Business Methods and the War (Paperback)

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1915 Excerpt: ...discharged, they can be re-engaged at short notice when wanted later on is by no means so certain. An essential condition of successful management is that labour of the required description shall always be forthcoming in the required quantities, to handle any work that may have to be performed. The tendency naturally is for the workers to drift into the employ of those houses which, upon the whole, treat them best; and accordingly if the conditions offered by any one house are markedly inferior to those offered by its competitors, that house will always experience a difficulty in obtaining the services of the required number of workers of really desirable quality. Unless therefore the quality of the worker is a matter of little importance, and labour is always abundant, the employer--even if he does not pride himself upon being a "model employer"--is obliged to consider his work-people, at all events up to a point. This means that he cannot exercise to the full the right which he probably possesses in law, of dispensing with their services whenever he pleases; because, if he does, the difficulty and delay that he would experience in replacing them later on, when a rush comes, would cause him a greater loss. As regards the cost of supervision and general administration, this as a rule can only be varied with the output, to the extent to which it may be found practicable to base remuneration upon profits. And the extent to which the total expenditure can be made to vary for this reason is in the majority of cases so slight that it would not be worth while instituting such a scheme (with its attendant complications) for this reason alone, however desirable it might be on other grounds. As regards the cost of raw materials, theoretically it is quite p...