ity in itself. Whatever of morality or lack
of morality the word "efficiency" calls forth is given to it by the
manner in which the terms of the ratio are defined. It is for society
to make the definitions. Society may determine the forms and the
limitations under which it will have business energy expended, and it
may decide what are the social ends toward which it will have business
effort contribute. Guided by wise social policy, efficiency and service
go hand in hand.

Since business is subject to control by society, it follows that the
efficiency factors in a particular business, in a whole industry, or in
business generally, must adjust themselves to the decisions that
society has made, and they must also take account of decisions that it
may make in the future. And these decisions are not all recorded in the
law or even in the vague thing we call public opinion. Laws and
opinions of particular groups, group morality, individual morality,
even inertia, and a long list of more subtle and often capricious
reactions are channels through which social purpose finds expression.

It is worth our while to consider how these reactions may affect
practical administration. No reflection is needed to see that in
proportion as business men fail to take account of forces outside the
business, in that proportion they are likely to miscalculate the
results of business policies. Striking examples of such miscalculation
are found in the experience of Mr. George M. Pullman back in the
nineties, and of Mr. Patterson, of the National Cash Register Company,
a decade later. Each of these men, with apparent good faith, undertook
to surround his laborers with conditions of physical, mental, and moral
uplift, and each undertook to do it as an act of paternal bounty. Each
of them, as far as we can judge, expected appreciation, gratitude, and
increased efficiency. But they failed to take account of the group
consciousness of their laborers; they did not know what the laborers
were thinking; and because the laborers were thinking something
different from what the employers thought, policies intended to arouse
gratitude aroused instead resentment and a strike.

But there are many things besides too much paternalism that may result
in a strike. Another concern of international dimensions and one whose
officers, I can vouch, are men of high character and public spirit,
also found itself confronted with a strike in 1910. This was a highly
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