preliminary interviewing would be done by the Employment Service. Qualified applicants would be sent to the Statler for final interview. We then revealed we had already built up a file of more than 200 applicants who had expressed a desire to work at the new hotel. It was agreed that all qualified applicants would fill out a brief Statler application in addition to our own. When the meeting ended, we felt we would be able to handle this recruitment in stride.

But the hotel suddenly found it necessary to advance its opening date by more than week. On Wednesday, August 18, the Statler Personnel Manager neatly snatched the rug from under our equanimity by informing us that he must begin hiring "for everything" on the following Monday. This gave us two working days in which to search our various files and to interview and refer on 85 separate orders for well over 300 openings. The hotel planned to break a "blanket" ad in Friday's newspapers directing all interested applicants to us on Monday.

Realizing that we could not cope with this huge addition to our normally heavy Monday workload, we decided to stay open all day Saturday on a "Statler only" basis. This concession was enthusiastically publicized by the hotel in paid advertising and publicity releases. The wisdom of our decision became apparent when some 1,700 applicants were screened by our Employment Service interviewers on Saturday. Such a response was unprecedented and required super teamwork on the part of the entire staff. In all, 523 referrals were made to the hotel that day with definite reporting days assigned for various job groups.

When very large numbers of Statler applicants continued to appear at our office on the following Monday, we decided to set up a temporary unit within the office. This prevented serious dislocation of our normal operations. A supervisor and six interviewers were assigned to a "Statler Unit," which took complete responsibility for this project over a period of 3 weeks. Applications were taken, inter

Smiles of accomplishment are exchanged by CSES personnel and Hotel Statler administrative and departmental executives as they review the completed staffing pattern. Left to right, seated: Frederick T. O'Neil, assistant manager and Samuel D. Arons, manager, CSES; Frank P. Morse, general manager, Statler Hotel; and Carl G. Thurston, personnel executive. Standing: Isadore Goldstein, interviewer, and Walter Theis and Hazel Anderson, supervisors, CSES; and Spencer Wallace and Lloyd Farwell, Statler assistant managers.

views conducted, and referrals made exclusively by this group.

During this time, numerous Statler representatives conducted positive recruitment at our office for special jobs, ranging from a statistical analyst to a stationary engineer. All contact with the hotel was maintained solely by this special department throughout the 3-week period. It is believed that this singlecontact arrangement obviated much confusion, vexation, and duplication of effort and was largely responsible for the singular smoothness with which recruitment progressed. When we totaled the score at the end of this intensive effort, we found that more than 3,500 applicants had been screened by our interviewers. Of these, 895 had been referred and 352 hired.

Following the dedication of the hotel in September 1954, the temporary personnel office was disbanded. On the eve of this move, Employment Service supervisors were given an educational tour of the hotel in operation. The visit was followed by a meeting with all department heads during which future recruitment procedures were discussed. General Manager Morse struck the keynote when he said, "We of the Statler are proud of our new staff and you should be proud that you did so much in providing us with it. We look to you in the future to keep us supplied with the same caliber of worker."

The Hartford "team" is proud of this accomplishment. The "team" includes every supervisor, interviewer, and clerk, as well as a most cooperative field supervisor and an equally cooperative agency administrative staff.

We recognize, too, that without a "Statler team" which placed their complete confidence in our service and worked diligently with us, there would be no "Statler Story."

TELEVISION
AND

PUBLIC RELATIONS

By MERRILL H. WRIGHT Manager, Springfield Local Office Illinois State Employment Service

cause here in Springfield, this prairie State capital, he would see something which might make him wish he hadn't wasted 20 years in sleep-hibernation. He would see much being made over a working man and his job relationship—all in a living picture, television.

Establishment of television stations may have progressed faster in major metropolitan centers than in smaller places, but smaller communities have been just as quick to recognize the value of putting human interest into their public service programs. Nor have metropolitan centers made more progress in many of the facets of television operation than our Springfield Station, WICS-TV, which is steeped in Lincoln lore and tradition. Affiliated with NBC, ABC, and DuMont television networks, WICS projects its messages to over 200,000 viewers in 20 counties in Central Illinois with a population of just under 500,000.

Opportunity Came Knocking

In May 1954, a few months after TV station WICS started operating, one of its officials contacted the local manager of the Illinois State Employment Service concerning the possibility of a weekly 30-minute public service show. This suggestion was like a "bolt out of the blue" to the local office manager and his staff. It was indeed an awakening. And it was the beginning of a gratifying experience in the sphere of both public and human relations.

Numerous conferences, studies, and discussions were necessary to plan this continuous weekly 30minute TV show. The television station representative and the manager of the Springfield local office .informally agreed that: (1) The program would be called "Job Opportunities;" (2) it would be a roundtable discussion running for 30 minutes each week; (3) the local office of the Illinois State Employment Service would have sole responsibility for preliminary

plans and preparations for the program, including selection of individuals to appear and the outline to be followed; (4) the television station official would act as moderator; (5) actual job opportunities would be emphasized; (6) the program would be unrehearsed; and (7) the principals participating in the discussion would include a representative of a prominent employer, one of our job applicants, a local Employment Service office representative, the television station moderator, and-where appropriate-a representative of the union concerned.

The Right Man for the Job

With this as a background, the next step was selecting a local office staff member to serve on the panel. While theoretically it might seem that this job should be passed around, from an operating standpoint it has proved more practical to have one qualified individual for the job, and an alternate. It takes an unusual person for this assignment. He must know whereof he speaks; thus, long and respected service in the agency is a prerequisite. He must always say the right words at the right time, for any utterances on these shows can never be "unsaid." He must be mentally alert and speak with articulate. smoothness and momentum, possess a voice that is pleasing to the ear and an appearance and personality that lend dignity to the show.

