Rewards of Work

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As our government touts the virtues of unemployment benefits, I wonder where our society is headed. Over the past few weeks, it has been brought to my attention that several of my coworkers have been forwarded for promotions and pay increases despite the fact that my work load is larger and that I have been "in grade" longer than they. The other fellow with whom I work closely in the Chemistry Department pointed out that they frequently turn to us because they know we will get the job done. As much as it irks me to watch others promoted over me (my base pay has been frozen for over four years now) because they "need the money" while they do less work, I find the timing of this post interesting.

After dinner Sunday night before I went home, my father handed me a pamphlet his father gave him years ago called "A Message to Garcia". With apologies to the author, but because I think the message matters, I am reprinting it in its entirety. Its message is as prescient and sagacious today as it was a century ago.

1899

A Message to Garcia

By Elbert Hubbard

In all this Cuban business there is one man stands out on the horizon of my memory like Mars at perihelion. When war broke out between Spain & the United States, it was very necessary to communicate quickly with the leader of the Insurgents. Garcia was somewhere in the mountain vastness of Cuba- no one knew where. No mail nor telegraph message could reach him. The President must secure his cooperation, and quickly.

What to do!

Some one said to the President, "There’s a fellow by the name of Rowan will find Garcia for you, if anybody can."

Rowan was sent for and given a letter to be delivered to Garcia. How "the fellow by the name of Rowan" took the letter, sealed it up in an oil-skin pouch, strapped it over his heart, in four days landed by night off the coast of Cuba from an open boat, disappeared into the jungle, & in three weeks came out on the other side of the Island, having traversed a hostile country on foot, and delivered his letter to Garcia, are things I have no special desire now to tell in detail.

The point I wish to make is this: McKinley gave Rowan a letter to be delivered to Garcia; Rowan took the letter and did not ask, "Where is he at?" By the Eternal! there is a man whose form should be cast in deathless bronze and the statue placed in every college of the land. It is not book-learning young men need, nor instruction about this and that, but a stiffening of the vertebrae which will cause them to be loyal to a trust, to act promptly, concentrate their energies: do the thing- "Carry a message to Garcia!"

General Garcia is dead now, but there are other Garcias.

No man, who has endeavored to carry out an enterprise where many hands were needed, but has been well nigh appalled at times by the imbecility of the average man- the inability or unwillingness to concentrate on a thing and do it. Slip-shod assistance, foolish inattention, dowdy indifference, & half-hearted work seem the rule; and no man succeeds, unless by hook or crook, or threat, he forces or bribes other men to assist him; or mayhap, God in His goodness performs a miracle, & sends him an Angel of Light for an assistant. You, reader, put this matter to a test: You are sitting now in your office- six clerks are within call.

Summon any one and make this request: "Please look in the encyclopedia and make a brief memorandum for me concerning the life of Correggio".

Will the clerk quietly say, "Yes, sir," and go do the task? On your life, he will not. He will look at you out of a fishy eye and ask one or more of the following questions: Who was he?

Which encyclopedia?

Where is the encyclopedia?

Was I hired for that?

Don’t you mean Bismarck?

What’s the matter with Charlie doing it?

Is he dead?

Is there any hurry?

Shan’t I bring you the book and let you look it up yourself?

What do you want to know for?

And I will lay you ten to one that after you have answered the questions, and explained how to find the information, and why you want it, the clerk will go off and get one of the other clerks to help him try to find Garcia- and then come back and tell you there is no such man. Of course I may lose my bet, but according to the Law of Average, I will not.

Now if you are wise you will not bother to explain to your "assistant" that Correggio is indexed under the C’s, not in the K’s, but you will smile sweetly and say, "Never mind," and go look it up yourself.

And this incapacity for independent action, this moral stupidity, this infirmity of the will, this unwillingness to cheerfully catch hold and lift, are the things that put pure Socialism so far into the future. If men will not act for themselves, what will they do when the benefit of their effort is for all? A first-mate with knotted club seems necessary; and the dread of getting "the bounce" Saturday night, holds many a worker to his place.

Advertise for a stenographer, and nine out of ten who apply, can neither spell nor punctuate- and do not think it necessary to.

Can such a one write a letter to Garcia?

"You see that bookkeeper," said the foreman to me in a large factory.

"Yes, what about him?"

"Well he’s a fine accountant, but if I’d send him up town on an errand, he might accomplish the errand all right, and on the other hand, might stop at four saloons on the way, and when he got to Main Street, would forget what he had been sent for."

Can such a man be entrusted to carry a message to Garcia?

We have recently been hearing much maudlin sympathy expressed for the "downtrodden denizen of the sweat-shop" and the "homeless wanderer searching for honest employment," & with it all often go many hard words for the men in power.

Nothing is said about the employer who grows old before his time in a vain attempt to get frowsy ne’er-do-wells to do intelligent work; and his long patient striving with "help" that does nothing but loaf when his back is turned. In every store and factory there is a constant weeding-out process going on. The employer is constantly sending away "help" that have shown their incapacity to further the interests of the business, and others are being taken on. No matter how good times are, this sorting continues, only if times are hard and work is scarce, the sorting is done finer- but out and forever out, the incompetent and unworthy go.

