SOME PERSONNEL PRO= OF AUTOMATION

Edgar Weinberg *
U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics
Washington, D. C.
Summary
The aathor presents two basic principles of
strategy for orderly transition to automation.
Also given are eight generalized solutions to the
attendant personnel problems -- solutions that
were suggested by research studies being conducted
by the Bureau of labor Statistics of the U. S.
Department of Labor. Specific examples are given
from the case studies of: a TV manufacturer issu-
ing printed wiring and automatic assembly equip-
ment, an insurance company and an airline both
using electronic computing systems, and a bakery
and an oil refinery representing other industries
that are more experienced in automation. The
author indicates that, as difficult as the problems
of extensive technological change may be, they can
still be handled in a constructive and orderly
fashion. Answers are suggested to such questions
as: how are workers informed about changes; what
.is the extent of displacement; how were workers
reassigned; what was the change in total employ-
ment; do new jobs require greater skill; has'there
been any upgrading or downgrading; and what is
the attitude of workers toward the changes? He
concludes with an 1835 quotation, "That machines
do not, even at their first introduction,
invariably throw human labor out of employment
must be admitted; and . . . that they never produced
that effect....".
Introduction
My assignment on this panel is to discuss
personnel problems of automation. This topic
covers a wide range of questions that no doubt
we will be answering for many years. This morning,
I would like to present a few generalizations
suggested by some research studies the Department
of Labor's Bureau of Labor Statistics is conducting
on this subject.
BLS Case Studies
The purpose of the BLS studies is to obtain
some of industry's experience that could be help-
ful to the Labor Department in fostering adequate
training, in advancing vocational guidance, in
administering the Nation's employment service;
and in assessing an important influence on labor's
welfare. Specifically, the BIS is undertaking a
series of case studies of labor displacement,'
changes in occupations, skill requirements, and
industrial relations at plants converting to
more automatic operations.
l Chief, Branch of Technological Studies
Bureau of Labor Statistics
'Division of Productivity and Technological
Developments
U.S. Department of Labor
In making these studies, the BIS staff inter-
views plant officials, and union representatives,
observes new equipment in operation and examines
data on. employment and earnings. Taking a single
plant as the unit of study affords an opportunity
to see the personnel problems of a given concern
in relation to economic, technical and other
aspects.
So far, the BLS has completed case studies
of five plants in various industries. One study
covered an electronics plant that was among the
'first to adopt printed circuitry and automatic
assembling equipment. Two others concerned
offices using new techniques produced by the
electronics industry: an insurance company using
a large scale computer, and an airline operating
a special purpose computer for reservation control.
Another study covered a highly mechanized bakery
with advanced materials-handling equipment. The
fifth, a modernized oil refinery, The list
includes, therefore, some of the developments
that are usually covered by the term -- automation.
Although the production techniques differed,
each plant faced personnel problems of a similar
general character. In discussing the problems of
automation, therefore, I will not confine myself
to the producers and users of electronic equipment
but will draw on the experience of the bakery and
the oil refinery as well.
Basic Principles of Strategy For Orderly Transition
From these studies, two principles for making
an orderly transition to automatic techniques have
emerged. First, the desirability of timing the
introduction of automation during periods of
company expansion. Any adverse effects on per-
sonnel are most easily minimized under such con-
ditions of economic growth. Second, the utility
of taking advantage of a gradual unfolding of a
najor technological development to plan the per-
sonnel changes that are necessary. Adhering to,
these principles of scheduling, firms have intro-
duced automation with the least dislocation of
personnel.
.Generalized Solutions to Automation Personnel
Problems
Beside these two principles of strategy, the
experience of the plants studied suggests a
number of generalizations relating to problems of
displacement, reassignment, training, and recruit-
ment of personnel that arise in a changeover.
have organized these under eight headings. They
must be regarded as tentative as some may be
modified with the accumulation of experience from
other plants and other circumstances.
First -- Since conversion to completely auto-
matic production is not likely to take place in
a short time throughout a whole plant, overwhelm-
ing ch.anges in personnel are not to be immediately
antici,pated. Automation at the TV plant studied
by BLS, for example, resulted in some reduction
in man-hours per unit of output (the amount not
disclosed) and this affected workers engaged in
the routine repetitive mass assembly jobs, but
it did not significantly affect the riveting,
packing, or shipping departments. It is not
possib:Le, of course, to say whether the actual
automatized performlance, taking account of down-
time, etc., matched the expectationsof the
designers of the new equipment.
