Leslie wrote about Planters

1. To start with, the manager of a plantation needs to have a sound knowledge of current trends in tropical agriculture and he must be fully experienced in the husbandry of his particular crop. He must be familiar with the different leaf, trunk and root diseases, and with the insect and animal pests which affect his crop, and he must know what action to take in the event of an attack.
2. He must be able to recognise all the major nutritional deficiency symptoms of the rubber tree, and he must have sufficient knowledge of soil-science and fertilising to take action to remedy these. He must be able to plan and construct drainage and road systems. He must have a knowledge of building techniques since he will have to design and construct a wide range of buildings. He must have a reasonable knowledge of town-planning since he will have to supervise the layout of his workers villages, including the sanitation and electrical system.
3. The rubber estate manager is usually directly in charge of the factory. He requires therefore a sound knowledge of process-control, practical engineering, vehicle repair and maintenance, and materials handling.
4. All of the above refers only to one aspect of the planter's job. A very large part of his duties is related to the recruiting, training, and management of his labour force and staff. An average sized rubber estate would have a total labour-force of perhaps five hundred workers.
5. These workers live, along with their wives and families, on the estate. They do not leave their work in the evening and return the following morning like workers in a manufacturing business. Their well-being and welfare is therefore the responsibility of the estate manager for twenty-four hours a day. He must have an extensive knowledge of their language and customs, as well as a large measure of compassion and common-sense.
6. A manager in a manufacturing company, in charge of a labour force of five hundred would undoubtedly have the services of a range of specialists such as personnel officers, work-study experts, builders, architects, company-lawyers, and so on, ready to call on.
7. The planter, because of his isolation, deals with all of such matters on his own. To manage an estate proficiently takes years of training and experience.
8. The average estate manager will usually have served an apprenticeship of ten years or more as an assistant or a divisional manager, directly responsible to his estate manager for perhaps a thousand acres of rubber trees, and for a labour force of two or three hundred workers.
9. All of this applies equally of course to the new breed of planter, namely the Malaysians who took over when the expatriates moved on. The planters' profes­sional body in South East Asia is the ISP, (The Incorporated Society of Planters.) To become an Associate, requires the passing of examinations in one or more of the local languages, Malay, Tamil or Chinese. It requires passes in examinations in Soil Science, Botany, Surveying, Estate Book-keeping, and Estate Practice.
10. When in the fullness of time, I became the chairman of Unilever Platations International, I interviewed and recruited many planters of many races, in different parts of the world. I can say with some confidence that Somerset Maugham, from what I have heard of him, would never, if he were still alive, have had the ghost of a chance of getting employment with us. I do not think he would have lasted a week as a planter.