Basic principles of the theory of production management and Gastev. Principles of notes according to gastev. Alexei Kapitonovich Gastev and his "last work of art"

A.K. Gastev (1882-1941), head of the Central Institute of Labor (CIT). The Institute was the largest and most productive research institute in the field of labor organization and management. A. Gastev wrote more than 200 monographs, brochures, articles. Under his leadership, the Institute has become a leading research, educational and practical center of Russia in the field of scientific organization of labor and management. The Institute combined a research, teaching and consulting institution, which was not yet even in Europe. Thus, A. Gastev and his associates managed to make one of the most valuable discoveries in the history of world organizational and managerial thought, namely, to formulate and test in practice the idea of a triune mechanism for the development of scientific management.

Aleksey Kapitonovich Gastev (1882-1941) - an outstanding Soviet theorist and practitioner of the scientific organization of labor and production management, a major public figure, poet. He is the author of over 200 monographs, brochures and articles. His main books are: Industrial World (Kharkov, 1919); Our tasks (M., 1921); The Revolt of Culture (Kharkov, 1923); Trade unions and labor organization (L., 1924); New cultural setting (M., 1924); Installation of production by the TsIT method (M., 1927); Rationing and organization of labor (M., 1929); Methodological prerequisites for the development, justification and classification of standards (M., 1933) and many others. others

In the eventful biography of A. K. Gastev, the brightest pages are associated with his activities as the founder and head of the Central Institute of Labor (CIT). The CIT, the main and favorite brainchild of A.K. Gastev, was formed in 1921 by merging two institutions: the Institute of Labor under the All-Union Central Council of Trade Unions and the Institute for the Experimental Study of Living Labor under the People's Commissariat of Labor.

In the activity of Gastev, first of all, attention is drawn to the scale in the formulation of labor issues. The entire scientific school of A.K. Gastev did not reduce them only to increasing labor productivity, improving quality, reducing costs, etc. For socialist production, the author and his colleagues at the institute believed that this was not enough. The problem is immeasurably more radical, for it consists in the complete organic reconstruction of the entire production structure and, above all, of the main productive force, the worker. The task, wrote A.K. Gastev, is how to restructure production so that in its very organizational technique there is a constant call for continuous improvement, continuous improvement both in production and in that limited field in which each individual leader works.

A. Gastev associated the solution of such a grandiose task with the development of the socialist science of labor and production management, designed to identify and formulate specific principles, as well as to develop methods of organizing labor that are immanent to the new type of economic basis and allow radically reorganize the labor process itself, which should turn into " from a heavy yoke for the worker" into a "positive creative process".

Such a complete reorganization of labor on a scientific basis cannot, however, take place automatically. Its implementation requires bold innovative searches, decisive experiments, which should be based on a comprehensively developed concept of the socialist organization of labor and production management. A. K. Gastev understood well (unlike researchers of a later time) that the process of forming such a concept cannot take place autonomously, away from the main road of world scientific thought. He believed that in order to create his own concept, it is necessary to critically rethink the theoretical achievements and practical experience accumulated in industrialized capitalist countries. The question of the need to study bourgeois science and the practice of organizing labor and management was interpreted by him from Leninist positions; he was equally disgusted by the obsequious attitude to the latest Western scientific systems, and the swaggering skepticism of individual Soviet economists (for example, O. A. Yermansky),

These initial assumptions formed the basis of all the activities of the CIT, which formulated its own concept of the scientific organization of labor and production management, original, original and at the same time sufficiently transformed and integrated all the most valuable finds of bourgeois organizational and managerial thought, primarily such of its “pillars” like F. Taylor, G. Ford, F. Gilbreth, G. Gang and others. The concept developed by the CIT team, called the concept of labor attitudes by A. K. movements in production processes and workplace organization; methodology of rational industrial training; theory of management processes. It is important to note that the CIT concept was multifaceted, it comprehensively covered the fields of engineering and technology, biology, psychophysiology, economics, history, and pedagogy. Moreover, it contained in its embryo the foundations of such sciences as cybernetics, engineering psychology, ergonomics, praxeology, which gained recognition and began to develop widely in subsequent years. It is no coincidence that the authors themselves called their concept "techno-bio-social">.

According to Gastev, NOT in its procedural and methodological part is based on the following elements: preliminary analysis of the object; decomposing it into components; choosing the best elements, which are then laid out in functionally interconnected rows; layout of the selected options according to the principle of their economical location in the labor process and, finally, on the general synthetic scheme of the object under study. A. K. Gastev proceeded from the fact that before changing one or another way of working, they must be carefully studied. This logic of scientific analysis has something in common with the schemes of theoretical constructions of F. Taylor and others, but has a more complete form.

A. K. Gastev proposed a research program for the organization of labor, which would be as close as possible to the needs of large-scale social production. Taking the standard as a specific form for a given production, he placed even higher the ability to quickly redesign production and all those skills that are associated with this production. The Gastevites raised the question not simply of developing an operation standard, they saw the most important thing in determining how an operation develops in its continuous improvement, starting from its most primitive execution and ending with the most rational one.

Of exceptional interest are the rules “How to work” proposed by A.K. Gastev, which have not lost their relevance and anticipated a number of praxeological ideas. “Whether we work,” he wrote, at the clerical table, whether we saw with a file in a locksmith’s workshop, or, finally, we plow the land, we must create labor endurance everywhere and gradually make it a habit.

These are the first basic rules for all labor.

1. Before undertaking work, it is necessary to think through it all, think it over so that the model of the finished work and the whole order of labor methods are finally formed in the head. If it is impossible to think through everything to the end, then think over the main milestones, and think through the first parts of the work thoroughly.

2. Do not get down to work until all the working tools and all the devices for work have been prepared.

3. At the workplace (machine, workbench, table, floor, ground) there should not be anything superfluous so as not to poke around in vain, not to fuss and not look for the necessary among the unnecessary.

4. All tools and devices must be laid out in a certain, if possible, once for all established order, so that you can find it all at random.

5. You should never take on work abruptly, immediately, do not break away, but go into work gradually. The head and the body will disperse and work on their own; and if you start right away, then soon you will, as they say, “slaughter” yourself, and you will “lock up” your work. After a steep initial impulse, the worker will soon give up: he himself will experience fatigue, and will spoil the work.

6. In the course of work, sometimes it is necessary to fit hard: either in order to master something out of the ordinary, or in order to take something together, in an artel. In such cases, you don’t have to lean right away, but first you need to adjust, you need to adjust your whole body and mind, you need to recharge, so to speak; then you need to try it a little, find the required strength, and after that, fit in.

7. It is necessary to work as evenly as possible so that there is no ebb and flow; rash work spoils both the person and the work by attacks.

8. The position of the body during work should be such that it would be convenient to work, and at the same time, forces would not be wasted on completely unnecessary keeping the body on its feet. If possible, work while sitting. If it is impossible to sit, the legs should be kept apart; so that the leg put forward or to the side does not break away, it is necessary to arrange a fortification.

9. During work, it is necessary to rest. In hard work, you need to rest more often and, if possible, sit; in light work, rest is rare, but even.

10. During the work itself, you should not eat, drink tea, drink in extreme cases only to quench your thirst; do not smoke, it is better to smoke during work breaks than during the work itself.

11. If the work does not work, then do not get excited, but it is better to take a break, change your mind and apply again quietly again; even deliberately slow down to endure.

