PERSONALITY.

Hawke's Bay Tribune, Volume I, Issue 66, 28 February 1911, Page 11

PERSONALITY.

THE SECRET OF SUCCESS. EVOLUTION OF THE SHOP GIRL. “Personality is to-day recognised as the greatest asset which can be possessed by any man or woman. Personality is worth more than brains alone. Brains can be hired or stolen. Personality is impregnable and indestructible.”

An Australian, Mr. James de Conlay, thus introduces an extremely interesting article on “Personality—the Secret of Success” — in last month’s issue of the London Magazine. “In politics, in the arts. in professions, and in commerce” (he says), “one sees personality everywhere triumphant. This, perhaps, is largely due to the increased influence of women in all directions. Personality is winning for them those things which hitherto men have only fought for with their brains. The man, therefore, who can organise personality has the world at his feet; and that personality is being organised can plainly be seen by the revolution which has taken place in the great shops of London during the past 18 months. For the first time in the history of department stores in this country the personality of the

saleswoman or shop assistants has been considered of as vital importance as the quality of the goods which they sell. The absolute necessity of possessing personality is indeed raising the shop girl from the position of a mere automaton into the rank of professional women.

I “The shop girl is one of a great class vitally important to the whole ■ community. Millions of men and ! women go shopping every day, and scores of thousands of shop girls wait on them. Yet, in the main, the shop girl means nothing to them. She is to them simply a human automaton, who passes things over the counter, and then wishes them Good-day! Now and again some extreme point of view swings the shop girl into the public eye. And for this one has. to a large extent, to be grateful to the stage. One sees the shop girl as a glorified and beautiful creature, with the entire peerage at her feet, as in ‘The Girl from Kay’s.’ ” “There is no business in the world which is so highly specialised as the drapery business. It requires years of experience to understand, say, laces alone. If a, girl enters the lace department she» will in all probability remain in the | lace department for the rest of her life, unless her ability is markedly above the average. The same applies to blouses, to shoes, to stockings, and the thousand and one things which the shop girls of Lon-

I don supply to the women of Loni* don every day. In every great draipery store specialisation and scien- * tific methods are gradually working ‘their way. Conditions of business are changing, and changing rapidly. It is not too much to say that the day is coming when the great drapery houses of London will reprei sent not so much a trade as a proi fession. And this is largely due to the influence of America.

j “Then again, the modern shop igirl is subject to the most search- ; ing scrutiny of her work. At Selfridge,s (in London) there is a chart j which shows every morning exactly what each assistant has accom■plished the day before. It is esti- ‘ mated that each assistant’s salary should represent so much on the sales they effect. The average is 5 per cent. If the assistant is costing less than this then, obviously, • she is a girl with exceptional abili- | ty. who is on the high road to proi motion. If she costs more than | this, say, from 7 to 10 per cent, 'then something is obviously wrong 'and she is required to furnish an explanation. “Filed away in the archives of Selfridge’s office ai «#, little dossiers which give each shop girl’s history, and the record of her progress with the firm. There is a debit side and a credit side. On the debit side are placed such facts as that she is

i inattentive, careless in her ac- * counts, or habitually late. On the credit side it is recorded that she is exceptionally keen and intelligent, that some customer has written in to praise her, or that she has transacted a particularly good piece of business. This dossier is the life’s ledger of the shop girl, which is consulted when it is necessary to consider her position. A good credit side may save her from dismissal, even though she has committed some serious breach of discipline or lapsed into some grave error.

“The tradesman of to-day cannot afford to be a mere tradesman. Ht must be a psychologist and a scientist. And it will be to the shop girl’s lasting benefit that it is now realised that business without humanity must eventually come to naught. Personality is triumphing, and will triumph.”