Now, a substantial business success means several things. It calls, in the first place, for concentration. There is no truth more potent than that which tells us we cannot serve God and Mammon. Nor can any young man successfully serve two business interests, no matter how closely allied; in fact, the more closely the interests the more dangerous are they. The human mind is capable of just so much clear thought, and generally it does not extend beyond the requirements of one position in these days of keen competition. If there exists a secret of success, it lies, perhaps, in concentration more than in any other single element. During business hours a man should be in business. His thoughts should be on nothing else. Diversions of thought are killing to the best endeavors. The successful mastery of business questions calls for a personal interest, a forgetfulness of self, that can only come from the closest application and the most absolute concentration. I go so far in my belief of concentration to business interests in business hours as to argue that a young man's personal letters should not be sent to his office address, nor should he receive his social friends at his desk. Business hours are none too long in the great majority of our offices, and, with a rest of one hour for luncheon, no one has a right to lop off fifteen minutes here to read an irrelevant personal letter, or fifteen minutes there to talk with a friend whose conversation distracts the mind from the problems before it. A young man cannot draw the line between his business life and his social life too closely. It is all too true of thousands of young men that they are better conversant during the base-ball season with the batting average of some star player, or the number of men "put out at second" by some other player, than they are with the details of their business.
Digression is just as dangerous as stagnation in the career of a young man in business. There is absolutely no position worth the having in business life to-day to which a care of other interests can be added. Let a man attempt to serve the interests of one master, and if he serves him well he has his hands and his head full. There is a class of ambitious young men who have what they choose to call "an anchor to the windward" in their business. That is, they maintain something outside of their regular position. They do this from necessity, they claim. One position does not offer sufficient scope for their powers or talents; does not bring them sufficient income, and they are "forced," they explain, to take on something in addition. I have known such young men. But, so far as I have been able to discern, the trouble does not lie so much with the position they occupy as with themselves. When a man turns away from the position he holds to outside affairs, he turns just so far away from the surest path of success. To do one thing perfectly is better than to do two things only fairly well. It was told me once, of one of our best known actors, that outside of his stage knowledge he knew absolutely nothing. But he acted well, – so well that he stands at the head of his profession, and has an income of five figures several times over. All around geniuses are rare – so rare that we can hardly find them. To know one thing absolutely means material success and commercial and mental superiority. I dare say that if some of our young men understood more fully than they do the needs of the positions they occupy, the necessity for outside work would not exist.
Stagnation in a young man's career is but a synonym for starvation, since there is no such thing as standing still in the business world. We go either backward or forward; we never stand still. When a young man fails to keep abreast of the possibilities of his position he recedes constantly, though perhaps unconsciously. The young man who progresses is he who enters into the spirit of the business of his employer, and who points out new methods to him, advances new ideas, suggests new channels and outputs. There is no more direct road to the confidence of an employer than for him to see that any one of his clerks has an eye eager for the possibilities of business. That young man commands the attention of his chief at once, and when a vacancy occurs he is apt to step into it, if, indeed, he does not forge over the shoulders of others. Young men who think clearly, can conceive good ideas and carry them out, are not so plentiful that even a single one will be lost sight of. It is no special art, and it reflects but little credit upon any man simply to fill a position. That is expected of him; he is engaged to do that, and it is only a fair return for a certain payment made. The art lies in doing more than was bargained for; in proving greater than was expected; in making more of a position than has ever been made before. A quick conception is needed here, the ability to view a broad horizon; for it is the liberal-minded man, not the man of narrow limitations, who makes the success of to-day. A young man showing such qualities to an employer does not remain in one position long.
Two traps in which young men in business often fall are a disregard for small things, and an absolute fear of making mistakes. One of the surest keys to success lies in thoroughness. No matter how great may be the enterprise undertaken a regard for the small things is necessary. Just as the little courtesies of every-day life make life the worth living, so the little details form the bone and sinew of a great success. A thing half or three-quarters done is worse than not done at all. Let a man be careful of the small things in business, and he can generally be relied upon for the greater ones. The man who can overcome small worries is greater than the man who can override great obstacles. When a young man becomes so ambitious for large success that he overlooks the small things, he is pretty apt to encounter failure. There is nothing in business so infinitesimal that we can afford to do it in a slipshod fashion. It is no art to answer twenty letters in a morning when they are, in reality, only half answered. When we commend brevity in business letters, we do not mean brusqueness. Nothing stamps the character of a house so clearly as the letters it sends out.
The fear of making mistakes keeps many a young man down. Of course, errors in business are costly, and it is better not to make them. But, at the same time, I would not give a snap of the fingers for a young man who has never made mistakes. But there are mistakes and mistakes; some easy to be excused; others not to be overlooked in the case of any employee. A mistake of judgment is possible with us all; the best of us are not above a wrong decision. And a young man who holds back for fear of making mistakes loses the first point of success.
A young man in business nowadays, with an ambition to be successful, must also be careful of his social life. It is not enough that he should take care of himself during the day. To social dissipations at night can be traced the downfall of hundreds upon hundreds of young men. The idea that an employer has no control over a young man's time away from the office is a dangerous fallacy. An employer has every right to ask that those into whose hands he entrusts responsibilities shall follow social habits which will not endanger his interests upon the morrow. So far as social life is concerned, young men generally run to both extremes. Either they do not go out at all, which is stagnating, or they go out too much, which is deadly. Only here and there is found one who knows the happy medium. A certain amount of social diversion is essential to everybody, boy, man, girl, or woman. And particularly so to a young man with a career to make. To come into contact with the social side of people is broadening; it is educative. "To know people," says a writer, "you must see them at play." Social life can be made a study at the same time that it is made a pleasure. To know the wants of people, to learn their softer side, you must come into contact with their social natures. No young man can afford to deny himself certain pleasures, or a reasonable amount of contact with people in the outer world. It is to his advantage that people should know he exists, – what his aims and aspirations are. His evening occupations should be as widely different as possible from those which occupy his thoughts in the daytime. The mind needs a change of thought as well as the body needs a change of raiment. The familiar maxim, "All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy," contains a vast amount of truth.