12. During the work itself, especially when things are not going well, it is necessary to interrupt the work, put the workplace in order, diligently put the tools and materials, sweep away the rubbish and start working again and again gradually, but evenly.

13. It is not necessary to break away from work for another matter, except for the necessary R for the work itself.

14. There is a very bad habit, after the successful completion of the work, immediately show it; here it is imperative to “endure”, so to speak, get used to success, crush your satisfaction, make it internal, otherwise, in case of failure, the will will be “poisoned”, and the work will become disgusting.

15. In case of a complete failure, one should look at the matter lightly and not get upset, start working again, as if for the first time, and behave as indicated in the 11th rule.

16. At the end of the work, everything must be tidied up; and work, and tool, and workplace; put everything in a certain place, so that when you start working again, you can find everything and so that the work itself does not disgust.

The main thing is that the studies of movements were accompanied by the search for methods of activating the abilities of the worker.

The main merit of Gastev lies in the development of theoretical and experimental ideas of a new science - social engineering (social engineering), which combines the methods of natural sciences, sociology, psychology and pedagogy. Under his leadership, dozens of enterprises introduced innovative methods of organizing labor and production. More than 500,000 skilled workers, thousands of management consultants and NOTs have been trained according to the CIT methods. His contribution to the development of the ideas of cybernetics and general systems theory is significant.

O.A. Ermansky Management and management Japanese management Interpretation of practice and theory of management (management)

Aleksey Kapitonovich Gastev (1882-1941) - an outstanding Soviet theorist and practitioner of the scientific organization of labor and production management, a major public figure, poet. He is the author of over 200 monographs, brochures and articles. Here are just a few of them: Industrial World (Kharkov, 1919); Our tasks (M., 1921); The Revolt of Culture (Kharkov, 1923); Trade unions and labor organization (L., 1924); New cultural setting (M., 1924); Installation of production by the TsIT method (M., 1927); Rationing and organization of labor (M., 1929); Methodological prerequisites for the development, justification and classification of standards (M., 1933) and many others. others

Biography of A.K. Gasteva is most associated with his activities as the founder and head of the Central Institute of Labor (CIT). CIT is the main and favorite brainchild of A.K. Gastev, was formed in 1921 by merging two institutions: the Institute of Labor under the All-Union Central Council of Trade Unions and the Institute for the Experimental Study of Living Labor under the People's Commissariat of Labor.

The formation of the CIT is closely connected with the name of V.I. Lenin. So, after a personal conversation with A.K. Gastev, he sent a letter to the Narkomfin with the following lines: “I would like to help Comrade Gastev, head of the Institute of Labor. He needs to buy 0.5 million gold. Of course, we can't do that now... Think about it, find out more precisely and try to get him a certain sum. All the same, even in a difficult situation, we must support such an institution.

The Presidium of the All-Union Central Council of Trade Unions, which appointed A.K. Gastev as the head of the CIT, was not mistaken in his choice. Chairman of the All-Union Central Council of Trade Unions M.P. Tomsky, who always ardently and consistently defended the CIT from the attacks of A.K. Gastev, who did not share his ideas, would say after three years: “I am proud ... that the CIT is our brainchild, and I consider all the merits in this regard to A.K. Gastev". Under the leadership of A. Gastev, the Institute has become a leading scientific, rationalization and training center of the country in the field of labor organization.

In the activity of Gastev, first of all, attention is drawn to the scale in the formulation of labor issues. The entire scientific school of A.K. Gasteva did not reduce them only to increasing labor productivity, improving quality, reducing costs, etc. For socialist production, the author and his colleagues at the institute believed, this is not enough. The problem is immeasurably more radical, because it consists in a complete organic reconstruction of the entire production structure and, above all, the main productive force - the worker. The task is, wrote A.K. Gastev, how to restructure production so that in its very organizational technique there is a constant call for continuous improvement, continuous improvement both in production and in that limited field in which each individual leader works.

A. Gastev associated the solution of such a grandiose task with the development of the socialist science of labor and production management. The process of labor, which should turn "from a heavy yoke for the worker" into a "positive creative process."

Such a complete reorganization of labor on a scientific basis cannot, however, take place automatically. Its implementation requires bold innovative searches, decisive experiments, which should be based on a comprehensively developed concept of the socialist organization of labor and production management. A.K. Gastev was well aware (unlike researchers of a later time) that the process of forming such a concept cannot take place autonomously, away from the main road of world scientific thought. He believed that in order to create his own concept, it is necessary to critically rethink the theoretical achievements and practical experience accumulated in industrialized capitalist countries. The question of the need to study bourgeois science and the practice of organizing labor and management was interpreted by him from Leninist positions; he was equally disgusted by the obsequious attitude to the latest Western scientific systems, and the swaggering skepticism of individual Soviet economists (for example, O.A. Yermansky),

The entire activity of the CIT was based on its own concept of the scientific organization of labor and production management, original, original and at the same time sufficiently transformed and integrated all the most valuable discoveries of bourgeois organizational and managerial thought, primarily such of its "pillars" as F. Taylor , G. Ford, F. Gilbreth, G. Gang and others. The essence of the studies named by A.K. Gastev's concept of labor attitudes included three main, organically interrelated areas: the theory of labor movements in production processes and the organization of the workplace; methodology of rational industrial training; theory of management processes. This technique was multifaceted, it comprehensively covered the fields of engineering and technology, biology, psychophysiology, economics, history, and pedagogy. Moreover, it contained in its embryo the foundations of such sciences as cybernetics, engineering psychology, ergonomics, praxeology, which gained recognition and began to develop widely in subsequent years. It is no coincidence that the authors themselves called their concept "techno-bio-social".

It is extremely interesting to compare the Zitov concept with the most striking and popular teachings of that period by F. Taylor and G. Ford (A.K. Gastev maintained regular correspondence with the latter). What are the common elements of these interpretations? What separates them?

The general can be seen both in relation to theoretical organizational principles, and in a number of specific approaches.

Tradition and routine are replaced by scientific research. Subjectivism and techniques give way to a system of rational methods, but the usual forms and methods of work and the adherents of these forms and methods encountering desperate resistance. The specificity of the concept of NOT A.K. Gastev saw precisely in the research moment. He considered NOT as a scientifically organized rationalization based on strictly accounted experience, "requiring constant research of production or labor processes" as opposed to the then prevailing empirical, semi-intuitive, or, as he calls it, "handicraft" method, which is a guess without special calculations. .

According to Gastev, NOT in its procedural and methodological part is based on the following elements: preliminary analysis of the object; decomposing it into components; choosing the best elements, which are then laid out in functionally interconnected rows; the arrangement of the selected options according to the principle of their economical location in the labor process and, finally, on the general synthetic scheme (drawing) of the object under study. A.K. Gastev proceeded from the fact that before changing one or another way of working, they must be carefully studied. This logic of scientific analysis has something in common with the schemes of theoretical constructions of F. Taylor and others, but has a more complete form.

The second point that unites the Zitov concept with the systems of Taylor and Ford is the struggle for the maximum increase in the productivity of each individual (even the smallest) element of the production complex: an increase in the return of each machine tool, mechanism and each worker. At the same time, A.K. Gastev proceeds from the principles, according to which the best (optimal) methods of work must be found and applied at any production site.

