'•iS3t§«Sl;° LIBRARY ANNEX "*fc 2 L HOW TO MANAGE AN OFFICE Isi METHODS THAT ENABLED 93 OFFICES TO HANDLE MORE BUSINESS AI LESS EXPENSE ^tm fork HuU QJnUege of Agricultute At flfortiBU Unitietraitg Stiiam. N. $. Cornell University Library HF 5547.S53 How to manage an office. 3 1924 014 544 617 Cornell University Library The original of tliis book is in tine Cornell University Library. There are no known copyright restrictions in the United States on the use of the text. http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924014544617 HOW TO MANAGE AN OFFICE MAKING CONDITIONS RIGHT FOR FAST WORK — SHOWING WORKERS HOW AND GETTING THEM INTERESTED— APPROVED PLANS FOR HANDLING LETTERS, ORDERS, FILES, LISTS AND SUPPLIES-EXPENSE CUTTING— DUTIES, SCHED- ULES AND DESK METH- ODS OF MANAGERS METHODS THAT ENABLED 93 OFFICES TO HANDLE MORE BUSINESS AT LESS EXPENSE A. W. SHAW COMPANY CHICAGO NEW YORK A. W. SHAW COMPANY, Ltd., LONDON 1914 THE MAGAZINE OF BUSINESS SYSTEM "HOW-BOOKS" How TO Incbeabe Your Sales How TO Increase a Bank's Deposits How TO Systematize the Day's Work How to Increase the Sales of the Store How to Sell Real Estate at a Profit How TO Sell More Life Insurance How TO Sell More Fire Insurance How TO Write Letters that Win How to Talk Business to Win How to Write Advertisements that Sell How to Sell Office Appliances and Supplies How to Collect Money by Mail How TO Finance a Business How TO Run a Store at a Profit How TO Advertise a Bane How TO Manage an Office Others m Preparation FACTORY "HOW-BOOKS" How TO Get More Out of Your Factory How Scientific Management is Applied How TO Get Workmen How to Cut Your Coal Bill How to Manage Men How TO Systematize Your Factory Others in Preparation STANDARD VOLUMES AND SETS THE KNACK, OF SELLING (In Six Books) BUSINESS CORRESPONDENCE LIBRARY (Three Volumes) THE AUTOMATIC LETTER WRITER BUSINESS ADMINISTRATION BUSINESS MAN'S ENCYCLOPEDIA iTwo Volumes) BUSINESS MAN'S LIBRARY (Ten Volumes) LIBRARY OF FACTORY MANAGEMENT {Six VoluTnet) LIBRARY OF BUSINESS PRACTICE (Ten Volumes) GOOD WILL. TRADE-MARKS AND UNFAIR TRADING By Edward S. Rogers KEEPING UP WITH RISING COSTS By Wheeler Sammons In Preparation THE MAGAZINE a/'MANACEMENT Copyright, 1914, by A. W. SHAW COMPANY CONTENTS PART I PUTTING THE ORGANIZATION IN TRIM Making Office Expense Go Further Chapter Page I Laying Out the Wokk on Straight Lines .... 7 II Showing Every Department Its Job 15 III More Work through Better Office Conditions . 21 PART 11 HIRING, HANDLING AND PAYING OFFICE HELP As the Workers See It IV Better Ways to Do Work 31 V Making AnvANCBMENi Fiiii Vacancies 36 VI Employment Methods That Hold Help 42 VII Making Payday Pay 48 VIII Getting the Force to Pull Together 56 PART III FIFTY WAYS TO CUT EXPENSES Economy as a Policy IX Saving Two-thirds the Cost of Correspondence 63 X Short Cuts in Handling and Fiung Mail . . 71 XI Low Cost and Dispatch in Handling Orders 79 XII How to Keep Up Mailing Lists 8t XIII Where Office Appliances Cut Costs . . . . 92 XIV Handling Office Supplies Like Cash .... 97 XV Plans That Stopped Money Leaks 104 CONTENTS PART IV DESK METHODS AMD EMERGENCY MANAGEMENT Filling the Manager's Chair XVI At the Office Manager's Desk 115 XVII Intekpeeting Reports and Planning Ahead . . . 121 OFFICE MANAGEMENT CHARTS AND FORMS Figure Page i charting routes fob office work 9 ii latino out paths for an order to follow ... 13 in essentials of office peocedube 17 iv how to plan effective lighting 27 v a definite h0t3tine for advancements 39 VI WHERE TO SAVE ON LETTERS 73 VII SCHEDULING DUTIES FOB A TEAR 117 Form i oedeb depaetment production record 19 ii requisition for employees ... 45 III PATEOLL DISTRIBUTION SHEET 61 IV COMBINED PAT ENVELOPE AND RECEIPT 62 V SALAET REQUISITION BLANK 63 VI PATEOLL EECOBD CARD 54 VII ADDRESSING CLEEk's PRODUCTION CARD 65 VIII EFFICIENCT SUMMABY OF ADDRESSING CLEBKS ... 65 IX STENOGBAPHERS' DAILY SCHEDULE 67 X copyists' REPORT OF DAILY OUTPUT 67 XI NOTICE OF INCOEBECT REMITTANCES 72 XU STAMP AND MAIL BECORD 72 XIII INTEB-DEPABTMENT COMMUNICATION ENVELOPE ... 75 XIV FILE BECOED OF BOBBOWED COREESPONDENCE ... 76 XV-XVIII OEDEB BLANK WITH CARBON COPIES 81 XIX-XX PROSPECT AND CUSTOMER RECORD 85 XXI CUSTOMERS' CARD 86 XXII CARD FOB SMALL MAILING LISTS .... ... 87 XXIII CHANGE OF ADDRESS PROSPECT CAED 89 XXIV REQUISITION FOR SUPPLIES 98 XXV PACKAGE LABEL AND INVENTORY CARD 99 XXVI RECORD OF SUPPLIES BY DEPARTMENTS 101 XXVTI DEPARTMENT EXPENSE BECORD 123 XXVIII "CUSTOMERS HANDLED" RECORD 125 Part I PUTTING THE ORGANIZATION IN TRIM Making Office Expense Go Further /GETTING money to go further means ^-^ making it follow straight lines. Directness is the main point to remember when you begin to shift office desks and revise office methods. As you tramp through the plant after hours, the shop will display its results in product and the sales corps in cash receipts, but the office will be empty. Don't be fooled. Don't tell your office manager to "go after" the overhead. Look deeper with him. Don't slash blindly. Find the uses and products of the office; then improve their quality and cut their cost. Study your office as the most valuable and intricate mechanism in your enterprise — the carrier of service and selling ideas, the bank for your factory and sales department, the clutch that joins product and trade, the range- finder for next year's business. Economize space, not brains — trim lost mo- tion, not system — reduce friction, not power. Find the short cuts in your office work, and "overhead" will be an economy to your business. ■■■ - ■■■ iia: :iiB WHAT DUTIES IS EACH DEPART- MENT RESPONSIBLE FOR? Order Handling Credit Control and Collections Shipping Purchasing Storekeeping Interpreting Classifying and Registeriog Billing Filing Investigation of Risks Decisions on Accounts Written Personal] Legal Procedure Records Filling Orders Checlcing Orders Handling In and Out Freight Routing, Adjustments and Records Setting Standards Investigating Products Purchase ond Follow-up Records and Files Inspection Storage Receiving Care of Stock i lni |_St< [inventories I Guarding agniost Loss and Depreciation. Money Details and Accounting Correspondence and tailing Distributing Records Cash Receipts and Payments Accounts Receivable and Payable Bills and Statements Checks and Discounts Cost Keeping and Payroll Management Reports and Statistics Distributing Considering Incoming Mail ■ Outgoing Mail- Routine Dictation Typing Signing Mailing Operations Filing and Finding Follow-up Library Facilities An oflace needs the same accurate methods as a factory. For the largest and best production at the lowest cost it is essential that the work of every department be clearly defined and assigned so as to conserve labor, material and expense BBB: :bmo w~^^<-^ H mil *-^ ■esiiisrlh j i^fe K 5,^ ECi pm^^l ^:!!^BE :«il ,JS^ -::* ~a» 5&. ' t^Sb'iS™ ~' T f CHAPTER I Laying Out the Work on Straight Lines EVERY business past the hip pocket stage requires an office or department to keep trajck and tally of the routine transactions of making sales, producing goods, collecting the money and paying the bills. In- crease sales or production and you face in turn a per- centage increase in recording and checking or an ex- penditure of gray matter, equally valuable, to figure how to hold down these administrative charges. So de- velop "office expenses". In the office, as with every other problem that con- fronts the man who carries the risk of the business, only a clean-cut analysis of the essential records and a sys- tematic way of cross-sectioning what goes on in his par- ticular business will effect true economy in "over-head". Castings, trucks or piles of parts dotting the factory man's daily path through his plant, are like the drift- wood that comes down the river; they show him how the "stream of production" is flowing. He can detect at what points it is dammed and where it is about to run dry. 8 ORGANIZING FOE "WORK But the stream of work in an office is a flow of papers and messages, all mueh alike to the casual eye. Work held up goes into desk drawers rather than jutting into aisles. Tasks puttered over do not declare themselves. It is respectable to handle successive office operations at opposite ends of a floor when it would be ri&ieulous if the work to be moved were sheet steel rather than rail- road manila. Like the factory, however, the office is a set of channels through which work should circulate di- rect, clean, even, rapid. "But too many managers expect everything in the office to be set to rights at once, ' ' warns a manager to whom belongs the credit for several exceptionally effi- cient offices. "To adjust an office to the run of work takes time, and requires that the proprietor and his manager find out accurately what materials they have to work with and what services the office ought to render." Five Tests That Show Up Lost Motion and Lead to Expense Reductions This practical viewpoint is something to remember in "shaking down" the office. At dozens of points in any office, the management sees tag-ends and chances to clip costs. A good rule, however, is to correct the frame- work first of all. Stopping only to repair any actual breakdown, the office manager whom you have picked because he understands the great savings to be made by correcting layout, routing, neglect of work and lack of adjustment between what a department can do and what is required of it, will get down to the ground and study the office as a channel for the transmission of work. Just as the forwarding of processed or finished goods determines the direction of the work current in shop or store, the handling of the order, which is the paper sym- STRAIGHT LINES FOR ROUTINE Open and Craaaify Mall 1 1 Renliter ind Balance Remiitances Orders without Remittaace Have Order Clerk Interpret Orders and Note Ctaangea of Short* Claiaify Number aad Mark Orders for Bill lag Eater on Regliter Send Charge Orders to Credit Man Credit Pasacd Credit Adjusted Credit Refused Sales or AdvertiainK Dept.to Credit Sources of Business OrigiDal Order, Corrcspon. deoce and Bill Copy Held Copy (o Collection Man Bger on Charge Accounts Copy to Accountant for Ledger Entriea Shipping Copies and Floor Tickets to Shipping Clerk Follow-up for Payment File for Origina) Eniry oi Destroy Shipping Copies Held Copy t Fillet ■ Order Floor I Copies to Order Fill- ers on Other Floors Returned, Checked and with Goods Returned, Checked and with Goods Shipping Clerk Aaaembles and Rechecks with Cooda -C Rebillingand Distribution of New Copies Where Changes Require Shipping Label Copies AtTBched or Packages Addressed Bill of Lading Copy Receipted by Carrier Customer Written and Bill (or Receipt for Cash) Eocloied Oirt-null SeAt Assembled Order Copies and Correspondence Checked sgaliut Customer and Prospect Lists Filed In Order Depaitment FIGURE I: The center of office efficiency is direct, clean-cut handling of orders. This chart indicates the principal processes which all copies of the order usually go through in the well-planned office. Campaigning yoiir office routine with this step by step, may reveal lost motions that are delaying your service to your trade and handicapping your workers 10 ORGANIZING FOR WORK bol for goods, determines the main stream of office work (Figure I). The source is the place to begin looking for wasted expense, or planning for a future office which shall give quick and cheap service to a busi- ness. Tributary to this current at convenient points will come the general service departments, supply purchas- ing and distributing, correspondence, adjustments, dis- cipline. Reorganization of these will wait. Beginning with the incoming mail, the point where waste begins usually, it is established practice in plan- ning either present or prospective offices : (1) To map the floor plan and examine it for the best all around layout. (2) To sketch on this or a similar map, the progress of the order, from the mail desk to the assembling and filing of the various carbon copies after shipment has been made. (3) To follow an order down this current and see it handled in every detail. (4) To get and tabulate reports of work done and imfinished, by departments. (5) To go through the detail work of each depart- ment in turn. In the small office the general manager will want to do this himself. In the bigger business, he can keep in close touch with the work of his office lieutenant. By the time the last two moves are under way, he will have become so thoroughly familiar with the conditions, that he can go back to his map and rearrange it to save wasted space, to stop the surprising gyrations usually found in the progress of an order, to correct the loca- tion and size of various departments and thus come nearer short-line routing all along. STRAIOHT LINES FOE ROUTINE 11 Unnecessary expenses hide in every kink or round- about. Because an office operation repeats over and over, the money waste is important wherever a clerk walks ten feet when the errand could be done by hand- ing a paper across a table. Once these roundabouts are straightened out, it becomes easier to maintain efficiency and to correct desk-to-desk details. The reports show- ing work finished and unfinished at each dividing line in the routine and for various individuals will then indicate sections that are cramped or needlessly spread out, over- taxed or subject to an ebb and flow of detail for which provision is worth while. How a New Office Manager Short-cut Miles of Lost Motion Two office-making tools used every day by a manager who is now rounding out the reorganization of a medium sized business office, are his experimental office plan (Figure II) and his map of order routine. Immediately on taking charge, this manager secured a 24x48-inoh plan of the office, on cardboard, and had the various desks, office appliances, files and other equipment indi- cated by movable bits of cardboard cut to scale and labeled. Tacks with colored heads indicating the vari- ous departments were used to stick the cardboards in place. He then ruled off the trail of an order, indicating by lines and arrows its rather "butterfly" flight back and forth, and up and down the room. The card labels in- dicated the exact processes, desk by desk. Over this plan, the proprietor and manager worked out hundreds of feet of lost motion, but they took no action as yet. Personally following his map of the order 12 ORGANIZING FOR WORK routine, the office man studied equipment, help and mo- tions involved in opening mail, sorting orders, entering cash, interpreting, pricing and copying orders, determin- ing credit questions, checking up advertising returns, filling orders, making shipment, sending the invoice, making the necessary bookkeeping entries and, finally, filing the records of the finished work. At several points the channel of work seemed insuffi- cient, and at another there was a larger force than the operation ordinarily required. Beginning with the de- partments that seemed most wasteful, he arranged to have individual daily reports referred to him. The form in every case merely showed the amount of work in- coming, handled and left undone daily, so that the indi- ■vddual could see his own record clearly as he set it down. Going over these slips day after day, the office head and his department chiefs began to get a perspective on the work a clerk can do. A corner of the office on which other processes almost always had to wait was soon found to be suffering from low-priced help. The record of one efficient worker suggested that the delays were due to the inaccuracies of less capable clerks. To rehandle the poor work made a double burden. The manager shifted three of these clerks to less exacting work and brought in one of high grade. This change reduced the number of desks from five to three and cut out the short circuit which the faulty work had caused. Spurred by this saving, moreover, the department head began a study of lost motion in the detail