By Noah Graff

Two weeks ago, I had the incredible opportunity to travel to Zurich, Switzerland — a beautiful, unique, and expensive place that is probably hard to fathom for those who haven’t visited there. I believe when most people think of Switzerland what first comes to mind are watches, army knives, chocolate, scenery, military neutrality and bank accounts. All definitely have a significant presence in the country, but how do those things affect Switzerland’s inhabitants? How does it feel to walk the streets of an old European city boasting the highest per capita of Porsches in the world, a city that remained pristine during World War II while so many other European cities were obliterated? I was blessed to get a taste of this exotic place, as I was sent by Graff-Pinkert to meet with several machining industry customers nearby. The following account is little peak into my experience during a weekend in Zurich.

Predictably, on Friday night I had to try out the Latin dancing scene of Zurich, as I do in just about every place I travel. Catholics find the church, Jews find the synagogue and I always look for the salsa bar. Contrary to what one might think, the salsa scene in Zurich is serious. That night, a venue called X-TRA Club, about a 25 minute walk from my hotel, hosted a huge salsa night. The music was an excellent variety of Puerto Rican and Cuban hits, and the diversity of dancers was great. I met dancers from Germany, Austria, Ukraine, Cuba, and Peru, all expatriates who had immigrated to Switzerland to find prosperity.

I got to know two Swiss girls while dancing, Katerina a tall elegant woman of Russian descent with with gorgeous shoulder length dirty blond hair, who had traveled to the club about an hour from Lucern, and Juliette, a cute petite woman with curly brunette hair in her late 30s living near the center of Zurich. Both women, like many Swiss salsa dancers, usually dance Cuban style salsa. I’m not very good at Cuban salsa so I taught them to dance my Puerto Rican style, which is much more common in the United States. They raved that I was a good teacher and we danced quite a lot as the evening progressed. Juliette and I definitely had chemistry on and off the dance floor — at least in my opinion. We bought each other several drinks, but she insisted upon buying a lot more rounds than me, partly because I’m only allowed to have one alcoholic beverage per evening do to a health condition. At the club, a glass of carbonated water cost 6 francs (the franc and dollar are virtually equal in value), a skinny can of Fanta cost 10 francs, and a cocktail such as a mojito (containing plenty of ice) was 15 francs, so you better not spill it.

When you talk with somebody about Switzerland, particularly in a city like Zurich or Geneva, it is almost a given that one of the first topics of conversation will be how damn expensive the place is. When you are trying to predict how much food will cost, just guess a very high number and then add a bunch more on top of it. A “reasonable” meal at a restaurant is 30 or 40 francs per person. I went to a casual Thai restaurant one evening and ordered soup, an entree, and a drink and it cost 45 or 50 francs. That same meal in Chicago would have cost $15 to $20. I will definitely have to explain this price disparity to our office manager when I finally turn in receipts from the trip.

At about 3:00 a.m. I left the club with Juliette, her friend Joanna, and Juan, a successful chef from Peru who Juliette works for part time as a caterer. We wandered over to an after hours bar called Mambo Cafe. The night’s activities at that point are a bit of a blur. A few final dances, me humoring a drunk Peruvian who insisted that he was “more American than I was,” and trying to rekindle any “chemistry” I could with Juliette. We all finally wrapped up our night at about 4:30 a.m. Google Maps on my iPhone guided me back to my hotel in about 30 minutes. It was a little eerie walking through the beautiful old city so late. The streets were quiet, with just a few folks walking around. Everybody assured me that it was about as safe a place in the world that one could wander late, so I felt pretty secure. After sauntering into my small hotel I recounted my evening to the 23-year-old front desk attendant who kindly brought me a croissant from the upcoming morning’s breakfast. He was a little surprised to hear about me getting to know some real Swiss people so quickly. The women I had met that night had bragged that they were more outgoing than most of their Swiss peers. Perhaps my experiences that evening were an anomaly, but I can only judge based on what I encountered. I told the front desk guy about the crazy prices of drinks at the club and he said they were par for Zurich. He said that his salary as a part-time front desk attendant at a small three star hotel was $30 per hour, and that the income taxes in Switzerland are minuscule compared to other countries. Of course, you can buy a beer in the U.S. for $3, rather than $15.

Question: Do you enjoy traveling for work?

