The difficulty that business men find in applying scientific method consistently in the analysis of their problems is strikingly revealed in the labor policy of the great majority of industrial concerns. While many men of scientific training are dealing with problems of employment, probably no concern has undertaken to make a scientific analysis to determine what are the foundations of permanent efficiency of the labor force which they employ. This is not surprising, when we remember how complicated is the problem and how short the time during which we have been emphasizing the human relations as distinguished from the material or mechanistic aspect of business organization. To state even a simple problem of management, like the one concerning the order sheet, set forth above, is to reveal some of the difficulties of analysis which characterize all subject-matter having to do with human activity. This means that we should not expect results too quickly nor should we be disappointed if the first results of efforts at scientific analysis are not absolutely conclusive. As soon as we recognize that business is primarily a matter of human relations, that it has to do with groups and organizations of human beings, we see that scientific analysis of it cannot proceed in exactly the same way as with units of inanimate matter. The reaction of human relations to changed influences, frequently cannot be predicted until the changes occur. Business, in other words, is a social science and, like all social sciences, must deal primarily with contingent rather than exact data; likewise conclusions drawn from scientific analysis must in large measure be contingent rather than exact. Although we cannot always isolate our factors, control our processes, and otherwise apply scientific method, with results as conclusive as those obtained in laboratories of chemistry, physics, or biology, we need not therefore reject scientific method in favor of a rule-of-thumb. We should, however, be suspicious of too sweeping claims based on any but the most careful and painstaking analysis of facts by persons who are thoroughly trained in the kind of analysis they undertake.