work at each desk, and so simplified it as to leave one of his two clerks two hours of spare time every afternoon. During this period, the office manager then made use of her as a STRAIGHT LINES FOR ROUTINE 13 reserve worker at various tasks which had piled up and held over on certain days. Out of these daily reports thus came a better adjust- ment of equipment, employment and instruction in each department. As he revised his ideas of the space and position needed for each phase of the work, he also shifted the cardboards on his ofSee map and tried differ- ent layouts. He had found, for instance, that no sooner was the mail opened, the non-cash correspondence sent to those addressed and the remittances eared for, than the orders FIGURE II: With a heavy cardboard plat of his office, bits of cardboard cut to scale and labeled to show desks and equipment, and fastened with colored tacks to indicate different departments, a manager in search of wasted expense money "moved the office" on Epaper and found the most direct route for work. The dotted line shows the "surprising gyrations" in the progress of an order from mail desk to billing machine. The solid black line shows how the order routine was revised and lost motion pruned went the length of the office to the sales head for exam- ination and check-up on the sales record; then, fre- quently, across the room to the office occupied by the managing partner. After that, they were brought back the length of the room for entry. The office manager 14 ORGANIZING FOR WORK shifted his cardboards for several days. Finally, he went to the head of the concern. "I can clip two hours from the time we take to fill the orders that come in the first mail," he said. His chief went over the suggestion and found that it M'ould in no way handicap the factory or the selling end. Administration would not cripple production or distri- bution. The round trip which the order mail had regularly made to the other end of the office was, there- fore, discontinued and in its place, a brief tabulation of the orders, made out in the order department, was put into the office mail for everyone concerned. The sales manager was free to consult the originals in the order department if the report led him to do so. Another digression which the map brought to light in this particular business was the trip which the orders made to the file of mailing lists. Other striking digres- sions from straight lines came of the out-of-the-way lo- cation of the general files and the shipping room. Both of these faults were readily corrected. Straight-line order processing, so far as practicable, thus became a fact. Every division of the office was better adjusted in size, equipment and force to do its share in the work ; tributary departments were better lo- cated, and through the trained reserve forces the crest of a wave of business was easily met as it worked its way down the office. T^HE business executive of today has -■■ a four-fold function : he is a watcher, an economizer, a pusher, a planner. —T. J. Zimmerman CHAPTER II Showing Every Department Its Job YOUR business office is merely the tool which enables those who manufacture and those who sell for you to do so more efficiently. Its function is to handle the communications, records, accounts, finances and reports essential to a business — to get things done efficiently. Every person and division of an office have particular uses. Lo.st motion results from having one sort of process unnecessarily done in two places. The short-line idea is as vital in reorganizing departments and improving desk methods as in routing the order itself. Whether there are only two desks or five hundred, every office (page 6) has some one: (1) To handle and fill orders. (2) To pass on credits and collect for goods sold. (3) To ship, route and handle claims regarding goods. (4) To keep the accounts, statistics and money of the firm — to handle the financial and banking operations and furnish reports to the management. ('5) To supply correspondence, circularizing and fil- ing facilities as tools to all parts of the business. (6) To purchase — to get the supplies necessary to IS 16 ORGANIZING FOR WORK the office, keep a record of sources, place orders and fol- low them to insure arrival. (7) To care for and distribute these supplies — to cheek in, to store, to notify the buyer of shortages, to give out and record the supplies used by the various de- partments. When the management of a business goes into the de- tails of office economy, the task is to see that every man or department does its share of certain of these and other things and is definitely freed from all the others. It is most effective to relieve everyone as much as pos- sible from split interests, and where the force is too small to keep various duties separated, so to combine them that no one will be assigned duties that conflict. Buying is best done by a man who is neither using what he buys nor selling to those from whom he might pur- chase. Complaints are less embarrassing to adjust by some one in the order department or by the management than by the salesman, on whom the customer "has the drop". If the proprietor is at once salesman, supply buyer and complaint adjuster, he can still train himself to a less biased handling of each duty. The allowance of credit can scarcely be handled without favoritism by an order taker. As good collections begin with good credits, the credit man does better if made responsible for round- ing up the accounts he allows. If, however, the actual money comes to his desk, the house is not protecting him against temptation and is putting him to embarrassment in the ease of any disputed settlement. Because the ac- counting department is handling figures which are a check on the work at many points, to keep it independent and judicial is an advantage (Figure III). Many of these points the office manager, whose work of FIXING DEPARTMENT TASKS 17 reorganization has been outlined in the previous chapter, found suggestive in his more detailed task of bringing the different divisions of his office into line with that general plan of expense control. Groing to the supply buyer, he found, as is always the I- I I mcnCDULC ED FIGURE III: Preliminary classification of ofl&ce departments and functions according to principles of scientific management. The analysis was carried^ much further, how- ever, the chart for each department, after the subdivision of functions had been made, having almost as many heads as here shown case when any officer shows special efficiency, that he wa&' saddled with work which rightly belonged to several other men. In his files were stored not only buying, sales and contract records which convenience centered there, but quantity records which belonged with the stockkeeper, and accounting matters and valuable papers which, in the hands of the cashier, might have been earn- ing interest. Charting and following through every detail of the buyer's routine with him, the office manager relieved him of all other work and helped him to cut comers in a 18 ORGANIZING FOR WORK number of ways. Going into the stock and shipping rooms, he repeated the same process. In the storeroom he found the clerk needlessly held at the window throughout the day to supply those who had been careless about keeping stationery, typewriter ribbons and blanks on hand. He set office hours and no- tified everyone to requisition all supplies within these limits, which were several times reduced before a sensi- ble minimum was reached. In the leisure time which this arrangement gave the stock clerk, he was able to check in and place his new supplies more accurately, classify his stock and organize a perpetual inventory which made future shortages and delays unlikely. Going to the sales head, the office manager showed him that the accounting, billing and correspondence sections were planned to care for these details for all depart- ments. Duplication was costly. Orders, remittances and collections were accordingly turned over to the proper men (Form I). The office manager and the sales head then laid out a calendar of sales effort and it was ar- ranged that the sales manager should put in writing a weekly statement of his plans so that the office manager could take care of the circularizing and the re- sulting order work by skillfully shifting his various re- serve clerks. Conditions just as bad were also found in the advertising department. Analyzing the collection complaints in turn, the office manager found that the collection letters which went out were not first checked against the incoming remittance for the same day. Adopting this plan relieved many cus- tomers from the exasperation of duns for bills already paid, and cut off much follow-up postage. In the bookkeeping, the most important source of un- FIXING DEPARTMENT TASKS 19 necessary expense came from work not being cleaned up each day. Daily and monthly reports were often tardy or incomplete, so that not only prompt collections but the decisions of the proprietor himself suffered. Several employees who showed little interest were found to be discouraged because there was no method in the way of promotion except what they interpreted to be favoritism. As the individual reports showed what the work required in ^^^^. t'O-L/.S-.a-f.'i^ U TE 37& 39 f A/ ORDERS On hand A.M Received TOTAL Cliecked .... .... Balance In hands of BILLERS 1 _ 2_ 3_ CHECKERS 1- 2_ 3_ IIST -. O TOTAL ^ 'A^ y o FORM I: A form sent to the manager each night showing the production of the order department and the incompleted work. Similar reports of unfinished and completed tasks were sent to the office head from various departments and what the men could do, the less efficient were shifted to tasks that better suited them, the force was cut down and a line of promotion fixed. The correspondence department, being the tool of the office generally, revealed to the management unusual chances to cut out wasted motions and reduce cost^. Facilities were scattered ; many files, often of a conflict- ing nature, absorbed floor space and proved a constant puzzle to the filing and finding clerks. There was no 20 ORGANIZING FOR WORK standard way to safeguard one class of contracts and certain valuable papers, nor to handle general records and business library material. Messenger service to the outlying departments was irregular. Letters were often filed without assurance that they had been answered and were often missing from the files without explanation. An evening rush of outbound mail usually made con- fusion. To consolidate facilities where of greatest common convenience, the office manager brought the various de- partment files down to their proper limits, enlarged the general file, which he had shifted to the order section, and put it in the control of a responsible head clerk. It was arranged that she should not file unanswered corre- spondence without the initial of the department head concerned and that record slips should be inserted when correspondence was withdrawn. Saturday afternoon in- spections enforced the ruling. In the moderate sized office which this manager reor- ganized, the work outlined occupied several months. At the end of that time, the manager found himself with a well-planned office where a colored tag attached to an order could have been seen moving down the room steadily and in the main, directly, with only unavoidable deviations from the shortest line. The various depart- ments, moreover, were working with smaller average forces and with less confusion than ever before. Mis^ understandings, disputes and conflicts of authority had become rare. The facts brought to each worker by hia daily report, together with the example of the office manager in simplifying the routine, had kindled a new enthusiasm among department heads and workers. CHAPTER III More Work through Better Office Conditions CONFUSION in the mail order department of a busi- ness was running away with the profits. So much energy was wasted by people working over the card records that it was actually costing hundreds of dollars annually. Clerks going back and forth from distant desks to the crowded filing section, often had to wait to get access to the records, and stopping to chat, wasted the company's time. All the actual work was necessary. To improve the system of records would have been a hard task. "What had to be done was to focus the steps and minutes of the employees on the work, so that these would really count for their full value. One day the manager caught a glimpse of better things. He watched the girls carrying card drawers from the cabinets to their desks and back again. In several cases the wrong drawers were taken and had to be returned. At both ends of the trip, there were slight delays. As he watched, an idea came to him. It meant the complete upsetting of established methods, and heavy 21 22 ORGANIZING FOR WORK expense for new equipment; but it meant also, he be- lieved, the cutting out of the los't motion, due to poorly situated fixtures, which threatened to ruin the business. Within an hour, a card cabinet expert was analyzing the situation with him, helping him to prepare specifica- tions on new fixtures and how they were to be laid out. As the cabinet man went out with a trial order marked "rush", a desk man entered. The latter 's order when written up called for a double flat top desk with a bridge eighteen inches above the top and eight inches wide. Two drawers on the bridge were to hold forms, stationery arwi desk accessories. The new card cabinets were just the height of the desk top. They were mounted on casters and proAdded with slots which allowed them to be clamped securely to either end of the desk. Each held three rows of drawers which slid in and out from either end. Each drawer was partitioned off into spaces holding approximately 300 cards. Extensive slides made it possible to pull the drawers out to their full length on either side. Testing the sample desk and cabinets to his satisfac- tion, the manager ordered enough of both to equip the department. Then he split up the customer cards of the various states into groups small enough to be handled by just two workers. When letters or orders were re- ceived they were arranged in these groups and assigned to the desk which looked after any particular group. Misdelivery merely meant passing the paper or papers to the proper group. Either of the two girls at a desk might handle the order. The bridge and drawera gave them whatever addi- tional desk space they needed. They could see and con- sult each other but not the other workers. Thus atten- BETTER WORKING CONDITIONS 23 tion was concentrated on the work at hand, and each pair worked steadily without interruption and without confusion. The segregation of the customer cards; the smaller, movable cabinets, and the group system of handling orders and correspondence had solved the prob- lem of wasted effort. The same principle of cutting off wasted steps and of arranging so as not to keep one file clerk waiting for another to finish, means a proportion- ate saving even in the branch real estate or insurance ofSce with its two or three workers. "While the office layout depends largely on the plan of the building, sufficient space and an arrangement of clerks to permit the handling of work in a straight line or without duplicating motions, have already been shown of prime importance in the office as in the factory. How to work this out in detail is only a question of ap- plying simple principles. One function should be performed at a given desk, the second operation at the desk behind, and so on. This plan avoids unnecessary floor travel. In one office the desks are so close that routine work is sent on and on from one desk to another by the mere handing of the papers to the next person without anyone leaving his desk. Another important test of every office layout is : does it permit expansion that will inevitably