Sorting through the ‘unfathomable mess’ of American productivity: Italian managers’ exploration of scientific management and U.S. industrial plants

American scientific management, promising increased productivity through rational working methods, had a tremendous impact on Italian businessmen. The figure of the manager gained momentum since the manager was held responsible for co-ordinating the application of scientific management principles inside the firm. Thus, it was often the case that Italian engineers with managing functions, such as general directors, and sometimes the entrepreneurs themselves embarked on study missions in order to understand the elusive secret of American productivity. In this contribution we will consider three cases relating to this form of temporary migration: Fiat’s engineers sent to American producers in order to solve “the confusion of the incomprehensible” and crash through the secret of American productivity; the cases of Camillo and Adriano Olivetti and their American tours to learn about the secret of American production and, finally, the 1938 mission of the managing director and other engineers from the Officine Meccaniche Reggiane to visit the most advanced aviation and aircraft motor building companies in order to introduce American production methods in the newly-born Caproni subsidiary in Reggio Emilia.