Benjamin S. Graham, Sr. (1900–1960) was an American organizational theorist and consultant known as a pioneer in the development and application of

scientific management Scientific management is a theory of management that analyzes and synthesizes workflows. Its main objective is improving economic efficiency, especially labor productivity. It was one of the earliest attempts to apply science to the engine ...

and industrial engineering techniques to the office and factory clerical work. He is recognized as the founder of paperwork simplification. He saw a growing need for improvement in information processing back in the 1940s (when the professional and clerical segments of the workforce were still in the minority).

Biography

Graham started his career in the insurance business. In the 1940s he was trained in work simplification by

Allan H. Mogensen Allan Herbert Mogensen, known as Mogy, (May 12, 1901 - March 1989) was an American industrial engineer, and industry consultant, and an authority in the field of work simplification and office management. He is noted for popularizing flowcharts in ...

and

Lillian Gilbreth Lillian Evelyn Gilbreth (; May 24, 1878 – January 2, 1972) was an American psychologist, industrial engineer, consultant, and educator who was an early pioneer in applying psychology to time-and-motion studies. She was described in the 1940s as ...

, which had started at the 1944 Work Simplification Conferences at Lake Placid, where he participated in Mogensen's class. Graham also participated in the programs of the Work Simplification Round Tables at New York University, the spring Methods Conferences conducted by the Wharton School of Finance at the University of Pennsylvania and at

UCLA The University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) is a public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in Los Angeles, California. UCLA's academic roots were established in 1881 as a Normal school, teachers colle ...

’s Engineering and Management Course.

MIT The Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) is a private land-grant research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Established in 1861, MIT has played a key role in the development of modern technology and science, and is one of the ...

Northwestern University Northwestern University is a private research university in Evanston, Illinois. Founded in 1851, Northwestern is the oldest chartered university in Illinois and is ranked among the most prestigious academic institutions in the world. Chart ...

Cornell Cornell University is a private statutory land-grant research university based in Ithaca, New York. It is a member of the Ivy League. Founded in 1865 by Ezra Cornell and Andrew Dickson White, Cornell was founded with the intention to teac ...

and Georgia are among other colleges that called upon Mr. Graham throughout his career. Graham organized and directed the Paperwork Simplification Conferences held at Madison, Wisconsin in the spring and fall, at the Seigniory Club, Quebec, Canada in the spring and at the

University of Dayton The University of Dayton (UD) is a private, Catholic research university in Dayton, Ohio. Founded in 1850 by the Society of Mary, it is one of three Marianist universities in the nation and the second-largest private university in Ohio. The uni ...

, Ohio in the fall. He conducted many sold-out public training workshops between 1953 and 1959 along with numerous in-house workshops for organizations in the US, Canada, and South America. He also conducted hundreds of speaking engagements to professional societies. Ben S. Graham, Sr. died in 1960 at the age of 59.

Work

Graham had adapted the Gilbreth flow process charts that were being used to improve factory work for use with more complex business processes. He was working with the Standard Register Company of

Dayton, Ohio Dayton () is the sixth-largest city in the U.S. state of Ohio and the county seat of Montgomery County. A small part of the city extends into Greene County. The 2020 U.S. census estimate put the city population at 137,644, while Greater ...

. His purpose was to display

processes A process is a series or set of activities that interact to produce a result; it may occur once-only or be recurrent or periodic. Things called a process include: Business and management *Business process, activities that produce a specific se ...

so that employee teams could study them and streamline them. Graham was invited to join Mogensen’s staff to provide instruction in paperwork simplification at Mogensen’s Work Simplification Conferences. Graham was a prolific author with articles on

Work Simplification Work may refer to: * Work (human activity), intentional activity people perform to support themselves, others, or the community ** Manual labour, physical work done by humans ** House work, housework, or homemaking ** Working animal, an animal ...

and Management Methods, particularly as applied to office and paperwork, that appeared in ''Fortune'',

Industrial Engineering Industrial engineering is an engineering profession that is concerned with the optimization of complex processes, systems, or organizations by developing, improving and implementing integrated systems of people, money, knowledge, information an ...

Magazine and a great variety of professional and other journals here and abroad. Standard Register published a collection of his articles that appeared in their PS magazine called Paperwork Simplification for Better Management Control. His process-charting technique is now used worldwide for Business Process Improvement.

Selected publications

* Graham, Ben S. "Paperwork Simplification." ''Industrial Management Institute'' (1950).

References

# ↑ Graham Jr, Ben S. "Work simplification: From bricklayer to microcomputer." at ''worksimp.com,'' 1998. Accessed 10. 2014. # ↑ Graham, Ben. "The Roots of the Business Process Mapping." (2008). # ↑ Ben B. Graham (2004). ''Detail Process Charting: Speaking the Language of Process''. New Jersey: Wiley. . {{DEFAULTSORT:Graham, Benjamin S Cornell University alumni People from Dayton, Ohio 1900 births 1960 deaths