The third common point - the scientific study of the material and personal factors of production is predominantly laboratory in nature and ends with experimental testing of the solutions found. The fourth point of contact is the preliminary calculation and preparation of all factors of production in time and space, ensuring maximum acceleration and compaction of production processes. Finally, the fifth unifying moment is changes in the qualification groupings of personnel with a pronounced tendency to limit the functions of the bulk of workers to narrow special tasks (based on an in-depth division of labor) and the simultaneous strengthening of the organizational role of lower and middle administrative and technical personnel, the introduction of briefing and various organizational devices.

The center of gravity of Taylorism lies in the plane of the shop organization of labor, the main components of which are timing, instruction, and a differential system of remuneration. Taylor's organizational initiatives led him to the idea of the expediency of reconstructing production management, based on the creation of a settlement and distribution bureau - the headquarters of the enterprise. All these elements of Taylor's system can also be successfully applied under socialist conditions. As for Fordism, it is primarily interesting for its approaches to the organization of production, the defining features of which are: the continuity of processing processes, the maximum division of labor, the mechanization of work and transport processes up to conveyorization, the disposal of all production waste, etc.

Unlike Taylorism and Fordism, the concept of A.K. Gastev is the concept of a truly socialist organization of labor. The bourgeois systems of NOT are completely alien to the defining idea that forms the foundation of the Gastev concept - the idea of "socialization of the labor process", the idea of the decisive role of the human factor.

A.K. Gastev, offers a real way out. In his opinion, it is more accurate to speak not about the a priori norm and social conservatism of the worker to everything new, but about creating the necessary psychological and general biological fitness for him to constantly improve both the operation and the method, which is expressed in the art of accelerating the work itself. To do this, first of all, it is necessary to develop a methodology that would cover the entire personnel of the workers of the enterprise and would serve as a general methodological guide for their introduction into production. Despite the fact that everyone at their workplace is, first of all, an exact executor of a rigid instruction card, A.K. Gasteva, however, provided for a fairly wide range and the possibility of displaying the freedom of personal initiative to change such a norm or standard.

A.K. Gastev proposed a research program for the organization of labor, which would be as close as possible to the needs of large-scale social production. Taking the standard as a specific form for a given production, he placed even higher the ability to quickly redesign production and all those skills that are associated with this production. The researchers raised the question not just about the development of an operation standard, they saw the most important thing in determining how an operation develops in its continuous improvement, starting from its most primitive execution and ending with the most rational one.

Methodists A.K. Gastev made a huge step forward compared to F. Taylor, H. Ford and bourgeois science in general, applying a fundamentally different approach to assessing the worker himself, believing that he is not only an object of study, but at the same time a creative subject, whose worldview largely predetermines the possibility of increasing the productivity of his labor. In contrast to the Taylor school and other systems that did not pay due attention to the psychophysiological problems of labor, while studying the geometry and energy of labor movements, in order to ensure the highest efficiency and exclude all unnecessary movements, the ZIT people did not lose sight of the person himself, all that regarding his health and working conditions. The most important aspect of the entire NOT, they believed, is to thoroughly study both the “living machine” itself (the human body) and all the conditions that affect its functioning.

They adhered to the position of an active attitude to the psycho-physiological capabilities of a person, resolutely rejecting the approach to them as something “frozen”, given once and for all. From this, it was concluded that it was necessary to constantly train the physical and mental abilities of workers, such, in particular, as observation (education of the senses, especially the eyes and ears), will, motor culture (mobility, speed of reaction), fine arts (the ability to accurately display the phenomenon in a word, writing, schedule), regimen (accounting for time consumption), etc. All this, according to A.K. Gastev and his colleagues, will make it possible to maximize the human factor and at the same time save the strength and health of workers, economically spending their energy.

Of exceptional interest are the rules “How to work”, which have not lost their relevance and anticipated a number of praxeological ideas, proposed by A.K. Gastev. “Whether we work at the office table, whether we saw with a file in a locksmith's workshop, or, finally, we plow the land - everywhere we need to create labor endurance and gradually make it a habit.”

Here are the first basic rules for any work according to the method of A.K. Gastaeva:

2. Do not get down to work until all the working tools and all the devices for work have been prepared.

4. All tools and devices must be laid out in a certain, if possible, once for all established order, so that you can find it all at random.

6. In the course of work, sometimes it is necessary to fit hard: either in order to master something out of the ordinary, or in order to take something together, in an artel. In such cases, you don’t have to lean right away, but first you need to adjust, you need to tune your whole body and mind, you need to recharge, so to speak; then you need to try it a little, find the required strength, and after that, fit in.

7. It is necessary to work as evenly as possible so that there is no ebb and flow; rash work spoils both the person and the work by attacks.

9. During work, it is necessary to rest. In hard work, you need to rest more often and, if possible, sit; in light work, rest is rare, but even.

10. During the work itself, you should not eat, drink tea, drink in extreme cases only to quench your thirst; do not smoke, it is better to smoke during work breaks than during the work itself.

11. If the work does not work, then do not get excited, but it is better to take a break, change your mind and apply again quietly again; even deliberately slow down to endure.

13. It is not necessary to break away from work for another matter, except for what is necessary in the work itself.

15. In case of a complete failure, one should look at the matter lightly and not get upset, start working again, as if for the first time, and behave as indicated in the 11th rule.

Thus, if Taylor, Ford and other bourgeois leaders of the NOT solved the problems arising within its framework by methods that were predominantly technical, technological and narrowly administrative in nature, then Gastev and his colleagues advocated a new work culture that would be worthy of the “coming electrification”. Unlike Taylor and Ford, who focused on the issues of organizing the work of the shop and enterprise, CIT put the individual workplace at the forefront. Only on the basis of a radical reconstruction of this primary cell of the enterprise, the CIT goes further and builds its own model of the rational organization of the workshop, enterprise and other formations of higher levels of the hierarchy. The scheme of scientific research is built in the following order: from a microanalysis of movements, techniques, operations carried out by an employee at the workplace, to a macroanalysis of the enterprise as a whole.

The main thing, as already noted, in the concept of A.K. Gastev is not in itself the search for rational labor movements, although they occupied a significant share in the CIT research program. This is exactly what the numerous and severe opponents did not understand, who caustically sneered on this occasion, as the reader will see from the article by A.K. Gastev “2nd Conference on NOT and CIT”. The main thing is that the studies of movements were accompanied by the search for methods of activating the abilities of the worker, new methods of work.

In 1924, under the leadership of A.K. Gastev at the institute formulated an installation (engineering) method of teaching with the strictest dosage of knowledge. The work on creating a methodology for rapid and mass training in labor techniques and operations was carried out in a comprehensive manner, it was accompanied by a number of laboratory studies and experiments in the field of biomechanics, energy, psychotechnics, etc. This technique made it possible to prepare a highly qualified worker in 3-6 months, while in the schools of trade and educational institutions it took 3-4 years. The CIT was tasked to train 10,000 workers with its own methods within a year. The cost of training these workers was determined at 1.2 million rubles. The training of the same number of workers in FZU schools would cost 24 million rubles. The decisive significance of the CIT methodology lies in the fact that it contributed to the solution of an extremely topical issue for the national economy - the accelerated mass training of personnel. It is difficult to overestimate the merit of the institute staff in solving this issue.

