A long time ago I was invited to take up a serious challenge. Once there stood a building on the outskirts of a sprawling steelworks, where 30 hardened and largely embittered men worked on one of the most dangerous industrial jobs - slicing rolls of raw steel for the next part of the production process.
Breakdowns were commonplace, lost-time injuries a regular feature. The rest of the works avoided contact with the Slitting Plant who avoided the rest of the works in turn. Communication didn't exist beyond the confines of those walls and within the enclave, everyone hated everything. Everything broke, kicked back, fell apart and caused more pain.
When I walked in, I knew I'd been thrown a bone with barbed wire all over it. They sat there, 30 of them, arms folded, waiting to see what this silly girl was going to stoke up as a challenge. I cut the atmosphere with a question.
"What's a singularity?"
That first question remains to this day.
We are human, and although every person and company is unique we do subscribe to certain laws. Understanding the basis of quantum mechanical law allows us to surf our days with a totally different point of view and cause positive effects we never thought were possible before.
What happened to me in the course of the Corus deliveries was a transformation from blind belief to solid proof that the quantum world and its intriguing components provide a solid bedrock for human development, and when introduced lightly (with no slurries of unintelligible gobbledegook), a sprinkling of science can be fun. These men, all 30 of them, turned the fortunes of their plant around in just three months after years of horror in an environment of their own making. Given the chance, the necessary encouragement and an opportunity they could work with, the written-off Slitting Plant became part of a process that transforms lives as it transforms companies, and broke a Corus record with
1,000 Days No Lost Time Injuries.
"Skeptical production operatives were achieving new pride
in each self-imposed challenge successfully met. Breakdowns and delays came down, quality of product improved, output increased – all against a background of escalating safety performance.
The benefits remained real and visible. A low-cost investment brought very substantial
economic and human resource returns.”
This was their song. We learned it together one day.