Читать книгу A Road Well-Traveled - Thomas Walsh - Страница 4

The early 1970’s was a recessionary time in the United States. Jobs for new college graduates were scarce. Tim looked at the few job opportunities available and decided to go on to graduate school.

An MBA, when added to a BS from the University of Illinois would in his estimation make him a lot more marketable in two years. MBA’s carried a lot of weight in those days. Besides he had already applied and been accepted to a number of graduate schools - just in case.

Tim decided to enroll in the MBA program at De Paul University’s downtown Chicago campus. His choice was motivated by the school’s offer, which included a position as a graduate assistant in the Finance Department. Fully paid tuition and books plus a stipend of $75 a month looked very attractive to a jobless newlywed living in a third floor walk-up on the north side of Chicago.

Graduate school would add depth to his knowledge and understanding of economics, finance and business. More importantly, it would enable him to build a network of connections that could help him land a good position upon graduation.

The school’s department chairman was well connected in the Chicago business community. A few good words from him would open doors to job opportunities that Tim would never have a chance to interview for otherwise.

Two years later, Tim graduated with honors. He had three strong job offers from well-respected Fortune 100 companies headquartered in Chicago. Like all hard decisions in life, there were pros and cons to consider for each offer. The decision was difficult.

He accepted an offer from Ferrous Metals, a major integrated steel company. The opportunity included participation in the company’s management training program. It was a prestigious entry level position where he would have the opportunity to rotate through several posts in his first five years and be mentored by upper management. The company was known for its progressive management development and training programs. The salary was competitive for a new MBA, and the benefits were incredible – 5 weeks of vacation, pension program, matched savings plan, fully paid medical and dental, retirement medical plan, and more.

Tim also knew this was too good to be true. The downside of this incredible offer was the steel industry ranked as 47^th industry out of 47 industries in the United States in performance. Like other manufacturing industries – automotive, electronics, textiles - steel companies were saddled with employment costs and manufacturing technologies that were not competitive with foreign manufacturers.

The higher domestic costs had not mattered much yet. U.S. companies passed along the additional costs in price increases rather than deal with the problems causing the competitive weakness. Foreign manufacturers took advantage of the situation with lower prices and in some cases better quality and service. Beachheads in U.S. markets were established by overseas companies.

What followed over the next three decades was a tsunami of foreign competition that swept across U.S. manufacturing, washing away antiquated management methods, obsolete manufacturing technology, and a complacency that had lulled domestic companies into taking their markets and foreign competition for granted. U.S. companies lost market share, hundreds of thousands of domestic jobs vanished, and some manufacturers filed for bankruptcy.

All of this was a blur in the future to Tim. He knew something would have to give eventually, but that was in the future; not something he could control. He decided this was an opportunity to establish a solid foundation for his career.

***

During his early years, Tim was considered a “comer” and was put on the “fast track”. He was a bit brash and arrogant; always asking why something was done the way it was done. He was often not willing to accept, “…because that’s the way we’ve always done it.”

He frequently stayed past 5 pm because the work was interesting. Tim didn’t care that many people left before 5 pm or that the building was empty by ten minutes past the hour. To him it was just another sign of the growing weakness of the U.S. steel industry.

Like many new MBA’s, it took Tim a while to realize that he would not be president of the company in a few years, and that people did not jump at his ideas or welcome him as a new messiah. Instead of an office with a view he was assigned a grey metal desk in a large bull pen along with 30 other employees.

There were no cubicles. No privacy. A constant low level sound of voices punctuated by telephone rings, adding machine tapes and the metallic “kachunk, kachunk” of Friden mechanical calculators. Personal computers and the internet had not been invented yet. Communication was very informal. People turned in their chairs to talk to others, or walked over to another desk. Tim, like everyone else, learned to tune out the noise to think and concentrate.

The 1970’s justification for this type of office layout (aside from being able to fit more people into limited space) was to foster learning. Some management and communication specialists believed then that a person immersed in such an environment absorbed the random bits of information floating around the area and over time would become more knowledgeable. Tim thought, ”Sort of like the concept of osmosis in biology, where a cell absorbs nutrition through its wall.”

The pace of work (with the exception of a few departments that had deadlines to meet) was very casual. Skipping lunch or coffee breaks due to workload(s) was rare. Food was never eaten at a desk. Morning and afternoon breaks in the company cafeteria were often 30 minutes or more (even though the official time for breaks was 15 minutes). Department managers often joined their employees, sometimes leaving just a secretary to run the department.

There were company sponsored events for employees at the office. Golf outings, picnics, baseball games and other events were heavily supported by the company and well attended. But nothing could hold a candle to the annual Christmas party. In good years and not so good years a gala holiday event was hosted every year.

The employee Christmas parties were always held in the ballroom of one of the large hotels in downtown Chicago. Complete with a sit-down dinner, full band and open bar for four hours, the parties were a huge hit. Spouses and significant others were not invited. The gossip about who danced together, and who left the party together stoked the office rumor mill for weeks afterward.

***

The company was well-known for training and developing management talent. Tim was smart enough to take advantage of opportunities to learn more about the guts of the business - how steel was produced, distributed and sold to customers. Tim soon realized he enjoyed the responsibilities that brought him into contact with customers and the business operations.

The steelmaking process intrigued him. It was a business that got into your blood. Everything was GIGANTIC! Iron mines with pits a thousand feet deep. Trucks used to haul iron ore from the mines had tires that were taller than three men. Massive ships carried iron pellets for blast furnaces from the northern Great Lakes to steel mills in the Midwest. Furnaces for making steel were 20 stories tall. Rivers of molten metal flowed into huge casts to be formed into intermediate shapes called ingots, slabs or billets. Finishing mills up to a half mile long rolled steel into sheet for autos and appliances, bars for rod and wire or beams for construction. Production was measured in millions of tons.

Operating the business was like running a bigger than life erector set. Men with engineering and metallurgical backgrounds dominated upper management. The executives that ran the fully integrated steel companies thought in terms of ever increasing production capacity measured in millions of tons; theoretically, to reduce the cost per ton by spreading the investment over more production tonnage.

However, many foreign competitors with more innovative management focused on new lower cost production techniques such as continuous casters to eliminate the intermediate step of making ingots, slabs or billets. They viewed smaller increases in production capacity coupled with quicker, more flexible production cycles as being the way to reduce the cost of producing a ton of finished steel.

The new approaches eventually won out. Because of the very long life cycle of steel making facilities, American companies were saddled with obsolete high cost capacity for decades. Some survived and eventually became stronger companies. Others failed or were acquired by competitors.

***

The steel business was always perceived as a dirty business with rough and tough people. But beneath that harsh demeanor, Tim remembered the courteous and caring way that people were treated by the company and each other. Maybe it was just the time in the country and world. People were respectful. You weren’t just an employee. You were a person. You had a family. You had feelings. People said “please” and “thank you”. People cared about you.

The collegial and casual atmosphere that permeated the steel business during Tim’s tenure eventually changed, as companies were forced by the harsh realities of competition to become much leaner, efficient and more profitable. Tim often thought of his years in the steel business as the lull before the storm that engulfed American manufacturing industries. Ignorance was bliss.