any length all of the details which go toward making the system a
success. Some of them are of such importance as to render at least a
brief reference to them necessary. And first among these comes the study
of unit times.

This, as already explained, is the most important element of the system
advocated by the writer. Without it, the definite, clear-cut directions
given to the workman, and the assigning of a full, yet just, daily task,
with its premium for success, would be impossible; and the arch without
the keystone would fall to the ground.

In 1883, while foreman of the machine shop of the Midvale Steel Company
of Philadelphia, it occurred to the writer that it was simpler to time
with a stop watch each of the elements of the various kinds of work done
in the place, and then find the quickest time in which each job could be
done by summing up the total times of its component parts, than it was
to search through the time records of former jobs and guess at the
proper time and price. After practicing this method of time study
himself for about a year, as well as circumstances would permit, it
became evident that the system was a success.

The writer then established the time-study and rate-fixing department,
which has given out piece work prices in the place ever since.

This department far more than paid for itself from the very start; but
it was several years before the full benefits of the system were felt,
owing to the fact that the best methods of making and recording time
observations, as well as of determining the maximum capacity of each of
the machines in the place, and of making working tables and time tables,
were not at first adopted.