Commercial Real Estate Revolution

Like I mentioned in the last blog I was tipped off to read a book called "The Commercial Real Estate Revolution by Rex Miller.  It is truly an excellent book.  It discusses "nine transforming keys to lowering cost, cutting waste and driving change in a broken industry."  The book hits the nail right on the head.  If only construction would follow its model. 

Let me give you the 9 keys and hopefully you are intrigued enough to read the book yourself.

1. Trust-Based Team Formation
2. Early Collaboration
3. Built-In Sustainability
4. Transformational Leadership
5. "Big" BIM
6. Integrating Project Delivery
7. Trust-Based Agreements and Client-Centered Incentives
8. Offsite Construction
9. Workplace Productivity

As you can tell I love this book.

Fixing the Industry

Last week a friend and colleague of mine suggested the book "The Commercial Real Estate Revolution" by Rex Miller (et al).  It is a great book and I hope people within the construction industry put the ideas from the book into practice.  The bottom line of the book is that we need more partnering.

Construction has lagged behind nearly every industry when it come to productivity improvements.  This book lays out a system for reversing that trend.  The solution is pretty easy but change isn't.  For a summary of the book go to http://rexmiller.net/wp-content/downloads/ebook.pdf.

If the summary peaks your interest then i would suggest you get the book.

They aren't accidents they are injuries!!!

Like we have mentioned in previous articles we find workplace injuries to be extremely saddening.  But often times we do two things with regard to safety that send out the wrong message.

The first mistake that we make is we call our injuries, accidents.  Too often we say things like we had an accident at project WYZ.  Butch Mellom, our Safety director, doesn’t use the word accident.  We need to change our terminology and only use the word, injury.  Seldom are the injuries the results of an accident.  In nearly 100% of the cases we realize that we could have changed our behavior and avoid the injury.  By using the word injury we reinforce the point that a person was hurt or disabled.    I think we need to keep in mind the personal side of the equation.  Somebody got hurt and it was the result of our actions.  We can change our actions.

The second mistake that we make is we use statistic to describe how things are going with regard to safety.  Again the problem with this method is it implies that some level of injuries is OK.  That concerns me because I don’t want any individual to suffer an injury.  Thinking of the injuries as people rather than numbers helps us eliminate them.

Let me give you an example.  Which of the following two statements makes you want to make sure we have a safe workplace?

A.      In the year 2012 we will have only one recordable accident.

B.      The only recordable injury next year is going to be you losing a finger.

The first sentence might leave you thinking something along the lines of, while accidents happen but we had a good year.  If we think that way they injuries will continue to happen and odds are it is going to involve you soon or later. 

The second sentence should leave thinking, I like all my fingers (toes, my back, eyes, ears and don’t care to have any scares)!   If you are the one recordable injury you won’t be impressed with the statistic highlighted in sentence A.

If we all work with the idea that you aren’t going to get hurt while at work we can all consider ourselves blessed.   My goal for next year is that you have an injury free year.  It is a two-step process. 

1.       Stop thinking in terms of accidents and start thinking in terms of injuries.

2.       People aren’t statistics, stop thinking stats matter.

What do you think?  Do you want to go the entire year injury free? 

I wish life was easier

My daughter didn't want to go to the doctor but after a week of listen to her cough we took her in and she has walking pneumonia. 

I love sports and my team haven't been having good seasons. 

Work is slow and the project we do have aren't making money.

We made a lot of changes as work and although all of them seems to be for the better and people are doing well in their new roles but the time it takes to train people in their new roles takes a lot of energy. 

Willmar Electric had a guy hurt his hand over the weekend.  He needed 10 stitches. 

I serve and work on the board of 3 not for profits.  I understand that they are not for profits but two of them are spending more then they are taking in.  So that needs to be fixed.

I fill like I weight 250 pounds.

Are you enjoying my whining?  I didn't think so.  Maybe I could look on the bright side.

My kids reports cards came in last week.  They are doing extremely well.

The bank and bonding company seem to be a great help in getting Willmar Electric into a stronger position.

My parents have been married for 45 years and are going to take all of us to Florida for a week.

I have been married for 20 years and my wife is the greatest person in the world plus she looks 28.

The Lincoln Nebraska and Lawton Oklahoma markets seem to have bright near term futures and we will likely get at least our share of the work.

Nobody has won more games in the last 7 days then the Vikings and the Red Sox haven't lost in weeks.

