Excerpt from The American Office: Its Organization, Management Ment and Records Eliminating waste effort is the aim of the age. There is no gainsaying the fact that this world of ours is wasting millions of dollars doing useless things with brains and body. The efficiency movement and the scientific management movement are the natural results of an almost universal desire to avoid the useless. The factory has had the lion's share of attention during all this attempt to reduce motions and increase output - that is, reduce costs. The office is only now coming into its own. Lack of literature and the feeling that the office is "different" have been somewhat responsible for the delay in applying to the office the principles that have been found sound in the factory. Yet, taking the country as a whole, we find certain principles applied here and others there. Unconsciously, business concerns have, each contributing a part, built up what might almost be termed a "science of office organization and management." There is no need therefore, to expound new theories. The author has found it unnecessary to go beyond the experiences of the better managed offices. The book is divided into three parts. Part I deals with the organization of an office. The elements of organization are treated at some length, since there does not seem to be any other standard description of them in book form. The reader is also told how to combine these elements into an efficient whole. Part II deals with the intensely interesting subject of management. The author found it difficult to confine himself to the illustrations quoted; it was thought best, however, to quote only such instances as would give the reader a conception of the lengths to which he may go. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.