How To Put Yourself Over

"One of my wife's cousins once paid us a short visit. I didn't have much time to spend with her, but after she had gone I said to Mrs. Carnegie, "What makes that woman so charming?" "I'll tell you," my wife said, "if you really want to know. She got you to talk about yourself." I realized it immediately. This cousin had asked me about my interest in Lincoln. I began to tell her about it. Her questions were skillful. I talked one evening until amost midnight. I had a chance to shine. She seemed so intelligent and receptive that I thought she was wonderful. What she did was observe one of the first principles of putting yourself over with other people. She showed an interest in one of my interests so she made a good impression on me."

Good Reading Rack Service, 1958

How Your Newspaper Fights For Your Right To Know

"The newspaper you read is your friend. It has fought your battles and those of your forebears from the day it was born. You may not know one person employed by it. You may actively disagree with some of its editorial policies. You may abhor some of its writers. But it remains your friend. Why? Because it is engaged in a daily fight to know what's happening in the world in which you live. In its columns it brings you a daily report on the world, the nation, the state, the city, the immediate neighborhood in which you live."

Employee Relations, 1957

One Moment Please

"Inspiring stories from the author's Christopher books which suggest a brief pause in the day's work to bring into our lives the strength and guidance needed to help solve our problems of living."

Good Reading Rack Service, no date

They Were There

"On my rounds as a writer, I get to hear a lot of stories. They start, say, over the cafeteria table: "There goes a guy you'll meet this afternoon. Funny how he came to be with us…" Or, watching the chattering crowd punch out at closing-time, "See that gal in the yellow sweater? One of the best. Well, last spring..." So the stories roll. Over the years one kind of story kept cropping up that fascinated me: how often the fortunate "break" for some man or woman had come just because that individual happed to be there - present, on deck and ready - when Old Man Opportunity knocked at the door. Almost, without realizing it, I started to collect such stories, the way some people save four-leaf clovers. Then friends found out and contributed more stories. Pretty soon I had a regular collection."

Good Reading Rack Service, 1957

The Man Who Delivers The Goods

"Vernon "Lefty" Gomez, stylish lefthander of the New York Yankees during the 30's and early 40's, was asked by a sportswriter at one spring training camp how many games he expected to win during the coming season. "I don't know," the mound ace grinned. "It all depends on how Johnny Murphy's arm holds up." Anyone who has followed baseball for a number of years will have no trouble remembering "Fireman" Johnny Murphy. He was among the first of the great relief pitchers in the Major Leagues, and the forerunner of such late-inning stars as Hugh Casey, Jim Konstanty, Joe Page, Clem Labine, Elroy Face, Don McMahon, Ray Narleski, Don Mossi, Dick Hyde and Ryne Duren. These are the special breed of baseball men who earn a living by their ability to enter a game in a tight situation, choke off a rival's uprising, and preserve the win for their team."

A Help-Your-Self Booklet, 1959

Who Killed The Spirit Of Horatio Alger?

"Talking with a mid-western businessman recently, he asked, reflectively, "What ever happened to the spirit of Horatio Alger?" For those too young to know, Horatio was the most widely read writer of boys' stories who ever lived. Exactly in accord with the temper of the times, his books provided inspiration for countless millions of American youth of the 1870's and 1880's. The popular Alger books pointed a moral, and his heros always triumphed over adversity by dint of great effort. Each story stressed how the innate honesty and other sterling qualities of the hero were instrumental in his reaching the fulfillment of his dreams in this wonderful lan of opportunity."

A Help-Your-Self Booklet, 1960

Making More Jobs

"Out of 65 million people in our total civilian labor force more than 62 million have jobs. In a recent month, average weekly earnings of factory workers were higher than they have been in any previous year. Because of tax reduction, moreover, take-home pay is higher still, and since the cost of living has remained virtually unchanged in the past two years, all of these financial gains represent an increase in purchasing power. Clearly these 62,000,000 are better off."

Good Reading Rack Service, 1954

Good Business Is Everybody's Business

"Life in our America of today is based on business. Business, as we use the term, is the manufacturing, the buying and the selling of goods and services. To one extent or another, every American is in business." 