Clear life isn't about making my life easy street.  I will have to work on being faithful, trusting God and being thankful for the things I have been blessed with.  (Even that doesn't sound easy but I can do it).

Two Great Leaders

I was send the following message and thought that it was good advice.  As you can tell from the name on the bottom it is from the Minnesota Quality Council. A Message From the President: The Legacy of Two Great Leaders: Steve Jobs and Bob Galvin

This month, the business world lost two giants: Bob Galvin (former CEO of Motorola) and Steve Jobs (co-founder and recently retired CEO of Apple).  Both were highly successful businessmen; both founded and/or led high performing organizations; both literally created one (or more) industries; and both left legacies that will sustain for quite awhile.  One (Jobs) was highly visible if not somewhat immortalized; the other (Galvin) was a quieter giant – his obituary didn’t even hit the front business page in many US newspapers – but without his contributions, there may not be iPhones today.  One single-handedly created the cell phone industry (that was Galvin); one single-handedly revolutionized that industry by creating smarter-phones, “pod” and “pad” technology, the digital music industry, and a new way of watching animated movies (Pixar).  Both of them left us with dozens of best practices and many insights for advancing organizational excellence.  I’ll give you eight… Sell the benefits of your product or service, not just its features and attributes.  Think about the ads that Apple has run the last few years.  Yes, they show the products themselves, but more importantly, they also capture emotions and show the benefits that come from the using the products.  The commercials show people playing games and having fun, dancing in the streets while listening to music, kids reading and learning from educational applications.  They show customers doing simple daily tasks (like checking in for a flight or booking a reservation at a restaurant for that evening) – only completing the tasks with more ease by using Apple products.  They create a FEELING not just from the products themselves, but by what the products can enable people to do. Know what customers want before they do.  Both Motorola in the 80s and Apple more recently have developed a keen sense of what the market needs, even before customers could articulate those needs.  I guess you could say that both companies have had premonitions of the “voice of the customer!”  People didn’t know that they needed cell phones before Galvin’s company created them; customers didn’t know that they needed a place to store music digitally instead of on the hundreds of CDs we all owned, but Jobs did; customers didn’t know they needed smart devices that can do 500,000 things (that’s how many applications are currently in the Apple AppStore), but Jobs envisioned a way to integrate the phone with personal computing, with music and video, with GPS and the Internet, and with personal applications that can do specialized and helpful things.  Galvin and Jobs had visions of these solutions before customers did, finding ways to solve problems that customers didn’t even know they had.  Stated by Jobs in a 1998 Business Week interview: “It’s really hard to design products by focus groups.  A lot of times, people don’t know what they want until you show it to them.” Make things simple.  This was a quote from Jobs in that same Business Week article: “Simple can be harder than complex: you have to work hard to get your thinking clean to make it simple.  But it’s worth it in the end because once you get there, you can move mountains.”  Think about how everything at Apple is simple – from product design itself (the simple curves and first-of-its-kind keyless technology of the iPhone and iPad), the simple website (Apple’s site is white, clean, and uncluttered), the simple advertising (“If you don’t have an iPhone, well, you don’t have an iPhone.”).  In today’s complex, fast-paced world, less is oftentimes more. Take risks and never be satisfied with status quo.  Galvin once said: “One of our main thrusts was that our company was always going to be preparing for the next adventure – the next thing.  I [Galvin] was always asking the question, ‘What’s the next thing we could be adding, multiplying; what would be good for our future lineup of products?’”  Galvin knew that not all products would be successful, but he demanded at Motorola that employees always try to find the next big thing.  He insisted on a strong R&D function, and he launched Motorola Labs, a leading contributor to cellular, digital and semiconductor technologies. Be creative and innovate.  Both Galvin and Jobs were highly innovative: they solved problems by applying proven technologies in new applications.  Steve Wozniak, who co-founded Apple with Jobs in a garage in 1976, said Jobs “had the ability to think out new ways of doing things…to do it in a totally different way that the world would swing toward.”  Part of Jobs’ genius was in finding new ways to use existing technologies.  According to Jobs in a 1996 interview in Wired: “Creativity is just connecting things. When you ask creative people how they did something, they feel a little guilty because they didn’t really do it, they just saw something…”  He goes onto say that “Picasso had a saying: ‘Good artists copy; great artists steal.’  We have always been shameless about stealing great ideas…”  Galvin had a similar philosophy about innovation and change.  He said “the absolutely distinguishing quality of a leader is that a leader takes us elsewhere.”  That’s visionary leadership. Strive for perfection.  When you think of Six Sigma, you may think of Jack Welch, former CEO of GE.  But it was Bob Galvin who first launched Six Sigma nearly a decade earlier in Motorola: January 1987.  Building off the work of two Motorola employees (Baldrige National Quality Award in 1988, partially because of their superior product quality.  Steve Jobs, too, demanded perfection.  iPhones just don’t crash (well, not frequently).  And it’s Apple’s reputation for nearly flawless manufacturing, along with its sophisticated engineering, that allows it to make premium pricing look like a value purchase.  While much of Apple’s and Motorola’s success can be attributed to innovation, a great deal of credit has to also go to its high quality production. Build an environment for employees to succeed and for the organization to achieve high performance.  “The most important thing that Bob [Galvin] did was create an environment that gave people the freedom and stimulus to do great things,” says Martin Cooper in Quality Digest, former Motorola vice president and division manager, who during the 1970s led the team that developed the handheld mobile phone. “He also set the tone from the top—no compromise on ethics—and emphasized objectivity in decision making by taking the personal issues out of the discussion and deciding based on doing what was right. His skills were not technological, but no one could pick and motivate people better than he could. He also made sure everyone in the company has the same tools and incentives to excel.”  Galvin was so tuned into the needs of his employees that he created Motorola University, an in-house training and development center that still stands today, some 25 years later.  Be passionate about what you do.  Both Galvin and Jobs were driven.  They both had a vision for not only what was possible, but for what would change the world.  Even after Job’s illness in 2004, he kept driving the company forward because he believed what he was doing was important work.  According to Jobs in the Wall Street Journal: “Being the richest man in the cemetery doesn’t matter to me. …Going to bed at night saying we’ve done something wonderful…that’s what matters to me.” Those eight tips could help us all improve our careers, our leadership effectiveness, and our organizations’ performance.  But I’ll add a ninth that may have less to do with business than it does with life itself.  Jobs, in a very powerful commencement address at Stanford University in 2005 (a year after he was diagnosed with cancer) said: “No one wants to die.  Even people who want to go to heaven don’t want to die to get there.  And yet death is the destination we all share.  No one has ever escaped it.  And that is as it should be because death is very likely the single best invention of life.  It is life’s change agent.  It clears out the old to make way for the new. …Your time is limited, so don’t waste it living someone else’s life.  Don’t be trapped by dogma – which is living with the results of other people’s thinking.  Don’t let the noise of others’ opinions drown out your own inner voice.”  In other words, be your own person.  Live life to its fullest and be true to yourself.  If you live life with passion, with purpose, with creativity…if you take risks and continue to learn…if you maintain ethics and respect people, you’ll not only be successful in your life and in your career, but you may just leave a legacy.  Thanks for your contributions, Bob Galvin and Steve Jobs. Want to participate in a discussion on this topic??  Visit our new blog to post a comment! Yours in Improvement, Brian S. Lassiter President, Minnesota Council for Quality www.councilforquality.org