It is extremely important to note that A.K. Gastev extended not only to production processes. In his opinion, it is designed to cover the general culture of people. The staff of the institute has invented ingenious ways to implement the methodology of installations. The first experimental station was created at Tsentrosoyuz. CIT organized courses for industrial administrators, training courses for future production instructors, who were to become the creators of new, more advanced installations at the enterprises and distribute them to all workers.

In 1927, the CIT, on the initiative of A.K. Gasteva creates a joint-stock company - the "Ustanovka" trust, whose purpose is to be an intermediary between the institute and enterprises in the preparation of the workforce and the introduction of NOT methods. The experience of this trust is still of great interest today. He trained hundreds of thousands of workers, tens of thousands of production instructors according to the Zitov methods. The teaching methodology developed by the institute's staff opened up broad prospects for reforming not only the outdated system of vocational education, but also the entire public education as a whole.

The following fact is curious. The scientific community within the country met the concept of A.K. Gastev and his colleagues. Some workers in the field of NOT expressed complete delight, others showed a wary interest, or a frownful attitude, in the third, who made up the majority, it caused a paroxysm of rejection. The situation was different abroad. In the summer of 1924 A.K. Gastev leads the Soviet delegation to the First International Congress on NOT in Prague, and there CIT methods are universally recognized.

A. Gastev expressed the idea: "... the worker who controls the machine is the director of the enterprise, which is known under the name of the machine (machine-tool)." Thus, he approaches management issues from the point of view of the workplace, extending the findings to the management of production, and even the state. The fact that such an approach is fruitful, the author was able to convincingly prove by identifying a number of functions that are inevitably performed by any worker at any workplace, understanding by the latter both the machine tool and the plant as a whole. These functions, which take the form of a continuous series, are, in his opinion, "calculation - installation - processing - control - accounting - analysis - systematics, calculation - installation." Applying this formula to both the worker and the administrator, A. Gastev, in essence, extended it both to the management of things (direct production) and to the management of people. Thus, the author showed a certain commonality of production and management processes, anticipating a number of cybernetic and praxeological ideas of the identity of various types of activity.

A. Gastev slowly climbs these peaks with his difficult “narrow” path, carefully looking at reality, constantly comparing his theoretical positions with it, making practically valuable conclusions along the way.

Of course, one cannot fail to notice some underestimation of the importance of an independent consideration of the problems of managing people, which the author dissolves in managing things. Having shown the commonality of managerial and production processes, he did not at all set the task of showing the differences between them. In other words, these were the years of “clearing the soil”, creating favorable conditions for the development of science.

A.K. Gastev clearly sees the complexity and versatility of the problem of labor organization and management, highlighting several important aspects in it: technical, psychophysiological, pedagogical, economic. True, the economic aspect is still far from leading for the author; he gives clear preference to technical issues, as well as psycho-physiological and pedagogical ones. At the same time, he was able to correctly single out some of the most important tasks of economic science in the organizational sphere, believing that until now its scientific conclusions about labor had been highly abstract. “In this science, the method of concrete accounting was too limitedly applied, its working methodology was too far from the retort of measures and weights. Meanwhile, now we are faced with the task of giving, although in a limited area, strictly shaded conclusions. The author sees the economic aspect of notovskaya, including managerial, problems primarily in the development of the issue of "economic incentives for labor", and, and this is extremely important to note, not only physical, but also organizational. It is here, he emphasizes, that little has been done. However, the most important is the thought of A. Gastev about a science that is different from those listed. “The problems just presented,” writes the author, “...make it possible to raise the question of a completely new science...” And this science - the science of labor and management - A. Gastev thought of as synthetic. The author has not yet been able to solve the problem of synthesis, the problem of the interaction of individual aspects, but the very fact of raising the question of a complex, “completely new” science is, in our opinion, of historical significance for the development of control theory. This science, in the terminology of A. Gastev - "social engineering", should become the science of precise measurements, formulas, drawings, mathematizing all economic, psychophysiological and other problems. Unfortunately, and at the present time it is sometimes forgotten that the formalization of the sphere of social phenomena, to which the management of production belongs, has very limited limits.

Realizing that the science of the organization of production and management is at the very initial stage of formation, A. Gastev made an attempt to identify its most important methodological problems. Among them, he primarily attributed the problem of developing rigorous scientific definitions of the main components of the organization of the production process, because "the maturity of any science can establish the existence of a certain number of basic definitions." The theory of organization and management, of course, did not yet have such clearly formulated definitions of categories and concepts. Among these problems, further, is the problem of laws, since the science of organization and management must study "the laws of social mechanics and social administration." The establishment of such laws is therefore the most important task of science at all stages of its development, including the modern one. Unfortunately, even now the laws of control are revealed very poorly. In this regard, A. Gastev's division of the laws studied by the science of organizing production and management into two large groups is of undeniable scientific interest: analytical laws, i.e. organizational tendencies to split the production process into limited acts, and synthetic laws, i.e. tendencies towards the direct linking and complex composition of these acts into organizational units. It seems that this most progressive, but apparently firmly forgotten idea of A. Gastev should finally be used today in the methodological substantiation of the laws governing the management of social production, of course, on a new, higher scientific basis. Summarizing as a whole, we note that, despite some inaccuracies, the author formulated a very original interpretation, one of the first to incorporate the rudiments of an integrated approach to control theory. Achievements of A.K. Gastev are undoubted, and, repeating the well-known thought of Academician A.I. Berg, we can say that we will learn a lot by referring to the legacy of this pioneer of the Soviet science of production management, the leader of a renowned scientific team, and the ideological inspirer of the Tsitov concept.

Undoubtedly, Aleksey Kapitonovich Gastev was the leader of the domestic science of management and NOT in the 1920s. , tragically died during the Stalinist repressions. A.K. Gastev (1882–1941), economist, sociologist, was an active figure in the revolutionary and labor movement in Russia. He graduated from the city school and technical courses in Suzdal, entered the Moscow Teachers' Institute, from where he was expelled for political activities, was repeatedly arrested and exiled, until 1917 he was in an illegal position. During this period, he emigrated to France, where he studied at the Higher School of Social Sciences (Paris) and worked in factories. Gastev has not only revolutionary, but huge production experience behind him: a locksmith at factories in Russia and France, and after October - one of the leaders at enterprises in Moscow, Kharkov and Gorky, and finally, in 1917-1918 secretary of the Central Committee of the All-Russian Union of Metalworkers. He is also known as a poet, his literary work was highly appreciated by V.V. Mayakovsky and A.V. Lunacharsky. Gastev was one of the theorists and leaders of the proletarian movement.

Gastev headed the Central Institute of Labor (CIT). The Institute was the largest and most productive research institute in the field of labor organization and management. A. Gastev wrote more than 200 monographs, brochures, articles. Under his leadership, the Institute has become a leading research, educational and practical center of Russia in the field of scientific organization of labor and management. The Institute combined a research, teaching and consulting institution, which was not yet even in Europe. Thus, A. Gastev and his associates managed to make one of the most valuable discoveries in the history of world organizational and managerial thought, namely, to formulate and test in practice the idea of a triune mechanism for the development of scientific management.

The main merit of Gastev lies in the development of theoretical and experimental ideas of a new science - social engineering(social engineering), which combined the methods of natural sciences, sociology, psychology and pedagogy. Under his leadership, dozens of enterprises introduced innovative methods of organizing labor and production. More than 500,000 skilled workers, thousands of management consultants and NOTs have been trained according to the CIT methods. His contribution to the development of the ideas of cybernetics and general systems theory is significant.

