Spanky and Alfalfa — Now They Were Innovators

Probably the most enjoyable lecture I've ever attended was by George McFarland at Lakeland Community College. You may already know that McFarland played Spanky in the old Our Gang and Little Rascals comedies produced by Hal roach and MGM Studios in the 1930s and 40s.
McFarland (Spanky) explained that Our Gang typified how kids grew up before the age of television; they had to find their own ways to entertain themselves. This usually meant brainstorming about starting a secret club or building some sort of exotic vehicle from items rescued from a junk pile.
Spanky showed a film clip that revealed the prime mover of the Gang’s fire chief’s car. In that car’s engine compartment was a cage with a cat inside. The cage was positioned in front of a dog, which, of course, tried to chase the cat. But the dog was held stationary by a harness, so its running motion was transferred to a treadmill, which, in turn, powered the car’s wheels.
We would certainly question the practicality of this humorous setup, but it does illustrate a solution that kids who had no access to an internal combustion engine would use to solve a problem. Before television, kids across America resorted to innovative (thought more practical) tactics like this in order to amuse themselves.
It’s no wonder, then, that American industry benefited from the carry-over of this innovation. When kids from this pre-television era grew up into adults, they already had creative design experience even before entering college. Moreover, I believe that this mechanical inclination becomes lifelong when it is etched into the inquisitive mind of a child.
Which brings me to my point. Read any current magazine discussing industry, and you’re bound to learn someone’s opinion of what has caused the U.S. to lose ground as the industrial leader of the world. Certainly video games and the internet cannot be singled out as the main reason for our lost ground. If kids would rather play video games, surf the net, or text their friends than use their ingenuity to entertain themselves, blame parents, not digital technology. Besides, there are plenty of good materials out there that educate and encourage children to figure out concepts. So point to today’s lifestyles as a main reason why so many kids shoot for MBAs and law degrees instead of engineering and sciences.

Everyone wants in on the action

The Great Recession has claimed countless jobs and shrunk businesses. We are now supposed to be in a recovery phase, although growth is expected to be rather slow. Strong businesses survive and are look for areas to expand during periods of growth, either through acquisitions or through “organic” growth — where new business sprouts and grows from an existing profit center.

The very strong businesses are in position for the most growth because they have gained market share during the hard times. This may have stemmed from advertising or other marketing strategies or by introducing innovative new products that resulted from maintaining research and development — or both.

Other companies seem to be looking to expand by grasping at straws. Recently I came across a publication containing a fluid power section — essentially about eight product descriptions. Problem is, only about half were products that would normally be used in hydraulics or pneumatics technologies. If it was a pump or a valve, I guess the editors assumed it fit into fluid power technology.

Ever since Hydraulics & Pneumatics debuted in 1948 as Applied Hydraulics, we have not lost sight of our focus: to cover fluid power technology. But we’re like any other business; to survive, we must evolve with the times — and I think we have. We’ve been increasingly covering electronic control since before I joined the H&P staff in 1987. We’ve also increased the frequency of our coverage how fluid power interacts with the environment. And as the world has embraced digital technology, we launched our website way back in 1997. Since then, we’ve responded with frequent additions to our website: videos, countless links, forums where you can communicate with colleagues, social networking at multiple levels, and useful information on fluid power technology and the industry.

We plan on keeping our focus on fluid power as long as it remains a relevant technology. So don’t look for us to start a new section on Silly Bands in hopes of attracting some new ad dollars. But, seriously, we do our best to bring you the most relevant information about fluid power technology, so you’re not likely to see us waste any space describing chemical process valves or sewage pumps.

