeds mad e s o m uch s ense, b ut what c ould it mean to the average production worker or junior manager? Maslow cr iticized t hose o f h is y oung s tudents w ho, h e s aid, thought s elf-actualization c ould be ac hieved wi thout e ffort. B ut at least they had hope. Their desires and dreams had not yet been ground down in t he corporate machine. He could count h imself fortunate that he had students who still knew how to dream, who had n ot be en d ulled i n a teac hing s ystem t hat re warded e ffort over inspiration. Maslow u nderstood t here w ere o bstacles t o s elf-fulf llment. He wrote of “healthy self shness,” of listening to one’s impulses,

The Wanting Animal of “embracing one’s own nature” as a m eans of achieving one’s highest p lan. T he u nemployed l aborers q ueuing for work a t t he dock gates would have loved to embrace their own nature, but the reality for many people in and out of work in the perpetual cycles of the capitalist system was a continual balancing act on the f rst rung of Maslow’s ladder. As he recognized himself, “to do some idiotic job very well is certainly not real achievement.” But what do you do w hen t he u nfulf lling j ob i n M aslow’s c hewing g um factory example is the only job there is? Is a ll paid work justif able simply because it is work? Is all paid work justif able simply because it is rewarded? Or should there be some broader justif cation, a test to sort the apples from the crab apples? None o f t hese q uestions t roubled Do uglas M cGregor. I n h is studies, w ork w as a gi ven, be cause ma n w ould be c onstantly engaged in attempting to satisfy his needs. As Maslow had put it, man was “a perpetually wanting animal.”10 McGregor’s emphasis was on the control and organization of work. Should it be authoritarian, the traditional form of top-down management by decree, or could better results be achieved by consultative management? What did a contemporary model of management look like? What could an alternative model look like? The f rst m odel h e d escribed, a m odel f amiliar t o ma nagements i n 1 960 w hen h e f ramed h is p roposition i n The H uman Side of E nterprise, he called “Theory X”; the second, he named “Theory Y.” T he t heories w ere b ased o n d ifferent as sumptions about h uman be havior. T he t raditional T heory X as sumed t hat the average person was naturally disinclined to work and had to be cajoled into working. Theory X assumptions were that people, in g eneral, p referred t o be d irected, cra ved s ecurity, a nd d isplayed li ttle am bition o r d esire f or r esponsibility. A uthoritarian management w as t he c ustomary re sponse t o s uch as sumptions. Theory Y, the theory that McGregor wanted to see applied in the workplace, assumed that people had no in-built aversion to work, that mental effort in work was as natural as play or rest, and that people were capable of self-control and self-direction when they were working at something to which they were committed. In the right conditions t he average person was quite capable of accepting and even seeking responsibility. Furthermore, said McGregor, the c apacity f or crea tive p roblem s olving i n o rganizations w as

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The History of Work widely d istributed a mong t he population, not narrowly conf ned within a decision-making elite. McGregor felt that people behaved in response to the way they were treated. They were perfectly capable of applying selfdiscipline, s eeking re sponsibility, ac ting crea tively, a nd p roblem solving if they were trusted to do so. It was a bold theory. Drucker said it should not be regarded as a form of “soft” management, since it required individual discipline, strong performance goals, and high standards, if people were to meet its demands. McGregor and Drucker were beginning to sing in tune. There w ere p arallels be tween t hese i deas a nd t hose o f M ary Parker F ollett. M cGregor w as a dvocating F ollett’s p roposal f or “power wi th.” F ollett h ad a lso be en a ttracted t o t he i dea o f managers gi ving w orkers s cope t o d evelop s ome re sponsibility. “Managers . . . s hould give the workers a chance to grow capacity or power for themselves,” she wrote. 11 Frederick Herzberg, professor of management at the University of U tah, be lieved t hat “j ob e nrichment” – e nlarging a n i ndividual’s j ob b y c reating gr eater r esponsibility an d p roviding broader s cope for o n-the-job learning – w as o ne way t hat c ompanies c ould ac hieve F ollett’s i deal. I n o ne s tudy h e l ooked a t secretaries working for the Bell Telephone Company. Their job – responding to letters from shareholders – involved working under close supervision to standardized formulas. Herzberg found t hat their morale was low and their work was prone to errors. The job was red esigned, as signing t he s ecretaries s pecif c areas where each c ould be come t he re sident e xpert. A t t he s ame t ime t hey were asked to organize their own workloads, and supervision was reduced. Productivity fell at f rst but soon rose well above previous levels. The quality of the work improved too. In a nother study for h is 1959 book, The Motivation to Work, Herzberg s urveyed s ome t wo h undred e ngineers a nd acc ountants in Pittsburgh, asking them to list the times they felt good about t heir work a nd t he t imes t hey d isliked t heir work a nd t o explain the reasons behind their feelings. The good feelings were produced b y a chieving s omething, r eceiving s ome r ecognition, the k nowledge o f a j ob w ell d one, h aving s ome re sponsibility, making s ome p rogress, a nd ac hieving s ome pe rsonal g rowth. Dissatisfaction with the job was invariably related to issues such

The Wanting Animal as pay, working conditions, management and management policy, job security and prestige, or to personal problems outside work. Herzberg c alled a ll o f t hese i ssues “hygiene f actors,” as pects of t he job or of life t hat had to be r ight if people were going to stay m otivated i n t heir work. T he factors of s atisfaction – w hat he c alled “ actualization f actors” – w ere e ssential f or l ong-term employee well-being. The hygiene factors were important but not intrinsically so. Their inf uence was temporary and not always as expected. A pay raise, for instance, might trigger a negative feeling if it was lower than a worker thought he or she deserved. These various theories of motivation were useful to managers b ut t hey te nded t o s implify t he c omplexity o f h uman needs a nd as pirations. As P eter D rucker ad mitted m uch l ater, Maslow w as s howing t hat “ different peo ple re quire d ifferent ways o f m anaging.”12 Maslow discussed this when he outlined an a pproach t o “En lightened E conomics a nd M anagement” i n Eupsychian Management.13 The thirty-six points he listed under this heading, drawn from his own work and the work of others in the s ame f eld of s tudy, a re p robably t he m ost i lluminating a nd succinct collection of assumptions covering human behavior and good management ever published. They deserve to be chiseled in stone. T he f rst a nd m ost i mportant o f a ll o f t hem i s: “Assume that everyone is to be t rusted.” Two other points may be e mphasized h ere: “ Assume t he p reference f or w orking ra ther t han being i dle,” a nd “All h uman be ings p refer m eaningful w ork t o meaningless work.” The h uman re lations s chool w as e nlarging t hroughout t he postwar pe riod, b ut ma ny W estern c ompanies w ere a pprehensive about putting its ideas into practice. Japanese companies had been more receptive. Their leaders had had their f ll of an authoritarian, militaristic regime that had embarked on an ill-conceived campaign o f c onquest a nd d omination t hat h ad e nded s o i gnominiously in 1945. The ground had been prepared for more consultative working practices in the future. Companies i n t he U nited S tates h ad e xperienced n o c omparable brush with humility. American managers were reluctant to consider the idea that they should sacrif ce some of their authority for a m ore consultative workplace. Authority was power. But more t han t hirty years a fter Follett had u rged ma nagers to give

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The History of Work workers the chance to involve themselves in shop f oor decisionmaking, a California company accepted the challenge. Non-Linear Systems of Del Mar, an aerospace company, began to apply the ideas of Drucker, Herzberg, McGregor, and Maslow in t he ea rly 1 960s. A ndrew Ka y, i ts p resident, g ot r id o f t he assembly l ine a nd o rganized t he w orkforce i nto s elf-managed teams t hat l earned e very as pect o f t he p roduction. T he tea ms decided t heir w ork h ours, w ork s chedules, a nd b reak t imes. Quality i nspectors w ere d ispensed wi th a nd w ork c ards w ere replaced by salaries across the workforce. Kay also paid employees 2 5 pe rcent h igher t han t he g oing ra te a nd i ntroduced a n options scheme for company stock. Many of these systems have been introduced in companies today b ut a t t he t ime t hey re presented a n u ntried, p ragmatic attempt to apply management theories from the human relations fold. W hen t he b usiness e xperienced a d ownturn i n t he ea rly 1970s, Kay reintroduced traditional management practices, made changes t o t he p roduction l ine, a nd c ut h is workforce. Di d t his mean t hat t he i dea o f s elf-managed tea ms w as a f ailure? T hat might b e one i nterpretation. A nother i nterpretation is t hat t he company’s business took a nose dive and management had taken its eye off t he b all. W hatever t he c ase, it was n ot t he f rst time and would not be the last that a company shed jobs in response to worsening t rading conditions, or t hat cr isis-inspired pragmatism overruled idealism. Nor would it d eter ma nagements f rom exploring t he i mplications of Theory Y. There was no chance of that with hundreds of new consultancies putting some varnish on these theories which they would soon be peddling as progressive management techniques promising the earth. Volvo, the Swedish carmaker, experimented d uring t he 1970s wi th tea m-built c ars a t i ts w orkshops in Udevalla a nd Ka lmar. T he idea was t hat a s ingle work tea m would build a model from scratch, seeing the production through from start to f nish. The system crea ted t he s ame t ype of job variety a mong p roduction w orkers t hat Ka y w as s eeking t o crea te a t N on-Linear Systems. T he e xperiment w as a bandoned i n 1 992. T he tea ms made good cars but the system could not approach the manufacturing speeds attained by assembly line production. Whether we

The Wanting Animal like Ford’s assembly line or not, it remains the most economical way of making mass-produced cars. Volvo might have failed in its attempt to get rid of the moving assembly l ine b ut d uring t he 1 990s as sembly-line ma nufacturers w ere i ncreasingly acce pting t he c hallenge o f s elf-managed teams and job variety. The Toyota production system gives workers t heoretical c ontrol over p roduction with a p ull-cord r unning above their heads, the whole length of the line. Pulling the cord summons a s upervisor to investigate the problem, and if the line needs to stop then it stops.14 The l ong-term U S re sistance t o a llowing g reater w orker involvement i n c ar p roduction be gan t o d iminish a fter Ge neral Motors instigated its own experiment in employee participation, when it established a new program to develop a small family car. The S aturn P roject was l aunched i n 1984, f rom a n e ngineering study o rdered t wo y ears ea rlier. T he e ngineers w ere as ked t o work from a clean sheet and to explore ways of integrating people and technology in car manufacture. Saturn’s philosophy would be based on a belief “that all people want to be involved in decisions that effect them, care about their jobs, take pride in their accomplishments, and want to share the success of their efforts.”15 The Saturn management dropped time clocks, emphasized teamwork, ensured that team members had a voice in decisions, and entered into a u nique p artnership wi th t he U nited A utoworkers U nion based on an agreement to consult the union in every aspect of the business. Saturn must have done something right. In the summer of 1998 Saturn was the only General Motors plant in the United States producing cars as an industrial dispute shut down every other plant. Worker involvement in manufacturing decisions became more common in t he 1990s. Since t he late 1990s assembly-line workers a t L eyland Trucks i n P reston, La ncashire, h ave be en s itting down wi th p roduction e ngineers t o d iscuss po tential i mprovements. “I remember when everything that was ever planned was planned and implemented by technical engineering people,” said Allister B utler, t he p lant’s ma nufacturing e ngineering ma nager. “I guess t hat i n o ur m inds w e d idn’t t rust peo ple o n t he s hop f oor. The one thing that we have learned is that the real experts are those who build the trucks.”16 Leyland Trucks says its changes

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The History of Work were b rought a bout i n a s pirit of e nlightenment a nd a d esire t o implement i nnovative ma nagement p ractices be cause t he o ld practices, based on Taylor’s contention that the worker should be under t he d irect c ontrol o f t he ma nager, h ad f ailed t o ma intain competitiveness. Worker participation can be a t wo-way process. Just as assemblyline e mployees c an be come i nvolved i n p roduction p lanning, those in executive management can immerse themselves in assembly w ork. J ames Dy son, w ho a lmost s ingle-handedly d emonstrated to disillusioned British manufacturers in the 1990s that a well-designed domestic product could still be ma nufactured in a high wage ea rning economy, insists t hat everyone who works at the Dyson Company makes one of his vacuum cleaners on their f rst day at the company. “This is true from the lowliest member of staff to a non-executive director,” he says.17 In many companies, however, empowerment of the workforce in t he closing years of t he t wentieth century was d riven less by these enlightened approaches and more by the desire to cut costs and d istribute t he workload a mong fewer people. I mprovements in te chnology t hroughout t he 1980s h ad h ighlighted t he c ost of people, as te chnology became cheaper a nd companies sought to off oad ma ny o f t heir n onessential f unctions. Em ployees w ere invariably exposed as t he m ost expensive as set o n a c ompany’s books, however vital their contribution. In fact, as far as accounting convention was concerned, people were a c ost, not a n asset. But not until the ideas of corporate reengineering had come along did companies begin to look at the costs of management. Reengineering was a simple concept. It was all about f attening the h ierarchical p yramid, t aking o ut l ayers o f ma nagement a nd contracting out most op erations t hat were not at t he core of t he business. If, at the same time, you handed over increased responsibility to your front-line workers, it followed that you would need f ewer peo ple t o s upervise t hem. S ince s upervisors w ere often among the most expensive employees, with their long service records delivering regular pay increments, there was an added f nancial attraction to thinning their ranks. Layoffs h ad be en a h arsh f act o f l ife f or ma ny i n ma nual employment, alleviated brief y among those born into that generation of steady economic growth after the Second World War. But

The Wanting Animal layoffs a mong w hite-collar ma nagement w ere a lmost u nheard of u ntil t he a xe began to fall i n t he late 1980s a nd ea rly 1990s. It fell i n t he s ervice s ector, pe rhaps m ore h eavily t han it d id i n manufacturing. I t c ut a s wath t hrough t he m iddle o f l arge c orporations, taking with it middle-class, middle-aged, middle management. Arthur Miller’s vision of white-collar obsolescence had come home to roost, as thousands of managers contemplated Willy Loman’s nightmare of rejection in Death of a Salesman. Frederick R eichheld, a d irector o f B ain & C ompany, t he management c onsultancy, be moaned t he d estruction o f l oyalty implicit in layoffs. Loyalty, he argued, was essential to the longterm prospects of extracting value from a b usiness.18 But writers like R eichheld a nd J effery P feffer o f S tanford B usiness S chool (another advocate of strong corporate commitment to employees) were voices in the wilderness during the 1990s. Far more common was t he ma nager’s c omment q uoted by Ch arles H eckscher in h is boo k, White-Collar B lues: “If you w ant l oyalty g o g et a dog.”19 T his k ind of contempt for t he m iddle ma nager had been implicit as far back as 1955, when Sloan Wilson wrote The Man in the Gray Flannel Suit, an unsettling novel about the way that men were prepared to bury their emotions and values in the name of corporate conformity. Reengineering w as t he g reat c orporate l eveler, po rtrayed nowhere m ore s tarkly a nd b itingly t han i n t he 1 997 f lm, The Full Monty. One scene shows out-of-work laborers and their former manager sharing the same queue for unemployment benef t. The manager has been unable to discuss his redundancy with his wife and maintains a charade, leaving for the off ce every day, carrying his b riefcase. H is wi fe, m eanwhile, i s s pending m oney as i f h er husband’s income will never run dry. Only when the bailiffs arrive for t heir f urniture d oes s he be come a ware o f t he cr isis i n t heir lives. The manager has further to fall than his former underlings. Finally he confronts the ultimate humiliation of the jobless executive, shedding his clothes to music before an audience of rapturous women as h e joins a g roup of other laid-off workers who decide that stripping on stage can earn them some money. Everything is laid bare – class distinctions, gender differences, male d ominance – a nd n one of it rea lly ma tters. T here i s a t riumph i n t he pe rformance – t he t riumph o f s hared h umiliation,

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The History of Work of common adversity. Each man in his own way f nds something special i n t he experience. Film d istributors i n t he United States were worried t hat A merican audiences would st ruggle t o u nderstand t he s trongly acce nted l anguage, b ut t hey u nderstood t he story all right. It was an all too common experience on both sides of the Atlantic. Like all good f ction, The Full Monty told so many truths. The truths were repeated across the Western world. Reengineering had changed the face of unemployment. In 1994 I was handed a sheaf of letters that had been sent to an Oxford-based recruitment magazine i n re sponse t o a c ampaign i t w as r unning a gainst a geism in the workplace. The letters all told the same story.20 They were from people in the forty to f fty-f ve age bracket with many years of e xperience i n t heir c hosen c areers. Typically t hey h ad be en working i n m iddle ma nagement, d rawing g ood s alaries a t t he time – between £30,000 and £40,000 ($47,500 to $63,250) with commitments and a l ifestyle to match. The Full Mo nty manager was writ large in their expressions of shock as t hey found themselves too old and too expensive for the needs of their employers. One wr iter w ho h ad c ommitted “ the c ardinal s in o f g etting old” said that he and his fellow job seekers had become so accustomed t o re jection l etters t hat t hey h eld a “l ottery as t o w hat excuse will be in the standard three paragraphs.” In another letter a forty-seven-year-old man who had lost his job f ve years earlier said he had never signed on for unemployment benef t and after a series of part-time and temporary jobs had become “resigned to never having a proper job again.” Some of the letters were from highly qualif ed people. An engineer said he had “worked very hard through engineering apprenticeship, engineering studentship, and university to achieve Master of S cience a nd Ch artered En gineer s tatus, a nd f or t he l ast t wo years I have been jobless like many other people in my situation. I could have pretended I am a self-employed consultant like many professionals do to hide the shame of being unemployed.” The letters were the cries of England’s suburbia, a groundswell of re sentment o therwise h idden within t he po plar-lined avenues and n eatly ma nicured l awns o f o pen-planned executive h ousing developments. T he same story, t he same pain was being experienced in similar developments across the manufacturing regions

The Wanting Animal of t he U SA. W hite-collar a ngst w as t he s elf-inf icted corporate disease o f t he 1990s as s hareholders t urned o n t he s tewards o f their investments and demanded quick returns. It all came down to the bottom line. Reengineering was the brainchild of Michael Hammer, a former computer science professor at M IT. He used t he term originally in t he l ate 1980s t o d escribe t he w ay t hat i nformation te chnology c ould t ransform b usiness p rocesses. B y t he t ime h e a nd James Ch ampy, c hairman of t he C SC I ndex c onsultancy, wr ote Reengineering the Corporation in 1993, he was def ning the term as “the fundamental rethinking and radical redesign of business processes to ac hieve d ramatic i mprovements i n co ntemporary measures of business performance.”21 This was quite a mouthful for something t hat e quated to t he removal of t housands of jobs, of people’s livelihoods, from thousands of corporate registers. Reengineering went f urther i n p aring away t he f esh of co mpanies down to the pure white bones of prof t, much further than Peter D rucker h ad ever ventured. It p ursued t he i mplications of an e mpowered w orkforce i n c orporations w here c omputer s oftware systems could handle much of t he i nformation a nd deliver know-how d irectly t o t he f ront l ine. I t q uestioned t he n ecessity of the top-heavy structure of corporations modeled on the system created by Alfred Sloan at General Motors and suggested that a lengthy chain of command was unnecessary. Links i n t he c hain c ould eas ily be re moved b y s tripping o ut layers of ma nagement. Board d irectors were h appy t o go a head with this because it saved money and it rarely affected their particular layer, not t he top job a nyway. T he apparent effectiveness of t he top job was usually enhanced, since t he cost savings t hat could be achieved were translated immediately to the bottom line. T his h ad t he a ttractive k nock-on e ffect o f i ncreasing t he company share price, which ref ected handsomely on t he potential earnings of top executives through share options. The s hare o ption w as a m ethod o f p ayment i nvented b y p ay consultants as a f nancial i ncentive f or e xecutives i n p ublicly owned companies. Executives were granted a n umber of options to b uy s hares i n t heir c ompany f rom a ce rtain da te. T he p rice of t he option was f xed at the sum paid when the company purchased the shares for the incentive scheme. But the option would

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The History of Work be exercised at the share price pertaining when it was cashed in. If t he c ompany a nd t he ma rkets h ad pe rformed w ell i n t he interim period it could deliver a signif cant gain to the executive. Why e xecutives s hould h ave a g reater i ncentive i n re ceiving options t han o ther workers i s o ne of t he mysteries of c orporate reward systems. There seems to be a prevailing attitude that workers who a re n ot executives would p refer t o be p aid i n c ash, t he theory being t hat t hey l ive such a h and-to-mouth existence t hey need every penny t hey c an spend. T he same t heory claims t hat workers w ould n ot l ike t o s ee a ny o f t heir p ay e xposed t o t he risks associated with the stock market. This is a peculiar assumption when it is recognized that the biggest risk associated with any w orker i s t he l oss o f t heir j ob, s omething t hey l ive wi th continually. Reengineering th e Co rporation w as a rguably t he m ost i nf uential management book since Drucker’s Concept of th e Corporation. While D rucker had described a m odel of ad ministration that h ad crea ted j obs, t hat h ad b uilt a s ocial s ystem wi thin t he large corporation, Hammer and Champy were prescribing a lowcalorie recipe for corporate anorexia. The system brought with it a whole new lexicon of management jargon that quickly became assimilated within t he A merican language a nd eventually found its way i nto t he En glish l anguage. T he c ontracting o ut o f work became “outsourcing,” the removal of layers of management became “ delayering.” R emoving j obs w as c alled “ downsizing,” putting t hem b ack a fter re moving t oo ma ny w as “ rightsizing.” The m id-1990s were cra zy a larming years for t he one-company career manager. Managers who cut jobs were lionized by their peers, who gave them nicknames reminiscent of the fearsome warriors who rampaged across Europe at the end of the Roman Empire. There was “Neutron” Jack Welch who shed s ome 100,000 jobs within f ve years of his appointment as chief executive of General Electric in 1981.22 T he “Neutron” was d ropped l ater, when Welch revealed his s kills as a c orporate b uilder. B ut A l “ Chainsaw” Du nlap would never get r id of h is own nom de guerre. T his was a ma n who cut his way through a cluster of companies until the formula lost its potency. At Scott Paper he walked into a struggling company a nd l aid o ff a t hird o f t he workforce wi thin a y ear. M ore

The Wanting Animal than tw o-thirds o f th e h eadquarters s taff, h alf o f th e m anagement, a nd a f fth o f t he h ourly p aid e mployees l ost t heir j obs. He t hen sold t he company to its r ival, K imberly-Clark, for $ 6.8 billion, returning a 2 25 percent prof t on t heir investment to t he shareholders of S cott P aper. Du nlap h ad ea rned h imself a lmost $100 million in salary and stock prof ts in a single year. When he walked into his next job as chairman of the Sunbeam Corporation, its stock rose by 49 percent on the day his appointment was announced.23 But when Sunbeam continued to struggle, even a fter j ob c utbacks, t he b uzzsaw w as t urned o n Du nlap himself. T he old hacker was unrepentant. It had a ll been necessary, he claimed. Few people shed any tears at Dunlap’s demise. Even his own son said he had it coming. But Dunlap had a point. His argument was that the overstaffed companies that had called him in were in severe trouble. Had he not cut staff the whole enterprise and thousands more jobs would have disappeared. His job was to keep the balloon aloft by throwing passengers out of the basket. Reengineering was a c orporate reckoning. N ever a gain c ould peo ple as sume t hat bo ard d irectors were acting in the interests of the company’s employees. The boards a nswered t o e xternal s hareholders, a nd t he s hareholders wanted value for their investment – continuous value. Shareholder value be came t he n ew c orporate l anguage re peated a t e very opportunity l ike g race be fore b reakfast, l unch, a nd s upper. Shares, t he l ifeblood o f t he p ublicly q uoted c ompany, w ere a tradable commodity, and the market was f ckle. The market was human. It d id not s ee t he c orporation as D rucker’s social enterprise, merely as a v ehicle for increasing personal wealth. In fact the ma rket system questioned whether a c ompany could ever be more than that. Was there an alternative? Some company bosses – a tiny minority – t hought there was. They had asked themselves a s imple q uestion. S upposing t he peo ple w ho o wned t he c ompany were the people who worked there? Wouldn’t that make a difference?

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CHAPTER 18

Sharp-suited Philanthropists To secure for the workers by hand or by brain the full fruits of their industry and the most equitable distribution thereof that may be po ssible upon the basis of the common ownership of the means of production. (Clause Four of the British Labour Party’s constitution, 1918; removed 1995) John Spedan Lewis was a ma n alone in a nation of shopkeepers. Some may have thought him subversive, even dangerous. Others may h ave w ondered i f h e h ad t aken l eave o f h is s enses, a ll because he wanted his company’s workforce to share the advantages o f c orporate o wnership. L ewis w as a s uccessful B ritish capitalist, t he h ead o f a g rowing re tailing e mpire, a n a utocrat obsessed with his business. But his obsession had some unusual characteristics. W hile h e w as d etermined, l ike o ther e ntrepreneurs, to create an ever-expanding business empire, he questioned why the prof ts from the business should be concentrated among a m inority of wealthy shareholders. Shouldn’t t he people whose labor contributed to the company’s success have a fairer share of the p rof ts? S houldn’t t hey e xperience, c ollectively, t he re wards and re sponsibility of ownership? H e t hought t hey s hould, s o h e placed his company in the hands of its workforce. The same questions had troubled Karl Marx in his analysis of the capitalist system, but Marx was rea red on the philosophy of Hegel, not the hard-nosed realities of prof t and loss. Marx could inspire a revolutionary movement that would grip half the world, dedicated t o s eizing c ontrol o f t he c apitalist s ystem. L ewis’s vision was far more benign. It did not rely on force of a rms but placed its faith i n a s pirit of be nevolence a nd a n u nderstanding that wealth crea tion was a mas s m ovement, a s ocial m ovement, not the sport of an entrepreneurial elite played out for the benef t of a privileged minority. In capitalism Lewis backed the winning 250

Sharp-suited Philanthropists horse, a nd y et h is e xperiment f ailed t o crea te a ny g roundswell of enthusiasm. T he plutocrats were not lining up to scatter their winnings among the working classes. John L ewis k new w hat i t w as t o be p rivileged. H e h eaded a growing chain of high street stores that had started life as a d rapery s hop o n L ondon’s Ox ford S treet. T he b usiness h ad be en established by his father, the original John Lewis, a former draper’s a pprentice. J ohn L ewis h ad be en ra ised b y h is a unt, A nn Speed, hence the unusual name chosen for his f rst son. Trading under t he s logan “N ever K nowingly U ndersold,” t he c ompany earned a reputation for fairness and value for money. John Lewis grew his business from a d etermination to make available to the customer a wide range of goods at reasonable prices. He was, in effect, e stablishing a re lationship o f t rust wi th h is c ustomer. I t would be repeated in other ways by Marks & Spencer in the UK and Nordstrom in the USA. Both M arks & S pencer a nd N ordstrom mad e a vi rtue o ut o f their refund policies. If goods were not acceptable for any reason, a c ustomer c ould re turn t hem f or a f ull re fund. T his b rought untold business for Marks & S pencer i n t he practice of presentbuying on birthdays or at Christmas. It meant that people could safely b uy s omething a t M arks, ad vising t he re cipient t hat t hey “could always take it back and change it.” It meant high rates of returned g oods, b ut eac h re turn b rought peo ple i nto t he s tores and o ften crea ted m ore b usiness. I n t he s ame w ay J ohn L ewis customers were attracted to its principled stance on fair trade. But f airness h as ma ny f acets. S pedan L ewis w as gi ven a £50,000 quarter share in the business on his twenty-f rst birthday in 1906. H is b rother Oswald re ceived a nother q uarter. B etween them t he t wo y oung m en a nd t heir e lderly f ather w ere s haring prof ts of £16,000 a y ear. At the same time the annual wage bill for t he t hree hundred employees came to t he same f gure – £16,000. I t d idn’t t ake a M arx t o work o ut t he i nherent i nequities i n t he way t hat ea rnings were be ing s hared. S pedan L ewis thought this was wrong. As a second-generation entrepreneur he couldn’t even claim that his share of the prof ts was a just reward for some initial risk or the product of his sweat and sacrif ce. He was simply enjoying the good fortune of h is birth. A t wo-year period away f rom t he

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The History of Work business, c onvalescing a fter a s erious f all f rom h is h orse, g ave him t ime t o t hink a bout h is f uture, t o t hink a bout t he b usiness and how it might be shared more equitably among the workforce. The brothers had a lready begun to concern t hemselves with t he interests of the employees, encouraging sports and creating a staff magazine. T he ma gazine w ould be come a c ornerstone o f s taff communications a nd re mains a re markable forum for e mployee debate and criticism almost a century on. The p rocess o f crea ting a w orkable w orker d emocracy w as achieved b y S pedan Le wis o ver a n umber o f y ears, aft er hi s father had died and his brother had relinquished his own shares. Gradually t he ma jority o f t he c ompany’s s hares w ere v ested i n a t rust p rotected b y a c arefully w orded c onstitution d esigned to maintain the business as a partnership of employees. To parody the United States Constitution, the principle was to create a business by th e em ployees, f or th e em ployees. The J ohn L ewis constitution, d rawn u p i n 1 928, c an be c ompared i n i ts i dealism wi th t he c orporate cre ed o f K onosuke M atsushita, wr itten one y ear l ater. M atsushita’s cre ed p romoted t he “w ell-being o f people” and quality of life. Matsushita was “united in spirit” with its employees. John Lewis’s constitution uniquely focused its concerns on its employees. “ The partnership’s supreme purpose,” it said, “is to secure the fairest possible sharing by all its members of t he ad vantages o f o wnership – g ain, k nowledge, a nd po wer; that is to say their happiness in the broadest sense of the word so far as happiness depends on gainful occupation.” The c oncept w as n othing s hort o f re volutionary. H ere w as a company d eclaring t hat its p rime p urpose was t he h appiness of its employees. The Protestant work ethic is f rmly planted within the c ompany’s d ef nition o f h appiness – i n t he w ords “ gainful employment” – b ut t he ethic seems to have undergone some modif cation. I t c an h ardly be i nterpreted as w ork f or w ork’s sake. It can be seen instead as work in order to gain happiness. This is a h igher order of a mbition t han mere job satisfaction. It recognizes t hat t here i s s omething o ther t han j oy i n w ork, t hat there is joy outside work, joy beyond work. John Lewis, the company, has stuck to those principles. Sir Stuart Hampson, its former chairman, believes that the partnership structure h as crea ted a s trong s ense o f be longing a mong e mployees.

Sharp-suited Philanthropists “We a re i n t his r ole for t he l ong te rm, a nd I ’m a bsolutely c onvinced that the only way to sustain success is to have a company with a h appy w orkforce. Do t hey c ome i n j ust f or t heir p ay o r do th ey c ome in b ecause th ey i dentify w ith th e b usiness?” h e asks.1 Spedan Lewis elevated the corporate perk to a different plane, introducing his workforce to the pastimes of the aristocracy. The company bo ught t wo ocea n-going rac ing y achts a nd s ecured the use of the Island Sailing Club on the Isle of Wight, one of the snootiest clubs in what was still, in the 1950s, one of the snootiest sports. Workers were able to enroll i n t he company sailing club for a n ominal fee a nd go sailing every weekend for the price of pitching a f amily tent on a p ublic campsite. Today the company has f ve yachts, and membership of the yacht club costs £1 a year. A da y’s s ailing c osts a bout £ 13. I t h as t hree s taff g olf c ourses and offers subsidized accommodation at four of England’s most sought-after h oliday re treats. T here a re t wenty c ompany-based special-interest c lubs c overing p astimes s uch a s s kiing, r iding, pottery, d rama, p hotography, a nd gl iding. T he c ompany e ven secured a stretch of the River Test, one of England’s f nest chalk trout streams. It also makes a commitment to employees, promising job security to any who have more than f ve years’ service. John L ewis s eems t o offer t he ultimate i n employee s ecurity, everything t hat peo ple h ad cra ved d uring t he j ob c learouts o f the early 1990s. So has it succeeded in its aims? Are employees happy? Well, not all the time. In 1999 there was a heated debate in its magazine, when employees began to suggest selling out so that they could cash in on the windfall from its vastly increased market c apitalization. A lthough t he s uggestion w as d ismissed by t he c hairman as “ carpetbagging” i nspired by t he g reed o f a minority, t he c ompany ma gazine’s s ubsequent ma ilbag revealed that there were other arguments behind the proposals. Some employees thought that the company’s management was rooted in a hierarchical system that was not prepared to invest sales employees with any great responsibility. Why should the existing management, w ondered so me w riters, a ssume t hat t he co mpany could not be r un better as a p ublicly owned business a nswerable to outside shareholders? How could the chairman uphold the principle of employee democracy and yet refuse a re ferendum on the

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The History of Work sale p roposal a mong t he c ompany’s f orty t housand e mployees? If John Lewis really was an employee partnership, why didn’t its management behave more democratically a nd put the company’s future to the vote? T he vote could not have changed the company’s partnership structure, tied up in a trust, but it would have given a def nitive indication of employee opinion. The c hairman d id n ot re gard t he d ebate o r a ny re ferendum as h elpful i n r unning t he b usiness. T he po sition was clear, s aid Hampson. J ohn L ewis w asn’t h is o r a ny o ther p artner’s t o s ell. It belonged to t he t rust set up on behalf of t he partners, not t he partners themselves. Trust ownership means that employees bring nothing into the company but their labor and ideas and leave with nothing other than their pay and pensions. Ownership in this case is a t ransient c oncept re lated e ntirely t o t heir l abor. T heir work conveys ownership. The real relation of the employee to the company might be called “workership.” We a ll l ive i n a s tate of workership t o some extent, i nf uencing t he w orld w e l ive i n b y t he w ork t hat w e acc omplish. T he John Lewis Partnership has given this state some def nition. The trust wi ll not r un i n perpetuity. It is a f nite entity. T he original trust deed of 1929 f xed a n expiry date for t he t rust t wenty-one years after the death of the last descendant of King Edward VII alive at the time that the trust was established. The two surviving descendants of the King alive at that time are Queen Elizabeth II and her cousin, L ord Harewood. I f t he Q ueen has i nherited t he longevity and constitution of her mother, the carpetbags are likely to be moth-eaten before they can bulge with the gains from a sale of J ohn L ewis. I n t he m eantime, h owever, t he c ompany m ust begin to confront its mortality, possibly with some modernizing of its r igid h ierarchical s tructure. But t here i s n o reas on w hy it should not carry on under sound management, providing services and employment well into the future. In his book, The Hungry Spirit, the management writer, Charles Handy, discussed the role of companies in society. Inheriting the i deas o f P eter D rucker’s c ompany-as-a-social-institution, Handy h as p ursued t he i mplications, s uggesting t hat i f c ompanies a re to take their place in the social system they must adopt the role and responsibilities of other social structures; they must become good corporate citizens. Handy has become disenchanted

Sharp-suited Philanthropists by t he w ay t hat a c ompany’s ma rket c apitalization c an f uctuate on the whim of shareholders whose only concern is seeing a quick return on their investment. His l atest t hinking h as e xplored t he i dea o f a c ompany as a community of interest. “It’s r idiculous to think of a c ompany as a p iece o f p roperty w hich i s owned by o utsiders w ho, i n ma ny cases, don’t even know they own it because they own it through a pe nsion f und,” h e s ays. “I ’m rea lly a rguing t hat w e h ave t o change our concept of the company very radically and to return to a s ense o f c ommunity wi th i nterest g roups, a nd t hat m eans diminishing t he po wer o f t he s hareholders.”2 H andy h as t oyed with t he i dea o f n onvoting s hares f or i nvestors, b ut w hen l arge blocks of shares are held by single investors or investment funds the mere threat of disinvestment may be e nough to force a ma nagement’s hand. A broader question needs to be a nswered by t he i nvestors. Is it in the interest of a pension fund to force a company into kneejerk reac tions t o p roblems t hat ma y re quire l onger-term p lans? Investors need to have almost as strong an understanding of the c ompany a nd i ts ma rketplace as t he bo ard i tself, h ence t he increasing i nclusion o f i nvestor re presentatives o n t he ad visory boards of US corporations. How close should investors be to their company? Is it best for business that a company ref ects the interest of outside i nvestors, or is t here g reater merit i n t he business that works in the interest of internal investors, where employees and s hareholders a re o ne a nd t he s ame? W ouldn’t t his crea te that ma gical a lignment o f i nterests be tween a c ompany a nd i ts employees so desired by chief executives when they ask their pay consultants to work out incentives for their management teams? Jeff Gates has championed t he potential of businesses owned by t heir e mployees i n h is boo k, The O wnership S olution. He envisages a c apitalist society in which those who participate a re given m ore re sponsibilities a nd a f airer s hare o f t he p rof ts. To some extent Peter D rucker a nticipated a m ovement t oward such a s ociety w hen h e po inted o ut t hat s hareholdings o f l arge p ublic corporations were increasingly held by mutual funds and pension f unds.3 But these investment blocks were held indirectly on behalf of the workers; they were not held by the workers or in any w ay c ontrolled b y w orkers e xcept i n ra re e xamples w here

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The History of Work they were co-opted as pe nsion f und t rustees. T his was nowhere near direct ownership of the means of production by the workers. However, once private pension schemes began to dominate investment capital, particularly in the United States, it gave the employees o f b ig b usiness a t iny w edge. W hen t his w edge be came organized in to inf uential v oting b locks s uch as t he Ca lifornia Public Em ployees R etirement S ystem (Ca lpers) a nd T eachers’ Insurance and Annuity Association – College Retirement Equities Fund (TIAA/CRF) – a be nef t plan for teachers and researchers in the United States – the wedge was transformed into an important lever of c orporate governance. A c apitalist society t hat h ad always depended on workers’ muscles had become increasingly dependent on the workers’ wealth. This did not mean so much for the worker, as d isenfranchised from the seat of power as he ever was. Companies have been reluctant t o c ountenance t he i dea o f worker d emocracy, b ut t he European U nion’s e mployment re forms h ave be gun t o ma ke a difference, i ntroducing t he Ge rman w orks c ouncil m odel i nto those large multinationals with a p resence in the member states. Many companies complained beforehand, but t he councils were introduced in 1998 without so much as a whimper of unrest. Gates p laces h is f aith i n t he Em ployment S tock Own ership Plan – the ESOP – as t he conduit for conveying company ownership to employees. T he concept was i ntroduced i n t he 1950s by Louis K elso, a S an F rancisco l awyer w ho be gan t o s tudy e conomics in an effort to understand why so many American workers had been laid off in the Great Depression. Here were people who wanted to work because they needed the things made in factories, but they could not buy goods without the earnings they made in their manufacturing jobs. The vi rtuous c ycle o f p roduction, ea rnings, a nd c onsumption triggered unwittingly by Henry Ford and explained by John Maynard K eynes i n h is 1 936 t reatise, The G eneral T heory of Employment, Int erest, a nd M oney, had re versed i tself d uring the De pression. K eynes h ad p roposed l arge-scale p ublic w orks to re store e mployment, ea rnings, b uying po wer, a nd t herefore demand. P resident Franklin D. Roosevelt put the idea into practice i n a p ublic works p rogram h e c alled t he N ew Dea l, a nd i t worked, to a degree.

