7 Components: the Function Pages - Developers

Taylor's Division
of Labor
A project as a
concept
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3. The amount of people, financial means, production means and
equipment available are planned in advance.
However, these characteristics can be used to describe just about
anything from construction projects worth millions to moving furniture
around in an office. Its presumable clearness leads to the use of
the term in daily language to refer to any random human activity.
After all, it only describes the fact that a person predefines his activity
in his head (“plans”), implements them and evaluates the altered
reality for further action.
But contemporary use of the term is not arbitrary. “Regardless of
what your project looks like, you always define it on the basis of the
three same elements: output, start and end date, and resources,” observes
Portny. 2 The word “project” in project management is related
to Taylor's principle of internal division of labor. According to this
principle, all work steps are divided into their individual components
(in project management, into “projects” and “work packages”) and
standardized. The individual work steps can thus be re-assigned and
resource usage more precisely planned. As a result, efficiency and
productivity of mass production can be increased considerably.
However, prerequisite to this success is the exact observance of
schedules and the extensive elimination of coincidence. Project and
personnel alike are under central control. 3
The project concept, as it also forms the base of the wiki philosophy,
counters that of the original meaning of “project.” The older
term “project,” stemming from the 17 th -century French word “projet,”
has a much broader target and is far less technocratic. It means
something like “design,” “urge forward,” “push out,” “throw forward,”
and “thrust out;” 4 all more reminiscent of the English verb
“to project.” The wiki philosophy, too, deals with reformulating systematic
action, but with the intent of moving from passive reaction
and optimization to rational planning. Here, too, the focus is on efficiency
and cost-benefit issues, but the reaction to these requirements
is different. The goal, which is far less clear, is not completely based
on the primacy of an increase in corporate earnings. It is based on an
idea of “people in free cooperation” (Spehr), aimed at promoting the
2 Portny 2001, 27.
3 The boom of “projects” in the working world fits in with a redesigning
of production, right up to greater flexibility of employment relationships
with the goal of a reduction in wage costs and a simultaneous
integration of the immediate producers with more responsible
autonomy (see Candeias 2004, 179).
4 See Kluge 2002, 722.
17 Preliminary Thoughts