Just got back from a trip to Germany last week. While we Americans are spending our energy hootin and hollerin about the 5000 Syrian refugees we let into the United States in 2015, who we vetted for a year, Europe, Germany in particular, is letting in an ongoing stream of refugees (and many non-refugees) from the Middle East. Germany alone allowed in around 1.1 million immigrants from the Middle East in 2015. Pretty significant when you consider that the entire country is around the size of Montana. I queried a few people in Munich on their views of the immigrants…
Author: Lloyd Graff
One of the major challenges for people in business is to define and understand what they are selling and what their clients believe they are buying. For employees the challenge is similar. What are you being paid for? How are you adding value? What could you do that would enhance that value either for your present employer or a future employer? On the face of it, these questions may seem simple and obvious. For a machining company the answer might seem as straightforward as “I sell brass fittings that meet the price and quality standards of my customers.” That probably…
My critics have often said my Swarf (British for scrap) was rubbish. I doubt that, but your swarf, those chips that are conveyed out of the machines you run, spun clean of oil and dumped in a bin awaiting the scrap recycler, may have reached the price point of nil. Steel chips today are worth almost nothing, and if the trend continues you will soon be paying the scrap company to take them away. Very soon it may get even worse. I was talking to the guru of metal minutiae, Miles Free of the PMPA (Precision Machined Products Association), and…
In August of 2008, I was in a state of catastrophic heart failure when I reached St. Francis Hospital in Evanston. A brave and talented heart surgeon was working at the hospital that morning named Mohammad Akbar. I required a stent in my 99% occluded lateral descending artery, also called the “Widow Maker.” Dr. Akbar somehow managed to insert the stent, which bought me enough time to get stronger so I could endure a quadruple bypass operation three days later. When asked afterward how he was able to do the stent insertion, which seemed almost impossible because of the complete…
I am writing this blog from home on Tuesday. My brain surgery to remove a benign tumor on my pituitary gland, which had grown from the size of a pea to that of a tangerine, was successful. The threat of blindness from its encroachment on my optic nerve has been removed. I am enormously grateful to the neurosurgery team at the University of Chicago, especially Dr. Issam Awad, who removed the ominous growth by channeling through my nose to get to the extremely enlarged gland. It seems incredible to me that brain surgery to remove a “tangerine sized” tumor can…
Every day I talk to myself. Some days it’s a happy soliloquy of self congratulations for a task accomplished or a relationship strengthened. Other days it’s just wallowing in failure, doubting my talent, feeling old and decrepit. The monologue in my brain is ever shifting, which is a good thing for somebody whose body chemistry is a bit screwed up. In a few days I “get to” have brain surgery. Yes, I “get to” because I need it quite badly and there is a very good chance it will make my life a lot better on the other side. I…
General Motors is doing more than just making a $500 million investment in Lyft, the ride sharing competitor of Uber. It also appears to me that GM is doing more than just hedging their bets about the future of car ownership and usage. The company has named its new venture “maven,” which I find both interesting and ironic. “Maven” comes from Yiddish. It means a person who really knows his stuff by accumulating a vast amount of information in a given area. For instance, someone who really knows shoes, boots and sandals could be called a “footwear maven.” By hiring…
Recently I read The 50th Law, the biography of the famous rapper, 50 Cent, written by Robert Green and Curtis Jackson (also known as 50 Cent). On April 24, 2000, right before 50 Cent was supposed to release his debut album and finally make it in the music industry, he was shot nine times by a gangster with a grudge against him. His music label immediately canceled the record release because they were afraid of the negative press. Making matters worse, his vocal chords were damaged by one of the bullets, altering his voice. But 50 Cent refused to give…
I was surprised by some of the outraged comments on my blog about the sale of Doosan to a private equity firm and changes in the machinery market which have affected the company. I wrote stuff that was available on the street for the people in the machine tool industry. There was some inside info I gleaned from reliable sources which gave the piece a newsy flavor. I’m happy I wrote an article that was not all common knowledge. My blog also will never be a vehicle for public relations releases. Today’s Machining World has a space for official company…
Hiring good people for your business or organization is one of the most difficult tasks in management. I think a lot of the problem stems from not really knowing what we are looking for and the job candidate not knowing how to explain what he or she is providing. I recently read a brief blog by Seth Godin, one of the most insightful practical philosophers of our day. He made the argument that we should hire for “resilience.” How easily do you bounce back from a disappointment? He calls it a skill, one that is more valuable than most. I’m…