Chapter 32: Winds of Change

“Congratulations!” I said as I held my glass of champagne up before the interns and the cameras. “You’ve all done a tremendous job over the past month, and we brought home the winning bid for the Army’s contract.”

They cheered for themselves. They had worked hard, together; both in Nevada at the Lab, as well as in the temporary production facility we had set up in Atlanta. They had overcome logistics and manufacturing issues, and had established an actual production line in record-setting time. Additionally, they had submitted a bid to the U.S. Army for a contract on a totally new kind of rapid deployment shelter.

“Sending the bid in was a tremendous accomplishment. I think that effort, alone, is worthy of a reward.”

They cheered again. They had come to like the rewards that were shared out.

I waited for the noise to die down a little.

“To show my appreciation, Jeryl, Kelly, and I have decided to move the production facility and IP associated with these shelters into a separate Limited Liability Partnership. Each of you will receive a five percent share of this new company, vesting the year after you complete school.”

More cheers and a few thoughtful looks.

“Even if we don’t win the Army contract, I anticipate building and selling these shelters to other organizations around the world. You will all profit from these efforts, even if you never help build another shelter in your lives.”

Cassandra raised her hand. I nodded at her.

“What if we want to come back and work here after graduation? I’ve only got one semester left at Berkeley.”

I smiled. “You’ll have to apply for a position, here, but I’d be happy to act as a reference for any of you. Now, since sending off the bid was the final task for the show, let’s all relax a bit before we worry too much about the future.”

A few of her peers laughed, but Cassandra frowned. She made her way toward me as the others began refilling their glasses and talking amongst themselves.

“You’d really make me apply for a job in a company I helped launch?” she asked, as she got closer to me.

I shrugged and replied, “It’s not up to me, entirely. Besides, what if you win the overall internship, and get brought on as my new PA? Would you prefer working here, over that?”

She chewed on her lip for a minute and then nodded.

“I think I would. I was the one that cajoled everyone into focusing on one design. I acted as both the project lead and the spokesperson for the team. I put a lot of effort into making this a viable start-up. I’d like to see how far it can go. The Army contract would be nice, but these shelters could be used in disaster areas, temporary shelters for fire fighters out west, or even starter homes in most of the third world. We have something unique and valuable, here.”

I kept my smile to myself. Cassandra was definitely one of the interns who had grown tremendously during our six-month process. She had started with a keen business focus, but somewhere realized it was not about making money, but about having an impact on people’s lives. It was rewarding to see her passion coming out.

“Cassie,” I said, “the most important thing you can take away from this is not a job title or a bullet item on a resume, it’s understanding how you can take a raw idea and transform it into a product or company. I don’t want you to worry about a specific job, or role, right now. I want you to think about what the next innovation you want to be involved in, is, and how you can apply what you’ve learned over the past few months to that effort. Do that while you finish your degree, and then let’s sit down and talk about what the future can hold for you. Okay?”

She held my eye for a moment, and then nodded.

“Okay. But, I will hold you to that promise of a discussion.”

It was my turn to smile as I said, “I expect you to.”

“Paul, have you seen the weather, lately?” Tom asked as he stuck his head in my office in Stanford.

I glanced out the window. It was sunny and beautiful. “No, what’s up?”

He stepped fully into my office. “The National Weather Service just upgraded their hurricane watch for Puerto Rico to a warning. They say Hugo is going to hit, and it’s going to be a big one.”

“How big?”

“Category four, maybe five.”

“Okay. Why the interest?”

“Shelters,” he said.

It immediately clicked. I nodded.

“Great catch. Let me call Matthew. He had a new line manager overseeing production in anticipation of making the cut on Army field tests as well as that demo contract with the Peace Corps.”

Five minutes later, I had the good and the bad news.

“Matthew has roughly five thousand in storage in anticipation of the Army field tests and a pending contract with the Peace Corps. Unfortunately, production is under a hundred a week right now pending new orders. I bet the interns could help. They designed the processes to hit a hundred a day. Tom, can you call all the interns and see if they can help out?