By Paul Nicolaus

With unemployment at 5.5% and baby boomers starting to retire it is vital for manufacturing to tap into the high schools and colleges for fresh talent. I believe making things and getting paid to do it is starting to resonate with young people in some communities. In Northern Wisconsin it is definitely catching on. -Lloyd Graff

At first glance it might seem odd that a business run and operated by high school students recently reeled in the Iron County 2014 Business of The Year award, but take a closer look and it becomes clear that Northwoods Manufacturing isn’t your average school program.

Based out of Hurley High School in the northern tip of Wisconsin, Northwoods Manufacturing has quickly evolved into a money-making venture that teaches advanced machining on metal and wood, develops professionalism, and increases students’ awareness of the manufacturing careers available to them following graduation.

Along the way, it gives students real-world manufacturing experience within a traditional school setting. Students can progress through the technology education program, create a resume and cover letter, and then interview for a job.

Once accepted into the student-run business, they are given positions ranging from welders and machinists to engineers and marketers, and related labor is performed using work orders and timecards in order to handle projects for local companies.

The jumpstart that made this unique setup possible came in the form of financial support from the Hurley Board of Education, the Hurley Education Foundation, local industry, and other community supporters, which produced over $80,000 in initial funds.

In addition to donated equipment, this pool of money led to the purchase of three new Miller 252 MIG welders, three Miller Sycrowave 210 Tig Welders, three Miller Thunderbolt Stick welders, a Clausing Lathe, Shopbot wood CNC, Sharp 3-axis metal CNC, and other tools.

“It’s really exciting to be in it from the ground floor and to see the enthusiasm from the kids,” says Mark Manzanares, tool room manager at Ironwood Plastics, who notes just how quickly the program has taken off. “When we first started to work with the school we had a three year plan,” he says. “I think in the first year we exceeded that three-year plan and we’re just continuing to grow with them.”

And thanks to field trips that have included tours of area companies and events like career day, which pairs students with local professionals, students are seeing local industry up-close and interacting with those who are currently working in fields they might just choose to enter.

“It’s amazing how much pride they have in their shop,” Manzanares adds. “The program not only teaches them about industry but also teaches them about the soft skills as well. You need to clean up your work area, you need to show up on time, you have deadlines to meet, and it’s really exciting to see them buy into that.”

The dynamic that has evolved is a win-win, notes Jacob Hostettler, metals instructor at Hurley High School. “By helping us, they’re helping themselves fill the jobs that they have in this area,” he says. “It works out for the schools, the students, and eventually down the line it will help the industry that is helping the schools.”

The success noticed early on in Hurley can be attributed at least in part to Hostetler’s student teaching experience at Eleva-Strum Central High School in the western portion of the state, which has an established student-run machine shop business called Cardinal Manufacturing.

“Once you bring relevance to the classroom all of a sudden the kids want to learn and it’s more exciting – it’s not just a project to get done, get a grade, and throw away,” says instructor Craig Cegielski, who initiated the program back in 2007. “Now there’s some real deadlines, some real quality issues, real customers and real money.”

Cegielski estimates that Cardinal Manufacturing will bring in roughly $150,000 this year, allowing the program to remain self-sufficient. This aspect may be heartening to other local schools who would like to run a similar program but simply cannot afford it. “We’re kind of solving that financial problem at a high school level and by doing this we’re producing more trained students that are choosing technical careers,” he adds.

With an estimated 10 to 20 percent of its graduating class heading on to manufacturing careers, Eleva-Strum Central High School is helping create a pipeline of well-trained, well-prepared students who are ready to head into the field or onto further education.

And it’s easy to see how a greater number of schools doing similar things could help tackle a larger issue. “Right now in the state of Wisconsin and the United States there is a big demand for the skilled trades,” he explains. “There’s all this talk about a skills gap. Nobody can find enough machinists, welders, or fabricators.”

Cegielski is eager to share what he’s learned along the way in order to address this skills gap. The creation of a detailed guide will soon be posted on Cardinal Manufacturing’s website, for example, thanks to a grant from the Wisconsin Economic Development Corporation (WEDC). The document will outline steps his program has taken in the hopes of making it easier for other interested school districts to hit the ground running.

Even though the model developed at Eleva-Strum Central High School is becoming increasingly sought after, Cegielski says there’s a realization that the program can continue to evolve, grow and improve moving forward. “We’re certainly happy where we’re at,” he says, “but we have lots of ideas on how this place can be so much better five years from now.”

Question: Would you want your kids to make manufacturing their career?

