IN WHAT WAYS IS 'POST-FORDISM' HELD TO DIFFER FROM 'FORDISM'

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IN WHAT WAYS IS 'POST-FORDISM' HELD TO DIFFER FROM 'FORDISM'

Henry Ford, (born 1863- died 1947) founded the Ford Motor Company in 1903. In 1908 the company initiated the production of the Model-T (of which the company sold 15million) It was the first car of its kind to built using a new type of production, Fordism involves the mass production of consumer durables which are made on moving assembly line techniques operated with the semi-skilled labour of the mass worker. Before cars were produced by hand which was both time consuming and very expensive. The actual physical production of the car was also a problem due to numerous parts involved, the Model T took only 12.5 hours per car to be built from start to finish, a build time which would have been impossible to sustain on a continuos basis before.

It was from this new process of the production line that Fordism took its name, he had come up with a way of producing cars that broke the overall production process down into hundreds and sometimes thousands of small, individualised, highly-specialised, parts. By introducing a complex division of labour, Ford reasoned (correctly) that costs could be lowered and profits increased. The production was a new way of thinking and doing, helped made possible by new advances in machinery.

Fordism, or Henry Fords new ideas of manufacture, came about as a solution to a problem, that of how to increase the amount produced and decrease the time needed to produce it. He saw the existing methods of production as being slow, laborious and inefficient. Previous to Fords new way of working, each worker had been highly skilled craftsman in his particular area of the manufacturing process. One of the key factors to the success of Fords new way of working was the breaking down and the simplification of the whole process of car manufacture and design. With the actual car itself he saw that the process of construction would be greatly complicated by having a wide range of components, so he standardised all of the various parts, including colour, all Model Ts were black. For example, a wheel builder would have had an intimate and detailed knowledge of the process and the skills needed in building a wheel. The construction of the wheel would have taken him much time but he would have seen it through form start to finish. Ford saw this process as being involved now in building with the worker being able to work to what ever speed he chose, as he was solely dependant upon him self to complete the task. Fords very simplified way of viewing society lead to him behaving in a way which limited his companies future growth development.

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Work tasks were simplified. By taking the skills and knowledge from his workers, Ford also took power. He was now able to regulate the rate of production. Production line workers now had to work to the speed of the man next him. Time and motion studies calculated the speed at which individual tasks were done, and than a standard was set. Time and motion studies were designed to ensure maximum efficiency on the production line and minimise waste. If workers didn't meet these standards

His factories were based around the idea of mass production on assembly lines. Everything was ...

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