“I’ll get right on it.”

I cleared my calendar and called Cheryl in to brief her on what I was thinking about. Two hours later, I was on my way to Atlanta.

“Hurricane Hugo struck the U.S. Virgin Islands early this morning, wreaking havoc on the island of St. Croix,” the morning anchorman said as footage of the storm swells breaking against the island played on screen. “It is currently estimated that ninety percent of the island has been severely damaged; and currently, residents are without power. The category four hurricane is now hitting Puerto Rico, adding to the devastation and destruction of this storm.”

“Okay, people,” I said as the faces on the shop floor turned my way. “Those are the people we want to help. We have five thousand shelters ready to send out, and I would really like to get another couple thousand made and ready to ship. Let’s get working!”

There was a ragged cheer in the cavernous building, before the din of machinery drowned it out. I smiled and headed back into the office of the plant.

Cassandra was waiting for me.

“I didn’t think I’d be back here this soon, Paul,” she said as she stood and shook my hand.

“I wish it were under better circumstances. Calvin, Don, Jodi, and Allen should be in before lunch. We need to see if we can improve the process and streamline it. Right now, we’ll be lucky to hit a hundred units a day, running two shifts.”

“That’s still better than our original design. We figured thirty-five a shift on three shifts.”

“We’re pre-fabbing the material in another building. But since we have to make the wall material as a whole piece for the cooling tubes, it’s a bottleneck.”

“What if we pulled the tubing from the design?” She asked.

“What are the implications? You’ll loose the cooling effects. What else?”

She frowned and pulled on her lip. “If I recall our detailed design specs, we’d loose about thirty percent of the cooling and thermal insulation factors. We’d have less of an acoustic barrier as well. But, we would simplify the fabrication of the wall material pretty significantly. Getting a uniform distribution of the tubing and connecting all of it for the circulation system was a real bitch. We’ll want to test one without the tubing and make sure it can still support the solar panel application for power generation.”

“Okay. The wall material fabrication is next door. Go over there and see what we can stop doing, to speed up the wall construction. It’s more important to have some shelter from the elements than our full blown structures three months from now.”

Cassandra grabbed a white hardhat, and her ear and eye protection.

As she headed for the door she said, “Send Calvin over as soon as he arrives. He designed the wall structures, and should be able to double check my work.”

“Will do.”

I turned back to the drafting table against the wall and scanned the production line layout. I was still staring at it when Matthew and Kelly came in.

“Hey, Paul, looks like we’ve got a storm coming,” Matthew said with forced joviality.

“That we do,” I said. “We need to add casting stations someplace to speed up the end cap molding production. We can cast them most anywhere and then bring them in for use in assembly.”

Matthew looked over my shoulder.

“I’ve got floor space, two buildings down, but we don’t have the equipment for the curing process.”

“Does CRP have any they can spare?”

Kelly shook her head.

“I had Jeryl call them. They are tapped out on equipment. However, they could shift their lines and make the end caps in New York and then ship them down here. I’ve got Sheryl chasing down boxcars to use for transport. They think they can load them eight hours after casting them. It’s going to take two days to ship them by rail.”

“What about trucks or planes? They’re bulky, not heavy,” I said.

“Trucks are going to be fighting traffic. They’re already talking about coastal evacuations on the eastern seaboard. I’ll see what our options are and get back to you.”

She stepped into a private office and grabbed the phone while I brought Matthew up to speed on the wall changes. Soon, we were grabbing our protective gear and heading down to the floor to see how things were going.

Twelve hours later, we paused the line for a shift change as our hundredth shelter of the day was completed. Roughly a third of our first shift was coming back in to work alongside a hastily assembled and trained third shift composed of college students from Georgia Tech and other local schools. Allen, one of the interns, had come up with the idea and called on the local chapter of his fraternity. They had spread the word and helped organize things.