come in every successful institution? Ample space should always be available for entire office or single department expan- sion. To avoid solid walls and partitions leaves the way open for such expansion. Partitions, if used at all, should be removable and preferably of glass. Moreover, no layout can be thought of as permanent where the 24 ORGANIZING FOE WORK size and work of the business are changing. An arrange- ment that was suitable for your business last fall will in all probability need changes when the next rush season is here. At some stated period each year, when in- ventory is in order or business is slack, some managers check over the layout which formerly fitted, and de- termine where it demands rearrangement. While space saving is essential to the success of every office, order and convenience are not to be sacrificed by crowding. Edging into the aisles and diminishing the working space in front of office devices causes a general appearance of disorder and confusion about the office with consequent psychological reaction on the workers affected. It has been found in many offices that the best results are obtained with a school room arrangement, the "pu- pils" facing the "instructor", with desks end to end in twos or fours. Another effective plan is to place typists back to back. The use of roll top desks facing the man- ager, on the other hand, shuts off his view and slackens discipline. While an employee in most such cases does not willfully waste time, the eye of the superior gives a definite reason for ambitious effort and is an excellent day-dream chaser. Giving Workers the Proper Amount of Space to Work In Workers are like plants. Don't get them too close together or the results will be poor. Certain recognized standard measurements for various workers and work greatly assist the office manager in planning readjust- ments. A clerk working in space where other clerks BETTER WORKING CONDITIONS 25 pass about him, should have all of three feet aisle space. With employees working back to back, a little less than four feet from desk to desk is recognized as an approxi- mate standard to give suflSeient chair room. A very common width for mail aisles (the average of a dozen offices) is three feet, although this ranges to half a foot more. Five feet is the space usually allowed in front of any file in continual use. As to space for each employee, it was found that a general average was an area ten and a half feet square. This includes the space for desk, chair, aisle, files and equipment. How to work out your new arrangement is a question that holds back many managers who would reorganize if they could vizualize. Any office, large or small, may use the map and tack plan (Chapter I) to decided advantage. A saving of time and money will be effected and the changes made will prove unusually satisfactory. Guesswork is elimi- nated because all the trying out is done on the "checker board". On this, a wall can be torn down, another built up, a desk removed or installed, a stationery cabinet moved or put in, at no cost whatever. Not only should space be properly divided, but efforts should be made to utilize it all for the full day. Every foot of floor space is being paid for in the city at several dollars per square foot and where its use is confined to a mere fraction of the working time, there is an unseen waste always going on, resulting in an abnormally high rent. A large hardware house in the West used one room for the employment department. A very few hours each week sufficed for this function, until the manager saw 26 ORGANIZING FOR WORK that waste of space was enormous. To remedy this, he ordered the room locked up to outsiders except when new help was advertised for. He then began to find uses for a "spare room" among his men. Whenever execu- tives wished to hold a private meeting, they were as- signed this room. Salesmen often take their customers here for conference. Thus where formerly there was wanton waste, a great increase has come about in the hours of use. Conditions That Enable Employees to Give Moi% with the Same Effort Good lighting, heating and ventilating systems and absence of noise are other essentials of the physically perfect office, which enables its . workers to do their best. When it is not possible to furnish daylight to every desk, poor lights are a costly economy (Figure IV). In one office accommodating eight clerks, partitions had been built so as to make it possible to get daylight from two small windows only. The clerks working near them had plenty of light, but those who were more than six feet away had to use artificial light all the time. The office had two clusters of sixteen candlepower lights, five bulbs to the cluster. A test was made to discover how light influenced the efficiency of a man. Two stenographers were set on straight copying for one hour each morning for one week. The first day they sat near the windows, the second day near the door where they had to use general illumina- tion from clusters, and the third day they were provided with desk lamps. The test was repeated on the follow- ing three days. BETTER WORKING CONDITIONS 27 In both cases, the most work was accomplished when the desks were near the windows. With a desk lamp they were able to do nearly as much as when they got light from the windows. With general lighting the work fell twenty per cent below "daylight work". In other words, poor lighting was costing the finn nearly an hour and a half of each clerk's time every day. Desk lamps were at once installed, dispensing with overhead illumi- nation. Quiet is regarded by many as a cardinal quality of the most productive office. Scientific research has shown some interesting things about the rebound of noises from Effective Lighting for the Office Dimensions of Office No. of Rows of Lamp Power 60 80 100 ISO -10 feet 2 Concentrated Reflector 10-14 .. 3 2 14-22 .. 7 5 4 (2 rows) 22-30 •• 16 10 8 (2 rows) 6 30-38 •• 25 20 16 (3 rows) 12 (3 rows) Distrlbutlni Reflector 39-40 ■' 40 30 24 (4 rows) 18 (3 rows) 46-58 •• 66 50 40 30 (5 rows) 1 FIGURE IV: The power indicated in this table is based on a uniform height of sus- pension of ten feet above the floor, which is the height necessary in order to have the points of light well above the direct lines of vision. The number of lamps given is based on the use of tungsten incandescents. For carbon filaments, approximately three and one-half times as many units would be required to give the same candlepower. An intensity of 1.5 watts to tne square foot is taken as given with this suspension, three to four watt candles to the square *foot on the working plan, which is the figure usually observed for ofl&ce lighting. In case of the largest sized lamj), 150 watts, the spacing being of course wider than for the smaller sizes, for a suspension of ten feet — in order to get proper distribution of the light flux, the usd of a wider distributing reflector is requisite. The use of high-efficiency reflectors is assumed in all cases. Naked lamps would be very much less efficient hard walls and in an open, high-ceiled room. A New York firm has successfully attacked the problem of noise by using the ''ounce of prevention" instead of the *' pound of cure". Hair felt, covering the walls and 28 ORGANIZING FOR WORK ceilings, practically undermined echoes and reverbera- tions. Installation of a system of forced ventilation was the first step taken. Circulation of washed and filtered air throughout the building allowed the sealing of the windows and the consequent exclusion of outside noises. This construction, together with the segregation of typing and calculating machines, reduced the offensive ofSce noises to a minimum. Ventilation, heat and humidity are other matters to receive constant consideration. A reasonably cool, moist, well-ventilated offi.ee is a big factor in assuring the com- fort of the workers and in maintaining their eifieieney the year round. An office gets a good or bad name for working con- ditions. Especially in the small office where no one with knowledge is responsible for living conditions, the neglect of these points is running into money every month be- cause of drowsy and lazy workers, wasted effort, dis- content and unused facilities. By planning to have con- ditions right, and entrusting this schedule to one re- sponsible clerk, production can easily be increased. Making it both easy and agreeable for employees to work in yoar office is a sure way of reducing the fluctua- tions of the office force and of developing the output to- wards the maximum. THERE must be no frills in the trans action of office routine, no lost effort, no jumbling of inter-department mat ters. To this end a well-planned ar- rangement of the office is obviously essential. ■ 11 Z=I=ZIIB Part II HIRING, HANDLING AND PAY- ING OFFICE HELP As the Workers See It T^IVE clerks recently came and went at the ■*■ same desk in a basement office. The man- ager is still looking for a good man, who will "stick". Another view of it is that five sensible clerks voted against handicapping themselves with bad air and poor light. The office is an Idea workshop; above all, it must have keen minds. To inspire and enlist these in team work demands fundamental ap- peals to loyalty through individual ambition. No manager can afford to know so much or decide so obstinately as not to review office hours, conditions, chances and pay through the worker's eyes. When five clerks cast a vote of resignation against a basement niche, the wise manager moves or betters his equipment. When ex- ecutives quit, chances for initiative and pro- motion are called "on the carpet". There is no more vital working rule of man- agement than this: Keen workers will not waste themselves long on dull tools or blind- alley jobs, for to do so means dullness. ill ■»■ hi: :iiB QUALITIES TO LOOK FOR IN CHOOSING OFFICE HELP i 1 < 1 1 1 u 1 1 1 1 1 i i i 1 •a 1 >> 1 1 1 1 1 1 i a Accarate X X % X X X X X X X X X X X X X Alert X X X X X X Conscientious X X X X X X X Dependable X X X X X X X X X X Diplomatic X X X X X Educated X X Enthusiastic X X X X Experienced X X X Firm X X X X Honest X X X X X X X X X X X Industrious X X X X X X X X X X X X X X ln(renious X X X Initiative X X X X X X X X X X X Mathcmalicat X X X X X X X X X X Neat X X X X X X X X X X X Original X Persistent X X Quiclc X X X X X X X X X X X Jt X Reserved X X X X X Self-reliant X X X X X Sincere X X Tcacliable X X X X X X X X Versatile X X X X Deft X X X X X Eyesight X X X X X X X Hearing X X Penmanship X X X X X X X Presence X X X X X When you hire your next man, put a sheet of paper alongside this list of points in character. Then check his required qualities and see how he stacks up. Any other qualities deemed necessary may be placed in the blank spaces ■II: III CHAPTER IV Better Ways to Do Work GROWTH of business brought a crisis in the office of an Eastern manufacturer not long ago. More room, more clerks, more people to take charge of work- ing groups, seemed to be urgently needed. Under the grind of steady overtime, stenographers, bookkeepers and other employees were becoming restive. The strain of the afternoon rush had begun to increase errors, delay work and unfavorably affect relations with cus- tomers. Facing conditions he felt he could not remedy while carrying his usual office duties, the manager asked for help. Not merely for an assistant to take part of his load, however. He had watched the application of scien- tific principles to management in neighboring factories and had laid hold of the idea that one right way could be worked out for writing letters, filing correspondence, keeping books and completing other office operations as certainly as for turning an engine crank shaft. So he asked for expert aid to study office conditions, equip- ment and methods, and to find the best way of perform- ing each task and the proper tools to perform it with, so 31 32 OFFICE EMPLOYEES that the employees could be shown how to do things correctly. After balancing the initial outlay involved, against the current wasted expense, the directors consented to the reorganization. The scope of this included every officer and clerk in the place and even the least of their functions. It looked at everything without prejudice but with a fixed purpose to find a better way. Time study, scrutiny, analysis and experiment were the means by which the reorganization went forward, detail by detail. There was no hurry ; the investigator, first of all, had been made a member of the organiza- tion. He wanted, of course, to show immediate returns, though it was plainly understood that his work was to be judged by final results alone. "While, therefore, the complete reorganization required two years, as he found leaks or losses, these were stopped at once. As soon as he worked out a new and better way of doing anything and had tested and checked it in practice, it was adopted as the standard operation; the program of economy and efficiency went forward one more step. Where confu- sion and waste were most apparent the investigator naturally turned first. One of the basic rules of the scientific method is to gather and preserve in concrete shape detailed knowl- edge about conditions, materials, processes, and so on, and the right way to handle them. In every business it has happened more than once that in the absence or after the resignation of some executive or employee, spe- cific tasks have had to be left to men who knew little or nothing about them. To acquire the necessary knowl- edge requires time, and blunders are almost certain to occur. BETTER WAYS TO DO WORK 33 With the more scientific program in force, however, such a dilemma never needs to be faced. Instead of re- lying on the judgment or inspiration of the men when a task presents itself, experience and proved knowledge are drawn upon to point the way. For, just as soon as the right way is worked out for any operation, whether by time study of processes and investigation of materials, equipment and the like, or from the experience of men who have conducted the operation successfully, this right way is adopted and recorded as standard. Making a Standard of the Bight Way and Recording It Depending on the size of the business and its char- acter, these standards may require for their recording only one or two scrap books or a large group of filing cabinets. In this office, the record was made in two blank books — a Book of Standards and a supplementary; volume containing exact instructions for the minor oper- ations peculiar to the business. One book might have served for both ; division and classification simply saved time for the person consulting the records; and time- saving and efiicieney are the primary purposes. The Book of Standards thus grew week by week to be a text-book of the business in its ofSee phases. By study of the instructions, blank forms, blue prints, and spe- cifications for supplies posted in the stores section, for example, any intelligent man could equip, arrange and operate an exact duplicate of the company's storeroom and furnish every supply needed by any department without consulting anyone in that department. The same thing was true, in time, of every office activity. 