The fundamental purpose of all training today is to develop the natural faculties and stimulate the brain of the individual rather than to treat him as a cog which has to be fitted into a great machine. The true purpose of _all_ rules covering the conduct of warfare and all regulations pertaining to the conduct of its individuals is to bring about order in the fighting machine rather than to strangle the mind of the man who reads them. Thus in the assignment of men to work within any military organization, no amount of perfection in the analysis of skills and aptitudes can compensate for carelessness in their subsequent administration. The uniformed ranks are not mechanics, storekeepers and clerks primarily, but fighting men. This makes a difference. The optimum over-all results do not come from the care exercised in seeing that every man is placed at exactly the right job but from the concern taken that in whatever job he fills, he will feel that he is supported and that his efforts are appreciated. There is scarcely a good man who has served long within the profession without filling a half-dozen roles requiring vastly different skills. And looking back, what would the average one say about it? Not that he was happiest where the nature of the task best suited his hand, but happiest where his relations with his superiors gave him the greatest sense of accomplishment. That is the human nature of the equation. We can let the economist argue that what a man puts into a job is largely dependent on what he takes out of it. And we can let the philosopher answer him that the fault in his proposition is that he has turned it the wrong way 'round. Regardless of which man has put the cart before the horse, there are two basic truths which outweigh the merits of the argument. First. _All human progress has come of the willingness of a man at a particular time to undertake a job which no one had ever done before._ Second. _The main reward of any job is the knowledge that worthwhile work has been accomplished._ This last may sound like a corny maxim, but it's true. The reason maxims become corny is because they're true. Despite all of the present-day emphasis on paycheck security as the mainspring of human action, the far stronger force which moves man as a social being is his desire for a secure place in the respect and affections of his associates, including his chief or his employer. Gary Cooper, playing in "The Cowboy and the Lady," used the line, "I aims, ma'm, to be high-regarded." Except for the few wrong-headed people, he was speaking for the whole human family. The man who can get along without wanting or needing words of approval from other people is fit for a cell by himself, either padded or barred.