Planning

“ The man in the planning room, whose specialty under scientific management is planning ahead, invariably finds that the work can be done better and more economically by a subdivision of the labor; each act of each mechanic, for example, should be preceded by various preparatory acts done by other men. And all of this involves, as we have said, "an almost equal division of the responsibility and the work between the management and the workman." ”

“ The planning is taken away from the worker, not because it is something too choice, sacred or entertaining for him to do, or something which the managers desire to do themselves, but because it is best, for the workers themselves as well as the work, that the planning be done by specialists at planning. If he is expert enough to plan, the worker will be promoted to the planning department. ”

“ Some people think that we should be in a position to compare the different possible changes of our life in such a future society, based on planning, with, as it were, a comprehensive standard, composed of the standards which may be elaborated by the experts in the single fields. ”

“ Or, if he prefer to employ the ingenuity of others to do his planning,—which, by the way, is, in most cases, the more natural and better course,—he certainly should possess sufficient judgment to see that such plans be correct and will answer his purposes. ”

“ Careful, systematic planning in advance lightens immeasurably the burden of housekeeping, and, many a time, makes the actual work nothing but fun. Those who have tried the experiment of planning meals for the entire week are enthusiastic in praise of the system. ”

“ The Man Who Dislikes Planning Can Be Relieved. — It must not be forgotten that many people dislike the planning responsibility in connection with their work. For such, relief from planning makes the performance of the planned work more interesting and desirable.
Provision for Planning by All Under Scientific Management. — Much has been said about the worker's "God-given rights to think," and about the necessity for providing every worker with an opportunity to think. ”

“ Planning is becoming almost universal: planning as a war measure, planning as economists' anti-slump medicine, planning as a pleasure for architects and planning as a characteristic of the new pattern of our society.
The men responsible for the war effort, irrespective of their political opinions, found the traditional market insufficient in dealing with the war and therefore they organized a comprehensive control of production and consumption not only on a national but also on an international scale. ”

“ In order that planning may be done best, previous to starting work, the entire sequence of operations must be laid out, so that the ideas of value of every element of every subdivision of the process of working may be corrected to act most efficiently in relation with each and all of the subsequent parts and events that are to follow. This planning forwards and backwards demands an equipment of time study, motion study and micro-motion study records such as can be used economically only when all the planning is done in one place, with one set of records. ”

“ There is a distinct place for initiative in Scientific Management, but that place is not outside of the planning department, until the planning department's method has been proved to be fully understood by achieving it. The standards must be made by the men to whom this work is assigned, and they must be followed absolutely by the worker. ”

“ The Government shall draft planning projects in accordance with forecasts supplied by Self-governing Communities and with the advice and cooperation of unions and other professional, employers' and financial organizations. ”

“ Planning is conceived of as an indispensable tool for economic development. Traditionally, five-year and annual plans for all segments and aspects of the economy have been formulated by a central planning agency with the participation of economic ministries, trusts, and enterprises. Planning has proceeded from broadly defined goals set by the PCR to minute instructions for all economic enterprises. In line with the established priorities, the main planning effort has been devoted to industry. ”

“ City Planning: Most of our cities have grown up haphazard without any definite plan of development. As new industries have come in they have brought in large numbers of employees, who have had to be provided with living-places, and a new [Pg 128] section of the city has been started. ”

“ It's all right to plan your work; that's economy in mental expenditure, for it simplifies, systematizes, and saves work.
Planning is Efficiency.
Plan your work in advance, but do not keep [Pg 31] your mind on the plans until the work is done. When you have planned, then close the mental book of to-morrow's duty, and turn to pleasures, rest, relaxation and enjoyment of to-day.
It is to get a definite, different thought habit fixed that I ask you to give me these few minutes each day, so that we may consider various phases of life, science, pleasure, morals and mental refreshment. ”

“ Besides this, some people who are good at planning come to take so much pride and satisfaction in the thinking part of an enterprise that they do not feel the need for action. Moreover, you can "plan" in a large way, without bothering about details, but once you start to execute your plan you encounter details and preliminaries which are apt to rob the enterprise of its zest. ”

“ Nowadays we hear much about planning—town planning, city planning, nation planning. The elder and younger statesmen are going to see to it that we are well-housed, well-fed, suitably employed according to our abilities, and provided for in our old age. ”

“ Between pulling down and building up—both sensational processes, especially the former—there intervenes a sober time of planning and surveying, a quiet taking of information before entering on a new campaign of action. ”

“ In speaking of them I think I best express the youthful attitude which all of us concerned with national planning must maintain if our plans are to be of any use to ourselves, as well as to the generations to follow. ”

“ Economy of planning, in the sense of avoiding waste spaces, or saving the footsteps of the inmates, was not much studied. The only evidence we have of its consideration lies in the occasional lopping off of extravagant features, or the substitution of a reduced set of plans for one of more extensive area. ”

“ In fact there come times when it is obvious that something must be done and it is quite clear that however imperfect may be the science of town-planning and however liable it may be to fallibility in its methods of forecasting the future, that science must be called in to guide the measures for which necessity is clamorous. ”

“ I believe in planning for the future, for the centuries which are to come and for the many thousands of men, women and children who will reside within my gates and who will suffer in body, in mind and in worldly goods unless proper provision is made for their coming. ”

“ Of these other phases, that which seems most important to me in the long run is the problem of controlling by adequate planning the creation and distribution of those products which our vast economic machine is capable of yielding. ”

