CHAPTER XXIX. 

 BUSINESS MANAGEMENT. 



EVERY business in our modern industrial life is becoming 

 better and better organized; in fact, this development and success 

 are in direct proportion to the efficiency of their organization. The 

 same thing is true of an individual's business whether it be a drug 

 business, a manufacturing plant, a quick-lunch restaurant, or a 

 farm. The more detailed a business, the more carefully it must be 

 organized in order to stop the leaks and insure against loss. The 

 poultry business is one of the most detailed of agricultural opera- 

 tions. It is made up of a large number of technical and practical 

 operations, each of which must operate perfectly by itself, and in 

 addition they must be organized to work harmoniously as a part of 

 the whole. This coordination of work and the efficient development 

 of the whole enterprise of managing a poultry flock can only be 

 attained when the operator is in the closest possible touch with 

 every detail of his business and when he is in a position to know at 

 any time just how efficiently the different parts of his operations 

 are performing. This can only be determined by the keeping of 

 accurate records as outlined in a previous chapter (page 453) . The 

 keeping of records, however, is not enough; the study must be 

 carried still farther and must include a complete financial and 

 managerial study of the entire business. Such a study is com- 

 monly called a farm management survey. It is the purpose of 

 this chapter to show what such a survey includes, how it should be 

 made, to give some typical surveys and to picture some of the very 

 important facts which have been determined regarding success 

 and failure in poultry keeping as a result of such studies. These 

 management studies are of equal importance whether they con- 

 sider large or small flocks, fancy or utility farms, intensive or exten- 

 sive enterprises. Such studies bring out the weak and strong points 

 in business administration; they show the weaknesses in buying 

 and selling and they bring to the front actual inefficient methods of 

 theory and practice. 



Poultry Farm Management Defined. Poultry farm manage- 

 ment is the act of skilfully and prudently planning and carrying on 

 the many operations which are an indispensable part of the modern 

 business of poultry keeping. 



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