Sanford E. Thompson
Sanford Eleazer Thompson (1867–1949) was an American
Education and early career
Thompson was trained as a civil engineer at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, graduating in 1889. He was initially employed in construction and hydraulic engineering before becoming an independent consultant from 1896 to 1917.[1]
He entered the United States Army Ordnance Corps as a lieutenant colonel in 1917.[1]
Work with F.W. Taylor and the time study
Thompson was a key ally of Frederick Winslow Taylor and was important in the development of Taylor's time studies, particularly in the building industry.[2]
To accompany Taylor's Harvard College lectures, Thompson delivered an advanced course on time studies.[3]
With Taylor, he co-wrote Concrete Costs (1912),[4] a goal of which was to distil different kinds of manual labor into comparable Unit Times data.[5]
Years later, Lyndall Urwick wrote of Thompson that 'To him belongs the credit for perfecting the "tool" of management, and to him is attributed the invention of the decimal-dial stop-watch.'[1]
Consultancy career
When peace returned, Thompson established another
He was president of the Taylor Society in 1932.[1]
During World War Two, Thompson acted as a consultant to the U.S.
Notes and references
- ^ a b c d e f Lyndall Urwick, The Golden Book of Management: A Historical Record of the Life and Work of Seventy Pioneers (1956)
- ^ Charles D. Wrege and Ronald G. Greenwood, 'Discovering Some of the Roots of Taylor's Shop Management: Taylor's Secret Six-Year Study of the Building Trades' Proceedings of the Midwest Academy of Management (1981)
- ^ Daniel Nelson, 'The Transformation of University Business Education' in A Mental Revolution: Scientific Management Since Taylor (1992) "Link" (PDF).
- ^ F.W. Taylor and Sanford E. Thompson, Concrete Costs (John Wiley & Sons, 1912). Online at Archive.org
- ^ Michael R. Weatherburn, 'Scientific Management at Work: the Bedaux System, Management Consulting, and Worker Efficiency in British Industry, 1914–48' (Imperial College PhD thesis, 2014). "Download PDF from Imperial College, London".
Further reading
- F.W. Taylor and Sanford E. Thompson, Concrete Costs (John Wiley & Sons, 1912)
- Lyndall Urwick, The Golden Book of Management: A Historical Record of the Life and Work of Seventy Pioneers (1956)
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