Pygmalion Effect

I recent was given an article about the Pygmalion Effect (or Self-fulfilling Effect).  The article pointed out to people often live up to (or down to) the labels we put on them.

It really made me think.  First I wish my family and friends would have nicknamed me slim when I was young.  It also caused me to think if I was building people up or bring them down by how I talked to them. 

I can't attach the article but I suggest giving the topic "the google" to learn more. One summary I found was at http://humanresources.about.com/od/managementtips/a/mgmtsecret.htm.

Confrontation

Confrontation is tough for most.  I found the attached article to be very helpful.  It deals with the issue of late payment of a vendor but may also apply to processing change orders, meeting deadlines or several other accountablitiy issue we face everyday.

http://www.crucialskills.com/

Sports can bring you down.

The Vikings are 0-4.  I took the time to drive to Kansas City to watch them lose on Sunday.  But I enjoyed the time with Mike and our friends.

The Red Sox blew a huge lead in September but I don't regret the time spent watching them during the summer.  Especially the time spent with my children (mostly my daughters) sitting by my side. 

But there is light at the end of the tunnel.  The Rays just got eliminated. 

Go Cards.

Right to Work

The attached is a very interesting article about what it means to our economy to have the "Right to Work."  Forced unionization is very costly for everybody involved. 

It either kills your ecomony or costs you your job in the long run. 

