Taylor s work was taking place in a time period when there was much industrial change happening after the Civil War.National industries grew out of local trades - steel, glass, textiles, and shoes and what were small factories became large plants.Owners of capital became wealthier with mass production ,and workers received little for their efforts.Problems included carelessness,safety, inefficiencies, and soldiering (worker foot dragging) on the job.Taylor sought to get past the futile incentive bonuses that management thought would remedy the problems.He believed that incentive wages were no solution unless they were combined with efficient tasks that were carefully planned and easily learned.He proposed that management should work cooperatively in a supportive role (Freedman 26 38).“Not only did Taylor have some definite ideas about work and how it should be studied, organized, and rewarded, but it appears he also knew something about organizational change”( Wredge and Greenwood 270 272) .
Ⅱ.Words and Expressions
curtail v.to make shorten than was at first planned 截短,缩短(讲话,假期, 节目等); 削减(经费等)slack a.be lazy or careless in one s work; having or showing little energy; dull; inactive; loose, not tight 懒散的, 清闲的,松弛的; 行动迟缓的, 有气无力的。
longshoreman n.man who works on shore ( on wharves, in dockyards, etc .) loading and unloading ships 码头装卸工人。
vengeance n.revenge; the return of injury for injury 报仇,报复clipboard n.带弹簧夹子的书写板。
discredit v.to cause people to lack faith in; loss of belief and trust 败坏??的名声;使不可置信。
year in and year out 一年一年地, 年复一年。
in large measure 很; 大半;大部分。
on and off ( or: off and on ) from time to time; now and again ;irregularly 不时; 断断续续地,间歇地。
do without If you do without something, you manage or survive in spite of not having it.没有也行。
have an edge 具有优势。
play into sb.s hands 为某人谋方便; 有利于某人。
Ⅲ.About the Text
1.Taylor s core values: the rule of reason, improved quality, lower costs,higher wages, higher output , labor-management cooperation, mutual help and support , stress reduction, and the careful selection and development of people.He was the first to present a systematic study of interactions among job requirements, tools, methods, and human skill, to fit people to jobs both psychologically and physically, and to let data and facts do the talkingrather than prejudice, opinions, or egomania .
2.The system he describes in his book is an actual composite of everything he had learned from trying different things at many companies.Taylor did what he could to fit as much of his thinking to his client s problems andmotives for each particular situation.He was the first person in history to make a systematic attempt to improve both output and worker life in factories .
Ⅳ.Notes to the Text
1.This sentence means only a person who suffers from mental disease would do the work from morning till night .
2.You can take your time to do the job while others attend to your work .
“Working on a job and off a job”as it is, more often than not , thought in America , is a fixed plan in one s career .
3.This sentence means“Since the bosses have no choice but profit, workers get the upper hand and they can do whatever they wish”.
4.This sentence means “An excellent worker in an important post could, if he didn t lower the production , have a rest as he pleases, and chances are that the bosses would pretend not to see it”.
5.This sentence means“ He could also shorten the working hours, make unremitting efforts and have production increase, and then you can ask for money more”.
6.The phrase“ with a vengeance.. .”used here is much more vivid and emphatic than“very hard”.
7.The author uses the expression“tell someone to go to hell”to show his great anger to such kind of readers .
8.The term“the Mr .Coffee machine”refers to“the machine used for making coffee”. “Mr.Coffee”originally is a brand for goods.This is a humorous usage .
9.The expression“taking a free ride”means“taking a bus without having to pay the money”. But in the passage, it only means“wanting to get more money without doing anything .”
10.The sentence means“If I want to get money without doing my work , how can I be so tired when I return home at the end of a day?”
Ⅴ.Text-Related Practice
A.Reading comprehension:
Decide whether each of the following statements is True or False .
1.Taking it easy is a way of the workman s compensation for the job he has to do repeatedly without any interest every day .
2.While enjoying great popularity among workmen, the attitude of“taking it easy”is disliked by management .
3.The workers are always expected to work more than they are willing to .
They feel that the money paid for their work is not equal to what they have done for the bosses .
4.If a good worker in an important position often takes long coffee breaks,it s very probable that the boss will stop employing him .
5.It s wise for a good worker to cut down on the coffee breaks, apply himself, and increase production , and then ask for and get more money .
Most workers would choose this working pattern .
6.Some longshoremen on the West Coast divide themselves into two groups and work in shifts.So they can work only four hours but get paid for eight hours .
7.While working on and off is getting popular among blue-collar workers, it never occurs among white-collar office workers .
8.An assembly line makes it impossible for a worker to do anything other than work .
9.Most people who do not have to work every day by the machine or loading and unloading cargo may feel a sense of moral outrage when they hear of people working on and off .
10 .The author of the text expresses a strong disapproval of working on and off .
B.Put in the missing information based on the text .
1.Some people may go mad if they are asked to tighten the same nut to thesame bolt hour after hour, , .
2.Most working people who labor in industry doing the same dull job all day long do not go mad because they can .
3. and rules are laid down by the management to limit the practice of working on and off .
4.The excessive amount of money created by workmen but kept by bosses is called .
5.Workers have an ; that is, workers have an advantage over bosses for the latter cannot do profit .
6.In order to be in a good position in the competition with others, a clever worker, instead of reducing his coffee breaks and asking for more money,would rather create and enjoy.
7.Some other office workers rob their bosses of their full-time services by spending too much time around or having on company time .
8.An assembly line makes workers do their jobs in .
9.Frederick W .Taylor conducted the studies which found a great deal of opposition from the workers because they thought the assembly line was reducing them to.
10.A campaign has been started by some employers to discredit the practice of working on and off with carefully chosen language, such as（）or（）