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All you do,” said the salesman for the Telagog Company, “is flip this switch at the beginning of the crisis. That sends out a radio impulse which is picked up here and routed by the monitor to the proper controller.” Ovid Ross peered past the salesman at the figure seated in the booth. Gilbert Falck, he understood the man’s name to be ; a smallish, dapper man who wore a shining helmet, from which a thick cable passed in a sagging catenary curve to the control-board before him. "So he takes over?” said Ross. “Exactly. Suppose you’ve let yourself in for a date where there’ll be dancing, and you don’t know how?” "I do, kind of,” said Ovid Ross. “Well, let’s suppose you don’t. We have in the booth, by prearrangement, our Mr. Jerome Bundy, who’s been a ballet-dancer and a ballroom dancing teacher — ” “Did somebody call me?” said a man, putting his head out of another control booth. “No, Jerry,” said the salesman, whose name was Nye. “Just using you as an example. Aren’t you still on?” “No, he gave me the over-and-out.” “See?” said the salesman. “Mr. Bundy is controlling a man — needless to say we don’t mention our clients’ names— who’s trying to become a professional ballet dancer. He’s only so-so, but with Jerry running him by remote control he puts on the finest tour-jete you ever saw. Or suppose you can’t swim — ” ('The Guided Man' by L. Sprague de Camp) “So if I sign up with you, and tomorrow 1 go see this publisher guy who eats horseshoes and spits out the nails, to ask for a job, you can take over?” “Easiest thing in the world. Our theory is; no man is a superman! So, when faced with a crisis you can’t cope with, call us in. Let a specialist take control of your body! You don't fill your own teeth or make your own shoes, do you? Then why not let our experts carry you through such crises... “Is their any carry-over effect? In other words — uh — if a controller puts me through some act like swimming, will I learn to do that better from having the controller do an expert job with my carcass?” “We believe so, though the psychologists are still divided. We think that eventually telagog control will be accepted as a necessary part of all training for forms of physical dexterity or skill, including such things as singing and speech-making. But that’s in the future.”

Technovelgy from The Guided Man, by L. Sprague de Camp. Published by Startling Stories in 1952 Additional resources -

So, how do you get this thing installed? It turns out you have choices:

WHEN Ross had signed the contract with the Telagog Company, the salesman said: “Now we’ll have to decide which class of telagog receiver to fit you with. For full two-way communication you use this headset with this hypospatial transmitter in your pocket. It’s fairly conspicuous. . .’’
“Too much so for me,” said Ross.
“Then we have this set, which looks like a hearing-aid and has a smaller pocket control unit. This doesn’t let you communicate by hypospatial broadcast with the controller, but it does incorporate an off-switch so you can cut off the controller. And if you have to communicate with him you can write a note and hold it up for him to see with your eyes.”
“Still kind of prominent. Got any others?”
“Yes, this last kind is invisible for practical purposes.” The salesman held up a lenticular object about the size of an eyeglass lens but thicker, slightly concave on one face and thin around the edge. “This is mounted on top of your head, between your scalp and your skull.”
“How about controls?”
“You can’t cut off the controller, but you can communicate by clicks with this pocket wireless key. One click means ‘take over’, two is ‘lay off but stand by’, and three is ‘over-and-out’ or that’s all until the next schedule. If you want to arrange a more elaborate code with your controller that’s up to you.”
“That looks like me,” said Ross. “But have you got to bore holes in my skull for the wires?”
“No. That’s the beauty of this Nissen metal. Although the wires are only a few molecules thick, they’re so strong that when the receiver is actuated and their coils are released they shoot right through your skull into your brain without making holes you can see except under the strongest microscope.”

Thanks to SFFaudio for reminding me about this story.

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Additional resources:
  More Ideas and Technology from The Guided Man
  More Ideas and Technology by L. Sprague de Camp
  Tech news articles related to The Guided Man
  Tech news articles related to works by L. Sprague de Camp

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