Keep in mind that the union bosses stand to gain a great deal if we don't allow people to choose for themselves.

Read more at http://bit.ly/rtLYLN

Leftist Explained

Maybe you listened to our President last night and are riding high.  If you are don't read on.

I my opinion the attached article does a wonderful job of explaining the left wing.  Which in my opinion is where our President comes ideology comes from. 

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424053111904787404576532623176115558.html

Credit goes to 1500 ESPN's Joe Soucheray for drawing the article to my attention.

Ronald Reagan

Last week Justin and I took our Dad to the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library in Simi Valley, CA.  It was awesome.  It was fun to spend the time with two of my best friends. 

It was also fun to walk through the museum and reflect on the great career of the Great Communicator. 

Ronald Reagan is clearly one of the greatest Americans.  If it were up to me it would say it is time to raise the money to put a 5th profile on Mount Rushmore.  (In honor of Reagan the funds would need to be private!)

We were inspired as we walked through the exhibits.  I don't recall him blaming his predecessor for the problems of his Presidency.  I remember him getting down to work and moving the country forward.

Book suggestion

A few years ago a read the classic "Raise and Fall of the Third Reich" by William L. Shirer.  It was fascinating.  It is a huge volume weighting in at 3 pounds and is 1264 pages long.  As its name and size implies it gives us great detail the Nazi regime and the leaders that brought us World War II.  It is a great but chilling read.

Based on my love of that book I recently purchased the book "Goering" by Heinrich Fraenkel.  Which as you might guess is about Hermann Goering, Adolf Hitler's right hand man.

Both books bring me to the same question.  Could this story even repeat itself again?  Could it happen in America?  I always still back on the answer of yes.  I would imagine that shocks or offends you.  But before you think of me as un-American.  Let me explain.

Germany calls itself a Christian nation.  It is the homeland of Martin Luther.

Germany was a democracy in the 1930's when Hitler took power and it still is today.

The Germany of the 1930's certainly was as diverse as the USA of today.  After reading both books you will see that it was a melting pot of sorts.

As Winston Churchill told us "Those that fail to learn from history are doomed to repeat it.”

Public Foolishness

I went on a trip with my family to Kansas City this weekend to watch the Red Sox beat up on the Royals.  The two teams spilt the 2 games we went to, so the trip wasn't a complete success.

But the general public did give us several teachable moments with our kids. We saw two people vomit in public and a group of people that partied so hard they had to spend the night at our hotel.

Let me recap our young examples.

1. Guy throws up from a moving car leaving Oklahoma Joe's.  No idea why he threw up.  Could have been illness.  It was gross.
2. "Lady" throws up on silverware waiting in line for omelet.  Stays in line and has hardy breakfast.  My kids wondered why a sick person wanted to eat breakfast.
3. We rode elevator with group of people still dressed from a Saturday wedding party at 11am Sunday.  They looked like death. Talked like fools.

Because of their public displays of drunkenness and hangovers our kids were able to see first hand  that getting hammered is more likely to lead to negative consequences rather than endless fun.  (Incident #1 was just gross but set the tone for the weekend.  It didn't give us any life lessons. )

Cost Savings

Yesterday I met with Misty Lauer, Regional Administrative Manager, and she shared with me several cost saving ideas.  All of the idea were very minor.  The ideas were things like changing how we clean the office, type of paper we pay, and licenses for seldom used software products.  The sum total of her ideas totaled about $5,000 or more per year!!!

The best thing about these savings is that nobody will notice a difference.  Certainly our customers won't.

I wonder how many millions of tax dollars could be saved by the government if we told them they needed to save some money. ( I realize we need to save Trillions but every nickle counts.)

Magic Solution

On a political note, i would like to pose a question.

Let's say we could magically eliminate the federal deficit without raising taxes or cutting a single government program.  Of the 435 members of congress and 100 Senators, how many of them would be willing to make the following choice.

Balancing the federal budget but being banned from serving in future congresses.

or

Being allowed to stay in office but have the country maintain the status qua of continuing to pile up debt.

My guess is that the lips of nearly all of them would say something to the effect of "yes if we could solve this crisis I would be willing to move on and let others serve" but in truth in their hearts they would be unwilling to move on because it is power they seek rather then solutions.

Maybe I have too little faith in our elected officials.  What do you think?

Bigger than Business

Over the course of the last week I have had the chance to meet with five different individuals from four different general contracting company's that we work with in the Lincoln area.  The conversations lasted anywhere from 5 minutes longs to an entire breakfast meeting.  After reflecting back on the meetings I was hit by a very important point.

