Part 21

"Hello, feller," said he breezily; "lemme know when there's room. And don't keep me waiting too long, or I'll be out on my ear."

Picture the manager's astonishment when the starter replied:

"Git in here, then, and git in quick," and let him in the first car going up.

Somewhere, somehow, that impudent youngster had struck a responsive chord. Instinctively--or else because of past experience with elevator starters--he had put the problem of that particular starter's service on a business basis. He had put it in the starter's power to perform his own work without trouble, and to feel at the same time that he was "a man of affairs."

He was able to show his authority without taking it out on the boy.

Analyze this "trade" with the "compensation" chart in mind. Do you not see the "balance" of interests? Do you not see the starter's feeling that the service he rendered was his own business, that the boy was one of his customers, that the avoidance of trouble was his compensation or profit?

Is there not in this very unimportant transaction the BALANCE OF INTERESTS suggested by our little chart?

At this stage of our approach to the KNACK OF MANAGEMENT, a ready objection comes to mind. We are now dealing in human values and relationships--and you can't chart them. Analysis, planning, organization--certain rules may be set down which will enable one to attain some degree of effectiveness in carrying them out.

But human nature? You can't deal with it by rule.

The objection is well founded. You can't chart human nature--but you can study the approaches to it and chart the laws that appeal to it.

Our chart on page 146 is based upon what successful managers have learned about finding the wants of the human element when it works, and is constructed to supply a method of supplying those wants with as much productiveness and as little friction as possible.

When you buy a new car and "put it to work," your first care is to find out its wants--how much you must give to get what it has to "sell"--what parts need oil and grease and so on.

So, IF YOU WANT TO GET WORK OUT OF A HUMAN BEING, your best bet is to find out what that human being needs and must get in return for the work he performs or the service he gives.

Some men seem to be born with an instinct for finding this out. But if you aren't built that way, there is no reason why you can't drill yourself to the same end by deliberately studying each case.

* * * * *

See, for example, how a study of this sort gets the most out of men in a large New England plant where modern management methods are making serious inroads into the old rule-of-thumb ways of doing things.

This concern was confronted with the very serious problem of maintaining a steady flow of product from one manufacturing department to another. Because of the nature of the product, skids and power trucks had been chosen as the equipment best suited for the job.

Skids and lift trucks are effective handling units. No argument about that. Their introduction into any factory which has been using more primitive handling methods should automatically cut costs. But they save precious little time and money when they aren't working, or when they are being worked uneconomically.

The problem, then, as this concern saw it, was how to be sure that Big Ed hadn't shipped off for a quiet smoke far from the maddening crowd--or that Little Joe wasn't arranging his work so that there'd be a handful of skids left over at closing time--moves that called for overtime pay.

In other words, to get 100 per cent efficiency out of very efficient handling equipment, the management realized that it must take out some sort of insurance which would guarantee Little Joe's and Big Ed's and all the other truckers' being engaged in gainful occupation eight hours--count 'em--each and every day.

The best insurance seemed to be a central dispatching system. No need to go into the details of its operation. Suffice it to say that it went a long way toward directing the efforts of the truckers along gainful lines. There came to be an orderliness which had never existed before. When a foreman put in a call for a trucker, he knew that the move would be made without unnecessary delay. In fact, orders were placed into the truckers' hands within three minutes of the time the foreman picked up his telephone to call the central dispatching department.

BUT--no attempt had been made to sell this system to the truckers. It met with some little resistance, just as anything new does. And there are ways, as who does not know, of beating any "game" designed to get more work out of human beings.

So the management--after many a huddle over this particular situation--decided upon a bonus plan.

And they set about selling it to the truckers--somewhat in the fashion about to be narrated.

"See here, men," said the manager in effect, "I'm going to put this plan right up to you and let you decide for yourselves. We've looked into it carefully. You men average 30 moves a day. So we've chosen 40 moves as the starting point. We're sure you can make 40 moves a day without tearing your shirts--and from there on, you begin to collect. For the next five trips you get a bonus of a nickel over and above your day rate; for the next five trips your bonus is 6 cents; and so on.

"So, if a man makes 50 trips, his day's pay is not $4.50, but $5.05 because he has earned 55 cents in bonus. Do you get it?"

"Yeah, we get it all right, all right. We do twice as much work for 50 or 60 cents more a day. How come? Why don't we get paid extra for all the moves we make over 30?"

"Because we're just like you. The company wants to make more money. We've shown you how it can be done and we'll split pretty much 50-50. But we won't give you all the extra profit any more than we'd think of keeping it ourselves. Now think it over tonight and if you want to make $5 or $5.50 a day instead of $4.50, come 'round in the morning and we'll talk some more about it."