Second -- Although automation results in
lower unit labor requirements, a plant that is
expanding need not displace its workers. None of
the plants studied found it necessary to make any
layoffs, as conversion occurred during a prosperous
period,, Wholesale curtailing of jobs simply to
reduce costs in a shrinking market was not the
principal motivation of the plants studied.
This is not to say, however, that displacement
of labor may not have occurred at competing
companies not in a position to take advantage of
new methods, or at suppliers of materials no
longer used; or that any such reduction was not
offset by the expansive effect on'employment at
the builders of automatic equipment.
Third -- In the Course of scheduling the
changeover for business expansion, management can
also take some preparatory measures in order to
reduce dislocation of employees to a minimum. The
TV,plant, for example, took advantage of the
normal high turnover among its women workers to
reduce slightly its labor requirements without
layOf fs. Some workers were shifted to more labor-
intensive activities in the plant.
Officials of the insurance company, which
employed a large number of young women as clerks,
spent six months prior to installing its computer
in planning the reassignment of personnel 'from
the actuarial to other departments. To allay
their natural anxiety, employees were informed
in advance that no one would lose her job with
the company or suffer a loss in pay as a result
of the change.
Fourth -- The collective bargaining process
offers employees and management a method of
arranging changes in personnel cooperatively --
an approach which can have the desirable result
of reducing antagonism to a long&term program.
Once s?me agreement for handling these changes is
reached, workers are likely to feel more secure
about their future.
Such bargaining took place at an oil refinery
where large-scale improvernents in processing were
made over an eight-year period. The management.
informed 'the officers of the AFL-CIO union at the
plant 15 months in advance of the first major
change. In the course of contract negotiations
prior to the change, the parties agreed upon the
size and classification of crews at various units,
seniority registers for resssigning workers whose
jobs were eliminated, and provisions for maintain-
ing for 6 months the wage rates of workers who
would have to be downgraded. The contract pro-
visions established the rules that governed the
introduction of subsequent changes at the plant.
Fifth -- Retraining of workers for numerous
new factory jobs connected with automation can
be done successfully in a-brief period of on-the-
job instruction. A major effect on prbduction-
worker jobs is to reduce the quantity requiring
the direct, step-by-step intervention in produc-
tion. The new jobs of machine supervision or
monitoring call for less physical effort and
manual handling of gbods in process, but more
responsibility if not skill.
The electronics plant, for example, eliminated
a number of hand-assembly jobs where manual
dexterity on a paced repetitive task was the chief
requirement. Printed circuitry and assembly
machines,required the setting up a few machine-
tending jobs. The worker now stands beside the
equipment: loading, unloading,- checking, and
adjusting the machine's performance as it goes
through a cycle of operations. These duties
could be done satisfactorily after only two weeks
on the job. However, since the new jobs involved
greater responsibility for costly equipment,
management and the union agreed on a slightly
higher rate of pay.
Sixth -- ,The somewhat greater need for main-
tenance craftsmen under automation makes it
important for management to give timely attention
to apprenticeship'and training in certain skilled
crafts. BLS found, for example, that the TV
plant needed additional machinists in their shop
to handle the rep'air work on the assembly machine.
Even in the highly-automatic oil refinery, where
nearly half of all production workers were already
engaged in maintenance work,.modernization required
a few additional instrument repairmen.
Of course, training skilled workers is a
problem not only for the plants but also for the
community's educational system and government.
No doubt personnel managers will have to work
more closely with unions and government agencies
concerned with this problem in order to meet the
manpower needs of automation.
Seventh -- In trying to anticipate and reduce
personal hardship, it will be advisable to give
special thought to the individual skills that may
become obsolete and to jobs held by older persons.
While most of the changes studied involved
transfer of relatively low-skilled workers to
jobs of equivalent grade, BLS also found that
automation sometimes results in downgrading. For
example, where more automatic equipment eliminated
a number of high paid jobs in the oil refinery,
the only jobs open to the individuals under the
seniority and job progression system were at
12
lower wage rates. But, the adjustment of these
older men was made somewhat easier by maintaining
their higher pay rates for 6 months after the
transfer.