A Help-Your-Self Booklet, 1960

TEAMWORK Spells Prosperity

"We hear a great deal, these days, about the iron curtain and the bamboo curtain, and about the serious threat these barriers pose to human understanding and world peace. Yet I sometimes wonder if there is not - right here in our own America - a kind of invisible curtain which separates people in business and industry from the farmers of our country, a curtain which poses an equally serious threat to our national growth and prosperity."

Good Reading Rack Service, 1956

The Man With 3 Bosses

"We are living in an age of miracles. They have become so commonplace that if a day passes without producing some new and wonderful accomplishment, we are inclined to worry about it. We wonder if maybe we aren't beginning to slip a little. At this point in the Twentieth Century, we have the miracles of television and nuclear energy andn rockets to the moon. Then there is the even greater miracle of mass production, to which we undoubtedly owe our very survival as a free nation. But now I want to point out to you another miracle. It may seem toyou to be a very minor one but, to my way of thinking, it may prove to be the most significant of them all. And that is the miraculous change which has occurred in the public attitude toward the American businessman - the Man with Three Bosses."

A Help-Your-Self Booklet, 1959

Profits Make More And Better Jobs

"If you'll look up the word profit in Webster's dictionary, you'll find that it comes from the Latin word profectus, meaning progress. At first glance, there doesn't seem to be much connection between profit and progress. But there is a link and it's a vitally important one. In our country and in our free enterprise system, the words should be regarded as practically synonymous. Profit means progress - for everyone."

Good Reading Rack Service, 1960

Are You A Good Ambassador?

"Did you ever stop to think that you are an ambassador for our company? Yes, you and everyone else on the payroll are engaged in our company's public relations program. Everything you do and say, every day, either helps or hurts our company." 

A Help-Your-Self Booklet, 1960

The Genie At Your Command

"You have a genie at your command, scarcely less spectacular than the slave of Aladdin's lamp. You call him into being by flicking a switch…to sweep floors, chill food, cook meals, power gadgets, and run factories. This genie has taken the load off the muscles of man. He has converted muscle power and skill into a capacity to produce th emany wonderful things that make our lives easier and more enjoyable. Without him, they would be a futile dream. This genie is power. His parent is capital and his grandparent is savings."

Good Reading Rack Service, 1953

Putting Public Relations To Work For You

Everybody knows someone like Harry Smith. He's the kind of guy who, at the drop of a hat, can tell you exactly what's wrong with everything - his friends, his wife, his company, even you. He rarely points the finger, though, at himself. It's a safe bet that Harry is an unhappy person. He doesn't get along well with most people. He's not getting ahead on his job fast enough to suit himself. Harry's personal appearance is usually sloppy. His shoes are rarely shined; his shirts and suits aren't usually clean. he often needs a haircut. Though appearance isn't all-important, it does reveal Harry's basic trouble. His whole attitude toward other people is one of "not caring," of self-centeredness.

A Help-Your-Self Booklet, 1959

Caution! Booby Traps At Work

"Every day some 67 million American men and women go to work. And, at work, thanks to the millions of dollars spent annually by business and industry on safety programs, these 67 million people are many times safer on the job than they are in their own homes. Despite this fact, and despite every precaution taken by the companies they work for, every day each of the 67 million run through an unseen obstacle course of countless potential accidents."

A Help-Your-Self Booklet, 1959

How To Become A Leader

"One of the highest estates to which a human being feels he can aspire is that of becoming a leader. There's something in that word which suggests everything desirable in the eyes of most people - power, prestige, influence, wealth, success. They're all there in that one estate - LEADER."

A Help-Your-Self Booklet, 1959

The Story Of Man And His Work

"Whatever his vocation or training, the American worker today lives in a world of technology. He is either the direct custodian of complex machines and instruments or he is the indirect beneficiary of their use. They have multiplied his usefulness and efficiency, expanded his responsibility and raised the standards of his life and work."

Good Reading Rack Service, 1959

Skilled Workers Needed

"A little more than a year ago, America was jarred into a sweeping reappraisal of its own potential for the future. Sputnik I was wheeling over our heads as we pondered its full import. A nation dominated by a communist dictatorship was setting a faster pace of technological development than our own. We searched for reasons. For the most part, we found fault within our system of education which, we decided, was not training and encouraging enough scientists and engineers, enough foreign language experts, enough teachers to meet the demands of space-atomic age. We laid plans to remedy these deficiencies, but we changed some of our attitudes as well. The man absorbed in things of the mind, particularly the scientists, no longer seemed quite so distant from our everyday lives. He was as close, indeed, as the preservation of our own freedom. This reawaking, this awareness has been a good thing for our country, and it has already begun to bear fruit."

