hearings, the accountant can not only prepare but should present data in an intelligent and impressive form. The accountant who is familiar with all of the conditions of a company's operation and its financial status, is in a position to present valuable testimony for the company. In many instances it is regretted that the accountant has not felt the confidence necessary for the presentation of such data, which presentation requiręs poise, personality and clear speech. The ideal efficient accountant has these attributes and makes them of value to his company. If we concede that an Accounting Department is necessary, then such a department, to be a productive branch of the business, must be efficient. Efficiency in this work is not confined to accuracy in figures. While accuracy is an asset to be desired, even more to be desired is a knowledge of administrative principles and the ability to execute them.

You may brag on occasions of your efficient Accounting Department. Are you sure that you gage your Accounting Department by proper and fair standards? You may say that your accounts are always up to the minute. That does not necessarily mean an efficient department. You may believe that the accounting officer is honest and loyal, and yet be deceived by a spoken loyalty that means nothing. You can say that your department is run at a minimum of expense or that your office cost per customer is low, and yet this may be the worst kind of economy. You may say that your accounting officer gets along well with other heads of departments and avoids friction. It is not impossible that by so doing failings are overlooked that would be brought to attention were the accountant not continually expected to go out of his way to agree with everybody for the purpose of avoiding friction. The accountant cannot be expected to do all of the cooperating and still be an efficient unit. The hard worker is not necessarily the efficient Long hours of application are not necessarily a proof of thoughtful, fruitful work. Neither is the apparently busy man or the man with a desk full of papers necessarily the real doer for the company. Your efficient accountant must be a broad gaged man able to determine not only office but general company policies from his contact with the records of the business and the personnel of his organization and com

man.

munity. It is not a one man proposition, but is so arranged that upon the retirement or absence of the executive head the work of the department will proceed along usual lines without confusion. He will give attention to such matters as education and instruction for those who are employed under him. He will educate them not only in business practice but in those qualities which are desirable and necessary for the successful executive.

Think of the part that the management may play in the development of such a man or department. or department. Is he consulted on matters of a confidential nature? Is he encouraged to study the business from the standpoint of gross earnings, net earnings and business policy, or does the management continually impress upon him by positive or negative action the fact that he is a mathematical drone to grind out correct figures to be magically produced at a moment's notice, without understanding the reason for requiring such figures or the part they will play.

Executives may have the impression that their accounting officer or department is indifferent and inefficient, and yet the responsibility may be with the management because it has not radiated confidence, good will, and helpfulness. When you ride on a train you are reminded of the hand that holds the throttle or of the conductor in whose hands rests the responsibility for the safety of passengers. These duties are picturesque and appeal to one's sense of romance. The accountant lacks opportunity for this picturesqueness. There is nothing romantic about his work and responsibility and yet he is there in the background . unseen and quite often viewed as a bothersome expense.

Young men of satisfactory calibre are not frequently drawn into this work, largely because men of affairs and college authorities have not yet recognized the possibilities of the field and its importance to business. Until those in authority give this recognition by other than verbal support, the profession will be lacking new material to be trained into efficient accountants. The efficient accounting officer is entitled to and should take an executive position in an organization in order to achieve the best results for that organization. Where his authority is hampered or where his instructions are governed or cancelled by those apparently on the same footing, he is handicapped in carrying out the work of his department. In this he should be supported

by the management and other executive officers. The accountant, however, must place this value on himself and not assume a hangdog position vulnerable and already defeated.

The importance of an efficient Accounting Department is real, the opportunity to make it so is yours.

CHAIRMAN INSULL. Is there any discussion on this paper? Before we close the meeting for the afternoon your Section Chairman would like to have suggestions as to the class of work the Section should take up during the coming year. We will be very glad to hear from anybody.

PAUL R. JONES: Quite a number of gentlemen spoke to me in the hope that we would have a chance to discuss subjects of interest which could profitably be studied. I am pretty sure some of you have ideas that would be of great value to us. You probably have problems that you have solved which would be of interest to us, and I would like to hear from you. For example, I have a letter from Mr. E. J. Allegaert, General Auditor of the Public Service Electric Company, of Newark, New Jersey, which is as follows:

"MR. PAUL R. JONES,

"NEWARK, N. J., April 30, 1919.