34 OFFICE EMPLOYEES Wherever a process is routine, it is analyzed and a right way built up for it, whether it pertains to the president or an office boy. Everybody regardless of rank is given standard means of getting his work com- pleted. In the bookkeeping department, ledger posting work was timed with the result that those postings re- quiring some thought were standardized at sixty per hour. Two hundred was the figure decided upon for posting direct from carbon sheets of invoices. Thus in an eight hour day a worker should make sixteen hundred entries of the latter class. Another standard described the exact procedure to obtain abatement of customs duties on certain materials imported. This was usually the task of the general manager: during his absence it had two or three times fallen to lesser executives, who, for lack of knowledge, had bungled it. Yet after the correct method had been reduced to writing and inserted in its proper place in the Book of Standards, any one of the forty men in the office could secure the abatement. Exact methods make a strong point of identification. Where there is any division of duties, everything is labelled. Even the office boys wear nvmiber badges. They are required to put their numbers on all documents which they handle, as in filing, so that responsibility can be traced. The same rule applies to all throughout the office. When executive or subordinate knows that a resulting loss is certain to be laid at his door, he will be careful not to break the rules. Every part of every office has a "best" way in which a particular item of work may be performed. A west- em manufacturing company secures a higher grade of general clerical service by making it a point to acquaint BETTER WATS TO DO WORK 35 the new employees with every kind of work in the office. They figure that the new man is in a receptive mental state and can be taught how to perform his work cor- rectly before his habits crystallize into inefficiency. Showing him all parts of the plants gives him the "why and wherefore" of his duties. There are two general ways in which employees are shown how to perform their duties. The first, more common and human, is to put the newcomer under the wing of an experienced employee. The length of time during which the guiding hand is kept over the novice depends upon the complexity of the work and the in- telligence of the new employee. The second way, more scientific and thorough, is the use of the standard book, showing exactly and completely the way to perform "Job 18". Both have their advantages. A combination of the two has often proved best. In one firm where written rules are given each employee, the management sees that they are read and understood, by giving semi-annual examinations to the workers. Re- wards, together with the discharge of disappointing workers, spurs most of them to become familiar with all phases of their work. E VERY unnecessary movement in the office wastes time and energy that properly belongs to the house. But more than that, the energy belongs to the worker himself, for by the proper expenditure of his efforts his own value to himself and to the house is determined. CHAPTER V Making Advancement Fill Vacancies I CAN'T find that letter, Mr. Holmes. I must have mis- filed it. I'm not used to this system yet. Over at the other place -where I worked" — and the new filing clerk rambled on while the office man glared out of the window. He was vexed because the recently vacated position had been filled by a new employee, unfamiliar with the insurance firm's system. After it was found during the day that a few more letters "must have been misfiled", the correspondent ex- plained the situation to the manager. So vehemently did he explain that a new training system was shortly installed. Bach position in the routine clerical work was, therefore, "understudied" by clerks on the "rung" below. Any position now vacated is filled by one who has studied the work in anticipation of an advancement to that position. A capable substitute is usually in train- ing for any place. More work is consequently turned out. And when there is a vacancy, it causes little or no break in the work. Just as an obscure understudy MAKING ADVANCEMENTS 37 often gives a performance superior to that of the self- satisfied stage star, so these understudies often better the past records of their new places. "Workers will not take full interest in the business and put their personalities into it unless they have a fair, personal incentive. "Promotion is the reward we hold out," says the manager of a soap business. "Our office men and de- partment heads have nearly all been trained in the fac- tory. Some of them have been with the firm since they left school. "Most of the salesmen, too, eame as office boys and rose through the ranks, until by the time they qualified for better positions they were so thoroughly acquainted with the details that their enthusiasm and knowledge were sufficient to carry them through any situation. Often the loss of a capable man opens the way for un- tried material that proves even better." There are numerous vital reasons why it is wise to advance employees to fill vacancies (Figure V) . For one thing: each firm has its policies. It has certain ways in which work is to be done that differ from other offices. One firm desires its stenographers to copy single spaced, with double spacing between paragraphs; and to word the complimentary close, "Very truly yours". Another firm has a letter style with double spacing, no extra space between paragraphs, and a complimentary close of "Yours truly". We can see many such differences by picking up any two letters from different firms and com- paring them. Rarely are two exactly alike ; and it is the same with other office work which the outsider does not see. The worker who has grown familiar with the tra- ditions of the business and with whose characteristics 38 OFFICE EMPLOYEES other people have grown familiar, is naturally more valuable than a green hand. When advanced vacancies are filled by new men, more- over, we see the dissatisfied worker ; the man who is side- tracked; who to satisfy his natural and commendable ambition seeks a position where he can "grow". The manager of an office in a Michigan city found that he was being forced to retrench simply because his force was fluctuating. As everyone knows, breaking in a new man — especially in the better grades of work — is an ex- pensive affair. The cost varies with the kind of work and the salary paid, but the very lowest is not, as a rule, very much under fifty dollars. This training some- times takes months. With a force fluctuating as his was (over twenty-five per cent yearly) a great amount went towards "breaking in" new men, many of whom left just when they had become fitted to their work. "A mistake or so, and out you go" — so the employees took upon themselves to find positions in which their future was more certain. After the retirement of this trouble-making manager and the substitution of the present decidedly human manager, the trouble should have ceased. But it didn't. The employment policy of the firm combined with the momentum of the "run" that had begun years back still played havoc. This policy was to take in an out- sider to fill whatever position was vacated. Even though the head bookkeeper changed firms a new man went into his shoes. The plan in doing this was not to keep workers down. It was merely to avoid shake-ups as much as possible. The firm wanted to keep its employees at the work in which — because they had been at it for so long a time — MAKING ADVANCEMENTS 39 How One Office Manager Outlined Advancement ' Class A Salary above $ 120 + + Maximum increase below Class A $5 on a monthly salary each year for three years T t ' Cbs8 B Salary S 105-120 ' , T j Class C Salary $90-105 . L Class D Salary $ 75-90 i i j Class E Salary $ 60-75 t t • Class F Salary $45-60 t T All lower employees considered applicants for every vacancy in ■ grade above.Promotion awarded on fitness, merit and length of service t t - Class G Salary $30-45 ' ■ f 1 Applicants from without con- ■ sidered only for places in class G except in emergencies All Higher Executives and Voucher Men Assistant Heads of Depls. Welfare Workers Accountants Chemists Librarian Special Adjusters Statisticians Chauffeurs Engineers Junior Engineers Bookkeepers Bill Clerks Sales Correspondents Head Stenographers Stenographers Telephone Operators House Salespeople Junior Bookkeepers Junior Stenographers Dictation Machine Operators Mail Clerks Special File Clerks Typists File Clerks Messengers FIGURE V: When vacancies are filled by advancing emiiloyees in pre! erence_ to out- siders, the cost of "breaking in" the new occupant of a position is reduced to a minimum. In fact, among employees of long standing, "breaking in" is seldom necessary, A definite salary plan helps to forestall jealousies and charges of favoritism. The care- ful plan here shown has been a gratifying success m all these respects 40 OFFICE EMPLOYEES they were highly proficient. Theoretically, the plan was not bad from the employer's viewpoint. But it did not work out. Instead of staying at the work in which prac- tice had made them perfect, they found positions where their ambition could at least partially be satisfied. The house disregarded the future of its employees. Finally the manager came to the conclusion that this was the trouble. He tested his conjecture by actual practice. New men were only taken at the bottom. As soon as the employes realized the reform, the changes in the corps became a reasonable per cent. The new em- ployment policy turned the trick. Filling a position is, to an employee, the same as es- tablishing an office is to his employer. He wants to gain a firm foothold in his work and then "stick" with the house, building up a better place for himself all the while. It is — as it should be — strictly a business propo- sition with him. The danger in a strict seniority plan is that no discre- tion remains to the management ; misfits must sometimes result, and exceptional ability be lost or only partially capitalized. To counteract this tendency, it is wise wherever possible to divide workers by grades, in each of which various kinds of work are included. Everyone in the lower grade is considered for any vacancy in the one next higher. Bach promotion finally hinges on what the individual is especially fitted for. In a large New York insurance office where advance- ment is thus worked out, the management divides the clerks into definite groups ranging from boys, junior clerks, senior and special clerks to supervisory and tech- nical employees. MAKING ADVANCEMENTS 41 Besides these divisions there are subdivisions among some of these such as copyists, typists, phonographers, calculating machine and addressing machine operators. Above these classes are department heads, junior officers and executives. The work of each class is standardized and a system of minimum and maximum compensation established which allows the hiring of workers at an initial salary fair to both the firm and the clerk. While they con- tinue in the same class they may gain limited increases in salary for meritorious work or length of service. It is mutually understood that compensation beyond a cer- tain maximum will be secured by promotion. So that they may secure larger salaries through ad- vancement the firm is endeavoring to establish a series of training lessons to make their clerks competent for more important work. The operations of each position have been put on paper in black and white, and each clerk studies the functions connected with any position of the notch above that interests him. SURROUND yourself with men in whom you have confidence and then put confidence in them; aim to give them the highest ideals of life. Make them better citizens and they will then be better workmen. Recognize merit. Promote from the ranks. Help your men keep out of a rut. Most of our executives have grown up in our service. —E. P. Ripley CHAPTER VI Employment Methods That Hold Help HIRE a bookkeeper, a mail clerk and two office boys," boomed the manager's voice over the wires to the employment head at the other end of the building. "With a word of assent the latter hung up the receiver and wrote three want advertisements which were duly sent to the newspapers. Numbers of applicants came in response. Men were taken on to fill the vacant positions, and the sign was put out: "No more help wanted". Yet how that sign erred! Among those turned away was the very bookkeeper needed; the mail clerk whom the manager had in mind ; and two keen office boys. In this single instance the bookkeeper lasted until "trial balance day"; the mail clerk still holds his job — by a bare thread ; and the two office boys were discharged before the end of the week. , Not a mile from this concern is another, about as large and in the same line of business. Practically no man who gets on its payroll is discharged. It isn't necessary. At the latter concern, the manager — a shrewd, far- METHODS OF HIRING 43 seeing leader — ^has written down, in black and white, just exactly what he wants to have in each worker — ^the qualities that the successful applicants must have for the respective positions. For each position, no matter how trivial, he gives detailed information. The employment head, a skilled and experienced second to his manager, carefully compares applicants with the requirements and by simple tests that probe for the needed qualities, picks the best (page 30). A wholesale house large enough to warrant an em- ployment department, has printed blanks for the use of the various heads, to be filled out by them when new men are desired (Form II). The requisitioner first gets formal permission from the general manager to take on the men desired. Permission granted, he states exactly the kind of man he wants and why he wants him : because he has discharged a worker ; because one has left ; because of an advancement ; or be- cause of permanently increased work which indicates additional help. This information, recorded day by day, grows into valuable annual records for enlightening the manager on employment conditions. In this firm also the qualities for each position have been quite definitely decided upon. Individual forms have been printed for bookkeepers, billing clerks and machine operators. Then, as he interviews each appli- cant, this employer puts a grade after each quality, as courtesy 90% perfect. The qualities have a wide range from such extremes as "hand writing" to "personality". After all the applicants have had their say, the man- ager glances over the cards and picks out those nearest the "hundred" mark for a final talk to see with which on£s he can make terms. 44 OFFICE EMPLOYEES Out of this sifting, he selects the two or three with whom he has made the best bargains and sends them to the requisitioner for final selection. This double cheek on the selection insures, in nearly every case, an excellent man at a moderate expense. The head of a small office is likely to be careless about finding out the health of applicants. Losses from this cause are important, however. This applies both to hiring and keeping the worker in health. Ailments have been held to cut ability in half." While the word "health" deals mainly with physical well being, the mental condition of a worker needs to be considered. There is nothing more destructive to efScieney than mental ill health. In a particular office where some fifty girls are em- ployed, the woman who is at the head of them keeps a careful watch for mental distress and makes it her busi- ness to unearth the trouble and remove or at least allevi- ate it. This "big-sister" work has brought a surprising increase of production. Many application blanks carry questions concerning the health of the applicant and that of relatives who might possibly have a contagious disease. In one hard- ware concern, if the applicant reports that a relative is afflicted with tuberculosis or cancer, for example, the prospective employee is examined for that disease. If found free of it, the fact that it is in the family is dis- regarded. There are various ways of handling this problem tact- fully. A large firm in Illinois formerly had many ques- tions pertaining to health in their blanks. This has been done away with. A doctor now takes the place of METHODS OP HIRING 45 printer's ink. This plan is more satisfactory in several self-evident ways. The applicant is examined by the physician immediately after he has been tentatively em- ployed. This examination extends from office employees to the manual workers in the shipping department. The girl worker, who constitutes the greater part of the class designated as junior clerks, is a distinct unit in the employment system. "In hiring girl workers it is Requisition for Employees EMPLOYMENT DEPARTMENT Kindly furnish one ■g»<^g»<»<-', —t***'^^^^ -$'6 to fill position as. To begin work aualifjcation desirable ^z-^^-^^^^-"^^**^ ^»»«^/»«a<^-%^^««»»<^ Experience- necessary -»4ffifl06«05af^ Position t o myofary- permanent . Needed on account of ^jg«^^yj«/ -^^o^aag ■ Rate about '^ In dZ't^eUyt^ nenailment Per (f?