Good Reading Rack Service, 1958

Nobody Wins A Strike

"We live in an age of miracles, and they have become so commonplace in our industrial world that if any day passes without producing some new and wonderful accomplishment, we are inclined to worry about it, and we wonder if maybe we aren't beginning to slip a little." 

Good Reading Rack Service, no date

Your Personal Public Relations

"Just what is public relations? Webster's Dictionary defines it as: "The activities of a corporation…or other organization in building and maintaining sound and productive relations with special publics such as customers, employees, or stockholders, and the public at large, so as to adapt itself to its environment and interpret itself to society." A simpler way of saying it is: "Public relations is doing what's right - and letting people know about it."

Good Reading Rack Service, 1956

Making Work A Pleasure

"A man who started at the bottom and worked his way to the very top of one of our largest corporations recently said: "To some, work can be fun; to others, even fun can be work. For my own part, work has always been interesting. To my mind, true and lasting enjoyment come primarily from pride in a job well done." These fruitful words come from the deepest corner of the big heart of one of America's greatest industrial leaders, Benjamin F. Fairless, former chairman of the board of United States Steel Corporation, an outstanding "self-made success."

Good Reading Rack Service, 1957

We Can Maintain Our Job Security

"In one way, at least, job security is like the weather. That is, everybody talks about it! But, putting an accurate definition on the term "job security" isn't too simple. That's because it means different things to different people. It all depends upon your own particular set of circumstances and personal motivations."

A Help-Your-Self Booklet, 1960

Better Lunch On The Job!

"In the old days, a man working in his own shop would amble home at noon for a feast of beefsteak pie, fresh vegetables and home-baked bread. And he'd take his time eating. Or if he worked on a farm, his lunch probably included plenty of fresh milk, fruit and greens. Well, as nobody needs to tell you, the days of the noonday feed in the kitchen are almost gone. Instead we have the company cafeteria - with its wide variety of foods, its carefully balanced menu. Or we have the lunch that's toted to work and munched in a quiet corner with plenty of coffee."

Good Reading Rack Service, no date

How To Be Happy At Your Work

"Some months ago, while visiting a steel mill in Ohio, I stepped into a nearby diner for a cup of coffee. I took a seat near a window overlooking the busy, sprawling plant. At a table next to mine two steelworkers were talking and I couldn't help hearing their conversations. A lean, nervous, worried-looking man in his late thirties was saying, "I tell you, Charlie, I hate working. I wish I didn't have to show up at the mill every day in the week. I could spend the rest of my life doing nothing at all, just nothing." 

Good Reading Rack Service, 1956

Profits Are A Man's Best Friend

"Some years ago, one of the song-hits on Broadway was a gay and cynical little ditty entitled: "Diamonds Are a Girl's Best Friend." I cannot vouch for the theme of the song, of course, because it occurs to me that even diamonds may leave something to be desired - especially on cold nights. But one thing, I have no doubt whatever - that in the economic sense, at least, employees can never hope to find a better friend than a profit in the companies for which they work."

Good Reading Rack Service, 1956

How A Corporation Works

"This year, nine out of ten Americans holding non-agricultural jobs - roughly 48,000,000 men and women-are working for business corporations. Many of these corporations are very large. Often they seem complicated, mysterious, hard to understand-even to those who have been with them for a long time. Few of us ever sit down and ask ourselves, "Just what is a corporation? How does it work? Why is it different?" Yet, when we know the answers to these questions, we can understand a lot more about our own jobs."

Good Reading Rack Service, 1960

A Shorter Work Week: What's Involved?

"Should we buy a new family car?...Should we continue renting - or by a house?...Would it be worthwhile for Mom to take a part-time job? When important economic questions like these come up, the family usually talks it out and chooses what to do, based on the time and money at its disposal."

Good Reading Rack Service, 1957

Jobs Are Made...Not Born

"Why must jobs be created? In a free economy like ours, can't each man who wants to work set up his own little business and provide a livelihood for himself and his family? A good many can and do, just that. But there are many, many more who have to man the plants, factories and offices in which they expect to find all the tools with which to work, tools which the business owners have to provide." 

Good Reading Rack Service, 1958