Evening public ledger. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1914-1942, 1920-09-15
THE SNoBS IN INDUSTRY
ARE ROOTS OF MUCH EVIL
Wcrk Of Real Leaders Like Sehwsb,
Brush and Others Proves That More
Than Wage pisasreements Can
Underlle Strikes

An ASTONISHING number of people
n still believe that the woes Of this dis
tracted world can be dispelled by statistical
formulas. That dclusion is spreading. 1t
has the sweep of fad. And, now and them
when some new crowd downs tools in
temper and turns for comfort to the sweet
singers of the /. W. w, it seems that
some one ought to get the statistcians out
OF their seclusion for a view of the unChang-
ing realities of everyday life and glimpse
of the processes by which few men of
deeper understanding pioneer toward indus
trial peace.
When news like todays comes from
Britain and from Italy a feeling that the
statisticians have been trusted too far be-
comes almost irresistible
How much of the general unrest Is due
actually to wage inequalities or hardship
and how much is due to defective human
leadership in industry and out of it? How
many strikes are due to the friction, the
hurt and the blind evaporation created by
snobs and Doors in places Of authority over
large groups of men?
Not long ago a costly and troublesome
walkout in one Of the Camden railway
yards was caused by the stupid arrogance
OF few foremen. 1t was a demonstration
by shop workers who knew only that their
immediate bosses didn't want to be fair.
Recent surveys in the wake of the steel
strike show clearly that the greatest fault
lay with minor executives, who seem to have
known no more about the aims and purposes
of their superiors than they knew of the
men under them. They were the climbers in
industry, giddy with authority for which
they were unfit and perfectly willing to
trample the faces of a multitude IL thereby
they could rise a notch or two.
The other day on this page Matthew c.
Brush, president of the American Interna-
tional Shpbuilding Corporation, had some.
thing to say about the qualities which he
deemed necessary to successful leadership
His observations were peculiarly interesting
to any one who ever got behind the scenes
at Hog Island launching. There came
back the memory of Brush down among his
men and, at the critical instant, solemnly
biting chew of tobacco from the leathery
plug rendered by Big Bill Fortune, chief of
the launching gang-a chew taken. in ac-
cordance with a yard tradition, for luck
before the ship went down the ways.
Brush is one of the new crop. He knows
statistics as we'll as any one else--better.
indeed, than most people, because he is
aware of their limited values. He could be
one of the crowd at the island and chew
Billy Fortunes tobacco on occasions of
ceremony, and by close contact he knew
what his men were thinking and feeling, and
yet he was the respected authority and the
revered boss.
Schwab is n genius of organization and
big business. But he can sit on a steel
girder at the lunch hour and cheerfully dis
cuss musical tempo with the puddler or
whoever wal!ops the drum in the Bethlehem
Steel Company's excellent band. Schwab
can be Charlie to any man in his shops and,
somehow, his dignity is not impaired for
that.
Between men like Brush and Schwab
and the captains of industry who sit
tightly in far-awny Offices and call
for the state constabuary when they got
into the inevitable disagrccments with men
whom they never try to understand, yawn
abysses as wide as the world. The work of
the newer education will be to bridge these
spaces. No statistician has ever tried to do
that.
Time was when business was business and
nothing more. But business nowadays means
CO. operation.
There was period when a lordv air and
an icy aloofness were accepted as the proof
of industrial wisdom and the proper mani
festatons of high authority Since then
affairs of mankind have become more com
plicated.
That part Of the world that labors hard
for living has been thinking and reading.
What is more, it has learned deeply to feel
1t believes, and believes properly, that a
modern government is common enterprise
and that democracy is common adventure.
And it has developed perceptions and an
| irOnic humor against which some of tho
| poses and attitudes of the Victorian business
man cannot be sustained
No one profits by the wide separation of
! the ruling group from the multitudes In mod .
| orn industry. And it is the boss and the
| captain OF business who seem to lose most
! Of all For TO withdraw out of the warn,
and strong current Of the common life to
| loneliness on some tinpot eminence or other
is to miss sort of education that cannot be
had from books and inspiration of kind
that crowds alone can provide for the men
! tney trust and approve.
mere accident of fortune does not give
any man the right to imply that his equals
are interiors.
THE resourcefulness of men," said Mr.
Brush ''is amazing when once they arc
made to feel that they are an integral part
of machine Of which their leader Is head
They tackle their problem wifi
energy that money cannot buy.
cannot too strongly emphasize the impor
tance of courtesy"
In other words, you must recognize ,
mans humanity If you wish to be a grea
leader, or even successful one in moderr
life or business An opposite rule may hav
operated successfully when tho minds of tn,
worlds workers were in the twilight tina
preceded general education. It will not worl
now. And the Qualtics Of leadership sug
gested by Brush In this instance cannot b
initiated. The manner cannot be assumed
II Schwab gets on well with all sorts OF me
it Is because he feels a community of inter
est with them and 1t Is because he has 1t il
him 10 know that others, too, can be sensi
tive.
We have been hearing a lot about tn
characterization OF industry and about In
dustrial welfare schemes, and most of th
! azn.rirnnnta attemntel mndnr tL