“What” is Frederick Winslow Taylor

Raising the issue of Taylor and his scientific management after less than a hundred years seems at first glance to be quite anachronistic. Today we are more likely to find Taylor’s works in antique shops than in the libraries of the schools of management. Has the memory of utilitarian and pragmatic managerial knowledge of a century back faded, or are we in a way ashamed of Taylor, the protagononist of management? How does the research into the origin and nature of management affect the efficiency of a particular manager, which seems to be the objective of management education? What is the difference between Taylor's management and contemporary management? Is it merely less scientific in approach? And where is modern management developing, if no longer in the field of exact science? And where do key notions of contemporary management, like ‘mission’ and ‘vision’ belong? Has management since its beginings proved to be only knowledge for managing organizations, or does it go beyond that? In a brief analysis of Taylor’s scientific management the author of the article tries to answer the above mentioned questions. Some of the questions are, however, only touched upon, awaiting an answer in the future.