personal finance Mass advertising media-press and television create demand in advance of individual selling effort and, in many instances, more of the consumer's penny or pound goes on advertising than on the cost of production. In addition there are the new distributive means selfservice, the supermarket, selling by direct mail which, in the field of consumer goods (which г are, after all, most closely related to the 'fuller life'), can revolutionize business productivity. I A great deal today is being said and written about auto 1 mation, which is another facet of productivity. There is ? f much confused thinking about automation. It is not a night mare of pushbutton machines and souldestroying ano Л nymity. It is, rather, a conception of how work should be organized. And work in this connexion is not just industrial production, but covers the whole business of business distribution, clerical work in offices, financial controls, even planning. Of course there is gadgetry in automation and much focus on mechanization and controls, but essentially automation (which really symbolizes the new technology) pays little attention either to skills or to the product or service to be economically supplied. It takes far more notice of the undeniable fact that there are discernible patterns in most happenings. Automation takes these patterns and hammers out ways and means by which processes can be developed which will produce goods and services in the greatest variety, at the lowest cost, and with the least effort. This is a considerable simplification, but this hurdle of definition, even if many readers will find a hundred refinements of it, had to be jumped. The business of business is today a great deal more, then, than making something or providing a service. The involvement is greater. It includes recognizing responsibilities inwards to workers; and, outwards, to setting a vigilant standard of production or service which will not debase the business function. This may sound pious and unreal, but if the principle of free enterprise is to survive, business cannot shut its eyes to this larger role. Time may be running out. A final point to be considered is the question of profit or, as it has been well called, the avoidance of loss. A business cannot continue to exist if it loses money, or if the money it makes is not sufficient to buttress it against the normal risks that have to be taken. Furthermore, profit is required in order to underwrite the cost of expansion. If a business marks time it will soon be left far behind. Research and develop 24 The Business of Management ment, new machinery the dynamic approach, in fact, to marketing, inventiveness, and productivity which has been sketched out in this chapter cost money. Additionally, a business, as will be developed later, has a considerable obligation to its shareholders. But in Britain there is another, and very topical, aspect to this matter of profit. personal finance