Sharp-suited Philanthropists But t he New Dea l d id not reduce t he broadening i nequalities between rich and poor. The rich did not appear to have suffered at a ll d uring t he De pression. Roosevelt’s ad ministration lurched to t he l eft i n 1 935 a fter a p residential re think t hat l ed t o n ew wealth taxation, increases in inheritance tax, the establishment of a graduated corporate income tax, and the Social Security Act.4 Louisiana g overnor H uey L ong, w hose g randiose p ublic w orks programs h ad i nf uenced g overnment po licy, w as as sassinated that same year, but his son, Russell Long, began to forge his own career in politics and became chairman of the powerful Senate Finance Committee in 1964. Attracted to any idea that might promote a fairer society, Long was persuaded by Louis Kelso to promote tax benef ts for ESOPs in emp loyment b enef t l egislation i n 1 973. T his a nd s ubsequent legislation has created in the ESOP a tax-eff cient method for business owners to transfer their corporate shareholdings to employees. By 2000 the National Center for Employee Ownership estimated there w ere 11,500 ES OP p lans worth $ 400 b illion a nd c overing about 8 .5 m illion e mployees acr oss t he U nited S tates. B y 20 09, the number of employees had risen to nearly 14 million with assets worth $925 billion. While the ESOP increases employee share ownership, in most cases t he e mployee s hareholding re mains a m inority o ne, t ypically be tween 5 a nd 20 pe rcent of a c ompany’s s tock. I n te rms of employee numbers the biggest employee-owned companies in the USA are Publix Supermarkets (145,000 in 2009) and Hy-Vee supermarkets (55,000 in 2009). The ES OP w as d esigned as a t ax-eff cient f orm o f cor porate f nance t hat could benef t both employees a nd owners. T he way it works is that the company sets up a t rust fund for employees. The company then either puts shares into the plan or contributes cash to buy company shares. Alternatively the plan may borrow money to buy shares and the company then makes payments into the plan to repay t he loan. T hese contributions can be d educted from corporation t ax. Employees pay no t ax on t he shares u ntil they retire, when they can either sell their shares on the market or sell them back to the company. If the ESOP owns 30 percent of the stock, the company owners who are selling their own stock to t he e mployee t rust c an d efer t axation o n t heir c apital g ain

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The History of Work by re investing t he p roceeds i n o ther c orporate s ecurities. T he tax benef t of t he ESOP is both its strength a nd its weakness. It means the ESOP has become a relatively popular tool for raising f nance, either to undertake a ma nagement buyout from a p arent company or to extract some value from shares for an owner in a partial sale to employees. It does not mean, however, that the ESOP has delivered some kind of utopian worker democracy. A minority of managements whose adoption of ESOPs has been accompanied by some power-sharing i dealism h ave e xperienced d iff culty making their ideas work. Jerry Gorde converted Vatex, a company based in R ichmond, V irginia, in to a n e mployee-owned c ooperative, using a n ES OP, b ut h e a bandoned t he a rrangement te n y ears later, buying out the shareholdings of the f fty-four employees for $750,000, a fter c oncluding t hat t he workers h ad not u nderstood the demands of capitalism. Under the cooperative system the company created an employeeelected bo ard. I t w as t he re sponsibility o f t he bo ard t o s elect a president and a chief executive. Worker committees set pay rates and e mployment po licy. T he i dea w as t hat t he c hecks a nd b alances built into the company – i ts governance – w ere organized democratically while hierarchical management relying on a chain of command would be maintained. The s ystem d id n ot work, s aid Go rde, be cause workers were constantly re belling a gainst a uthority. “ They d on’t rea lize t hey are the authority,” he said. The comment was injudicious. Gorde was t he authority. He h ad no belief i n t he employees’ a bility t o read balance sheets or understand the business, and the employees ultimately had no belief i n t hemselves. T his is t he d ilemma of worker d emocracy. T he c ulture of ad versarial relations – t he mindsets of ma nagers who believe t hey k now be st a nd workers who s hy a way f rom re sponsibility, t hereby c onf rming their mutual prejudices – is not easily broken. Gates wr ites o f a u nionized c ompany, Cl ark o f N ew J ersey, bought o ut u sing a n ES OP. T his f ormer Ge neral M otors ro ller bearing p lant c ould n ot s hake o ff l abor d isputes e ven a fter employees became shareholders. On one occasion they instigated a go-slow in pursuit of a p rof t share-out when the company had wanted t o u se t he p rof t f or i nvestment. T he i ndustrial ac tion

Sharp-suited Philanthropists wiped o ut t he p rof t a nd wi th i t a b adly n eeded p lant u pgrade. Ultimately all the jobs were destroyed when the business failed.5 The Cl ark c ase h ighlights a nother p roblem o f t he ES OP – i t has s ometimes be en u sed as a l ast-gasp s ource o f f nance for a struggling company or as a n escape mechanism for owners who can see no future for the business. This was true of the employee buyouts i nstigated by t he steel i ndustry u nions. Steel has a s pecial p lace i n t he h istory o f t he A merican e conomy. S teel a nd railroads working in harmony were the driving forces of the latenineteenth-century U S e conomy, p ushing e xpansion w estward. Oil a nd a utomobiles be came t he p istons o f t he ea rly t wentieth century but steel, which reached its employment peak of 650,000 in 1953, remained a vital industry until the 1980s, when cheaper high-quality J apanese i mports be gan t o ea t i nto t he U S s teel market. S uddenly U S s teel c ompanies f ound t hemselves da ted and u ncompetitive. N ew p rocesses h elped s tave o ff t he te chnological decline but could not prevent industry contraction. Neither could they prevent layoffs, since the new technology was inevitably labor-saving. The s teel t rade u nions t ook t he g amble o f n egotiating ES OP plans i n t he s teel b usinesses f or t heir m embers. I n 1 997 s ome 60,000 of the remaining 163,000 American steelworkers were shareholders i n ES OP p lans. Worker o wnership be gan t o c hange t he union–management relationship. As shareholders the union members were more willing to accept f exible working practices t hat made the plants more eff cient. T heir n ew o wnership pe rspective a lso made t hem more demanding of t heir u nion leadership, expecting it to display a greater understanding of business. Labor disputes be came a t hing o f t he p ast. B ut w hether t he a rrangement is strong enough to stave off the forces involved in industry decline remains to be seen. The s ame q uestion w as f aced b y Tower C olliery. As o ne o f the l ast re maining c oal m ines i n S outh Wales, t he c olliery was bought out and run by its workers when every other of its neighboring mines had been closed down by the state-owned National Coal Board as u neconomic. Tower Colliery, which f nally closed in 20 08, w as a bo ld e xperiment i n w orker o wnership, e xtending a way of life that was precious to the people of South Wales. The jobs t hat replaced t hose i n m ining were t ypically low-paid,

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The History of Work low-skilled warehousing or assembly manufacturing. The miners at Tower restored their pride and asserted their independence. But theirs w as a f ragile c apitalism, n ot a n e xpansionist e nterprise. The mine’s lifetime was f nite, depending on coal resources and available markets. The most successful ESOP arrangements have involved the simultaneous i ntroduction of more pa rticipatory management st yles. Companies t hat began t o t rust t heir employees, explaining t heir business p lans a nd s haring m onthly s ales a nd p rof t da ta – s ocalled open-book ma nagement – be gan to reap d ividends i n big improvements to their business performance. Management a t Sp ringf eld R eManufacturing i n S pringf eld, Missouri, d isproved Go rde’s a rguments w hen t hey i ntroduced training for employees so that they could read f nancial and production f gures. Work groups are encouraged to analyze f nancial statements and look for possible improvements. When Springf eld launched i ts e mployee o wnership p lan i n 1 983 i ts s hare p rice stood at 10¢. By 1993 the price had risen to $21. Like many companies w ho ha ve i ntroduced E SOPs, S pringf eld h as w orked a t developing closer cooperation and consultation between management and workers. The employee-share-owned companies appear to have become the proving ground for Drucker’s theories on self-managed groups. The m ost s uccessful of t hem a re h arnessing t he crea tiveness of their employees, using quality circles, project teams, and suggestion schemes. A s tudy in 1987 found t hat ESOP companies t hat increased w orker i nvolvement i n d ecision-making g rew m ore rapidly than they would have done otherwise.6 The da nger o f e mployee-owned c ompanies i s t hat t hey ma y be s een as a w ay o f a massing a f ortune ra ther t han as a g oing concern that can, with prudent and skillful management, provide livelihoods for generations. T his was t he idea of Spedan L ewis. It was a lso t he idea of D avid Er dal, t he former owner of Tullis Russell, a S cottish paper manufacturing business. Erdal sold his shareholdings to a t rust that now owns the business on behalf of employees. T he s ale w as f nanced b y a l oan t hat i s be ing p aid off over a n umber of years out of prof ts. Severed from his family business connection, Erdal has used his new independence to undertake a s tudy comparing the quality of life in a c ooperative

Sharp-suited Philanthropists community r un o n e galitarian l ines wi th t hat o f a c ommunity dominated by private business. He c hose f or h is c omparison S assuolo a nd I mola, t wo s mall towns n ot f ar f rom B ologna i n n orthern I taly. I mola, a t own of about 60,000 people, is supported by a large number of cooperative ventures, many of them more than a hundred years old. Some 18 pe rcent o f its po pulation works i n c ooperatives, a nd a bout a third o f t he t own’s f amilies h ave a t l east o ne m ember w orking in a c o-op. Just forty m iles away i n Sassuolo, a t own of 40,000 people, n o o ne w orks i n a c ooperative. O ne o f t he f rst differences Er dal n oticed a mong h is po pulation s amples, d rawn f or comparison, was that Imola had no great divide between rich and poor, whereas the divide in Sassuolo was much sharper. Erdal w anted t o te st h is t heory t hat c ooperative ventures p romote s tronger, m ore peace -loving, a nd h ealthier c ommunities. The e vidence po inted t o g reater i nvolvement i n v oluntary w ork and more employee t raining i n I mola. But one of t he most striking discoveries was that people in Imola were living considerably longer t han t hose i n S assuolo, wi th a 1 4 pe rcent l ower m ortality rate over the six years prior to the research which started in 1998. “Employee share ownership makes you live longer. That’s the main thing I w ant to bring out,” said Erdal, shortly a fter a nalyzing h is preliminary results in 1999.7 As he pointed out, “Sassuolo is a good place to live by international comparisons – but Imola is better.” There is some supporting evidence for t his f nding i n a l ongrunning study of hierarchies in the British civil service. A s tudy of t he h ealth p rospects a mong W hitehall ma ndarins, c arried out by Michael Marmot, director of the I nternational Centre for Health and Society at University College, London, has discovered that people lower down a hierarchy are more likely to suffer heart attacks than those in the upper echelons.8 The c ooperative e mployees o f M ondragon i n t he S panish Basque region would need no convincing by academic research that th eir way of life i s p referable t o th at of e mployees in c onventional businesses. Mondragon is one of the success stories of the cooperative movement. The movement itself began in 1844 in Rochdale, La ncashire, w hen a g roup o f t radesmen poo led t heir resources t o f orm t he R ochdale S ociety o f E quitable P ioneers. The R ochdale p ioneers, i nspired b y t he i deas o f R obert Ow en,

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The History of Work the Welsh-born textile entrepreneur turned utopian dreamer, were at the vanguard of a movement that would spread worldwide, inf uencing the working practices of millions. But c an t his k ind o f e nterprise p revail i n a c apitalist s ystem where only the strong succeed and the weak either go to the wall or f nd themselves absorbed by a merger? The story of Mondragon suggests that it can. Cooperative working was established quietly in this Basque town in 1941, when Spain’s European neighbors were at war. Father Jose Maria Arizmendiarrieta, a Catholic priest and a veteran of the Republican cause in the Spanish Civil War, arrived in Mondragon intent upon carrying out a mission on behalf of his bishop to help the town’s young people. His p roposal t o e nlarge a s chool f or a pprentices r un b y t he town’s largest industrial employer, the Union Cerrajera steel company, was rejected by its ma nagement, so t he priest made plans instead for a s eparate school. He placed u rns, l ike ballot boxes, on street corners a nd asked people to d rop letters pledging cash or a ny o ther s upport t hey m ight gi ve t o t he p roposal. T he s ix hundred replies represented support f rom a q uarter of t he families in the town’s 8,000 population.9 As Robert Oakeshott points out i n h is book, Jobs & Fairness, a s trong c ommunity i nvolvement and spirit of self-help were engendered among the students and their families from the start. Five o f h is o riginal g raduates w ho c ontinued t heir s tudies, gaining e ngineering d egrees a t Za ragoza U niversity, re turned to Mondragon, where they worked in management at Union Cerrajera. They wanted the company’s senior managers to restructure t he business on t he cooperative social model t hat had be en outlined to them as students by Fr Arizmendiarrieta. When the company rejected their ideas, they left to set up their own cooperative factory in 1956, making oil stoves and heaters. By the end of the century the Mondragon Co-operative Corporation was one of t he l argest c orporations i n S pain, be ing t he c ountry’s l argest supplier of domestic appliances and machine tools, and an important supplier of car parts, employing twenty-six thousand people in a hundred industrial, f nancial, and retail companies. Eighty of these businesses are cooperatives. Woven i nto t his n etwork o f b usinesses a re w orker ed ucation and t raining ce nters, u niversities, re search ce nters, a nd s ervice

Sharp-suited Philanthropists cooperatives. The cooperatives are worker owned and democratically managed. Each worker has the right to vote colleagues onto a general assembly that elects the board. No one in the company earns more t han six t imes t he salary of t he lowest paid worker. Typically, when a company grows to more than f ve hundred employees, the parent f nances another start-up company to ensure that each unit remains relatively small and manageable. Mondragon is a giant among cooperatives, but at the other end of the scale some businesses have learned to live with even more democratic and idealistic principles. SUMA Wholefoods, a sixtystrong cooperative based in Halifax, England, was created in the 1970s by a g roup of l entil-eating h ippies who be came a ttracted to v egetarian l ifestyles a nd w anted to ens ure a co ntinuing s upply of wholefood. The business has proved determinedly idealistic i n its p rinciples, i nterchanging ma nagement r oles with t hose of production work and paying the same pay packages to everyone, w hether t hey s weep t he f oors o r l ook a fter t he acc ounts. No one is rich at SUMA, but the business sustains itself and the pay i s reas onable i n a l ow w age a rea wi th h igher t han a verage unemployment. Cooperatives take many forms, but many of them tend to have a dated image with histories steeped in the ideology of socialism and worker equality in the factory system. More recent manifestations tend to be f ounded on a d esire for more e quitable working a rrangements. L och F yne Oy sters i s o wned a nd r un b y i ts employees t hrough t he L och Fyne Oysters Trust t hat l ists as i ts aims: “ relief o f po verty, t he ad vancement o f ed ucation a nd t he protection o f t he e nvironment p articularly wi thin S cotland a nd the area around the head of Loch Fyne.” Employee shareholding ideals also led to the establishment of the L ondon ad vertising a gency, S t. L uke’s, a n e mployee-owned business that feeds off its collective imagination and channels its creativity into advertising campaigns. St. Luke’s started life as the London o ff ce o f Ch iat D ay, t he U S ad vertising a gency k nown for its c olorful o pen-plan o ff ces exploiting t he f ashion for “h ot desking,” w here e mployees w ho o nly s pend p art o f t heir w orking week in the off ce are encouraged to share desks. Andy Law, the L ondon-based e xecutive re sponsible f or f nding n ew b usiness, David Abraham, the account director, and a g roup of other

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The History of Work colleagues w ere as ked b y t heir h ead o ff ce to look at ways of renewing t he c ompany. T hey w anted t o e xplore t he c oncept o f running t he b usiness o n s trong e thical p rinciples. T he idea was rejected b y t he U S p arent, b ut La w a nd A braham w ent a head with t heir i dea a nyway, w orking wi th c lients i n a m ore o pen way, w ho w armed t o t he a pproach. B ut w hen Ch iat D ay s old out t o Om nicom, o ne o f t he l argest ad vertising b usinesses i n the United States, neither Law, Abraham, nor t heir L ondon colleagues wanted to be part of the new set-up. In a company where people a re t he o nly rea l as sets t heir vi ews c arried c onsiderable clout. Omnicon agreed to sell them the London business for £1 in return for a £1.2 million share of its prof ts over the next seven years.10 Law a nd A braham w ere t he o stensible o wners o f t his n ew business, but how could they pursue a po licy of openness, trust, and c ooperation wi th t heir t alented c olleagues i f t hese peo ple were merely employees earning prof ts for a two-man partnership who simply got lucky? It didn’t seem fair or particularly sensible if they wanted to retain the best people, so they set up the business as a n employee-owned cooperative. They, too, opted for the trust method of ownership, distributing shares to employees but retaining a majority ownership in trust. In i ts ea rly da ys t he a tmosphere o f S t. L uke’s w as t rendy beyond be lief, wi th s pecial r ooms f or c lients c alled “b rand meeting r ooms” a nd a r ound r oom c alled t he “womb,” u sed as a retreat. Strip away the fancy furniture and there may not have been much difference between this business and many other professional p artnerships – La w h imself l eft i n t he m id-2000s to set up a n etworked franchise-based company called The Law Firm – b ut it showed t hat employee ownership a nd p artnership, backed by a sense of idealism, could thrive in an economy dominated by multimillion dollar share-option d eals for chief executives and telephone-number bonuses for investment bankers. This disconnected world o f f at-cat s alaries c aused d eep c oncern a nd government approbation in the 1990s, yet deep down many of us continued to harbor desires for wealth and riches. When Gordon Gekko p uffed o ut h is c hest i n O liver S tone’s 1 987 f lm, Wall Street, and announced “Greed is good,” it was supposed to invite contempt. But too many of us believed him.

CHAPTER 19

The End of Management So much of what we call management consists of making it diff cult for people to work. (Peter Drucker, b. 1909) London’s Houses of Parliament, the Gothic revivalist creation of Charles Barry and Augustus Pugin, were built for a period when the s poken w ord c arried f ar m ore i nf uence than it does today. Pugin’s m agnif cent i nteriors, wi th t heir bo ld W illiam M orris prints, a re a c onstant re minder o f t he h istory e mbedded i n t he building’s w alls. I t h as a h umbling, ma jestic, a nd s ometimes intimidating a tmosphere, a nd i t w as h ere, i n c ommittee r oom 15 in January, 1995, that f fty-nine-year-old Ced ric B rown, t he head of one of the UK’s largest companies, faced charges placed before him in the gravest tones by his parliamentary inquisitors. Brown, t he t hen c hief executive o f B ritish Gas , was acc used o f making t oo m uch m oney, o f a greeing t o a p ay ra ise t hat w as wholly unacceptable. Brown h ad r isen t hrough t he ra nks a t B ritish Gas , s tarting in what had been the publicly owned Gas B oard as a f tter after leaving school at age 16. His was a story of a hardworking young man w ho mad e g ood a fter y ears o f s olid e ffort, t he t ype o f story t hat i s ad mired a nd ce lebrated i n t he U nited S tates. B ut Americans d o n ot s uffer f rom e nvy t o a nything l ike t he s ame degree as t heir B ritish c ousins. En vy i s p art o f t he B ritish d isease. When stirred together with equal measures of self-righteous indignation a nd t he British s ense of fair play it creates a po tent cocktail worthy of a newspaper’s front page. Brown’s p ay d etails h ad be en re produced i n t he c ompany’s annual re port, a l egal re quirement c overing B ritish-registered publicly quoted companies. A j ournalist had queried t he size of the ra ise, a nd a B ritish Gas p ress o ff cer h ad e xplained t hat i t amounted to a salary increase of 75 percent, from £275,000 to 265

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The History of Work £475,000. A ny f urther e xplanation w as s uperf uous i n te rms o f tabloid column-inches. The 75 percent ra ise i n basic pay was quite correct, but it d id not te ll t he w hole s tory. T he f gure had been skewed by some f nancial ma nipulations. Brown was a pproaching re tirement, a nd his pension would be c alculated as a p roportion of his basic pay. His overall pay, including bonuses, was much higher than his basic pay, and the board wanted to consolidate some of this unpensionable bonus pay into basic pay in order to boost his pension. This kind o f ma nipulation w as pe rfectly l egitimate a nd n ot u ncommon. I t w as re gularly u sed t o g uarantee a n a greeable s end-off and a c omfortable lifestyle to the chief who had made it through to re tirement. It m ight n ot h ave be en pe rceived as f air by s ome, but such arrangements were par for the course in the relationship between top people in big companies and their pay advisors. The raise in overall pay – the real raise in effect – was 28 percent over two years, enough for most of us perhaps. T he problem was that the b asic f gure s tood o ut i n t he re port l ike t he p roverbial s ore thumb, and an irritating journalist had the presence of mind to question it. The result was a scandal, the sort of newspaper feeding-frenzy in which the British press delights. Cedric Brown was branded a fat cat. Brown became the representative whipping boy for all top UK executives perceived to be overpaid, particularly those former public s ervants w ho n ow h eaded p rivatized u tility c ompanies. Once their utilities had entered the private sector they saw their pay a wards s piral t o l evels t hat m ore c losely ma tched t hose i n competitor companies. Pay is emotional, and Cedric Brown’s pay raise was starkly translated in newspaper headlines. There w ere p lenty o f ob vious met aphors. S ome ne wspapers described him as a p ig with his snout in the trough. The unions were o nly t oo h appy t o l end a h and. L est t he p ublic w ere i n any d oubt a bout t his a nalogy, t he G MB g eneral w orkers u nion acquired a p ig it named Cedric. The pig was paraded before the press in organized photo opportunities. Brown, the former public servant t urned c apitalist, w as p illoried. A nd t his w as o nly t he start. The Em ployment C ommittee – a p arliamentary i nvestigatory committee comprising eleven sitting Members of Parliament of

The End of Management different political hues – decided it was time to look at executive pay a rrangements. W hen B rown s at be fore t he c ommittee t hat January day he knew what lay in store. It didn’t help that for the previous f ew m onths B ritish Gas h ad be en s eeking t o red uce the b asic p ay o f ma ny o f i ts e mployees, w hile i ncreasing t heir variable p ay, p lacing m ore e mphasis o n t he e lement t hat c ould be ea rned i n c ommission – a re versal o f t he c hanges mad e t o Brown’s pay. Politicians can work with this kind of material. First they softened h im u p with q uestions o n t he s taff p ay n egotiations, t hen they w ent f or h is e nhanced pe nsion. B rown c onf rmed t hat h is improved pe nsion e ntitlements w ould c ost t he B ritish Gas pe nsion f und a n extra £ 750,000, according to calculations made by actuaries. There was more. How much did he earn in a day, asked one committee member who had calculated the f gure at around £1,000, and how much did his lowest-paid workers earn? Brown reckoned he earned more than a thousand a day. A sales assistant, he said, would earn between £10,000 and £13,000 a year. It was clear w hat w as c oming n ext. W ould h e be h appy t o w ork f or £10,000 a year? Brown said it was a matter of differentials, so the committee d iscussed d ifferentials. T he a verage rat ios o f top -tobottom pay in Japan, they noted, were about 7:1. “Do you not think that is a m ore fair a nd equitable system for r unning a b usiness? It certainly seems to be a s uccessful one, since the Japanese are the c ompetitors w ho w e a re a ll c hasing, f or p roductivity, e ff ciency, a nd a ll t he re st o f it, i n t he world ma rket,” s aid A ngela Eagle, who had taken over the questioning. Brown h it b ack wi th U S a mmunition. H e c ould t hink o f t he boss o f a m uch s maller A merican c ompetitor w ho ea rned te n times his own salary. The question of differentials, he said, was a matter for politicians. But, as he also suggested, the chief executive’s p ay w as a n i mportant f gure t o g et r ight i n a p rivatized company. I mplicit i n h is a rgument was t he po ssibility t hat i n a few y ears’ t ime t he c ompany m ight be s eeking t o f ll the post from outside, and it would need to offer a rate of pay that would attract candidates from its competitors. None o f t his ma ttered m uch t o t he c ommittee. T he h arrying continued, increasing in intensity when the baton was handed to the c hairman, G reville J anner. Ot her c ommittee m embers h ad

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The History of Work already h ighlighted a v oluntary red undancy p rogram. J anner mentioned o ne o r t wo o ther l ittle e mbarrassing c oincidences occurring a round t he t ime t he p ay ra ise c ame i nto t he p ublic domain. On top of the start of a restructuring program that would shed t he j obs o f 2 5,000 peo ple ( a t hird o f t he w orkforce), t he company had announced an increase in the price of gas and the closure of many of its showrooms. There had also been a leak of plans to cut spending on safety surveys of gas ma ins, a nd complaints t o t he Gas C onsumers C ouncil h ad r isen c onsiderably. Did he not agree, asked Janner, t hat it had be en i nsensitive a nd tactless t o h andle t he p ay ra ise i n t he way t hat it was h andled? “I think it could have been handled better,” said Brown. But that was not enough for Janner, who administered the coup de g râce with a verbal f ourish: “M r B rown, i t w as i nsensitive, tactless, a nd a g rave m istake, a nd you were chief executive at t he time?” Brown’s reply was a simple “Yes.”1 If there is such a thing as Judgment Day, surely it could not offer anything as severe as this. American p ay c onsultants were i ncredulous a t t he hullabaloo over B rown’s p ay. T here h ad be en s ome r uctions i n t he U nited States, b ut o ver m uch v aster s alaries. I n l ate 1 992, f or e xample, M ichael Ei sner, t he c hairman o f W alt Di sney, e xercised $202 million of share options. The presence of these options packages has made the basic pay rates of senior US executives almost insignif cant in comparison. Since then, Eisner’s earnings through share o ptions h ave s oared e ven f urther i nto t he s tratosphere. Shortly a fter h e h ad rea lized a nother $ 551.6 m illion be fore t ax from c ashing i n s hare o ptions i n 1998, Fortune ma gazine es timated t he t otal v alue o f Ei sner’s o ptions, bo th e xercised a nd unexercised, at $1.43 billion and suggested that his pay deal might have made Eisner the “highest-paid hired hand in history.”2 Making m oney h ad a lways be en a pe rfectly re spectable a nd thoroughly l audable e xercise i n t he U SA, w hereas B ritish s ociety h ad be en w eaned o n s eventeenth-century a mateurism, ac ademic i ndifference, a nd p rofessional s nobbery t hat p referred t o emphasize t he n otion o f v ocation o ver g rubby co mmercialism. The poo rer working mas ses went a long with t his s ystem, a rguing t hat w ealth a nd p rivilege w ere “ not f or t he l ikes o f u s.”3 It d id n ot h elp a ny w hen A merican c ommentators l ike Ga ry Hamel, the management writer and academic, pointed to the lack

The End of Management of e ntrepreneurialism a mong p ublic c ompany c hief e xecutives, many of whom had never known what it was to build a company from s cratch, u nlike t hose w ho ra n t he te chnological po werhouses of Silicon Valley in California. Cedric B rown re tired s oon a fterwards. H is w ork s teering British Gas into the private marketplace had been eclipsed by the infamy of his pay raise. A committee was formed to look at executive pay policy throughout the UK. It met under the tough a nd uncompromising control of R ichard Greenbury, the chief executive of Marks & Spencer, Britain’s best-loved retailer. Greenbury was o ne o f t he m ost re spected b usiness c hiefs i n t he c ountry. Within two years h is committee had made its recommendations for even greater clarity in corporate reporting of salaries, greater independence o f re muneration c ommittees i n t he d eliberation of p ay a wards, a nd i ncreased c larity i n t he f xing o f p ension arrangements ( a po int t hat w as l ater f udged a fter s ubmissions from actuaries). Suddenly corporate governance was a h ot topic on both sides of the Atlantic. Within a further two years Greenbury had retired form Marks & S pencer a mid g rowing c onsternation a nd boardroom b attles a mong h is f ellow e xecutives a bout t he f uture direction o f t he c ompany, as i ts s ales a nd p rof ts plummeted. If Marks & S pencer w as i n t rouble, i t s eemed t hat n o o ne w as safe. Other giants began to falter, relying on mergers to maintain market dominance. Nevertheless, c hief e xecutive s alaries c ontinued t o c limb e ver upwards, attracting forthright comments from people like John Edmonds, general secretary of the GMB union, who, when president of Britain’s Trades Union Congress, quite simply called their recipients “greedy bastards.” 4 If it wasn’t inf ated pay increases it was overblown p ayoffs for a j ob d one b adly. W hen t he bo ard o f British Airways agreed a £1.98 million payoff and a handsome pension for its former chief executive, Bob Ayling, who lost his job after the c ompany ra n u p l osses o f £ 244 m illion i n t he f nancial year 1999–2000, shareholders rebelled a nd forced t he board to review its a rrangements.5 I t l ooked l ike A yling, a f ormer c ivil s ervant, was being rewarded for failure. Where was the justice in that? It seemed particularly improper that large rewards were available f or peo ple w ho h ad n ever k nown w hat i t w as t o b uild a

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The History of Work company f rom s cratch o r who h ad n ever d isplayed a n o unce of entrepreneurial or innovative sparkle. Gary Hamel has described disparagingly the heads of large public companies as a generation of “ stewards” w hose ma in r ole i s t o c oncentrate o n e ff ciencies and re turn value t o s hareholders.6 S tewardship, he a rgues, do es not involve risk or entrepreneurialism. On the contrary, it is risk averse. In t he l ate 1 990s t he po sition o f t hese bo ardroom s tewards seemed unassailable. In 2000 they found themselves under attack, as ma ny o f t hem s aw t heir c ompany’s s tock ma rket c apitalization be gin t o s tagnate. F inancial j ournalists, s tirred b y t he pe rformance of Internet stocks in the f rst f ew m onths o f t he n ew century, be gan t o p artition t he b usiness s ector i nto t he o ld a nd new economies. In writing of solid manufacturing or service sector businesses as “old economy” enterprises, there was an implicit suggestion that these were solid, slow-moving, boring old businesses not worth the candle when compared to the nimble, agile, youthful and sexy dot.com start-ups of the “new economy.” Hamel h elped t o c ompound t he s lur, d escribing t hese s olid multinationals a nd t heir o bsession wi th m ergers as “ dinosaurs mating.”7 Even then the analogy was ironic since dinosaurs were hugely successful animals who lived on the planet for 160 million years. S ubsequent e vents w ould p rove t he acc uracy o f t his observation. A t t he t ime, h owever, H amel w as u sing t he w ord “dinosaur” as a m etaphor f or a n o utdated, l umbering gi ant. He w ent f urther i n h is d ismissal o f t hese m erging m ultinationals, c ommenting: “I ’m n ot s ure t hat t wo d runks ma ke a s table person.”8 Investors seemed to concur with him in 1999 and early 2000, switching their loyalty to emerging technology stocks, but the e uphoria c ouldn’t l ast, a nd by t he e nd of 20 00 ma ny of t he stalwarts w ere be ginning t o r eassert t hemselves as tec hnology stocks nose-dived. Worse still, Enron, the energy company that Hamel had championed a s a business r evolutionary, a pa ragon of innovation a nd an “open ma rket for t alent,”9 c ollapsed a mid one of t he biggest business f rauds i n h istory. Ot her p rominent b usiness f rauds, including those of WorldCom and Tyco, led to the 2002 SarbanesOxley A ct t hat t ightened re gulatory c ontrols o n c ompanies i n the US.

The End of Management The companies t hat could adapt to harsher t rading conditions after t he 1990s era of excess, a rgued R ichard Pascale, t he ma nagement wr iter, were be having l ike t he k ind of “complex a daptive systems” found in nature. “‘Living Systems’ isn’t a metaphor for how human institutions operate. It’s the way it is,” he wrote in Surf ng the Edge of Chaos.10 As companies at tempted to come to g rips with t his new Da rwinism, i t w as n o s urprise t o f nd t hat t ried a nd t rusted ma nagement m ethods, pe rfected a nd re f ned f or a ce ntury, w ere running aground. Were we beginning to witness the end of management as we knew it? The signs had been there for several years in the vogue for f atter h ierarchies, s ingle-status workplaces, a nd bo sses who c alled themselves colleagues, associates, or partners. While these more egalitarian-looking c ompany c hiefs ma y h ave be en o n f rstname terms with their staff, the fundamental power base in most companies d id not change. T here a re still h ierarchies supported by a mbitious ma nagers a nd f ormal re porting s tructures. S ome of t hese ma nagers, l ike A ndy G rove a t I ntel, w ould s it a mong their s taff i n t iny off ces, s haring t he work experience – b ut h e was s till a n a utocrat. A nd t op ma nagement re mained a ma ledominated world. Women h ave f ound i t t ough t o pe netrate w hat t hey d escribe as the “glass ceiling,” a l ayer of management beyond which few emerge t o r ub s houlders wi th t he e xecutive e lite. O ne w ho h as is M arjorie S cardino, t he A merican c hief executive o f P earson, the London-headquartered media and information conglomerate, who w on h er s purs i ncreasing t he c irculation o f t he Economist business magazine in the United States. It was a big jump to take over the helm of an FTSE 100 company, and S cardino’s a rrival w as re garded wi th i nitial s uspicion, particularly when she seemed slow to act. But when she did move, s he d emonstrated a bo ldness t hat ea rned t he ad miration of h er pe ers. S he s et a mbitious t argets a nd t alked t he l anguage of the Internet teeny-boppers. Pearson moved with apparent ease from t he o ld e conomy i nto t he p layground o f t he n ew. B ut h er success did not trigger a feminine revolution. In September, 2000 less than 2 pe rcent of executive directors in the FTSE 100 – t he UK’s largest quoted companies – were women.11

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The History of Work At the top of the largest US companies the presence of women was n ot m uch s tronger. Fortune 5 00 c ompanies h ad o nly t wo women c hief e xecutives i n t he y ear 20 00. I t t ook Ca rleton S . Fiorina at Hewlett-Packard more than twenty years at companies like AT&T a nd Lucent to get to t he top. A ndrea Jung had be en passed over once for an outside candidate, before she eventually became chief executive at Avon. Women h ad g reater s uccess i n d ot.com s tart-up c ompanies. The i nitial i nvestor a ppeal o f t hese b usinesses o ffered a b ypass of t he t raditional bo ardroom. Suddenly women c ould get t o t he top through the entrepreneur route, not the route that was controlled by the headhunter who had mastered the game of boardroom musical chairs. Each of these developments tended to disguise other forces pounding a way a t t raditional w orkplace re lationships. O ne o f these w as te chnological. T he m odem, t he I nternet, a nd s peedier e lectronic c onnections w ere e nabling i ncreasing n umbers o f people during the 1990s to work from home. The extent of this practice was diff cult to gauge, because the work was often done quietly. T his w as a s ilent m ovement, n ot n ormally a rranged i n a systemized or organized way – peo ple were reasoning t hat as long as the work was done, why should their managers complain? Sometimes it had the approval of managers, sometimes it did not. Sometimes it was p ursued by t he ma nagers t hemselves, re treating to dens at home for some solitude away from the unceasing demands o f t heir o ff ces. O ccasionally, c ombined w ith a r eduction in desks to save on off ce overheads – t he hot-desking system introduced at St. Luke’s – it was part of a planned regime of working. T his s ystem be gan i n c omputer c ompanies b ut h ad become so commonplace (and so unpopular) in 2001 that Fortune magazine t hought it worth h ighlighting t he “be nef ts” of off ces with a d oor, desk, and computer for each staff member at Plante & M oran, a M ichigan acc ounting f rm, l isted te nth i n i ts “ 100 Best Companies to Work for” feature, without a trace of irony.12 Teleworking – t he n ame gi ven t o t his m ixture o f h ome a nd off ce w ork – d emanded d ifferent a ttitudes t o w ork. F irstly i t demanded a d egree o f t rust t hat w orkers w ere n ot s hirking. Beyond t hat it n eeded a reas sessment of what was pe rceived as shirking. I f workers were saving t wo hours a da y on t heir da ily

The End of Management commutes, and if they chose to spend some of that time watching the T V, w andering i n t heir g ardens o r r unning t he od d e rrand, what d id t his ma tter t o t heir bo sses, as l ong as t hey d elivered results? After all, most off ce workers would take natural breaks throughout the day to gossip around the coffee machine or go for a smoke. Even at their desks they might be e xchanging personal emails or trawling the Internet. In many off ces t he a mount o f real productive work taking place seemed to be dwindling, yet hours spent at work appeared to be lengthening. No such changes were apparent among assembly workers tied to t heir w orkbenches. T he p rocesses o f s cientif c management remained a pparent, a lso, i n t he p roliferating u se o f c all ce nters for servicing customers, often based in large, anonymous sheds – the battery cages of the information industry. Nor was life much different for those whose days were governed by strict timetables and deadlines, such as teachers, postal workers, and train drivers. But, to the authoritarian mind, new technology appeared to have delivered unprecedented opportunities for shirking as well as for work. There were two approaches to this dilemma: to police the technology a nd t he worker’s day – a c ostly u se o f ma nagerial t ime and which is technically diff cult – or to outline clearly the expectations that went with the job and monitor the results. The second option placed the responsibility on workers to manage their job as they saw f t. It was not quite so straightforward, because it would be i ncumbent o n t he e mployer t o e nsure t hat e mployees w ere well trained and appraised of the company’s policies and culture. But extending greater freedom and scope to the employee might bring added dividends of innovation and creativity. The idling or incompetent worker could be quickly weeded out, or, better still, could be taken in hand and helped or redirected into work that was better suited to his or her potential. The increase in online working was soon forcing the issue. In late 2000 the intimate contents of an email sent by a sometime girlfriend to a junior lawyer at Norton Rose, a large London f rm of solicitors, was passed between the lawyer and some of his colleagues. Within two days the message had been seen by millions around the world.13 The Norton Rose website received so much traff c i n re sponse t hat i t cras hed. S uddenly, w orkplace e mail

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The History of Work policies and protocols became an urgent issue, as companies woke up to the power of this Pandora’s Box they had introduced as a tool. Incidents such a s thi s emphasize th e urgency of th e n eed for businesses to establish relationships of trust with their employees. Big Brother-style controls, recalling the days of the factory overseer, may be the knee-jerk answer but are hardly likely to increase job s atisfaction o r i mprove w orkplace m orale. I n t he o nline workplace it will be incumbent on an enterprise to ensure that work is meaningful. When the tool is also a toy, when it works like a te levision set a llowing workers to download t heir favorite f lm or music, the real work had better be absorbing if it is to distract the on-screen worker from tarrying within the Internet. In spite of the growing literature and theory of the empowered workplace, The Dilbert Principle, a boo k of cynical cartoons, is one of the world’s most popular business books, because it recognizes the reality of the workplace and the disingenuousness of so much modern management theory. We are told about job enrichment a nd s elf-management o n t he o ne h and, b ut o n t he o ther hand we still run up against the boss–minion relationship. “Subordinate” is such a n a rchaic word; it should be b anished from t he w orkplace l exicon. B ut t he “ subordinate” s till e xists. Archie Norman might have introduced the term “colleagues” to engender a sense of equality when he was chief executive of Asda supermarkets, but he was still the boss. If the boss said that meetings would take place standing up, as Norman did, then that was the r ule. M anagers, l ike t he cra ftsmen o f M idvale, i nstinctively work t o t he r ule. I n t his case it is a h ierarchical r ule with l ines of authority. The more senior of them have been invested with power and budgets, and many are poorly equipped, behaviorally, to exercise the relationship with their staff in a spirit of openness and trust. The i nadequacy o f ma nagement i n t rying t o i mplement Drucker’s self-managed work teams is at the heart of much workplace te nsion t oday. M any ma nagers f eel u ncomfortable wi th the l anguage o f “bo sses” a nd “ subordinates,” b ut t his l anguage and the concepts that go with it are tremendously resilient. It is not only managers but employees, too, who need to adjust. Selfmanagement m eans j ust t hat. I f y ou g o t o a bo ss a nd as k f or

The End of Management work, y ou a re pe rpetuating a re lationship t hat m ust c hange i n the crea tive w orkplace. S tephen B arley, a p rofessor a t S tanford University, says this conditioning is perpetuated in “western images of work rooted in several polarities: mental/manual, clean/ dirty, ed ucated/uneducated, w hite c ollar/blue c ollar, ma nager/ worker.”14 T he f rst a nd l ast te rms o f eac h o f t hese po larities, wrote Barley, anchored “the upper and lower end of a s ystem of status and prestige.” But t he f astest g rowing te chnical j obs i n t he United S tates – those of p rogrammers, systems a nalysts, o perations re searchers, computer operators, a nd computer repair te chnicians – w ere, he argued, f undamentally a ltering t he o rganization o f w ork, s ince the r oles d id n ot f use eas ily wi th t raditional o ff ces ma nned by managers a nd s ecretaries. T he n ewer j obs, s taffed b y te chnical experts, w ould re quire ma nagement t o t ake o n a c oordinating role between teams of professionals. Barley a lso n oticed t hat a s tudy o f s ecretaries a t C ornell University had revealed that the spread of computers was developing the secretarial job into that of an administrative or research assistant. It appeared that the jobs of the secretary and the manager were beginning to merge, yet there remained a gulf between the reward a nd qualif cations for – a nd status of – t he two jobs. Barley predicted, however, that technology would produce more horizontal d ivisions o f l abor, wi th s ignif cant consequences for management. “M anagement’s t raditional s ource o f l egitimacy will begin to wane,” he asserted, concluding that “the likelihood is that managers, unable to ma ke k nowledgeable decisions autocratically, will f nd themselves relegated to the important but less heady role of coordination.” Barley may well be o n the r ight track in his thinking, but his conclusion d emands s ome g reater a nalysis o f t he ma nagerial job. Henry Mintzberg described the job accurately as s omething of a j uggling ac t i n h is 1 973 boo k, The N ature of M anagerial Work. A ma nager’s time, he wrote, was perpetually interrupted. Far from the portrait of managerial work outlined by Henri Fayol, 15 e mphasizing p lanning, o rganization, c oordination, a nd control, the manager was constantly handling interruptions, each of w hich, t ypically, would be d elegated a nd d isposed o f wi thin ten minutes.

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The History of Work While the coordinating role remains important in management, other f unctions s uch as p lanning a nd o rganization a re i ncreasingly being handed over to employees. This can only happen if there i s a re laxation o f c ontrol. B ut t here i s a nother s ignif cant role f or ma nagers w orking c losely wi th p rofessional e mployees who b y t he n ature o f t heir w ork wi ll e xercise h igh d egrees o f self-management. A dvertising, e ducation, t he me dia, m arketing, f nance, and research and development are all sectors where this relationship i s e volving. T his i s t he c oncept o f t he c ustomermanager, whose relationship with the professional is transactional rather than commanding. A relationship on t hese l ines h as existed for years i n English barristers’ chambers, where the clerk offers work to the barristers, who choose whether they want to take it. The clerk is an important c oordinating a nd a dministrative f gure, b ut h e d oes n ot have t he same status or ea rnings power as t he senior barristers. In o ther o rganizations, w here d epartmental d emarcation l ines have b een re duced by re engineering, t he customer-manager wi ll undoubtedly need to have technical knowledge and some experience to make a fair assessment of the product. He will also begin to notice that he is in competition with other managers in the same organization. I have been involved in these transactional relationships inside newspapers a nd seen t hem working a mong colleagues. A n ewspaper c omprises s everal s ections, each r un by a s eparate ed itor. At t he Financial Times there are numerous page editors responsible for t he day-to-day c ontent a nd a ppearance o f t hese p ages. A s tory ma y b y “ sold” b y a wr iter t o a ny o ne o f t hese ed itors he or she thinks most appropriate. If he thinks the story strong enough f or t he o utside p ages, h e c ould s ell i t f urther o r l et i t establish i ts own s trength as i t i s evaluated t hroughout t he day. Often a feature idea is discussed before it is researched, to assess the willingness of an editor to use it or the willingness and suitability of a writer to undertake the work. Relationships be tween wr iters a nd ed itors a re i mportant, because each will use past experience to make a judgment about the willingness of the other to keep his or her side of the bargain. The bargain is not always recognized as s uch explicitly, but it is implicit. Often the contract is precise, expecting a certain number

The End of Management of words by a certain deadline. There has to be f exibility in these arrangements. P ressure o f s pace ma y f orce a s tory as ide. B ut, like the boy who cried wolf, the writer soon recognizes the editor who overcommissions or who hacks back a good story. When this h appens t he wr iter wi ll t ry t o “sell” h is ma terial elsewhere and he wi ll go to someone who he k nows wi ll handle h is story sensitively and use it sensibly. The c ontract w orks bo th w ays, a nd a n ed itor wi ll ma rk t he card of an unreliable writer, commissioning him less frequently. But editors may not always realize the two-sidedness of the relationship, t hat t hey h ave be come c ustomers. T hey ma y s till s ee themselves as o riginators u sing wr iters as s uppliers, b ut t hey cannot always count on a wr iter who may be working for someone else. It can be seen, therefore, that the editor–writer relationship is quite f uid, relying heavily on mutual understanding, trust, and p rofessionalism. T he s ame re lationships a re e merging e lsewhere. The manager who expects his charges to drop everything at the sound of his command is fossilizing before our eyes. That said, it’s all very well relating the experience of a newspaper, but can a m ore open transactional relationship exist between managers a nd e mployees i n ma nufacturing? R icardo S emler, the c hief e xecutive o f S emco, t he B razilian w hite-goods ma nufacturer, h as p roved t hat i n a c ountry n oted f or i ts t raditional boss–worker autocracies, it is possible to originate innovative management s tyles. W hen S emler i nherited t he b usiness f rom his father, his f rst action was to purge the top management of all those w ho w ere n ot p repared t o a lign t heir vi ews wi th h is. H is second step was to recruit a solid f nance head and an aggressive head o f s ales. T hose w ho d eparted ma y h ave j udged S emler as no less ruthless than any previous corporate demagogue. He was growing the business by acquisition through leverage – supporting his bids on t he promise of f uture prof ts. Managers were putting in long hours to achieve t heir goals, ra rely seeing t heir families. “Work ha rd or get f red. T hat was t he ethic of t he new Semco,” he conceded later.16 But Semler had other ideas once the company had s ecured i ts s urvival wi th a s ound f nancial b ase, a h ealthy order boo k, a nd a c ollection o f b usinesses t hat h ad p romising prospects of growth. People had been pushed forward, he wrote. Supposing he tried to create a “self-propelled” workforce.