^- y^^->*'^^^t.^r*C - DEPARTMENT MGR. Remarks by Employment Supervisor _ FORM n; When a new employee is desired, the department head fills out this form and sends it to the employment department. The employment head scans the applicants with a view to meeting the requirements of the requisitioner scarcely possible to use the magnetism of advancement when bargaining with applicants," says the manager be- fore mentioned. "Better working conditions and short hours, are alluring inducements." "What is the hardest knot in hiring?" repeated a successful employment head. "Hiring is like giving credit; you may be too lax and accept dishonest em- 46 OFFICE EMPLOYEES ployees, on whom you lose heavily, or accept better em- ployees at too high a price; or you may be too strict and offend workers, who will damage your good will in the labor market. "I carefully set a price on each position in the office and then try to get the best man at the price. Of course, I allow this price to fluctuate a few dollars. If I see a man or girl that I want in my employ I do not let a difference of a small amount cut any figure in the negotiation. But I don't allow my 'tryout' salary standards to vary to any appreciable extent. "In bargaining with the applicant that I want, I then try to make him see all the values the position honestly includes — the value of experience and reputa- tion to be gained in the performance of the work (espe- cially if he is a young man) and how far it is possible for him to climb; the minor details of vacations, our bonus plan and the like. In other words, I try to keep away from the mistake many employers make, of sup- posing that their men, unlike themselves, live wholly to work. Since there are many agreeable features in our house's policies, applicants are usually willing to come into the office for a reasonable amount. "Accurate credit methods also have a place here, in the investigation of character among prospective em- ployees. I know of one case where a youngster was sys- tematically robbing the employer and clearing out ; then working at another office, getting the job by offering to begin for next to nothing if sure of opportunity ; getting references and leaving to enter the employ of another firm ; filching here, clearing out and beginning the whole procedure over again. METHODS OF HIRING 47 "The worst of such a situation is that when the news spreads about the office that this or that — perhaps cur- rency — ^has been stolen, the effect on the office force is intensely demoralizing. Only a strict credit policy as regards investigation, references and prosecution in the employment department, coupled with working condi- tions that do not leave temptingly loose ends, will solve this problem in any office. "And then there is another demoralizing influence; that of having the worker who is tried out, found want- ing and discharged, to go about hinting that his former office is a poor place to work: 'They don't give you a chance, and pay starvation wages — '. Often the truth of the matter is that the worker failed to earn even his 'starting in' figures, and gave his superior no grounds for encouraging him further. "The way out of this difficulty, I have found, is to come to a definite understanding with every worker in the beginning. Tell him frankly instead of hinting at it or letting him take it for granted, that he is not per- manently hired. State the length of time to ensue before you can come to a definite decision. Establish a follow-up card pack which will remind you to review every man's wages and revise them in line with any promise or merit. "Since I have adopted this plan of candid negotiation, I have had little understanding. When I am com- pelled to discharge a worker, he never leaves before I have a friendly and helpful talk with him. The result has not been all to be desired, but it has been a great improvement. ' ' CHAPTER VII Making Payday Pay I'VE certainly been fortunate," says a certain employer. "Why, I'm paying one of my men $7,000 per year. Then I have a number of other men looking after differ- ent ends of my business. I am paying each of them $2,000 a year. I give each of them a Christmas present of $3,000 a year. It isn't the salary they work for — ^it's the present. And I get results from them, too. It pays." The amounts make this an exceptional case, but the principle is significant. It indicates how office heads are growing away from the set wage, acknowledging that every individual has his own ambition to progress and offering prizes to the detail manager and even the routine clerk who can thus be spurred to greater or better-di- rected effort. Piece work, the payment of a bonus, gifts, voluntary increases and various profit-sharing plans have all been tried in office work, with varying success. One of the most common plans has been to give the employees a percentage of the annual profits. The per- centage has ranged from y^ to 10%. Obviously the amounts — and the methods of distribution also — vary. 48 MAKING PAYDAY PAY 49 The return in loyalty and thinking service has usually, however, been adequate. A customer of a French printing firm in which this policy is in force, received proof sheets three times in the same envelope. On asking why this happened, he re- ceived the following answer from the clerk: "Because in our business profit-sharing has been introduced." Another plan is rewarding department heads for the gain in their respective departments. On the face of it, this seems liberal enough; and when a firm gives a de- partment head a reward, disregarding a month in which there was a marked loss, it may seem too liberal. Such an act of an eastern wholesale grocery, however, proved it to be only good business. Their "dried fruit" man had had a brilliant record for eleven months. Then he made a bad deal, losing fifteen thousand dollars for his firm. In this particular establishment the bonus is a definite percentage. When "bonus" time arrived this department head found his reward based on his successful months, and the last month, the note informed him, would be added to the coming year. This gave him a fighting chance. And with the intense gratitude and enthusiasm his em- ployer's generous act had instilled in him, he was able to bring his profits up to normal for the next year, even though the deficit of the preceding year was considered. Payment Plants That Succeed with Machine Operators and Boys Other methods of paying a bonus are to give the em- ployees whose efforts do not show up in "black and white" whatever the boss thinks is right, and to make 50 OFFICE EMPLOYEES an extra payment to the girl worker as the basis of her record — the stenographer, the addresser, the typist and the like. The last named involved a different bonus principle. The overamount is paid every week or twice a month. The extra payment is made for different reasons than those given to the male employees. "Over" payihent to girl workers is a reward for the present work — and an immediate encouragement to further efforts. In the case of higher employees, the extra pay seeks to buy judgment, loyalty and permanence of service. To make the short-time bonus plan profitable, it is usual to gauge the work by the results of the capable and conscientious workers. The spur of extra pay will soon bring the laggards up into this class. Of course, an offer of this sort will rarely make a good worker out of a poor one. It has a remarkable influence on the middle averages of work, however, and enables the man- ager to weed out the hopelessly poor or indolent workers with little difficulty. The production in the addressing department of one basiness house increased from 3,353 names the first week to 40,779 during the eighth week of the experiment; an increase of 1,200%. This was the outcome of a bonus offer of two dollars per month for every additional two hundred per day over one thousand. To keep out errors that creep in when there is an incentive for speed and resulting quantity, two cents was deducted for every error revealed in proof reading. The frequency of payday among office workers ranges, as a rule, from weekly to semi-monthly. In some houses where other departments overshadow the office — say for MAKING PAYDAY PAY 51 an example, a commission house — where the "hustlers" out-number the office force, their payment plan (once a week) extends to the office workers. This, is true because two payment methods would cause too much clerical work and precipitate confusion (Form III). PAYROll PERIOD ENDING O^^JI DEPARTMENT f'L,r^>uyrxX£-yiSi- ^ _19l«L_ 1 CHECK Na. NIME MOHTHLr „,,„., II DEBIT L OISTRIBUTIOH / RATE AYROU |- 20 S2I F21 II S22 F22 w FORWARDED ?7 00 / iS J0 c •■/}<: 3^ / / 00 Ion iioo est* J ! i 5 W.WIU^ n 00 T 00 ass _ 1 ioo 3 6 <■ AVI ^«:k IS 000 7 lao iaoc 1 OOO 100 , (lflf> 3 6 7 VW^-V- 1 1 00 5 00 Soo I'iOO ioo I floc I -_ .^ U A. J_ „ . J^ _j J L. LU) >- -l— " " \ 1 1 OEPT.TOTAt 1 1 1 1 II 1 .. 1 1 I II 1 FORM HI: On this sheet the payroll totals are assembled, distributed and receipted by check numbers in one large office. Time cards and checks complete the routine Planning a good mechanical payment system is a point to be considered. A small office in the west furnishes an example of simple and inexpensive methods of making payment. A list of names of those on the payroll and the amount coming to them is made out for each payday. The time clerk sends in her report of the absentees. The proper deductions are made by the assistant paymaster. In all this work the clerks are greatly aided by labor- saving devices. In the first place, names are printed on the payroll sheets by addressing machines; the total is computed in adding machines; and so rapidly and ac- curately is the work done that the expense is reduced to 52 OFFICE EMPLOYEES a small fraction of the cost when written in by hand and cheeked back. Pay envelopes are likewise printed on this machine, thus insuring absolute accuracy and effect- ing considerable saving in both time and cost. An amount exactly equal to the total payroll is depos- ited in the bank in a special payroll account and the checks are drawn on this account. An envelope is made out for each one on the payroll. The paymaster writes out the cheeks and puts them in the corresponding envelopes. This is cheap work, but the paymaster, (whose other duties are that of auditor and cashier) wants to take no chances on having a care- less clerk put the manager's cheek in the office boy's envelope and vice versa — giving that youngster an oppor- Data Salary Amount Signature Date Salary Amount Slsnature .^ " 'i^O 66 ^■/at,,^*, (Pa^'il, ■3,/, " ^o tsa :/'U/t.^yece, (PoaJi^ FORM IV: A pay envelope which can be printed to cover either six or twelve months' pay, montUy or semi-mon hly, and wliclj also serves for the same time as a receipt. It reduces costs in material and penmanship tunity to publish the figures of the executive's salary all over the office. A clerk then goes about the office dis- tributing them. The cancelled checks are, of course, the receipts. "Formerly we paid in cash," says the paymaster. "In many small places this method is still in vogue. I MAKING PAYDAY PAY 53 would carefully count out the cash for the total payroll, in a heap at one sid6 of the desk. Then I would fill the addressed envelopes. I knew that I had made a mistake if any currency or envelopes remained after one or the other was exhausted. "Each worker, on receiving his envelope at the cash- SFFICE CHECK KOI TMKSFEIUBLE UNO CHMiiE auE IS wr Accoum . Nana TT— ^C^t-^.«g^.£^^^ FORM V: In another office, once a week — on payday — the employee fills out this form and sends it to the salary clerk for his signature. Then he secures the stated sum in cash from the cashier, m return for the slip. _ This serves as a receipt and as a means of identification ier's cage, signed a receipt. That was all there was to that. Paying by check is more satisfactory, however, even if it involves more work." In an office employing about fifty clerks, and where it is not deemed advisable to pay by individual check, salaries are paid semi-monthly according to this plan: Names are listed in a trial balance book, and as there are twenty-four columns to the year (twelve "Dr." and twelve "Cr.") this saves relisting of names twenty-three times a year, and, in addition, serves as a permanent record of all such payments and is easy of reference. Each payday a check is cashed for the total of the current column and the individual amounts, in suitable denominations (thus avoiding future reference to the 54 OFFICE EMPLOYEES cashier for change) are placed in stout envelopes lined inside with linen. This envelope is sufficiently large to receive unfolded paper currency and is ruled on the out- side (Form IV). One envelope is assigned to each employee and is ruled for entry of twenty-four pay records. The name, ad- dress, and ntunber of the payee appear at the top of the envelope. Each payday a clerk in the office enters the / Ho. 7\ Name .^^ ^ V^-tZi*— nun patio n /3i9-&-^^j^JL^2je^3^ Received from A: H. Gleason & Co. In lull of all servJCB XkT^Xf. 6 £- Payroll No. From To Amodnt 1 Signature 1 ^/3 /ZfCiZ. / /^/^ tSt^^ g^ /^/■/ /.5 ^« ^w^<^i-J.iJ^ ^7 i/' FORM VI: This card was devised as a substitute for more cumbersome forms of payroll receipt. It makes it possible to keep confidential the individual worker's salary amount and date of the payment in the envelope and the cash is enclosed. When the employee receives his pay he signs his name and the envelope is returned. Paying in cash has a drawback when a payroll book is used to secure the receipts of the worker. A St. Louis employer met and overcame this stumbling block. It was easy for one employee, when signing the book, to ascertain the amount drawn by a fellow workman. This caused dissatisfaction. Further, this employer found that the use of individual receipts necessitated too much work in the treasurer's department, and did not allow satisfactory reference files. MAKING PAYDAY PAY 55 In order to save time and expense, a card (Form VI) was devised. One is allotted to each employee. It is made out by the treasurer 's department at the beginning of each year, or whenever a man enters the service. Each employee is given a number, and this is entered on hia payroll card, in addition to his name, occupation and the rate of pay he receives. The card is filed ac- cording to number, with an alphabetical cross reference file. It answers as a payroll receipt for one year. The payroll number is filled in every payday, and the period stamped in with a rubber stamp, followed by the amount of wages. The employee signs his name in the final column, thus acknowledging the receipt of the money due him. The system has done away with the payroll book, and cut the number of receipts from twenty-four a year to one card for each employee. In addition to this, there is a clear pay record for the individual, giving at a glance the date he entered the service, the amount drawn for the year, when his salary was increased; or, in case he was discharged, it gives the date and the rea- sons for dismissal. THE acme of system is automatically to care for routine and matters that recur with mechanical regularity — to remove the superfluous detail from the brain and leave it free to plan and create. CHAPTER VIII Getting the Force to Pull Together FORMERLY," says the manager of a large Pitts- burg ofSce, "I found it necessary to keep a num- ber of mediocre people on the payroll for use during rush seasons. This plan was exceedingly expensive. I had tried using green help, and that, too, had panned out poorly. For the little they accomplished, their re- muneration reached an expensive figure. Then I set about to devise some plan whereby I could dispense with the services of these substitutes. I realized tfrat this change could not take place over night. I began slowly, therefore, to take selected clerks of the various depart- ments and transferred them about the ofiSee when they had spare time, so that they could gradually learn other phases of the work. Later on, as my workers became more versatile in the office work, I dropped my substitute force, one by one. "That summer, with the advent of vacation time, came a splendid opportunity further to train these workers. There were temporary vacancies to be filled all over the office. When September came, I had a corps of emer- gency clerks who were competent to take up the work in other parts of the office at short notice. 