Selection of the employer to be represented on each show is vastly important. Likewise, selection of the applicant is very important because we are displaying our product and as the old saying goes, "A good picture is worth a thousand words." In the search for a suitable applicant, the whole office staff is alerted. Here, too, it is desirable to have at least one alternate applicant because quite frequently the person selected to appear on a given show will be placed just hours before the show starts (or get "butterflies" and be unable to appear).

So much for the principal actors; the next step is the preparation of the program itself. As previously mentioned, actual jobs should be stressed. So, a few hours before the show starts, selected job openings are obtained from active orders in the placement units and these occupations are listed on a bulletin board especially prepared for publicizing jobs before the television camera. At the top of this board are the words: "Illinois State Employment Service" in 11⁄2-inch letters; immediately below are the words "Job Opportunities" in 11⁄2-inch letters; and under that the job openings are listed in 1-inch letters. In addition to these job openings, a list of other job openings, copies of selected clearance openings, announcement of any positive recruitment, a copy of our demand list, and other significant job information, such as State Civil Service Examination Announcements, are assembled for quick reference.

The Program Outline

At this stage we have selected the employer, the applicant, the local Employment Service representative, the jobs; we have assembled part of the material. Next comes preparation of the outline for the moderator to use in conducting this unrehearsed TV show. Brief

introductory statements concerning the participants are outlined, together with suggested questions for the moderator to pose. In the meantime, the participating employer or his representative has been told that he will be interviewed by the moderator; that he will be asked about his products, his employment, his hiring methods, his business, and his payroll; and that large pictures of various parts of his plant, maps, charts, and often actual products can be shown to good advantage. The ES representative reviews the outline with the moderator prior to the show.

Briefing Eases Tension

After these steps have been taken, the next is the get-together of the participants about 30 minutes before the show. During this period, the Employment Service participant briefs the guest applicant and employer, suggesting what to say and what not to say, describing the physical layout of the TV studio, and the seating arrangement. Last, but not least, in some cases it is necessary that our Employment Service participant put the guest applicant and occasionally the employer at ease.

(Continued on page 36)

A few months ago the Public Relations Office, Ontario Region Unemployment Insurance Commission, Canada, prepared and publicly released a series of five articles concerned with the evolution of the theory of unemployment insurance which culminated in the system currently in operation in that country. Excerpts from these articles-particularly those dealing with the chronological development of the Canadian unemployment insurance system, the basic provisions of the enabling legislation, and the system of administration-appear on these pages.

IN

'N CANADA, unemployment insurance was first given consideration about 1919. A Royal Commission on Industrial Relations recommended, in April 1919, that a national system of unemployment insurance be established. The subject was under consideration from time to time until June 28, 1935, when an Employment and Social Insurance Act was passed. The system to be set up, as a result of the Act, was to cover the whole of Canada. The bill was disallowed in 1937 by the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council as it involved an infringement of provincial rights as limited by the British North American Act.

The provinces were then approached in order to get their consent to amend the BNA Act. In June 1940, consent of the nine provinces was secured, and the Act was amended accordingly. The Bill was given unanimous approval by Committees of both the House of Commons and the Senate. The Act of Parliament which sets up the Unemployment Insurance Commission to administer the unemployment insurance plan became law on August 7, 1940. Within the following 11 months, the necessary administrative machinery was organized, and insurance contributions first became payable on July 1, 1941.

In brief, the Unemployment Insurance Act of Canada contains the following provisions:

Scope of the Act

Risk Insured Against.-The Unemployment Insurance Act, 1940, insures wage earners against involuntary loss of employment. The Act came into force on July 1, 1941. It is administered by the Unemployment Insurance Commission, which is responsible to Parliament through the Minister of Labour.

Coverage. Every person is insured who is employed in Canada under any contract of service or apprenticeship, written or oral, whether expressed or implied, or whether the employed person is paid by the employer or some other person, and whether under one or more employers, and whether paid by time or by the piece, or partly by time and partly by the piece, or otherwise, except when employed in certain employments. The chief exceptions are agriculture, fishing, hunting and trapping, private domestic service, service in hospitals and charitable institutions not carried on for gain, private duty nursing, teaching, the armed forces, police forces, the permanent public service, professional sport, the service of the husband or wife of the employee, or employment where the annual earnings exceed $4,800 (other than employment remunerated by the hour, day, piece or mile, in which case the employment is insurable regardless of the amount of earnings). Persons working on their own account are not insurable.

Relation Between Contributions and Benefit

Entitlement to Benefit.-Benefit is payable to an insured person who proves that he is unemployed, capable of and available for work, and unable to obtain suitable employment, provided that contributions have been paid in respect of him for at least 180 days during the 2 years immediately preceding the date of his claim, at least 60 of them being within the last 12 months (or alternatively at least 45 within the last 6 months). The qualifying periods of 2 years, 1 year, and 6 months may be extended, if during that time a claimant has been sick or working in non-insurable employment or engaged in business on his own ac

count.

Rate of Benefit.-The amount of benefit is determined by the average rate of the 180 most recent daily contributions paid by an insured person during the 2 years immediately preceding the date of his claim, in accordance with the table on this page.

The daily rate of benefit is one-sixth of the weekly rate.

Duration of Benefit.-The duration of benefit is determined by the number of contributions made in respect of the claimant during the 5 years immediately pre