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The History of Work Change t o a m ore d emocratic w orkplace a t S emco s tarted with a cr isis. At t he a ge of t wenty-f ve Semler felt seriously ill. His vital signs were f ne, but his doctor told him that his was the most advanced case of stress he had encountered in someone of Semler’s age. Semler decided to rebel against the most ingrained ethic of his business regime – t he gospel of hard work that concentrated on quantity over quality. “Executives feel pressure from t heir bo sses t o o utwork c olleagues a nd b uild t heir i mage and career,” he wrote. “By t his reasoning, having a h eart attack because of work leads to true glory, and keeling over at the off ce is even better – a sign, a Calvinist might say, of being among The Elect.”17 His tactic was to move f rst on the little things, the details: ending factory s earches of employees a nd getting r id of t ime cards to check up on workers’ arrival and leaving times. Formal dress codes w ere a bandoned a nd s igns o f s tatus, s uch as e mbossed business cards, personal parking bays, and private executive dining r ooms, w ere re moved. S ecretaries w ere s hared, a nd o ff ces were no longer f tted out in size and decor according to seniority. Participative m anagement was encouraged r ather th an c onsultative management. Semler w as c areful t o s tress t his d ifference, w hich i s k ey t o the c hanging ma nagerial r ole. P articipative ma nagement, s ays Semler, does not merely involve listening to people’s opinions but involves h anding o ver d ecision-making re sponsibilities. A t l ast someone had g rasped Drucker’s f fty-year-old plea for self-managed plants. “It’s only when the bosses give up decision-making and l et t heir e mployees g overn t hemselves t hat t he po ssibility exists for a business jointly managed by workers and executives,” wrote Semler. Management as managers knew it for most of the twentieth century h as a ll b ut d isappeared a t S emco. T he t rail b lazed b y this B razilian ma nufacturer i s t he m odel for t he f uture. S emler has opted for common-sense management, throwing out the procedures a nd r ulebooks. H is c ommon-sense a pproach, b ased o n what i s r ight a nd p roper, h as t ransformed t he w ay S emco g oes about its business. At the core of this transformation is a reliance on t rust, a be lief t hat most people i n t he workforce wi ll not r ip off their employer if they are treated decently and fairly. Anyone

The End of Management who wants to know about the business can look at the books, and if they don’t understand the f gures there are training courses to explain what they mean. Where S emco h as v entured, o thers ma y f ollow. W ithin t he next t wenty o r t hirty years we ma y well s ee t he d isappearance of c onventional ma nagement a nd re porting s tructures, re placed by i nterdependent n etworks e ngaged i n t ransactional re lationships. C omplex ada ptive s ystems d emand re sponsive f ront-line employees, as Richard Pascale has pointed out. If o ld-style m anagement b ecomes e xtinct, m anagement i tself will f ourish, because it remains an organizational foundation of human society. Management wasn’t invented. It has existed from the earliest times. Only its def nition changes periodically. Work will remain in tomorrow’s enterprise and will still need to be managed. But people will increasingly manage themselves. Wages wi ll b ecome m ore er ratic, re f ecting g ood y ears a nd bad. Many people will work from a base line, with possibilities t o i ncrease t heir w ealth t hrough bo nuses a nd i ncentives and by working on specif c projects. But t here wi ll be n o accusatory f nger po inted a t t hose w orkers w ho w ant a m ore b alanced l ife. I n f act b alanced workers wi ll be d esired, be cause i t will be pe rceived a nd accepted t hat t hey a re pacing t hemselves. As t he d emographic curve begins t o swell t he numbers of peo ple in Western society at or near retirement age, it will become more natural and desirable from both employers’ and employees’ standpoints for people to ease their way into retirement, working less hard but perhaps working later into their seventies. The d emographic shadow crea ted by falling birth ra tes i n t he West and Japan has created a new caucus of doom-mongers, worried about pension fund def ciencies and falling sperm counts. But they rarely seem to factor into their arguments the large injections of inherited wealth that the late twentieth-century middle classes began t o e njoy with t he d eath of t heir p arents, often a round t he time their offspring would be approaching retirement. This is not to say that Western governments and businesses can ignore demographic trends. These trends will cause problems. Ken Dy chtwald, a p sychologist a nd s pecialist o n a ging, h as warned that, unless some cure is found, some fourteen million Americans wi ll h ave A lzheimer’s d isease b y t he m iddle o f t he

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The History of Work century.18 But Dychtwald is more positive than negative, describing t he “age wave” s welling t he world’s e lderly po pulation as a new economic and political powerhouse. Many of the elderly will work by c hoice, be cause t heir views wi ll c arry s ome clout. But they will not work long hours. They will not need to do so and will have no desire to do so. Employers will have to create f exible p art-time po sitions t o m eet t hese re quirements. T hey wi ll not d o s o o ut o f c harity b ut o ut o f n ecessity be cause t he o lder employee wi ll be t he m emory, t he wi sdom, t he c onscience a nd the c ultural s tandard-bearer o f t he c ompany. Em ployers m ust change their attitudes to the older worker. It is an imperative. Adjusting to this changing prof le of society will not be helped if Western employers persist with t he k ind of overwork t hat has become endemic in Japan. Death from overwork is not uncommon among Japanese employers. They even have a w ord for it – Kaoroshi.19 Do we really want this Kaoroshi to spread like a disease throughout the West?

CHAPTER 20

Melting the Frozen Assets Nature has not provided ready-made all the things necessary for t he l ife a nd h appiness o f ma nkind. I n o rder t o o btain these t hings w e h ave t o W ork. T he o nly ra tional l abor i s that w hich i s d irected t o t he crea tion of t hose t hings. A ny kind of work which does not help us to attain this object is a ridiculous, idiotic, criminal, imbecile, waste of time. (Robert Tressell, pseudonym of Robert Noonan, 1870–1911) The end of management was the last thing on the mind of Peter Drucker when his book, The Practice of Management, was published for the f rst time in 1955. This, after all, was the book that was supposed to be inventing management.1 And yet, at the same time, t he book was presaging t he end of ma nagers. I n a w ay he was s aying: “M anagement i s d ead, l ong l ive ma nagement!” Drucker w as a ttempting t o d ef ne a n ew be ginning wi th ma nagement, o rganization, a nd p lanning i ncorporated i nto a ll j obs. Nowhere is t his struggle for meaning more apparent t han in h is dissection of personnel management. Drucker w as s cathing i n h is cr iticism o f t he pe rsonnel r ole. In t he 1950s pe rsonnel ma nagement was s omething of a s chizophrenic p rofession, t orn be tween h uman re lations a nd e mployee administration. Plus ça change. There had been no great changes in personnel ad ministration, he wrote, since its foundations were laid down shortly after the end of the First World War. In human relations t here h ad be en l ittle p rogress s ince t he o riginal i nsight on h uman m otivation a t Western Electric’s H awthorne works. I n a telling remark that seems to have as much resonance today as it did half a century earlier, he wrote: “The constant worry of all personnel administrators is their inability to prove that they are making a c ontribution t o t he e nterprise. T heir p reoccupation i s wi th the s earch f or a ‘ gimmick’ t hat wi ll i mpress t heir ma nagement associates. Their persistent complaint is that they lack status.”2 281

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The History of Work He didn’t stop there. He added a joke, that personnel management had been described as an amalgamation of “all those things that do not d eal with t he work of people a nd t hat a re not ma nagement.” T hen h e ad ded h is own a ttempt a t a j ob d escription: “It i s p artly a f le c lerk’s j ob, p artly a s ocial w orker’s j ob a nd partly ‘ f re-f ghting’ t o h ead o ff u nion t rouble o r t o s ettle i t.” Other parts of the job – l ooking after health and safety, pension plans, a nd u nion g rievances – w ere “necessary chores.” But t he two m ost i mportant a reas o f e mployment – t he o rganization o f the work and the organization of people to do the work – he said were generally avoided. Drucker’s as sassination o f pe rsonnel’s c haracter w as a lmost complete, b ut n ot q uite. H is g ravest c harge w as t hat t he pe rsonnel r ole as sumed t hat peo ple d id n ot want t o work. H ere h e was agreeing with a po int made by Douglas McGregor, that work was viewed as “a kind of punishment.” This was contrary to the spirit of human relations, which started out with the assumption that people wanted to work. This was the correct assumption, said Drucker. It recognized that the “human resource is a specif c resource.”3 The a ttack ac hieved s ome re sults, b ut n ot t hose d esired b y Drucker. Within a f ew years A merican personnel ma nagers had begun to describe themselves as h uman resource managers. The job h ad n ot c hanged s ignif cantly. I t w as s till a ttracted t o w hat some might call gimmicks. Family-friendly policies, 360-degree or a ll-round assessment, employee assistance programs, mentoring, a nd benchmarking a re just a f ew of t he processes i n vogue today. It is a p rocess-oriented job, and the title Human Resource Manager s eemed t o s tress t he p rocess s ide o f t he j ob. W hat’s more, it tended to convey more status, backed by the prospect that its processes could produce measurable results. If a nything, t he n ew j ob t itle d ehumanized h uman re lations. This had not been Drucker’s intention but at least it exposed the underlying dishonesty of human relations – the suggestion that its exponents might be i n some way concerned about the welfare of employees. Human resources was about sweating the most valuable assets of the company. It still is. Drucker, h owever, w as c oncerned a bout e mployee w elfare or, ra ther, t he j ob i n h and, re cognizing t hat t he w ell-being o f employees was linked to productivity. He had never let go of the

Melting the Frozen Assets concept o f t he s elf-managed p lant. T his, h e d ecided, w ould require j ob i ntegration u sing s ome o f t he p rocesses a lready developed, such as scientif c ma nagement. Assessing t he i mpact of s cientif c ma nagement, h e mad e t he a nalogy o f t he a lphabet. T aylorism c ould b reak a w orker’s j ob i nto i ts c onstituent parts, j ust as t he a lphabet h ad b roken d own l anguage. B ut t he alphabet was impractical unless the letters were reassembled into pronounceable words that had their own sounds. The key to management, he reasoned, was to assemble the constituent parts of a j ob in a w ay that f tted the talents and desires of t he w orker. J ob p lacement w as t he t hing – p utting t he r ight individual i nto t he r ight j ob. Taylorism h ad s eparated p lanning from doing. Drucker was saying that they needed to be handled as a whole. He decided that planning – a vital part of management – did n ot n eed t o be c arried o ut b y s ome d esignated ma nager. I t could be ac hieved by workers themselves if they were given the necessary information. As a n e xample h e po inted t o t he w ay t hat w orkers a t t he Chesapeake and Ohio Railway had involved themselves in remodeling the workshops.4 The railroad managers did not need a pe rsonnel assistant to explain to t hem t he t heory of empowerment. They simply sat down with employees and listened to their ideas. “We ha ve o verwhelming e vidence t hat t here is a ctually b etter planning if the man who does the work, f rst responsibly participates in the planning,” wrote Drucker. 5 His boo k w as h ailed b y re viewers as “ a t our d e f orce,” t he seminal w ork o n ma nagement, a nd y et t his p articular m essage was largely ignored in the West until Japanese companies – with their q uality c ircles a nd c lose w orker p articipation i n c ontinuous improvement – began to set the standard. Drucker could not have s pelled h is m essage o ut a ny m ore p lainly. H e e ven u rged his readers to look at the work of Joseph Juran.6 Drucker’s writing was i lluminating b ut s ubversive. P ersonnel ma nagement, h e said, was “insolvent,” preferring to ignore the “the frozen assets” of scientif c ma nagement a nd human relations in favor of “techniques and gadgets.”7 Perhaps he bruised too many egos, not only of those in personnel management but also those in general management. After all, he had written that “many workers of tomorrow may have to be able to do more planning than a good many

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The History of Work people w ho c all t hemselves ma nagers t oday a re c apable o f.”8 Like Frederick Taylor before him, he was undermining the r ule, only this time it was the management r ule. Here he was writing about t he p ractice o f ma nagement b ut c arrying t he m essage o f management to the shop f oor. It wouldn’t do. There may have been too much in one book to take on board at once. And Drucker wasn’t right about everything. In describing employees as stakeholders in the business, he was years ahead of his t ime.9 Yet he was dismissive of employee-share ownership, suggesting that it would not overcome “the employees’ resistance to pro f t.” O n t he o ne h and h e was s aying t hat e mployees were quite c apable o f o rganizing t heir w ork, b ut o n t he o ther h and he seemed to t hink t hey had a n atural d isinclination to t hink of prof ts. T he o bservation l acked c onsistency. D rucker w as, h owever, capable of a remarkable prescience, noting, for example, the way that employees, indirectly, were assuming ownership of publicly quoted companies through pension trusts, investment trusts, and l ife-insurance f unds. B ut h e d id n ot, a t t hat t ime, e nvisage the personal share ownership that is beginning to def ne popular capitalism today. The P ractice o f M anagement w as a m ilestone i n t he u nderstanding of work. It demolished the idea of a worker as an automaton a nd re instated t he t hinking w orker. La ter D rucker w ould build o n t his t heme, o utlining t he c oncept o f t he k nowledge worker. T he boo k a lso h ighlighted t he i mportance o f s election. Some e mployers were a lready aware o f t his. P sychometric te sting a nd l inks with universities a nd assessment centers had been growing increasingly popular among more progressive employers before and after the Second World War. But the vast majority of employers – t he small businesses run by people who had neither the t ime n or t he i nclination t o i mmerse t hemselves i n ma nagement t heory – c ontinued to rely on g ut feeling when t hey i nterviewed c andidates for a j ob. Western government off ces would be d rawn i ncreasingly t o s ophisticated s election p rocesses, b ut most careers continued to be founded on relationships. It was still possible to go in at the shop f oor a nd work your way up if you displayed some initiative and a willingness to work. Psychology had moved on. Selection had become institutionalized in the education systems of the West. By 2000, in the USA

Melting the Frozen Assets alone, s ome 2 ,000 m illion te sts o f i ntelligence o r ac hievement were be ing ad ministered every year,10 as children undergo continual assessment in a range of subjects. Intelligence tests such as Stanford-Binet, however, do not test the work ethic. In response to what some have regarded as a n omission, t he work ethic has begun to play a much greater role in school examination systems. It is not enough simply to be “clever” or “bright.” Indeed, many employers a re s uspicious o f t he b rightest g raduates, o ften p referring a s econd-class degree to a f rst. The suspicion is that the academic s tar m ight n ot h ave a ny g reat g rasp o f rea lity. F ew manufacturing companies would be a ble to ma ke much use, for example, of John Stuart Mill. There a re exceptions. I nvestment banks want t he b est ma thematicians to work out ever more complex derivatives – the f nancial instruments f rst conceived as a way of hedging an investment but w hich w ere l ater v alued s imply f or t heir m oney-making potential. Oi l companies want scenario planners. Software companies want focused but lateral-thinking geeks. Increasing corporate c omplexity i s d emanding in creasing c omplexity in th e a rea of placement. Team building has become an amalgamation of science and art. People are mixed like complementary ingredients in a human recipe, and there seems to be a test for everything under the sun. First there were ability tests that looked for different thinking skills. Later there were personality questionnaires, aimed at discovering i ndividual be haviors. Today t he ma rketplace i s a wash with p ersonality t ests pro duced b y la rge co mmercial p ublishers such as S aville & H oldsworth, A SE, a nd Ox ford P sychologists Press. The 16 Personality Factor (16PF) questionnaire devised by Raymond Cattell and originally published in 1949 was the f rst to be developed for commercial use. It has various forms but t ypically it asks upwards of 180 questions and takes about forty minutes to complete. T he questions seek agreement or otherwise to various propositions such as: “I prefer going to parties rather than reading a book at home.” Depending on your opinion you mark a box indicating whether you believe the statement to be true, false, or questionable. The test, and others like it, is looking for the strength of various personality traits or factors. To arrive at these factors Cattell sifted

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The History of Work out all the words he could f nd in the English language to describe human behavior. T hen he sifted out t he synonyms, until he was left with words which each carried a different meaning. The next step w as t o as k as sistants t o ra te a s ample o f s tudents over s ix months, using the traits he had listed. This allowed him to analyze their o bservations a nd a rrive a t t he m ost s ignif cant t raits. T he traits included such qualities as warmhearted, abstract thinker, aggressive, e nthusiastic, g regarious, s uspicious, a nd i nsecure. A questionnaire was assembled to test for these and other factors and further analysis of these results picked out a t otal of sixteen traits – twelve from the original list and four new ones. Factor a nalysis, t he s tatistical m ethod u sed i n d evising s uch tests, i nvolves c omparing a nd c orrelating t he s cores a mong a large number of people who have undertaken the test with those of peo ple w ho h ave t aken o ther s imilar te sts. T he m ore t hese results h ave i n c ommon – t he m ore t hey c orrelate wi th eac h other – t he m ore l ikely i t i s t hey a re te sting for t he s ame t rait. Psychologists re fer t o t his as v alidity – p roof t hat t he q uestionnaire i s f nding what it s et out t o f nd. Validity h as be come t he cloak be hind w hich t he s uccess o r o therwise o f pe rsonality testing has hidden itself ever since. There is nothing wrong with factor analysis per se. T he technique was developed, like many others, from the separate and not always interrelated work of several people, namely Karl Pearson, who had been working on Francis Galton’s ideas for correlation, Charles Spearman, a former army off cer who arrived at a theory of general intelligence published in 1904, and Cyril Burt, the man who i ntroduced p sychometric te sting i nto t he B ritish ed ucation system. Burt’s e xamination m eant t hat m illions o f s choolchildren would be s orted at t he age of eleven according to t heir i ntellectual promise. This “11-plus” selection test, to determine whether a child went to a state “grammar” school or a “secondary modern” school, w as i ntroduced a t t he e nd o f t he S econd W orld W ar and a bandoned i n t he 1970s. T he s ystem w as wi dely cr iticized for labeling so many children as failures at an early age. On the other hand, for the f rst time, it gave thousands of working-class children the opportunity to obtain a grammar school education.

Melting the Frozen Assets Many of these same children would f nd themselves as ad ults undertaking occ upational p sychometric te sts t o m easure t heir suitability for a p articular line of work. But a re these tests foolproof? Some cr itics have pointed to t he da nger of t he “Barnum Effect,” n amed a fter t he s howman P hineas T . B arnum, w ho believed t hat y ou c ould “ fool m ost o f t he peo ple m ost o f t he time.”11 T he Barnum effect is a po pular device of mediums a nd fortune-tellers, w ho d erive cred ibility b y v oicing s ome o bvious comment that people are convinced is a reasonable description of themselves. Other worries have been voiced over the potential for ethnic bias in some tests. Beyond t hese w orries t he te st p ublishers m ust c onfront a further, more f undamental question: can a pe rsonality questionnaire predict future job performance? Unfortunately, the validity scores of these tests are too often not so much measures of their predictive worth as of their ability to assess the personality traits of t he c andidate. T here i s a p arallel wi th t he I SO 90 00 q uality s tandard. I t c an e nsure t hat p roducts a re mad e t o a d ef ned standard, b ut i t c annot s ay w hether t he p roducts a re w orth buying. S o a n e mployer c an d iscover, f rom te sting, t he t ype o f candidate he is getting – w hether t he job applicant is a l oner or gregarious, f or e xample – b ut te sts wi ll n ot n ecessarily re veal whether the candidate is up to the job. This po int w as ra ised b y S tephen B linkhorn a nd Ch arles Johnson, two British occupational psychologists whose criticisms caused uproar among test publishers during the 1990s. Writing in Nature magazine, t hey said: “ We see precious l ittle evidence that even t he best personality tests predict job performance a nd a good deal of evidence of poorly understood statistical methods being p ressed i nto s ervice t o b uttress s haky c laims.”12 Sa ville and H oldsworth p sychologists h it b ack a t t hese c laims wi th two re lated v alidation s tudies o f t he Occ upational P ersonality Questionnaire, the company’s most popular test. The studies, on groups of British bank managers, provided proof, they said, that such tests could indeed predict future job success.13 The c ontroversy o ver t he e ffectiveness o f pe rsonality te sting looks l ikely t o r un a nd r un. I n t he m eantime Blinkhorn, working wi th a tea m o f re searchers a t h is c ompany, P sychometric

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The History of Work Research & De velopment, h as d evised a s eries o f te sts t hat a re def ning a t hird way in occupational testing. These a re the Able Tests, pub lished b y O xford Psy chologists P ress. T he Ab le Tests are job specif c and incorporate an element of training. The idea is that they are testing a candidate’s ability to learn. This is particularly important for a specialized job that may require some specif c skills training. It is also useful for assessing the potential of young people who, for whatever reason, may have had a poor education. If their latent learning skills are evident, their early disadvantages c an, i n t heory, be s wept as ide b y i ntensive o n-the-job training b y e mployers w ho w ant t o re cruit peo ple f or t heir potential. Another problem with testing, a nd with selection a nd re cruitment g enerally, i s t he d etermination o f t he be haviors o r s kills that the job requires. Employers often think they know both what they are looking for and how to f nd it, but they can be mistaken. Some years ago recruiters at Chemical Bank advertised in Flight International m agazine f or “ numerate, ri sk-oriented, c onf dent, a nd h ighly a mbitious p rofessionals” t o t rain as d ealers.14 The b ank w as s eeking t o a ttract a ir t raff c c ontrollers w ho, i t reasoned, were accustomed to react ing u nder pres sure to m ovements on screens. Perhaps these people would make good money market d ealers. W hat t he b ank d id n ot a ppreciate w as t hat a ir traff c c ontrollers m ust be r isk averse. A l arge p art o f t heir j ob involves m inimizing r isk. M oney ma rket t raders, o n t he o ther hand, are constantly taking risks. They, too, should be m inimizing t heir r isk, i n t heory. I n rea lity, however, t hey l ive with r isk, and as t he events of 20 08 would d emonstrate, when r isk-taking behavior is allowed to dominate an industry it can bring an entire f nancial system to t he brink of collapse. Fail-safe r isk ma nagement remains, it seems, an ideal to which organizations can only aspire. But can it ever be achieved in an industry that relies on a complex betting system for its beating heart? When job requirements are drawn up by managements, therefore, they can be prone to f awed assumptions. David McClelland, the A merican be havioral s cientist w ho ad vanced t he s tudy o f ambition – he referred to it as the “need to achieve” – in motivation, u nderstood t his w hen h e be gan t o o bserve t he f actors that w ent i nto t he j ob pe rformance o f i ndividuals. I n a n e ffort

Melting the Frozen Assets to determine the factors of superior performance he interviewed people who were considered by their peers or managers to be the best in their particular f eld. H e t hen i nterviewed t hose c onsidered to be average. He canceled out the common features in both groups, leaving h im with ce rtain t raits, a bilities, o r work h abits that determined the success of the best workers. In o ne e xercise l ooking a t t he cre ws o f U S n aval s hips, f or example, he wondered why one ship’s crew appeared to be more successful t han o ther cre ws i n ma king t heir v essel read y t o g o to sea. The determining factors were dishonesty, sneakiness, and negotiating s kills. T he m ost effective crews would beg, bo rrow, or steal t o get t he e quipment t hey n eeded f rom t he stores. T his was not the information that the naval authorities wanted to hear, but it was the truth. McClelland c alled t hese t raits, a bilities, a nd work h abits t hat differentiated w ork pe rformance “ competencies.” T he w ay h e himself d ef ned competencies was: “A little bit higher than a skill, more of a motive and a trait, a human characteristic that differentiates outstanding from typical performance.”15 McClelland questioned the reliance placed by employers on academic qualif cations. Knowledge and skills, he believed, could be developed, but it was much more diff cult to develop basic human motives. Specif cally the motive that fascinated him most was the need to achieve, and he k new, from the work of Hagen and Tolles on the Nonconformist origins of so many eighteenth- and nineteenthcentury b usiness l eaders a nd i nnovators,16 th at thi s q uality was closely associated with the Protestant work ethic. McClelland devised w hat h e c alled t he B ehavioral Event I nterview, a r igorous process designed to sift out the crucial competencies def ning excellent work in a particular f eld. It was as if the work ethic had somehow found its way into the human genome, creating a c ompetitive advantage for t hose who possessed i t. C ould t his po ssibly h ave h appened? C ould t hose people w ho w ork t he h ardest h ave i nherited t heir m otivation? This is a critical issue. It introduces the eternal debate of nature versus n urture – w hether i ntelligence i s s omething w e i nherit from our a ncestors or whether it is derived f rom our immediate environment. A curious feature of this debate is the polarization of opinion. Very few of the protagonists on both sides of the issue

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The History of Work seem prepared to concede t hat t he a rgument may be l ooking at questions o f d egree – t he d egree t o w hich peo ple’s i ntellectual performance i s i nf uenced b y u pbringing a nd e nvironment a nd the degree to which their intellectual capabilities are inherited. John L ocke’s “b lank s heet” i n i nfanthood s till h as i ts adherents. E qually t here re mains a s trong v ein o f s upport f or Galton’s i deas o n i nherited i ntelligence. R ichard J . H errnstein and Ch arles M urray’s e litist a nd c ontroversial 1 994 boo k, The Bell Cur ve: Int elligence a nd C lass Str ucture in A merican L ife, claimed that hereditary factors governed various social ills such as po verty a nd cr ime. N ot f or t he f rst t ime t his t ype o f s tudy was used to point to the disproportion of black Americans in the lower half of the curve. Opponents of the authors’ ideas, however, pointed o ut t hat t he g ap be tween t he ed ucational a ttainment o f white and black Americans was narrowing, as educational opportunities and social conditions among black Americans improved. The problem with Galton’s theories, then as now, is that they are d istasteful t o m ost l iberal-minded peo ple. T hey f ormed t he basis of the discredited science of eugenics a nd inf uenced Nazi ideas of A ryan s upremacy. A t a t ime when s ociety was fearing Malthusian predictions of catastrophic overpopulation there may have s eemed s ome m erit i n s elective b reeding t o p reserve t he best of t he human species. I n h is f uturistic work, Anticipations, H. G. Wells explored the ways in which a world state in the year 2000 m ight s eek t o p hase o ut E urope’s “ vicious, h elpless a nd pauper masses.”17 But all these discussions were subsumed by the evils of Nazism. Today t he d ebate i s o nce a gain h otly c ontested, wi th e volutionary psychologists on one side a nd “environmentalists” on t he other. Ni gel Nicho lson, p rofessor o f o rganizational b ehavior a t the London Business School, pursuing the argument of evolutionary psychology, has argued that people are predisposed to certain types of behavior t hat may have be en adopted as f ar back as t he Stone Age. T hese behaviors, he believes, a re so i ngrained i n our genes that to deny their inf uence is futile. “There is little point in trying to change deep-rooted inclinations,” he wrote in an article that p oured s corn o n th e i dea o f l eadership tr aining. “Th e m ost important attribute for leadership,” he said, “is the desire to lead.”18

Melting the Frozen Assets In h is f avor h e h as t he c olloquial re cognition b y p arents o f familiar traits displayed by their children, the sort of recognition that prompts remarks like: “He has his father’s sense of humor,” or “He has a good memory for names, just like his mother.” This kind o f re cognition s eems f ar m ore pe rsuasive o f h ereditary behaviors than the various long-running studies of identical twins. The studies of twins tend to be vulnerable to arguments that similarities in their behaviors, responses, and intelligence test results have b een i nf uenced b y e nvironmental f actors s uch as c ontact with t heir p arents o r wi th eac h o ther. Very f ew t wins i n t hese studies have been denied contact from birth.19 Diametrically opposed to the idea of hereditary intelligence are environmentalists such as Michael Howe, professor of psychology at Ex eter U niversity, w ho be lieves t hat e xcellence i s n ot i nborn but d etermined b y f actors s uch as o pportunity, e ncouragement, and e ndless h ours o f p ractice.20 Howe found that waitresses could remember far more d rinks orders t han a c ontrol g roup of students in a comparative study. The ability of the waitresses, he concluded, depended on practice. The same applied to violinists. Violinists w ho ac hieve t he l evel o f s kill n ecessary t o pe rform at t he h ighest level h ave p racticed i n t heir c areers t housands of hours longer than those who go into teaching. T he same can be said of many sports stars. As Gary Player, the golfer, once said when h e w as as ked a bout h is g ood l uck i n h oling a p ut: “I t’s funny, but I f nd that the more I practice the luckier I get.” More recently, in his book, Talent i s O verrated, Geoff Colvin has written about the need for highly skilled people to engage in what he calls “deliberate practice” – working on the minutiae of a specif c skill, perfecting and then moving on to the next aspect of a skill that needs to be improved. Whichever w ay y ou l ook a t i t, h owever, p ractice t akes t ime, involving c ountless h ours o f re petition. I t’s h ard w ork. T he Protestant work e thic, t herefore, re mains ce ntral t o t he i ssue o f nature v erses n urture. A nother m ore f undamental i ssue i s t he nature o f i ntelligence. W hat i s i ntelligence, a nd h ow i mportant is this ability? What do we mean when we say someone is smart or bright? In recent years some academics have begun to investigate different aspects of intelligence. Robert Sternberg, professor

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The History of Work of psychology and education at Yale University, likes to illustrate different approaches to thinking with this story: Two students are walking in Yellowstone Park when they come across a g rizzly bea r. T he f rst, an Ivy League graduate from the t op d rawer o f ac ademic ac hievement, c alculates t hat t he bear can reach them in seventeen seconds. “We can’t outpace him,” h e te lls h is c ompanion, w ho i s p ulling o n h is r unning shoes. T he o ther boy, w ho n ever went t o c ollege, s ays t o h is friend: “I d on’t need to outpace the grizzly. I just need to outpace you.”21 “Both boys were smart,” says Sternberg. But while the Yale student w as i ntelligent i n t he a nalytical w ay u sed t o d ef ne excellence in universities, the second was intelligent “to the extent that you def ne intelligence as the ability to adapt to the environment.” Sternberg’s environmentalist a rgument has t aken t he issue to its roots by s eeking t o d ef ne i ntelligence i n a v ariety of ways. H e outlines t hree d ef nitions o f i ntelligence – a nalytical, p ractical, and creative. The f rst is understood and emphasized by academic institutions, b ut t he o ther t wo, h e s ays, te nd t o be n eglected o r ignored. “You need more than IQ skills to get through life,” he says. “In U.S. society, if you’re good at IQ-like skills – t he type of t hings t hat g et you As i n s chool – y ou a re extremely h ighly rewarded b y t he s ystem. T hese s ystems p romoted y ou f rom a n early age, so there is no incentive to acquire creative and practical skills.” Sternberg calls those systems that concentrate on a single feature of attainment “closed systems.” These become self-selecting societies t hat s hut o ut o ther u seful f eatures. I nstead o f f ocusing o n o ne t ype o f i ntelligence, s ays S ternberg, s ociety s hould be s eeking t o re cognize what h e c alls “successful i ntelligence,” something t hat c ombines t he a nalytical, t he p ractical, a nd t he creative. Here a gain, h owever, t here i s r oom f or a rgument. W hen I used Sternberg’s example of the bear and the students to begin a c olumn i n t he Financial Times, a read er wr ote i n a fterwards, suggesting t hat t he “ smart” re sponse t o t he d ilemma w as m orally f awed. T he read er was a n A rab. I n h is culture, h e pointed

Melting the Frozen Assets out, i t would h ave be en d ishonorable a nd m orally u nacceptable to leave your friend to the bear. It was a sound point. Sternberg’s example of practical intelligence stressed the idea that in a cr isis it is every man for himself. But it has been a long-accepted hallmark of h umanity t hat i n a s inking s hip, t he p riority i s women and children f rst. It is tempting, when d iscussing i ntelligence, a lways t o pursue the s o-called i ntellectual a rgument. T his may be t he reas on for the polarity of opinions in this f eld. Is it possible that some people can be t oo i ntelligent for t heir own good? E dward de Bono, the man who introduced the concept of lateral thinking, says that “a lot of people with high IQs get stuck in the intelligence trap.” He ad ds: “ They h ave a po int o f vi ew a nd t he m ore i ntelligent they a re the better they a re likely to be a t defending their a rgument. M any e xcellent m inds a re t rapped i n poo r i deas. T hat i s not exc ellent t hinking.”22 W hat is the point of intelligence, after all, if it supports a conviction that turns out to be wrong? Wasn’t it K eynes w ho ad mitted: “ When t he f acts c hange I c hange m y mind. What do you do, sir?” In The Asc ent of M an Jacob B ronowski l amented t he w ay some academics were “in love with t he a ristocracy of intellect.” He wrote: That i s a be lief w hich c an o nly d estroy t he c ivilization t hat we know. If we are anything, we must be a d emocracy of the intellect. We must not perish by the distance between people a nd g overnment, be tween peo ple a nd po wer, b y w hich Babylon, Egypt, and Rome failed. And that distance can only be c onf ated, c an o nly be c losed, i f k nowledge s its i n t he homes and heads of people with no ambition to control others, and not up in the isolated seats of power.23 Of c ourse th ere i s n o r eason, o ther th an s implicity, th at Sternberg should have settled on just three forms of intelligence. Howard Ga rdner, t he H arvard p sychologist, f or e xample, l ists seven t ypes o f i ntelligence.24 This thing called intelligence is a slippery s ubstance. I t s eems t o be s omething b roader t han t he ability t o g et a ll t he q uestions r ight i n t he s chool e xam. W hat should we call this broader, practical form of intelligence, this

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The History of Work intelligence t hat c ombines q ualities s uch as c ommon s ense a nd nous wi th i nventiveness a nd w orldliness, w hat w e m ight o nce have called “wisdom”? In 1996 D aniel Goleman d escribed a t ype of t hinking c alled Emotional Intelligence i n h is book of t he same name. T he idea of emotional intelligence, as Go leman acknowledged, belongs to John Mayer, a p sychologist at the University of New Hampshire, and P eter S alovey o f Yale U niversity. M ayer d ef nes emotional intelligence a s “ the ab ility to p erceive, to i ntegrate, to u nderstand a nd re f ectively ma nage o ne’s o wn a nd o ther peo ple’s feelings.”25 So there we have it. Emotional intelligence demands oodles of empathy and self-awareness. A number of management consultancies h ave d ecided t hat t his k ind of a bility i s j ust what is n eeded t o r un l arge c ompanies, h ence a w hole n ew f eld of psychometric testing and leadership prof ling. There has never been so much choice in selection testing, or so much awareness of what makes people tick. The problem today is not so much the motivation to work but understanding the nature of work – s orting the necessary, worthwhile, and satisfying work from the frivolous. Each of us must ask ourselves: What are we achieving with the work that we do? Is i t worth the candle? Is i t making a better world? Is it making a difference? Some years ago Studs Terkel carried out a series of lengthy interviews with people in a wide variety of jobs for his book, Working. Many of the interviewees f ound l ittle t o ce lebrate i n t heir w ork b ut o ne o f t hem, Tom Patrick, a f reman, t hought d ifferently about h is job. “I c an look b ack a nd s ay: ‘I h elped p ut o ut a f re. I h elped s ave s omebody. It shows something I did on this Earth.’ ”26 How many of us can be so certain about the value in the work that we do? How can we rationalize our working lives? Do w e need a n ew work ethic, an e thic t hat q uestions t he c ontent o f work, t hat d oes n ot v alue prolonged hard work above everything? Isn’t it time we began to concentrate o n re sults? S urely a j ob s hould be a j ob w ell d one. If work is neither well done nor worthwhile, why work at all?

CHAPTER 21

The Road to Panama To make employment regular is to invite industrial decay. (Henry Ford, 1863–1947) Religion is the medium through which a l arge proportion of the world’s people seek meaning in their lives. Its power is so strong that when ma ny of us speak of faith we need no other explanation. B elief, i n a nd o f itself, i s t he a nchor t hat te thers o ur l ives within t he universe. Lying behind our beliefs – t he generator of belief – is an innate desire to understand at the very core of our being. To h arness t his d esire t o c orporate t hinking s eems i nappropriate when we know there is much more to life than business. But when we see business as one of the most important fulcrums of c hange, o r as a s ocial i nstitution, as P eter D rucker re garded the large corporation, there seems some merit in grappling with the mysteries of corporate evolution. If Ca rlyle was r ight i n describing a ll t rue work as re ligion, it helps t o e xplain t he f ervor wi th w hich s o ma ny o f u s g o a bout our work. T his doggedness a nd determination to persevere, t his pilgrim’s p rogress o f h ard w ork w hich i nforms o ur o utlook o n almost every aspect of our l ives, h as s erved t he Western i ndustrialized nations well in a world that measures itself by the standards of economic growth outlined by Adam Smith. But will it continue t o s erve u s well i n a s ociety of ra pid change? Perhaps we should sit back and analyze whether we are indeed living in a time of great change, as so many people insist. Change, l ike e volution, i s a c onstant. I t ma kes l ife l ivable. But we can’t always see it and sometimes when we can see it we choose t o ignore it. Today we c an a lmost smell it, just as t hose who l ived t hrough t he I ndustrial R evolution w ere c onscious o f that whiff of change they called progress. If we are living through a period of change on a par with the Industrial Revolution, when

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The History of Work did it start? A re t here similar characteristics? A nd what wi ll be its consequences for the way we run our lives? The late twentieth century was thickly populated with change merchants peddling an often-fuzzy futurology. But most of them were t ailgating t he i deas o f o thers. D aniel B ell was t he f rst of these s eers t o wr ite of t he “i nformation a ge” i n h is 1973 boo k, The Comin g of P ost-Industrial S ociety: A V enture in S ocial Forecasting. T hen, i n 1 980, A lvin a nd H eidi T off er launched their in terpretation o f th e inf ormation r evolution in The Th ird Wave. Their observations leaned heavily on the changing face of the labor market and advances in technology. Well before personalized c omputers w ere occ upying e very d esk, a nd y ears be fore the I nternet would begin t o i nf uence co mmercial pract ices, t he Toff ers were i nsisting t hat s ociety h ad e mbarked o n a w ave o f change a s sig nif cant as t wo ea rlier w aves. T he f rst wave wa s that o f a griculture, w hich t ransformed peo ple f rom n omadic hunter-gatherers t o s ettled f armers. T he s econd w ave w as t he later I ndustrial R evolution, w hich c oncentrated e mployment i n factories. The Toff ers da ted t he beginning of t his t hird wave t o 1956, when, f or t he f rst t ime, t he n umber o f w hite-collar e mployees in t he U S l abor ma rket o utnumbered t hose i n b lue-collar j obs. While t hey po inted t o c omputing as a b ig i nf uence, t hey a lso highlighted t he signif cance o f ot her so cial f actors, s uch a s t he availability of the contraceptive pill and the advent of the commercial j et a irliner. T he p ressures a nd c onf icts a rising f rom these waves o f c hange, s aid t he Toff ers, h ad l ed t o warfare i n the past. T he A merican Civil War, t hey ma intained, was a w ar between a s econd-wave s ociety – t he i ndustrial N orth – a nd a f rst-wave s ociety – t he a gricultural S outh. T he n ature of t hese societies meant that they were supported by different employment systems – slavery and wage-earning workers. The simplicity of the picture is useful, but the reality is more complex than the Toff ers’ interpretations. Agriculture in the Deep South of America had industrialized by the time of the Civil War. Although the cotton gin was a labor-saving device, its impact was to increase the demand for slaves, as cotton producers prospered and expanded their plantations. So the second wave had impacted on the South in a way that was socially unsustainable. The South

The Road to Panama had industrialized its cotton production without industrializing its society. The failure to recognize the impact of change is common throughout most societies. Rapid change creates a p henomenon t hat we might call “social drag.” This social drag is one of the most signif cant features of change as s ociety struggles to adapt. I u se t he term “social drag” rather than “social lag” because “lag” implies that part of society is playing catch-up, while “drag” recognizes that much of society is resistant to change. We can see this resistance to change in our nostalgia for recent history. It helps explain why paintings by John Constable or t he Impressionists are more popular on chocolate boxes than those of Mondrian or Matisse. It explains why Manet’s paintings of contemporary nudes in the nineteenth century were relegated to the Salon des Refusés in Paris. Ian Dunlop, the a rt historian, called it t he Shock of th e N ew.1 A nd y et crea tivity d emands n ewness. Art must experiment or the very substance, the lifeblood, of the artist is diminished. So the creative world continues to push out the f rontiers of experience in t he a rts a nd technology, while t he receptive world – that’s most of us – comfortable in the familiarity of our surroundings, our habits, and routines, tends to look at change with some suspicion, even hostility. In the f lm, Shi rley Valentine, S hirley’s h usband i s a ngered w hen s he c ooks h im “chips and egg” instead of the steak he always has on Thursdays. The e xtent o f ch ange, t herefore, i s d iff cult t o in terpret in a society t hat pe rpetually l ives i n d enial. Ch ange i s a lso re lative. An insurance broker who left the old headquarters of Lloyds, the London-based insurers, for the replacement “outside-in” building designed by R ichard Rogers, was a lways going to feel a lienated from t he c omfort of h is former environment. I n fact t he Lloyds board w as s o a ttached t o i ts A dam-style bo ardroom t hat i t h ad it transferred – t he plaster work, the paneling, the paintings, the table, t he l ot – t o a l ocation h igh u p i n t he n ew s tainless-steel structure. Walking i nto t he bo ardroom i s l ike s tepping b ack i n t ime t o a former e ra of l ife i n t he City of L ondon, when a g entleman’s word was his bond. That may be part of the allure, a nostalgia for a way of life that many regarded as be tter than the one they see around them today.