66 WINNING COOPERATION 57 "When a vacancy occurs, there is always some one ready to step in temporarily or permanently. A rush season in one department usually finds extra workers nearby who can pitch in with a helping, experienced hand." So this manager epitomizes his solution of one prob- lem of getting more from the working force: econom- ically overcoming the difficulty of rush periods which hit various departments at some time each year. A manufacturing and wholesaling house uses a similar plan in its office. Chances are given the ambitious peo- ple to read about, watch and assist in operations adja- cent to their own. Examinations are held annually in which workers can demonstrate proficiency in the duties of other departments. These examinations consist of questions relating to the work of the respective depart- ments. Those who answer their questions with the few- est errors and in the most thorough and satisfactory manner are given prizes. One goes to the men and an- other to the girls. After the examination papers have been graded, the marks are posted throughout the building and the win- ners receive rewards at a meeting in the general office. This gathering is distinctly a social affair. As to getting enough power out of the working force to overcome rush periods, the office manager of a wide- awake sales office says : "I am having clerks in the cir- cularizing department trained in daily periods of two hours each to learn the work of the checking depart- ment. An experienced checking girl is the instructor. The incentive I gave this girl is a wage increase if she succeeds in training enough girls for our next rush sea- son. I find that giving these 'instructors' monetary in- 58 OFFICE EMPLOYEES centives overcomes the natural reluctance they have to teaching others their work." One firm recently had a "rush season" in its filing department due to a proposed change in the filing sys- tem. There were exactly 235,776 cards to be filed. The task would have taken the several filing clerks weeks to complete. As it was the employees of the company were asked to stay one night to work at filing. With hundreds of hands working on the cards, the task was completed that evening. The enthusiasm of the game is a good thing for a force. Rush periods can, not infrequently, be taken care of with the same amount of time and workers as are ordinarily used. Sluggishness, due to slack work, often is thrown off when busy seasons occur. The workers speed up to their maximum and find a new interest in the setting of records. How to Make Costs Measure Down to Income during Slack Periods Fortunately both for the ofSce and its workers, busi- ness in most lines is dull during the summer, when vaca- tions are most desirable to the rank and file. One man- ager always secures first and second vacation choices from everyone in advance so that he can adjust the sum- mer force to the work, and have full values when busi- ness picks up in the fall. "But what about vacations in my business, which has its busy season in summer ? ' ' many oifice men have asked, and that question is answered by the manager of an ofiSce in an ice distributing concern. ''We have found that Christmas time is considered not half bad for vacation time, especially by the girls. Devotees of winter sports enjoy a vacation during any of WINNING COOPERATION 59 the cold months. And fall and winter find the nimrods of the office anxious to be off. Many employees are in- different as to the time of their vacation. This leaves few who really object to the winter vacation. ' ' Other offices, to meet slack periods, cut time like fac- tories. Sometimes the day's work is shortened a half hour to three hours ; or the working week is cut to four or five days. When slack time affects particular departments only, the plan first mentioned, of teaching a worker to be "jack-of-all-departments", comes in handy. The forces in the over-manned departments may be reduced and the resulting surplus of help shifted to those departments that can conveniently use more help. It is plain that to gain the best efforts from employees the hearty and complete good will of the working force is required. Worry a horse and notice how quickly he tires out. Irritate a working force and notice the de- crease in the output. Some office managers get more work for less money than others, because they keep irri- tations down and give their people a sense of team spirit. Ideal working conditions will improve a worker's out- put for sheer psychological reasons. A dusty desk, one manager believes, is enough to materially decrease the output of a worker. If such a matter has a retarding effect on the clerical output, what are the limits to the detrimental possibilities of unfriendliness and sometimes suspicion among workers, or on the other hand, of un- due familiarity and lack of respect for superiors. The organization of social and athletic life is a valued step in the direction of neighborly spirit and mutual re- liance among workers. Some years ago the credit man- 60 OFFICE EMPLOYEES ager in a big office organization played on the firm's baseball team. The manager, captain and pitcher com- bined, was a "cub" salesman. It was a tight game; and when the credit man, "covering" third base played "in" to jump on an expected bunt, the batter whaled the ball past him. "While the credit man was congratulating himself that he had not been disfigured by the ball, he was startled to hear himself reprimanded by the youngster whose orders had been hanging on his credit decisions. The credit manager laughed. "Say that to me on Monday morning in the office, will you?" he banteringly re- torted. The salesman laughed with him and felt that the supposed enemy of every salesman was, after all, a good fellow. It takes gatherings of this sort: club and committee work, office picnics and entertainments to mold your bookkeepers and clerks into a working force. More than coal and an engine are required to make speed. TO build a successful business requires the same factors as the building of any great organization: first, proper selection of material; second, proper molding or training of this material; third, the generation of power which is to run the organization, and fourth, the transmission of this power into and through the complete organization. — John V. Farwell Part III FIFTY WAYS TO CUT EXPENSES Economy as a Policy npHREE steps will insure you lower expenses and larger results in the office : Let the management continually devise better and cheaper ways of doing work. Let it continually hire loyalty in its force. Then let it continually teach this force these methods. In whatever offices make these the ruling policies and first duties of their executives, lost motions gradually become less than re- spectable and the short cut comes to be the habitual way to work. But economy and efficiency were never made in a month. They cannot be set up and left to function like electric time-clocks. Behind these three policies must come follow- up, thought and persisting effort on the part of the management. ■■■ ■ib: :iii SELLING THE MANAGEMENT IDEA TO THE WORKERS 1 Per cent locrease 1912 1913 Dec Jan. Feb. Mar. Apr. Mar lane 14 21 :g 4 11 18 25 1 8 15 22 1 8 15 22 29 5 12 19 25 3 10 17 24 31 7 14 21 July 18 5 U 95 90 65 to 75 70 (5 «0 55 50 45 40 35 30 25 30 15 10 5 Average Production since Instaltiog Bonus _ y *- \ / \ ^ s / % / ^ S ^ \ / 1 \ / f ^ / Ul / 1 - / / . / Drops in Percentage are due to Exlensioo of s ystem to New Groups / 1 Vvera e Wage Saving per Year 10,000 9,500 9,000 8,500 Net Saviog no Overhead t including , /• — Saving *•- V ■^ N --. / 7,500 7,000 6,500 \ / \ / S, / / ^ / / V / 7 ^ r 5.S00 / / 5,000 4,500 ^ / 4,000 1 / 2,500 , 2.000 USM / / SOO / ' 1 Department managers in one office receive records of costs in this graphic form. The gradually rising line indicates an increase in output over the average prior to installing a bonus payment system. The curve of net savings below matches the output curve III: :iBa CHAPTER IX Saving Two-thirds the Cost of Correspondence FOUR YEARS ago forty-one phonograph operators who were employed in one of the departments of the Curtis Publishing Company produced 48,000 square inches of typewritten matter in one week. This output was regarded as a fair average. The weekly wages of the girls averaged $9.00. This meant that the company paid $369 for the labor required to turn our 48,000 square inches of typewritten work, or at the rate of $7.69 per thousand square inches. Then the management made a scientific study of the subject, established a "standard day's work", and paid all the typists on a basis proportionate to their capa- bilities. Later the same department produced in one week 115,- 000 square inches of work with only twenty-seven work- ers — slightly over one-half of the force of the year be- fore the new schedule was put into effect. The average income of each worker rose from $9.00 to $11.00 a week in salary and bonus, an increase of 22 per cent. And the weekly cost to the company for labor in the depart- fi3 64: WAYS TO CUT EXPENSES ment fell from $369 to $297, which meant that the cost of typewritten matter fell from $7.69 to $2.58 per thou- sand square inches. In other words, the efficiency of the department, based on these two tests, was increased 200 per cent. How was this accomplished? First of all, the poorer workers were weeded out. A card system showing the individual production determined the ability of the stenographers. An employment instruction department was established, the purpose of which is: (a) to select only those applicants who give evidence of becoming proficient in the work for which they are to be engaged ; (b) to train these chosen applicants for a period rang- ing from a day to two weeks in the details of the depart- ment to which they are to be assigned ; (c) to hold classes for old employees, to review work and to explain modifications ; (d) To determine what constitutes a "day's work" and to establish that day's work as a standard; (e) to establish a bonus system that will remunerate each worker according to the quantity and quality of her work. Suppose an applicant's record in the files indicates that she would meet the requirements of one of the de- partments as expressed in the manager's requisition. She is immediately employed and put in the instruction di- vision of the training school at full pay. If she passes the final tests after this schooling she is engaged. The company measured the average amount of work turned out, and after cutting out waste motions, set up the standard day 's work. This standard varies with the WRITING LETTERS 65 salary of the stenographer. The problem of keeping records of a worker's output was not an easy one at first. Distinctions had be made among the different classes of office work. Allowances had to be made for luncheon hours, fire drills, special work and) other inter- ruptions. Penalties were inflicted for inaccurate work. To "key up" the workers to further effort, a weekly re- port of the record of each girl is posted on the bulletin board of the department. To illustrate how standards are defined, production 0je£t^v^ 7>it>-B-^Lc No. '7 Div. and Section Date Operation Number Time Record Standard Production Time Loss and Special Woric From To Total l>er Hour For Time fft. 8 ' ?/s- /--» n y) Efficiency Summarv Weeii Endin? %fuc/i-\^\ f \ . „,„„ 0M^ /H^n^ „.p „„ /? Sectinn /?-V- »« at /O ■ Day Time on Standard Operations Standard Units for tlie Time' Production Units for the Time Time Worli Time Loss Total Time (Ciocii) Efnciency % Standard % Gain .- '% \ 1/4 Retained. - % ' lint Cain % ' 7-fS 07 7f2. 7-VS /i- r Remarlis: \ Salary for Time 1 Totai Remarlts: Total Bonus % FORMS Vn and VJII: Individual records of An addressing clerk's work are kept compactly on the back card {Fonn VII). Operators receive a bonus for passing an amount fixed as a standaid day's work. Individual daily records are summarized by the week on another card (Form VIIIJ. Different forms are used for the different classes of work. Even with such a system it was found that letters cost ten to twelve cents each, including rent, salaries, stamps, stationery and equipment in the calculation. It is said to be almost impossible to reduce the costof letters in any case beneath six cents records kept and the bonus figured, take the case of a clerk in the addressing section. A clerk working on listed operations fills in a card (Forms VII and VIII) 66 WAYS TO CUT EXPENSES where the operations are designated by number, leaving columns headed "standard" and "production" vacant. She may work on one or more operations during the day, yet one card, l^pproved by the superior, is sufficient. These daily cards are forwarded to the employment and instruction department where they are completed and checked, and where, at the end of the week, the work is summarized for each clerk and the bonus figured. No set standards to cover dictation are made. But accurate record is kept on a form tabulating the amount of work and the time spent for each operator. After the system had been in successful operation for over three years, the net saving per year was found to be $8,164. During that period, three-fourths of all the clerical workers had been placed on the bonus system. Maximum efficiency of stenographers and consequent low cost of letters, is obtained in another office by put- ting the girls on a piece-work basis. Operators are aided in attaining a higher standard of ability by systematiz- ing their work and by relieving them of inconsequential but time-consuming details. Since the new system has been in use, the total weekly payroll has been decreased sixteen per cent, but the average salary has been in- creased one dollar per week. The number of operators has been materially reduced, but the work done in the department has been increased approximately fifty per cent. These results are obtained by maintaining a general department, directed by a head stenographer and two assistants, which includes all machine operators except a few secretaries. In the office in which this plan was developed, seventy-five stenographers and phonograph operators were required to do the work. In smaller WHITING LETTEES 67 offices the duties of management have been confined to the head of the department. As the system is used, the head stenographer keeps the time of her operators and supplies them to dictators. The first assistant has charge of the phonograph division and the second assist- Daily Schedule Dictator Stsno. Called at Wanted at Suppried at Returned at No. Letters Remarks +^Ar^ L^ 10.00 //. //. II3S /:2 :'■ ■■ .'■;'^i^!ji!iNii■■:iv■■: "Mlili^f:'-": '■,;, "^■iili:;'::>'!''''^';iiiir;;: i '!" ; ' ' . .--r^ =':"■■■.." , ■■ ' ■*■-/ ;. ! ■ ; ■ ' - '-mo - '■-fiAp0inil No.'! ■-:'{*, a ".,-;; Oila Entcrid s/u/w-e Webster and Burling Company R*itr 367M , 1 Vl» 8BtD. S0ld» H.0.K1PFU; 8 itt^!0^ ;M.