Gastev and the staff of the institute understood that in conditions of extreme ruin and complete cut off from the entire cultural world, they were expected to give practical instructions on how to plan production, stimulate labor, how to work effectively in a specific situation in order to restore the country's industry. However, according to A. Gastev, the problem facing the country was much more radical, because it required a complete organic reconstruction of the entire production structure and, above all, the main productive force - the worker.

The CIT associated the solution of this grandiose task with the development of the science of labor and production management, which was supposed to identify and formulate principles, as well as develop methods of organization that would radically transform the labor process from a heavy yoke for workers into a positive creative process. A. Gastev was convinced that in order to create his own theory, it is necessary to critically rethink the theoretical achievements and practical experience accumulated in industrialized countries: the scientist considered equally unacceptable not only an obsequious attitude to the latest Western scientific systems, but also an absolute rejection of this knowledge. In this regard, it can be noted that the ideological postulates of the CIT were formed as an original, original, but at the same time absorbing all the most valuable Western management thought (primarily F. Taylor) concept. It covered in a complex the spheres of engineering and technology, biology, psychophysiology, economics, history, pedagogy, and also contained the rudiments of such sciences as cybernetics, engineering psychology, ergonomics, which were widely developed and disseminated in subsequent years. It is no coincidence that the authors themselves called their concept technobiosocial.

"Social Engineering" by A.K.Gastev

Undoubtedly, A.K. Gastev was the leader of the domestic science of management and NOT in the 1920s. From 1921 to 1938 he headed the Central Institute of Labor (CIT) in Moscow.

The main merit of Gastev lies in the development of theoretical and experimental ideas of a new science - social engineering ("social engineering"), which combined the methods of the natural sciences, sociology, psychology and pedagogy. Under his leadership, dozens of enterprises introduced innovative methods of organizing labor and production, more than 500 thousand skilled workers, thousands of management consultants and NOTs were trained according to the CIT methods. His contribution to the development of the ideas of cybernetics and general systems theory is significant. Gastev's developments have received worldwide recognition; they are being studied in the USA, England, France and other countries.

The industrial revival of Russia, according to Gastev, is inseparable from the cultural revolution. The concept of labor education and cultural attitudes involves the destruction of the "spontaneous licentiousness" of a person, which begins with Gastev's physical and everyday culture - a rational daily routine, proper nutrition, rest and movement, then is fixed in the socio-psychological culture of behavior, the art of owning oneself and one's emotions , relationships, and results in the rise of the general culture of production. The work culture begins with a gradual getting used to a single pace sustained throughout the day. Labor endurance is best formed during the work of the operating room and more difficult - during the editing, non-repeating or having a ragged rhythm.

The initial stage of the manager's labor training is performing work, simple "obedience, for only here is it checked what a person is capable of." Only after passing the school of organizational and managerial activity can an employee be allowed to take on more complex, planning functions.

Gastev requires a creative approach to the most mundane things. In production, it is not the machine itself that is important, but the installation on it, that is, the focus on constant, everyday design, invention. In order to infect the working masses with the "relentless demon of invention," it is necessary to develop and implement an effective system of methods for attracting workers to management. It is they, as well as the daily attention from the administration (training, assistance) that will create the preconditions for the worker to think about his every movement and technique, to be able to understand his "anatomy" and device.

One of the specific tools for educating NOT in everyday life was Gastev's chrono-card, that is, a kind of accounting document for recording the time budget. Statistical processing of registration cards collected from the population, according to Gastev's plan, will help to establish the degree of his socialization, and their systematization - the main social groups ("worker, director, student, peasant, red warrior") according to the nature and method of using their time.

In the work "Installation of production by the CIT method" (1927), Gastev put forward the task of NOT - to build a modern enterprise as a huge social laboratory. To do this, it is necessary to create a new science - the science of social restructuring of enterprises. Hence, social engineering as a scientific and applied method that solves a complex problem in the "machine-man" system. In its most general form, the implementation program consisted of the following:

1) scientific definition of the initial elements of the production process;

2) the same in relation to the labor process;

3) establishing the laws of the anatomy of the production process;

4) analysis of the laws of production - the division of the process and the division of labor;

5) the synthesis of these laws - the combination of compositions and labor cooperation;

6) the genesis of forms of production;

7) "labor technology" of professions in accordance with these forms;

8) formation of attitudes of employees;

9) education of a new type of worker.

In mass production, with its accelerating pace of work and strict regulation, scientific experimentation and technical rationalization are necessary. But this does not mean that they should be brought in from outside. Rather, they are the logical result of the internal evolution of production itself.

The effective implementation of the same Stakhanov method requires a "clinical" analysis of the situation and a series of organizational measures. Modern production is a system of interconnected jobs. Therefore, the task of their maintenance comes to the fore - the creation of a "system of actual preventive maintenance".

Only a high production service culture guarantees the final effect of implementation. Moreover, the introduction of innovations serves as the basis for further improvement of the organization of labor.

The principle of continuous improvement of the introduced system is organically connected with another principle: the introduction should be a matter of internal evolution of the production itself, and not the introduction of science from outside. Both of these principles form the core of Gast's innovation program.

Gastev's originality lies in the close connection between the introduction of new forms of labor organization and the system of training workers in new labor methods. The main thing, Gastev reasoned, is to give each worker not a "frozen norm" or standard, as Taylor did, but a psychological and general biological attitude - a focus on constant, everyday improvement of both methods and labor organization.

The "parallelism principle" (the reorganization of production goes hand in hand with the development of the workers themselves) singled out the Gastev program among not only Soviet, but also foreign methods. The main principle of teaching a profession is the transition from simple to complex, from mastering the secrets of a labor method to learning the laws of a labor operation. It is possible, of course, to decompose the operation, the process into its constituent elements, choose the most correct ones and, discarding the superfluous ones, synthesize the "ideal model". This is what Taylor, Gilbrett and some Soviet scientists did. But this is not enough. The most difficult thing, Gastev believed, was to reveal to the worker the laws of the technology for performing his work, to force him to study these laws himself and master them in practice.

Opponents accused Gastev of being passionate about laboratory practice, not realizing that this was not a weakness at all, but a strong side of the CIT. It made it possible to experimentally study operations that were not observed by the eye (a quick blow of a hammer, the movement of a hand, etc.) with the help of special equipment and to give their exact analysis. That is why the whole logic of the CIT activity developed from the microanalysis of the labor operation to the macroanalysis of the enterprise as a whole. Or, in the words of Gastev himself, "from the microanalysis of movements through the workplace and the flow, through the work of preparing the labor force, through the clinic, designing and developing forms of organization of production and labor to the most complex management problems."

In the 20-30s of the CC century, a powerful movement for the scientific organization of labor and production management unfolded in Russia, in which the applied developments of social engineering played an important role.

For the first time, the concept of social engineering was introduced into scientific circulation by Aleksey Kapitonovich Gastev. The scientist raised the question of a complex, completely new science of labor and management - applied "social engineering". This science was intended to replace the former theoretical sociology and solve the problem of synthesis of the most important aspects of the organization of labor and management activities: technical, psychophysiological, economic. Gastev A.K. considered social engineering as a relatively independent branch of research. Its distinguishing feature was its predominant focus not so much on social cognition (the discovery of scientific facts or empirical patterns), but on changing social reality (the introduction of innovative and practical recommendations). This science, according to the author's intention, is at the junction of social and natural areas of knowledge. From the latter it borrows precise experimental methods and adherence to reliable facts.