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The History of Work This nostalgia is a feature of social drag. We remember selectively. Although I w as born in 1957, I g rew up hearing so many stories of the Second World War that it might as w ell have been continuing around me. Whenever my relatives were gathered together for s ome occ asion, s uch as Ch ristmas, a b irthday, o r a funeral, they would begin to reminisce about the war. The stories were not about tragedy or death but of the many good times they enjoyed in the bonding that only seems possible when people are experiencing adversity collectively. The stories became familiar – my father losing h is h elmet, i n which h e h ad s tored h is F rench francs f or s afe k eeping d uring t he D -day l andings, m y m other falling into the air raid shelter during the blackout, my uncle fraternizing with t he Fräuleins i n Berlin. Everyone had heard t hem before and everyone wanted to hear them again. The war was the biggest thing that happened in the lives of my parents and probably i n t he l ives o f m ost o f t heir g eneration. T hey would n ever have sought war, but having survived they held onto the good times and shut out the bad. The p sychological c ondition t hat crea tes a n eed i n m ost o f us f or c omfort a nd n ostalgia ma y be e volutionary i n n ature. Pioneering is dangerous. The Oregon Trail, the route of the largest mass m igration in h istory, has been described as t he longest graveyard in t he world. One report estimated t hat a lmost eleven people d ied f or e very k ilometer.2 B ut t he po tential re wards eclipsed the fear of failure for those facing an uncertain future in an economic depression. Pioneering i s a h uman a nd c orporate n ecessity – s omething that i ts e xponents s ometimes acce pt wi th re luctance, f earful o f the consequences of staying where they are. And pioneers do not always survive. In the event of catastrophe those who have stayed behind a re t he survivors, a h olding pool f rom which f uture d iscoverers will set out. A l ove of nostalgia and the comfort of the familiar should not, therefore, be seen as regressive traits. They are necessary a nd they a re probably ma nifest in a ll species to a certain degree, if only in the concept of safety in numbers. We can understand what drove those pioneering American settlers. The life they were leaving was far from satisfactory. Some groups, like the Mormons, were seeking freedom from religious persecution wi th t he s ame c onviction t hat h ad pe rsuaded t heir

The Road to Panama Pilgrim f orefathers t o cr oss t he A tlantic t wo ce nturies ea rlier. But the underlying motivation of those who change jobs or move house today out of a c onstantly nagging sense of d issatisfaction is more diff cult to understand. Sometimes the driving force is an irrational belief that life is better somewhere else. Most people seem to possess a romantic concept of paradise. In The Trip t o Panama b y Janosch, t he p seudonym o f H orst Eckhert, a bear and a tiger live in blissful harmony in their small rural cottage by the side of a r iver, until one day they f nd a box that has been f oating down the river.3 The box smells of bananas, and o n i ts s ide i s t he w ord Panama. T he s mell o f b ananas i s overpowering. Panama, they conclude, must be a wondrous place, the l and o f t heir d reams. But w here c an t hey f nd it? T hey u se the boxwood to make a sign that points the way, and they set off with a few sandwiches. On their travels they meet more animals and make new friends. One friend has a particularly comfortable sofa. Every now a nd again t hey see a m essage i n a bo ttle f oating down the river, but it always goes by, unopened and unread. Finally t hey f nd a h ouse, s lightly o vergrown a nd t atty. B eside the house is a f allen-down sign on which they can see the word, Panama. Here it is, the land of their dreams. Of c ourse it’s their old house, but t hey don’t re cognize it. T hey buy a s ofa just l ike the one they had admired, and they are blissfully happy. But t hen t hey were happy in t he f rst place. T he land of t heir dreams was t he l ife t hey h ad. Well, n ot q uite. A f ew i mportant things h ad c hanged. T hey h ad mad e n ew f riends a nd t hey n ow possessed a c omfy s ofa. I n t his s imple s tory J anosch crea ted a metaphor for ma ny of our lives, including the opportunities that pass us by like messages in bottles. We are all of us seeking Panama in our d ifferent ways. T his is good a nd ad mirable. It is what keeps t he world t urning. But we should not be b linded by our ambitions or yearnings to the good things of life that we may already possess. There are moments – we all experience them – when life is as good at it gets. T he t rick is t o re cognize t hem when t hey c ome along a nd t o s avor t he m oment f or a ll i t’s w orth. F or Ch arles Foster Ka ne i n O rson W elles’s c inematic mas terpiece, Citizen Kane, it was the good times that he had enjoyed as a c hild with his s led, c alled Rosebud, s ymbolizing a m other’s l ove t hat w as

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The History of Work denied him when he was sent away to be reared outside his natural family home. Citizen K ane was m ore t han a c ommentary o n t he e mpirebuilding a cquisitiveness o f R andolph He arst, t he ne wspaper baron. It was, in part, an exposé of the damage people can inf ict upon themselves when they fail to recognize their individual Panamas. I nstead t hey ma rch o n i n p ursuit o f e ver-changing unfulf lling goals. T he large estate a nd towering castle modeled on Hearst’s San Simeon are dismissed by Kane’s bride, Susan, as “forty-nine t housand acre s o f n othing b ut s cenery a nd s tatues.” She is lonely. She doesn’t want a palace full of grand possessions. She wants friendship. Kane spent his life searching for the love that had been taken away i n c hildhood. B ut l ove was t he o ne e motion h e c ould n ot understand. Every friendship he ever had, he lost. The Panama of his ea rly career had be en h is newspaper a nd t he hard work a nd dynamics o f t he n ewspaper i ndustry. H is l ife o n t he n ewspaper was as g ood as i t would get. But he couldn’t see it. Janosch and Herman J. M ankiewicz, t he f lm’s s criptwriter, a re a lmost s oulmates in their common insight. We a ll re cognize s omething i n Ch arlie Ka ne’s u nquenchable ambition. And yet so often we seek to repeat Kane’s journey. We see a vi sion of the perfect life that never measures up in reality. This g ulf be tween i mage a nd rea lity w as e xplored i n A lex Garland’s book, The Beach. The book was made into a f lm, and hundreds of young people were drawn to the movie location, only conf rming Os car W ilde’s o bservation t hat “ each ma n k ills t he thing he loves.” Our ceas eless p ursuit of e conomic g rowth i s n ot o nly k illing the things we love, but killing the things we need. We should not ignore the forces that sent people onto the street in Seattle and London, protesting at the way the capitalist system appears oblivious of the biosystem that maintains the health of the planet. But it is not just pollution and trade imbalances that are undermining society. There are imbalances too in our approach to work. The Protestant mind is tortured by the need to achieve. Success must be earned. We work hard because we must, because we hear but cannot identify that unseen Puritan whispering in our heads. We used to take deep pride in our work for this same reason.

The Road to Panama When we practiced a cra ft, this pride was fulf lling in itself. But the deskilled f exible workplace that, like Frederick Taylor, views “the r ule” – t hat s pecial k nowledge o f t he s killed a nd e xperienced exponent of a trade – as a n unnecessary cost, has removed the i ntrinsic j oy i n w ork. S o w e c ontinue t o w ork l ong h ours in p ursuit o f s omething t hat i s n o l onger a ttainable a nd s lowly, inexplicably, we are suffocating. The Mexican artist Diego Rivera portrayed the role of production workers in the relentless progress of industry very effectively in a set of murals commissioned by the Ford Motor Company for the De troit I nstitute o f A rts. T he j ourney po rtrayed i n t he f our frescoes is not of people but of a machine given life by the hundreds o f peo ple w ho p artake i n i ts crea tion. M ost o f t he w orkmen a re r ooted t o t he f oor o f t he gi ant R iver R ouge f actory. Signif cantly, pe rhaps, t he f nished product, a 1932 Ford V-8, is obscured by the workmen, as if they are engaged in some elaborate ritual. This indeed is the way Rivera saw the process, comparing the car plant with the Aztec temples of his native Mexico. The f actory h ad be come a t wentieth-century te mple o f h uman sacrif ce. As far as Rivera was concerned, for thousands of immigrants, the Panama dream, the search for some better way of life, had ended in factory exploitation. Others h ave e xpressed J anosch’s P anama-need i n d ifferent ways. R ussell H . C onwell, t he B aptist m inister w ho f ounded Temple U niversity i n P hiladelphia i n 1 888, f ound h is pe rsonal Nirvana i n a n i nspirational s peech, w hich h e re peated ma ny times be fore e nthusiastic p aying a udiences. H e s poke o f a ma n who sold his land to search for diamonds, only to discover later that t here h ad be en d iamonds i n h is o wn b ackyard a ll a long.4 The message was simple, says Joanne Ciulla, a fellow of Harvard University, i n h er boo k, The W orking L ife. “ Work,” s he wr ites, “was p art o f a q uest i n l ife, b ut i n A merica you d idn’t h ave t o travel far.” Today this quest has become a burden for all involved. But the burden is viewed differently from different perspectives. Business is concerned about the cost of employment, whereas government concerns itself with the cost of unemployment. European Union leaders, therefore, were jubilant in the spring of 2000 when they could declare a “strategic goal” of creating 20 million jobs within

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The History of Work a decade.5 Why should it be t he goal of any institution to create work? Governments seem to take the view that a s ociety of full employment i s a h ealthy s ociety, bo th s ocially a nd f nancially, with f ewer peo ple d rawing w elfare f rom t he s tate. B usiness is happy with this picture as long as it is able to prof t from the l abor. B ut w hat o f t he i ndividual? H ow h appy a re w e wi th the make-work society? Shouldn’t we be looking forward to more leisure than work? The e xtent t o w hich w orking t ime h as ea ten i nto t he a verage American’s leisure time was explored by Juliet Schor in The Overworked American. Trade unions on both sides of the Atlantic had f ought f rom t he be ginning o f t he I ndustrial R evolution f or fewer working hours, gradually shortening the working day over a h undred-year t rend. B ut i n t he ra pidly i mproving e conomic conditions a fter t he S econd W orld W ar, w orking t ime i n t he USA began to buck the trend. By the early 1990s manufacturing employees i n A merica w ere w orking a bout e ight w eeks a y ear more than workers in Germany or France.6 At o ne s tage, d uring t he 1 930s De pression, i t s eemed t hat a w orking w eek o f t hirty h ours w as wi thin t he u nions’ g rasp. “Mass unemployment became the route to leisure,” writes Schor. The idea was t hat a s horter working week would a llow employers t o re engage ma ny m ore o f t he w orkers t hey h ad l aid o ff.7 Legislation for a t hirty-hour week was passed by the US Senate but, under pressure from employers, President Roosevelt scrapped the i dea. B usiness l eaders w ere w orried t hat a b ig red uction i n the poo l o f u nemployed l abor w ould i ncrease c ompetition f or employees, thereby pushing up wage costs. Some argued that the same forces would undermine discipline in the workforce, since employees would be less fearful of losing their jobs.8 Businesses used the same arguments against the shorter working week as t hey did against the minimum wage – t hat it would increase their costs. The argument is as vigorous today as it was then. Opposition to the minimum wage in the UK reached fever pitch d uring t he Ge neral El ection c ampaign o f 1997. B ut t here was little if any evidence of an adverse effect on business after its introduction. Its o pposers w ere g rudging i n t heir acce ptance, a rguing t hat its lack of impact was due to the “sensible” limit at which it was

The Road to Panama set. The British government steered a middle course, insisting on the m inimum wage but ignoring trade union demands for a ra te higher than the one that was f xed. The British also delayed their acceptance o f t he E uropean U nion’s W orking T ime Di rective that would limit the working week to forty-eight hours. Its introduction included voluntary opt-out arrangements. This seemed a sensible policy, since the right to work is just as important as the right to take time off. We must ask ourselves, however, whether any of these policies are radical enough to meet t he changing demands t hat information technology is placing on the workplace. What do the change merchants s ay? Ch arles H andy, w hose work o n m odern o rganizations has put him among the most predictive of all contemporary management writers, delivered a convincing analysis of the evolving company i n The Age of U nreason, where he described the “shamrock organization.” Handy was describing a c ore structure of expertise consisting of essential managers, technicians, and professionals forming the nerve center of the organization. Embodied within this f rst leaf are t he o rganization’s c ulture, i ts k nowledge, a nd i ts d irection. The s econd l eaf o f t he s hamrock c omprises t he n onessential work that may be farmed out to contractors. The third leaf is the f exible w orkforce – te mporary a nd p art-time w orkers w ho c an be called on to meet f uctuating demands for labor. A world of s hamrock c orporations, reas oned H andy, re quires a d ifferent re lationship be tween e mployers a nd e mployees. H is solution was t he “ portfolio c areer.” I nstead o f working a ll your life for one employer, you would “collect” relationships and contracts with different employers. The idea is that you decide where you want to work and how much you want to work.9 The interim management industry has created an important contracting niche from this concept. The i nterim or temporary ma nager belongs to a n agency t hat hires the manager out at a daily rate for the duration of a project. Typically the interim will be c aretaking a f ull-time management job a fter a s udden d eparture, t o give t he bo ard b reathing s pace before it ma kes a pe rmanent a ppointment. A lternatively a c ompany might need someone from outside to lead a s pecial project of a l imited duration. The supplier of these interims is providing

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The History of Work options in f exible management. Companies must pay a premium for t his s ervice, s ince t he s upplier t akes a c ommission a nd t he temporary manager must be compensated for the sacrif ces made in order to be f exible. It may not be possible, for example, to take a vacation between assignments. Interim management began in the Netherlands in the late 1970s at t he B oer a nd C roon G roup, a ma nagement c onsultancy t hat needed experienced executives to run some of its programs in client companies. Dutch employment laws insisted on lengthy periods of notice so companies saw potential i n using temporary executives as a way of increasing management f exibility. Today it has spread across Europe and into the United States. Job tenures fell so markedly a mong e xecutives i n U S c ompanies d uring t he ea rly 1990s that many jobs began to look like temporary assignments. By t he l ate 1 990s t he rea l i nnovation w as h appening i n t he small s tart-up c ompanies t hat h ad be gun t o a ttract i ncreasing interest f rom v enture c apitalists a nd get -rich-quick i nvestors. This dot.com phenomenon that had been gathering pace during the late 1990s enveloped t he ma rkets i n ea rly 20 00, putting t he share performance of hitherto reliable businesses into the shade. While A lan G reenspan a t t he F ederal R eserve a nd S ir H oward Davies a t t he U K’s F inancial S ervices A uthority be gan t o worry that Internet stocks were taking the form of a s peculative bubble, ma ny commentators were hedging t heir bets, wr iting of Shumpeter’s creative destruction, regarded by some as a necessary constituent of dynamic change. Yes, a greed t he o ptimists, s ome c ompanies l aunching t heir services on the Internet would most probably perish in the struggle for ascendancy, but, like salmon climbing a waterfall to reach their s pawning g rounds, t he s trongest w ould s ucceed. N ot o nly that, they would transform the way people bought things and the way c ompanies d id b usiness. T he pe ssimists w ere t hin o n t he ground b ut c ontinued t o re gurgitate t heir c autionary t ales o f Tulipomania and the South Sea Bubble. Tulipomania – the Dutch speculation i n t ulip bulbs during t he s eventeenth century – w as a particularly striking comparison because, although many speculators l ost f ortunes i n t he f nancial euphor ia t hat v alued some bulbs beyond the price of a house, the trade in tulips transformed

The Road to Panama the Netherlands, both geographically and agriculturally. The bulb industry continues to be a mainstay of the country’s agriculture. Whatever the future of technology stocks – they suffered a steep d ecline i n v alue d uring 20 00 – c ontinuing c ommercial activity o n t he I nternet s eemed t o favor t he S chumpeter m odel. The success of some Internet businesses like eBay, a website that conducts I nternet a uctions, w ould e nsure t he c ontinued vi gorous spawning of thousands if not millions of hopeful knowledge workers wi th s almon-like as pirations t o g row t heir w eb b usinesses into corporate adulthood. Peter Drucker had begun to explore the concept of knowledge workers in his 1959 book, Landmarks of Tomorrow, although he did not use the term until 1969, when he drew the reference from Princeton p rofessor F ritz M achlup’s d escription o f k nowledge industries.10 The knowledge workers – Drucker describes them as “people who get paid for putting to work what one learns in school rather than for their physical strength or their manual skill”11 – would inherit the computer age. As Alain Cotta, professor of economics a t t he U niversity o f P aris-Dauphine, o bserved i n 1 994: “More t han h alf t he people a re now employed i n s ectors where they crea te, re lease, t ransfer, re ceive, a nd u tilize i nformation. The crossing of the frontier between muscle and neuron may have as many consequences as the rise of industry.”12 Given t heir T aylorist h eritage i t s hould n ot be s urprising t hat some of the ea rliest efforts by large companies to exploit systematically t he h uman k nowledge i n t heir c ompanies i nvolved t he creation of a concept called “knowledge management.” Knowledge management f rom t he s tart w as a lmost w holly e xploitative. Companies wanted their employees to transfer their knowledge to the c orporate da tabase s o t hat e mployees with less experience o r with different experience could tap into this k nowledge bank and use it for the general good of the business. It was touted as s omething new, but Ralph Waldo Emerson had sensed a desire for such exploitation in the nineteenth century, when he wrote: “I hate this shallow A mericanism w hich h opes t o g et r ich b y cred it, t o g et knowledge b y ra ps o n m idnight t ables, t o l earn t he e conomy o f the mind by phrenology, or skill without study, or mastery without apprenticeship.”

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The History of Work Knowledge ma nagement w as e xactly t hat – a n a ttempt t o obtain s kill wi thout s tudy, a nd mas tery wi thout a pprenticeship. Again t his s upposedly m odern c oncept c ame u p a gainst “ the rule.” After a period of heavy staff cutting across industry during the late 1980s and early 1990s, those that remained were hardly enthusiastic a bout h anding over t heir m eal t ickets. It was t antamount to asking a journalist to disgorge the contents of his or her contacts boo k. Too o ften k nowledge ma nagement w as a cr ude attempt t o m echanize re lationships. Too o ften i t d id n ot reward employees f or t heir pe rsonal “i ntellectual c apital.” N either d id it recognize that knowledge alone is no more attractive than an uncut diamond. Knowledge is a c ommodity. The real value is in the way it is applied. The u nderlying c hallenge o f t he I nternet i s i ts u seful a pplications as a m edium. T his is why t here is so much work a head of us. When I l ook at the Internet I s ee an unquantif ed mass of work, an unraveling of human minds, translated into a hotchpotch of type and images, some of it stimulating but much of it, like the labels on sauce bottles, of little more than passing interest. Advertising l itters websites i n t he same u nplanned way t hat signposts a nd b illboards c log t he a rteries o f A merican c ities. The commercial image, the logo, the brand, f ashing from every street c orner a nd vi deo s creen, a re as po lluting t o t he m ind as exhaust emissions are to the atmosphere. The Internet started out as a u seful means of conveying information between academics. Later, in adolescence, it became an unregulated playground for disaffected, rebellious youth, for extremists, wackos, and pornographers, for t hose on t he f ringe of society. By t he ea rly 20 00s it w as d isplaying a ll t he h allmarks o f i mmaturity – s elf-belief, hopes, a nd idealism m ixed with naivety, rawness, a nd incompetence. T here must be s omething i n t hese q ualities t hat s tirs o ur juices, because the businesses that began to exploit this medium created a new gold rush, fueled by the belief that much of future society w as g oing t o s pend i ts t ime i n d ialogue wi th a vi deo screen – and today it’s beginning to pay off. Is the rise of the Internet as signif cant as t he I ndustrial Revolution? O r s hould w e t hink o f i t as a n i nformation a nd communications m ilestone a kin to t he one t hat appeared before recorded h istory, w hen p eople f rst ac hieved t he s poken w ord?

The Road to Panama These m ilestones a re more frequent than the Toff er waves. T he second big step in communications was the development of writing. Some of t he ea rliest wr itten re cords i nvolving a m ixture of numerals, p ictographs, a nd i deograms a re re cords o f b usiness arrangements made by Mesopotamian priests about 3,500 bc. Message and medium seem to be common factors in these step changes. S tone w as re placed b y p aper. P aper, o ne o f t he g reatest te chnologies e ver d iscovered, h as s till n ot be en re placed adequately. Its cheapness and utility are unmatched. Printing created an explosion of the printed word. Computers, and today the potential of cloud computing, has created massive storage potential, re sponse s peeds, a nd n ew o ptions f or c ollaboration. T heir inf uence cannot be d enied. Gradually, slowly, sometimes imperceptibly, computing and the Internet is changing the way we live. When f ast b roadband c ommunications a re a vailable e venly i n rural villages some of us may be tempted back in to the communities our ancestors deserted in the Industrial Revolution. This may be t he biggest change effected by the Internet. Will it t ake a way o ur w anderlust? As t ravel c osts d iminish a nd t he world becomes available to all, will we tire of our search for The Beach? Will we nestle in our comfy sofas and f nd contentment in a s impler life or in a c omplex internal domestic life servicing our household gizmos? Will we play God on the computer, spending m ore t ime i n a vi rtual S econd Li fe t hat s imulates d omestic scenarios? Will we turn our homes into mini museums, schools, zoos, and laboratories, drawing on our ability to tap in to a v ast sea of online knowledge? Will we rediscover the pub and the corner s hop a nd re turn t o t hose w ho c lung o nto t hese i nstitutions, those who had no desire to go out West? Isaac Newton def ned t he basic law of motion. For every reaction t here i s a n e qual a nd o pposite reac tion. S ometimes t he l aw applies in society. For every Ferrari capable of clocking 200 mph there i s a t raff c j am, a d riving b an, o r a s peed b ump; for every alcohol i nspired b inge t here i s a h angover; for every crea m c ake a layer of fat. Every development in society has its consequences, both g ood a nd b ad. T here h as be en t oo m uch I nternet e uphoria. We should prepare for the fallout. Marshall McLuhan, who introduced us to the “global village,” also declared that “the medium is the m essage.”13 Today t he m edium i s d estroying t he m essage, as

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The History of Work the cuckoo Internet absorbs corporate aspirations and the rest of us bow i n da ily h omage before t he c omputer s creen. M artin L uther King warned us of the dangers of technology in 1963 when he wrote that “the means by which we live have outdistanced the ends by w hich w e l ive. O ur s cientif c po wer h as o utrun o ur s piritual power. We have guided missiles and misguided men.”14 The s ame N ewtonian p rinciples g overning reac tionary f orces apply t o w ork. I n t he ea rly 1 990s J uliet S chor c oncentrated o n the o verworked A merican, b ut E urope s oon f ollowed, wi th t he UK heading the charge into the long-hours culture. Did it deliver fantastic b enef ts f or b usiness? W ork i ncreasingly t ook o n t he appearance o f a t readmill w here, h owever q uickly w e ra n, w e didn’t get anywhere any faster. People stayed in the off ce because they felt they should. Suddenly there was voicemail to catch every incoming telephone call to the desk and to the mobile phone; then there were emails to cover the unanswered telephones, faxes, and postal deliveries. When everyone was given the ability to send emails the messages multiplied in their millions. The desk was under siege. The f rst thing to suffer under this deluge of communication was work itself. Information was spinning into our laps like junk mail, like discarded l itter. T his w asn’t i nformation b ut i nformation po llution. Unsifted, u nregulated, u ncontrolled i nformation was g umming up our brains. No sooner had we begun to experience this social p henomenon o f i nformation overload t han s urveys be gan sprouting l ike d andelions c onf rming e verything w e c ould s ee. Then t here w ere t he ma licious, d estructive, s oftware-eating viruses – M elissa a nd t he L ove B ug – d isguised as i nnocent email messages. Like the cavalry charge on the back of the artillery barrage came advice sheets and books on the email menace and how to deal with it. It was time management all over again. And this was all before social networking demanded even more of our attention, before Twitter a nd t he automatic newsfeed a nd the b leeping B lackBerry. T he m essage i s t here: s liced, d iced, and d elivered a h undred t imes a da y s o t hat we a re s wamped with information. The message, any message, has become a t iny insignif cant voice i n a c acophony of communications, a n email maelstrom. Work? The chance would be a f ne thing.

CHAPTER 22

One Life. Live it. We are moving from the workplace to work done any place. (Alvin Toff er, b. 1928) Every weekday m orning i n d owntown M umbai ( Bombay), l ong after the rush hour, when most off ce workers are looking forward to lunch, it is possible to witness the f rst signs of a n extraordinary operation at each of the city’s mainline train stations. As the trains begin to arrive around 11.30 a.m., you can see men in their hundreds carrying long wooden t rays on t heir heads, struggling to extricate t hemselves f rom t he p assenger c ars. Eac h t ray c ontains a bout t hirty r ound c ans, l ike t all p aint c ans. Eac h c an, o r dabba, contains t he home-cooked lunch of spicy meats, vegetables, rice, and chapatis for an off ce worker. The cans a re handled by dabbawallahs, men whose job it is, every da y, t o c ollect t he l unch-boxes f rom t he o ff ce workers’ wives or mothers at their suburban homes, bring in the lunches, then c ollect t he e mpty c ans a nd re peat t he d istribution p rocess i n reverse. Every dabba, or t iff n box, is ma rked with small painted symbols identifying where the owner can be f ound. The dabbawallahs a re e xpert a t s orting a nd d istributing t he c ans, working like links in a c hain, passing the cans between them at various stages. Some e stimates re ckon t hat as ma ny as 1 00,000 lunches are delivered in this way in Mumbai every working day.1 Why does it happen? The dabbawallahs are unique to Mumbai. Their business originated from the desire of a single British off ce worker more than a h undred y ears a go, d uring t he B ritish Ra j, t o h ave h is l unch cooked by his wife and brought to his desk. The fashion caught on and today, even though fast food is beginning to appear in Mumbai, t his “ slow f ood” t radition c ontinues. T hose w ho u se it s ay i t p rovides a n i mportant s ocial l ink wi th t heir h ome a nd with their colleagues, since the arrival of the dabba is one of the 309

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The History of Work few o pportunities employees h ave each day t o b reak off a nd sit around a table and talk to each other. Labor in Mumbai is cheap, which means that the delivery system and cost to the customer are also cheap. It could be e quated with t he p rice of ma iling a l etter. T he dabba i s c heaper t han a meal t aken outside i n a re staurant, but it is hardly cheaper t han sandwiches o r a p repared m eal a nd f ruit i n a T upperware bo x. In some ways the service doesn’t make much sense. Why, for instance, c an’t peo ple t ake t heir e mpty dabba ba ck home w ith them? L ooking a t t he s ystem l ogically t here s eems t o be m uch unnecessary w ork, p articularly t o W estern e yes s chooled o n maximizing the eff ciency of every job. Some may view the system as a f orm of entrapment for women, keeping them at home, rather than encouraging their entry into the labor market. But the system is not some form of government job creation scheme. It is private enterprise. The dabbawallahs themselves rarely see their families except for two weeks a year when they go home to their villages outside Mumbai, and the city is left to pine. The dabba system is a remarkable exercise in logistics among men who have never learned to read or write. It functions perfectly. It relies neither on digital technology nor on the written language. A c ounter-argument i n s upport o f t he s ystem s ays t hat t he 2,300 dabbawallahs, a ll m embers o f t he U nion o f T iff n Box Suppliers, w ould be be gging o n t he s treets wi thout t heir w ork. It gives them a role in society and brings in an income for their families; i t ma kes t he o ff ce w orkers h appy – a lthough wi ves might not like the way that it conf nes them to the kitchen – a nd it works. I t i s a pe rfect example o f work d riven by f ashion a nd social ne ed, w here e conomic co nsiderations p lay a se condary role. Nowhere, perhaps, is labor such an important national economic factor as in India. With a population of 1 billion people, keeping a plentiful supply of work has become essential to maintaining order and keeping incomes at sustainable levels. Much of the work, however, seems unnecessary, less signif cant, in fact, than dabba work. The state sector is bulging with bodies f ling bits of paper on dusty shelves, passing forms f rom one desk to a nother, often getting i n the way of projects that could inject genuine economic life into the country.

One Life. Live it. The free market is viewed with suspicion in India, partly as a re sult o f t he l egacy o f ad ministration u nder t he Eas t I ndia Company and partly due to a fear of cultural dilution by Western ideals, something that is already happening. Additionally there is a belief that any solutions to poverty emerging from the capitalist system have been by-products of the system rather than stemming from values embodied in any capitalist ethos. It used to be the case that the West looked guardedly at countries l ike I ndia, seeing t hem as po tential t hreats to its ma nufacturing b ase be cause o f t he read y s upply o f c heap l abor. I t h as been argued that part of the Indian labor movement had its roots in a d esire b y n ineteenth-century B ritish te xtile ma nufacturers to s uppress co mpetition.2 T he i dea was t hat I ndia would be less competitive if its manufacturers were forced by unions to pay workers higher wages. If this was true, all it succeeded in doing was t o d elay t he i nevitable. M ohandas Ga ndhi p layed t he e conomic counterpunch, urging his followers to burn their imported British clothing. Today t he West m ight look a gain a t I ndia as a market for its goods, but not as a dumping ground. The only way that India can become a market for expensively produced Western goods a nd s ervices i s t o p rovide t he I ndian e mployee with p urchasing power, in the same way that Ford workers received more pay in 1913, enabling them to buy their own Model Ts. Not o nly a re t he W est’s f uture e xport ma rkets e merging i n developing c ountries, t hese c ountries a re a lso be ginning t o p rovide high technology labor. The Indians have become aware of t heir h uman po tential i n t he f eld o f i nformation te chnology. Bangalore is the Silicon Valley of the East. Although some of the most c omputer-literate I ndians h ave m oved t o Ca lifornia t o t ake advantage o f hi gh w ages i n Am erican t echnology c ompanies, others a re preferring to stay in I ndia. Cheaper labor in countries such as India, China, the Philippines and Indonesia has led employers to b ecome i ncreasingly at tracted to o ffshoring pro ducts a nd services seeking out what some have called the “China price” – the l owest l evel o f l abor c ost ( although Ch ina’s e conomic r ise means it has probably already lost this benchmark status). In this developing w ellspring of e mployment, l abor-sourcing i s b eginning to go to the places where it is most needed. It is no longer realistic for Western governments to fear the search by the largest

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The History of Work companies for the cheapest labor. The advantage of sourcing labor in developing countries is to create spending power and wealthier internal ma rkets w hich wi ll be come e xport ma rkets f or Western countries t hat n ever e xisted be fore. B usiness h as be gun t o s eek out labor globally, and the means of doing so has become simpler through t he I nternet. T his should not be s een as a t hreat by governments inclined toward protectionism but as a n opportunity for Western ma nufacturers i n crea ting n ew e xport ma rkets f or t heir goods and services. There has to be a trade-off between businesses and i nternational g overnments. I n e xchange f or a g overnment’s willingness to liberalize trade, large international companies must be willing to set new market rates by paying higher wages than the existing market level. The economic effect would be that of Ford’s f ve-dollar day but multiplied onto a global scale. The developing world has been dismissed for too long as a drain on Western capital in economic aid, much of it pocketed by corrupt rulers. But if earnings, not aid, were placed separately in the pockets o f t housands, i ndeed m illions, o f i ndividuals t he W est would be crea ting a ma rket f or t he f uture. J obs crea ted a broad will create jobs at home in the cross-fertilization of business. This is an international argument. “Home” can be a nywhere. The World Wide Web is the Main Street of the global village, creating massive opportunities for countries with few natural or ma nufacturing resources to begin marketing the know-how of their people. But w e m ove t oo s oon t o ma ke W estern-style e conomic judgments. T here a re p arts o f t he w orld t hat j ust d o n ot w ant much t o d o with Western-style c apitalism. P erhaps t he Western democracies should respect their wishes. Who is to say that economic progress and everything it brings with it – want and waste – is t he o ne be st w ay f or a ll h umanity? W estern c apitalism w as forced on some nations. Perhaps the model of social capitalism, fostering increasing worker-ownership of businesses, would mean much more to many developing economies. These countries cannot expect to receive much encouragement from Europe. The Li sbon s ummit i n 20 00, wi th i ts p romise t o crea te 20 million new jobs in the European Union, remained anchored to the policies of social protectionism implicit in the old agenda rhetoric o f j ob crea tion. T he p hilosophy o f j ob crea tion i s as f awed as Henry Ford’s idea of creating a bird reserve on his

One Life. Live it. homestead. Building bi rdhouses a nd put ting down bi rdseed was a waste of time and money. Birds want to f y free and make their own w ay. S o d o peo ple. B irds s eek t o c ongregate i n e nvironments rich in the basics they need to thrive – food, shelter, social groups, a nd reas onable s afety f rom p redators a nd t he e lements. People have slightly more complex needs but not dramatically so if you re move t he ma nufactured “w ants” o f c onsumerism f rom the equation. In f act, i f t he f uturists a re r ight i n t heir read ing o f a f undamental sea change i n society, enabled by t he a lmost i nstantaneous transfer of information, some of our consumerist hunger may well recede. The very fact that almost anything is attainable may restrain our desires. With fewer f nancial, political, or legislative caps on personal ambition, people can begin to confront an ambition as a realizable dream. Will this mean that the dream loses its luster, because it is no longer special, testing, or unique?3 The futurists write of a paradigm shift. A paradigm shift is a shift in attitudes or beliefs so signif cant that it changes the way we see t he world. T he rea lization t hat t he world was round, not f at, i nvolved a p aradigm s hift, p articularly f or s ailors. M ichael Dunkerley po ints t o s everal o thers i n h is boo k, The J obless Economy. Charles Darwin’s The Origin of S pecies forced people to rethink their concept of the Creation, and Louis Pasteur’s discovery that bacteria transmitted disease revolutionized the understanding o f d iseases. “ Changing j ust o ne be lief c an force o n t o people a completely new world view, and that is a very disturbing experience. People will hold on to old, even outmoded beliefs, just to avoid this experience,” writes Dunkerley.4 He is writing about t he pheno menon o f so cial d rag. T his is t he phenomenon that can blind us to what is happening around us. Dunkerley’s boo k, p ublished i n 1996, w as wr itten be fore t he explosion of the Internet, when companies such as America Online, Yahoo!, Amazon.com, and eBay were barely on the radar screen. Yahoo! – s ome suggest its i nitials stand for “ yet a nother h ierarchical o ff cious oracle” – w as founded i n 1994 by t wo Stanford University electrical engineering students as an Internet directory f or w ebsites. I t be came a s tock ma rket q uoted c ompany in 1 996. N etscape, a p rovider o f I nternet b rowser s oftware, was founded t he same year. It a lso came to t he ma rket i n 1996.

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The History of Work Amazon.com sold its f rst book over the Internet in 1995. Google, the c ompany t hat h as c ome t o d ominate t he I nternet i n t oday’s new a ge o f t he s earch e ngine, w as n ot f ounded u ntil 1 998. Facebook, the social networking internet phenomenon, was created by M ark Z uckerberg i n 20 03, T witter, t he m icroblogging s ite, in 20 06. W ikipedia, t he o nline i nformation s ervice t hat re lies on updates f rom m illions of volunteer contributors worldwide – challenging our thinking on knowledge-based transactions – was launched in 2001. The history of so much that we take for granted today is barely out of kindergarten. The speed and impact of Internet-based information technology has been so staggering that Don Tapscott, a writer and consultant on Internet businesses, is convinced that the paradigm shift is for real. “We’re moving into a n ew period of human history. It’s not about dotcom. We’re beginning to see some fundamental changes in how we create value and how we govern ourselves,” he says.5 Some of these changes, says Tapscott, involve the way that people will work in the new economy. Far more people, he believes, will have freelance or partnership arrangements with new technology companies. He quotes Steven Behm, the former vice president of global a lliances a t C isco S ystems. “ We h ave 3 2,000 e mployees but only 17,000 of them work at Cisco,” said Behm.6 It i s d iff cult f or ma ny peo ple w ho s tarted a nd re tain t heir careers i n t raditional e mployment – p rogrammed as i t i s wi th career l adders a nd ce rtain expectations – t o a ppreciate t he way the c orporate a nd e mployment l andscape i s c hanging. T homas Malone and Robert Laubacher, wr iting in the Harvard Business Review i n 1998, i llustrated t he w ay t hat t he ra tio o f e mployees in t he b iggest c ompanies re lative t o o ther c ompanies h as be en falling. Fortune 500 companies employed one in f ve US workers in the 1970s. By the late 1990s this had fallen to one in ten. As Malone and Laubacher pointed out, “the largest private employer in the United States is not General Motors, IBM or UPS. It’s the temporary employment agency, Manpower Incorporated.”7 Are we witnessing a nother w holesale red ef nition of t he j ob? Will we look back in twenty to f fty y ears’ t ime a t t he s tructured employment of twentieth century big business, founded on practices developed in the previous century, as the era of the job?

One Life. Live it. Should we think of the job as nothing more than what William P. Bridges, the author of JobShift, called a “h istorical a rtifact”? Up t o a bout 1 800, h e s ays, “ people did j obs b ut d idn’t have jobs.”8 I n a 1 993 Time magazine a rticle called t he “ Temping of America,” Lance Morrow decided that the “great corporate clearances” a nd “ ruthless re structuring e ff ciencies” o f t he n ineties were crea ting a “j ust-in-time” w orkforce o f “f uid, f exible and disposable” part-time and temporary workers.9 Tom Peters, the management writer, was dismissive of Morrow’s article, preferring to be upbeat about the nature of change. A few years later he was less dismissive. In a lurid prediction published in Time magazine i n May, 20 00, Peters was forecasting t hat 90 percent of white-collar jobs in the United States would be either “destroyed or altered beyond recognition in the next 10 to 15 years. T hat’s a c atastrophic p rediction, given t hat 90 pe rcent of us are engaged in white-collar work of one sort or another,” he wrote.10 It was also way off the mark. The predictions were accompanied in the magazine by a list of jobs expected to disappear. It was alarming stuff. Destined for the dump, according to Time, were teachers, printers, truckers, housekeepers, o rthodontists, st enographers, st ockbrokers, c ar d ealers, insurance agents, real-estate agents, and prison guards. For good measure it included the role of the chief executive. It was a deliberately provocative piece of journalism. Surely there will always be s omeone w ho c alls t he s hots, s omeone w ho h as t he c asting vote. B ut n eed i t be t he s ame pe rson a ll t he t ime? P erhaps t he role of t he c hief executive wi ll c hange t o o ne of c oordinator o r choreographer. In an organization run on the principle of Follett’s power with there could be combinations of experts who will take center stage at different times. “All the world’s a stage and all the men a nd women m erely players,” wr ote Shakespeare i n As You Like It. “One man in his time plays many parts.” When power i s d emocratized, t here i s n o reas on why l eadership cannot interchange. It a lready happens within partnerships. It happens within government. The president of the United States would not presume to overrule the head of the Federal Reserve or the Attorney General. Yet so ma ny c ompanies a re still r un l ike personal f efdoms responsible to anonymous shareholders.

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The History of Work Behind t he s cenes po wer i s wi elded b y t he c ontrolling ma nagers of large pension f unds. Some of t hese have be come k ingmakers. T his c ould n ot h appen i n a c ompany r un o n be half o f its e mployee a nd pe nsioner s hareholders. S ome ma y a rgue that s uch a n i nstitution w ould be s low m oving a nd u nwieldy. Constant voting prevents crisp decision-making. But it is the way we r un Western d emocracy, a nd c onsultation b y g overnment i s increasing. B esides, a c ompany d oes n ot own i ts peo ple, a nd i t may n ot e ven f ormally e mploy i ts be st peo ple. You d on’t o rder these people to do something, you ask them nicely and they see if they can f t the project into their schedule. An artisan independence is returning to the workplace. Relationships are growing in importance. Whatever Dilbert may say, the command-and-control philosophy is not going to work in the information age. Peters’s argument for change appeared to be founded partly on a n observation – h e had be en t alking to a n old dockhand i n London – t hat a n a wful l ot o f b lue-collar j obs h ad v anished. I re member t he b lue-collar j obs d isappearing i n t he 1 970s a nd 1980s. I w atched the textile mills close down in the town where I grew up. I saw the steel industry melt away in Sheff eld. I interviewed o ut-of-work s hipyard w orkers o n Teeside a nd m iners i n the W elsh v alleys w ho c omplained t hat t he o nly w ork l eft f or them was “women’s work.” More re cently I vi sited ma nufacturing s ites w here t he b luecollar and white-collar distinctions were blurring. In some it was d iff cult t o te ll w orkers f rom ma nagement. M anagers h ad abandoned t heir t ies a nd j ackets, a nd w orkers h ad a bandoned their overalls, and both groups were spending more time in each other’s company. In the early 1990s Rover, the former car manufacturer, deliberately mixed the roles for a while in an attempt to preserve jobs. As some white-collar jobs disappeared, the people who d id t hese jobs were offered work on t he assembly l ine. The idea was not popular. T he biggest p roblem for white-collar workers was psychological, associated with t he stigma of losing the trappings of the off ce job. No longer did they leave for work in the morning clutching their briefcase. Jobs take on trappings, and these trappings become part of an individual’s identity, affecting not only how t hey see t hemselves but how t hey a re seen by others.

