the least altruistic instituted programs designed to reduce and prevent work injuries and to organize company health programs. New positions developed as a result of welfarism and scientific management, such as safety engineers, safety directors, company physicians, industrial nurses, and medical directors.
The greatest impetus toward the development of a centralized personnel function came from Frederick W. Taylor. Taylor's theories incorporated a fundamental precept that selection, placement, and training of workers could no longer be undertaken in a haphazard, rule-of-thumb manner, but must be conducted on a systematic, procedural basis with a high degree of specialization. It is true that the first personnel departments were manned by people who saw their position as primarily one of buying loyalty, curbing unionism, and engendering a happy spirit in the fashion of "Y.M.C.A." directors.
While at the turn of the century industrial firms employed social or welfare secretaries, the true beginnings of modern personnel administration can be traced to
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