ABSTRACT
Electronics Limited was a mass production firm in the electronics industry, located in the north-west of England. The company produced three complex products or lines. Researchers from the London School of Economics visited Electronics Limited as part of a research project on systems of supervision. The researchers studied two departments in the company, departments X and Y, in which the supervisory organisation was similar. Departments X and Y were at different stages of the production process. The departments’ 370 male employees were organised on a shift basis. There were three rotating daily shifts. The researchers studied a total of fifty-one supervisors, including twenty-four first-level supervisors. There were two or three levels of supervision in each department. The span of control of the first-level supervisors ranged from fifteen to seventeen.
