So much for theory and mechanics. In the banking industry, for example, there has been revolution in productivity in the past decade. Through the use of computers, magnetic ink character recognition equipment, and mechanizing various repetitive operations, there has been a 50 percent reduction in labor requirements for check handling between. Studies on administrative productivity programs indicate that improved productivity comes from standardizing administrative procedures, streamlining operations, and increasing computer applications. These examples illustrate the importance to productivity of both advanced technology and proper management.
Different businesses use different measures of productivity.
Airlines traditionally have used passengers boarded per employee and revenue tonmiles per employee as partial productivity measures. The Bell System has developed a sophisticated productivity program and integrated it into its overall budgeting and planning activities. The Bell program is worth a closer look. Bell uses two Partial Productivity measures-volume of business per employee and number of phones served per employee. Both measure labor productivity.