It is the survival of the fittest. Self-interest prompts every employer to keep the best- those who can carry a message to Garcia.

I know one man of really brilliant parts who has not the ability to manage a business of his own, and yet who is absolutely worthless to any one else, because he carries with him constantly the insane suspicion that his employer is oppressing, or intending to oppress him. He cannot give orders; and he will not receive them. Should a message be given him to take to Garcia, his answer would probably be, "Take it yourself."

Tonight this man walks the streets looking for work, the wind whistling through his threadbare coat. No one who knows him dare employ him, for he is a regular fire-brand of discontent. He is impervious to reason, and the only thing that can impress him is the toe of a thick-soled No. 9 boot.

Of course I know that one so morally deformed is no less to be pitied than a physical cripple; but in our pitying, let us drop a tear, too, for the men who are striving to carry on a great enterprise, whose working hours are not limited by the whistle, and whose hair is fast turning white through the struggle to hold in line dowdy indifference, slip-shod imbecility, and the heartless ingratitude, which, but for their enterprise, would be both hungry & homeless.

Have I put the matter too strongly? Possibly I have; but when all the world has gone a-slumming I wish to speak a word of sympathy for the man who succeeds- the man who, against great odds has directed the efforts of others, and having succeeded, finds there’s nothing in it: nothing but bare board and clothes.

I have carried a dinner pail & worked for day’s wages, and I have also been an employer of labor, and I know there is something to be said on both sides. There is no excellence, per se, in poverty; rags are no recommendation; & all employers are not rapacious and high-handed, any more than all poor men are virtuous.

My heart goes out to the man who does his work when the "boss" is away, as well as when he is at home. And the man who, when given a letter for Garcia, quietly take the missive, without asking any idiotic questions, and with no lurking intention of chucking it into the nearest sewer, or of doing aught else but deliver it, never gets "laid off," nor has to go on a strike for higher wages. Civilization is one long anxious search for just such individuals. Anything such a man asks shall be granted; his kind is so rare that no employer can afford to let him go. He is wanted in every city, town and village- in every office, shop, store and factory. The world cries out for such: he is needed, & needed badly- the man who can carry a message to Garcia.

THE END-

I am not always the best at being a Rowan in the workplace. Some of the things they ask of me are things to which I do not have permission, and so I must ask for further direction. My signature is worth about as much as a used toothpick. What I have done is give my superiors options, appraise them of objectives, update them on achievements, and take care of business as far as lies in my poor power. While a coworker slated for promotion takes credit, I have taken the initiative, knowing that to wait (as was the case with this person last year at this same time) will be worse than to be proactive. Sometimes, I am given directives, and while I may carry the message to Garcia, my pay is not in proportion. The consequence of this has been that where others have their base pay increased, I have other opportunities.

I came to this state and Nevada higher education in October 2007. I started teaching in January 2008. Since then, I have taught six different courses, many without so much as an example syllabus or my own copies of the lab book or course text and with as little as five days notice until the start of term (like just happened today when I was offered a seventh unique course to teach). With each offering, I have moved up the course listing to more important classes with higher requirements. Two weeks ago, a friend of mine from undergraduate asked me if I would be willing to teach a senior level class in Biochemistry and create a class on scientific instrumentation for a Chemistry Minor.

I am not a power player in the GOBNet. I am outranked, outclassed in terms of publications and degree titles and even the choice of alma mater. I usually get the dregs of the class listings. Yet, the people who make the decisions are coming to me to get the Message to Garcia because they know I will do the job well and on time, and that students will get a good value from what I offer. I have the largest overload of anyone in the department (I will spend 58 hours a week on the clock), and I am teaching three different courses this semester, some of which have students on the roster that I have seen before.

To close, allow me to quote Mr. Hubbard again: "Folks who never do any more than they get paid for never get paid for any more than they do." I am fairsure that they are offering me these opportunities because I go above and beyond. Even if some of the administrators choose to overlook my contribution or at least withhold rewards, the rewards of work are sometimes beyond the paycheck. For anyone who looks at my resume since coming to the Nevada System of Higher Education, they will see the following: a man of inauspicious beginnings was given greater and more opportunities until he eclipsed some tenured faculty, passing more senior persons to take advantage of opportunities. I have risen to the occassion and risen in their estimation as a consequence.

Although I earn a fair wage, I am very cheap. I earn the rock bottom minimum, even when I teach overload because the minimum overload exceeds 1.5 times my normal hourly wage. Others cost the institution far more. My sections are also at 75-99% capacity whereas some of theirs are barely large enough to keep open. My reputation and resume speak for themselves, and I thank God for rewarding me for my work. I may not be as good as Rowan, but God has granted me opportunies and shown me to be a civilized man. I consider that a great blessing. Now, I'm off to work.