Matthew, Kelly, the interns, and I fell into a rhythm as we worked alongside the various shifts. We kept one ear open for the weather updates, and noticed increased effort and focus with the announcement that Hugo was regaining strength after overrunning Puerto Rico, and was heading to the northwest.

On September 20th, five days after starting the ramp up of our production, we completed our thousandth new shelter. Hugo was now racing up the coast, taking aim on the Georgia-South Carolina border. It was time to get some shelters out to Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands.

Sheryl had arranged Air Force transport for our palletized shelters and interns volunteered to fly along to instruct the set-up, on the island. Tom sent a cameraman along with each team.

Cassandra took to sleeping in the plant office. She was convinced that she could get a dozen more units a day out of the assembly line if we could just perfect the final assembly. I left her to her passion and collapsed in a hotel bed, so I could be alert when the storm made landfall.

As I fell into a deep slumber, I realized how proud I was of the team’s accomplishments over the past week.

“While the devastation of Hugo continues to be calculated,” the reporter said, “there are also tremendous stories of hope and support.”

Her cameraman pulled back to show a row of shelters shimmering in the tropical sunlight.

“This refugee camp did not exist three short days ago, but thanks to the heroic efforts of Paul Taylor and his company, PT Innovations; today over eight hundred families are not only living in safe, comfortable shelters, but they have power and fresh water as well.”

The camera followed her inside a shelter where eight cots were neatly arrayed. “This shelter was flown in on Air Force planes just twenty-four hours after the winds abated enough to allow flight operations. A small team of volunteers and interns showed people how to erect the shelters, which takes only minutes. Once the sun came out, the solar cells lining the top of this innovative cabin began generating electricity for lighting, and for charging batteries for use through the night.”

They exited the tent and walked down the row of shelters.

“In addition to family accommodations for the people who lost nearly everything, several shelters have been converted into aid stations and even field hospitals. Since they generate their own electricity and can be linked together, these shelters make perfect infirmaries to handle the more than six hundred reported injuries from the storm.”

The news cut back to the studio anchors.

“PT Innovations has sent their shelters not only to the island of St. Croix, which was nearly flattened by Hugo, but also to the hardest hit parts of Puerto Rico. They are currently preparing to deliver shelters to the coastal region of South Carolina as soon as it is safe to do so,” the anchor reported.

“The fact that a private individual came to the aid of those in need is admirable,” the talking head said on the Sunday morning news show. “But the fact that our government, who we pay taxes to, was not prepared to take similar, timely and effective actions, is an outrage.”

The camera cut to another member of the panel.

“You have to give the government some credit,” he said. “Paul Taylor had those shelters available because he was bidding on a contract for the Army. If they had not been looking to buy better temporary shelters, he would not have had them designed and built to use.”

“That is sophistry at its best,” the original commentator said. “Using that argument, why was the Army opening a bidding process while FEMA sat on its hands? That is the organization charged with being ready for emergencies and natural disasters, not the Army. The politicians responsible for being ready to react and help, failed! The Army was lucky enough to have enabled a private firm to help out. No matter how you spin it, this was a failure of our leadership.”

I shuddered at the sight of the news vans and cameras outside the office as we pulled up in our Range Rover. I had flown back from Atlanta the previous night, happy with the production processes which were shipping out almost one hundred and fifty shelters a day to those impacted by Hugo in the lowlands of South Carolina. Candace had struck a deal with the state government to cover our production costs, and a small profit. I did not like the way the news was already trying to manufacture a story about us profiteering from the misfortune of others. I took a deep breath as the car stopped and opened the door to face the crowd of reporters.

“Paul, why are you refusing to send shelters to Montserrat?” A female reporter yelled as she shoved a microphone at me.

I held up a hand and stepped onto the sidewalk as Tom came rushing out of the building with his own cameraman trailing him. The reporters pulled back slightly as Sanford stepped up to my side.

