J. Slater Lewis

Midway through the 19th century American railroad executives Henry Varnum Poor and Daniel McCallum had published some ideas about a modern system of management, but their impact was limited.

Much attention is devoted to strictly commercial office-accounting.To Mr. Lewis belongs the credit of making a very full exposition of the important subject of the proper distribution of establishment charges, as he calls them, or expense accounts as generally designated in America.

Lewis provides a very thorough discussion and mapping of a factory's decision making and information flow, details the cost accounting, and describes how manufacturing was orchestrated from order taking to shipping.

'"[6] In the Preface of the work, Slater Lewis (1896) explained about the aim and purpose of this volume: Notwithstanding the progress of the age, every manufacturer still devises his own system of accounts, has his own books and forms specially drafted and printed and his clerks educated in methods which may be of little or no value to them in other factories.

Engineering, save in the matter of factory accounts, is endowed with acknowledged formulae, rules, tables, and data of every description, the acquisition of a knowledge of which the State has deemed to be of national importance, and technical schools and other State-aided institutions have come to stay; but whether the legislature will ever recognise the exact relationship between successful engineering and scientific book-keeping, and afford the rising generation opportunities of qualifying themselves for positions where both are indispensable conditions, remains to be seen.

[7]In the opening of the first introductory chapter, Slater Lewis further explained: This book is intended as a practical handbook for the use of manufacturers who wish to adopt modern methods of organisation.

It is written throughout from the point of view of an organiser and manager, rather than from that of a professional accountant, and the author hopes that this feature will commend it to those who have to bear the responsibility of conducting large engineering and manufacturing undertakings.

[8]And furthermore: The author is satisfied that it is almost as difficult to persuade those who have the responsibility of conducting large industrial undertakings that a complete and intelligent office organisation will save money, time and worry, as it was a few years ago to convince them that the use of modern machine tools was indispensable to good workmanship with cheap production.

Thus, a works order for a lathe will include such jobs as planning bed, cutting leading screw, milling slide rest, etc.

It will be evident that some jobs will be charged with material and some not...[11]In chapter XI on "Estimating" Slater Lewis (1896) presents a notable basis for labour costing.

Slater Lewis focussed on the next step, and developed a method to practically use the ledger accounts to distributing overhead to work in process.

[13]In a diagram of manufacturing accounts, Slater Lewis explained how "scheme of production and cost control is unfolded in its logical flow.

"[14] This diagram was based on the scheme, that pictured how to incorporate labour costs into the factory accounts, presented by Garcke and Fells in 1887/89 (see above).

Urwick & Brech (1946) more specifically explained: As the scheme of production and cost control is unfolded in its logical flow, following the sequence that the customer's enquiry will take as it is transformed into an order, a job ticket, a material requisition, and so on, it eventually reaches the general accountancy phase and opens up the processes of book-keeping.To deal with these in the simplest manner, Slater Lewis added an illustrative appendix of nearly thirty pages, containing transactions set out in specimen sheet form.

So closely related are the various procedures and documents that he is able to portray them all in a single "flow chart," undoubtedly the first of its kind in British industry.

How precisely and clearly they illustrate his teaching, Lewis indicates himself by a note in heavy type offering on application unfolded copies of the diagrams for framing and display.

It has been ably and exhaustively argued in the work of Mr. Slater Lewis, already referred to, but the argument may be briefly recapitulated here.Nothing is naturally more distinct than the operations of making and selling.

At the same time, work in process and finished goods would be debited with their respective shares of overhead cost, and a suspense account in the general ledger would be credited.

"[21] Slater Lewis (1896) stated: The question of staff precedence is also one which deserves more attention than it usually receives, and is very often a fertile source of jealousy and heart-burning amongst employees.

It would be just as imprudent as allowing two commanders to dispute for mastery on the same ship, or as having no degree of rank amongst the officers, or any dividing line between the duties of the steward and those of the carpenter.

It is imperative that every member of the staff should have a clearly defined position, and be given to understand in unmistakable terms to whom he has to look for orders, otherwise continual bickering and consequent dis-organisation will inevitably occur.

[22]In the last chapter of his work Salter Lewis presented a short paragraph about the "Diagram of Staff Organisation," which read: Some officials being disposed, not infrequently, to regard themselves as equal, if not superior to men who are really their masters, it is essential to the well-being of all industrial concerns to have a definite organisation under which responsibility may not only be fixed, but the relative positions or rank of the officials clearly defined.

They concluded that "the fact that in a treatise so intimately concerned with every aspect of management, organisation structure is touched on so incidentally as regards method indicates how little the need for definition of formalised relations in an industrial enterprise had been appreciated by the end of the nineteenth century."

The "Journal of the Iron and Steel Institute" (1901) wrote in his obituary: Lewis was the inventor of several electrical devices, but he is perhaps best known as the author of the standard book on "The Commercial Organisation of Factories," (1895) the pioneer work of its kind.

He was a keen student of the social and economic conditions of commercial life, and his broad views, often strikingly original and forcibly expressed, together with his exceptional administrative abilities and personal force and influence, made him a prominent figure in engineering circles, and he enjoyed to the full the confidence and respect of those whose good fortune it was to be associated with him.

This was based on the theory and techniques contributed by the work of F. B. Gilbreth and F. W. Taylor in the U.S.A., J. Slater Lewis and A. J. Liversedge in England, and Henri Fayol in France.

Correspondence developed, interest led to a plan, and the 'Institution of Production Engineers' was inaugurated in February 1921...[24]Nowadays Lewis is still known for his pioneering work on cost accounting.