FLOPPINGHAM WATERDELL sat in his office, feet erect, smoking his morning sisal. And nursing along his habitual grouch against Dear Firm. Six months before, Floppingham Waterdell had been stricken with the honor of Branch Manager. It was the biggest job he had ever managed to throw in all his long speckled career, but for some foolish reason Dear Firm thought they had hold of a Whale when they fished him out of the deep blue sea of Job Searchers. “The utter planlessness of their work,” sighed Floppingham, re-crossing his unexercised legs and taking another long, legumenous puff at the root of all evil. “They send me here to take charge of an office that has heretofore been conducted absolutely without system, and then they expect me to go out and do business without telling me where they want me to go, or how they expect me to go about it. They scuttle my plans and they don’t offer any themselves. All they say is, ‘Go get the business.’” “All work should be planned beforehand,” continued Floppingham, reflectively. “No business man should attempt to do business until he knows his territory thoroughly and the character of his Prospects—even down to their peculiarities and hobbies, thus eliminating lost motion in the Approach, and simplifying the road of ingress.” From the foregoing irridescent little exerpt from Floppingham Waterdell’s daily conferences with himself over the deficiencies of his Firm, the reader has come to the conclusion, or not, as the case may be, that Floppingham was himself a rhinoceros of no small heft when it came to Business Efficiency. And indeed Flop was. Every file in the office, every colored thumbtack on the map, every drawer of his desk, every card-index, chart, letter and cuspidor sang of The Office Efficient. And all accomplished within six short, shrimpy months! For examp: When Floppingham took charge of the dump, you couldn’t find a letter in the files without looking for it. Three months later you didn’t have to go to the files at all when you wanted to look at a letter. You would go to a Card Index where you found all the meaty paragraphs of the letter arranged on a card alphabetically, chronologically and hypodermically, including the writer’s telephone number and all such other thrilling news as appears at the apex of the average letterhead. As a check against error, you then would get out the original letter from the regular files and compare the card with the letter, or the letter with the card, or vice versa, and the trick was done! Positively no plush curtains or false bottoms to deceive you! It took one girl only four months to get this system in shape so she could take off the skid-chains. Before Floppingham assumed charge, nobody around the office even knew how many steps a thirsty bookkeeper had to take to make the water-tank at the opposite side of the room and get back to the revolving perch. Nor did anybody know the amount of time that was consumed per step in such a wild orgy.