The progress of this movement presents an inter esting study. Here we see displayed the same atti tude of mind on the part of the administrative officers as in the case of the planning department in the fac tory. Each man is inclined to say that the logic sup porting the argument for a planning department is' good but applies to the "other fellow," for "my busi ness is different." But while this attitude is evident among managers of large businesses, they never per sist in it so long as the managers of small businesses. It is the small manager who first refuses to entertain new ideas, with the argument that "my business is different," and then after being driven from this de fense, settles down into his trenches behind the plea that only a large business can afford the luxury of a "thinking" department; and from this position the small man is seldom driven out. But there is a differ ence between holding a position and being buried in it.
4. New policies involve new inethods.—When the equipment of an office was made up of quill pens, a high desk and a stool, the administration of an office consisted largely in the distribution of work among the employes. But a modern office, besides being larger, has many new duties connected with its oper ation. The purchase, installation and care of the office machinery is almost an art in itself, to say noth ing of the constant watchfulness necessaiy to discover new and better methods while guarding against the countless importunities of salesmen with new but un proved devices and systems.
But while the problems pertaining to the mechani cal side of the office control have grown, the human element presents problems never dreamed of a few, decades ago. The old type of office manager, who based his control on ire and summed up his two func tions by adding "h" to ire when be wanted a new employe and "f" to ire when he wanted to get rid of him, is very different from the modern manager ; the latter must have something more than temper for his administrative equipment. Corporations and other business organizations have now generally accepted as a part of their plans the training and guiding of their employes, as well as the careful selection of them —all of which involves studied methods for increasing efficiency thru better physical, mental and moral sur roundings. Office management, therefore, has grown in importance in just the proportion in which cooper ation has superseded exploitation in administrative policies.
5. Function I: Keeping the organization in or der.—Most businesses, no matter how progressive, present opportunities for improvement. Rapid growth generates maladjustments in the organiza tion. Especially is this true of the office. There fore the first function of the planning department pertains to the solution of problems connected with the office as an organization. If we presuppose a standard of organization and procedure which all employes are expected to know and observe, the first duties of the planning department would be to pro vide a systematic means of keeping in touch with all technical changes in the organization and all de partures from standard practice. This requires the planning department to be in touch with the whole office organization, so that its recommendations and decisions may achieve the greatest good for the organ ization as a whole. Thus, the planning department would receive information from individual depart ments and would offer its recommendations, based on first-band contact with all departments, to. the head of any individual department. Even if the functions of the planning department did not go further than those matters pertaining to organization, much aid could be rendered individual heads of departments by placing at their disposal all the accumulated experience which would come to this central department. For, besides the duty of collecting information from within its own organization, it would also make a special effort to study the methods and policies of other concerns. A second organization duty would consist in keeping the lines of authority clearly marked out between the various departments. Weak but aggressive men often step over the boundaries of their provinces and attempt to annex new duties which do not belong to them; while passive men not only permit these aggres sions but allow their own administrative methods to become immersed in a mass of detail which cuts them off from functioning as an organic part of the organi zation as a whole. A third function in connection with organization is the constant watching for de partures from prescribed procedure. The subtlest evil of every system is the tendency of the individual to depart from the scheme of organization as it is laid down. The individual loses sight of the relation that his activity bears to the organization as a whole and slights certain duties which may cost him an outlay of energy or at least impose some discomfort.