The subject of study by A.K. Gastev were not generally existing management processes, but processes taking place in various spheres of social production. Structurally, the study of production included two sections: the scientific organization of the production process, the theoretical basis of which was physiology and psychology, and the scientific organization of management, the theoretical and methodological basis of which was social psychology. The subject of the first is the rational connection of a person with a tool, and the second is the interaction of people in the labor process.

Gastev A.K. clearly distinguishes between two independent objects of study: the management of things and the management of people. Assuming that they have common features, the scientist, meanwhile, does not set himself the task of identifying differences. The problems of managing people in Gastev A.K. dissolves in the sphere of technical organization. However, with all the attention to the processes taking place in the "man - machine" system, he emphasizes the importance of human relationships in the organization and points out that "in the general system ... the movement of things, the movement of a person and his impact on others ... turned out to be small, but often a defining oasis."

In moving towards the organic reconstruction of the entire production structure of the country, one should begin with its main element - the worker. The main task is how to organize production so that the call for continuous improvement is constantly heard already in the organizational technique itself, including the improvement of the field in which each manager works.

Gastev A.K. approaches management issues from the point of view of the workplace (an individual worker), extending the findings to the management of the workshop, enterprise, state: the worker at the machine has a director of production, known as machines - tools. Dexterous maintenance of this elementary system brings up in each worker his real managerial qualities, precise, business-like. It is with streamlining the activities of an individual, whoever he may be - a leader or an executor, that work should begin on the scientific organization of labor and management. This is the essence of the so-called "narrow base" methodology, on which A.K. Gastev. Thus, the focus of the scientist is the primary cell of the enterprise - the employee at his workplace, and the scheme of scientific research unfolds in the direction from microanalysis of movements (techniques, operations) to macroanalysis of the enterprise as a whole.

In the matter of organizational construction, the question arises of training capable leaders endowed with "organizational dexterity," strategic talent, and special "social" qualities. So, the "organizational skill" of both the leader and the performer, according to A.K. Gastev, are: the inner strength that the subordinates have the need to "feel". From the point of view of the manager, this force, in our opinion, is a mechanism for influencing, regulating and precisely coordinating the efforts of ordinary labor participants. Another quality is dexterity as the ability of the worker to design movements, quickly and accurately complete tasks. For the organizer, this feature seems to us as the ability to give the most optimal recommendations under certain conditions, to develop decisions in strict accordance with the current situation, to respond vividly to successes and failures in the functioning of the enterprise, in the ability to achieve goals, to conduct training in a timely manner, etc. An important quality of any leader is courage, which allows you to overcome indecision both in new beginnings and in the continuation of the case. The ability to grasp the whole process, to foresee the consequences of one’s actions (vigilance), to penetrate into the essence of phenomena (“tracking”), to be resourceful with lightning speed, to have an everyday fantasy and a savvy memory (the makings of a designer and inventor) - this is the necessary set of qualities that distinguish people " continuous enterprise".

The special skill of the organizer is the art of teamwork, the ability to inspire and unite the team on the basis of a common goal with an unbending will and a certain enthusiasm. This is a special art of management, the art of disposing. It should be noted that Gastev A.K. by management he understands calculated, prudent leadership, and in the concept of "manager", in his opinion, an element of surprise is introduced, requiring flexibility, maneuverability. The art of managing is impossible without special communicative skills, without the inclinations of a leader in order to lead. Being a psychologist is another essential quality of a leader: to know the psychology of the crowd and the individual. The organizer should learn to regulate the teams (as a traffic controller does), direct, coordinate actions that form a common harmonious flow. This is a person of observation, signal and quick volitional action (which are firefighters), who owns the briefing method (like sappers and military technicians), able to calculate time by minutes.

Gastev A.K. believes that managerial functions of a regulatory nature are, as it were, automated (individual techniques and methods of work are being worked out), which sharply distinguishes them from the sphere of general management, based on foresight and taking into account long-term factors. Thus, he emphasizes the presence of a kind of intuition, creative element, art in the work of senior and middle managers. Their task is to carry out planning - setting goals, developing a strategy - and actually organizing - establishing the features of actions and taking into account the resources necessary to implement the plan and make decisions on the distribution of powers, duties and responsibilities. Another category of managers, according to the plan of Gastev A.K., controls, regulates the activities of employees, instructs and provides ongoing advice. Thus, the author establishes a hierarchy of managers, determines their competence.

An important issue in organizational building is the selection of personnel and the development of a labor incentive system, which, according to Gastev A.K., must meet the requirements of social dynamics, or "qualification movement", that is, career prospects. It also solves the problem of discipline: self-organization through self-interest in success in the atmosphere of cooperation prevailing in the enterprise.

Much credit goes to A.K. Gastev in developing rules for any work and principles of proper management activity.

So, in the 1920s, in our opinion, a distinctive, original, and at the same time, to a sufficient extent absorbed all the most valuable discoveries of Western organizational and managerial thought, the concept of "social engineering" appeared, the foundations of which were laid by A.K. Gastev. The scientist created such an effective methodology, the principles of which were used by many Notovites: Vitke N.A., Zhuravsky A.F., Dunaevsky F.R., Burdyansky I.M. etc. Everything that was done in the 20s and later in the 60s in the field of the human factor in production fits into the concept of social engineering, which at that time was limited to the construction of a social environment at the level of a single enterprise. However, attempts were made to extend the new methodology to the management of the entire sphere of production, and in the distant future, the whole of Russian society was thought to be built on its basis.

87. The activities of the CIT, its "concept of labor attitudes."

The CIT associated the solution of this grandiose task with the development of the science of labor and production management, which was supposed to identify and formulate principles, as well as develop methods of organization that would radically transform the labor process from a heavy yoke for workers into a positive creative process. A. Gastev was convinced that in order to create his own theory, it is necessary to critically rethink the theoretical achievements and practical experience accumulated in industrialized countries: the scientist considered equally unacceptable not only an obsequious attitude to the latest Western scientific systems, but also an absolute rejection of this knowledge. In this regard, it can be noted that the ideological postulates of the CIT were formed as an original, original, but at the same time incorporating all the most valuable Western management thought (primarily F. Taylor) concept. It covered in a complex the spheres of engineering and technology, biology, psychophysiology, economics, history, pedagogy, and also contained the rudiments of such sciences as cybernetics, engineering psychology, ergonomics, praxeology, which were widely developed and disseminated in subsequent years. It is no coincidence that the authors themselves called their concept technobiosocial.

The main provisions of the CIT concept, coinciding with the ideas of F. Taylor and G. Ford:

a decisive rejection of the empirical approach to the organization and management of production, the main method is research. According to A. Gastev, the NOT in its procedural and methodological part is based on the following elements: preliminary analysis of the object, its decomposition into components; selection of the best elements, which are then decomposed into functionally interconnected rows; layout of the selected options according to the principle of their economical location in the labor process; their reflection on the general synthetic scheme (drawing) of the object under study.

the struggle for the maximum increase in the productivity of each individual element of the production complex, the increase in the return of each machine tool, mechanism and each worker;

the scientific study of the material and personal factors of production is predominantly laboratory in nature and ends with experimental testing of the solutions found;

preliminary calculation and preparation of all factors of production in time and space, providing maximum acceleration, compaction of production processes;

a change in the qualification groupings of personnel with a pronounced tendency to limit the functions of the bulk of the workers to narrow special tasks (based on an in-depth division of labor) and the simultaneous strengthening of the organizational role of lower and middle administrative and technical personnel, the introduction of briefing and various organizational adaptations.