“We are not refusing to send shelters, anywhere,” I said firmly. “But we are only making a hundred and fifty a day, which limits how many we can ship, quickly. Right now, I have directed our production to be sent to locations impacted here in the States. If I had more to send, I would be happy to help out the people of Montserrat.”

“How much money are you making off these shelters?” Another reporter asked.

“Right now, we are covering costs, shipping, and a five percent margin. Once we are through this emergency, and have stable production and ongoing orders, we will adjust our margins upwards, to meet our long-term business goals.”

“Why don’t you outsource production to other companies to increase volume?” another reporter asked.

I forced a tight smile and replied, “Why don’t you investigate what that would take, and get back to me?”

I decided that was enough silly questions, and headed toward the door.

Tom intercepted the crowd as it tried to follow me. I just shook my head.

“Idiots,” I said.

Donna was waiting for me in my office. I glanced at the clock. It was five after nine.

“Sorry, I’m late,” I said.

“You’re hardly late, Boss,” she replied with a smile. “I saw the crowd of ‘fans’ waiting for you, and suspected you might have a little trouble getting in.”

We sat down and she began my morning briefing.

“Five national guard organizations have placed orders for shelters this morning. Once we get through the surge, we should have a good pipeline of orders. No governor wants to be caught during the rest of hurricane season.”

“I’ve asked the team to continue sending out shelters until next Thursday. That will be ten thousand shipped in total for Hugo. After that, we need to stabilize production and begin filling regular orders. Cassandra has informed me she wants to stay on and run things. She worked a deal with U.C. Berkeley and can finish her last class remotely. The positive press Tom and the team generated worked in her favor, at least.”

“Good. I’ll make sure she is looped into the orders and your directions.” she said. She looked at her notes and added, “DigiNet is lighting up the last segments of the western loops this week. We’re working on building out two paths to Denver to start expanding east. We’ve got our bid for spectrum into the FCC. It’s another case where your positive press may help the process.”

I snorted and said, “Based on the questions from a few minutes ago, I’m not too sure about that.”

Donna smiled.

“Well, we should get another boost in two weeks when “The Interns” launches on ABC. You’ll be on a couple of talk shows over the next couple of weeks, to help plug the show as well.”

I groaned and asked, “When did I agree to that?”

“Jeryl agreed for you both, as well as for Kelly.”

I shook my head.

“Lucky thing that I love my wife,” I said. “Anything else pressing, for today?”

“Nothing this morning, but you have a meeting with the U.K. trade representative this afternoon. Kelly and Matthew believe they want to pitch some tax breaks at us, to open a facility in the United Kingdom.”

“Interesting. Any idea where?”

“We think, Wales, but that’s a guess based on where they could use economic stimulus.”

I thought about that for a moment. Opening production in Europe had several interesting possibilities.

“Why don’t you investigate what that would take and get back to me?”

The sound-bite clip from my impromptu Q & A with reporters had taken on a life of its own over the past two weeks. Now, when I was supposed to be pitching “The Interns” launch, I was instead talking about old news.

“A lot has been made of that comment over the last couple of weeks,” Lou Dobbs said.

I smiled and shook my head slightly. Tom had prepped me well for this week’s interviews.

“A lot should be made of it,” I said.

We were in the CNN studios in Atlanta. I was dressed casually in an open collared light blue shirt with a navy blazer. Jeryl and Tom had defined my wardrobe for all of my appearances.

“A lot of people think you were ridiculing that reporter.”

“I was,” I admitted. “I expect a certain level of professionalism from people. I expected a reporter asking that question would have done their homework, and known that the bottleneck on production was the assemblage and integration of a variety of custom materials we were making on site. Outsourcing fabrication would not have sped up production; it would have delayed it by having to transport partial assemblies to other places for final fabrication. A professional would have investigated that, and framed a different question that had real meaning.”

“Such as?”

