The Book of Business Etiquette

ney ready and moving aside as quickly as possible instead of lingering to converse with the ticket-seller about train schedules and divers other interesting subjects

he train for Bellevue, and when the guard at the gate repeats that it

ndow must stay down. Lounging over a seat is bad form, especially if there is some one else in it. So is prowling from one end of the car to the other. Besides, it makes some people nervous. Snoring is impolite and so is talking in one's sleep, but they are beyond remedy. Talking with the person in the berth above or below is not, however, and is much more disturbing than t

er, there is a comradery of the road, a sort of good fellowship among voyagers which lets down ordinary bars, and the men who like to rest as they travel find it highly diverting and interesting to talk with other men from various parts of the country. This holds true in hotels, especially in the commercial hotels, where traveling men foregather to meet their customers and transact their business, and in hotels in small places where the possibilities for amusement are limited and the people have to depend on one another for entertainment. But there are limits. No m

ason, most hotels prefer that they be gentlemen. There is an atmosphere about a first-class hotel that frightens away second-rate people. Mo

to receive tips draw very small salaries, if any. They depend upon the generosity of the public they serve. The system may be all wrong (we believe it is) but it means bread and butter to those who live by it, and it is only just, as matte

s that the little gift was once simply a spontaneous act of thoughtfulness. It has degenerated into a perfunctory habit, but it should not be so. Excellent service deserves a recompense just as

ally-can never indulge in the luxury of a grouch. One of the biggest parts of his job is to keep cheerful all the time and that in itself is no small task. (Try it and see.) A farmer can wear a frown as heavy as a summer thunder cloud and the potatoes will grow just the same; a mechanic can swear at the automobile he is putting into shape (a very impolite thing to do even when there is no one but the machine to hear), and the bolts and screws will hold just as fast; a lawyer can knit hi

mers. Often they spent the night-hotel accommodations were few and houses were far apart-and entertained the family with lively tales of life on the road. Next morning they gave the children trifling presents, swindled the farmer out of several dollars and made themselves generally agre

ated with good-natured indulgence. He was less objectionable than the man who followed him, the agent. He was (and is) a house-to-house and office-to-office canvasser and a general nuisance. He sold everything f

decided to try this, and adventurers who believe they see in it a chance to get rich quick. The teachers of salesmanship tell us that we are all selling something, even when there is no visible product. The worker, according to them, is selling his services jus

d becomes a kind of mesmerism in which the salesman uses a sort of hypnotic process (which is simply the result of being over-anxious to sell) to persuade the prospect that he cannot wait another day before buying the particular article that the salesman is distributing. The article may be stocks and bonds, wash cloths, soap, or hair nets. It make

at they have had to erect barriers, in many instances almost impenetrable ones. It is especially difficult in big cities where the pressure is heavy, but most worth while business men have learned the value of cont

hat the time is not inopportune. Some salesmen are afraid to write because they think the knowledge of what they have to sell will prejudice the prospect against it. At the same time they feel that if they can only get a chance to talk to him a few

ve a letter or a card of introduction. Sometimes he will telephone or speak for an appointment. It is best when these come unsolicited, though it is permissible to ask for them. No man should depend upon the help of his f

. This is a universal standard of measuring a man's character and calibre. Until we have heard him speak we judge him by the way he

hat he is a life insurance agent who thinks that if he can once get inside he can "put it across." Most business men have no use for such practices and rarely allow the salesmen who employ them to stay in their offices any longer than it takes to get them out. Besides, the salesman places himself under a handicap to begin with. He will find it pretty hard

al to send in a card (a good card is a letter of introduction in itself) but if the salesman finds it a handicap, however slight, he should by all means dispense with it. If the card is cheap or flashy or offensive in any way it arouses prejudice against the man who bears it before he has had a chance to present his case in

be seated before resuming one's own place. But promiscuous handshaking is an American habit which Europeans as a rule frown upon and in which a number of Americans do not indulge, for

t of the United States has more than once in the course of the history of our country come to the end of the day with his hands bleeding from the number of times people have pressed it during the day. Now the President ought to be willing to give his life for his country, but he ought not to be required to give it in this way

efore which the prospect is sitting, hitch their chairs up as close as they can, and talk with their breath in his face. No one likes this and it is only a rude and thoughtless salesman who is guilty of it. On

s of the office. For these reasons a number of business men are going out to see their callers instead of bringing them in to see them, a practice which is much more cordial than the other if one can afford the time for it. One big business house abolished its large reception room and built in a number of smalle

office, and he sits in it. Another never allows a visitor to enter his office, but goes to the outer reception room and stands while he talks. One man stands up as a signal that the interview is at an end. Another begins to fumble with the papers on his desk, and the salesman does not live who is not familiar with the man who must hurry out to lunch or who has only five minutes to catch a train. One man has his secretary or his office boy interrupt him after a visitor has been in as much as ten minutes, to tell him that Mr. So-and-So is waiting outside. Another rises to his feet and walks slowly toward the door, the sales

And most business men know what they want, or think they do, and when they ask a direct question they want a direct answer. Many a young salesman has ruined himself so far as his career was concerned because he went out with instructions to keep the interview in his hands and every time the man he was "selling" asked a question he passed airily over it and kept stubbornly on the road he had mapped out

speech he had memorized about some charts. The man listened until he came to the end-the boy was talking so rapidly and excitedly that it would have been hard to interrupt him except by s

the office of a busy lawyer one morning recently in

ive you some boo

moment in his carefully planned speech at which he thought it best to mention the name of the books. He went throu

oing to give them to

all was another door which opened into a closet that contained a shelf which was a little more than five feet high. The salesman opened this door by mistake and struck his head smartly against the shelf. This made him angrier than ever. He jerked the other door open and slammed it beh

e offices here disturbed by people who act like this. Now go on," he

salesm

self-respecting man will engage in, "is selling goods that won't come back to customers that will." It is cumulative in its effect, and the man who sells another something that really fills a want wins his

smen are guilty here-they wheedle the customer into buying more than he can afford, beginning on the premise that since their stocks are good (and the men who sell fraudulent ones use the same methods) a man should if he has a hundred dollars buy a hundred dollars' worth, if he has a million he should buy a million dollars' worth, if he has a home he must mortgage it, if he has an automobile he must sell it. No good salesman works like this. People are very gullible and it takes little argument to persuade them to in

hundred million Chinamen in the world engaged in other occupations. Salesmen who are consumed with their own importance do their firms more harm than good. They usually are men in positions too big for them (they may not be very big at that) and are for the most part of not much more real consequence than the

elf to look cheerful (we are not talking about the one who takes on an idiotic grin) may find himself after a while beginning to feel cheerful. After he has greeted the elevator boy with a smile (it may be a very crooked one) and the ho

the man in the backwoods of ignorance has a fence around the limits of his mind and it is hard for anything to get inside it. He is open to conviction, but like the Scotsman, he would like to see the person who could "convict" him. It is hard work to get a new idea into the mind of a man who is encased in a shell of ignora

ind comparatively little rudeness in the world. And a good salesman is courteous to all men alike. With him ove

lead him into belittling them. He need not go out of his way to praise them nor should he speak of them insincerely in glowing terms; but an honest word of commendation sh

They know that one who is ill-mannered or offensive in any way indicates either a lack of breedi

o