I am blessed to be apart of an industry that has many Christian men in important positions.

Each meeting consisted mainly of conversations build on issues unrelated to contracting.  We talked about family, faith, politics and many other things.  The topic of "work" came up within all of the conversations but it always played a very small part by taking a back seat to more important things in life.

I paused to reflect and it occurred to me that whenever I have visited with any of these five individuals in the past I leave the conversation glad that we talked.   They have shared insights or given recommendations for my life that have proven very useful.

I understand that each of these individuals has hired Willmar Electric in the past and if things go poorly on a project they are ready to discuss work.  But the basis for our relationship is a common faith and not a common industry.

For that I praise the Lord.

Focus on the Jungs

Recently an article in the Nebraska ABC magazine focused on the Jung family.  The Chapin family has always thought a lot Dave Jung and his entire family.  The article highlights Dave's commitment to education over several decades.

Well done Jungs.

Find the article at

http://www.newslink.com/pubs/ABCU/ABC_AITF.pdf

Collaboration

A friend of mine helped write this article for EC & M magizine.  Dave is a very wise man.  If you have a chance to read the attached article it will be a rewarding experience for you.

http://ecmweb.com/construction/collaborative_design_conversion_20110729/index.html

Mentoring

My son is entering high school next week.  5 friends of mine are in the same situation.  Our only sons are entering a new phrase of manhood.  None of us want to miss this opportunity to let our sons know that manhood isn't the same as boyhood.

As a dad I plan to turn out a man that can change a tire, fix a drain, change an outlet and grill a steak.  I don't really need help with teaching those items.  But I also want to raise a son that know how to treat a women with respect and handle peer pressure.  I could really use the help of friends that are willing to stand beside me on issues that at times even full grown men struggle with.  

Last night we got some members of the class of 2011 to sit down with our sons and talk about their high school careers.  The soon to be college freshman did us fathers of soon to be high school freshman a huge favor by taking the time to mentor our sons.  We are very grateful to Ben, Brian and Andre for their time and witness.

It is my hope that during my life I am able to serve as a mentor to others.  I don't claim that I am the example of greatness that everybody needs to follow but rather that I would prefer that others not make the same mistakes that I have made. 

My Baseball Team is Better Then yours!!

A co-worker sent me this article.  It is about two very important topics, Lean and the Boston Red Sox.  If you like either one you will likely enjoy the article and it's attachments.

Forgive me, non-baseball fans. But, it is the season.
Readers of mine know that I like baseball and find many parallels between it and lean thinking. In other words, I see a lot of good lean thinking in baseball. [See "Managing to Pitch with PDCA (Pitch-Defend-Catch-Adjust)" and "You Gotta Have Wa"]
So now I live in Cambridge, essentially part of Boston, home of the Lean Enterprise Institute. And home of the Boston Red Sox baseball team, who just hosted their rivals, the New York Yankees for a three-game series. Amidst all the media coverage was a great quote from new Red Sox first baseman Adrian Gonzalez, who has some interesting lean views about batting.
We know that "lean" is all about plan-do-check-act (PDCA). The challenge we all face in our everyday work is to answer the question, How do I do PDCA here, now.
I like to remind folks at every opportunity that PDCA begins with ... "P." So, you can't do PDCA without the P (and the D and the C and the A - the P alone will, of course, get you nowhere). Now, check out this observation from Adrian (forgive me Yankees fans), who has a clear plan for every at-bat:
"... even if it's the dumbest game plan in the world, at least it's a game plan, and I’m going to go to the plate and try it. I'm willing to lose with that game plan. It's a game of failure, and I understand that."
Interesting. His approach is reminiscent of Edison's great observation: "I haven't failed - I've found 10,000 things that don't work."
If baseball (and surely football or soccer is no different) can be seen as a game of failure, could that insight shed useful light on our attitude toward business? If we are focused on learning through each PDCA cycle - win, lose, or draw - then the only real failure is failure to learn. Think of your own sports analogy, but maybe business isn't so different from baseball.
John Shook
Chairman and CEO
Lean Enterprise Institute
P.S. By the way, Adrian's failure rate at batting (at getting a hit) this year is about 65%. So, he fails most of the time. And that's easily the lowest failure rate (and possibly also the highest learning rate) in Major League Baseball. (Read more about his approach in this Boston Globe article by Charles P. Pierce.)

