The Principles of Scientific Management

President Roosevelt in his address to the Governors at the White House, prophetically remarked that ldquo;The conservation of our national resources is only preliminary to the larger question of national efficiency.rdquo;The whole country at once recognized the importance of conserving our material resources and a large movement has been started which will be effective in accomplishing this object. As yet, however, we have but vaguely appreciated the importance of ldquo;the larger question of increasing our national efficiency.rdquo; We can see our forests vanishing, our water-powers going towaste, our soil being carried by floods into the sea; and the endof our coal and our iron is in sight. But our larger wastes of human effort, which go on every day through such of our acts as are blundering, ill directed, or inefficient, and which Mr. Roosevelt refers to as a, lack of ldquo;national efficiency,rdquo; are less visible, less tangible, and are but vaguely appreciated."