By Jerry Levine

How can Israel — a country of only 7 million, with no natural resources, enemies on every border, and in a constant state of war, produce more start up companies then Japan, India, Korea, Canada, and the UK? In Start-up Nation Dan Senor and Saul Singer describe how Israel’s adversity-driven culture does it — how they foster their unique combination of innovation and entrepreneurial spirit.

The short, partial answer is: Israelis put chutzpah first! But more in-depth: their policies on immigration, R&D, and military service have spurred the country’s rise. For the US and others there has never been a better time to look at this remarkable and resilient country for some impressive and surprising lessons.

Israel is most noted for its high-tech developments, and ties to the likes of Google, Intel, Microsoft, and Cisco; but their real start began 80-100 years ago in the low tech battle against the desert. In 1869 the “tourist,” Mark Twain, described the area as a desolate land — infertile and lacking water. But this infertile land eventually yielded to invention and technology, and more and more is now covered with agricultural fields and forests. Over two hundred and fifty million trees have been planted.

It started with smart water management. The first great innovation was trickle irrigation combined with water recycle and desalination. These techniques have now grown worldwide. On a recent trip to Ecuador, I was impressed to visit a huge rose farm with big signs out front indicating that it was operating on Israeli irrigation technology. Israel also leads the world in recycling of waste water; over 70% is recycled which is three times the percentage recycled in Spain, the second leading country.

When water wells were drilled in the desert, the water came up warm and salty — bad for irrigation, but ideal for fish farming! That technology has spread to the US Midwest, home to several huge talapia farms. In Israel they are called St. Peters fish. Here they are called talapia — different names for different markets, but the same technology and the same fish.

Not only was the environment hostile, so were their so-called friends and neighbors. Facetiously, the two real fathers of Israeli high-tech were the Arab Boycott and Charles DeGaulle. They forced the need for secure home-grown industry. Israel’s industry developed out of Israeli traits of tenacity, constant  questioning of authority, determined informality, and unique attitudes toward failure, teamwork, mission, and cross-disciplinary creativity.

Many Israeli start-ups fail, but their attitude is to bring failed entrepreneurs back into the system, use their experience and try again. By contrast, in the Far East, loss of face inhibits risk taking. This is not an Israeli characteristic.

Israelis, in addition to their unique attitude toward failure, constantly question authority. Their focus is on the mission, and their stress is on teamwork and cross disciplinary creativity. The authors relate a story at Intel where there was a great internal debate about the future of chip design. The Israeli workers argued for a different direction from their US supervisors. The Israelis persevered, and moved the company in a totally new, but winning direction. To the Israelis the fight wasn’t about winning the battle inside Intel, rather it was about winning the war outside, against the competition. This story epitomizes so many US union/management fights, where the union’s adversary is their management. Obviously, the focus for both sides ought to be uniting to win the war over the competition. But this doesn’t always happen.

Collaborative behavior comes from the military training, which essentially all Israelis — male and female alike — undertake. The Israeli Defense Force (IDF) stresses a downward delegation of authority. The army has very few colonels and an abundance of lieutenants. The ratio of senior officers to combat troops in the IDF is 1 to 9. In the US army, it is 1 to 5. This culture generates more maturity and better judgement at lower levels of the organization. The authors doubt there is any other country in the world where the creative types all have done (and continue to do) national service. When hiring, Israeli businesses still look for private sector experience, but the crucial metric is the applicant’s military service — what unit was he or she with.

The authors draw an analogy to the 1967 Six Day War where the combined militaries of Egypt, Jordan and Syria (probably 10 times the size of Israel) boasted they were about to destroy Israel and drive all the Jews into the sea. At that time Israel did not have strong world-wide support. President Johnson counselled against a preemptive strike. He suggested they wait to be attacked first, and suffer some losses to garner world sympathy. Israel told the President “no,” struck first, destroyed the Egyptian air force on the ground, and won the war.

So, what is the answer? What makes Israel so innovative and entrepreneurial? The conclusion is a set of contradictions: 1) aggressiveness yet team orientation, 2) isolation yet connectedness, and 3) being small yet aiming big. Also, it’s OK to try and fail. Success is better, but failure is not a stigma.

Many worry that Silicon Valley may be losing its creative mojo. I don’t know if that’s true, but I suspect managements worldwide are studying the Israeli model for guidance.

Question: Do you have faith that Obama can make a good deal with Iran on nuclear weapons?