These are a few of my favorite formulas

I always find it interesting how people from outside an organized group expect characteristics of individuals within the group to conform to a stereotype. For example, when I played on and managed a men’s softball team, one of our team members was a pediatrician. I found it unusual that a pediatrician would play on a men’s softball team. My stereotypical perception of doctors would have their preferred recreation to be playing 18 holes of golf at a private country club every Wednesday with other doctors.
I suppose many people have formed stereotypical opinions of engineers. When I was in college, the stereotypical engineering student wore a calculator on his or her belt -- yes, I knew a girl who did this. And in extreme cases, he (I never saw the girls do this) used a plastic pocket protector to hold a variety of writing and drawing utensils. Of course, many -- maybe even the majority -- did not fit this stereotype. But one characteristic I think the majority of engineering students shared was a keen interest in what makes things work.
Suppose, then, you were an artist who had been commissioned to produce a painting that captured the essence of engineering. I found such a piece in a calendar from National Engineer’s Week. I didn’t really need a new calendar, but I thought I’d page through it to check out the artwork for each month. An image I found particularly interesting was the one for November, which is reproduced here.
This piece depicts a wide variety of engineering fields, such as rail transportation, space exploration, energy generation and transmission, and agriculture. However, one, and only one, equation appears in the illustration – it’s e = mc². Have you ever used this equation in the course of your job? Of course, I can’t speak for all engineers, but I’ll bet less than 1% have ever actually applied this familiar formula.
So what formula would best represent the work done by engineers? My favorite is x = 1/2at² + vt + x. Now, I realize this equation might seem too complicated to incorporate into artwork. So my second choice would be F = ma. This equation is even simpler than e = mc² and has far more practical applications.
Of course, those in the electrical world would probably lobby for E = IR, which, again, has far greater application than e = mc². While we’re at it, those involved in fluid power would likely vote for F = PA.
Considering all the different fields of engineering, it would be difficult to reach a consensus about a single representative equation. But I don’t know of any group that would promote e = mc², except, of course, the proverbial rocket scientists. And most of them probably wore calculators on their belts when they were in college.

The huge potential of exhibiting at trade shows

I once read a piece about the merits of exhibiting in a trade show, and it’s stuck with me for more than 15 years. The material can be applied to visiting a trade show as well as exhibiting at one. The author, Steve Miller, president of The Adventure LLC, presented a series of calculations to indicate the financial success of exhibiting at a show. I was intrigued by the hypothetical situation he described that seemed reasonable and logical.

It starts by multiplying the total number of hours a show will be open by the number of salespeople working the booth. If the show will be open 8 hr/day for three days, and you two salespeople will attend, you’ll rack up a total of 48 person-hours. Okay so far. You then multiply this figure by the number of prospects you expect each salesperson to garner each hour. Steve suggested six leads per person per hour, which seems excessive to me, but even if two is used, the final result is still impressive.

If we use the suggested 6/hr, we would finish the show with 288 qualified leads (48 X 6). Now, if an average of 10% of a company’s qualified leads result in a sale, and we multiply this figure (we’ll round it down to 28) by the average annual sales per customer, and the average number of years a customer stays with the company, we’ll end up with a total return on the investment for exhibiting at the show.

Steve’s hypothetical example assumes average annual sales per customer at $5,000, and that the average customer lasts 10 years. Our end result, then, would be $1.4 million generated by exhibiting at the show (28 X $5,000 X 10). Even 1 1/2 leads/hr would return $350,000.

Perhaps a similar type of extrapolation can be applied to attending a trade show. You invest your time away from work plus travel expenses. What you gain are ideas from dozens of exhibitors gathered in a single place. You can:

* compare one vendor’s apples to another’s

* look for solutions to current problems, and even look for better solutions to problems you’ve already solved

* learn how application problems similar to yours— but from other industries — were solved (opportunities to share ideas with colleagues may occur relatively often, but trade shows present an opportunity to cross-pollinate problems and solutions between industries), and

* take a few minutes to learn about companies or technologies you hadn’t investigated or even heard of before.

I’m not sure how to calculate the success of attending a show, but you might find something if you check out Steve’s website, at www.theadventure.com

Is e-mail a blessing or a curse? Yes.

It's no understatement to say that e-mail has had a profound effect on our professional and personal lives. People thousands of miles away from each other can send and receive detailed documents within mere seconds. This allows us to take on projects that wouldn't have been practical or possible only a few years ago. It has become routine for us to correspond and exchange files with people overseas. The only obstacle is the difference in time zones.