“Such as, ‘Are you investigating methods of scaling up the production of materials that make these shelters so valuable in emergencies?’ Or, ‘Have any other firms approached you about aiding in increasing production?’ Either of those questions would have at least indicated they had done their homework.”

Lou nodded for the cameras. “Did you ever imagine such a backlash for an off-the cuff comment to a reporter?”

“Imagined, yes. Expected, no.”

“What do you mean?”

I smiled again and replied, “I can imagine quite a range of responses to any given statement I make. I expect people to listen to my actual words, and evaluate them for themselves. I do not expect people to fall into blind faith on what I meant or thought, based on someone else’s interpretation.”

“So you expected everyone to believe you were serious in your question to that reporter?”

“If he had come back with a way to accelerate production through outsourcing, yes, I would have listened to him. Instead he raised a claim of a personal bias against him, on my behalf. I did not know him from any other reporter. I was unaware that he had been trying to arrange private interviews with me prior to Hugo. I have a staff to handle such requests. Now, it appears he has found a way to elevate his own reputation by casting aspersions on me. As a professional journalist, do you think he is doing his own career any good?”

Lou frowned. I don’t think he expected me to put him on the spot. He recovered quickly.

“I think he has gained a small following, but attacking you is a one trick pony.”

“I agree. Now, forget him. Look at all the other media people that have taken up his cause. They act on his words and accusations, but have not been able to defend how that was a smart or relevant question that deserved an answer. Instead, they use this manufactured controversy to boost their own ratings, essentially saying the original reporter was correct in making the story up, just to boost his own stock.”

“That’s a bit harsh, isn’t it?”

“Is it? Is there a real story, here? Why didn’t any of the people launching attacks at my behavior bother to go visit the people we were helping? Why didn’t they go to the plant here in Atlanta and see how those dedicated teams were churning out shelters to help people?” I asked. “No! Instead, they sit in studios and comment on another person’s comments. That’s not reporting, in my mind. It’s not helping the national dialog or informing public opinion with regards to the sorry state of many of our emergency preparedness plans. It’s non-news being trumped up to boost ratings.”

“Well, here at CNN, I’m glad to state that we did go out and talk to your teams. Here’s what they had to share.”

A series of clips ran on the monitor while our lights were dimmed and our mics were muted. Don Joy was shown demonstrating how to set up one of the shelters in a refugee community in South Carolina. Calvin Hodges was shown in front of the final assembly stage in our factory. He talked about how we had organized a third shift, and streamlined the production process as much as we could, to increase our output. Finally, Cassandra Sanchez spoke for all the interns, describing the thought processes and trials we had put them through, and how much better they had become as both thinkers and doers over the course of their internships.

The studio lights came back up.

“Those were all participants in your internship program?” Lou asked.

“They were. They all did a tremendous job during the storm, as well as during their six-month internship.”

“And that is what this new show is about?”

“It is. We filmed the entire process; the good, the bad, the trials and tribulations. On the show, people can see the process of having an idea, testing it, refining it, pitching it; turning it into a business, and helping it grow. I never thought making money was enough. This is part of how I want to give back to the entire country and world. There are a lot of smart people out there. Hopefully, they will watch the show, and see a process they can adopt themselves to help build something great for themselves, their communities, their countries, and the world.”

“Are you nervous?” Joan Lunden asked as the sound man fiddled with my microphone.

I was about to go on the air, live, for “Good Morning America”.

“Not really. I’ll just be happy when we’re done.”

It was the last PR junket on my schedule.

“You’ve been on quite a few shows lately,” she said.

I nodded. I had done the taping for Lou Dobbs three days ago. Since that appearance, Tom had Jeryl and me on the Tonight Show with Johnny Carson. Kelly and I had been taped for a segment on Hugo, on Sixty Minutes, and I had also done a slew of radio spots before landing on the set of GMA.

“I don’t know how you folks do this every morning,” I said as the sound man backed away.

Joan chuckled.

“Lots of practice,” she said.