More serious is the case where an older worker
loses his job because of technological change.
The consequences for the older individual may be
a prolonged period of unemployment; for the com-
munity, a critical problem of retraining and
relief; and for the company, the perplexing task
of overcoming unfavorable public and employee
reactions.
With older workers becoming a larger proportion
of the labor force, the Department of Labor is
trying to promote a more realistic understanding
of their abilities and experience. One of the
studies made by the Bureau of Labor Statistics,
for example, tends to emphasize the great varia-
bility in the job performance of individuals and
to cast doubt on widely held generalizations about
older workers. Personnel managers in preparing
for changes, will find it worthwhile to consider
the results of these studies in providing places
for older people.
Eighth and finally -- With automation, the
problems of training, recruiting, placing and pro-
moting nonproduction workers -- professional,
technical and semi-professional people -- demand
more explicit attention. The BIS found that the
electronics plant, oil refinery, insurance company,
airline and bakery were all seeking or had hired
engineers and other technical employees. Auto-
mation requires more manpower for organizing and
planning, thus contributing'to the heavy demand
on the already short supply of nrofessionally-
trained personnel.
On the other hand, it is important not to
overestimate the skill or technical requirements
of newly created jobs, or to under-estimate the
capacities of individuals to perform them, even
if they have not previously worked at those par-
ticular tasks.
An example of a type of excessive requirement
was found at the bakery the BLS visited. Manage-
ment at first hired an engineer to operate a
newly-installed pneumatic conveyor on the grounds
that it required a technical background to under-
stand the dials and levers on the control panel.
Later it was discovered that the system was
understandable to a worker who ably operated it
after a few weeks training.
The insurance company that the BLS studied
and other companies introducing electronic data
processing, have found that persons selected
from their own clerical staffs by tests can
sometimes do the programming and analytical jobs
which originally were expected to, be filled by
college graduates. While this upgrading of pro-
duction workers may be only a limited source, it
is worthy of some attention.
Conclusion
This discussion indicates that, difficult as
the problems of extensive technological change
may be, they can still be handled in a construc-
tive and orderly fashion with the cooperation
of all concerned. The generalizations presented
are only tentative guides and,they can, no doubt,
be supplemented by many others. In this regard,
it is most important to assemble more information
on industry's experience -- in order to extend
our capacity to administer these changes and to
permit revision of widely-held opinions.
It is somewhat reassuring that this conclusion
parallels one set forth more than a century ago
when the effects of the first power-driven machines
held the attention of thoughtful men. Charles
Babbage, the English mathematician and inventor
of computing machinery, gave an answer to a much
discussed question of 1835, that might well be
repeated today:
"That machines do not, even at their first
introduction, invariabLy throw human labor
out of employment must be admitted; and it
has been maintained by persons very competent
on the subject that they never produced that
effect. The solution of this question depends
on facts which unfortunately have not yet
been collected.,,
CALENDAR OF COUING EVE&T Mr. J. E. Eiselein, Chairman of the PGFT Meet-
(conto from page 7 In@ Committee, reported that the IRE Professional
Group on Industrial Electronics had endorsed.par-
JOIRT AIRE-AEM?&IRE SYMPOSIUM ticlpation in this joint Symposium. The Adminl-
OR AUTOMATION AND DATA PROCESSING
strative Committee of our PGPT likewise voted to
A~rll 14 thou 16. 1958, Detroit. Michigan
participate. and Mr. Eiseleln was designated to
represent the PGPT on the Symposinm Steering
Those who attended our last joint meeting with
Committee.
the AIEE (Fifth Annual Industrial Electronics Con-
ference, September 24 and 25. 1956, in Cleveland),
With Mr. Elselein,s representation, and with
will rememlber that there were four sessions devoted
the additional wrticipation of the American
to the following general themes:
Society of Mechanical Engineers (ASME), the forth-
coming Symposium promises to present an even more
l..Deslge of Electronic Equfpment
colnprehensive automation coverage than did the
2. Automation of Electronic Assembly Sleveland Symposium. Tentatively, a two-day pro-
3. The use of Electronics in Induetrial Control gram is planned, with invited papers to be directed
4. Computers and Ilata Reduction toward ,,Processlng of Products,,.
13