Commercial Research; An Outline of Working Principles (Paperback)

Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: CHAPTER II THE NEED FOR COMMERCIAL RESEARCH Native business ability ? A new element in business ? A business problem ? Evidence of lack of knowledge ? Business cycles ? Maladjustment in business ? New business forces ? Business research in foreign countries ? Research in the United States ? A research bureau ? Educational value of research ? Conclusion. There is everywhere a growing demand for a better knowledge 6f business principles. In the future commercial competition, the present rule-of-thumb, hit-or-miss, trial-and-error methods will not suffice. Business must become more nearly like an exact science; business facts must be organized on a sound, safe, dependable basis. Practical affairs need more theory, and the practical man needs must be more thoroughly grounded in abstract principles. But a science can be built up only by men who are free from the daily grind of routine, free from the ever-pressing burden of management, free from the multitudinous details of immediate direction. This is the field of commercial research. In fact, the call of to-day is the call for business research, the abstracting of the real problems of real business for the purpose of careful, uninterrupted, scientific analysis. Native Business Ability. Hitherto there has been a kind of native shrewdness that has served in place of carefully organized business knowledge. This shrewdness was based upon years of experience, a natural ability to observe the ways and reactions of people, an intimate interestin men and their affairs, together with an abundance of common sense. This combination of qualities has been called native business ability. It was this ability, too, which was supposed to fit a man for any kind of enterprise. It dispensed very largely with the need for formal education; it...