^ ill fiUFf^ ■■ '■ if!;; Sl'tion ctaek Ch'wk """""* ""■* B 1 ciSE REOAL OUAIXD PUSIPPLE Crttiil [i(pt QaU EQarGd ,-. itebsWr ddRut^ Company -(Jhfcaet noKtrtM-'sem'"-':' ■ SHlPPWe ORDER , Wq BH.-D rfiUM.Uh ^|B[ra[llt«t«l« Sold to H. 0. Himz STATE 4 HiDlSiB ST. " .-^^v b .cirtm . tWta'BniM " " stitfirt & SUnr's. CtHlCk tHrmlRy DeJKiptiw Unit filer (hit fifCiBt Two PwCOTt ■<■«»« 1 "~9 ;■ 1 vm mstUK (Kt*'m immyeis ':.':.■ i-ii , *-■ ■■■■ ^f'^ :, '-• ;V- ..-.>: ■ . . •■'. -.. v:::i^ .^■>.> -■'■■■■■.--f.-'. / '•■•- : , ii* ' rf^';: ^ kr'?', L^ ■ .. ^ ,^ FORMS XV, XVI, XVII and XVHI: Order forms of a system used by a wholesale grocery. These forms required no important change in the fifty years' growth of the concern, demonstrating conclusively the flexibility of the system. At the bottom of the rear form, (Form XVJ , is a chain of segregated spaces for the various floors. Pine- apple comes under fancy groceries — ^floor eight — and is so billed goes to the bookkeeping department. The order is "checked against" the register to indicate that it has been shipped out. Once a week a clerk goes over this register to see that all orders have been checked, sig- nifying that they have been shipped or delivered. The order copy then goes to the profit department, where 82 WAYS TO CUT EXPENSES the gain is figured. The original order written out by the salesman is filed alphabetically, and the copy of it numerically. Even though in one case the name is misspelled or in the other, the number is incorrect, the file clerk can locate the order under this arrangement. Gaining time^ — cutting down the minutes on order handling— is and was the aim of all firms that have sys- tematized their routine. "Straight line" routing with no duplicated motions, is the plan or desire of up-to- date concerns. They realize that a straight line method means quick serice and is the shortest line between the company and the buyer's good will. Exceptions are held down to the minimum. The fact that smooth, uninterrupted routing is val- uable is shown by the fact that, regardless of delivery costs, one firm prefers to deliver goods rather than that their customers should bring their own teams and call for their goods at perhaps inopportune moments. Such practice upsets the routine and causes confusion. In a large manufacturing stationery company's office are forty clerks whose duty it is to check up the orders as sent by the salesmen, comparing the catalog numbers, prices, discounts, special terms, quantity allowances, promises, dates, and so on, with the customer's "price ticket" or record sheet. The many styles of tablets, grades and weights of paper, and odd sizes, in addition to the graduated prices for different classes of dealers, necessitates a very large catalog with many thousands of numbers. From time to time specials or "bulletins" are sent to salesmen showing numbers of which the stock had just been exhausted. Errors were very liable to occur. Often the salesman forgot about the "special", and sent in an order for PUTTING ORDERS THROUGH 83 items which were out of stock; or he showed a wrong number on his order, or gave the wrong price. .Several other little errors were found to creep in when an order carried a long list of items. It required several hours each day for a high sal- aried order clerk to dictate letters to the salesmen on these questions, and an expert stenographer was kept busy. Upon finding an apparent error when checking up the orders, the clerkk would make a brief memorandum of the question, pin it to the order and pass it on to the head order clerk. Or, especially during the rush sea- son, they would pass on slight errors themselves. The correspondence clerk whose duty it was to read the letters when they came to the secretary's office no- ticed a similarity in the letters being sent to the sales- men, and designed a form to eliminate useless letter dictating and writing. Hundreds of these are now used each month. A pad containing this form in multiple is given to each of the clerks. When a question arises in regard to an order he simply fills out the blank provided, or checks the question intended, adding remarks if necessary, and sends the form on to the salesraan in his regular mail. The duplicate is attached to the order and held until the return of the original. This saves lost time for order clerks, the stenographer and the reader, as well as hurrying up orders. The query is now sent out as soon as the order clerk dis- covers it. Upon receipt of this form the salesman makes any corrections or notations and returns it. CHAPTER XII How to Keep Up Mailing Lists KEEPING lists in sueh shape that they are easy to handle and contain no worthless names is what every manager strives for. Where the list numhers only a few hundreds or thousands of names and does not fluctuate more than ten per cent annually, it is pos- sible to keep it in good condition by a page-system. This consists of a loose-leaf book especially ruled to suit the purpose. By a special arrangement the plan has been found especially practicable in saving time of clerical help and in minimizing the errors that often arise in handling a large list. With the list of names fairly well established, the work of writing up the book is accomplished easily. One or more spaces are left between each two names inserted, allowing room for the insertion of other names as shown in Form XIX. But there is of course a possi- bility of some names being crowded out of place. To meet this contingency, a "line-number space" is pro- vided between the lines. These are merely blank spaces for the addition of index numbers referring to the new names. On the reverse side of the sheet, the lines are num- 84 HANDLING MAHjING LISTS 85 bered as indicated by the back card (Form XX). When inserting a name that is "crowded off" the front of the sheet the clerk writes it on the first vacant line on the reverse side of the sheet, and then inserts the line number in the proper "line number space", so that, when referring to this name again, the small number will be a guide to the reverse side of the sheet. This will save considerable time in the work. About one- third of the page at the bottom may be used for over- flow of names instead of the reverse side of the sheet. FORMS XIX and XX: Skill in preparing forms lequires provision for errors and omissions. In this mailing list space is left for items overboked or forgotten. The front card (Form XIX) is the regular list; the other is the reverse on which extra names are entered The typewritten names show the sheet as originally written. Any additions are put in script. Bach page can be revised when necessary without any interference whatever with the adjacent sheets. The method can be 86 WATS TO CUT EXPENSES easily adapted to any small ofSce which uses small pros- pect or customer, associate or supplier lists. An individual card system which includes several suggestive points is being used with unqualified success by a western commission house. Its mailing list had been carried on cards arranged according to post offices. Each of these cards was divided vertically to take care of three classes of names 'l.nftn - ^J\poti QU^y (^,. ^U^J^ 3Z. 8 - /a.TC. £i. ^Zcca^tlU ^k/Ka^y /full AZ^aTj^ JL>IAA /a//. jfZ^t , - y ^c*^~a^trt^j ^^y>/ I iSJi^ Y C^dlA/^ r a^ 7t/to^ &SL /?gy t 'o^iAy /n /f /< 22& T^ /f/' Cu^ata^^it^^ty aiO /j^^ t-C/ - S/M,£/. CC/UfMya.^1^ ^ £c«-C^ •^flm^X^ FORM XXI; At the extreme left in this file, red cards give the names o£ the states; at the extreme right blue cards give the names of cities and towns, filed alphabetically under states; and under the cities and towns the names of pros[>ects are filed alpha- betically, on wiuCe cards, with projecting tabs which aSord quick reference to the various kintU of business in the same towns, the one on the right representing regular customers, the one in the center those who were in correspondence and the left-hand column those purely prospective. To transfer a customer from one list to another not only necessitated defacing the card, but broke into the alphabetical arrangement of the names. HANDLING MAILING LISTS 87 The firm: obviated this difficulty by using a card file in which the name of each customer and his post office address were recorded. These cards (Form XXI) were filed in tin trays with three longitudinal compartments. A geographical guide card was made to embrace all three . a-^jy^jLAj^ /Ci/>-£ti>t4y JU^xJuuryU^-et. S^aAa FORM XXII:^ This form is va/uable for keeping track of small lists. The inverted tabs are inked in to show the prospect's line of business. Thus concentiated mailing hsts can easily be selected of these compartments by slotting it over the partitions. The individual cards were then filed alphabetically be- hind these geographical guide cards. In this way, when any name was transferred from one di-vision to another the card itself was moved, entirely obviating any mutilation of the record and at the same time preserving the exact alphabetical order. Stencils available for addressing purposes might have been used under the same three-in-one arrangement. 88 WAYS TO CUT EXPENSES For the business man whose office includes a simall index or finding list of names and addresses to which he occasionally refers, the system of classification worked out by an Eastern office man, will prove help- ful. This scheme, which the designer calls the "four- in-one" classification, is not adapted to indexes of big lists ; neither is it intended to replace any of the stand- ard equipment now used for such files. Rather, it has been designed to simplify the classification of small- indexes such as a business man or merchant keeps on or in his individual desk. Its operation is simple. Any ordinary filing card may be used, and the ruling and information upon the card arranged to suit the needs of the user. Printed along the top margin, how- ever, is a series of inverted tabs, as shown in Form XXII. The number of these tabs may be fixed to suit the needs of the individual file in which they are to be used. As used by the designer, the tabs represent different lines of business ; the first position tab designates depart- ment stores; the second position, druggists; the third, hardware stores; and the fourth, grocery stores. In this ease, a fifth tab is provided at the right which is used to distinguish between prospects and customers. "When an inquiry was received from Frank Smith, a grocer at Park Ridge, N. Y., and it was desired to place him on the list for follow-up, a card was made out in his name, giving the available information about him. Before inking the fourth tab (to show that he was a grocer), his credit rating was determined; this was then indicated by the color of ink used. On ratings of $5,000 or over, the tab is colored with red ink. If the rating is less than $5,000, black ink is used. The HANDLING MAILING LISTS 89 edge as well as the face is colored. Various colored inks have been used to make further classifications, such as green ink for $25,000 ratings. The next step in the classification in to show that Smith is only a prospect. This is accomplished by CHANGE of ADDRESS or NAME Noteil ty *"» c£»^ /P. a.Z£J,.Ay^ Stencil Oept «"'"""""*" fay ^StlA^liL..^,.,^ ^^-^ Cit»aiUSHI. 1C:tC&.a^, "9?^ List Oept (Zc^./J'^,-!'!--. fii. ^Z/i-gyfi^S-e-^Ls^ Street and Number .Jjl. a. 3 _^:g^X.^.ZiU^ CZ-zJt-A^. Coll. Dept City and State T^jiizot:^ . 9? 2^. AUG 5 1914 /^ Siened (^ (2*<^ ^. // Stencil Inforniation FORM XXIII: For the convenience of the road salesman or customer, this card provides an easy way to report a change in address and any necessary notation arising therefrom. The form may he printed on the bacli of a postal card leaving the tab at the right blank. If at a later date he becomes a customer, the tab is inked in the same way as the business classification tab. Either black or red ink may be used in this case, unless it is desired to make a further distinction between different classes of customers. Another popular plan where projecting tabs are used, is to cut off the right-hand tab to indi- cate a prospect become a customer. The card is now filed alphabetically, thus completing the quadruple classification. When the cards are filed, all the tabs appear in dis- tinct rows. The ink marks show up as short dashes. 90 WAYS TO CUT EXPENSES Each set of similar tabs forms its own separate row, making it very easy to pick out immediately, without going over the rest of the list, the names in the desired class. At the same time the -list remains in alphabet- ical sequence, and any name can be located without need of referring to more than one file. Whenever it is desired to advertise a new piece of equipment directly to the larger grocery concerns, it is only necessary to have a clerk "up end" each card which shows the fourth tab marked with red. The envelopes are then addressed from the up-ended cards. Keeping a large list of names, ranging from 50,000 upward, involves such work as : (1) Selecting method and extensiveness of filing. (2) Adding new names. (3) Taking off worthless names. (4) Making changes in address. (5) Keeping a "morgue" for names or mail returned stamped "refused" or "unclaimed"; also those names which have been taken off the lists because shown un- desirable trade. To keep a large list in good shape for expeditious handling, it is customary to have two files: one alpha- betical, the other geographical. The alphabetical often stands alone, but when a par- ticular section covered by the lists is to be circularized, an alphabetical list obviously makes this next to impos- sible. When new names are desired, the original sources usually will make it possible to bolster up the decreas- ing lists. Brilliant successes in business have been built by men who delegated several associates to clip first- class names from the papers every day. HANDLING MAILING LISTS 91 Changes of address are brought in by road salesmen or sent in by the prospects themselves (Form XXIII). The latter way is either voluntary or secured by mailing a suitable printed form. In finding out which names are "dead", a two cent stamp will bring the undelivered mail back. A better and more economical way is to use the one cent stamp and the w'ords "postage guaranteed for return". Still a third way is to send parts of the list to the various postmasters about the territory, covered. They will make the corrections either at a charge of thirty cents an hour or gratis. Very often they are pleased to per- form this work so as to avoid a great quantity of mail which must be returned. WHEN you look at your office as a piece of fine and essential equip- ment, you will oil and adjust, repair and remodel it part by part, as you do your lathes and engines. The closer your profit and the harder the condi- tions, the more carefully you will make these adjustments. You will cut lost motions, reduce friction, fit every part to do one thing at a time and do it right. CHAPTER XIII Where Office Appliances Cut Costs INSTALLATION of office appliances in an Eastern house cut the cost of office work in fifteen months from $20,000 to $10,000. A detailed review of this particular office and the changes that were made illustrate the possibilities of cutting costs through the use of office mEichinery. It employed on an average thirty men and women in its office routine, exclusive of stenographers. The rate of pay ranged from eight to twenty-five dollars a week; the average being thirteen dollars. This made a total of $390 a week — a yearly aggregate of more than $20- 000. This sum was out of proportion to the volume of the business. The members of the firm had a theory that their gross profits should be thirty-five per cent of the sales. In reality they were less than half of that. Investiga- tion showed that lack of labor-saving equipment was the greatest single cause of the high operating expense. The first experiments were made in