"Git in here, then, and git in quick," and let him in the first car going up.
Somewhere, somehow, that impudent youngster had struck a responsive chord. Instinctively—or else because of past experience with elevator starters—he had put the problem of that particular starter's service on a business basis. He had put it in the starter's power to perform his own work without trouble, and to feel at the same time that he was "a man of affairs."
He was able to show his authority without taking it out on the boy.
Analyze this "trade" with the "compensation" chart in mind. Do you not see the "balance" of interests? Do you not see the starter's feeling that the service he rendered was his own business, that the boy was one of his customers, that the avoidance of trouble was his compensation or profit?
Is there not in this very unimportant transaction the BALANCE OF INTERESTS suggested by our little chart?
At this stage of our approach to the KNACK OF MANAGEMENT, a ready objection comes to mind. We are now dealing in human values and relationships—and you can't chart them. Analysis, planning, organization—certain rules may be set down which will enable one to attain some degree of effectiveness in carrying them out.
But human nature? You can't deal with it by rule.
The objection is well founded. You can't chart human nature—but you can study the approaches to it and chart the laws that appeal to it.
Our chart on [page 146] is based upon what successful managers have learned about finding the wants of the human element when it works, and is constructed to supply a method of supplying those wants with as much productiveness and as little friction as possible.
When you buy a new car and "put it to work," your first care is to find out its wants—how much you must give to get what it has to "sell"—what parts need oil and grease and so on.