Just like Taylor, CIT supporters believed that the worker, as a rule, does not know his capabilities, therefore, he obviously does not work at full strength, capacity. Therefore, it is necessary to study the work, that is, a thorough analysis of the movements of individual workers during the performance of their labor functions. A. Gastev and his collaborators strove to do it the way F. Taylor did in his time: to break each operation into elementary terms and achieve, using timing and other methods, the creation of optimal methods of work based on the elimination of all erroneous, unnecessary and useless movements and rationalization of the best elements of the labor process. However, it would be unfair to say that the CIT has become Russian Taylorism. For example, Taylorism and Fordism were completely alien to the idea that constitutes the foundation of the Gastian concept - the idea of socialization of the labor process, the idea of the decisive role of the human factor. Thus, the CIT transferred the main attention and emphasis of all work to the human factor of production: it is necessary to create the psychological and general biological fitness of the worker for the constant improvement of both the operation and the technique, which is expressed in the art of accelerating the work itself. First of all, it was necessary to develop a methodology that would cover all the workers of the enterprise and would serve as a universal manual for their introduction into production. Despite the fact that each employee at his workplace is, first of all, the exact executor of a rigid instruction card, the CIT methodology at the same time provided for a fairly wide range and the possibility of displaying the freedom of personal initiative to change such a norm or standard. The CIT methodology was considered by its authors as the inoculation of a certain organizational and labor bacillus to each worker, each participant in production. This famous idea of the CIT was called the labor installation, A. Gastev noted that although F. Taylor created an instruction card, neither he nor G. Gilbert created a methodology that would infect the masses, would force them to show continuous initiative. The goal of Gastev's methodology was to activate the working masses, instilling in them the demon of the inventor, the demon that forces them to constantly try, constantly adapt, forces them to be active and alert under all conditions. At the same time, the concept was supposed to cover not only production, but also the general culture of people.

The approach formulated by the Zitovites allowed them to substantiate the exclusively original idea of social engineering, which had no analogues in the world literature on management. The labor organization of society is the most complex and inseparable combination of the organization of human complexes with the organization of machine complexes. These complexes of machine-people, according to A. Gastev, provide a synthesis of biology and engineering. A holistic calculated inclusion of certain human masses in the system of mechanisms will be nothing but social engineering. In this idea of a social engineering machine, a person no longer acts simply as an individual, as a subject of activity, but as a unit of a complex, as an integral part of the whole organism, a labor organization, but a decisive, main part.

Gastev paid great attention to consulting work. The result of this activity was interesting conclusions about the qualities that an effective management system should have. For example, these qualities are:

Discipline, without which no government is possible.

Accurate knowledge of each employee of their rights and obligations.

The exact establishment of the last resort for the resolution of each issue.

Granting the right of final authority to lower employees in the maximum number of cases. (Currently, this is one of the main principles of scientific management).

Automaticity, the establishment of an order in which the rights and obligations of each employee are defined so clearly that most issues are resolved by the coordination of lower employees without the sanction of a higher administrator.

Precise definition of issues to be resolved only by the highest administration.

Execution by each employee, if possible, of one precisely defined task.

Establishing the responsibility of each employee for the accuracy and timeliness of the fulfillment of his duties and orders of the administration.

To determine the effectiveness of enterprise management, it is necessary to analyze the existing system at the enterprise and, if possible, accurately determine the degree of its deviation from the effective one in all of the above parameters. After that, it can be concluded that it is advisable to reorganize the enterprise (preferably in stages, not immediate).

Gastev paid much attention to work culture. Work culture also has an economic dimension: thus, with the right arrangement of tools, the worker wins an hour during the day; a cultured person always has everything at hand. Thus, NOT for Gastev is also a culture of the workplace. The culture of movements organically transforms into a culture of behavior, personal culture into a collective one. The relationship of people at work, according to the Gastev concept, requires a certain cultural convention, which softens our hostel. To show tact in relations with others, friendliness, even conditional, instead of deliberately emphasized rudeness, is the duty and right of every person. These qualities, along with discipline, the ability to obey a common task (in other words, performance), enthusiasm and the ability to infect others with the work that you are currently doing, are called social attitudes that make up the art of teamwork. The basic rule of joint work is to hide, and not expose one's individuality, to be able to put not one's own self in the first place, but common interests. Learning this is more difficult than mastering a personal trainer.

At the top of Gastev's pyramid of work culture is the culture of the working class. The individual skills acquired by each employee are reinforced by a clear organization of joint activities, which awakens a thirst for creativity and the desire to improve their tool of labor. The realization that the means of production are now the property of the class forms a fundamentally new, creative attitude towards labor in the proletariat. The worker becomes the creator and manager, he seems to merge with the entire factory mechanism. To production, in which a person every day forges a particle of his own, he will treat as his own business. So the questions of labor culture came to the problem of attitudes towards work.

In the 20s of the XX century. the foundation of the domestic science of labor organization was laid. During this period, more than 10 scientific research institutes were engaged in problems of the theory and practice of the scientific organization of labor. In 1923 alone, more than 60 monographic (including translated) works were published, about 20 journals were published on problems of the organization of production and labor.

The movement for the scientific organization of labor in Russia is primarily associated with the names of A.K. Gastev and P.M. Kerzhentsev.

At the end of 1920, a prominent public figure, scientist and poet Alexei Kapitonovich Gastev began to create the Central Institute of Labor (CIT). In 1921, the 1st All-Russian Conference on the issues of NOT was held. The tasks of research, development and practical implementation in industry of the most advanced and progressive methods of organizing labor and production, training personnel, and improving tools were entrusted to the CIT.

CIT staff believed that the creation of their own concept of reorganization of labor on a scientific basis is possible as a result of a critical rethinking of all theoretical achievements and practical experience accumulated in industrialized countries.

The concept developed by the CIT team, named A.K. Gastev's concept of labor attitudes included three main organically interconnected and mutually intersecting directions:

The theory of labor movements in production processes and workplace organization;

Methodology of rational industrial training;

The theory of management processes.

The CIT concept covered the fields of engineering and technology, biology, psychophysiology, economics, history and pedagogy. Moreover, it contained the foundations of later widely recognized sciences, such as: cybernetics, engineering psychology, ergonomics, praxeology. It is no coincidence that the authors called their concept "techno-biosocial".

Unlike the Taylor school and other systems that did not pay due attention to the psychophysiological problems of labor, the CIT team, studying labor movements in order to eliminate all unnecessary movements and ensure their highest efficiency, did not lose sight of the person himself, all that concerns his health and working conditions. Therefore, psychophysiological aspects (for example, the problems of fatigue of workers, etc.) occupied a significant place in the studies of CIT. The employees of the CIT adhered to the position of an active attitude to the psychophysiological capabilities of a person, resolutely rejecting the approach to them as something given once and for all. Hence the conclusion was drawn about the need for constant training of the physical and mental abilities of workers.