One Life. Live it. The t rappings o f t he w hite-collar j ob i n ma ny c ases a re the o ff ce, t he te lephone, t he s ecretary, a nd t he c ompany c ar. These tend to convey status, and in the past these status symbols have been expanded or elaborated to extraordinary degrees. In British Civil Service jobs a higher grade would at one time attract a larger desk and several more square feet of off ce space. A property executive at Mobil Oil, when trying to make cost savings in off ce space at the company headquarters, found that many of the company’s senior executives liked to have extra space for a couch. “In my own off ce I worked out that 35 percent of the off ce was status space – the place where the couch went,” said Joe Licameli, the company’s vice president for real estate in 1995.11 These examples a re h istoric, b ut ma ny o ther s tatus t rappings still e xist, a nd t he d esire t o po ssess t hem h as n ot d isappeared. I was told of one executive who t urned down a j ob move in the 1990s because he was refused a re quest to have wi re wheels on his c ompany B MW. I n h is boo k, Liar’s P oker, Michael L ewis, a former bond trader at Salomon Brothers, the investment bank, ridiculed t he w ay a s pirit o f pe ttiness c an d evelop i n t he p ampered executive a nd t he way t hat service organizations fall over themselves t o pa nder t o t his spi rit. A fter a chieving some e arly success in his dealings, Lewis f nds himself yelling at a be llhop about t he i nadequacies o f h is h otel r oom. T here w ere n o b ath robes, no fruit bowl with apples and bananas, and, worst of all, the staff had forgotten to form a little triangle on the f rst sheet of the roll of bathroom tissue. It’s just a d ream, he explains. In fact it was a n ightmare – t he fear of a w orld without perks, without those l ittle f rills t hat s ymbolize s pecial t reatment. “S ometimes I d ream I h ave been downgraded by British A irways f rom Club Class to Economy. Other times it’s even worse,” he wrote.12 Many s uch pe rks s till e xist – a irline, h otel, a nd re staurant businesses thrive on them – although one of the healthier consequences of reengineering and the f attening of hierarchies was a move, often for the sake of economy rather than ideology, toward single-status w orking. A n ew g eneration o f y ounger e xecutives got r id o f n amed p arking s paces a nd i ndividual o ff ces. Some even g ot r id o f d esks. O ne U K o ff ce of Digital, the computer c ompany, i ncreased its worker–desk ra tio t o 12:1.13 In th ese hot-desking e nvironments t he o ff ce f urniture a nd o ff ce space

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The History of Work were changed to ref ect the desired mobility of the job, where the off ce became no more than a drop-in station. Christopher Jones, a consultant at Unisys whom I interviewed in 1995, said the only drawback of the change was the hefty barrister’s briefcase he had bought to lug around his papers. His few other off ce possessions and f les were kept in a box-on-wheels that could be trundled out when he needed a desk. The b iggest re sistance t o t hese t ransformations c ame f rom managers who found it diff cult to make the psychological adjustment to the way their job was changing. Stephen Jupp, a specialist in change management at Digital, contrasted the difference in managerial attitudes at the time: “Good managers manage by results. Sloppy ones assess your contribution by your presence and how long you are there.”14 The concept of bums-on-seats, of being seen to be working in white-collar off ces, remains one of the most persistent obstacles to the introduction of f exible working p atterns. Too often f exibility i s one-sided. T he employee i s expected to be f exible with no quid pro quo from the employer. Big-time g urus mu st m ake bi g-time p redictions. P eters m ight have been r ight about some aspects of change, but it will not be catastrophic. T he f undamentals of t he job wi ll remain. Teachers will still be needed to teach, but they may no longer stand, autocratically, in front of classrooms dispensing knowledge in syllabusdriven p ackages. T he r ole wi ll be m odeled a round t he n eeds of the children. Education, like the job, is due for an overhaul. The changing e xpectations o f t he j ob, in deed, w ill f eed t hrough t o education p roviders. B ut ed ucation, l ike o ther a reas o f s ociety, remains in the grip of social drag. Here’s a te st. How many jobs today require keyboard skills? How many schoolchildren receive typing lessons? Typing has become as fundamental to communications as joined-up writing, perhaps more so, and yet the education system continues to neglect this basic area of training. Most of Peters’s predictions, like most of those concerning the changes i n work, were p rincipally a bout p ackaging. A rguments about the packaging of the job remain relevant. Repackaged work needs to be supported by a new and more f exible f nancial infrastructure that appreciates the value of freelance workers moving from project to project. The packaging and support for these new jobs has been slow to improve. A f reelancer, for example, needs

One Life. Live it. variable arrangements to look after mortgages and other lines of credit. These issues a re beginning to be ad dressed by the f nancial s ervices i ndustry, b ut t he i ndustry s till p refers t o f ocus i ts products on the so-called permanent workforce. More i mportant questions for society revolve a round our attitudes t o w ork. I f w e as k o urselves, “Is t here w ork t o d o?” w e must conclude that in the new century there is more work than ever. Technology designed to save labor invariably creates work. The internal combustion engine and the car led to vast new industries, from petrochemicals to road construction. It led to new laws, new living patterns, new leisure patterns. The advent of the massproduced car, in fact, was as signif cant a social revolution as that which acc ompanied t he s team e ngine, b ut n o e minent h istorian ever chose to favor it with a label. Perhaps it is because historians have become tired with the concept of revolutionary change in social history. Social history, after a ll, is not about events but about continuity. As o ne country invades another, the social history is bound up in the streams of refugees, their thoughts, their fears, and their aspirations. The tide of war shifts them this way and that. Sometimes the war creates a vortex into which are sucked whole strata or groupings of people – the kulaks in Russia, the Jews in Europe, the Armenians in Turkey, t he Muslims i n Bosnia. T hose who survive a re capable of a ferocious resistance to integration, such is the evolutionary power of d iversity. T heir t raditions l ive on, often i n a nother geographic location. Social continuity transcends revolution, transcends geography. It i s n ot a bout k ings a nd q ueens o r d espots o r c onquests. I t i s about people making the best of their lives, looking out for themselves and for those who come after them, and work is so central to the human continuum. Where there is humanity there is work. Where there is life there is work. We must look carefully, then, at the work before us, the work we have created for ourselves, a nd deliberate over how much of it i s n ecessary a nd u seful. As w e d eliberate o n t he be st way t o organize a nd accomplish t he necessary work, however, we must also b egin to co nfront t he en during presen ce of t he work e thic. If w e a re i ndeed i n t he m iddle o f s ome c hange i n t he w ay w e look at work, some paradigm shift, to use the phrase so beloved

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The History of Work of the modern guru, should we be thinking of ditching the work ethic as s omething that has served us well in the past but which has outgrown its usefulness? Has it become redundant? The idea sounds absurd. The work ethic seems to be b uried as d eeply within Western society as the chemical reaction that pumps us with adrenaline in the event of sudden danger. Adrenaline gives us the physical preparedness for the f ght or f ight. Which is it to be? We must make the decision ourselves a nd i n a n i nstant. We have a l ittle longer to deliberate over our work. So should we work ever harder or should we try to ease up on the accelerator? Were the question so simple. Some of us are psychologically incapable of easing up. The work ethic is so ingrained. When I say “we” in this context I am referring to you and me, not t o s ome g overnment a gency o r s ome a nonymous e mployer. We cannot expect capitalism to dispense with the work ethic. The capitalist system, as Adam Smith, Max Weber, and R. H. Tawney understood s o w ell, w as f ounded o n t he P rotestant w ork e thic. To remove the work ethic is to remove the foundation of capitalism. S o t he w ork e thic wi ll s tay wi thin t he bod y c orporate. Many companies will continue to view people as employees, as work units, as cost items to be factored into the price of a product or s ervice. B ut s ome o f t he n ewer I nternet c ompanies a re f nding that they can obtain the products of work without paying for them. Amazon.com, for example, runs thousands of book reviews contributed willingly by customers. Great work is not about ergonomically styled off ces in different shades of blue and green. It is certainly not about all the processes of h uman re source ma nagement. I t i s n ot a bout l eadership – not leadership from above, anyway. It is not about technology. It is about kindling the inner human spirit that makes us the people we are. We may well be inspired by the work or the example of others b ut o nly w e, as i ndividuals, c an g enerate t he gl ow t hat illuminates t he ac hievements o f o ur a ncestors a nd s parks t he achievements of our heirs. If we want to refer to this glow as work, then well and good, but I t hink i t i s m ore t han w ork. S ome w ork h as d immed t his glow to nothing more t han a f icker i n t he human soul. I f work cannot crea te t he f re t hat fortif es every h uman s pirit t hen t hat

One Life. Live it. work has lost its meaning a nd should be d iscarded. We need to recover t he s piritual i n o ur l ives a nd h arness i t t o t he w ay w e work. Work h as be come t he o ne-eyed m onster t hat i nvades o ur dreams, but we can learn to love it. We have come a long way in the two and a h alf million years since o ur a ncestors f ound s ome m erit i n f ashioning t ools t o improve t heir l ives. T he v ery ac t o f crea tion, w hether B iblical or e volutionary, i nvolved w ork. B ut God w as a llowed t o re st. Man h as be come i ncreasingly re stless. W hatever t he s everity of his original sin, he must have served his punishment by now. Yet man continues to punish himself in the way to which he has become accustomed – b y heaping upon himself ever more complex levels of work. Our society wi ll a lways reward t he i ndustrious a nd long may it continue to do so, but hard work a lone is not going to deliver either employee or employer satisfaction. It must be purposeful work, rewarding i n a nd o f itself. A j ob n ot worth d oing s hould be ignored. The irony is that much technology has gone to war on work, replacing jobs (and therefore costs) with machines. Yet technology crea tes w ork be cause i t f eeds o ur d esires, s timulating economic demand. People must learn to inhibit their desires. They m ust l earn t he l esson o f P anama – t hat t he l and o f t heir dreams is the land that they live in. At the same time they must continue to dream and to search in the knowledge that that search itself is the adventure. The lesson is psychological. Today we have become deaf to what Martin Luther described as the “calling.” If we hear something l ike it today, we hear a s iren song. T he sirens a re so seductive; t hey a re r iches a nd po ssessions, gizm os a nd f ashions, pro ducts a nd bra nds. I n t he co mmercial e xploitation o f the human genome, life itself becomes a b rand. Shall we opt for a q uality b rand o r s hall w e s ettle f or a v acuous l abel t hat o nly delivers unhappiness, an empty exercise in gratif cation? Taylor’s p roduction m ethods a nd W eber’s b ureaucracy d id much to damage the human spirit. They compartmentalized work and, in so doing, they compartmentalized leisure. C. Wright Mills wrote i n White Co llar: T he A merican M iddle C lass th at o ff ce work h ad crea ted a n ew leisure e thic. H e a rgued t hat peo ple i n dull white-collar jobs during the 1950s were no longer driven by

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The History of Work the w ork e thic b ut b y a l eisure e thic wra pped u p i n t he p romise of the weekend. “Work has been split from the rest of life, so the idols of work have been replaced by the idols of leisure,” he said.15 This new attitude of “Thank God It’s Friday” was noticed by F. Scott Fitzgerald. “The rhythm of the week end, with its birth, i ts p lanned g aieties, a nd i ts a nnounced e nd, f ollowed t he rhythm of life and was a substitute for it,” he wrote.16 Work a nd l eisure h ave be en a rtif cially d ivided f or t oo l ong. Lewis Mumford believed that “in origin, work and play have the same c ommon t runk a nd c annot be d etached; every mas tery of the economic conditions of life lightens the burden of servile work a nd opens up new possibilities for a rt a nd play.”17 So why don’t m ore of u s begin t o explore t hese po ssibilities? Work a nd leisure can be f used together once more in the new working patterns of the future if employers and individuals are prepared to let go of the ingrained attitudes anchoring them to worn-out systems. It is the forces of social drag that hold them back. Nothing else. A n ew g eneration o f b usinesses – a nd t his ma y w ell i nclude those in dot.com and technology enterprises – must show the way. If they don’t, then it is up to individuals. The World Wide Web means t hat we no longer need t he safety of t he old job. We just need an idea, and that idea might be something as simple as selling homemade jam through the Internet. We ma y n eed t o l ook t o t he I nternet g eneration f or a n ew work e thic. Unlike t heir B aby B oomer p arents rea red o n a d iet of television, a n ew generation i s e merging t hat i mmerses itself in interactivity of the Web. Don Tapscott says that these children display d ifferent a ttitudes t o t heir p arents, re jecting t he i dea o f conventional employment. “Every kid with a computer is creating his own rad io station,” he says. “ They want to share t he wealth they create. Tell them you’ll give them a job and a corner off ce? I don’t think so. Offer them lifelong, full time exclusive employment? I d on’t t hink so. T his huge demographic change is l ike a tidal wave. These kids are going to shake the windows and rattle the values of every company. If you really want to have security, be a n e ntrepreneur. T hat’s t he w ay t hese k ids t hink. T he rea l security is working for yourself.”18 Frederick T aylor’s s cientif c ma nagement w as t he P rotestant work e thic h arnessed t o o ne ma n’s b idding, t aking c ontrol o f

One Life. Live it. our w orking l ives. I t h elped t o s ecure t he f actory s ystem o f production. A utomation a nd t he I nternet h ave t he po tential t o release us from this system if only we can summon the courage t o t ake t he l eap f rom o ur i nstitutionalized w orkplace t o a f uid working p attern m erged with t he l ifestyles we c hoose a nd the homes and communities we inhabit. But we must be c areful about t he w ork w e s elect. M uch n ew w ork h as be come re petitious. I nformation f ound i n n ewspapers o r i n boo ks i s re peated on the Internet. Instead of one news channel there a re hundreds of t hem, each employing n ewscasters relating t he s ame n ews t o fragmented audiences. This f ragmentation c annot l ast. Q uality h as s uffered i n t he ubiquity o f t he i nformation i ndustry. I t wi ll o nly re turn w hen excellence begins to attract a d iscerning audience. Then we may be a ble t o ce lebrate t he v alue o f crea tive w ork o nce m ore. As Mumford put it: “The function of work is to provide man with a living; not for the purpose of enlarging his capacities to consume but of l iberating h is capacities t o create. T he social meaning of work derives from the acts of creation it makes possible.”19 Not s ince t he I ndustrial R evolution h as i t be en s o i mportant for individuals to explore the nature of their work. A poo r decision t oday c an l ead t o a l ifetime o f u nfulf lled a mbitions. H ow much c an we rely o n i nstitutions, o n government, a nd o n t raditional e mployers to pro vide us wi th f ulf lling w ork? Ca n t here be w elfare i n w orkfare? H istorically, t he p rospects f or re lying on p ublic- a nd p rivate-sector e mployers t o d eliver w orthwhile employment do not look encouraging. Historically, most manual work has be en u ndertaken for t he enrichment a nd l ife enhancement of a privileged few. If it wasn’t the lord of the manor, it was the plantation owner, the factory boss, or the tribal chieftain. Was there ever a world when communal work was undertaken for the benef t of the whole of society? The theories of the archeologist Marija Gimbutas are compelling. The idea that people once worked for each other, that decisions were taken democratically, mediated possibly by women, is easily d ismissed by t hose of u s who c annot c onceive of a s ociety t hat i s n ot d ominated b y peo ple w ho l ead, i n t he w ords o f Nigel Nicholson, because they desire to lead. But Gimbutas was not a lone i n h er observations. Mary Parker Follett saw s ense i n

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The History of Work a society run on the basis of power with rather than power over. When power over is abandoned as a desirable ambition, the alternative becomes attractive. Of course there will be those who dismiss such notions as “too much l ike c ommunism,” re fusing t o ac knowledge t he h istorical precedents o f ec onomically s uccessful c ommunist m odels s uch as N ew H armony, crea ted b y Geo rge Ra pp. H is w as a f awed society, d enying t he n atural s tate o f t he n uclear f amily, b ut i t channeled work e ff ciently w hile ce lebrating t he working s pirit. There are lessons to be learned from Rappist organization. There are lessons, too, from Robert Owen’s learning society, if only that learning alone cannot sustain a successful standard of living. But c ooperation i n s ociety d elivers h ealthier l ifestyles, acc ording to David Erdal’s study of Italian cooperatives. In these societies, as i n t he Ra ppist t owns, t he m embers w ere s takeholders. Does t his ma ke a d ifference? We s hall s oon s ee. We a re a ll capitalists now. Within two generations most people will own f nancial shares in t he v entures o r i nstitutions f or w hich t hey w ork. T he v alues of t he workers wi ll be come t he values of t he c orporation. O nly then wi ll companies have b ecome t he representative i nstitutions of s ociety, as e mployers a nd e mployees e volve t heir re lationship t hrough t he conditions of “workership” – o wnership vested through work. Even then, companies will lay claim only to commercial s ociety – as f ar reac hing as t hat ma y be . T he c orporation will continue to be subordinate to the family as a social unit, because the family must survive if society is to prosper. Society without the family ceases to be society. The evolution o f workership s hould be eas ier t o ac hieve i n a world w here i deological d ifferences h ave ceas ed t o d ominate elections, where the difference between political parties is determined by their electoral appeal. It is time to rid ourselves of ideological b linkers. T he o ld i deologies a re d ead. Ca pitalism w on and c ommunism l ost. P eople p refer c apitalism. T hey p refer t he opportunity t o be tter t hemselves as i ndividuals i n t he way t hey see f t. But this does not mean that self shness will abound or that it cannot be directed at communal effort. Work should be a means to an end. But work has got out of hand for s o ma ny o f u s. O ur a ttitudes h ave be come i nstitutionalized

One Life. Live it. by t he s ecularized m indset o f t he P rotestant w ork e thic, t ransferred d own t he years i n c ultural expectations a nd teac hings of families and societies. Its importance needs to be d iluted in our perspectives. I t i s p art o f l ife, n ot l ife i tself. Voltaire d escribed labor as “the father of leisure,”20 yet today we strangle the child at b irth. Work m ust be f used wi th o ur l eisure, p laying a m ore balanced role in our lives. Leisure should not be t reated as i dleness. T he g ranting o f p ublic h olidays s hould be ce lebrated, n ot damned. Greater leisure time can be an economic boon, allowing people to spend more of their earnings on leisure pursuits. It will also allow greater opportunity for those who wish to pursue other work, and sometimes this work will be voluntary. But we should have no more desire to create a leisure society than we should desire to create a world that is dominated by work. The ancient Greeks pursued the concept of a leisure, or learning, s ociety ( the i deas a re i ntertwined) a nd i t w orked – f or t he privileged citizens of Athens. The Greeks thought six hours were suff cient for a day’s labor.21 I would agree with the Greeks. But theirs was a two-tier society supported by slavery. The most freethinking civilization the world has known was a state wrapped in chains. The only acceptable Greek revival today would be one in which machines were the slaves, and that seems beyond our wildest aspirations. But w e d o n eed a re vival o f t he G reek vi sion. T he G reek scholar Edith Hamilton reminded us that “the exercise of vital powers along lines of excellence in a l ife affording them scope” was a G reek d ef nition o f happ iness.22 S he c alled i t a c oncept “permeated wi th t he e nergy o f l ife.” T he d ef nition h olds w ell for a f ulf lling life today. It could almost be a def nition for t he future of work. No employee or employer could ask more of a job. Neither, in choosing a career, could they go wrong in adopting the two pieces of advice said by Plato to have been inscribed on the temple of Apollo at Delphi: “Know Thyself” and “Nothing in Excess.”23 Work and leisure are vital ingredients in the soup of life. They can r un t ogether as a s ingle f ulf lling e xperience. T his i s w hat should i nform o ur a mbitions – a v arying f ow of experience, barely separable as work or play, not the telephone-number salary. Pay will continue to feature strongly in people’s expectations, but

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The History of Work it m ust n ot d ominate e xpectations. I ncreasing n umbers o f peo ple i n t he W estern i ndustrialized n ations c an l ook f orward t o greater f uctuations in income. T hese variable incomes, containing h igher proportions of performance-related pay a nd bonuses, will be boosted occasionally by share dividends, interest from savings, pension annuities, and inherited wealth. Our identity will no longer be framed by a single source of income o r a s ingle e mployer. T hey may be d ef ned p artially by a skill or set of skills or changing skills as w e adapt throughout life; they may be def ned by our values, and they may be def ned by our circumstances. But in future our world will no longer be dominated b y vi rtuous w ork. W e h ave be come c onditioned t o the idea of l iving for work. But t he changing workplace, g radually undergoing transformation through the forces of f exibility, teleworking, h ome w orking, a nd w ork/life b alance, a ided b y constantly i mproving re mote co mmunications, is i nf uencing a change in attitudes, and the job opportunities today seem greater than they have ever been before. Technology is t he g reat leveler. Technology is handing us t he capability of packaging our work in a way that suits us. We begin to look at choosing a career in the same way that we choose a holiday. We c an f nd o ne “ packaged” t hrough a n a gency, o r we can d o s ome re search a nd g o o ur own way, t racking d own a nd shaping work to f t our needs l ike modern-day hunter-gatherers. The essential lesson is that the choice is ours. “Choose life,” says Renton, the young Scottish reprobate, in the f lm Trainspotting. But working l ife offered s uch few p rospects that he confesses, “I c hose not to choose life. I c hose something else.” H is c hoice w as a d issolute e xistence ad dicted t o h eroin. How many others have chosen this path in preference to a fastfood c ounter o r mac hine-watching i n a f actory? Work a nd t he prospect of work must offer hope of something better if it offers nothing e lse. I n f uture, work wi ll n eed t o ea rn i ts p lace i n o ur lives. We c annot l ive for work. I nstead we must t ake c ontrol of our l ives. B ut t he c hoice i s o urs. W e c annot e xpect a nyone t o make it for us. I f we choose wisely, if we follow our hearts, we may just begin to experience something called living. In the end it’s up t o us; our work, our play, our learning. We only get one life. Let’s live it.

CHAPTER 23

Age of the Search Engine The Earth is nobler than the world we have put upon it. (J.B. Priestley, 1894–1984) The f rst de cade o f t he t wenty-f rst ce ntury h as p assed s ince I f rst wrote this history of work. Our children have been reared in the new age of the Internet, an age of instant communications and democratized knowledge, but also an age of extremes where grinding poverty at one polar end of society contrasts with fabulous wealth a t t he o ther. It i s a w orld where governments pe rsist with economic solutions to recession and unemployment that may have worked in the twentieth century but which are ill-suited to t he g rowing c hallenges o f e nvironmental d egradation i n t he shadow of climate change. Recession-tainted b anks, m eanwhile, s eek t o j ustify t he te lephone number bonuses of their highest paid employees, demonstrating b reathtaking i ndifference n ot experienced since Nero chose t o play h is f ddle as Rome burnt around him. Some governments have promised clampdowns, but will it lead to a lasting change in behaviors?1 I doubt it. The world I d escribed in the later chapters of this history was one w here c apitalism h ad t riumphed. T he ce lebrations o f t hat triumph h ad b arely s ubsided, h owever, be fore t he d evastating attacks on New York’s World Trade Center in 2001 sent a s hiver through t he n ew world o rder. B ut i t t ook a n ear f nancial meltdown of the Western banking system in 2008 to shake the capitalist system to its very foundations. While governments reacted swiftly t o s hore u p t he s ystem, t hey f ailed t o p aper o ver t he f ssures that exposed an ugly side to corporatism. How much d id t hose who s ought t o e nrich t hemselves i n t he f nancial s ystem rea lly c are a bout t he w orld be yond t heir cr ystal a nd s teel h igh-rise t owers? As b anks s hed s taff – i ncluding some w ho h ad o nly j oined f rom u niversity t wo o r t hree y ears 327

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The History of Work earlier – s tudents a nd g raduates a mong t omorrow’s g eneration could be forgiven for thinking that the system in which they had invested their hard-earned education had failed them. This failure of corporatism, not only through its self-serving introspection, b ut a lso t hrough i ts re luctance t o e xplore o r t o innovate n ew working re lationships, h as be en o ne o f t he m ost egregious e xamples o f l assitude a mong e mployers d uring t he formative years of the new century. At a time when the Internet was l iberated b y s earch-engine te chnology i n ways t hat t ransformed t he d issemination o f k nowledge, ma ny c ompanies f ell back on old fashioned protectionism, attempting but often failing t o r ing-fence t heir i ntellectual p roperty a nd c opyrights i n stubborn def ance of a n ew spirit of openness and informationsharing. The established corporate sector did not invent the Internet, nor did t he old o rder h ave t he vi sion o r t he i nventiveness t o exploit the new medium in any novel way. The real breakthroughs of the information age have been t he province of t he entrepreneur a nd the start-up venture, taking corporate form in most cases because capitalism is the only game in town for those who need f nance to achieve their ambitions. If corporatism can be c ondemned for inertia, so can governments, blinkered against changes in society that demand fresh thinking in labor market policy. To shed some light on emerging t hemes t hat a re inf uencing attitudes to work, I embarked on a s econd book, The Future of Work, designed as a c ompanion t o t his o ne. I t s ought n ot o nly t o explain t he way that work is changing, but also to outline a case for reform within antiquated labor markets. It h as be come c lear i n t he p ast d ecade t hat d emographic change and the aging of Western populations is demanding new approaches in health care, retirement, a nd pensions. With as y et insuff cient g uidance, large sections of society a re searching for ways to engage with work beyond the parameters of conventional employment. N owhere i s t his m ore a pparent t han a mong t he aging population. But policy has been slow to respond. Take, f or e xample, t he d ecision b y t he U K’s H igh C ourt i n late 20 09 t o u phold a E uropean C ourt o f J ustice r uling, a llowing British e mployers t o ma intain d efault re tirement a ges. H igh

Age of the Search Engine Court judges, who can work in post until they are seventy (with discretionary year-on-year extensions to age seventy-f ve), might be forgiven for seeing some merits in imposing limitations on the working age. But their own working age limits are set much higher than those for most other people in work. Why d id t hey i nsist o n d elaying t he i nevitable? As Di anah Worman, diversity adviser to the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development, pointed out: “The High Court has missed a trick to resolve t his issue once a nd for a ll. T he government itself has admitted that the days of the default retirement age are numbered. It s eems c ounter-intuitive t o d rag t his d ecision o ut even f urther while thousands of older people will be forced out of work in an already diff cult jobs market.”2 Just as i mportant as t hese economic a rguments for reforming labor markets around an aging society is spiritual reform. Today our l ifestyles a re d ef ned b y “ two-of-everything” ma terialism ensuring that Sunday car boot sales are more popular than church services i n t he U K.3 A 20 08 re port b y Ch ristian R esearch, t he statistical arm of the Bible Society, claimed that by 2050 Sunday congregations wi thin t he Ch urch o f En gland w ould f all be low 88,000, c ompared wi th j ust u nder a m illion n ow.4 T he Ch urch may h ave lost its b attle t o keep Sunday s pecial b ut s ociety wi ll be the poorer if it allows the creeping demands of corporatism to destroy opportunities for shared communal leisure time and rest at weekends. The point was made i n a d iscursive exploration of h istorical and religious inf uences on the evolution of work undertaken by the Rt Rev. & R t Hon. Richard Chartres, Bishop of London, in a l ecture h e g ave i n 20 07.5 H is l ecture e xplored ma ny o f t he themes I h ave covered in this book, portraying two very different understandings and experiences of work, the f rst aligned to the doctrines of the ancient Greeks as u nderstood by Plato and Aristotle, the second relying on an Old Testament interpretation where, he noted: “The idyllic picture of harmonious work conjured up in Genesis II lasted in Luther’s striking phrase ‘about as l ong as t he f rst a fternoon.’ ” Work be came t oil be cause i t was a bstracted f rom t he c onnections a nd re lationships w hich give i t m eaning, acc ording t o Ch artres, w ho a rgues t hat work

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The History of Work needs b alance i n t he s ame w ay t hat t he S abbath ma intains relativity a nd b alance be tween l abor a nd l eisure. T he B ishop continued: Work goes far beyond any utilitarian calculation and is meant to express and to bring into being our potential. Toil is what is experienced when work loses its connections and its meaning. Miners very understandably used to rail against the toilsome character of their work but, hard as it was, it also gave them dignity and established the values of strength and solidarity on which their communal life was based. In modern conditions it is easy to lose the connection between our work a nd t he meaningful l ife a nd so we have to be distracted by a h ectic pace and bribed by the accumulation of things to conceal the draining away of meaning. Families too had been impoverished by the demands of work, he said. “The absent father has been joined by the absent mother on t he t readmill o f t he w ork-and-spend c ycle. N o o ne o n t heir death-bed ever expresses regret that they did not spend more time in the off ce. More often, in my experience, people regret that they did n ot p ay m ore a ttention t o f amily re lations a nd f riendships. The two things which bring joy in life are love and work but the balance between them has to be right.” The Bishop i s o ne of a n umber of h igh p rof le individuals in the UK who have lent their support to a Work Foundation campaign c alled t he Good W ork C ommission, s eeking t o d ef ne the m eaning of a nd b roaden t he po tential for good work. Good work has always been recognized in the sense of achievement we experience over a j ob well done. But there a re so many deadening aspects of modern off ces and manufacturing plants that both this sense of good work and any sense of our individuality can be drowned in the processes of management and corporatism. Sometimes these processes can come to dominate a job, eclipsing t he e nd p roduct. I n a re cent r outine f rom t he po pular BBC TV s ketch s eries, The A rmstrong a nd M iller S how, o ne o f t he actors is portraying a h arassed executive spending h is t ime during a f ight struggling to coordinate his meetings within a h ectic

Age of the Search Engine travel schedule. His fellow passenger asks him what he does for a l iving a nd t he e xecutive re plies: “I h ave n o i dea.” T he be st humor is always grounded in truth. The way t hat e mployees of l arge c ompanies c an be come lost in t he system was observed by t he philosopher A lain de Botton in h is boo k, The P leasures a nd S orrows of W ork. “It i s s urely signif cant t hat t he ad ults w ho f eature i n c hildren’s boo ks a re rarely, i f e ver, R egional S ales M anagers o r B uilding S ervices Engineers. T hey a re s hopkeepers, b uilders, c ooks o r f armers – people w hose l abour c an eas ily be l inked t o t he vi sible be tterment of human life,” he wrote.6 One of t he most curious aspects of de Botton’s project – t hat involved spending time observing people at work among various employers – w as t he reticence of large c ompanies t o o pen t heir doors. Some 90 percent of his requests to go inside companies and look at how they went about their day-to-day business were rejected. Could it be t hat companies sensed they had a heretic in their m idst bent on r idiculing t heir strategy t rees, m ission statements, ma nagement j argon, a nd s terile e mployment s ystems? It w ould n ot t ake l ong f or c orporate e xecutives i n c onversation with d e B otton t o rea lize t hat h ere was a ma n w ho t hey m ight reasonably describe as “not one of us.” Such s uspicion s macks o f a t awdry h omogeneity wi thin t he tiers o f w hite c ollar ma nagement – a “ them a nd u s” d ivision between the body corporate and those in the arts and academia. The w ay t his is m anifest i n cor porate j argon is appa rent w hen de B otton q uotes t he c hairman o f a l arge f rm o f a ccountants replying to a q uestion asking how the f rm differs from its competitors: “ Our peo ple a re o ur b rand i n o ur c lients’ e yes a nd a differentiated client experience can only be crea ted t hrough our people living our values,” said the chairman. The s adness i s t hat f ellow ma nagers n od i n p assive acq uiescence at such statements because their senses have been anesthetized b y p rolonged exposure t o t he s ame t ribal l anguage. W hat George Orwell in 1984 once def ned as N ewspeak has materialized i n t he workplace as “ Corpspeak.” T he l ack o f m eaning i n Corpspeak, it seems, is less material than streaming the words together in s entences th at g ive th e im pression o f c ohesion b ut which will not stand up to any serious analysis. No one dies when

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The History of Work people communicate this way, but something in the human spirit dies, enough to inf uence an imperceptible drooping of the shoulders that begins to weigh heavily over the years. It w as wi th t his s ense o f w eariness t hat, i n h is f nal column as Management Editor of The O bserver, t hat S imon Ca ulkin concluded that the management model in place for the past thirty years was “bust, dead, f nished.”7. Not e veryone i n t he c apitalist s ystem, h owever, i s w eighed down under the burdens of bureaucracy, blandness, and banality endemic in modern management systems. Take Warren Buffet, probably the world’s richest man if he could ever be bo thered to count his wealth. The so-called sage of Omaha still skips to work as an 80-year-old. Buffet enjoys his work because he understands that business is about getting things done. He invests, therefore, in those who do things well. He also understands himself – t hat his joy in life is making money and spending sensibly where the end is related directly to the means. His greatest gift to his children has been to pass on this understanding. The vast bulk of his wealth will go elsewhere – m ostly t o h elping t hird world d evelopment t hrough the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. Buffett’s brain seems to be hardwired to the business of investing in order to make a g ain. In as m uch as h e has developed an ethical philosophy it seems, today at least, to be b ased on a s ingularly humane preference – that he would prefer to make money in a w ay t hat i s m utually be nef cial to ot hers to t he a lternative of p rof ting t o t he d etriment o f o thers. H is a pproach t o h uman relations is also simple – he believes that it’s good to have them. This m eans t hat h is h ead o ff ce i s s mall s o t hat h e k nows a ll of h is c olleagues; h is h ouse i s re latively s mall ( by m ultibillionaire standards), and he lives in a small city in the Midwest where home-spun ideals mean that people know what they like and like what they know. In the Future of Work I discussed an idea that has informed the way I have lived for some years now. For want of a better phrase I called it t he “E conomics of Enough.” It is not a f ully rounded principle u nderpinned b y c omplex e conomic t heory. I n f act I f nd it diff cult to illustrate because I am not talking about being satisf ed wi th o ur l ot i n a w ay t hat e xtinguishes a mbition – f ar

Age of the Search Engine from it. What I’m really talking about is understanding the wasteful prof igacy underpinning a desire to accumulate that is bordering on addiction among those who live to shop. If anyone embodies this concept of enough – and no one can fail to capture the irony here – it must be Warren Buffet who regularly eats in the same simple restaurant, usually ordering the same meal, drives a relatively modest car, and embodies values that measure people b y t heir i ntrinsic h uman w orth a nd c haracter, n ot b y t he size of their bank accounts. For Buffet money is a utility. For many of us today, however, it has become a source of reverence. This m eans t hat w ealthy i ndividuals c an c ome t o be l auded not f or w ho t hey a re b ut f or t heir w ealth a nd po ssessions. T he comedy writer and actress Caroline Aherne raised this suspicion mischievously when i n c haracter as “M rs M erton” i n h er s poof 1990s chat show she asked magician’s wife Debbi Magee: “What was it that f rst attracted you to millionaire Paul Daniels?” Unfortunately t he r ich t oo read ily i nterpret c alls for re straint as cr ies o f e nvy without re cognizing t hat u nbridled acq uisitiveness do es n ot g uarantee happ iness. T here wi ll a lways b e so meone with a bigger boat. David Ca meron, l eader o f t he C onservative P arty i n t he U K, underlined t he d irection of t he party’s f uture employment policy in a w ide-ranging s peech t hat e mphasized t he n eed t o im prove the well-being of people at work. In what amounted to a backlash against long-hours working and the kind of working practices that have encouraged hastily consumed snack lunches in front of computer sc reens, t he Co nservatives pro mised to co ncentrate o n a series of policies that emphasize effective, purposeful work. It was signif cant, perhaps, that Cameron used the language of economics, stressing something he called General Well Being beyond wealth-producing metrics such as Gross Domestic Product.8 Measures of happiness would seem to make much more sense if w e a re t o g auge f ulf llment in life in terms of how we feel about ourselves rather t han by how much money we have made or how many cars or houses we posses. In his book Happiness: Lessons f rom a N ew Sci ence, R ichard La yard d escribed w hat he called the Hedonic Treadmill. This refers to the insatiable appetite f or ma terial po ssessions i n o rder t o “k eep u p wi th t he Joneses”: “When I get a n ew home or a n ew car, I a m excited at

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The History of Work f rst. But then I get used to it, and my mood tends to revert back to what it was before,” he wr ites. “Now I f eel I n eed t he bigger house and the better car. If I went back to the old house and car I would be much less happy than I was before I had experienced something b etter.”9 Layard h as identif ed what he calls t he “big seven” f actors t hat i nf uence w ell-being: f amily re lationships, f nancial s ituation, w ork, c ommunity a nd f riends, h ealth, pe rsonal freedom, and personal values. The inf uence of these factors has been measured in the World Values Survey carried out by the University of British Columbia, covering ninety thousand people in forty-six countries. The survey, r un four times since 1981, asks people to rate their happiness on a s cale of one to ten against various factors. T he t wo biggest single ratings (each rated at six) are apportioned to work and health. It cannot be coincidence that both of these issues are related. O verwork, p articularly w ithout m aintaining c ompensating f tness levels a nd a s ensible d iet, creates stress a nd, in some cases, a poor physical condition. Employers c ould a nd s hould d o m ore i n ac tively h elping employees t o s tay f t a nd h ealthy. I t i s as i mportant t oday as i t was in the factories of early industrial society. For some this will mean overcoming t he attitude a mong ma nagers t hat equates t he constant occupation of workstations with productivity. If people are happy to spend lunchtimes sitting in front of a screen, eating packets of crisps and sandwiches, that may be f ne, but if they are doing so in order to meet their deadlines, or for fear of breaking ranks, and if this practice becomes consolidated in daily routines, they and their employers could be storing up health problems for the future. People have been willing to make compromises because their careers are important to them. As Layard stresses, work provides both i ncome a nd m eaning i n l ife. “ That i s w hy u nemployment is such a disaster: it reduces income but it also reduces happiness directly b y d estroying t he s elf-respect a nd s ocial re lationships created by work. W hen people become unemployed their happiness falls much less because of the loss of income but because of the loss of work itself,” he writes. But t he a nswer t o j ob s ecurity i s n ot m ore e mployee p rotection. Europe has enough of this as i t is. The answer has to be i n

Age of the Search Engine promoting more f uid ways of working. Why should work always be rewarded by money? Why not use more time off as a re ward if time off is valued by an employee? The suggestion is made by Ken Hopper, joint author with his brother William of The Puritan Gift. L onger pe riods o f t ime o ff te nd t o be come a ttractive t o employers on ly du ring r ecessions a s w ays t o r educe p roduction while retaining necessary skills. As soon as a recession ends and demand i ncreases t hen t he p ressure f or peo ple t o w ork l onger hours i ncreases. T he f requently cr iticized E uropean W orking Time d irective w as i ntroduced i n a n a ttempt t o a void t his c oncentration of work, s preading it o ut a mong m ore peo ple. W hile it ma y h ave be en vi ewed as s omething o f a b lunt i nstrument, curtailing people’s choices to work longer hours, it did at least establish t he idea t hat n ot everyone wants t o work a ll h ours o r, indeed, should be compelled to do so. The o ption t o w ork f ewer h ours s hould be e nshrined wi thin employee rights. This would help to break down the idea that everyone should have a single employer that is owed their undivided attention all of the time. People should not be vi ewed like sticks of B lackpool R ock w ith th e n ame o f th eir e mployer im printed from end to end almost as an assumption of ownership. Up to now, however, European employment legislation has done t oo l ittle t o re lax l abor ma rket re strictions t hat a re l ess apparent i n N orth A merican e mployment. L ower l evels o f j ob protection in the US have allowed more f uidity in the workplace, creating more temporary or project work that can be appealing to those with the right kind of skills. Too many European workplaces have become tied to rigidities embedded in twentieth-century attitudes to jobs a nd employment, whereas in t he emerging second g eneration I nternet i ndustries peo ple a re c ollaborating a nd learning n ew s kills be yond t he bo undaries i mposed b y t heir existing employer, if indeed they have one. In future, therefore, it’s important that employers become more conscious of the need for a d iversity – n ot simply the diversity of minorities b ut a d iversity o f o ptions – t hat re cognizes t he d ifferent demands of different people at different stages of their career. The n eeds of a d ual-income, childless c ouple, with no m ortgage, for example, are different from those of a s ingle mother in rented housing. Diversity thinking in employment has to be extended into

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The History of Work accommodating the varying personal circumstances of employees. Attitudes to work change within a working lifetime during different life stages. But l ife should not be s tereotyped i n to a m odern-day interpretation o f S hakespeare’s s even a ges o f ma n. Today’s s ixtyyear-old, f ree f rom f amily c ommitments, m ortgage p aid p erhaps, may f eel i nvigorated a nd read y f or a nything; a nd t hat i ncludes a readiness to engage with workplaces in different ways. Organizational or brand identity still matters but it need not be expressed any longer solely through the job. Jobs will continue to def ne working re lationships f or t he v ast ma jority o f peo ple f or some t ime. T his is b ecause, a s Da vid Ca meron a cknowledged, they u nderpin a n i mportant sense of commitment on both sides of the contract. But jobs do not suit every working arrangement. Employment policy therefore should not be f ocused on the right way to package work but on creating the skills and opportunities to undertake meaningful work. If an economy of well-being is to be something more t han a C onservative Party sound-bite on a da y short of n ews, it wi ll d epend o n good work p roducing good p roducts and services, and on earnings invested in personal relationships, health, and those values that emphasize the things that matter in life. Building s uch a vi rtuous c ircle i s t he b iggest j ob o f a ll. Unfortunately t he n ew work of t he I nternet h as f ailed as y et t o inf uence g eneral w orkplace re form. B ishop Ch artres s ays h e has yet to see improvements. “I f a nything the quality of life for off ce workers over the past ten years has deteriorated,” he says. “The asceticism of so many modern off ce workers is remarkable. Like a ncient votaries we take our places before our screens a nd tune in like mediaeval monks going about the Opus Dei.” It might have been hoped that new techniques in performance management would have offered some respite for those engaged on screen for much of t heir working days, but t he Bishop i nterprets developments differently: The reduction of staff and new techniques for extracting more work f rom h uman re sources a lso d iminish t he t ime for crea tive t hought a nd t here i s a h ardening o f c orporate a rteries. The w ork t hat n eeds t o be d one t oday i s pe rformed m ore

Age of the Search Engine eff ciently b ut t he e rosion o f s pace t o c ontemplate t omorrow makes our organisations very vulnerable. This is very much exacerbated by the new puritanism. Trust and profound communication are learned in the lunch hour but macho-management crea tes a n a tmosphere i n w hich peo ple are induced to graze on salad wraps with non-fat Mayo without leaving their screens. In re sponse t o t hese d evelopments, B ishop Ch artres h as c alled for small i ncremental ways of c hanging t he a tmosphere a t work. We must insist, particularly to ourselves, on having a proper lunch break preferably in congenial company. In o rder t o d ivert t he p ressure o f t he p assing m oment w e might try beginning the day with a half hour’s meditation and treating this time as s eriously as we would any other business engagement i n t he d iary. O nce e stablished as a da ily h abit it is possible to take f ve m inute b reaks t hroughout t he da y a t convenient t imes t o re -establish a h ealthy e quilibrium. H ow the m essage w ould re verberate a round t he b usiness w orld i f the receptionist asked us to ring back in a couple of minutes because the CEO was meditating. We a re e ngaged i n a l ife a nd d eath s truggle. It i s n o good putting off the day when we give ourselves time to do justice to love as well as work. If there is no struggle today then when tomorrow co mes t he i nner l ife wi ll b e to o i mpoverished to bear much fruit. I have quoted liberally from Bishop Chartres’s lecture because it is such a refreshing antidote to the make-work society. His fear of “cultural impoverishment in the midst of abundance” dovetails precisely with my own fears a nd t hose I s uspect o f m illions o f others worldwide; a nd h is demand for a be tter understanding of the way we work is a clarion call echoed throughout this history and my later book. We shouldn’t be surprised, perhaps, to f nd s uch c larity o f understanding within the Church that historically has concerned itself intimately with the direction of human endeavor. In the past

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The History of Work this concern has been focused on human a nd spiritual relations. Today, however, it must be coupled with our new understandings of the forces creating environmental impoverishment. Employers in what we should now recognize as po st-industrial society must learn t o re focus t heir i nstitutions t o t he s hape o f t omorrow’s society, and that means evolving attitudes just as much as technical innovation. We m ove forward wi th a da ngerous s ense o f c omplacency i f we i nvest our faith i n purely te chnical solutions to environmental d epravation, w orld po verty, o verpopulation, a nd d windling oil reserves. These developments lie at the very heart of the new work a nd t hey a re coloring a nd i nforming attitudes to materialism that need to be digested in government. Governments need to be taking a lead in conservation beyond token s ystems o f re cycling a nd f nancial a nd l egislative s upport f or a lternative a nd re newable e nergy s ources. T hey n eed to re form a nd re focus t heir e conomic s ystems t hat c ontinue t o depend on the generation of consumption. If consumption is the lifeblood of economic growth, then the answer has to be to redirect consumption into regenerative and renewable resources. A s econd a rea o f po tentially h ealthy g rowth i s t he g eneration of intangibles such as t he stuff of leisure – music, literature, the a rts, a nd t he t ransfer a nd d issemination o f i nformation a nd knowledge. Much of this work need not be so resource-hungry as the creation of bigger airplanes, faster cars, grander buildings, and t he c oncrete, as phalt, a nd steel c itadels t hat h ouse much of the world’s population. A concentration on t his concept of having enough, emphasizing needs rather than wants, may well be viewed as economic heresy s ince m ost of o ur e conomic s ystems d epend o n crea ting more than enough. Tailoring work toward need is a v enture into the u nknown, a t l east f or m odern s ociety, a nd c ould be i nterpreted as a re gressive step. It is, a fter a ll, t he philosophy of t he hunter-gatherer. But it’s a m odern philosophy too. Dame Ellen MacArthur has switched her attention from round-the-world racing in recent years to issues of sustainability informed by her own approaches to thrift and need, shaped partly by her childhood and partly by the ultraconservationist appro ach ne eded to ens ure t hat a l ong-distance

Age of the Search Engine racing yacht h as n o m ore e quipment a nd s upplies t han it n eeds. “Why tear a piece of kitchen towel at the perforations just because the manufacturer puts them there. We might need no more than a fraction of that tear-off piece to do the job,” she says.10 One c onsideration w hen c ontemplating a m ore m inimalist society is that a reversion to something akin to subsistence living might limit our ability to innovate. As Jared Diamond points out in Guns, Germs and Steel, the production of food surpluses was essential for t he evolution of wr iting: “ Writing was never developed or even adopted by hunter-gathering societies, because they lacked both the institutional uses of ea rly wr iting and the social and agricultural mechanisms for generating the food surpluses to feed scribes.”11 In other words, surpluses are essential for developing societies. So t he i dea o f a n ew e conomics t hat n o l onger v enerates c onsumption m ust acco mmodate t he pr inciples o f w ealth c reation. Perhaps, a s R ichard L ayard ha s s uggested, w e ne ed to re def ne what we regard as wealth, moving away from material riches to al ternative r iches s uch a s f ellowship, c ommunity, m utuality, health, knowledge, and art. Another d anger o f s imply me eting ne eds, r ather t han g enerating a surplus, is that of miscalculation that will leave us genuinely i mpoverished. But i f corporatism has achieved a nything it is an understanding of eff ciency. Is it beyond our competence to create a “j ust-in-time” society on the lines of a Japanese kanban wall? To d evelop t he c oncept o f e nough, h owever, w e n eed t o def ne the meaning of the word just as we may need to reappraise what constitutes wealth. The biggest hurdle of all, perhaps, is in changing attitudes. But people have been here before. My grandmother, m entioned a t t he be ginning o f t his boo k, h ad h er o wn aphorism: “Enough’s a f east,” she used to say. But she was born into a nineteenth-century society that pre-dated mass production. In the twentieth century the tenets of mass consumerism, feeding w hat be came k nown as t he d isposable s ociety, d estroyed understandings of need, endorsing instead the desire that replaces needs with wants. As greed became good, people abandoned any historical sense of restraint and suff ciency, supplanting contentment with acquisitiveness and ambition that could be ad equately described as enlightened self-interest.