The floor director motioned at us and held up five fingers. Joan straightened and looked at the camera as he counted us down.

“Welcome back to Good Morning America,” Joan said brightly. “Our next guest has gotten quite a bit of attention over the past week for both his actions and his words. Please join me in welcoming Paul Taylor.”

There was a swell of applause and even a little genuine enthusiasm in the small studio audience.

“Paul, you’re officially here to announce your new television show, ‘The Interns’. What was the genesis of this radically different show?”

I smiled at the camera as I said, “It was actually thought of by a friend of mine, Tom Harding. He first approached me a couple of years ago to be the subject of a documentary he wanted to film. It was very well received at the Sundance Film Festival. About a year ago, he pitched me the idea of making this show.”

“And I understand it is a new type of television.”

“It is. We had crews filming about eighteen hours a day, while a group of interns learned about technology and business, and got to help solve real world business problems.”

“And you graded them each week?”

I smiled again.

“Each of their projects was reviewed, and they were given feedback by myself, or other industry experts. Our goal for them was not to ‘grade’ them, so much as guide them through a more realistic learning process than they would typically get in school.”

“But there were winners each week?”

I nodded. “The individuals or teams that did the best job on each challenge were rewarded. In some cases, it was a cash award. In others, they got to pitch their idea or work product to industry executives or have some one-on-one time with a technologist.”

“Did you really arrange for them to have lunch with Larry Ellison and Steve Jobs?”

I laughed. “I did. Both were gracious enough to meet with some of the interns who did well.”

“And one of their projects was the fabulous shelters that you sent out to victims of Hurricane Hugo, right?”

“It was. They designed not only the shelters, but the manufacturing process as well. When we needed to ramp up production as we saw the magnitude of the storm, most of them came back to help on the assembly line or go out with their product to show people how to set them up and link them together. They demonstrated what the youth of America is capable of. I can’t praise their efforts enough.”

The audience clapped spontaneously.

Joan smiled at the cameras. “Well, I think we are all believers in what the youth of America can achieve. That includes you, Paul. Is it true that your company is valued at over a billion dollars, and that you started from the garage on your family farm?”

“I don’t know about a billion dollars,” I said with a grin. “But I did start out in a garage on the farm.”

“And now you are running multiple companies and are driving innovation in the automotive, computer, aviation, and telecommunications industries?”

“I’ve had some success,” I admitted.

“And what do you attribute your success to?” she asked.

“Hard work. A willingness to try, and fail, and try again; and a desire to never settle only for what other people think can be accomplished.”

“Well, you have certainly accomplished a lot.” she looked from me back to the camera. “To learn more of how Paul has accomplished such great things in his life, tune into ‘The Interns’; premiering tonight, on ABC.”

The crowd applauded again, and Joan held her smile until the director motioned and called, “We’re clear.”

“Well done, Paul,” Joan said. “I’ve looked at the clips of the show, and think it’s going to be very popular. I look forward to learning more about you and your process.”

“Thanks, Joan. It’s been a pleasure chatting with you this morning.”

I unclipped the microphone and stood to shake her hand. It was a happy ending to a grueling week.

“Paul, have you seen this?” Tom asked as he walked into my office holding a tabloid newspaper before him. The headline read “Tent-Gate?” and had a picture of one of the shelters on the front page.

I scowled as I said, “No. What dreck is the fourth estate making up now?”

Tom handed me the paper and sat down. “They’re accusing us of making money off the misery of people who lost everything in Hugo, and then bribing the Army to select our shelters for their contract.”

“That’s such bullshit. Get ahold of Kelly and Jim. Let’s sue their dumb asses for defamation.”

“Hey, let’s not over react.”

“We’re not. We’re defending our integrity. You know how and why we built those shelters. You helped film the entire process. You know how and why we helped people three months ago during Hugo, you filmed that, too. The fact is, we won that army contract because we made the best shelter for their needs. We have so much proof of the process from your filming, that I want to own the assholes who decided to publish this.”

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