Human resources

“ This organization affords a unique medium for exhibition of new variations of human ingenuity and efficiency as well as perversity. These opportunities are embraced both by aggregations of capital on the one hand and by aggregations of labor on the other hand. ”

“ To the degree that governments faithfully exercise their legitimate public functions and refrain from interfering with legitimate private functions, they contribute to the Productive Process. This is demonstrated by observable Economic results. Wherever Government approximates a realization of its functions, Economic conditions are manifestly better than where it neglects or abuses them. Evidently, then, Government is a form of human service which, like all other human service forms, belongs as an Economic factor in the Labor category. ”

“ The part of income realized in a contractual organization of associated labour which is left after the allocation of resources for the satisfaction of the personal and common needs of the manager and workers and of the part of income accruing to the manager on account of the resource he has pooled in the organization, shall become social property. The workers, together with the manager, shall on the basis of their labour manage this part of income as social resources. ”

“ The constant development and concentration of the ownership and control of industry will be met by a like concentration of the number of industrial unions and industrial departments. It is meant that the organization at all times shall conform to the needs of the hour and eventually furnish the medium through which and by which the organized workers will be able to determine the amount of food, clothing, shelter, education, and amusement necessary to satisfy the wants of the workers. ”

“ This leads us to the third branch of industrial administration the settlement of the conditions under which the human beings are to be employed. The adoption of one material rather than another, the choice between alternative processes or alternative ways of organising the factory, the selection of particular grades of workers, or even of a particular foreman, may affect, for the worse, the Standard of Life of the operatives concerned. ”

“ Work was the foundation of the Organization—the work day, the work hour, the work minute. This was the basic commodity, the medium of exchange, the measure of social status. Work to pay off your tax debt. Work to climb the rungs on the ladder that led to freedom. ”

“ To all of the making and development of these social institutions the workers, and they alone, contribute their intellect and their manual labor. They have created the instruments to produce wealth with, and improved them as time rolled by.
These institutions are organized in their operative functions to yield profits for a few who never did, nor do, contribute to their making and maintenance, except in a manner to protect them in the possession of things that they did not make. ”

“ This great doctrine, originally brought forward as an argument against the indefinite improvability of human affairs, we took up with ardent zeal in the contrary sense, as indicating the sole means of realizing that improvability by securing full employment at high wages to the whole labouring population through a voluntary restriction of the increase of their numbers. ”

“ The time has come for a real economic organization of the workers, and that organization is now in the field and makes its appeal to all workers, and its principles and purposes deserve the encouragement, the support and the loyalty of every workingman who has intelligence enough to understand his best interests and manhood enough to assert and stand by them. ”

“ In the enterprises, the activities of which provide the basis for the creation and increase of social wealth, the working people cooperate directly in management with the assistance of their elected bodies. ”

“ A manager of a large manufacturing and selling organization made a study of the conditions affecting the prosperity of his organization. From his observations he deduced the principle that for him it is more important to increase the loyalty of the men to the organization than to reduce the apparent labor cost. ”

“ By steps so small, that year after year the industrial arrangements have seemed to men just what they were before—by changes as insensible as those through which a seed passes into a tree; society has become the complex body of mutually-dependent workers which we now see. And this economic organization, mark, is the all-essential organization. Through the combination thus spontaneously evolved, every citizen is supplied with daily necessaries; while he yields some product or aid to others. ”

“ He consolidates and harmonizes every branch of wage labor in the industry, until should he declare the present owners expropriated the industry would go along its accustomed course in the hands of the industrial organization without any shock or jar to the rest of us. ”

“ The working organization shall be assured a part of the created value of the product to expand the material basis of its work, proportionate to its share in producing the means of social economic growth, and in non-economic activities, a part consistent with the tasks of the working organization and in accordance with social needs. ”

“ The world has made great progress in this direction during the last fifty years, through voluntary organizations for prudent expenditure. The only limit to such community of organization for special purposes is in the nature of the work and the relation of the workers. ”

“ Thus, here, too, the central organ of the control of industry is composed of representatives of workers, and is supported by mass organisations of the working class and of the poorest elements of the peasantry. ”

“ Why, then, should not all stress be laid upon the organization of the workers on the industrial field?
The illustration used by our fellow worker in which he likens the economic organization to a one legged concern because it does not mention political action, is not a comparison that in any way fits the case. ”

“ And yet, my boy, there are many in the world, with larger responsibilities than yours are at present; think, for instance, of a great employer of labour who has to decide great things, affecting, perhaps, the welfare of both his employés and his business. ”

“ The workers’ control is carried out in practice in a certain order according to which control does not precede, but, on the contrary, follows the executive work.
6. Workers’ control is also to solve the problem of the gradual preparation of the large masses of the working class for direct participation in the matter of management and organization of industry. ”

“ Management in its dealings with labor should be imbued with the spirit of justice and fairness, and both out of ethical considerations and of economic, having in view the promotion of common interest, should pay great attention to the education and control of foremen, who are the agents coming in direct contact with the workmen and in general are the only officials whom the workman knows. ”