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The History of Work Unfortunately t his ce lebration o f s elf-interest, c ondoned b y the l ikes o f A yn Ra nd i n w orks t hat o utlined h er o bjectivist philosophy, p lacing t he p ursuit o f h appiness a t t he v ery ce nter of o ur m oral c ompass, w as t o b lind-side s ociety t o t he k ind o f environmental c risis envisaged i n G arrett Ha rdin’s a rticle, “ The Tragedy of the Commons,” f rst published in the journal Science in 1968.12 Hardin a rgued t hat a n o bjective p ursuit o f s elf-interest o n a grand s cale w ould ul timately d estroy l imited re sources, t hus damaging t he l ong-term i nterest o f a ll. T he po wer o utages t hat disrupted c ompanies i n Silicon Valley during 20 01 a re just o ne consequence o f u nbridled g rowth. De forestation, o ver-f shing, shortages of drinking water, and soil erosion are among the more critical examples of Hardin’s tragedy in the making. Society, therefore, is faced with two choices: regulatory restrictions on the self sh exploitation of resources or voluntary restraint, induced by a widespread understanding that wealth is both f nite and re lative. S ome ma y a rgue t hat v oluntary re straint i s u nrealistic. B ut t here a re n umerous h istorical e xamples o f ma naged societies a nd good husbandry, such as t he m ediaeval t hree-f eld system that allowed land to regenerate, just as there are examples of t he m ismanagement of resources leading to societal collapse. The P olynesians w ho d iscovered a nd s ettled o n Eas ter Is land, survived for 1,000 years before deforestation reduced their ability to sustain themselves. Their society had collapsed before the f rst Europeans arrived in 1722. Could Western society be heading for a similar collapse but on a much more catastrophic and terrifying scale? The warning signs were there to see in the late 1990s when George Carlin, the late US comedian, puzzled over the contradictions of his overly materialistic n ation: a n ation of “bigger houses but smaller families; more c onveniences b ut l ess t ime; wi der f reeways b ut n arrower viewpoints; taller buildings but shorter tempers; more knowledge and l ess j udgement.” Ca rlin w as q uoted b y P eter W hybrow i n his 20 05 book, American Mania: When More is not Enough, a book that highlighted the damage that today’s “fast new world” is doing to the average American citizen. Are we really prepared to tolerate a future of growing obesity and rampant diabetes fueled by overindulgence and untrammeled

Age of the Search Engine consumerism? Obesity is not simply about body fat. Today we are suffering from obesity of the mind, our thought patterns clogged each day by t he information donuts we g raze f rom t he I nternet. When Homer Simpson complained that “every time I learn something new, it pushes some old stuff out of my brain,” we may have chuckled at the absurdity of his analysis. But it was symptomatic nevertheless of t he sense of men tal overload we so metimes feel when dealing with multiple i nformation streams channeled over the Internet in emails, tweets, and newsfeeds. The way we live, the way we spend, the way we eat, the way we work, and the way we look at ourselves and our world, must all change if we a re to leave any worthwhile inheritance for the unborn g enerations t o c ome. A dvances i n g enetics, h ealth c are, technology, a nd environmental approaches ensure that change is inevitable. Wealth creation is f undamental t o t his change, but it is our appreciation of wealth itself that needs some revision. We must begin to think beyond the salary and the bonus and to the way t hat f nancial w ealth i s e ngaged i n t he b roader w ell-being, not just of people, but of the entire planet. In the past decade many of the nascent communications technologies at t he t urn of t he century have be en consolidated. T he power of the search engine meanwhile has t ransformed the way that peo ple t ransmit, re trieve, a nd d isseminate i nformation. Human creativity has proliferated over t he Web where i nformation consumers are still learning to sift the genuinely useful and the innovative from a s ea of mediocrity. In the information gold rush m illions of people a re striving t o e stablish t heir i ndividual entities on social networking sites such as Facebook and Twitter. Nowhere, h owever, h as t he d emocratization o f k nowledge be en more a pparent t han i n t he g rowth o f W ikipedia – t he o nline encyclopedia. Meanwhile, evidence of climate change through global warming is hardening, t hereby shaping t he attitudes of a n ew generation. These changing attitudes are f ltering into the workplace as potential recruits question employers’ environmental credentials, seeking i ndications t hat p rospective e mployers h ave a g enuine commitment to sustainable development. At t he sa me t ime p erformance me asurement is g rowing mor e sophisticated a nd a ttitudes g enerally s eem t o be t oughening as

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The History of Work younger e mployees be come i nured t o a m ore c ompetitive w orkplace. De mographic s hifts, h eralding a n a ging s ociety i n m ost Western industrialized nations, is forcing governments to rethink their pe nsions a nd re tirement systems. A mid a ll t his c hange, t he structure o f j obs a nd c areers h as p roved re markably re silient, remaining t he d ominant s ystem o f d elivering a nd acc omplishing work. T he P rotestant work ethic has proven e qually persistent as a virtue among those who seek to prosper in their chosen careers. Hard work and commitment continue, rightly, to be prized among employers, b ut t oo ma ny a re i nterpreting pe rformance ma nagement as a b lunt-edged i nstrument, c ontinually d emanding h igher workloads in order to maintain competitiveness. Employers need to realign t heir ma nagement t hinking a round a f ew o ld-fashioned principles such as mutual trust and purposeful work that is rewarded by a sense of achievement in a job well done as much as it is by the year-end bonus. Yet n ew un derstandings h ave in spired s ome d eeper th inking about our relationship with work. Work should not be disengaged from meaning and purpose. Drudge work continues and so does unemployment. So too does industrial action and all the different forms of i llegal d iscrimination. Work itself, however, should no longer be seen purely as a m eans to earn a living but as a s ource of personal development. Today, increasingly, it is chosen for its intrinsic v alue. I f w ork i s a l iving, t hen peo ple a re l iving t heir work. The kind of work we can accept as ce ntral to our lifestyle is lending us a sense of vocation. Employers n eed t o s ee t hemselves as e nablers f or t hose w ho seek this vocational path. Companies that score highly on various “best places to work” rankings seem to do just that. There should be a duty, therefore, among those who prof t from work to ensure that t he w ork i s bo th re warding a nd w ell ma naged. Too m uch existing work is def cient on both counts. Will it remain so or can we look forward to the day that all work is a s ource of stimulation as well as earnings? Societies can never return to the Garden of Eden. But work can be good again. We owe this much to ourselves.

POSTSCRIPT: NEW CENTURY, NEW ETHIC

I go on working for the same reason that a hen goes on laying eggs. (H. L. Mencken, 1880–1956) The gestation period for this book was about six years. That’s six years spent grappling with the idea of change within permanenc y, the idea that we are undergoing a revolution in society without needing to v enture out of our sitting rooms to see it. It’s a quiet revolution. Or at least it has been quiet up to now. Looking back has helped me to be clearer about one thing. Change creeps up on you. The concept of re volution is one of hindsight. It should remain where it be gan, as a description of sudden, violent, political change. It is wholly inadequate in describing the changes in the way we li ve and this thing we call w ork. We cannot di vorce work and life. They go together. Work can be fun, b ut the fun had gone out of it for so man y people. When I look ed around me, so man y people seemed to be dissatisf ed with their w ork. There seemed to be a common suspicion, a realization among some, that if the y were w orking to live, they were working in a way that was ruining the w ay that they lived. Many did not e ven allow themselves this ref ection. They took their w ork for granted; the y had become consumed by w ork. They were li ving to w ork. They were the ones, to v arying de grees, who could not remove themselves from the psychological, historical grip of the Protestant work ethic. I must number myself here. Work avoided, work done badly, could only fan the smoldering coals of Protestant guilt. If only I could confess my sin and recei ve absolution. If only I could be carefree about laziness, like Jerome K. Jerome, pottering through life in a state of fascination. In Three Men in a Boat he writes: “I lik e work: it f ascinates me. I can sit and look at it for hours. I lo ve to keep it by me: the idea of getting rid of it nearly breaks my heart.” But a w ork-obsessed society w ould ha ve no truck with that idea. Any remaining Jeromes in the corporate sector were winkled out in those fastidious exercises of personnel grooming called reengineering. 343

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Postscript It may have been reengineering, however, that indirectly inspired my approach to this book. The f rst time I encountered the w ord “outplacement,” in 1994, I had no idea what it w as. As someone who had ne ver been unemplo yed, had ne ver lost his job, had ne ver been do wnsized, I did not know there was an industry dedicated to helping people out of their old jobs and into ne w ones. Outplacement w as aimed initially at management, because industry was traditionally conducted in a spirit of “us” and “them” – management and workers. It was considered all right to lay of f workers. Their jobs had ne ver been secure. But management was dif ferent. Managers had an unwritten psychological contract: in return for their loyalty, they could expect a steady career moving up the ladder until retirement. Reengineering beggared that dream. It was hard for top management to break the ne ws among the people who shared their off ces. Outplacement was a way to say it with f owers, to cushion the pain of saying goodbye on both sides. Outplacement recognized that when you took away a manager’s job, you were taking a way a piece of his or her identity. For a small in vestment a compan y could b uy its departing e xecutive an outplacement program designed to f ll the v oid between one corporate life and the ne xt. To make this period of limbo f amiliar, the outplacement companies could pro vide an off ce and secretarial support. Some companies pro vided psychological support. Out of interest for my newspaper column I attended some of these sessions. There were different techniques all with the same aim –discovering what you really w anted to do with your life. One psychologist who relied on so-called guided imagery demanded that the subject close his or her e yes and think of something, an object or an e xperience, that would then be woven into a story. The story would be viewed as a metaphor for whatever it was that lay at the seat of the subject’s desires. For some the sessions were plainly a w aste of time. These were people who had a good idea of what the y wanted. For many, however, they were a re velation. An accountant realized he had al ways wanted to be a magician, a merchandiser knew he could enjoy the challenge of running his own corner shop. Sometimes the session w ould point to a vague interest – bird w atching, perhaps. The next stage was to explore the possibilities of a career w orking with birds or harnessing the skills and behaviors adopted in bird watching. Easier said than done, perhaps. Ho w do you step a way from one successful career and pursue what some might call a pipe dream?

Postscript In mentioning birds, I must ha ve been recalling Josep del Ho yo. Del Hoyo didn’t lose his job . He w as very happily emplo yed as a f amily doctor in a village in Spain. Often people w ould visit his clinic only to f nd a sign on the door saying “In the Woods. Back Soon.” Del Hoyo’s real passion w as wildlife. Gradually bird w atching began to predominate. It might ha ve remained a hobby , b ut there w as something niggling him: no where could he f nd a book that listed and described every species of bird known to man. So he decided to create one. The Handbook of the Birds of the World really is an act of creation. Del Hoyo isn’t writing it all – that w ould be f ar too great a task – b ut he is making it happen. He is the editor. It is his project. By the time it is f nished in 2011, it will consist of sixteen v olumes. If some people had been sk eptical initially , the f rst v olume changed their minds. Suddenly anyone who was anyone in ornithology wanted to contribute. Del Hoyo commissions plates from some of the w orld’s f nest painters of birds. He b uys the w ork, so by the time the project is complete he will have a unique collection of artw ork depicting every one of the nine to ten thousand types of bird we kno w to exist. Not even Nathan Rothschild, the nineteenth-century bank er, had that. Rothschild b uilt up the world’s largest collection of bird specimens b ut had to sell half of it to pay of f a former mistress in what today w ould be described as a palimony suit. “I feel very grateful to birds because they have given me the chance to tra vel the w orld doing the things that I enjo y,” says del Ho yo, whose personal philosoph y is inspired by a quote from P ablo Neruda, the Chilean poet and Nobel prize winner: “Bird by bird I kne w the world.” What a wonderful way to launch a ne w career. Del Hoyo isn’t Superman. He simply disco vered what he w anted in life and decided to make it happen. Yet so man y people ne ver achieve these le vels of fulf llment. They cannot let their dreams soar with the birds. That way invites ridicule. The real w orld demands w ork, not dreams. That said, the psychotherapy offered by some outplacement companies is daring people to dream once more, then pointing to w ays they may clothe these dreams in reality. I could not di vorce my o wn dreams from these outplacement sessions. Writing my weekly column – meeting some of the best brains in the f eld of management writing, people lik e Peter Druck er, Warren Bennis, Rosabeth Moss Kanter , C. K. Prahalad, and Gary Hamel, and

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Postscript at the same time dealing with the issues f aced daily by the recruitment and personnel industries – began to shape my own thinking while feeding my frustrations. Something was happening to the job, but what was it? It w asn’t simply an abandonment of the “job for life” concept. The job for life w as a modern myth circulated by those who had cruised through the civil service or the middle reaches of some lar ge corporate monolith. It never existed in journalism. Books like Charles Handy’s The Empty Raincoat, William Bridges’s JobShift, or Jeremy Rifkin’s absurdly titled End of Work were trying to make sense of the changes, b ut every new discussion seemed to ha ve its academic detractors who churned out f gures suggesting that the job market was changing far less markedly than some were suggesting. Without taking sides, one thing seemed ob vious: a lot of people were doing some serious na vel-gazing about the concept of w ork. I w anted to do more than add my o wn tw o cents w orth in a weekly column, so I decided to in vest my savings, to buy for myself a year of my life, to organize and use it as I saw f t, to investigate the merits and drawbacks of working at home, to enter a w orld of social isolation, to cut myself of f from the corporate e xpense account and the monthly pay check, to read some books, to sit and think, and to write. I chose a time when the business world began to turn upside down. Old reliable blue-chip stocks f oundered as hoppity-hopeful Internet stocks soared upward in a shiny, growing bubble, gleaming with anticipation and dripping with greedy speculation. Ev ery f fteen-year-old schoolboy w anted a website that w ould earn him instant millions. Sitting in the tiny home-based cube I call my off ce, it was like watching an episode of the 1970s tele vision spy f antasy, The Prisoner , in which people lived an unreal e xistence of harmon y and contentment, separated from the real world by a giant bubble. Every time they grew curious, the b ubble would steer them back to ward the candy-striped existence of their model to wn. But in this real-life episode e veryone was sitting inside the bubble. The Internet b ubble had all the characteristics of pre vious waves of f nancial euphoria. Internet stocks were being v alued in the w ay the Dutch once v alued tulip b ulbs. People could see the speculation, b ut they fervently believed it would pay off or that the strongest would prevail at the expense of the weak. This is the price of transformation. The bubble didn’t burst. It def ated to more acceptable proportions. Dot.com has not disappeared, but it appears to have learned some humility.

Postscript Guided by an aff nity with Jerome’ s remark that “w ork f ascinates me,” I have tried to shed some light on the question, Why do we work? Looking back, it’s tempting to conclude: “It’ s the Puritans w ot did it”; or, as some will continue to insist, “It’s the pay, stupid.” But that doesn’t explain Stonehenge or the Pyramids or the e xtraordinary constructions of the Incas. It doesn’t explain the paintings at Lascaux and Chauvet. Perhaps none of these achie vements were vie wed as w ork. I think we work because we want to leave something better for those we leave behind, some signpost of our e xistence, of our potential. Our w ork is an instinctive recognition of human greatness. Modifying the w ay we work, as Taylor did, w as as misguided as the genetic modif cation of plants. There were benef ts, b ut our personal skills and capabilities are characteristics of our indi viduality. To alter or to re giment human ability is to distort life’ s inf nite variety, and that is an of fence against humanity for which we must all pay a price. Do we want human variety or do we want Aldous Huxley’s industrial clones? If we opt for variety, then we must begin to change our society from the roots, starting with education. The dominant system of education is designed for the industrialized world of Frederick Taylor and the rational systems of Max Weber. A teacher, a f gure of authority , stands in front of a class and pours forth information. The children sit in ro ws of desks and struggle to digest lik e o versoaked sponges. Teaching is barely one step remo ved from Gradgrind’ s barrage of meaningless facts. Stir in a bit of Socratic method and there you ha ve it. Maria Montessori, the Italian educator, believed that children were trapped in the classroom “like butterf ies mounted on pins.”1 Traditional teaching in schools is command-and-control learning: I speak and you listen; you ask a question and I tell you the answer , or I force you to think with another question and we arri ve at the answer together . Just as we’ re getting some where in French class, the bell goes, and it’ s over to history , more f acts, a bit of discussion, a smidgen of interpretation, set the home work, books closed, and of f you go. Command-and-control learning produces boredom and unrest. It closes minds. As I once heard a conference speak er say, children go into school as question marks and leave as full stops. Real life isn’ t like this. Left to ourselv es we are open to hundreds of inf uences. A day de velops. We may grasp just one of a myriad of colorful threads and we be gin to wea ve, picking up information and understanding as we go along. The more we learn, the more we w ant

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Postscript to learn. We may need guidance, and one of our guides may well be a teacher, but another may be a parent or a book or a TV program or a movie or a game or a con versation with friends. We may e ven learn something from the Internet, but we should not hold our breath. I don’ t teach my children in an y formal w ay, b ut, lik e man y par ents, I help them to learn when the y seek my help and I w ork with them on their home work. So does my wife. But we don’ t push the teaching, because the children are being dri ven hard enough at school; too hard, perhaps. Educational e xpectations are rising. Schools and teachers must realize their students ha ve a life outside the classroom. Companies, too, must realize their emplo yees need a life outside the workplace. Often this outside life pro vides a platform for creati vity denied in the institution, be it employment or education. Creativity is our future. It may not be the future of big companies, because most big companies have stif ed the creativity of their employees by insisting on processes, on time sheets, by constantly measuring or by boxing in the creati ve process in brainstorming sessions. I ha ve been to brainstorming sessions and I ha ve thought alone in the bath. The bath is better. Isaac Newton enjoyed the stimulation of his Trinity College colleagues at Cambridge Uni versity, but his best thinking, his most focused thinking, occurred when the uni versity was closed down in 1665 for fear of the Great Plague. Ne wton went home and mused in his orchard, and that’s how we know about gravity. The w ork ethic, this historical relic of Nonconformism, has been transformed by capitalism into a corporate ideology controlling our lives. But it has not al ways dominated our concerns. The ethic should not be vie wed as a permanent feature of life. It w axes and w anes. It strengthened in the w ake of corporate engineering, and its inf uence has spread with that of the Americanization of commerce. The working breakfast, the alcohol-free lunch, the staying late in the off ce, are all part of this pervasive American business inf uence. Even political correctness is Puritanism in disguise. Tina Bro wn’s Talk magazine referred to the most signif cant symptom of the ne w Puritanism as “anhedonia” – the inability to f nd pleasure in leisure. 2 “We’re too b usy achie ving and fretting about what we’ ve yet to achieve,” said Talk. The w ork ethic, it admitted, had in vaded almost every facet of life. Leisure time is de voted to producti ve pursuits such as f tness programs and w orkouts, children’s play time is increasingly organized to ref ect its educational possibilities, e ven sex has become

Postscript invested with the pressure to achie ve peak performance, lik e competitive f gure skating before card-holding judges. What are we doing to ourselves? There is madness in this work. Once we could celebrate the social side of the w orkplace. Today we are damned if we don’ t work, drained if we do. To balance our li ves in this ne w century we need nothing less than a ne w ethic. We need to tak e the old ethic, dismantle it, analyze it, then reconstruct something which makes more sense. We need an ethic that leans f ar less on its religious antecedents b ut which concentrates on the needs of society; not the needs of the job which might ha ve been outlined in some dry job description, but on the work that needs doing to ensure we can maintain a health y society. If our w ork is not making a dif ference, to quote the f reman in Studs Terkel’s book, we shouldn’t be doing it. Slavery, whether enforced by inhuman societies or disguised as a wage-earning job, should not be encouraged by the philosoph y of job creation. Job creation is a corruption of wealth creation. If we belie ve we have become slaves to our jobs we should e xamine our own value systems and mak e some adjustments. We cannot rely on emplo yers. Most employers have only e ver seen w orkers as costs. Any self-made employer will remember the cost–benef t equation he or she mak es when considering the need to emplo y someone else. The emplo yer may de velop social cares. He or she may be gin to identify with his employees, but, when the chips are do wn, in times of f nancial crisis, it is every man and woman for themselves. There are occasional e xceptions. Aaron Mordecai Feuerstein became a national hero in the United States when he decided to rebuild his ninety-year-old Massachusetts te xtile factory after it b urned to the ground in 1995. Fe w w ould have blamed him had he simply retired. He was sixty-nine at the time. Instead he reb uilt the plant while paying the salaries and benef ts of the 2,400 emplo yees during the time the plant w as shut do wn. His decision w as viewed by man y as a rare philanthropic gesture. Feuerstein’s philosophy that “if you pay people a f air amount of mone y and gi ve them good benef ts to tak e care of their families, they will produce for you, ” made so much sense it w as regarded as rather quaint. 3 It seems e xtraordinary that a commitment to a b usiness should ha ve caused so much surprise. But in a w orld where values have become aligned with an uncompromising servicedriven economy, such examples tend to evoke a nostalgia for a w ay of life and work that is fast disappearing.

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Postscript The new work ethic will not be apparent among most con ventional employers. It will not be found on management courses. But it is there, in all strata of the corporation, in all strata of society . It is something that resides within us, that only we as indi viduals can de velop. Inevitably it will borro w hea vily from its Nonconformist heritage. It would be unrealistic to think otherwise. It may even appear as a new Puritanism in some. It will certainly rely on indi viduality and require an element of self-will. But it must be inclusi ve, not e xclusive, har nessing the self sh gene of self-help and e xtending itself to helping others. It in volves letting go of some reassuring habits. It may in volve letting go of a lifetime career . It will in volve careful e valuation: a personal soul searching, an understanding of what mak es us tick, what it is in life that we really v alue, what we lo ve doing, and what needs doing in the wider en vironment. There are man y w ays of taking this step. Some utilize a form of personal psychoanalysis – the sort sometimes used by outplacement practitioners – some dra w on the insights to be gained from personality testing, and some in volve careful questioning of our nearest and dearest. This does not mean we should go rushing out for the nearest selfhelp book. That would be pandering to the damaging obsession with perfection that characterizes our w ork-focused lives. We must not sacrif ce ourselves to the anhedonia syndrome. We must learn to relax, to “chill out,” to do less, to recognize the essentials and skim a way the froth, to li ve with imperfection; m ore than that, to celebrate imper fection. There is more to life than six-pack stomachs and cellulite-free thighs. Fashion has brought total quality , six-sigma lifestyles into the domestic arena. It’s time to say “enough.” So one of your dinner plates has a chip on the rim. Let’s hear it for the chip. Act we must, and quickly. At the very least we can try to engineer a break for a period of ref ection. The world is changing so quickly , we don’t have time for that, you say. Speed and change, speed and change. It’s the latest f ashion. Change is lik e a ri ver. The f ow is f astest in the middle, but if you swim to the side you can paddle in the slack w ater by the bank. That’s where you f nd the messages in their bottles. Stay in the current and you’ll be swept out to sea. Of course change is a constant, b ut rapid change is an illusion. The most important things in life – our beliefs and v alues – are tremendously resilient to changing f ashions, and much of today’ s so-called

Postscript change is wrapped up in f ashion. It is essential for our sanity that we f lter the good and the wholesome and the important from the transitory hype and hysteria. The career break I took to research and write this book w as the best move I ever made. Not only did I enjo y that year more than an y other, I have probably w orked harder than at an y time of my career; b ut the work was focused and organized and fun. I read books, I tra veled, and I learned. Work became a jo y. So much so it no longer seemed lik e work. “You won’t want to go back to work,” said some people. But I never left it. On the other hand the w ork never became so b urdensome that it dominated my e very w aking moment. There w as al ways time for a change of scenery . There w as al ways time to stand and stare. The difference w as – and this will be recognized by some who are selfemployed – I was setting my own pace and it worked. I set out to write a book about something that has run through human society lik e an unbrok en thread from the da wn of our history . It’ s a book about w ork. It’s a book about the or ganization and the management of w ork. But most of all it’ s a book about people, the men and women who created the w orld we live in and the inner soul-deep sense that pushes so man y of them e ver onw ard. Jerome K. Jerome w as right about one thing. Work is f ascinating when you look at it. But we shouldn’t become obsessed with it. We shouldn’ t become sla ves to work.

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Introduction 1 . Max Weber, The Protestant Work Ethic and The Spirit of Capitalism, Routledge, 1992 (f rst published 1930), p. 181. 2. Juliet Schor, The Overworked American, Basic Books, 1992, p. 29. Schor’s es timates a re b ased o n l abor f orce s tatistics d uring 1969–87. 3 . Valerie Bayliss, Redef ning Work, R oyal S ociety f or t he En couragement of Arts, Manufactures and Commerce, 1998. 4. D aily Telegraph, S eptember 26, 1 998. A ra ndom po ll o f 1 ,178 adults carried out by ICM for BBC Radio 4 found that 55 percent described t hemselves a s w orking c lass a nd 41 p ercent s aid t hey were middle class. Just 1 percent said they were upper class.

1 Hands to the Grindstone 1. For t he de f nitive s tudy o f t he La ngdale a xe w orkings read B. B unch a nd C .I. F ell, A S tone A xe Factory at P ike o f Sti ckle, Great Langdale: Westmorland, 1949; see also Prehistoric Society Proceedings, vol. 15, pp. 1–20. 2. S ome con jecture on t his p oint is r aised b y T .H. M cK. Cl ough and W.A. Cummins in Stone A xe Studies, CBA Research Report No. 23, 1979, p. 10. 3. Michael D. Lemonick and Andrea Dorfman, “Up From The Apes,” Time, August 23, 1999. 4. Graham R ichards, “ Freed Ha nds o r Ens laved F eet?” Journal of H uman Ev olution, pp . 1 43–50, q uoted b y Cl ive Ga mble i n Timewalkers: The P rehistory of G lobal Civ ilization, P enguin, 1995, p. 101. 5. A ccording t o T imothy B ottoms, th e C airns hi storian, th e f rst aboriginal contact with Europeans in the Cape York area was in 1623 when Dutch ships sailed down the west coast of Cairns. Cattle drovers pushing into the peninsula in 1864 killed at least 30 352

Notes

6. 7.

8.

9. 10. 11. 12. 13. 14. 15. 16. 17. 18. 19. 20.

21. 22.

Yir Yoront tribesmen in the Battle of the Mitchell River. Like most such “battles” the encounter was one-sided. Edward H. Spicer, ed., Human Problems in Technological Change, Russell Sage Foundation, 1952, p. 75. Richard B. L ee a nd I rven D e Vore, K alahari Hu nter G atherers: Studies of the !Kung San and Their Neighbors, Harvard University Press, 1976, p. 102. Also quoted in Michael Pitts and Mark Roberts, Fairweather Eden, Arrow, 1998, pp. 152–3. Barry Alpher, Yir-Yoront Lexicon: Sketch and Di ctionary o f an Australian L anguage, B erlin: M outon de G ruyter, 1 991. A lpher considered whether “woq” might have been a der ivation from the English “work” but, other than noting the possibility, he cannot be def nitive on the point. Author’s interview with Jerry Mission, member of Yir Yoront tribe. Gamble, p. 66. The leading proponent of the scavenger interpretation of early hominid food gathering is Lewis Binford. Daily Telegraph, February 2, 1997. A photograph of the spears with a fossilized horse skull is featured i n National G eographic, July, 1997, p. 113. Interview with the author. Pitts and Roberts, Fairweather Eden, p. 298. Interview with the author. Interview with the author. Flint knapping techniques are described by John Lord in The Nature a nd Subsequent Uses of Flint, John Lord, 1993. Pitts and Roberts, Fairweather Eden, pp. 202–3. E. Paul G. Bahn, The Story of Archeology, Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 1996, pp. 54–5. Brigitte and Gilles Delluc, Discovering Lascaux, Sud Ouest, 1990, p. 38. Rick G ore, “ People Li ke U s,” National G eographic, J uly, 20 00, vol. 198, no. 1. Ibid. Evidence of textiles has been discovered at Do lni Vestonice and P avlov i n t he C zech R epublic. T he s ites b elonged to t he Garvettian p eople who l ived about 7,000 years a fter t he Chauvet paintings were executed. Gore, “People Like Us,” p. 95. Ibid., p. 152, quoted from Lee and De Vore, Man the Hunter, New York: Aldine Publishing, 1968.

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23. R ichard Rudgley, Lost Civ ilizations of th e S tone A ge, Ce ntury, 1998, p. 20. 24. Ibid., p. 352. 25. Gore, “People Like Us,” pp. 110–11. 26. Pitts and Roberts, Fairweather Eden, p. 168. 27. G enesis 4:19. 28. R udgley, Lost Civilizations, p. 159. 29. Ibid., p. 14.

2 Fettered Lives 1. Paul Johnson, A History of th e A merican People, Phoenix, 1998, p. 37 (f rst published 1997). 2. Fustel de Co ulonges ca lls s lavery a “pr imordial f act, co ntemporary with the origin of society.” Quoted by M.I. Finley in Ancient Slavery and Modern Ideology, Pelican, 1983, p. 67. 3. Ibid., pp. 131–2. 4 . K eith Bradley, Slaves and Masters in the Roman Empire, Oxford University Press, 1987, p. 21. 5. Ibid., p . 2 2, q uoted f rom t he L oeb t ranslation o f De r e r ustica, 1919. 6. Ibid., p. 22. 7. Ibid., p. 33. 8 . Frederick Douglass, My B ondage a nd M y F reedom, N ew York, 1855, quoted in M.I. Finley in Slavery in Classical Antiquity, Man, 1961, p. 67. 9. Germanica, ch. 15. 10. A dam Smith, Wealth of Nations, Book I, ch. viii and Book III, ch. ii, quoted by John Kells Ingram in A History of Slavery and Serfdom, Adam and Charles Black, 1895, p. 281. 11. William Li m Westerman, Slavery i n Cl assical A ntiquity: V iews and Controversies, ed. M.I. Finley, W. Heffer, 1960, pp. 26–7. 12. F inley, Slavery in Classical Antiquity, p. 68. 13. Ibid., p. 30. 14. The Art of Rhetoric, 1367a 32. 15. Franklin R oosevelt’s mes sage to Co ngress, J anuary 6, 1 941, i n Public Papers, vol. 9. 16. 2 Thessalonians 3:10, Authorised Version of the Bible, 1611.

Notes 17. Bradley lists three major slave revolts between 140 and 70 bc. The most serious of these was the one led by Spartacus in Italy from 73 to 71 bc. 18. Quoted by Finley in Slavery in Classical Antiquity, p. 160. 19. The lever theory was advanced by Peter Hodges in How the Pyramids Were Built, ed. Julian Keable, Warminster: Aris and Phillips, 1993. I .E.S. E dwards d iscusses pyramid co nstruction me thods i n The Pyramids of Egypt, Penguin Books, 1972, pp. 254–95. Edwards noted the use of ramps in some pyramid construction and ventured that a single ramp may have been used for the Great Pyramid. But he also notes that Herodotus wrote that machines were used for lifting the single blocks of stone (p. 270). The precision employed by the Egyptian builders is illustrated by Edwards in a d iscussion of their expertise in leveling the site of the Great Pyramid to an overall deviation of just over half an inch. 20. G imbutas, The Civilization of T he Goddess, HarperCollins, 1994, p. 341. 21. A driano Tilgher, Work: W hat I t Ha s M eant T hrough th e A ges, George G. Harrap, 1931, p. 3. 22. E dith Hamilton, The Greek Way to W estern Civilization, Mentor, 1954, pp. 25–6. 23. F inley, Slavery in Classical Antiquity, p. 72.

3 Job Creation 1. Two o f t he t hree po rtraits a re reprod uced i n Ancient F aces: Mummy Portraits from Roman Egypt by Susan Walker and Morris Bierbrier, British Museum Press, 1997. The f rst on p. 44 is dated ad 55–77. The second on p. 88 is dated ad 100–140. The third, of a bearded man, not pictured in the book, is dated ad 250. 2. Quoted in ibid., p. 21. 3. The Sutton Hoo treasure is exhibited at t he British Museum. One of the most impressive pieces of Anglo-Saxon jewelry is the King Alfred jewel in the Ashmolean Museum. 4 . A driano Tilgher, Work: W hat I t Ha s M eant to M en thr ough th e Ages, tr. Dorothy Canf eld Fisher, George G. Harrap, 1931, p. 39. 5. Sarah Leigh and Simon Taylor, eds, The Livery Companies of th e City of London, The Corporation of London, 1997, p. 6.

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Notes 6. Ibid., p. 5. 7. R.H. Hilton, The D ecline of Se rfdom i n M edieval E ngland, Macmillan, 1969, p. 53. 8. T he J ulius W ork Ca lendar i s preser ved i n t he B ritish Li brary, London. T he Ca lendar was used as a b asis for Robert Lacey a nd Danny Danziger’s description of life at t he end of the f rst millennium in The Year 1000, Little, Brown, 1999. 9. According to J ohn W ade’s History of th e M iddle a nd W orking Classes, L ondon: Ef f ngham W ilson, 1 834, p . 9 , t he se lling o f slaves openly in the market was made i llegal in England in 1102. A Papal Bull had been issued for the emancipation of slaves in the 11th century. 10. Ibid., p. 24. 11. H ilton, The Decline of Serfdom, p. 15. 12. Ibid., pp. 55–8. 13. Frances Da venport o utlines h ow re nts f or l eased l and g radually became m ore i mportant t han t he l and’s prod uce for t he l andlord in “ Decay o f V illeinage i n Ea st A nglia,” a s tudy p ublished i n E. Carus-Wilson, ed., Essays in Economic History, vol. II, Edward Arnold, 1962. 14. Da vid Knowles, Christian Monasticism, Weidenfeld & N icolson, 1969, p. 213. 15. Ibid., p. 41. 16. Ibid., p. 221. 17. There are several accounts of this incident. One of the most de tailed I found was Philip Lindsay and Reg Groves, The Peasants’ Revolt 1381, Hutchinson, 1941(?). I ma ke no apology for favoring a po rtrayal of Tyler as the good guy and Sir William Walworth, the Lord Mayor, a s t he o ppressor, b ut I w as re minded o n a re cent vi sit to Fishmongers’ Hall, London, that some view this differently. A statue of the f shmonger Walworth, sword in hand, stands on the stairs, with a plaque commemorating the intervention of “Brave Walworth.” 18. Statute of Labourers, 1351. 19. This and earlier poll taxes are analyzed by Rodney Hilton in Bond Men M ade F ree: Medieval P easant Movements a nd th e E nglish Rising of 1381, Methuen, 1973, p. 162. 20. This pro verb w as t he cat chphrase o f t he re volt a nd ca nnot b e attributed to Ball alone. It was widely used by priests supporting the peasants.

Notes 21. Ball was captured, then hanged, drawn, and quartered at St. Albans, July 15, 1381. 22. E .M. Carus-Wilson, Essays in Economic History, vol. I, Aberdeen: University Press, 1854, pp. 41–60. 23. Lindsay and Groves, The Peasants’ Revolt 1381, p. 18. 24. T ilgher, Work, p. 50. 25. R. H. Tawney, Religion and the Rise of Capitalism, Penguin, 1990, p. 114 (f rst edn John Murray, 1936). 26. Ibid., p. 119. 27. T ilgher, Work, p. 51. 28. Back i n t he g ood o ld d ays w hen M ore w as a t rusted ad viser o f Henry V III, he w as a sked to re fute Luther’s cr iticism of Henry’s defense of the sacraments that had been attacked by Luther at Wittenburg. M ore w ent abo ut h is t ask wi th g usto i n a t irade o f name-calling, using the earthiest of scatalogical language, all written i n Lat in. L uther, he s aid, w as a n “ ape, a n a rse, a d runkard, a lousy l ittle f riar, a p iece of sc urf,” a nd t hese were s ome of t he milder expressions. The response is detailed in Peter Ackroyd’s Life of Thomas More, Vintage, 1999, p. 226. The 18th-century Church man, Francis Atterbury, called it “the greatest heap of nasty language that perhaps was ever put together.” 29. T ilgher, Work, pp. 36–7. 30. T awney, Religion and the Rise of C apitalism, p. 198. He uses the phrase “most fundamental movement of the seventeenth century.” 31. I bid.

4 The New Religion of Work 1 . Christopher Hill, The E nglish Bible a nd th e Se venteenth Cen tury Revolution, Penguin, 1994, p. 15 (f rst published Allen Lane, 1993). 2. Ibid., p. 10. 3. Ibid., p. 11. 4. Dallas Morning News, April 24, 1998. 5. Paul Johnson, A History of T he American People, Phoenix, 1998, p. 31. 6. Juliet Schor, The Overworked American, Basic Books, 1992, p. 70. 7. I would love to claim this observation as my own but it belongs to David L . E dwards i n A Co ncise History of E nglish Chr istianity: From Roman Britain to the Present Day, Fount, 1998, pp. 29–30.

