The Bata system of management originated from the early ideas of Ford, summarized in his seminal book Today and Tomorrow, which were based on worker autonomy, knowledge, just-in-time, waste minimization, quality and customer involvement. These ideas were all but abandoned by Ford when he embraced Taylorism and mass production in the 1930s, but they were picked up and brought to practical fruition in Moravia, in central Europe in the late 1920s and early 1930s by Tomas Bata.

The Bata system is a management system of extrordinary productivity and effectiveness. Its main characteristics include integration instead of division of labour, whole-system orientation, continuous innovation and quality improvement, team self-management, profit-sharing, worker participation, organizational flexibility and an uncompromisingly human-orientated capitalistic enterprise. Bata's first slogan, 'Thinking to the people, labour to the machines', summarizes his views on the roles of human capital and technology. His human resource policies included strong attention to the quality of life for his employees, and the firm provided many amenities and services for its workers.

Bata's system was in many ways ahead of its time. Following the loss of Czech independence in 1939, the Bata system was dismantled first by the Nazis and then by the communists after 1948, who chose instead to adopt mass production practices.

Milan Zeleny