"Taylorism"? I don't think that means what you think it means...

There's a tendency for people in the Agile community to throw around the word "Taylorism" as a synonym for evil.

It's worth remembering how work was seen before Taylor and "scientific management":

• Work is not worthy of study
• If you miss quota, you're incompetent... dock pay; if you beat quota, you must have been sandbagging previously... dock pay
• No rest breaks
• Workers are all the same
• Improvements only benefit owners

Some of the ideas advocated by Taylor were significant improvements:

• Work is worthy of scientific study
• People should get rest breaks; fatigue exists!
• People are different, which means some will be better suited for some work over others
• Workers should benefit from improvements, not just owners

The problem with Taylorism really comes down to one assumption, that workers are lazy and dumb which means managers need to design how they work.

This is the key difference between Taylorism and Toyotaism (aka Lean):

• Taylorism: Managers are the scientists
• Toyota / Lean: The people doing the work are the scientists