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Notes 8. Robert Greenleaf, The Power of Servant Leadership, San Francisco: Berrett-Koehler, 1998. 9 . Maurice W. Thomas, Young People in Industry 1750–1945, Thomas Nelson, 1945, pp. 60–1. 10. Ibid., p. 61. 11. Everett E . H agen, On the Theory of Social Change: How Economic G rowth B egins, L ondon: T avistock P ublications, 1 964, pp. 295–309. 12. David C. McClelland, The Achieving Society, The Free Press, 1967, p. 367. 13. Frederick B. Tolles, Quakers and the Atlantic Culture, Macmillan, 1948, p. 58. 14. Ge orge Unwin, Industrial Organization in the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries, Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1904, pp. 196–227. 15. J .U. Nef, Essays in Economic History, Methuen, 1954, p. 90. 16. Da vid L . E dwards, Christian E ngland, v ol. I I, Co llins, 1 983, p. 348. 17. Neither should we forget the Jews, least of all Haym Salomon who, after helping to f nance the American Revolution, was left destitute for his efforts. His loans were never repaid. 18. Speech in Philadelphia, August 1, 1776. 19. Q uoted in Harper’s Monthly Magazine, September, 1932.

5 The Most Important Pile of Bricks in the World 1 . W.H.G. Armytage, A Social History of Engineering, Faber & Faber, 1966, p. 62. 2. Maxine Berg summarizes the arguments in The Age of M anufactures: Industry Innovation and Work in Britain, Routledge, 1994, pp. 1 3–21 a nd co ncludes t hat a pplications o f e conomic ca lculations are insuff cient to e xplain the changes in society during this period. 3. G.M. Trevelyan, Illustrated English Social History, vol. III, Pelican, 1964, p. 182 (f rst published by Longmans, Green, 1942). 4. I bid. 5. Arthur Raistrick, Dynasty o f I ronfounders, S essions B ook T rust in association with Ironbridge Gorge Museum Trust, 1989, p. 20 (rev. edn; f rst edition 1952).

Notes 6. Ibid., p. 22. 7. By 1620 a series of patents had been granted for coking coal so that it might be used by brewers and maltsters, see W.H.G. Armytage, A Social History of Engineering, Faber & Faber, 1961, p. 62. 8. Abiah Darby, quoted in Raistrick, Dynasty of Ironfounders, p. 38. 9. This re fers to t he s o-called “po twalloper bo roughs” s till repre sented i n Pa rliament du ring t he ei ghteenth c entury. To claim t he right to vote in these boroughs the inhabitant had to establish that he had a f amily and had boiled a pot there. The potwalloper franchise was a re lic of ea rlier t imes when f reemen would t ake t heir meals in public to demonstrate their independence from the lord of the manor. See J.L. Hammond and Barbara Hammond, The Village Labourer 1760–1832, Longmans, Green, 1911, p. 9 (paperback edn 1987). 10. Interview with the author. 11. Ra istrick, Dynasty of Ironfounders, pp. 38–9. 12. From Abraham Darby’s cash book and accounts, held in the Elton Collection, Ironbridge Gorge Museum, Shropshire. 13. B arrie Trinder, The Industrial Revolution in Shropshire, Phillimore, 1981, pp. 207–9. 14. Some m ill a nd m ine owners were prepa red to e xploit t he system themselves, opening their own truck shops. 15. An e xample o f a t wo-faced c lock i s he ld i n t he co llection o f t he Museum of Science and Industry in Manchester. The museum quotes a n e ntry i n t he re cords o f Q uarry B ank M ill, S tyal, f or September, 1818, stating: “Ten days lost time to be worked up in half year, 256 spindles or two drums upon an average of want of water.” 16. E.P. Thompson, “Time, Work-Discipline and Industrial Capitalism,” Past and Present, vol. 38, 1967, p. 86. 17. L ewis Mumford, The Lewis Mumford Reader, ed. Donald L. Miller, The University of Georgia Press, 1995, pp. 325–6. 18. R.S. Fitton a nd A.P. Wadsworth, The Strutts and the Arkwrights, 1758–1830, Manchester University Press, 1958, p. 67. 19. M aurice W. Thomas, Young P eople i n In dustry, 1 750–1945, Thomas Nelson & Sons, 1945, p. 3. 20. The story is related in a h istory of the silk mill on the Derby City website: www.derbycity.com. 21. Fitton and Wadsworth, The Strutts and the Arkwrights, p. 62.

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Notes 6 Secrets of the Dumb Steeple 1 . Frank Peel, The R isings of th e L uddites, Ch artists a nd P lugDrawers, 4 th e dn, F rank Ca ss a nd Co ., 1 968; a lso q uoted i n J.L. Ha mmond a nd B arbara Ha mmond, The S killed L abourer, 1760–1832, Alan Sutton, 1995, p. 307. 2. Charlotte Bronte, Shirley, Collins, n.d., p. 296. 3. The Penny Magazine, December, 1843, p. 508. 4. I bid. 5. R.S. Fitton and A.P. Wadsworth, The Strutts and the Arkwrights: 1758–1830, Manchester University Press, 1958, p. 101. 6. Philippe Aries, Centuries of Childhood, Penguin, 1973, pp. 125–30 (f rst published 1960). 7 . Fitton and Wadsworth, The Strutts and the Arkwrights, pp. 234–6. 8. K. Marx, Capital, vol. 1, Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1976 (f rst published in German in 1867). 9. Laws were introduced in Elizabethan England to curb domestic wood burning so that timber could be preserved for ship building. 10. An idea of the complexity of chimney systems in large houses can be gleaned from the sectional view of the drying room chimney at Buckingham P alace, r eproduced in M aurice W . T homas, Young People in Industry, 1750–1945, Thomas Nelson & Sons, 1945, p. 46. 11. J.L. Ha mmond a nd B arbara Ha mmond, The T own L abourer 1760–1832, Alan Sutton, 1995, p. 182 (f rst published 1917). 12. Ibid., p. 179. 13. I bid. 14. Ibid., p. 185. 15. Ibid., p. 188. 16. T homas, Young People in Industry, p. 43. 17. Hammond and Hammond, The Town Labourer, p. 173. 18. Ibid., pp. 190–1. 19. E .P. Thompson, History of th e E nglish W orking Cl ass, P enguin, 1991, p. 237. 20. J.L. Ha mmond a nd B arbara Ha mmond, T he V illage L abourer 1706–1832, Longmans Green, 1911, p. 38. 21. The story is told concisely in The Story of the Tolpuddle Martyrs, London: Trades Union Congress, 1991. 22. The U nknown M ayhew, Se lections f rom th e M orning Chr onicle 1849–1850, ed. E.P. Thompson and Eileen Yao, Penguin, 1971.

Notes 7 The Silent Monitor 1. The town plan was based on the Phalanstery, or communal palace, concept of Charles Fourier. 2. There a re varying acco unts of t he pr ice p aid by Owen. T his f gure i s b ased o n P osey Co unty re cords q uoted wi th o ther f gures by Wi lliam E . Wi lson i n The A ngel a nd T he Se rpent, I ndiana University Press, 1964, p. 110. 3. Donald E. Pitzer and Josephine M. Elliott, “New Harmony’s First Utopians,” Indiana Magazine of History, vol. 75, no. 3, 1979. 4. K arl J.R. Arndt, America’s Co mmunal U topias, e d. Do nald E . Pitzer, Chapel Hill, 1997, p. 74. 5. The i nformation o n t he K irkburton f re was supplied partly by Denis Kilcommons, a journalist at the Huddersf eld Examiner, and partly from newspaper accounts in the Examiner archives. 6. The sale may have been agreed in July, 1799 when two of Owen’s partners had visited New Lanark. 7 . Gregory Claeys, ed., Selected W orks of Ro bert O wen, v ol. 4 , London: William Pickering, 1993, p. 155. 8. Address delivered to t he people of New La nark, January 1, 1816, quoted in Robert Owen, A New View of Society and Other Writings, Penguin, 1991, p. 120. 9. L. Urwick, The Golden Book of Management, L ondon: Newman Neame, 1956, p. 7. 10. I bid. 11. Karl J .R. A rndt, America’s Co mmunal U topias, e d. Do nald E . Pitzer, U niversity o f Ca rolina P ress, 1 997, p . 8 1. A ccording to Arndt, J ohn D uss, a m usician w hose m other had w orked for t he Rappists, secured a pos ition as a j unior trustee and spent his way through millions of dollars accumulated by the society. 12. Ian Do nnachie a nd G eorge H ewitt, Historic Ne w L anark, E dinburgh University Press, 1993, p. 94. 13. Described in the Penny Magazine, December, 1843, p. 501. 14. Financial Times, Survey of Leeds, December 1, 1989.

8 The Last Puritan in a Nation of Amateurs 1. Quoted by Crispin Tickell i n Mary Anning of Lyme Regis, Lyme Regis: Philpot Museum, 1996, p. 3.

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Notes 2. Ibid., p. 26. The tongue twister is taken from a 1908 song by Terry Sullivan. 3. Ibid., p. 3. 4. Ibid., p. 27. 5. T.H.S. Escott, England: Her People, Polity and Pursuits, London: Richardson, 2009 (1885), quoted by Martin J. Wiener in English Culture a nd th e D ecline of th e In dustrial S pirit, P enguin, 1 987 (f rst published by Cambridge University Press, 1981). 6. Wiener, English Culture a nd the Decline of th e In dustrial Spirit, p. 22. 7 . Kenneth Clark, Civilization, BBC a nd John Murray, 1979, p. 2 47 (f rst published 1969). 8. Paul Johnson, A History of th e American People, Pheonix Giant, 1998, p. 137. 9. The two raised f ngers – a popular gesture of abuse in Britain, used in t he s ame way a s t he m iddle f nger i n t he United S tates – ha s its o rigins i n A nglo-French me dieval w arfare. T he i ndex f nger and the middle f nger were used by English archers as drawstring f ngers. Sometimes these f ngers were severed if a bowman fell into the hands of the French, so the two-f ngered gesture became an act of def ance and remains so today. Winston Churchill used it, apparently without irony – but maybe not – as a sign of victory. The V for Victory sign, however, was usually reversed in the same way as the hippie Peace sign. 10. W einer, English Culture a nd th e D ecline of th e In dustrial S pirit, pp. 14–15. 11. A nthony Trollope, Doctor T horn, Cha pman & Ha ll, 1 858, pp. 11–12, quoted by Wiener, English Culture and the Decline of the Industrial Spirit, p. 31. 12. Quoted by Weiner, p. 32, from Fraser’s Magazine. 13. T homas Carlyle, Latter D ay Pamphlets, Cha pman & Ha ll, 1858, p. 21. 14. “Mark Twain’s Christmas Book,” New York World, December 10, 1899. 15. Paul Johnson, p. 413. 16. Past and Present, Routledge, date unknown, p. 26. 17. Ibid., p. 29. 18. I bid.

Notes 19. Ibid., p. 197. See also Simon Heffer, Moral Desperado: A L ife of Thomas Carlyle, Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 1995, p. 230. 20. Ibid., p. 264. 21. Ibid., p. 263. 22. I bid., p. 265. 23. S imon Heffer, Moral Desperado, p. 153. 24. W iener, English Culture a nd the Decline of th e In dustrial Spirit, p. 33. 25. I bid. 26. A nthony B imba, The H istory of th e A merican W orking Cl ass, London: Martin Lawrence, 1927, p. 23. 27. Ibid., pp. 14–15. 28. Charles Johnson, Patricia Smith, and the WGBH Series Research Team, Africans i n A merica: A merica’s Journey through Sl avery, Harcourt Brace, 1998, p. 39. 29. Ibid., p. 40. 30. I bid. 31. B imba, The History of the American Working Class, p. 18. 32. Stanley M. Elkins, Slavery: A Problem in American Institutional and Intellectual Life, University of Chicago Press, 1968, p. 7 (f rst edition, 1959). 33. I bid., p. 21. 34. Ibid., p. 24. 35. “Occasional Discourse on the Nigger Question,” London: Thomas Bosworth, 1853, p. 7. 36. Ibid., p. 12. 37. A Social History of England, Penguin, 1991, p. 272.

9 The Yellow Dog Unleashed 1. O.D. Boyle, History of Railroad Strikes, Washington: Brotherhood Publishing, 1935, pp. 8–10. 2. Ibid., p. 11. 3. Ibid., p. 7. 4. Ibid., p. 23, supported by accounts of the Baltimore and Pittsburgh disturbances in the Baltimore Sun, from July 20, 1877 to July 26, 1877. 5. Ibid., p. 26.

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Notes 6. Ibid., pp. 27–8. 7. Ibid., p. 33. 8. From a ph otograph i n t he p ermanent e xhibition o f t he Ch icago History Society. 9. Liston E . L eyendecker, Palace C ar P rince: A Bio graphy of George M ortimer P ullman, U niversity P ress o f Co lorado, 1 992, pp. 29–30. 10. The palace ca r idea was originated by Plyman B. Green but, like many inventors, Green prof ted little from the concept; see Boyle, History of Railroad Strikes, pp. 53–4. 11. Ra y Ginger, Eugene V. Debs: A Biography, Collier, 1962, p. 125. 12. Ch ristopher Hill, The English Bible a nd the Seventeenth-Century Revolution, Penguin, 1994, p. 73. 13. L eyendecker, Palace Car Prince. 14. S tanley Buder, Pullman: An Experiment in Industrial Order and Community Planning, 1880–1930, Oxford University Press, 1967, pp. 6 8–9. B uder w rites t hat t he P ullman co mpany repo rted a n 8 percent return from its farm investment in 1885. 15. W .F. Burns, The Pullman Boycott: A Complete History of The Great Rail Road Strike, The McGill Printing Company, 1894, p. 22. 16. I bid. 17. Ibid., p. 21. 18. Quoted by Buder, p. 36. 19. B uder, Pullman, p. 132. 20. Ibid., p. 42. 21. Ibid., p. 133. 22. J ohn Tebbel, From Ra gs to R iches: H oratio A lger J r. a nd th e American Dream, New York: Macmillan, 1963, p. 12. 23. Title of an article by Carnegie published in the Pall Mall Gazette. He advocated d ispensing wealth during t he l ife t ime of t he g iver to e ither f ound o r s upport v arious i nstitutions i n t he f ollowing order: universities, free libraries, hospitals and hospital extensions, parks, concert and meeting halls, swimming baths, churches. Wall writes that “ministers were outraged to f nd churches seventh on the list” ( Joseph F razier Wall, Andrew Ca rnegie, N ew York: Ox ford University Press, 1979, p. 808). 24. Wall, p. 808. When Carnegie’s will was disclosed it showed that he had given away $350,695,653, leaving a residue of $30m, two-thirds of which was left to the Carnegie Corporation. The remaining $10m

Notes comprised gifts a nd a nnuities for various f riends a nd relations i n Dunfermline where he was born (Wall, p. 1042). 25. David Ra y P apke, The Pu llman C ase: The Cl ash of L abor a nd Capital in Industrial America, University P ress of K ansas, 1999, p. 5. Andrew Carnegie did the same. It was a popular way for the wealthy men to avoid the draft. 26. B urns, The Pullman Boycott, pp. 17–18. 27. Ibid., pp. 17, 23. 28. Ibid., p. 42. 29. Ibid., pp. 40–1. 30. P aul Averich, The Haymarket Tragedy, Princeton University Press, 1984, pp. 205–8. 31. B urns, The Pullman Boycott, pp. 300–4. 32. Ibid., p. 306. 33. B uder, Pullman, p. 3, quoted from Carnegie’s Triumph of D emocracy, C. Scribner’s Sons, 1888. 34. Chicago D ispatch, M ay 1 4, 1 894, q uoted i n B uder, Pullman, p. 170. 35. Pinkerton guards were privately recruited uniformed guards run by the agency established by Allan Pinkerton. 36. L ouis Adamic, Dynamite: T he S truggle of Cl ass V iolence i n America, Peter Smith, 1960, p. 12 (f rst published 1934). 37. Joanne B. Ciulla, The Working Life, Times Books, 2000, p. 103. 38. Daniel A . W ren, The Ev olution of M anagement T hought, J ohn Wiley & Sons, 1994, p. 169. 39. Ibid., p. 170, quoted from Whiting Williams, Mainsprings of Men, Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1925, p. 147. 40. A damic, Dynamite, p. 23.

10 The Philadelphia Catechism 1. Henry Da na, J r., Two Years bef ore th e M ast, Wordsworth, 1996, p. 14 (f rst edition 1840). 2. Ibid., p. 56. 3. Robert Kanigel, The One Best Way, Viking, 1997, p. 100. 4 . Ra y Wild, Mass-Production Ma nagement, W iley & S ons, 1 972, p. 27. 5. Some ha ve c laimed t hat P ittsburgh-born W illiam K elly w as t he f rst to p erfect t he B essemer pro cess, b ut K elly w as s hort o f t he

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Notes mark. He discovered, like Bessemer, that blowing air through molten cast iron could control the temperature of the melt by burning out carbon. But, crucially, he did not realize how important it was to stop the blow. Nor, unlike Bessemer, did he devise any method to deoxidize the steel before it was poured. So Kelly went bankrupt and B essemer d idn’t. B ut K elly’s l awyers d id have s ome s uccess in challenging Bessemer’s 1856 US patents, and a ro yalty-sharing deal was s truck a fter pro tracted legal act ion. To i nsist t hat K elly invented the Bessemer process, however, is to get involved in the type of semantics that could be used to promote the case for Elisha Gray against Alexander Graham Bell over the invention of the telephone or Joseph Swan against Thomas Edison on the incandescent lamp. In all these cases the losers were beaten to the Patent Off ce, lacked some vital ingredient, or lacked the essential big picture or the wherewithal to apply their discovery commercially. 6. Robert Kanigel, The One Best Way: Frederick Winslow Taylor and the Enigma of Eff ciency, Viking, 1997, p. 74. 7. E.P. Thompson gives several examples of such practices in “Time, Work-Discipline an d In dustrial C apitalism,” P ast a nd P resent, vol. 38, 1967. 8. Ibid., pp. 202–3. 9. Quoted by Morris S. Viteles in Industrial P sychology, J onathan Cape, 1933, p. 9, from Dupin, Cours de Geometre et de Mécanique Appliquée. 10. I bid. 11. David S. Landes, Revolution in Time: Clocks and the Making of the Modern World, Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 1983, p. 130. 12. M . Cutmore, The Pocketwatch Handbook, David & Charles, 1985, p. 92. 13. Charles D. Wrege a nd Ronald G reenwood, Frederick W. Taylor: The Father of Scientif c Management, Myth and Reality, Business One Irwin, 1991, pp. 83–8. 14. F red Taylor, Shop Management, Harper & Brothers, 1911, pp. 150–6. Shop Management was f rst read as a paper to the American Society of Engineers in June, 1903. 15. K anigel, The One Best Way, pp. 226–7. 16. Ibid., p. 319. 17. Ibid., p. 320.

Notes 18. Ibid., p. 317. Kanigel says the house was demolished in the 1960s. Taylor refers to Noll’s house building in his book, saying that he was working on the house at t he same time as he was carrying out the pig iron loading, but Wrege and Greenwood, Frederick W. Taylor, p. 104, say that Noll’s house had not been built until after the experiments had been completed. A sign has been erected at the now disused Bethlehem Steel Works in recognition of Noll’s achievement. Today an industrial museum is being installed on part of the site. 19. W ild, Mass-Production Management, p. 20. 20. G eorge Dodd, Days at the Factories: The Manufacturing Industry of Great Britain Described, E. P. Publishing, 1975, p. 137 (f rst published 1843 by Charles Knight, London). 21. M axine Berg, The A ge of M anufactures 1 700–1820: In dustry, Innovation and Work in Britain, Routledge, 1994, p. 267.

11 Modern Times 1. Quoted in David A. Hounshell, From the American System to Mass Production, 1800–1932: T he Development of Manufacturing Technology in the United States, The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1984, p. 241. 2. Daniel A. Wren and Ronald G. Greenwood (Management I nnovators: T he people a nd Idea s th at Have Sh aped M odern Busine ss, Oxford University Press, 1998, p. 44) point out that Ford’s system of ma ss prod uction e volved b y t rial a nd er ror a mong a t eam o f engineers, including Peter E. Martin, Charles E. Sorensen, Harold Wills, Clarence W. Avery, and Charles Lewis. 3. Wren a nd G reenwood, pp . 4 4–5, o utline t he d ifference a s t hey see it: A t F ord “ the workers were re quired to ‘ adjust to t he l ine’ rather than designing the line to f t the worker. That was the difference between the assembly line and scientif c management – the former was conveyor-paced, the latter, worker-paced.” 4. H ounshell, From the American System to Mass Production, p. 252. 5. Robert Lacey, Ford: The Men and the Machine, Heinemann, 1986, p. 17. 6. Horace Arnold quoted in Hounshell, From th e A merican Sy stem to Mass Production, p. 241. 7. Lacey, p. 107.

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Notes 8. Hounshell, p. 249. 9. Robert Kanigel, The One Best Way: Frederick Winslow Taylor and the Enigma of Eff ciency, Viking, 1997, p. 496. 10. Lace y, Ford, p. 9. 11. K anigel, The One Best Way, p. 212. 12. The pres s react ions a nd t hat o f F ord a re o utlined b y Lace y, pp. 118–22. 13. Frank B. G ilbreth a nd E rnestine G ilbreth Ca rey, Cheaper by th e Dozen, Consul Books, 1961, p. 10. 14. W ren and Greenwood, Management Innovators, p. 143. 15. K anigel, The One Best Way, p. 525. 16. Ibid., p. 18. 17. Ca rey Scott, Sunday Times Magazine, November 17, 1996. 18. O liver Pritchett, Daily Telegraph, O ctober 18, 1 988, a nd R upert Cornwell, The Independent, October 17, 1988. 19. A lexei Stakhanov, The Stakhanov Movement Explained, Moscow: Foreign Languages Publishing House, 1939, pp. 7–8. 20. Ibid., p. 11. 21. I bid. 22. Ibid., pp. 29–30. 23. Rosabeth Moss Kanter, “Power Failures in Management Circuits,” Harvard Business Review, July/August, 1979. 24. A lan Bullock, Hitler and Stalin: Parallel Lives, BCA, 1991, p. 1003. 25. Ford R. Bryan, The Fords of Dearborn, Harlo, 1997, p. 174. 26. K anigel, The One Best Way, p. 433. 27. L . Urwick, The Golden Book of Management: A Historical Record of the Life and Work of Seventy Pioneers, Newman Neame, 1956, p. 75, quoting f rom Frank Barclay Copley’s Frederick W. Taylor, Harper & Brothers, 1923. 28. Lace y, Ford, pp. 342–4. 29. P eter Drucker, The P ractice o f M anagement, B utterworth Heinemann, 1999, p. 274 (f rst published 1955). 30. Quoted b y S tuart C rainer i n The Ult imate B ook of B usiness Quotations, Capstone, 1997.

12 Western Electric Discovers Motivation 1. Charles D Wrege, Facts and Fallacies of Hawthorne: A Historical Study o f t he O rigins, Procedures, and R esults of th e Ha wthorne

Notes Illumination Tests and Their Inf uence upon the Hawthorne Studies, Garland Publishing, 1986, p. 62. 2. Andre Millard, Edison a nd th e B usiness of In novation, J ohns Hopkins, 1993, p. 32. 3. Ibid., p. 24. 4. Warren G. Bennis and Patricia Ward Biederman, Organizing Genius, Nicholas Brealey, 1997, p. 15. 5. David E . N ye, Henry F ord: “ Ignorant Idea list”, K emikat P ress, 1979, p. 100. 6. Ibid. 7. Wrege, Facts and Fallacies of Hawthorne, p. 7. 8. Ibid., p. 36. 9. Ibid., p. 67. 10. Ibid., pp. 670–1. 11. I bid., p. 106. 12. Ibid., pp. 107–8. 13. Ibid., pp. 237–54. 14. Ibid., p. 299. 15. L ouis Adamic, Dynamite: The Story of Class Violence in America, Peter Smith, 1960, pp. 341–3. 16. Author’s interview with Joseph Juran, May, 2000. The story is also told by Stephen B. Adams and Orville R. Butler in Manufacturing The Future: A History of Western Electric, Cambridge University Press, 1999, p. 161. 17. W rege, Facts and Fallacies of Hawthorne, p. 666. 18. W rege’s Facts and Fallacies of Hawthorne is by far the most comprehensive s tudy a vailable o f t he o riginal l ighting e xperiments, drawing on documents in General Electric’s archive. 19. Ibid., p. 695. 20. From newspaper f les, Chicago Historical Society. 21. Charles D. Wrege, Facts and Fallacies of Ha wthorne, New York: Garland, pp. 209–10. 22. Stephen B . A dams a nd O rville R. B utler, Manufacturing th e Future: A History of Western Electric, Cambridge University Press, 1999, p. 119. 23. Ibid., pp. 240–1. 24. Ibid., p. 120. 25. Ibid., p. 124. 26. Adams and Butler, Manufacturing the Future, p. 126.

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27. Ibid., p. 127. 28. Quoted b y S tuart C rainer i n The Ult imate B ook of B usiness Quotations, Capstone, 1997, p. 322. 29. Quoted b y P auline G raham i n The Ha ndbook of M anagement Thinking, International Thomson Business Press, 1998, p. 248. 30. Daniel A. Wren and Ronald G. Greenwood, Management I nnovators: T he people a nd Idea s th at Have Sh aped M odern Busine ss, Oxford University Press, 1998, p. 176. 31. I bid. 32. Pauline G raham, i n The H andbook o f M anagement Th inking, p. 4 42, s ays t hat “ between 1 923 a nd 1 943, M ayo a nd h is co lleagues received grants totalling $1,520,000 from the Rockefeller Foundation.” 33. Bernard M. Bass and Gerald V. Barrett, People, Work, and Organizations: An I ntroduction t o Industrial a nd O rganizational Psychology, 2nd edn, Allyn & Bacon, 1981, p. 56. 34. Ibid., p. 443.

13 Unnatural Selection 1. Morris S. Viteles, Industrial Psychology, Norton, 1932, p. 41. 2. Ibid. 3. Edwin G. Boring, A History of Experimental Psychology, Prentice Hall, 1950, pp. 134–5. 4. “Death by Ca nnibalism a nd Co conut,” Financial Times, O ctober 4/5, 1997. 5 . Adam Smith, An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations, W. Strahan and T. Cadell, 1776, Book I, ch. II. 6. Descarte’s Le Discours de la Methode w as p ublished i n 1 637, but t he q uote “Cogito, e rgo su m” i s t aken f rom t he 1641 Lat in edition. 7. Raymond E . F ancher, The Intelligence Men, Makers of the IQ Controversy, W.W. Norton & Co., 1987, pp. 61–2. 8. Ibid., p. 65. 9. Ibid. 10. B oring, A History of Experimental Psychology, p. 574. 11. F ancher, The Intelligence Men, Makers of the IQ Controversy, pp. 142–3. 12. Ibid., p. 119.

Notes 13. Stephen B. Adams and Orville R. Butler, Manufacturing the Future: A History of Western Electric, Cambridge University Press, 1999, p. 120. 14. Quoted in Walter Dill Scott, Increasing H uman E ff ciency i n Business, New York: Macmillan, 1911, p. 5. 15. Ibid., p. 6. 16. Ibid., p. 15. 17. V iteles, Industrial Psychology, p. 43.

14 Arbeit Macht Frei 1. IG F arbenindustrie w as a c hemical a nd d yestuffs co nglomerate created in 1925 from the merger of the following companies: Bayer, Hoeschst, B adische A nilin u nd S oda F abrik ( BASF), A G f ur Anilinfabrikation ( AGFA), Ca ssella, K alle, G riesheim-Elektron, and Weiler-ter-Meer. 2. Josiah E . Du Bois, Generals in Grey Suits, B odley H ead, 1 953, p. 155. 3. Joseph Borkin, The Crime and Pu nishment of IG F arben, A ndre Deutsche, 1979, p. 117. 4. D ubois, Generals in Grey Suits, p. 172. 5. Robert Kanigel, The One Best Way, Viking, 1997, p. 528. 6. Borkin, The Crime and Punishment of IG Farben, p. 23. 7 Hitler and Stalin: Parallel Lives, BCA, 1991, p. 320. 8. Ibid., p. 320. 9. Heinze Paechter, Karl O. Paetel, and Berta Hellman, Nazi–Deutsch: German–English Di ctionary, N ew Y ork: O ff ce o f E uropean Economic Research, 1943. 10. J oan Campbell, Joy in Work, German Work: The National Debate, 1800–1945, Princeton University Press, 1989, p. vii. 11. This e xplanation f or t he s logan i s o ffered b y Ca mpbell, i bid., p. 34 7. S he w rites t hat R udolf H öss, t he co mmandant, f rst of Dachau, t hen l ater o f A uschwitz, re garded l abor a s “ essential to counteract the degrading effects of prison conditions and could help to de velop t he q ualities o f c haracter t hat w ould prepa re i nmates for eventual freedom.” She adds: “For Höss, at least, Arbeit Macht Frei, was more a statement of faith in a widely proclaimed national principle, t han a n expression of cynical d isdain for t hose held i n subjection.”

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Notes 12. T he f gure is given by Gitta Sereny in Into that Darkness (Pimlico, 1974, p. 100), her po rtrait o f F ranz S tangl, t he f ormer co mmandant of Treblinka. According to Martin Gilbert in The Holocaust (HarperCollins, 1986, p. 287) t here were just t wo survivors f rom Belzec, t hree f rom Che lmno, s ixty-four f rom S obibor, a nd “l ess than forty” from Treblinka. 13. T he f gure is taken from Herbert Ulrich’s Hitler’s Foreign Workers, Cambridge U niversity P ress, 1 997, p . 1 57 ( f rst p ublished i n German in 1985). In the same book, however, he quotes Werner Mansfeld claiming he had 3 .9 m illion Russians available (p. 161; see a lso B ullock, Hitler a nd S talin). T he l atter f gure ma y ha ve been Mansfeld’s mistake. 14. S ee Bullock, Hitler and Stalin. 15. William L. Shirer, The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich, Secker & Warburg, 1959, p. 946. 16. J ohn Dalmau, Sl ave W orker i n th e Ch annel I slands, Guer nsey Press, 1956. 17. D uBois, Generals in Grey Suits, p. 50. 18. I bid. 19. I bid. 20. B orkin, The Crime and Punishment of IG Farben, p. 113. 21. Ibid., p. 123.

15 Whatever Happened to Homer Sarasohn? 1. Author’s interview with Masaharu Matsushita, June, 1999. 2. Memorandum on t he ne ed f or m anagement t raining cou rses i n the communications and manufacturing industry, August 6, 1 949, Research a nd D evelopment D ivision, G eneral H eadquarters, Supreme Commander for the Allied Powers Civil Communications Section, declassif ed document. 3. Will H opper i nterview wi th S arasohn, M ay 2 2, 1993. A v ersion of this meeting is recalled in Robert Chapman Wood’s feature, “A Lesson Learned and a Lesson Forgotten,” in Forbes, February 6, 1989. The feature, rightly, credits Kenneth Hopper, a B ritish-born management consultant who lives and works in the US, with much of the original research into the CCS. A detailed article by Hopper, covering t he work of Sarashon, Polkinghorn, a nd P rotzman, was published in Human Resources Management, summer, 1982. Ken’s brother, Will, has been assisting him in his researches.

Notes 4. 5. 6. 7.

Text of the lecture supplied by Masaharu Matsushita. Quoted from the Personnel Policy of Matsushita Electrical. Ibid. Typed re collections o f H omer S arasohn s upplied to M asaharu Matsushita. 8. Financial T imes, D ecember 3 0, 1 993, q uoted i n The Ha ndbook of M anagement T hinking, e d. M alcolm W arner, I nternational Thomson Business Press, 1998, p. 337. 9. Chapman W ood, “ A L esson L earned a nd a L esson F orgotten,” Forbes Magazine, February 6, 1989. 10. Interviews and correspondence with Ken and Will Hopper. 11. I bid. 12. Interview with the author, May 6, 2000. 13. This view about the impact of Japanese militarism is sourced to the author’s interview with Toshio Goto, professor at Shizouka Industrial University in Tokyo in May, 1999. According to Goto the adoption of several US management ideas, including scientif c management and standard cost accounting, came to t heir peak in Japan in 1935 when the military set itself against these ideas. “The military people w ere ag ainst a nything na med ‘scientif c,’ ” he s aid. B ut s ome companies quietly resisted this military opposition. Sumitomo, for example, persisted with standard cost accounting for its cost control, concealing its methods from the attention of the military. 14. Ford factories did not achieve just-in-time delivery. In practice the workshops built up overlarge inventories. 15. W ill Hutton, The State We’re In, Vintage, 1996, p. 269. 16. E. E. Hagan, On the Theory of Social Change, Tavistock, 1 962, p. 341. 17. I bid. 18. Working, Pantheon Books, 1972, p. xxiii. 19. Ibid., p. xviii. 20. G emba Kaizen, A Commonsense, Low-Cost Approach to Management, McGraw-Hill, 1997, pp. 237–47. 21. Interview with the author, June, 1997.

16 Managing the Corporate State 1. Peter Drucker, Adventures of a Bystander, Heinemann, 1979, p. 256. Drucker’s a utobiographical o bservation i s n ot q uite acc urate. I n The Future of Industrial Man he was arguing the case for business

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Notes as a social institution (pp. 50, 205) while not accepting that it had already made this transition. 2. Ibid., p. 1. 3. Josiah DuBois, Generals in Grey Suits, Bodley Head, 1953. 4. Jo seph Borkin, The Crime and Pu nishment of IG F arben, A ndre Deutsch, 1979, pp. 131–3. 5. Robert Lacey, Ford, the Men and the Machine, Heinemann, 1986, p. 388. 6 . Peter Drucker, Concept of th e Co rporation, Transaction E dition, 1995, p. 9. 7 . Peter Drucker, The Future of Industrial Man, William Heinemann, 1943, p. 1. 8. In his own words Drucker became a “nonperson” (Concept of the Corporation, p. xii) at GM for pointing out the company’s problems. Neither he nor his work was mentioned in Alfred Sloan’s book, My Y ears a t G eneral M otors. In this book Sloan went to some length to explain that the decentralized structure was his idea and his idea alone, based on a study he carried out in 1919. 9. Peter Drucker, Adventures of a Bystander, Heinemann, 1979, p. 262. 10. James O ’Shea a nd Cha rles M adigan, Dangerous C ompany, Nicholas Brealey, 1997, p. 24. 11. I bid., p. 22. 12. D rucker, Adventures of a Bystander, p. 21. 13. Ibid., p. 263. 14. D rucker, Concept of the Corporation, p. 5. 15. F rancis Fukuyama, Trust, Penguin, 1996, p. 159. 16. C arol Kennedy, Guide to the Management Gurus, Century Business, 1993, p. 41. 17. D rucker, Adventures of a Bystander, p. 273. 18. Ibid., p. 273. Andrea Gabor takes issue with this point in her book, The Capitalist Philosophers (Times Business, 2000, p. 312), pointing to a later remark by Drucker that the idea was an “intellectual Edsel.” Drucker, however, was commenting on the impracticality of the idea at that time. Gabor, like John Tarrant, author of Drucker: The Man Who Invented the Corporate Society, believes Drucker was “wedded to the notion of hierarchy.” This is simply not correct. Drucker was a pragmatist, working with and for hierarchical organizations. His boo ks i nterpreted ma nagement i n a h ierarchical f ashion because this was the way management worked. His self-governed

Notes plant represents his idealism whereas his acceptance of hierarchy ref ects his realism. 19. Da vid Montgomery, Workers’ C ontrol i n A merica, Ca mbridge University Press, 1979, p. 12. 20. Ibid., p. 276. 21. I bid. 22. Mary Parker Follett, Prophet of Management, ed. Pauline Graham, Harvard Business School Press, 1996. 23. Mary Parker Follett, Creative Experience, 1924, pp. 167–8. 24. Henry C. Metcalf and Lyndall Urwick, eds, Dynamic Administration: The Collected Papers of Mary Parker Follett, N ew York: Harper & R ow, 1940, pp. 32–3. A co ncise summation of Follett’s contribution to management theory can be found in Daniel Wren, The Evolution of Management Thought, John Wiley & Sons, 1994, ch. 14.

17 The Wanting Animal 1. Speech in Washington, April 16, 1953. 2. The o rigins o f t he head hunting i ndustry a re o utlined i n J ohn Byrne, The Headhunters, Kogan Page, 1987. 3 . Abraham Maslow, Maslow o n Ma nagement, J ohn W iley, 1 998, p. 16. 4. Ibid., p. 10. 5 . Gitta Sereny, In to th at D arkness: f rom M ercy K illing to M ass Murder, Pimlico, 1995, p. 127. 6. Ibid., p. 200. 7. Peter N. Davies, The Man Behind the Bridge: Colonel Toosey and the River Kwai, Athlone, 1991, p. xiii. 8. Quoted by Daniel Wren and Ronald Greenwood in Management Innovators: T he P eople a nd Idea s that Have Shaped Modern Business, Oxford University Press, 1998, p. 179. 9. See Chapter 15, p. 213. 10. Wren and Greenwood, Management Innovators, p. 178. 11. Henry C. Metcalf and Lyndall Urwick, eds., Dynamic Administration: The Collected Papers of Mary Parker Follett, 1940, New York: Harper & Row, 1940, p. 80. 12. Peter D rucker, “ Management’s N ew P aradigms,” Forbes, Global Business and Finance, October 5, 1998, p. 56.

375

376

Notes 13. M aslow, Maslow on Management, pp. 20–42. 14. There i s a co mmon m isconception t hat t he p ull co rd a llows t he worker to s top t he l ine. It d oes n ot. I f t he s upervisor, o nce s ummoned, b elieves t he pro blem i s ser ious e nough to w arrant a l ine stoppage, only then will the conveyor system be brought to a halt. 15. V icki Lenz, The Saturn Difference: Creating Customer Loyalty in your Company, John Wiley & Sons, 1999, p. 12. 16. Interview with the author, Financial Times, July 9, 1997. 17. J ames Dyson, Against the Odds: An Autobiography, Orion Business Books, 1997, p. 256. 18. Frederick F . R eichheld, The L oyalty E ffect: T he H idden F orce behind th e Growth, Prof ts a nd L asting Value, Ha rvard Business School Press, 1996, p. 5. 19. Quoted i n “ Loyalty B onus S hould n ot b e D evalued,” Financial Times, November 1, 1995. 20. “Redundancy R eigns i n M etroland,” Financial T imes, J uly 2 7, 1994. 21. Q uoted in Management T hinking, e d. M alcolm W arner, I nternational Thomson Business Press, 1998, p. 268. 22. Business Week, August 8, 1998. 23. J effrey Pfeffer, The H uman E quation, Ha rvard B usiness S chool Press, 1998, p. 150.

18 Sharp-suited Philanthropists 1. Sir Stuart Ha mpson, speech at t he Centre for L eadership Studies Conference, London, November 1998, reported in Financial Times, November 18, 1998. 2. Financial Times, September 4, 1997. 3 . Peter Drucker, Managing in a Time of Great Change, Butterworth Heinemann, 1995, p. 215. 4. J eff Gates, The O wnership S olution, P enguin B ooks, 1 998, pp. 52–3. 5. Ibid., p. 63. 6. NCEO study, Harvard Business Review, September/October, 1987. 7. “La Dolce Cooperativa,” Financial Times, January 20, 1999. 8. Ibid. 9. Robert Oakeshott, Jobs & Fairness: The Logic and Experience of Employee Ownership, Michael Russell, 2000, p. 457.

Notes 10. The story is told br ief y by Cha rles Leadbeater in Living on Thin Air, Viking, 1999, pp. 65–9, and in greater detail by Andy Law in Open Minds, Orion Business Books, 1998.

19 The End of Management 1. House of Commons Employment Committee, minutes of evidence, Tuesday January 24, 1995, HMSO, pp. 8–21. 2. Fortune, August 6, 1998. 3. This expression is the common retort of workmen in Robert Tressell’s Ragged T rousered P hilanthropists (G rant R ichards, 1914) when Frank Owen, the intellectual among them, attempts to describe the iniquities of the capitalist system. 4. The Guardian, September 15, 1998. 5. Financial Times, July 12, 2000. 6. Address by Hamel to Hay Management Consultants conference in Amsterdam, March 30, 2000. 7. I am paraphrasing an introduction Gary Hamel used to a Financial Times article, suggesting that the pages of the newspaper “may be the only place outside Jurassic Park where you can watch dinosaurs mate.” The phrase was removed in the editing, possibly for reasons of taste. He has used it frequently since in addresses at management conferences. 8. Both of these comments were made at the Amsterdam conference. 9. Gary Hamel, Leading th e R evolution, Ha rvard B usiness S chool Press, 2000, pp. 258–9. 10. R ichard T. Pascale, Surf ng the Edge of Chaos, Texere, 20 00, p. 7. 11. Kerry Townsend, “Knock, Knock, Knocking on Boardroom Doors,” FTCareerPoint.Com, December 22, 2000. 12. Fortune, January 8, 20 01. The absurdity of this apparent development was h ighlighted by Lucy Kellaway i n her Financial T imes’ column, January 15, 2001. 13 New York Times, December 24, 2000. 14. S tephen Barley, The New World of Work, British–North American Research As sociation ( UK), 1 996, q uoted b y t he a uthor i n t he Financial Times, March 6, 1996. 15. Ca rol Kennedy, Guide to the Management Gurus, Century, 1993, p. 105. 16. R icardo Semler, Maverick, Arrow Books, 1994, p. 51.

377

378

Notes 17. Ibid., p. 60. 18. K en Dychtwald, Age Power: How the 21st Century Will Be Ruled by the New Old, Tarcher Putnam, 1999, p. 79. 19. John M icklethwait a nd A drian Wooldridge, The W itch D octors: What the Management Gurus are Saying, Why it Matters and How to Make Sense of It, Heinemann, 1996, p. 232.