Vacation is all I ever wanted

The Chapin family just returned from spending 8 days traveling the southeast corner of the USA.  The two words I would use to describe the trip would be fun and hot.

I enjoy spending time with my family, especially when it is just the 5 of us.  Even though we are crammed into a hotel with at least one person sleeping on the floor and we spending 47 hours in the car, we still had fun.  Ziplining, touring historical sites, manufacturing facilities and watching baseball all made it the trip one to remember.  Spending time in close quarters with loved ones helps you get to know each other better.  And we loved it.

On the other hand it was the hottest week of my life.  100 degrees, humid and sticky.  unlike anything I have ever felt before.  If you were hot in July in OK, NE or MN I would suggest you stay away from the Deep South in August. 

But now it is time to get back to work and I am looking forward to it.

Love Life

One of my heroes is my great uncle Frank.  Since coming to work full time at Willmar Electric in 1991 to be groomed to take over Frank's role at Willmar Electric I have used him as a valuable resource.  As far as I am concerned he is a truly great man.  Open, honest and frank. 

Frank's wife Shirley is currently extremely sick and in all likelihood is very near the end of her life.  Although we pray that she will rally or that a miracle will turn things around.  As our family shares the news of Shirley's health and my hero Frank and his children struggle with the health of their matriarch, I can't help to reflect on two things I consider to be reality. 

One reality is that life is precious and should never be taken for granted.

The other reality is that our day to day activities should always be kept in prospective.  Often we tend to worry about things out of our control.  I often tend to think things are in crisis mode when the truth is the event or detail is just a minor item that can be easily be weathered.

I have respected Frank over the years because I consider him a wise man.  Certainly the Frank Chapin family understands how precious life is and is keeping day to day activities in prospective.

The lesson I take away from both of those realities is that I should make sure I have my priorities in line and that make sure our loved ones know that they are in fact just that, loved!

As I pray for a miracle in Shirley's life I also pray that Frank will lean on God during this time and I pray that God will be at his side as he deals with what for most of us would be the worst days of our lives.  Decades of time together and over a half century of wonderful memories build a bond that can't be broken.  My heart goes out to Frank, Shirley and their family (Mike, Bruce and Deb).

I am glad that the next 9 days of my life will be spent with the 4 people I love the most and hopefully I can convey that to them the entire times.  Hopefully when I return from my vacation I won't let my priorities get out of whack just because I have returned to the real world.

Vacation

Next week I am taking off work to spend time with my family.  I love to spend time with my wife and 3 kids.  It is also nice to get away from work.  We are planning to spend about 40 hours driving around the southeastern part of the USA.  My daughter is going on a college visit and our kids have never seen that part of the country.  It will be a blast.  And by blast I mean fun, not furnace although it will likely be extra hot as well. 

Don't get me wrong I love my job and the people I work with.  It is just that I like my family more.  I also find that it is easier to come to work every day when I get a break every now and then. 

I think the same is true of everybody.  We all need to take long breaks every so often.  Hopefully everybody looks at the number of vacation days listed on the lower right corner of their paycheck and uses their vacation time.  The key is to keep it above zero and not to be continually running against the ceiling.  My guess is if you find yourself bumping the vacation ceiling on a regular basis you will find yourself "climbing the walls" at work.

When I come back I expect to be a better, more refreshed Dave Chapin because I have taken a long break from my day to day tasks at Willmar Electric.

Why a blog?

Communication is a popular topic these days.  Everybody would like to be better informed about the things the affect their daily lives.  As an employee of Willmar Electric, Willmar Electric is one of those "things" that affects your life.

One of the facts of life in a company with more than 250 co-workers it is hard to stay in touch.  So we are going to try a few things to keep communication open from our end.  I have started a blog and plan to update it on a regular basis.  Most of the time I will cover things that directly involve Willmar Electric but from time to time I may get into more personal topics.  What I would like to ask of you is that if you blog or tweet account, send me information about about your blog or twitter account I will start too follow you to see what you have to say.

I understand that these methods are a little less than personal but as a company that is spread out over such a large area these methods can help shrink our world.  I wouldn't suggest you start up a blog to communicate better with your spouse or children but between the two of us it could work.

Hello again

I am trying to see if I understand how to do this process.  Hopefully future blogs will be more interesting.  It would be hard to be less interesting then the first two.

Getting Started

I would love to make sure that we are doing a good job of communicating so I have started a blog.