Arizona republican., 1918-06-23
F|RESTONE TELLS IF SHAPING HUGE
 BUSINESS ID WAR

Before the United States got into the war against Germany, even for some time after our entrance into it, one met with many little neat cards and much superficial talk to the effect of Business as usual"
 A year is a long time to have waited. but the cards have finally dis and the talk subsided. Ali of us in business seem to have been shaken out of our smugness. at least to some degree. But it took powerful lot of shaking. Not because business lacked the full measure of patriotism - not because business was unwilling to serve, but because business as a whole did not get the right angle on it's op- portunities for service The war was lover there" And so most of us thought in terms of service that were expressed lover there'
 Business gave up its most valuable young men without even considering requests for exemptions-because that was an lover there" expression. The calls for money from the Red Cross, the Y. NJ. C. A, the government, were generously met and with enthusiasm. That money meant the doing of things lover there"
 American Makeup
 All this was necessary and all of it shows a certain kind of fineness in the American makeup. but it was not enough. ft was not making a soldier of the cause of every man and woman in civil life. It was not mobilizing business to a war footing It was no, hardening down to the emergency tests the business individual and or ganization as our boys were being hardened in the training camps.
 Now that very thing is being done to quite an extent. It has been done ef- Actively in spots. The example we want to cite is the organization com- posing the Firestone Tire and Rubber company at Akron. Ohio. That com- pany has a man at the head of it, H. $. Firestone, who early felt the respon- sibility of his position under the new conditions. Before America got into the war he was busy on the lover there basis. He was not only active in all the recognized methods of rais- ing funds, and the like, but he equipped with full outfits for ambulance work groups of young men who wanted to go over and fight for France.
 The same spirit was shown toward the government immediately upon our declaration of war Then it was that Mir. Firestone began to see the wal not only lover there. but lover here" It was not long before the Firestone service flag bore 1000 stars Soon MT. Firestone saw what a few weeks of our intensive military training did for the young men responsible for the stars in that flag.
 What the army and navy dealers did for the boys was an inspiration to the leader of those who had to stay home and stick to the job. If few weeks of intensive effort could make soldier out of civilian. develop for man an entirely new brand or fund of efficiency. how far were we who stayed in the old routine falling short of our opportunitie? Why not some of this intensive effort applied to our selves to multiply our power and our usefulness,-our serviceability under the new regime for the new cause?
 Then Mir. Firestone called his ex- ecutives around him to picture the new conditions, to analyze the organiZa tion's relations to these conditions, to -outline his standards of service to the public by the new measurement of wal requirements. and then to ask all to face their new responsibilities accord ingly. From the president, to the other officials. through them to de- pertinent heads. then to assistants, su> perintendents. foremen, on down the | line to the worker at the humblest tasi, the word to mobilize. to strip for ac. ton. to harden down to harder work was given.
 Search for Waste
 And so a search for waste in any form was started and sustained, de- | partment by department, the organiza | ton passed under the spotlight of \ board of examiners' so to speak | Wherever prosperity had bred a feel. | ing of complacency, a free and easy attitude toward expenditures, divorce lnent of the executive from those who execute or systems of reports or sta tistics not basicly vital to business cf. ficiency-all these were smoked out h, investigators and, in the case of men made to prove their ability to adap
 themselves quickly to the new order O
 things. In the case of methods ant
 details they were analysed out or ex
 istence unless absolutely vital to tn,
 three primary clements of the Fire
 stone business--tho making of goo.
 tires. the sale of them and collect;n,
 the money for thom.
 Considering the fact that the Fire
 stone Tire and Rubber company has
 through it's whole history of conspicu
 ous success, been pointed out as al unusually clean cut direct acting hioh