20 Melting the Frozen Assets 1. Jack Beatty, The World According to Drucker: The Life and Work of th e W orld’s Gr eatest Management T hinker, O rion B usiness, 1998, p. 104. 2. Peter Drucker, The P ractice o f M anagement, B utterworthHeinemann, 1999, p. 269. 3. Ibid., p. 272. 4. Ibid., p. 302. 5. Ibid., p. 303. 6. Ibid., p. 281. 7. Ibid. 8. Ibid., p. 280. 9. Ibid., p. 310. 10. R ichard Goss, Psychology: T he S cience of M ind a nd Beh aviour, 3rd edn, Hodder & Stoughton, 1996, p. 708. 11. Cha rles Jackson, Understanding Psychological Testing, BPS Books, 1996, p. 37. 12. S. Blinkhorn a nd C . Johnson, “ The I nsignif cance o f P ersonality Testing,” Nature, vol. 348, 1990, pp. 671–2. 13. ‘Work a nd Personality’, Special Issue, g uest e d. Nigel Nicholson, Applied Psychology, vol. 45, no. 3, 1996, pp. 243–62. 14. Financial Times, July 6, 1994. 15. Financial Times, October 12, 1994. 16. See Chapter 4, pp. 51–2. 17. Quoted by John Carey in The F aber Book of U topias, F aber & Faber, 1999, p. 368. 18. “How Hard Wired is Human Behaviour,” Harvard Business Review, July/August, 1998. 19. N icky Hayes, Foundations of P sychology, T homas Nelson, 1998, p. 141 (f rst published 1994). 20. Financial Times, September 16, 1998. 21. Financial Times, September 23, 1998.

Notes 22. Financial Times, “Nurture v. Nature,” September 16, 1998. 23. The Ascent of Man, British Broadcasting Corporation, 1973, p. 435. 24. R ichard Gross, Psychology: The Science of M ind and Behaviour, 3rd edn, Hodder and Stoughton, 1996, p. 717. 25. People Management, October 28, 1999, pp. 49–50. 26. S tuds Terkel, Working, Pantheon Books, 1972, p. 589.

21 The Road to Panama 1. Ian Dunlop, The Shock of The New: Seven Historic Exhibitions of Modern Art, American Heritage Press, 1972. 2. CBS report, September 7, 1993. 3. Janosch, The Trip to Panama, Andersen Press, 1978. 4. Joanne B . Ciu lla, The W orking L ife, T imes B ooks, 20 00, pp. 61–2. 5. Financial Times, March 25, 2000. 6. Juliet Schor, The Overworked American, Basic Books, 1992, p. 7. 7. The Alabama senator, Hugo L. Black, who introduced the Thirty Hour W eek b ill es timated i t w ould creat e i mmediately abo ut 6.5 million jobs. 8. Schor, The Overworked American, pp. 74–5. 9. The idea sounds enticing but in reality it is diff cult t o a chieve. Henry F ord e xperimented wi th s omething s imilar i n t he 1 930s when he created a string of “village industries”: automotive supply businesses s pread a mong vi llage co mmunities i n M ichigan. T he idea was that farmers could work part of their time in these industries t hen re turn to t heir f arms for cro p p lanting a nd ha rvesting. In rea lity f armers ab andoned t heir f arms to w ork i n t he s upply companies f ull-time rat her t han m ix t he t wo forms of work. T he village industries were never prof table and were phased out after Ford’s death. 10. P eter Drucker, The Age of Discontinuity, Heinemann, 1969, p. 247. 11. P eter Drucker, Concept of the Corporation, Transaction, 1995, p. xvii. Note that in the Preface added later to this book, Drucker states that he coined the term in his 1959 book, Landmarks of Tomorrow. In fact he did not use the term in this book but he did stress the importance of k nowledge i n prod uctive w ork, e mphasizing t he s ignif cance of employees who he would subsequently call knowledge workers. 12. Speech at Ha y M anagement Co nsultant’s Co nference, P rague, November 10, 1994.

379

Notes

380

13. M arshall M cLuhan, Understanding M edia: T he E xtensions of Man, McGraw-Hill, 1964, title of Chapter I. 14. Martin Lut her K ing, Strength t o L ove, Ha rper & R ow, 1 963, Chapter 7.

22 One Life. Live It. 1. Financial T imes, “ Lunch S urvives a Ha rd J ourney,” J une 1 9, 1995. 2. Financial Times, “Union Power is Eroded,” June 19, 1995. 3. I pursued this argument at g reater length in Twenty-First C entury Leadership: A Fairy Tale Future, a report published by Hay McBer in May, 2000. 4 . M ichael Dunkerley, The Jobless Economy: Computer Technology in the World of Work, Polity Press, 1996, p. 131. 5. Presentation at Canada House, London, June 1, 2000. 6. Don T apscott, Da vid T icoll, a nd A lex L owy, Digital Capital : Harnessing the Power of B usiness Webs, Nicholas Brealey, 2000, p. 170. 7. Thomas Malone and Robert Laubacher, “The Dawn of the E-Lance Economy,” Harvard Business Review, vol. 76, no. 5, 1998, quoted by Tapscott, Ticoll, and Lowy, Digital Capital, p. 172. 8. Financial Times, “No More Jobs Please,” December 23, 1994. 9. Quoted by John Micklethwait and Adrian Wooldridge in The Witch Doctors: What the Management Gurus are Saying, Why it Matters and How to Make Sense of It, Heinemann, 1996, p. 212. Morrow’s article was published in Time on March 29, 1993. 10. Time, May 29, 2000. 11. Financial Times, “Tales of the Off ce Nomad,” May 29, 1995. 12. M ichael Lewis, Liar’s Poker, Penguin, 1989, p. 185. 13. Financial Times, “Tales of the Off ce Nomad,” May 29, 1995. 14. I bid. 15. C. Wright Mills, White Collar: The American Middle Class, New York: Oxford University Press, 1956, p. 236. 16. Ibid., p. 237. 17. L ewis Mumford, The Co nditions of M an, N ew York: Ha rcourt, Brace and Co, 1944, p. 4. 18. Interview with the author. 19. L ewis Mumford, The Conditions of Man, p. 5.

Notes 20. V oltaire, Discourse, no. 4. 21. “Six hours are most suitable and the four that follow, when set forth in letters, say to men ‘live.’ ” Unknown author, from the Home Book of Quotations, p. 1,062. 22. E dith Hamilton, The Gr eek W ay to W estern Civ ilization, W.W. Norton, Mentor, 1954, p. 21 (f rst published 1930). 23. Ibid., p. 25.

23 Age of the Search Engine 1. Consider the words of Gordon Brown: “Our bank bonus regulation will b e t he toughest i n t he world.” The Guardian, September 27, 2009. 2. CIPD statement in response to the Heday case decision ruling in favor of default retirement ages, September 25, 2009. 3. “Return of the Car Boot Sales” reported that more than 19 million Britons were expected to attend three or more car boot sales in the summer of 2008. Femalef rst.co.uk, July 11, 2008. 4. “Church Attendance to Fall by 90 Percent,” The O bserver, September 21, 2008. 5. Alan Rogers memorial lecture, June 17, 2007, St Mary’s Church, Twickenham. 6. Alain de B otton, The P leasures a nd S orrows of W ork, Ha mish Hamilton, 2009, p. 80. 7. Simon Caulkin,” Farewell, with a last word on the blunder years,” The Observer, June 14, 2009. 8. Speech to Google Zeitgeist Europe, May 21, 2006. 9 . Richard Layard, Happiness: Lessons from a New Science, Penguin, 2006, p. 48. 10. In conversation with the author, June 20, 2009. 11. J ared Diamond, Guns, Germs and Steel, Vintage, 1998, p. 236. 12. “The Tragedy of the Commons,” Science, December 11, 1968.

Postscript: New Century, New Ethic 1. George Ochoa and Melinda Corey, The Fitzroy Dearborn Chronology of Ideas, London: Fitzroy Dearborn Publishers, 1999, p. 190. 2. Talk, August, 2000. 3. Financial Times, June 8, 1998.

381

INDEX

Able Tests 288 Abraham, David 263, 264 Adams, Douglas 16 Adams, Samuel 55 Agrarian revolution 14 Agricola 59 Agriculture colonization and 46, 47 feudal system and 31–2 hunter-gatherers and 3–9, 14–15, 24 labor 84 land enclosure laws and 83–4 Aherne, Carolyn 333 Alaric 20 Alatas, Syed Farid 116 Alfred (King of England) 29 Alger, Horatio 126 Altgeld, John 128 Amazon.com 313, 314, 320 Ambros, Otto 189–190, 200, 201 America Online 313 American Civil War 114 American Federation of Labor 127 American Railway Union 127 American Telephone & Telegraph (AT&T) 168, 169, 175, 203, 272 Anarchist bombing, Chicago 128 Andreae, Johann Valentin 89 Anning, Mary 103–4, 105 Apprenticeship 31, 246, 305, 306 Archimedes 60 Aries, Philippe 76 Aristotle 22, 25, 329 Arizmendiarreta, Father Jose Maria 262 Arkwright, Richard 60, 69–70, 76, 77, 78, 88, 92, 93, 100, 136, 359, 360 Armstrong, Neil 3 Arthur D. Little 219 Asda (supermarket) 274 Ashton, Nick 5 Ashton, T.S 51 Assembly line, and Ford 146–7, 149 Attila 35 Attlee, Clement 231 Auschwitz camps 190, 191, 194, 200, 201, 371 Austen, Jane 93, 104

382

Avon (cosmetics) 272 Ayling, Bob 269 Bain & Company 245 Ball, John 37 Baltimore and Ohio Railroad 117–9, 128 Bank Top Mill 93 Banks, Sir Joseph 107 Barclay, David 53 Barley, Stephen 275 Barnum effect 287 Barnum, Phineas T. 287 Barrett, Gerald 175 Barry, Charles 265 Barth, Carl 151 Bass, Bernard 175 Bayeux Tapestry 36 Beal, Heine 168, 169 Bean Ing Mills 100 Beche, Henry de la 105 Bede, Venerable 34–5, 49 Beeton, Isabella Mary 152 Behavioral Event Interview 289 Behm, Steven 314 Bell, Alexander Graham 366 Bell, Daniel 296 Bell Telephone Laboratories 168, 169, 240 Bennett, Harry 158 Bennington College 216, 221 Bennis, Warren 162, 228 Bessbrook, Northern Ireland 98 Bessel, Friedrich 179 Bessemer, Henry 135, 136 Bethlehem Steel Works 141, 142, 177 Bible 39–42, 43–4, 45, 50 Breeches 45 Geneva 45 Great 45 New Testament 39, 44 Bierderman, Patricia Ward 162 Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation 332 Binet, Alfred 181–4 Birkenau camp see Auschwitz BlackBerry 308 Black Death 37 Blackmore, Susan 16 Blinkhorn, Stephen 287 Boatload of Knowledge, The 90

Index Boer and Croon Group 304 Bono, Edward de 293 Boulton, Matthew 106 Boulton & Watt 162, 163 Bond, Bertha 220–1 Bonomi, Ignatius 99 Booth, John 72, 73, 74 Booz, Allen & Hamilton 233 Borkin, Joseph 217 Boston Tea Party 108 Botton, Alain de 331 Boulle, Pierre 236 Boxgrove archeology site 5 Boyden, Sydney 233, 234 Bracken, Stanley 168 Bradley, Keith 18 Brandies, Louis D. 164 Bridges, William P. 315, 346 Briggs, Asa 116 British Airways 269, 317 British Gas 265–8 British Museum 5 Bronowski, Jacob 293 Bronte, Charlotte 73, 74, 360 Brown, Cedric 265–9 Brown, Donaldson 216 Brown, Tina 348 Browne, Sir Thomas 122 Buckland, William 105 Buddhism 212 Buffet, Warren 332, 333 Bullock, Alan 191 Bunyan, John 49 Burke, Edmund 12 Burt, Cyril 228, 286 Bushido code 210, 212 Business schools, development of 223 Butler, Allister 243

218–9,

Cadbury 54 California Public Employees Retirement System (Calpers), 256 Calvin, John 39–40, 45 Cambridge University 181, 348 Cameron, David 333, 336 Cape York Peninsula, Australia 3 Capitalism and Protestantism 55–6 Capone, Al 166 Cargill, David 179 Carlin, George 340 Carlyle, Thomas 43, 103, 109–16, 126, 180, 295, 362, 363 Carnegie, Andrew 88, 125–6, 129, 132, 136, 228, 230, 364, 365 Gospel of Wealth 126 Carnegie Foundation 170 Carroll, John Lee 119

Cartwright, Edmund 70 Cartwright, William 73 Carwardine, William 123 Catal Huyuk site, Turkey 10 Catholic church see Roman Catholic church Cattell, James 180, 181, 187 Cattell, Raymond 285, 286 Caulkin, Simon 332 Cave art 7 Central Pacific Railroad 120 Champy, James 247–8 Chaplin, Charles 146 Charcot, Jean-Martin 182 Charlemagne 36 Charles I (King of England) 49, 110 Charles II (King of England) 49, 54 Charter masters 66 Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development (CIPD) 329 Chartres, Richard, Bishop of London 329–30, 336–7 Chaucer, Geoffrey 44 Chauvet Cave paintings 7 Chemical Bank 288 Child labor chimney sweeps 79–81 labor legislation covering 80–1 in mills 77–9, 92, 95 in mines 81 Chimney sweeps 79–81 Chippendale, Thomas 61 Chorlton Twist Company 93 Church, Alexander 164 Church of England 329 Churchill, Winston 231, Cisco Systems 314 Ciulla, Joanne 301 Clark, Clarence 139 Clark Company 258–9 Clark, Kenneth 107 Clarke, Arthur C. 10, 11 Classical civilizations, slavery in 15–17, 19, 21, 22, 25, 31, 325, 354, 355 Class distinctions, and rise of technology 74, 86 Class struggle 23–4, 52–3 Clausewitz, Karl von 59 Cleaver, Henry 122 Clocks in Taylor’s research 140–1 in timekeeping 67, 68 Cobbett, William 85 Colonization 45–7 Colt, Samuel 135 Columbus Iron Works, Ohio 226 Columella 18–19, 97, 164, 199 Colvin, Geoff 291

383

Index

384 Commentry-Fourchambault and Decazeville mining company 219 Confucianism 57, 212 Conrad, Joseph 72 Constable, John 297 Constantine 23, 36 Conwell, Russell H. 301 Coon, Carleton 8 Cooper, Peter 117 Cooperative movement 261 Cooperatives 127, 258, 260, 261–4, 324 Copernicus 58 Cornell University 275 Cromford Mill 76, 92, 100 Cotta, Alain 305 Counter Reformation 47, 48 Couzens, James 149 Crompton, Samuel 70, 93 Cromwell, Oliver 50, 54, 110 CSC Index 247 Dabbawallahs 309 Dachau concentration camp 193, 194 Dale, David 95, 98 Dalmau, John 196 Dana, Henry, Jr. 133–4 Darby, Abiah 66, 358 Darby, Abraham 57, 59, 62–4, 136, 159, 161 Darby, Abraham II 64–5, 66, 81, 136, 359 Darby, Abraham III 65 Dark Ages 29, 35, 47, 60 Darley cotton mill 77 Darwin, Charles 178, 313 Davies, Howard 304 Davies, Peter 236 Davies, W.H. xviii Dawkins, Richard 16 Debs, Eugene 127, 128 Degesch 201 Deland, Thorndike 233 Del Hoyo, Josep 345 Deming, Sir Peason 209 Deming, W. Edwards xxi, 166, 202, 206–10 Demographic trends 342 Descartes, René 182 Diamond, Jared 339 Dickens, Charles 173 Dickson, William 173, 174 Diet of Worms 38 Dietz, Walter 168 Digital (computer company) 317–8 Dilbert 274, 316 Dill Scott, Walter 168–9, 177–8, 181, 185, 186, 187 Disney, Walt 159, 162, 268

Division of labor 143–4 Dod, John 122 Domesday Book 31 Douglass, Frederick 19, 114, 354 Doxiadis, Euphrosyne 28 Drucker, Peter xxi, 158, 216, 218, 220–1, 222, 224, 228–30, 232–4, 240, 255, 265, 295, 373–6, 378–9 influence of 242, 247, 248, 249, 254, 260, 284 knowledge workers 305 Maslow and 241 on personnel management 281–3, research at General Motors 214, 216, 218, 220, 221, 224–6, 227 self-managed groups and 228, 274, 278, 283 Dryden, John 4 DuBois, Josiah, E. 198, 200, 201, 371, 373 Dunkerley, Michael 313 Dunlap, Al (“Chainsaw”) 248–9 Dunlop, Ian 297 Dupin, Baron Charles 139–140 Durgin, William 165 Dychtwald, Ken 279–80 Dyson, James 244 Easter Island 340 Eastern Rates case 164 East India Company 311 Eastland disaster 167 Eastorwine 34 eBay 305, 313 Eckhert, Horst 299 Economics of enough, the 332 Edison, Thomas Alva 55, 160–3, 187, 219, 366, 368 Edmonds, John 269 education Bible and literacy and 49–50 in New Harmony, Indiana 90–2 in New Lanark, Scotland 95–6 Quakers and 51 Edward VI (King of England) 44 Edward VII (King of England) 254 Egypt, ancient, slavery in 24 Eisner, Michael 268 Eisenhower, Dwight 232 Elkins, Stanley 114 Elizabeth I (Queen of England) 44 Elizabeth II (Queen of England) 254 Embalming 29 Emerson, Harrington 157 Emerson, Ralph Waldo 305 Emotional intelligence 294 Employee Stock Ownership Plan (ESOP) 256–60 Empowerment 155

Index Enclosure legislation 83–4 Engels, Frederick 85 English Civil War 49, 50, 53 Enron 270 Erdal, David 260–1, 324 Escott, T.H.S. 105 European Working Time Directive Exeter University 291

335

Facebook 314, 341 Factor analysis 286 Factories description of England before 60, 61 legislation in 78 rise of 68, 69, 76, 77 Fayol, Henri 152, 275 Fayum, mummy portraits 28 Feudal system 30–1, 36, 83, 101 Feuerstein, Aaron Mordecai 349 Field, Marshall 125, 220 Financial Times 276, 292, 361, 370, 373, 376–81 Finley, Moses 16, 17, 22, 25, 354, 355 Fiorina, Carleton S. 272 Fitzgerald, F. Scott 322 Five-dollar day 150 Follett, Mary Parker xxi, 160,187, 228–30, 240–1, 315, 323, 375 Ford Henry 139, 145, 146, 149, 150, 151, 156, 157, 159, 162, 295 assembly line and 146–7, 149 five-dollar day and 150 later followers of 211 sociology department 158 Taylor and 147–8, 149, 150 Ford, Henry II 224 Forest Gump 186 Fortune magazine 268, 272 Fox, George 50, 51, 54 Franklin, Benjamin 86, 101, 107, 222 Franklin Institute, Philadelphia 140 Franks 33, 36 Freedom concept of 21–2 in workplace 25–6 French Revolution 84, 85, 111 Freud, Sigmund 182, 183 Frost, Robert 1 Fry & Sons 54 Fujitsu 209 Fukuyama, Francis 117 Future of Work, The 328, 332 Galileo 58 Galton, Francis 178–82, 184, 286, 290 Gandhi, Mohandas 311 Gardner, Howard 293 Garland, Alex 300

Gates, Bill see Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation Gates, Jeff 255 Geneen, Harold 234 General Electric 162, 163, 165, 166, 167, 168, 248, 369 General Motors 214, 216, 222, 224–5, 226, 243, 258, 314 Drucker’s research at 214, 216, 218, 220, 221, 224–6, 227 Sloan at 220–2, 224–5, 247, 374 Gestalt theory 229 Gilbreth, Frank 151, 164 Gilbreth, Lillian 151, 173, 229 Gimbutas, Marija 9, 17, 24, 323, 355 Giraudoux, Jean 133 GMB General Workers Union 266, 269 Goering, Hermann 190 Goleman, Daniel 294 Gompers, Samuel 127 Google 314 Gorde, Jerry 258 Gott, Benjamin 99 Gould, Jay 132 Gould, Stephen Jay 103, 104 Great Exhibition (1851) 100, 135 Greece, ancient 17, 19, 21–3, 49 Greenbury, Richard 269 Greenleaf, Robert 49 Greenspan, Alan 304 Greenwood, Ronald G. 174, 367, 368, 370, 375 Grove, Andy 34, 271 Guilds 30–1, 38, 52, 53, 58, 209 Guinness, Alec 236 Gulags 191 Gutenberg, Johannes 39, 63 Haan, David de 65 Hadza people, Africa 3 Hagen, Everett 51–2, 212, 289, 358 Hamel, Gary 268–70, 377 Hamilton, Edith 325 Hammer, Michael 247–8 Hampson, Sir Stewart 252, 254 Hand-axe construction 5 Handy, Charles xix, 254–5, 303, 346 Handy, Jack 233 Hardin, Garrett 340 Harding, Thomas 99 Harewood, Earl of 254 Hargreaves, James 60, 69, 93, Harmony, Indiana see New Harmony, Indiana Harrison, John 67, 144 Harvard Business Review 314 Harvard Business School 174

385

Index

386

Harvard University 133, 134, 155, 187, 293, 301 Hawthorne effect 164, 167, 175, Hawthorne works, Chicago 164–6, 167, 207, 281 Hayes, Rutherford 119 Headhunting, origins of 233 Hearst, Randolph 300 Heckscher, Charles 245 Hegel, George Wilhelm Friedrich 250 Heller, Joseph 238 Henri, Victor 184 Henry VIII, King of England 40, 43, 45, 50 Henson, Josiah 114 Heraclitus vii Herrnstein, Richard J. 290 Herschel, Sir William 107 Hershey Chocolate Company 130 Herzberg, Frederick 227, 234, 240–2 Hesiod 21 Hewlett-Packard 272 Heydrich, Reinhard 199 Hill, Christopher 44–5 Himmler, Heinrich 190, 194, 196, 198 Hippocrates 28 Hitler, Adolph 193, 195, 196–7, 198, 200, 217, 230 Hobbes, Thomas 2, 3, 22, 24 Holy Roman Empire 36 Homestead strike 132 Hopf, Harry 228 Hopper, Ken and William 335 Hot desking 317, 318 Hounshell, David 148 Howe, Michael 291 Howell, John W. 161 Human Resources Management 18, 282, 372 Hume, David 182 Hunter-gatherers see Stone Age Huntley & Palmer 54 Hutton, Will 211 Huxley, Aldous 156, 172 Huxley, Thomas Henry 106 Hydraulic Press Company 131 Ibuka, Masaru 209 IG Farben 189, 191, 194, 197–201, 217, 371, 372, 374 Imai, Masaaki 214 Imhotep 29 Industrial Revolution xvi, 14, 51, 53, 59–63, 67, 83, 134, 295, 296, 302, 306, 307, 323, 359 Inoue, Bunzaemon 209 Intel 34, 271 Intelligence tests 184, 185, 291, 293–4 Interim management 303–4

International Telephone & Telegraph (ITT) 234 Irish Republican Army (IRA) 230 Ironbridge 65 Ironworking, Darby dynasty in 57–66 Islam 40, 48 Jacquard, Joseph 70 Jamestown 46 Janner, Greville 267, 268 Jerome, Jerome K. 343, 347, 351 John Lewis (retailer) xx, 251–4 Johnson, Charles (author) 113–14 Johnson, Charles (psychologist) 287 Jones, Christopher 318 Julius Work Calendar 31 Jung, Andrea 272 Jupp, Stephen 318 Juran, Joseph 166, 202, 206–10, 283, 369 Just-in-time delivery 210 Kafka, Franz 26 Kalahari bushmen, Africa 3 Kanban walls 211, 339 Kanigal, Robert 134 Kanter, Rosabeth Moss 155 Kaoroshi (death from overwork) 280 Kato, Takeo 209 Kay, Andrew 242 Kay, John 60, 69, 70 Kazantzakis, Nikos viii Kelly, Alice 8 Kelso, Louis 256 Keynes, John Maynard 256, 293 Kimberly-Clark 249 King, Martin Luther 308 Klann, William 146 Knights of Labor 127 Knowledge management 305–6 Knox, John 45 Krauch, Carl 189, 190, 200 Kubrick, Stanley 10, 11 Kurosawa, Akira 213 Labor laws child labor and 81–2 taxes on peasants and 37 Lacey, Robert 149 Lake District, England 1, 5 Land ownership enclosure laws and 83–4 serfdom and 32–3 La Pointe Steel Company 227 Lascaux cave paintings 7 Laubacher, Robert 314 Lauderdale, James Maitland, 8th Earl of Law, Andy 263, 264

82

Index Layard, Richard 333–4, 339 LeBon, Phillipe 163 Lee, Richard 3, 8 Leisure 25, 232, 302, 321–2, 325 Leland, Henry 148 Lenin, Vladimir, Ilyich 152, 153 Leo III (Pope) 36 Leroi-Gourhan, André 7 Levellers 53 Levi, Primo 189 Lewis, John 251 Lewis, John Spedan 250–3, 260 Lewis, Michael 317 Leyland Trucks 214, 243–4 Liberty ships 143 Lilburne, John 53 Literacy, and Bible 50–1 Lloyds Bank 53 Loch Fyne Oysters 263 Lochrane, A.O. 125 Locke, John 177, 181, 182, 290 Lollards 43–4 Lombe, John 69 Lombe, Thomas 69 London Business School 290 London guilds in 30–1, 52–3 poor in 85 Lord, John 6 Loveless, George 84 Luddites 72–4, 76, 120, 158, 360 Lunar Society 106, 107 Luther, Martin 38–41, 43, 44, 321, 329, 357 MacArthur, Douglas 203 MacArthur, Dame Ellen 338 Macmillan, Harold 232 Machlup, Fritz 305 Mackay, Charles 229 Madigan, Charles 220 Malone, Thomas 314 Manchester United Football Club 83 Mankiewicz, Herman J. 300 Manpower Incorporated 314 Mansfield, Werner 195, 199 Mantell, Gideon 105 Marks & Spencer 223, 224, 251, 269 Marmot, Michael 261 Marshal Field (retailer) 220 Martin, Pierre and Emile 136 Marx, Karl 23–5, 78, 85, 116, 174, 250, 251, 360 Marxism 23, 85, 116, 156, 192, 194 Mary I (Mary Tudor), Queen of England 44 Maskelyne, Nevil 179 Maslow, Abraham 230, 231, 234–9, 241, 242, 375

Massachusetts Institute of Technology 166, 212, 247 Matsushita Electrical 203, 205–6, 208, 252 Matsushita, Konosuke 203, 205, 252 Matsushita, Masaharu 203, 205–6 Mayer, Arno 193 Mayer, John 294 Mayflower 46 Mayhew, Henry 85, 360 Mayo, Elton xxi, 170–5, 187, 219, 228, 232, 370 McClelland, David 51, 234, 288–9, 358 McClure, William 91 McCormick, Cyrus 135 McCormick Harvester Company 128 McGregor, Douglas 234, 239–40, 242, 282 McGuffey, William Holmes 149 McKinsey, James 219, 220, McKinsey & Co. 220, 233 McLuhan, Marshall 307 Melbourne, 2nd Viscount, William Lamb 84, 85 Memes 16 Mencken, H.L. 343 Menlo Park laboratory, New Jersey 160–1, 163, 187 Midvale steel works, Pennsylvania 136, 137–42, 151, 155, 157, 274 Mill, James 181 Mill, John Stuart 109, 111–13, 115, 181, 182, 184 Miller, Arthur 245 mills 87 architecture of 99 child labor in 77–9, 95 cotton production and 100–1 Luddites and 72–4 model communities and 98, 122–9 in New Lanark, Scotland 87, 88, 92, 95–6 rise of factories and 77, 78 settlements around 38 working hours in 78 Mills, C. Wright 321 Mining 8, 53, 67, 81, 154, 259 Mintzberg, Henry 275 Missouri Compromise 100 Mitsubishi Electric 209 Mobil Oil 317 Molly Maguires 130 Moltke, Helmuth von 225 Mommsen, Hans 198 Monasteries 33–4, 38, 44, 58 Mondragon Cooperative Corporation 261–3 Montessori, Maria 347 Montgomery, David 226 More, Thomas 40

387

Index

388 Morita, Akio 209 Morgan, J.P. 163 Morris, William 192, 265 Morrow, Lance 315 Mumford, Lewis 68, 322, 323, 359, 380 Murdoch, William 163 Munsterberg, Hugo 187, 228 Murray, Charles 290 Murray, Henry 237 Mushet, Robert 136 Mutiny Act 84 Natufian culture 12 Nazism 187, 193, 194, 197, 234, 290 concentration camps and 191, 193–4, 196 Russian prisoners of war and 192, 193, 194–7, 199 work ethic and 192–3 New Deal 256–7 New Harmony, Indiana 86, 88–91, 97, 98 New Lanark, Scotland 86, 87, 88, 92, 95–6, 122, 361 Newton, Isaac 58, 307, 308, 348 Nicholas I, Tsar of Russia 87 Nicholson, Nigel 290, 323 Nicole, Adolphe 140 Niemoller, Martin 200 Nike 82, 83 Noll, Henry 141, 144–5, 153, 155 Nonconformism 38, 44, 47, 51, 54, 211, 213, 348 Non-Linear Systems 242 Nordstrom 251 Norman, Archie 274 Norman Conquest 31 Norton Rose (solicitors) 273 Nuffield, Viscount, William Morris 222 Oakeshott, Robert 262 Ohno, Taichii 210, 211 Olds, Ransom E. 148 Olduvai Gorge, Tanzania 2 Oliver, John 214 Omi, Hanzou 209 Oppenheimer, J. Robert 162 Opus Dei 34 Orwell, George 331 O’Shea, James 220 Outplacement 344 Owen, Sir Richard 103, 105 Owen, Robert 84, 86, 87–8, 90–8, 261, 324, 361 Oxford Psychologists Press 285 Oxford University 54, 106, 107, 222 Paine, Thomas 101 Pascale, Richard 271, 279, 377

Pearson, Karl 286 Pearson (media company) 271 Peasants Revolt (1381) 36–7, 44 Penn, William 54 Pennock, George 167, 170 Pepys, Samuel 51 Personality tests 285, 287, 288 Personnel management 155, 187, 346 Drucker on 281–3 Owen and 96 Pestalozzi, Johann 90, 91 Peterloo 85 Peters, Tom 224, 315, 316, 318 Pfeffer, Jeffery 245 Philadelphia Centennial Exhibition 137 Piers Plowman 44 Pilgrims 47, 151, 299 Pinkerton detectives 132, 223 Pitts, Michael 6 Plante & Moran 272 Plato 25, 325, 329 Player, Gary 291 Polkinghorn, Frank 203, 210 Pont, Pierre du 224 Pott, Percival 81 Prahalad, C.K. 345 Prehistory see Stone Age Priestley, J.B. 327 Printing press 39, 43, 63 Professional classes 107 Professional societies 107–8 Protestantism capitalism and 55–6 colonization and 46–8 culture and intellectual revolution with 49–50 in England 44–6 Luther and rise of 38–9 work ethic in 20, 40–1, 47, 49, 55, 101, 107, 111, 113, 192–3 Protzman, Charles 203 Psychology Dill Scott’s testing and 168, 169, 177–8, 181, 185 personality tests and 285, 287, 288 Silent Monitor and 94 Western Electric Hawthorne works and 168, 169, 185 Pugin, Augustus 265 Pullman, company 121–2, 124, 127, 129 Pullman, George 121–6, 128, 129, 130, 165, 186, 230 Pullman strike 125, 127–8, 129, 130 Puritanism 41, 44–7, 49, 101, 109, 122, 128, 149, 183, 213, 300, 337, 348, 350 Putman, Mark 174

Index Quakers in England 50–4, 59, 62, 64, 78, 95, 96, 178 in the United States 54–5, 137, 149, 358 quality circles 208 Railroads Chinese laborers on 120 strikes and 118–21, 125, 127–30 Rand, Ayn 340 Rapp, George 89–90, 91, 97 Reade, Charles 123 Reengineering (business process reengineering) 244, 247–8, 249, 343–4 Reformation (in England) 41–3, 49, 60 Reichheld, Frederick 245 Rembrandt 28 Renaissance, The 7, 58, 60, 61, 99 Retirement ages 328–9 Richards, Graham 2 Richardson, John Grubb 98 Rifkin, Jeremy 346 Rivera, Diego 301 Roberson, Hammond 72, 73, 74 Roberts, Mark 6 Rochdale Society of Equitable Pioneers 261 Rockefeller Foundation 171 Roethlisberger, Fritz 173, 174 Rogers, Richard 297 Rolls-Royce 209 Roman Catholic church 33–7 Counter Reformation and 47, 48 invasions of Europe and persistence of 35–6 Luther and rise of Protestantism and 38–9 monasteries in 33–5 Peasants’ Revolt (1381) and 36–7 work ethic in 39–40 Roman Empire 17–20, 29, 33, 35 Roosevelt, Franklin D. 22, 256, 257, 302, 354 Roundtree 54 Rousseau, Jean-Jacques 101 Rover (car manufacturer) 316 Royal College of Surgeons 108 Royal Society 106, 107 Royal Society for the Encouragement of Arts, Manufactures and Commerce xviii, 106, 107 Rudgley, Richard 10 Russell, Lord John 85 Sahlins, Marshall 3 Saint Monday 137 St. Benedict (rule of) 34, 68

St. Luke’s (advertising agency) 263, 264, 272 St. Paul 23, 122 Salomon Brothers (investment bank) 317 Salovey, Peter 294 Salt, Titus 98 Saltaire, England 98, 122 Santayana, George 151 Sarasohn, Homer 202–7, 209, 372 Sarbanes–Oxley Act 270 Saturn Project, General Motors 243 Sauckel, Fritz 197, 198 Saville & Holdsworth (publisher) 285 Scanlon, Joseph 227, 229 Scardino, Marjorie 271 Schindler, Oscar 200 Schools see Education Schoningen, Germany 4 Schor, Juliet xviii, 302, 308 Schumpeter, Joseph 224, 305 Scientific management theory 143, 157–8, 164–5, 173, 210, 219, 322, 232, 322 Scott Paper 248–9 Second Life 307 Self-actualization 237–8 Self-managed groups 228, 274, 278, 283 Sellers, William 137, 138 Semco (manufacturer) 277–9 Semler, Ricardo 277–8 Sereny, Gitta 235 Serfs 21, 23, 31–2, 37, 38, 46, 101, 123, 354, 355, 356 Shakespeare, William 315, 336 Shartle, Charles 141 Shaftesbury, Anthony Ashley-Cooper, 7th Earl of 82 Shelburne, William Petty, 2nd Earl of 144 Shewhart, Walter 207, 209 Shroeder, Henry 161 Sibbs, Richard 57 Siemens, Friedrich and William 136 Silent Monitor 94 Silicon Valley 269, 340 Simon, Theodore 184 Simon of Paris 31 Singer, Isaac 135 16 Personality Factor (16PF) questionnaire 285 Slater, Samuel 100 Slave labor and Nazis 191, 192, 200 Slavery abolition of slave trade in UK 80 abolition of slavery in British Empire 115 in ancient Egypt 24 in classical civilizations 15–17, 19, 21, 22, 25, 31, 325, 354, 355 class struggle and 23–4

389

Index

390 Slavery – continued conditions for development of 21, 24–6, 37, 46, 349, 354 in United States 46, 100–1, 113–5, 296, 363 Sloan, Alfred see General Motors Smith, Adam 21, 101, 112, 143–4, 180, 182, 295, 320, 354, 370 Smith, Patricia 113–14 Social drag 297 Socrates 25, 221 Soldiering 137 Sony Corporation 209 South Sea Bubble 229, 304 Southey, Robert 87 Spartacus 18 Spearman, Charles 286 Spinning technology 69–70, 76, 93 Springfield ReManufacturing 260 Stakhanov, Alexei 153, 154–6 Stalin, Joseph 153, 155, 156, 191, 230 Stanford Business School 245 Stanford–Binet test 184–5, 285 Stangl, Franz 235 Steelmaking technology 135–6, 366 Stern, William 184 Sternberg, Robert 291–3 Stoll, Clarence 167 Stone Age 1–13 cave art in 7 hunter-gatherers in 3–9, 14–15, 24, 136, 180, 296, 339, 353 mining in 8 slavery in 12 tools used in 2, 5–7, 8, 10, 24 warfare and conflict in 10–11, 17 weaving in 7, 10 Stone, Oliver 264 Stonehenge 24 Strikes, railroad 118–21, 125, 127–30 Strauss, Richard 10 Strutt family 77, 359, 360 SUMA Wholefoods 263 Sunbeam Corporation 249 Sutton Hoo 29 Szmajzner, Stanislaw 235

Tabun nerve gas 217 Tacitus 20 Tafur, Pero 143 Tapscott, Don 314, 322 Tawney, R.H. 39, 41, 47, 320, 357 Taylor, Frederick xxi, 94, 134–5, 152, 157, 172, 177, 186, 211, 244, 301 Ford and 148, 149, 150–1 grass-growing experiments 152 Midvale steel works research of 137–42, 151, 155, 157

scientific management theory of 143, 157–8, 164–5, 173, 210, 219, 322, 232, 322 stopwatch timings 140–1 worldwide acceptance of ideas of 152, 177 Taylorism 158 and Nazis 191 in Japan 187, 210 in Soviet Union 152–3 Teachers’ Insurance and Annuity Association-College Retirement Equities Fund (TIAA/CRF) 256 Teleworking 272, 326 Temple Mills 99 Terkel, Studs 214, 294, 349 Terman, Lewis 184 Textile industry child labor in 77–9, 95 cotton workers and 77, 85, 93, 100 Luddites and 72–4 settlements around mills 38 technological breakthroughs in 69–71 see also weaving Theory X 239 Theory Y 239, 242 Thomas Aquinas 30 Thomas, John 62 Thompson, E.P. 68, 83, 359, 360, 366 Thompson, Sanford 140, 141 Thoreau, Henry David 216 Thucydides 23 Tilgher, Adriano 39, 40 Time magazine 315 Timekeeping, clocks in 67, 68 Titian 28, 99 Toffler, Alvin and Heidi 296, 309 Tokugawa Shogunate 211–12 Toleration Act (1689) 51 Tools used in Stone Age 2, 5–7, 8, 10, 24 Toosey, Lt.-Col. Philip 236 Tolpuddle Martyrs 84, 85, 360 Tower Colliery 259–60 Toynbee, Arnold 61 Toyota 210, 211, 243 Trade unions 53, 84–5, 118, 120, 123, 127, 128, 130, 132, 157, 158, 166, 171, 187, 202, 208, 225, 226, 227, 231, 232, 243, 259, 266, 302, 310, 360 yellow dog contracts 130 Trades Union Congress (TUC) 269 Tragedy of the Commons 340 Tressell, Robert 281 Trevelyan, G.M. 60, 61, 358 Triangle Shirtwaist Company 131–2 Trollope, Anthony 108 Tulipomania 229, 304 Tullis Russell (paper manufacturer) 260 Twain, Mark 110

Index Twitter 308, 314, 341 Tyco 270 Tyler, Wat 36–7 Tyndall, William 39 Ulster Unionists 230 Unions see trade unions Union Cerrajer steel company 262 Union of Tiffin Box Suppliers 310 University of British Columbia 334 United Automobile Workers 227 Urwick, Lyndall 96, 361, 368, 375 Utopian societies New Harmony, Indiana 86, 88–91, 97, 98 New Lanark, Scotland 86, 87, 88, 92, 95–6, 122, 361 planned model villages as 98 Vatex 258 Venice ship yard 143 Victoria, Queen 134 Vikings 35, 48 Villeins 32 Vinci, Leonardo da 58, 60 Vintiki 156 Virginia Company 46 Visigoths 20, 33 Vitales, Morris 177 Voltaire 101, 113, 324 Volvo 242, 243 Vore, Irven De 8 Watson, Nora 214 Watt, James 63, 70, 81, 106, 139, 162 Weaving cottage workers and 75–6 fulling mills and 38 guilds and 38, 52–3 power looms and 70 in prehistoric period 7,10 Weber, Max xviii, xxi, 55, 219, 320, 321, 347, 352 Welch, Jack 248 Welles, Orson 299 Wells, H.G. xvii, 20, 290 Wenban-Smith, Francis 5 Wehgenroth, Ulrich 191 Werkbund 192–3 Wertheimer, Max 229 Westerman, William Lim 21 Western Electric 167, 168–71, 173, 174, 177, 185, 203, 206, 207, 209, 219, 220, 281, 369, 370

391

Dill Scott’s psychological testing at 168–9, 177 Hawthorne works of 164–6, 167, 207, 281 Weston, Edward Payson 186 Whistler, J.A. McNeill xx White, John 46 Whitney, Eli 100, 135 Whybrow, Peter 340 Wikipedia 314, 341 Wilberforce, William 82 Wilde, Oscar 300 William of Normandy 35–6 Williams, Whiting 131 Willis, Harold 148 Willstaetter, Richard 189 Wilson, Charles 226, 227 Wilson, Sloan 245 Wilson, W. 100 Windsor Castle 79 Winthrop, John 46 Women as executives 271–2 Hawthorne works research and 169–70 in hunter-gatherer societies 15 needleworkers 85 Triangle Shirtwaist Company fire and 131–2 Work ethic Japanese 211–13 Nazis and 192–3 Protestant xx, 20, 40–1, 47, 49, 55, 101, 107, 111, 113, 192–3 Work Foundation 211, Good Work Commission 330 Working hours 302–3, 335 WorldCom 270 World Trade Center, New York 327 Worman, Dianah 329 Wren, Sir Christopher 107 Wren, Daniel A. 174, 365, 367, 368, 370, 375 Wundt, Wilhelm 180, 181 Wycliffe, John 44 Yahoo! 313 Yerkes, Robert 185 Yir Yoront tribe, Australia 15, 353 York, Joseph 158 Zaibatsu companies 202 Zuckberg, Mark 314

3, 4, 8,