These studies were accompanied by the search for methods to enhance the abilities of the worker. How to develop in each worker a constant inner need for continuous improvement of his work? How to "magnetize" it by methods of scientific organization of labor and management? These are the main questions set by the CIT team, who understood well that external incentives for production creativity alone (in the form of, for example, bonus systems) are not enough to solve them. A.K. Gastev and his colleagues found the key to solving them in a special method of industrial training developed by them, which became the cornerstone of the entire techno-social concept of CIT.

When the morning horns are buzzing on the outskirts of the workers, this is not at all a call for captivity. This is the song of the future. We used to work in squalid workshops and started working in the mornings at different times. And now, in the morning, at eight o'clock, the horns are screaming for a whole million. Now minute by minute we start together. A whole million take the hammer at the same moment.

Our first blows thunder together. What are the horns singing about! - This is the morning hymn of unity!

Work Strike Poetry

We spend the best part of our lives at work.

One must learn how to work in such a way that the work is easy and that it is a constant life school.

How to work

Gastev Aleksey Kapitonovich - a revolutionary, a proletarian poet and a prominent figure in the field of labor rationalization - was born on September 26, 1882 in the city of Suzdal, Vladimir province. His father was a teacher and died when Gastev was two years old. Testev's mother was a dressmaker. At the end of the city school, and then technical courses, Gastev entered the teacher's institute, but was expelled from there for political activities. Since 1900 he has been participating in the revolutionary movement. Having given himself up to political work, he wandered through prisons, exiles (Vologda province, Arkhangelsk province, Narym) and worked as a mechanic at factories in St. Petersburg, Kharkov, Nikolaev, as well as in tram depots.

Until 1917 he was in an illegal position. He emigrated several times to Paris. He worked in factories abroad. Since 1901 - a member of the RSDLP. Since 1906 - an active worker of trade unions. From 1907 to 1918 he was a member of the board of the Petrograd Union of Metalworkers, and in 1917–1918. - Secretary of the Central Committee of the All-Russian Union of Metalworkers. From the moment of the October Revolution, he worked as a professional, manager of industrial enterprises and a journalist.

Artistic things Gastev began to write in the 1900s. For the first time his work was published in 1904 - the story "Beyond the Wall" from the life of political exiles. Collections of works of art were published several times under the title "Poetry of the Work Strike". The last collection was published in Moscow in 1923. In the early 1920s, Gastev left his work in the field of fiction and devoted himself entirely to work on the organization of labor. Gastev considers his last work of art to be the CIT (Central Institute of Labor) of the All-Union Central Council of Trade Unions organized by him in Moscow in 1920, which he manages and which embodies all the legendary ideas invested in his artistic work.

The main scientific work of Gastev is the book "Labor Installations" (published in 1924), which outlines the CIT methodology for teaching labor techniques.

In solving its main task - the training of the workforce - CIT applied the method of analyzing labor movements using "cyclography", that is, photographs of individual elements of the movement of human working organs. Starting with a study of the simplest working operation - a blow, Gastev established the "normal" (the system of the most correct movements) for cutting with a chisel. The study of cutting with a chisel for several years caused a number of criticisms from critics of the TsIT, who saw this slowness as an organic defect of the "narrow base". However, already in 1925, Gastev fully developed the methodology for training a locksmith, and the CIT moved on to training turners, fitters, blacksmiths, construction workers, textile workers, aviators, etc. Having developed the methodology, Gastev moved on to mass retraining of workers, establishing for this joint-stock company "Installation". Training of workers according to the CIT method requires 3-6 months.

Gastev wrote a number of books in which he sets out his views on the issues of the professional movement, the scientific organization of labor and the construction of a new culture: Industrial World, Trade Unions and Labor Organization, How to Work, Time, Rise of Culture, “Youth, go!”, “New cultural installation”, “Installation of production by the CIT method”, “Reconstruction of production”, etc. Edits the journals “Organization of labor”, “Installation of labor force” and “Bulletin of standardization” ...

Behind these protocol lines (taken by us from the autobiography of A.K. Gastev in the 41st volume of the encyclopedic dictionary "Granat" and the biographical note in the 14th volume of the first edition of the Great Soviet Encyclopedia), broken through by the metaphor of the "last work of art", the image of a revolutionary, worker, a poet who became one of the founders of the Scientific Organization of Labor, a true nugget from a scattering of talents born of the Russian Revolution and creating it.

For many years after the thirty-eighth year that ended the life of this remarkable man, his deeds were consigned to oblivion. Generations grew up who did not hear not only the name of Gastev, but also the words "NOT" and "CIT". And more than understandable, therefore, is the exceptional interest now being shown in questions of the scientific organization of labor, the most valuable heritage of the twenties and thirties.

In 1964, "The Poetry of the Work Strike" was republished. The fantastic hyperbole and class pathos of Gastev's poetry and journalism, which his peers associated with the "proletcult" twenties, unexpectedly and organically "fit" into today's reality. Gastev's calls for "remaking man", for the construction of "social engineering", which seemed to many of his contemporaries to be fantasy, turned out to be understandable and close to people of the sixties with their "cybernetic" way of thinking. The preface to the new edition of "The Poetry of the Work Strike", articles in magazines and newspapers, memoirs of friends and contemporaries recreate the stages of Gastev's wonderful biography, so sparingly told (alas - not completely) by himself: 1900 - the first exile, escape, Switzerland, Paris , return to Russia. 1905 - leadership of a fighting squad in Kostroma, Bolshevik organizations of Ivanovo-Voznesensk, Yaroslavl. IV Congress of the Party (Gastev-"Lavrenty" - a member of the Bolshevik, Leninist faction), again arrest, again exile, again escape, again emigration, again return ... And all the time - work in factories ("dismissal" always went according to stage ...), and in between - "rest" and classes in "belles-lettres" in transit. In the Narym exile - the first thoughts about "social engineering". Again Paris, and again Petrograd... A revolution that returns Gastev from yet another exile, the intensification of work in the trade unions. Then Ukraine - the leadership of the "Council of Arts" and interrupted by Denikin's plans for the organization of the "School of Social Engineering Sciences" (the prototype of the CIT). In 1918, Gastev was sent to Nizhny Novgorod as the Extraordinary Commissar of the Sormovo Plant. Work at factories again (Moscow, Nikolaev, Kharkov). Work at the All-Union Central Council of Trade Unions. The last "constructive-poetic" experience is "A Bundle of Orders" (published later, in 1921).

And, finally, the organization of the Institute of Labor at the All-Union Central Council of Trade Unions (1920). In August 1921, the Institute became known as the Central Institute as a result of a decree of the Council of Labor and Defense signed by V. I. Lenin. Shortly before this, Gastev met with Ilyich for the last time. “I would like to help comrade Gastev, head of the Institute of Labor,” Lenin wrote then to Deputy People's Commissar of Finance A. O. Alsky. “... We still, even in a difficult situation, must support such an institution.”

It is this - the last and main "work of art" of Alexei Kapitonovich that this book is dedicated to.

Alexei Kapitonovich himself will be the narrator. We will neither interrupt it nor supplement it with importunate explanations. The reader himself will be able to see for himself the comprehensibility (and relevance) of the thoughts and deeds of those not so long ago days and make his own judgment about them. Let us recall only the most basic facts.