connection with the checking of incoming invoices. In this operation only men had been employed, drawing from $15 to $20 a week. Not only was it essential to have this work 92 / APPLIANCES THAT SAVE 93 done by clerks with the ability and knowledge to cheek the unit prices intelligently, but the operation required considerable accuracy and skill. Goods bought by the pound or yard usually involved the multiplication of fractions. The average invoice contained from fifteen to twenty items. Under the old method over seven minutes was required to cheek one such bill. But, after the experi- ments with calculating machines had been reduced to a regular practice, the same operation was done in four minutes. This included the checking of prices, multi- plications, and totals. The checking of unit prices, how- ever, was still performed by the higher paid clerks. In many of the operations connected with this in- voice cheeking, the gain in time was almost incredible. Thus, in finding the cost of 4191/^ yards of cloth at 20%c a yard, the machine answer was secured in six seconds — less than the time ordinarily required to write down the figures to be multiplied. An increase of a thousand per cent in efficiency was shown in these de- tached partial operations, while the fingers of the opera- tors flew over the keys in purely mechanical fashion. All in all, the machine reduced the time consumed in cheeking fifty or sixty per cent. One third of the sav- ing was in salary — cheaper clerks being used. The house did a large credit business. Nine clerks whose salary aggregated $120 were used in working on the statements and related procedure. One experiment with a machine, for example, showed that a given lot of statements could be produced in seventy minutes against one hundred and twenty-five minutes by the old method. Here was a gain of about forty per cent. The weekly gain on all the laborious detail amounted to $45 — 94 WAYS TO CUT EXPENSES nearly $2,400 a year. The initial investment for the machines was wiped out in a few months by the net returns. In bookkeeping work, and at kindred processes, five men were formerly employed. They drew an aggre- gate wage of $325 a month. An experiment showed that the machine would do a given amount of work in nine minutes against seventeen minutes for skilled men Another experiment in checking postings showed the elapsed time under the former methods as two hours and fifteen minutes. By the machine method the gain was about an hour and fifteen minutes, or fifty-five per cent. This did not represent expert machine operation, but the usual performance of bookkeepers. Just as production in factories has been immensely speeded up by automatic machines, so production in the office has been quickened. In the bookkeeping items typified above, the saving of fifty-five per cent meant a monthly gain on every $65 salary of over $35. On the entire bookkeeping department the gain was not that much, but it reached $1,000, with an additional gain of $30 a month diverted in giving higher salaries. But these reductions were by no means the most as- tonishing of the results accomplished in the office — results that did not come at once, but were an evolution extending over a period of two years. It was in the general statistical work that the most sweeping cuts in wage expense were made. Machine calculation here showed an increase in efficiency of over five hundred per cent. Another saving was accomplished in regular practice in totalling sales slips, by clerks and by departments. An operation that had required the service of two girls APPLIANCES THAT SAVE 95 for one-half day is now performed by one girl in two hours. Under the old methods, nine working hours were consumed per girl; hence the saving was seven hours, or about one dollar ; more than $30 a year. The mechanical device method made it possible to handle five or six figures where one had been handled before, and made feasible a more extensive system of reports, comparative tables, and general statistical in- formation. In getting manufacturing costs, a gain was made of fifty per cent, by using machines. One of the apt girls was trained in the machine manipulation. She was able to accomplish what three girls had done indif- ferently well. The saving amounted to $25 a week, or $1,300 a year. In the payroll work the time was cut seventy-five per cent. In figuring the worker's wage at 17% cents an hour for 39i/^ hours the machine answer was given in from three to four seconds, against at least fifteen seconds by the old method. The remainder of the savings was chiefly accomplished through the speeding up of inventories. The use of machines in this work showed results often several hun- dred per cent more efBcient than the old method. In addition to the time saved in the office work connected with stock-taking, an immense sum total of the time was eliminated in the store and stock-rooms. In taking inventories it was found possible to make the computa- tions directly from the shelves, the machine operator taking the items and values as they were called off to him, and making the multiplications on the spot; thus both qualities and values were obtained practically in one procedure. Here the saving was seventy per cent. By such methods, this particular concern, bit by 96 WATS TO CUT EXPENSES bit, and as the result of careful experimentation, has chopped its ofSee cost in half. In like manner other business offices in all lines are reducing the standard operations of the daily routine to mechanical processes. ,The introduction of the dozens of office appliances now perfected is widening the fields of business, is creating a more insistent demand for statistical matter and, instead of doing away with the clerk, is finding more useful fields for him. Office registers, electric tabulat- ing machines, overhead desk-to-desk carriers, check pro- tectors and all sorts of letter manifolding and mailing devices are multiplying the deftness of office minds and fingers. To "run an office by machinery" is not an experi- ment. When the office manager grows impatient at the tardiness or inaccuracy of an operation, or the type of work which is constantly keeping his office behindhand, he can often solve his problem by investigating in the field of automatic "employees" and "hiring a machine". TEN years of effort and millions of dollars dug the Panama Canal. But the saving to the world's commerce will repay the initial cost a thousand times. You cannot dig another Panama Canal. But is there not some improve- ment in your business, from which you are withholding capital, that would re- pay the investment dozens of times over in lower operation costs? Is there not a Panama route to be found in your business? CHAPTER XIV Handling Office Supplies Like Cash EH. HARRIMAN has been described as an in- • veterate saver of used paper clips. Another habit which he shared with many of the men who head enter- prises and who know by long experience how prone overhead expenses are to get out of bounds, was the use of envelope backs for scratch paper. Economy in paper and pencils to the disregard of economy in time is one extreme in the handling of office supplies. The other is that of a discharged clerk whose desk the head of a small business recently had cleared. In it he found a six months' supply of his "A" grade stationery, pen points enough for half the office force, a drawer full of assorted scratch pads and four boxes of rubber bands which were brittle with age. Either carelessness 6r too much red tape in giving out supplies is likely to result in overstock and waste at the individual desks. Office supplies deserve records and safeguards as accurate and as simple as accounts and cash. To make sure on this point is one of the first moves for the proprietor in putting office ex- penses where they belong. It is simple enough in the concern where a trained stockkeeper can give all his 97 98 WAYS TO CUT EXPENSES time to the work ; but some of the methods worked out by smaller offices, where the keeper of stock has a half dozen other duties in the way of manifolding, buying, shipping and mailing, indicate the direction for better BALANCE OF OFFICE SUPPLIES AND OTHER PRICEO STORES STirfaoC /3 ^60 notk: when stores «nE onoen to, aoo ouaNTrTv to column i. whin STcyica SI. WHIN STOBCB *BC laSUCD. SUBTRACT OU«NTITT FROM COLUMNS. ri'A.EN^''^;^'"'*'" KINDOFUHn-i2«£ .i^^^^"Sf.= ' .v^^o^VR^str- 1 a.caNTiNUEti 1 1 S .U.NT. •UnCHASE >NOEnHO tll\ OU.NT. .■S5. ISSUE DATE '1^^, CH'O'O TO DATE REC'O Vrr^" DATE cJ?I-S'to a n u _ ^ I 1 ' — - FORM XXIV: To prevent wastes or unauthorized use of office supplies and maintain a proper balance on hand in a St. Louis office, no article, however small, is issued except on a requisition signed by a department head. Each item is given a separate card m the stockkeeper's file, on which withdrawal or addition is noted control even where the stock-room is merely a desk drawer and a shelf in the clothes closet. The direct risks and losses that come of loose stock- keeping are these: (1) Overstock. (2) Shortage. (3) Pilfering. (4) Wasteful use of supplies. (5) Damage and excessive depreciation. In addition to these, however, the method may be a veritable "wrench in the machine" of office work, if items are mislaid and overlooked until new stock has been ordered unnecessarily, if the stockkeeper is absent and the door locked while office people are held up in their work, or if the stock boy is held at his post in idleness. One of the most perplexing problems in every busi- ness house is to find a proper method for keeping track A CHECK ON SUPPLIES 99 of printed forms, different kinds of stationery, and other small office supplies. An inventory system becomes a great saving in the case of expensive supplies ; and even in small articles such as pins, pencils, rubber bands, and the hundred other articles that every office requires, economies may be brought about that are well worth considering. A St. Louis business man, after experiencing the an- noyance of lost stocks discovered after the purchase of more, evolved a storekeeping plan that suits the small office. He had a closed stationery closet constructed under a Package Nn. /■¥■ Di». Hn. '3 R^ceiveil "^^a/l^'C^ ^ ^ 191 J^ Contains /s .^-^^^a^8z«-g— Number of Items Item A items y -/-/-( / / IMPORTANT : — For each customer handled at counter or by phone and no order or niefliorandum is issued the clerh wiii immediately take credit for one "information Item". Do not estimate. Keep a careful record and hand to Supervisor at end of each days woiif. FORM XXVIII: From the information on this form the superintendent can tell at a glance how many customers the clerk handled "face to face". The deftness and tact of the various salespeople becomes more evident day by day from these records When one department calls for workers in the line of promotion, the office head consults the individual effi- ciency records and takes the opportunity to adjust some worker more closely to his capacity. Reading between the lines is therefore an essential 126 MEETING EMERGENCIES ability in an office manager. Reports do not free him from the requirement of experience, but enable him to capitalize his familiarity with the business. In a series of reports on "customers' orders not executed by shops" for example, this office manager sees daily and monthly the proportion of the different reasons for failure to fill each class of orders. By experience he knows how these reasons should proportion. The first one on the list is "house locked". If this reason is popular, he is prompted to find whether the men have been careless about asking where the key may be found in case the resident should not be at home. He calls for the actual blanks which the delivery men turn in at the end of the day and notes who found the house locked. This gives him the correct direction for discipline. The same is true of the stenographic department, among the file clerks, at the one-way telephones, in the accounting di- vision and throughout the administrative work. When the statistician notes a marked change one way or the other in any reports, he underlines it to make doubly sure that it will get attention. "With reports so thrown into high lights and shadows, one man can speed- ily study a vast amount of office work and quickly tell what changes to make in his control. Before printing or installing a new type of report, one manager requires the requisitioner to state in a stand- ardized written way the purpose he has in mind for it. This applies to all sorts of forms and blanks. Here is a sample statement: Purpose — Used at station for drawing material out of stock. How originated — Written in duplicate by fitters or fore- men who reQUisitlon material for their work. REPORTS THAT GUIDE 127 Information furnished — Account number, name of sta- tion, name of person requesting material, name of job for which material is to be used, units, pounds, feet, articles, unit, cost, amount, date, name of store- keeper. Routing of forms — Original and duplicate numbered at station; original sent to Stores Accounting depart- ment, duplicate retained permanently at station. Original checked by stores accounting department to ascertain if all numbers are accounted for, material is recapitulated (one sheet for each account); at the end of the month totals are charged to each account. Final disposition — Original filed permanently in stores accounting department, duplicate retained perma- nently at station. Departments interested in the use of this form: Engi- neering, Stores, Accounting. Rush seasons are at best unpleasant, costly to meet and to some extent avoidable. A heavy run of business not anticipated or provided for will put more emery into the bearings and do more to unloose wasteful methods, break up the organization and reduce individual effi- ciency both physically and in spirit than almost any other routine difficulty. Rush seasons are on the calendar every year. Some of them never fail. Therefore, they have to be met, and preparation can be made to meet them. Most other troubles are temporary and confined to particular departments; inefficiency or jealousy; the as- sociation of workers who dislike one another; careless- ness and lack of discipline ; the unexpected loss of valued workers ; waste and temporary extravagance ; rare cases of dishonesty ; errors in judgment. If you have never checked over your office difficulties, you will quickly see that different reports which fore- 128 MEETING EMERGENCIES warn you of inefficiency and rush seasons, and different reserve workers trained at all times for various positions, will meet most of these difficulties. "Wrong addresses are in one office a detail which weU illustrates the use of reports by those who are controlling and planning the work. "When the man sent on outside work finds that he has the wrong address — a vacant lot, perhaps, he telephones to a specialist whose talent, ex- perience and business it is to study out right combina- tions for wrong numbers. Keeping down these errors, however, is the important matter for the order department head and the office man- ager. "When the report of individual errors comes in, they have at hand the means of locating and handling anyone who has made a low record. "With the posting of the errors, indeed, the natural pride and ambition of the employees largely supply the check upon excessive care- lessness. "Wherever the office manager can adjust such an auto- matic check upon the errors which his reports show, he leaves more of his attention free to plan more con- structively and to invent new short cuts in the overhead of the business. ANY business is like a bridge that is building. You must anchor your structure to a foundation of experience and knowledge and rivet home each member as you add it. To carry your span safely across the new and untried, build on what you have proved — build on what you know. \ h \. i. t|,i t