But on the other hand, e-mail can eat up a substantial portion of our workday. Most of the time and effort involved is going through unsolicited messages and separating the good from the bad. But not all unsolicited messages are spam. (However, the huge amount of these unwanted messages became such a problem that I had our IT department install a spam filter into my e-mail software.)

Many of the unsolicited messages I receive are valuable, so it would be reckless for me to delete them without further investigation. After all, many of the messages we receive come from co-workers, and ignoring these messages could get you fired — especially if they're from your boss.

But the problem seems to be that many people aren't very considerate. For example, when a co-worker became a father recently, he e-mailed pictures of his newborn son to his friends at work. No problem there, but one of the recipients sent a reply to everyone on the list. All he said was, "Cute kid." I guess he thought it was important for me and 15 other people to read his profound statement. Either that, or he was unaware he could simply reply to the sender instead of to everyone.

This addresses the root of the problem: Most people were not taught e-mail etiquette. E-mail just sort of happened, and users often don't put much thought into how they use it. When I went to our IT department for training on some new e-mail features, I discovered an area of e-mail etiquette I was guilty of violating. (When replying to messages with attachments, my reply still had the files attached.) I suggested to the instructor that she hold a class on e-mail etiquette. She said she tried to, but met with a lot of resistance. It seems that most people feel they practice good etiquette, and they know how to use e-mail, so they equate this with knowing e-mail etiquette.

When comparing the time e-mail saves to the time it consumes, I sometimes wonder if we'd be better off without it. But how about you? Does e-mail take up a substantial part of your work day? And do you feel that most of the communication directed to you is unnecessary?

Maintaining journalism ethics

Early in my editorial career (probably 1983) while working on a different magazine, I was given an assignment by Jim Z, the publisher. Assignments usually came from my boss, the editor, so getting an assignment straight from by boss's boss meant I'd better get it done.

A new advertiser told Jim that its gearboxes were being used by a power company in Tampa, Fla., and it would make a good story. The gearbox manufacturer offered to pay all my travel expenses, so the publisher told me to head down to Tampa to get a story.

Most editors would consider this unethical because it compromises the magazine's editorial integrity -- producing editorial to as a favor to an advertiser. I understood this, but my own personal integrity came into play because I wasn't about to write something with my name on it unless it met my own personal standards. Besides, escaping a brutal Northeast Ohio winter for a few days in warm, sunny Florida sounded pretty good at the time.

After I arrived at my hotel in Tampa, Walt Monreal from the gearbox company took me to dinner. Things didn't get any better because Walt didn't know what I was supposed to write about.

So the next morning he took me to the power plant, and we met with one of the staff engineers. The engineer showed me around the place, and I started asking him technical questions about the gearbox application. Fortunately, I knew enough about gearing to ask some probing questions, so I learned some objective reasons why the power plant was using that particular type of gearbox. Turns out, the gearbox used case-hardened gears instead of through-hardened gears. So my story compared the benefits of case-hardened gear teeth to those of through hardened, not about brand names or anything. Of course, I used the gearbox as my example.

So I got a good story and also a great shot for the front cover of the issue. The gearbox was situated at the top of a tall conveyor, and the background showed a panoramic view of the plant.

I also got a couple shots of the staff engineer checking the oil in the gearbox using a dipstick. Problem was, he had a huge Band-Air on his chin from having a boil removed a couple days prior. This was before the days of Photoshop, but I figured our photo expert, Ted Michols could retouch the photo. And he did. He ended up giving the engineer a goatee. Fortunately, he liked it, so all ended well.

Something I thought I'd never see

A couple weeks ago Mike Ference and I visited an advertising and PR agency in downtown Cleveland. The office is on the sixth floor, so, naturally, we'd take the elevator. We entered the Artcraft Building on Superior Ave., but instead of seeing the usual bank of elevators, we saw a single wooden and glass door with a button next to it.
I pushed the button, and within a few seconds, the elevator arrived. Much to my surprise, an operator was inside. I thought these were all long gone. But a second entrance to the building has another elevator.
The operator's name is John, and he said the building opened in 1919, so the elevators are 91 years old. I think John siad it was a shirt factory until the 1950s. It has since been converted to offices and studios. But the original elevators are still intact.