Issue link: https://iconnect007.uberflip.com/i/306762
52 The PCB Magazine • May 2014 by Gray Mcquarrie, GrayrocK & assocIates and Jim Shaw, leanFastracK llc Does Corporate Lean Work? c o l u m n solViNg daM ProbleMs "Leadership is influence." ~John Maxwell It was the winter of 1984, Hoosick Falls, New York. I was sitting in a dark, cold office. Stacks of papers sat scattered on a large formal desk. Shelves were packed with books and other interesting things. And a sign, "Thou Shalt Not Whine," caught my eye. Like a bolt of light- ning, Jim Shaw entered, and he walked behind his desk, sat down, looked at a piece of paper that had been faxed to him and said, "I didn't know you were coming." Still not looking at me, he got on the phone and made a quick call, during which he made a remark and a short joke, and then a specific request. He hung up. He repeat- ed the process. All the while he talked on the phone he would occasionally turn and look out the window, as if staring at the person he was speaking to, who might be at the Oak-Mitsui plant, or the Teflon plant, or the flex material plant. After his last call he looked at me and said, "OK, here is the plan, you will meet with so and so…." And he went on in this way un- til he said, "And you will have lunch with me at exactly 12:30 pm." Then he was gone. I had never been so competently micromanaged in my entire life! Jim was the boss of that laminate factory, and it ap- parent to me within the first microsecond of meeting him.