1861–1919

Henry L. Gantt

Henry Laurence Gantt was an American mechanical engineer, industrial adviser, and management consultant. Educated at Johns Hopkins and Stevens Institute of Technology, he worked with Frederick Winslow Taylor at Midvale and Bethlehem Steel before developing an independent practice. Gantt designed task-and-bonus wage methods, wrote about training and management responsibility, and created charts that made scheduled and completed work visible against time. His charts were used in large-scale United States wartime production and later spread through industry. Earlier time-based scheduling methods existed, so describing him as the sole inventor of visual scheduling overstates the record. Gantt belongs in this library because his books connect scientific management with leadership, incentives, social responsibility, and an enduring visual method of production control.