The Montgomery advertiser., 1903-11-08
WORKERS LIMITED
 BY PERSONALITY.
Technical Equipment Counts for Lit tie If Personal Side is Neglected.

you for the intricac cies of engineering and mechanics; no matter what the university and the college and the high school may have accomplished in fitting you for pro- fessions, it Is the opinion of Earl M Platt of the Accuracy Press Bureau of Chicago. that thorough inventory of yourself, which shall show to yourself your limitations no less than your capa. bilities and capacities. is of more vital moment to the young man and the youna woman.
 Tn the worlds work there are two sides to the worker" said MT. Pratt. "one side of him is the personal side, which embraces all that may be accredited tc personality; the other is his technical equipment. To me- looking at the man. regard the personality of the man as the right hnnd of his accomplishments and his technical knowledge and adapta bility as his left hand.
 For instance, I knew a man in Cleve- land who was a bookkeeper and whose tastes were for the work. He was given good position with big drug house and gave up the place in a week for the reason that in the business were SC many abbreviations and technicalities that he would not try to master them in order to keep the position. On the other hand, knew a young fellow who was offered a place in a big carriage works. and who. finding that he knew nothing of the business. took the house catalogue to his home and mastered every portion of the carriage makeup in two weeks
 Each of these men had a personality which appealed strongly enough to em- ployers to put them upon the pay roll but only one of the candidates had the interest. perseverance and concentration sufficient to overcome the obstacle of the missing technical knowledge. , The man without the drug technicalities at his hand might have acquired the knowledge in a week had he possessed the personal quality of concentration: for one of the most efficient railroad men of my ac- quaintance was sought out in his ca paeity as clerk in a country grocery store and given a place in a department of the service where he had not the slightest knowledge. It simply had been recognized that he had a personal equip- ment beside which the technical was only incidental.
 Look at the experience of two stu dents whom l knew in one of the univer- sities here; they continued at post grad uate courses, term after term, waiting for a call to the work of the world They were women who markedly had neglected their personal appearance in school and who finally passed out into the world with the handicap of unattract tiveness.
 I know young men and young women in Chicago drawing salaries far below those that they might draw. simply be- cause the value of personal appearances has not been brought home to them. They could buy some becoming dress. take a little more care of their hair, hands faces and feet, and draw perhaps a third more salary because of 1t.
 Touching the world of the employed and the employer alike, I can say that the world is lacking woefully in con- potent help. whethe. from the point of technical or personal equipment, or the combination of both There are not enough capable people to do the world s work. The cry of the employer is that his men lack interest in the work; that they are indolent and devoid of concen- tration. This Is not a new complaint and long ago 1t was decided that the time clock would remedy the evil. It has done it. however; 1t has unnamed men and has machine made the ldler: it has brought workers to the shops on time, but has left them there. good and bad. on the same general plane of servioe-the idler anxious to beat the machine if he can; the competent. industrious one in- different if he shall do so.
 There must be d better method than this evolved in the business world. AL ready In some houses there is a disposi- ton to discredit the clock and the idea of the cashiers punching q hole each day in the pay envelope of the employe has been introduced as substitute The clock. of course. is confession on the part of the employer that he cannot get the class of employees that he would like to have. and the worst feature of it is that when he gets a good man and sub jects him to the system, that good man is less good because of it.
 Again. as to the personality of the man employed. he will make fewer mis- takes out of his personal equipment of judgment. memory. concentration. and self-control than will be saved him by proficiency in technical knowledge A character may have all the technical knowledge in the world. and If 1t has not these four personal attributes It's training will have gone for nothing.
 "Recognizing the defects that are in the mental equipment of men and women as one of the bars to their progress, 1t is a striking fact that the physical defect Is less disability friend of mine who has a printing office was walking through an alley several years ago and found q man who had lost both legs playing marbles with some newsboys He asked why the man was not at work and was tod there was no work for him. My friend looked the man over and told him If he wanted work to do to wash up and come clean to the office on the next Mon dav morning. Tine fellow came and thero found a bench built for him at the side of a iob press and there he was placed to feed paner into the machine Today he is regarded as the hest operator of a press in the whole establishment. He could not have heon bank messenger, hut he f.; an excellent press feeder while with as big q defect in his mental and moral nature as is this Ioeless state he would have bcen fitted fnr anythng.
 ..Nya+,ro eee,,,s t7 he especially disposed toward tt,a extinction of the mentally de- fojent If a man bns onlr one log thore ia not the Ieas. difficulty in getting him to sea tb4 nA.asei-v of 2 wooden ono hut if be ,s locking Tn two ar three of the v,ost i-,,,ortan+ nerSo0"l attributes. men tol and moral ho ~10"S resistance tust
 .Aa o,+er+ +rat ha jc lacking If hn L., ,nv,o oLvSicqiIv he will take a crutch t,a4 ,s handed to rim, but if he Is lame 'r+aIIectrauv rc viii resent the sueges- +,or that he etoula take mental treat ment f,r the defect
 ,rrv,np os he does to get between the yo.oos of the employers and the emnloved ,r o-dor to de-7ons'rate to both tho i~- ,,ero tive nece~sitv of 7c"uracv in thought .,d oc.,or M~ Pr"'t feels th"t the 'r- ,,rrat,on he hoe p'i0ed "iong th"s" ''nHs hoe hcan vc-t1 tho 'N'~tv Y"'-s "' +,orrh. and .he money he has expe1dei fr, n,-oIvtrr it
 rho wors of 'eo N''~o'" 'S to ''S""'.Hr h- res47~chos the '7''V '9"~'"s ~ d's'~