Personal Habits

Personal habits are the most apparent and those by which we most often judge an individual. Manner of dress becomes so much a matter of habit that the wearing apparel is sometimes spoken of as the habit, and, as Shakespeare says, it oft betrays the man. Cleanliness and neatness of appearance, the tone and accent of voice, the manner of walking and of carrying the head, and the use of language are personal habits which are acquired early in life, but which mean much in the chances of success. The manner of eating, of sleeping, and of caring for all the needs of body and mind are for most persons mainly a matter of habit, yet they, to a large extent, determine the condition of health and the length of days.

We become fond of doing things in the manner to which we have become habituated. This tendency manifests itself to an abnormal degree in the drinking and the smoking habit. In a lesser degree we see the same thing in the attachment of the babe for his pacifier and the child for his chewing gum. Habit creates a craving for the good as well as for the bad. The ways to which we have become habituated seem pleasing to us whether they be good or bad. There is truth in the proverb, ``Train up a child in the way he should go and when he is old, he will not depart from it.'' It might be added that the child will not want to depart from the way to which he has been trained, for the habits thus acquired beget a fondness for the acts themselves.

It is very unusual for any one to acquire a language after the age of twenty so as to speak it without a foreign accent. All other personal habits are like the use of language in that they are acquired during the early years and are not easily changed. So far as personal habits are concerned, but little change need be anticipated after the twentieth year.

SOCIAL HABITS

Our treatment of others is largely a matter of habit. We are affable or gruff according to habit. Honesty and dishonesty in dealing with others is, in the main, a matter of habit. The honest man is the one who takes honesty for granted and acts honestly from habit. So soon as he begins to observe that he is an honest man, to call attention to the fact, and to be much impressed by the honor of his choices--at that moment suspicion of him should be entertained, for honesty has with him ceased to be a habit.

We classify individuals largely by means of their personal and social habits. By these the gentleman is recognized as surely as the boor. By means of them we select our friends and engage new employees. Efficiency in every life calling depends upon our success in dealing with people. Such success is largely dependent upon the social habits that we acquire.

OCCUPATION HABITS

Until the recent rise of interest in psychology, relatively little attention had been given to the study of those habits which are developed in business. When proper care is not given to the formation of these habits developed in connection with one's daily occupation, wrong habits are certain to appear. The mason makes two motions with his trowel where he should make but one. The accountant substitutes ``short cuts'' in adding where all the operations should be taken in regular order and made as automatic as the few short cuts previously developed. The executive has the habit of depending upon ``desultory'' memory where the logical should be developed. The salesman in speaking to a critical customer says ``he don't,'' instead of saying ``he doesn't''; ``gents' goods'' instead of ``men's goods.'' Every investigation into the human actions and the human methods of thinking as involved in business reveals the presence of unfortunate habits such as the examples here cited.

Therefore, one of the most noteworthy events in the business and industrial world of the last twenty years is the study of the occupation habits of the workman to which reference was made in the first paragraphs of this chapter. The research has been especially successful in dealing with the occupation habits of mechanics.

The fundamental discovery was made that the workman's occupation habits are not such as enable him to accomplish his task in an economical and efficient manner. To discover what occupation habits should be developed, experts in each of several typical establishments were assigned the task of making a careful study of every movement of eye, hand, foot, and body, and the rate and sequence of all the movements necessary for performing single tasks most easily and efficiently. The experts were also to study the tools, the materials, and conditions best adapted to the work. In general, the experts found the greatest opportunity for improvement in the *movements of the men. As a result of this research, numerous processes have been scientifically standardized. The workmen have been taught the new and better way and have been drilled till the processes have been, so far as possible, reduced to occupation habits. The workmen have been easily induced to acquire the new habits, as their earning capacity is thereby greatly increased. Ordinarily, a considerable bonus is awarded to all workmen who develop the desired habits and perform the task exactly as prescribed by the expert.

An investigation into the results secured from the adoption of this scientific attempt to study and to regulate the occupation habits of workmen reveals most gratifying success.

Mr. H. R. Hathaway, an expert engineer, testifies that ``under this system a workman can turn out from two to four times as much work'' as he was able to accomplish when working with his old habits,

Mr. Lewis Sanders, of the General Engineering Company, New York, reports most satisfactory results from the introduction of this systematic attempt to regulate the occupation habits of employees. A typical example which he reports is the following: It regularly took a man one minute and forty seconds to set a piece in a jig. ``After a study of the exact motions required to pick the piece up and set it accurately, we showed the same man how to do it in twenty seconds.'' This workman soon reduced the correct movement to habit, attained the specified speed, and without in any way working harder than formerly was assisted to increase his efficiency four hundred per cent.

A well-known engineering company required the reading of twelve thermometers, each every two minutes. The man assigned to the task could rarely read so many as eight of them in the two minutes. An expert took up the problem and at first could do no better than the first man. The expert studied the most favorable position of the head and eyes for reading, eliminated all useless motions, and discovered that the twelve thermometers could then be read in one minute and fifty seconds. The workman who previously had with difficulty read eight thermometers in two minutes soon acquired the proper occupation habits and was enabled to read the twelve with perfect ease. His efficiency was increased forty per cent, and the task was rendered less exacting than before.

Typewriting is carried on by habits. The habit of writing most naturally formed is that known as the sight system. Recently, attempts have been successfully made to enable the operators to form the habit of writing by touch rather than by sight. The operator who acquires the habit of locating the keys by touch writes much faster and with less nervous strain than the operator who writes from sight.