28 Mart 2008 Cuma


Henry Ford and Division Of Labor

Division of labour is the specialisation of cooperative labour in specific, circumscribed tasks and roles, intended to increase the productivity of labour. Historically the growth of a more and more complex division of labour is closely associated with the growth of total output and trade, the rise of capitalism, and of the complexity of industrialisation processes. Later, the division of labour reached the level of a scientifically-based management practice with the time and motion studies associated with Taylorism .The productivity gains of the division of labor are important within any type of production process, ranging from pin manufacture to software production to legal practice and medical care.The division of labor makes trade necessary and is the source of economic interdependence..

Henry Ford was the founder of the Henry Ford Motor Company which later became Cadillac and Ford Motor Company. He was the first person to implement the assembly line manifacturing tecnique to the mass production of the affordable automobiles.

In spite of the fact that he is known as the inventor of Ford automobiles, he has many inventories about automotive mechanisms. Actually his best remembered idea is the implementation of the factory assembly approach to the production which is a revolutionary step of the automobile industry because of the reducing time to assemble a car.

Ford grew up in an agricultural environment but he always had a big interest about how the things work and always had considered about the mechanisms of the machineries, he was became famous in his neighborhood for fixin the people’s wathes.

Henry Ford constructed his first steam engine at he age of 15 and then he started to work as amachinist at Detroit. Later he became a mechanical engineer and started to work witk Edison.In the following years he invented first internal combustion engine, a small one-cylinder gasoline model. However, Ford’s business adventure started by his invention of “the Quadricycle”(horseless carriage) which showed enough popularity that opened the doors of the business world to Henry Ford.

After leaving Edison in order to work for the newly developed Detroit Automobile Company that can only produce a few amount of cars Henry Ford decides to work for his own racing car. While his studies in Henry Ford Company he shought for incorporate ideas from different industries in order to make the production process more efficent. His own racing cars were good enough to attract backers and even partners, Ford Motor Company was founded on June 16, 1903.Soon his vision of producing automobile was understood to get bigger and bigger. During the first five years Ford used a development program that started in converted wagon shop.

Henry Ford’s consideration about the future of the car production was producing affordable cars for a mass market and in a great amount. In 1907, Henry Ford announced his goal for the Ford Motor Company: to create "a motor car for the great multitude." At that time, automobiles were expensive, custom-made machines. Ford's engineers took the first step towards this goal by designing the Model T, a simple, sturdy car, offering no factory options ( not even a choice of color). The Model T was inexpensive for its day, and proved to be sturdy, reliable and easy to operate. It quickly became very popular; and soon Ford found he was unable to meet the enormous demand for his cars.

Ford had a solution about in order to satisfy the demand. The idea was moving industrial production line. By installing a moving belt in his factory, employees would be able to build cars one piece at a time, instead of one car at a time. This principle, called "division of labor," allowed workers to focus on doing one thing very well, without being responsable for the different tasks at the same time. After the adaptation of labor division, his plant incorporated the first moving assembly line. In addition to the moving assembly line, Ford revolutionized the auto industry by increasing the pay and decreasing the hours of his employees, ensuring he could get enough and the best workers. (at that time Ford gives a wage of 5 dollars per day which is enormous at that time). Perhaps Ford Motor Company's single greatest contribution to automotive manufacturing was the moving assembly line. The new technique allowed individual workers to stay in one place and perform the same task repeatedly on multiple vehicles that passed by them. This innovation, although greatly increasing productivity, had resulted in a monthly labor turnover of 40 to 60 percent in his factory, largely because of the unpleasant monotony of assembly-line work and repeated increases in the production quotas assigned to workers. Ford met this difficulty by doubling the daily wage then standard in the industry, raising it from about $2.50 to $5.Ford considered the workers as “potential costumers” ( Ford gives a wage of 5 dollars per day which is an enormous amount at that time). Instead of constant turnover of employees, the best mechanics in Detroit flocked to Ford, bringing in their human capital, raising productivity, and lowering training costs. Ford called it “wage motive.”

Besides being a successful scientific business man Henry Ford dealed with politics but he was not very successful(during the World War 1 he tried to seek peace without ayn government support bu he became unsuccessful then he never ran political subjects)

The famous Ford Model T automobile ended production in 1927.. It is generally regarded as the first affordable automobile, and the car which "put America on wheels".

Henry Ford was the founder of the Ford Motor Company and father of the modern assembly line used in mass production. His introduction of the Model T automobile revolutionized transportation and American industry.


Mass Production Vision

Ford’s main aim was to produce cars in great amounts,at that time the automobiles were expensive and Ford’s engineers take the first step by producing very simple T models without any factory options and T models gained big interest, because from the start T model was cheaper than most of the cars.Ford then thought about the ways to produce the cars in a lower price. He and his team used the corporation of the different ideas which are: interchangeable parts, continuous flow, division of labor, and reducing wasted effort.

Interchangeable parts: The making of the individual part of the car the same at every time.This method increases the machinery while decreasing the necessity of high skilled worker.

Continuous flow of network: The production should be arranged so that one part of it finished than the next part of the production is started without losin any set up time. This could be done with a moving conveyor belt. By this way workers will spent time during production.

Division of labor: Each worker should be done only one part of the work. Assembly is divided into pieces.This increases the productivity.

Reducing waste effort: Ford studied with Frederick Taylor in order to achieve this principle. By making time studies and determining the exact speed at which the work should be done and the exact motions that workers should use to accomplish their tasks, the waste of the effort can be minimized.

Ford put these principles into play gradually over five years, fine-tuning and testing as he went along. In 1913, they came together in the first moving assembly line ever used for large-scale manufacturing. Ford produced cars at a record-breaking rate. That meant he could lower the price and still make a good profit by selling more cars.

Some Quotes From Henry Ford:
" When everything seems to be going against you, remember that the airplane takes off against the wind, not with it."
" Quality means doing it right when no one is looking."
"Failure is simply the opportunity to begin again, this time more intelligently
."

References:
1-http://www.ideafinder.com/history/inventors/ford.htm
2-http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Henry_Ford
3-http://quotes4all.net/authors/henry%20ford/quotes.html
4-
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Division_of_labor


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