hat are going all wrong and laboring with them till you've persuaded
them to lead a better life. For this reason, one of the most important
duties of your job is to keep track of everything that's out of the
usual. If anything unusually good happens, there's an unusually good
man behind it, and he ought to be earmarked for promotion; and if
anything unusually bad happens, there's apt to be an unusually bad man
behind that, and he's a candidate for a job with another house.

A good many of these things which it's important for you to know
happen a little before beginning and a little after quitting time; and
so the real reason why the name of the boss doesn't appear on the
time-sheet is not because he's a bigger man than any one else in the
place, but because there shouldn't be any one around to take his time
when he gets down and when he leaves.

You can tell a whole lot about your men from the way in which they
come in and the way in which they go home; but because a fellow is in
the office early, it doesn't always mean that he's panting to begin
work; it may mean that he's been out all night. And when you see a
fellow poring over his books after the others have quit, it doesn't
always follow that he's so wrapped up in his work that he can't tear
himself away from it. It may mean that during business hours he had
his head full of horse-racing instead of figures, and that he's
staying to chase up the thirty cents which he's out in his balance.
You want to find out which.

The extra-poor men and the extra-good men always stick their heads up
above the dead-level of good-enough men; the first to holler for help,
and the second to get an extra reach. And when your attention is
attracted to one of these men, follow him up and find out just what
sort of soil and fertilizer he needs to grow fastest. It isn't enough
to pick likely stock; you've got to plant it where the conditions are
right to develop its particular possibilities. A fellow who's got the
making of a five-thousand-dollar office man in him may not sell enough
lard to fry a half-portion of small potatoes if you put him on the
road. Praise judiciously given may act on one man like an application
of our bone-meal to a fruit tree, and bring out all the pippins that
are in the wood; while in the other it may simply result in his going
all to top.

You mustn't depend too much on the judgment of department heads and
foremen when picking men for promotion. Take their