Promotion

Promotion comes to him who sticks

Unto his work and never kicks,

Who watches neither clock nor sun

To tell him when his task is done;

Who toils not by a stated chart,

Defining to a jot his part,

But gladly does a little more

Than he's remunerated for.

The man, in factory or shop,

Who rises quickly to the top,

Is he who gives what can't be bought:

Intelligent and careful thought.

No one can say just when begins

The service that promotion wins,

Or when it ends; 'tis not denned

By certain hours or any kind

Of system that has been devised;

Merit cannot be systemized.

It is at work when it's at play;

It serves each minute of the day;

'Tis always at its post, to see

New ways of help and use to be.

Merit from duty never slinks,

Its cardinal virtue is — it thinks!

Promotion comes to him who tries

Not solely for a selfish prize,

But day by day and year by year

Holds his employer's interests dear.

Who measures not by what he earns

The sum of labor he returns,

Nor counts his day of toiling through

Till he's done all that he can do.

His strength is not of muscle bred,

But of the heart and of the head.

The man who would the top attain

Must demonstrate he has a brain.

                      by Edgar Albert Guest