“ Will the present standards of management, skill, workmanship and factory discipline be improved? Will the consumers benefit? Will people save? i. e. Will sufficient fresh capital be forthcoming for the further developments of industry? ”

“ Those who are concerned with the establishment of a working basis for economic society must bear constantly in mind the purpose of economic organization—to provide livelihood on the most effective possible terms. The economic system is not called on to perform any other function. ”

“ But a further gain arises when the employments are of a kind which, in order to their effective performance, call for special capacities in the workman, or special natural resources in the scene of operation. There would be a manifest waste of special power in compelling to a mere mechanical or routine pursuit a man who is fitted to excel in a professional career; and similarly, if a branch of industry were established on some site which offered greater facilities to an industry of another sort, a waste, analogous in character, would be incurred. ”

“ In order to assure efficiency of labor, every wage earner working in an enterprise, establishment or institution (governmental, public or private) employing labor in the form of organized collaboration, as well as the administration of the enterprise, establishment or institution, shall strictly observe the rules of this article of the Code relative to standards of efficiency, output and rules of internal management. ”

“ The whole purpose of such an organization would be the attempt to develop efficient labor and prosperous laboring men, whereas the tendency of the existing organization is to associate the prosperity of the laboring man with the inefficiency of labor. ”

“ All work should be thoroughly supervised

and inspected so that employees know that good service will be recognized and rewarded.
The policy of filling all positions from the ranks seems growing in favor, since it gives certain hope for advancement and hence greater satisfaction with the present wage. ”

“ And for that disease there is no other remedy than the one I have told you of—the PUBLIC OWNERSHIP and cultivation of the land, the PUBLIC OWNERSHIP of the mines, railways, canals, ships, factories and all the other means of production, and the establishment of an Industrial Civil Service—a National Army of Industry—for the purpose of producing the necessaries, comforts and refinements of life in that abundance which has been made possible by science and machinery—for the use and benefit of the whole of the people. ”

“ When the managers of industry become responsible to Labor, Capital, and the Community for the manner in which their vast powers and opportunities are exercised, we shall have something in the government of industry closely resembling the responsible executive in the government of the State. ”

“ If industry is to progress, Capital must elevate its conception of the duties of the Administrative Staff and recognize that administration, even in its lowest branches, is work as skilled as that of an expert craftsman. ”

“ And the survival mechanisms which have been developed in recent decades, such as relatively stable employment relations, collective agreements, employee representation, employer-provided job training, and jointly funded social security schemes, may be sorely tested in a world where work crosses borders at the speed of light. ”

“ Production ought, therefore, to be regarded as the principal means of advancing the happiness, social welfare and material prosperity of the nation, and industry, the chief instrument in that beneficent work, as the highest and the noblest form of national service. ”

“ Finding that a strenuous effort was in progress to promote their physical and moral welfare, and that increased industry on their part would be rewarded by diminished hours of work, the assistants have become more attentive, the workrooms are better managed, and both parties, relieved from a system which was oppressive to all and really beneficial to none, have recognized the fundamental truth, that in no industrial pursuit is there any real incompatibility between the interests, rightfully interpreted, of the employer and the employed. ”

“ All regular citizens must be supplied with work if they desire it. If they cannot get employment from some firm or corporation, the government officials represented locally must supply it or its equivalent in money. The government controls enough of the business to employ two-thirds of the male population. ”

“ As I hinted before, in the new order of things all branches of labor will be organized, similar to the arrangements we see to day in large factories, large estates, or institutions of the government. Unnecessary work will be avoided and the reward for work done will be greater. ”

“ Capital and the Administrative Staff—Capital and the Manual Workers—The Manual Workers inter se—The Administrative Staff and the Manual Workers—Industry and the Consuming Community—Industry and the Nation.
Before we can construct any scheme of reform of our industrial system we must have a clear idea of what is industry. In the prosaic language of economics it is a purposive production of commodities and services, the immediate object of those engaged in it being to provide, through the result of their work, the material means of satisfying their wants and desires. ”

“ The economic power of the large enterprises, as compared with that of the individual employee, was such that wages and conditions of employment were pretty much what the employer decided they would be. ”

“ The enterprise would be under the direction of managers competent in technological processes, in the estimate of costs, and the organization of the work on a basis of productive efficiency. The working force would be a corps of young people who had received their elementary school certificates and their certificates for employment together with the necessary complement of adult workers for the successful development of the plant. The working force would be paid the market rate of wages. ”

“ It may be possible, indeed, that certain changes in the future, as the requirement of greater skill and efficiency in all kinds of labor, may make combinations in this class of occupations easier and more effective. Our domestic affairs, for instance, are constantly growing more complex, and require greater skill in their operation. ”

“ The organisation of Workers’ Control is a manifestation of the same healthy activity in the sphere of industrial production, as are party organisations in the sphere of politics, trade unions in employment, Cooperatives in the domain of consumption, and literary clubs in the sphere of culture. ”

“ When organized under the laws of the State and under by-laws designed to secure steady employment, rather than any artificial condition of things in regard to pay hours, and continuance of labor, the true interests of the workman will be advanced. It may be that some one of you will develop a talent in the direction of organization and be the means of aiding in the solution of this great problem. ”