Evening Republican, Volume 14, Number 65, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 17 March 1910 — BUSINESS CONVERSATION. [ARTICLE]

BUSINESS CONVERSATION.

It la jX*alne« All Known Feminine Principles to" Be Brief. It is most difficult to accustom oneself to business brevity, even if one is a business woman. There is something so meager, almost poverty stricken, about restricting the conversation to the business in hand. It does not seem cordial. And then to stop just as yotf have begun to like your business associate —ho, no, never can one cease to feel that there is something very unsatisfactory about business methods. The man may be a busy magnate, but that is no reason why one should be curt with him. He is probably a father as well and perhaps a lover of dogs. At any rate make an effort to find out. When the six minutes have passed which it took to settle the matter you called to see about, ask how his children are, and if he thinks there will be any skating this winter. There Is no need of being surly just because business has been touched upon. One can always say, “How is your wife’s cold!” or “the price of meat is going up, Isn’t it?” —something folksy and nice. Even men in swivel chairs must have a human side, and although one scowls and barks while business la under discussion, it being well understood that this is the way to give the impression that one is clear headed, hurried and keen, when business has been pushed aside it is so against all a woman’s instincts to leave abruptly, the New York Sun says. One wants to settle back and murmur, “What an awful tie you’re wearing,” or “Don’t you think French opera Is ■being rather overdone?” This thinking quickly, speaking quickly, acting quickly and always to the point, it will just end in the business women stopping one day, turning fiercely about, and addressing the air behind them with, “Aw, stop yer pushln’*, there isn’t any real hurry. As for us, we have got to be irrelevant or bust.”