"Henry L. Doherty & Company,

"60 Wall Street, New York.

"DEAR SIR:

"I have your letter of the 24th instant in answer to mine of March 27th.

"We are much interested in the bonus system for commercial office employees, and the responses received from a number of the larger utilities show that little or nothing has been done along this line, although the idea is not a new one.

"I would, therefore, request that this matter be brought up as a subject for discussion at one of the accounting sessions at the convention to be held in Atlantic City next month.

"Yours very truly,

E. J. ALLEGAERT, General Auditor.”

THE CHAIRMAN: I think there must be some companies that could help out Mr. Allegaert, and give us the benefit of their viewpoints on the bonus system.

H. M. EDWARDS, New York: I suggest you call on Mr. Scobell, of Rochester.

E. C. SCOBELL, Rochester, N. Y.: We adopted the bonus plan in the commercial office some three years ago, and a paper was written on the subject by Mr. Patterson, my assistant, who had charge of the work. The plan is similar to all bonus plans. The department was divided into various groups, starting with the application counter, the order department, the credit department, the bookkeepers, the meter readers, and all the various operations carried on in the commercial department. A standard was set for each group, and a rate of wages for the standard, and all the work performed above the standard was to be paid for on the bonus plan. It has worked out very successfully, the employees are very much interested, and have done much more. work than they did in the past under a straight wage proposition.

We have compared the cost with a number of the larger companies and, without exception, we have shown a lower cost per account. It is rather difficult to enter into the details here without data.

MR. EDWARDS: The reason I suggested calling on Mr. Scobell in regard to this bonus system is that I recall hearing Mr. Hutchings, the general manager of the Rochester Company, a little while ago describe the effects of this bonus system in his office. He said that he entered the office one afternoon when the Liberty Bond propaganda was on, in order to say a few words to the people on behalf of the loan. He said that formerly when he would go into the accounting department, nearly all work would cease, everybody would sit up, and nothing was done until he went out, and for some time afterwards they would be discussing what he had talked about, so that every time he went into the accounting department there was a decided lack of efficiency in the work that was being done. He said that on this particular occasion he went in and had to rap for attention, and just as soon as he went out all the heads went down over the desks again and everybody got busy.

I am very much interested in the bonus system because in our business and with our clerks it is inevitable that a man, after he has served a number of years and attained a certain efficiency,

reaches the maximum rate of pay. I suppose everybody will have, for instance, a maximum sum he will pay to run a consumers' ledger. Inevitably the work is standardized. There is a certain amount of work a man can do, and we are apt to fix a certain wage which will represent good and efficient operation. When a man has reached that point, he is about as far along as he can get. I think that is true of the great bulk of our people. Of course, we always have alert men who keep moving along, but especially in large companies there are always a large number of men who reach their limit of availability when they have reached the maximum rate of pay. When such a man has reached the point where he is receiving all the pay there is in a given occupation, he does not see much ahead of him, and therefore is apt to lie back on his oars, and perform just about as much work as is necessary to hold his job. The question arises if there is not some incentive we can put in front of that man to keep him on his toes more or less all the time, so that when he does a good piece of work he will be benefitted by it and see the benefit in the form of cash. I believe that is what the bonus system means.

I recently had occasion to talk with the Editor of the Electrical World on the meter reading proposition. I do not know whether you have seen the article in this week's issue of the Electrical World or not, but all of us have, I am sure, experienced trouble with meter readers. The real root of the trouble is that the amount we have been paying for meter reading no longer attracts the kind of man it used to attract. I suppose meter readers are usually paid from $15 to $18 a week. The type of man wanted as a meter reader is the type of man engaged as conductor on a trolley car. Surely the type should not be lower than that, and $15 or $18 a week no longer attracts that man to our busi

ness.

Another feature of the work is that it does not lead anywhere. A man can spend all day reading meters without learning anything toward progress. He learns to be a good meter reader, but does not learn anything about the construction of the meter, does not progress along that line technically.

The result is you must give a meter reader something to keep him interested in his work, and I understand that in companies where the bonus system prevails meter readers do better