“ The scope and variety of step arrangement is, indeed, a matter that can only be realised by designers who have given it their study. As to practical points. In planning steps make the treads wide, the risers low. ”

“ These plans cost a great deal of thought and oftentimes much delay in beginning, but in the end they save both time and expense, and secure the most desirable results.
Plans for Building a House.
Every boy and girl should have a plan, for we are all builders. We build day after day and week after week, and year after year. First of all, you should have some great purpose in life, and then all your other plans and purposes should be made to further and help the great main object which you have in life. ”

“ It is important to get these three stages clearly outlined in our imaginations, and it is important also to bear in mind that each stage will smooth the path for its successor precisely in proportion to the sincerity and thoroughness with which it has been completed. There is but one goal for those who are honest and far-seeing. That goal is to create a condition of the world in which there shall be opportunity and security for the legitimate development of all Peoples. ”

“ Every hour brings additions to the original scheme, suggests some new expedient to secure success, or discovers consequential advantages not hitherto foreseen. While preparations are made, and materials accumulated, day glides after day through elysian prospects, and the heart dances to the song of hope.
Such is the pleasure of projecting, that many content themselves with a succession of visionary schemes, and wear out their allotted time in the calm amusement of contriving what they never attempt or hope to execute. ”

“ How do you arrange the details of your exposition? You attempt to convey to another person the plan of some large building. What arrangement is inevitable? How do books on sports explain the baseball field, the football gridiron, the tennis court, the golf links? When specifications for a building are furnished to the contractor, what principle of arrangement is followed? If an inventor gives instructions to a pattern-maker for the construction of a model, what plan does he follow? Would a man discussing drawings for a new house be likely to formulate his explanations on this scheme? ”

“ But the unredeemable fault, in his eyes, was the very magnitude and beauty of the plan. “The plan,” he wrote, “is fine, cleverly and grandly designed, but it is its very grandeur, its magnificence, which causes it to be nothing but a dream.” ”

“ It is, therefore, of vital importance that the worker be properly selected, in order that, in his advancement and promotion, he shall be able to achieve his task after having been put at the new work. He must be advanced and promoted in a definite line of gradual development, in accordance with a fully conceived plan. This should be worked out and set down in writing as a definite plan, similar to the plan on the instruction card of one of his tasks. ”

“ Plans for either kind of scheme, sufficiently well worked out to be dependable and to be clearly explanatory of the results to which they would lead—such plans, in other words, as the Managers should have before them at the time of reaching a definite decision in a matter of such importance and involving commitment to such large expenditures—can be prepared only with much study and labor. ”

“ When plans, calculated to be of general utility, are carried into execution with partial views, and upon interested motives, it is natural to attempt to confine, within some narrow circle, the advantages which might have been derived to the world at large, by an unreserved disclosure of all that had been effected. ”

“ But, when we have once formed the plan, and acted upon it often enough to remember its successive steps, so that we can repeat them in action by rote without any reference to the rationale, it becomes a plan ready formed in the mind, and the acting upon it becomes habitual. ”

“ It is wise, therefore, for all persons to devise a general plan, which they will at least keep in view, and aim to accomplish, and by which, a proper proportion of time shall be secured, for all the duties of life. ”

“ Implies a Plan, and that Plan embraces human Conduct.—If we suppose the supreme Being to be, not only a Creator and Ruler, but a wise and intelligent one, then we must suppose him to have some plan of operations. ”

“ Still farther away from the mere task is the effort that devises the plan; adjusts part to part, decides upon materials suitable for each part, establishes the ideal of excellence for every part and for the whole, and foresees its actual uses. ”

“ To make it an aim is to throw away the surest means of attaining it, namely attention to the full use of present resources in the present situation. Forecast of future conditions, scientific study of past and present in order that the forecast may be intelligent, are indeed necessities. Concentration of intellectual concern upon the future, solicitude for scope and precision of estimate characteristic of any well conducted affair, naturally give the impression that their [pg 267] animating purpose is control of the future. ”

“ Do not imagine that, Paul; construction, apart from certain branches of scientific and practical knowledge, which you will be able to study at leisure, is nothing but a method,—a habit of reasoning,—a compliance with the rules of common sense. ”

“ If the plan is founded on some peculiar notions of your own, which would enable you to succeed in it when others, who might also be interested in such a scheme, would probably fail, consider whether there may not be danger that your plan may be imitated by others who can not carry it into successful operation, so that it may be the indirect means of doing injury. ”

“ There is a Plan, an infinite, a just, a universal Plan, to which all things, mundane or otherwise, must, in the end, conform. To keep ourselves informed as to the part that we were meant to take in this great Plan, it seems to me, should be our constant study and our constant strong desire. ”

“ In outlining a plan of work, concerning which such inquiry is to be made, it has been found necessary, in the lack of formulated opinion by the Society, to make assumptions as to what should be its purpose and policy in undertaking exploration. ”

“ Our task is merely to examine the progress made, the manner of its making, the direction toward which it tends, with the aim, if possible, of adding to its speed. We have no new plan to offer, no gratuitous advice to give. The plan is already sketched out—God has sketched it; and our only aim is to see how man may cooperate with designs far higher than any proposed by human wisdom. ”

“ It is not to be presumed that the limited means on which we have had to commence will enable us to mature any practical plan of operation within a year or two; but the good work has been seriously commenced, and we have every ground for reasonable hope that it will go on and prosper. ”