Lehman’s Country Life

Bezaleel means “under the shadow of God” and is the name of a school in Guatemala where Galen Lehman did volunteer work in July, 2008. #4 in a series of posts on what he learned there.

People have told me I’m hard-working, responsible, task-oriented. Compliments? Maybe not!

Being “task-oriented” means I measure my worth by how much I’ve accomplished. A day with a lot of things crossed off my list is a good day!

In Guatemala, I learned to measure the quality of my days by how I had strengthened my relationships with others.

Maybe I had no choice! Work in the mountains of Guatemala moves at a different pace than it does stateside. Supplies were seldom adequate. The project leader usually showed up five minutes after the announced start time. Laughter over practical jokes like smearing paint on each other often distracted us. We arm-wrestled for bragging rights, and other things. (I lost the right to carry our room key in an arm-wrestling match. But, at least I didn’t lose my favorite pair of pants, like my friend, Lydell, did.)

After a few days of this, I started to figure out that I needed to focus on the relationships and let the work get done at its own pace. We went to Guatemala to work. But, the real value of the experience was the friendships we made along the way. The best parts of my trip were not “getting things done.” The best parts were things we did together.

Like the afternoon when a few of us slipped away from the group for a long, lazy coffee. Or, teaching our K’ekchi’ hosts to sing “When the Lion Sleeps tonight” in English, a language they didn’t know. Or, when three us worked through a tropical rain storm vainly trying to put a nice brushed finish on concrete we had just poured. In the end, we gave up on the brushed finish and settled for something we jokingly called the “Guatemala Rain Finish.”

Since I’ve been back at my “real” work, I’ve tried to hang onto the idea that it’s OK to settle for second-best if you can have some fun along the way. It hasn’t been easy.

This world is a little more demanding than that world was. And, I’m learning that all my co-workers already know what’s wrong with task-oriented people like me. Apparently, I’m locally famous for charging off to the next task while people are still talking to me and for not hearing them say “Good Morning!” because I’m too deep in thought.

But, I’m hoping I can stick with it. I want to do the best work possible. But, I also want to remember that the people are know are more important than the work I do.

Week: Read about how to make a difference.

Click here for more information on Bezaleel.

Learn more about Mennonite Central Committee, a non-profit relief organization.

Learn about Guatemala.

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Bezaleel means “under the shadow of God” and is the name of a school in Guatemala where Galen Lehman did volunteer work in July, 2008. #3 in a series of posts on what he learned there.

Most of the time I was in Guatemala, we were working members of the K’ekchi’ “culture group”.  In North American terms, I suppose you would say they are the “K’ekchi’ Indians.”

They are direct descendants of the Maya, and have a strong and proud tradition.  One of the most entertaining times we had was meeting with a K’ekchi’ elder, told us some of their legends.

According to tribal myths, corn was the food of the gods.  One day, a mouse stole some seeds and hid them in his hole. A fox dug up the seed and ate it.  When he excreted the kernels, they grew and flourished (fertilized, as they were, by the fox’s dung).  That is their version of how corn came from heaven down to earth and how the Maya found it. To this day, corn is a mainstay of K’ekchi’ diet.  We had corn tortillas at every meal.

One of their traditional gods is the moon, whose changing phases were integrated into their calendar.  We learned that tortillas are round and white, and baked on a round stone, as a reminder of “Mother Luna”.

To us, those traditions seem silly.  And, as the elder told us the stories, he laughed and winked as if we were sharing a good joke.  It seemed that even he recognized that they no longer held value for his people in today’s world.

But, outmoded or not, traditions define who we are.  Our connection to the past gives us security and a strong foundation in a world of shifting values.  The K’ekchi family I stayed with (shown here) most assuredly did not believe the old Mayan god myths.  But, they still made round corn tortillas at every meal on a round stone over an open fire, just the way they had been made for the last 2000 years.

Our host family had a traditional home made of wooden slats.  There were no windows, but light streamed in through cracks between the boards.  The floor was dirt.  The roof was corrugated tin.  Corn was planted on every square foot of land.  A single faucet in front of the home provided running water.  The bathroom was a latrine in the cornfield.

Within the last 10 years, they had gotten two things that dramatically changed their lifestyle:

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Bezaleel means “under the shadow of God” and is the name of a school in Guatemala where Galen Lehman did volunteer work in July, 2008. #2 in a series of posts on what he learned there.

Last week, I wrote how Guatemala’s indigenous people are mostly poor and often discriminated against by wealthy landowners of European descent.

But, there’s another group adding to their suffering. It’s me, my family and my friends! As it turns out, many Guatemalans believe that the economic, military and cultural power of the USA is tearing at the fabric of their lives.

Here are some examples of how this plays out, given to me by my Guatemalan hosts:

- The Free Trade Agreement destroys locally-owned industries by allowing the free import of mass-market goods. NAFTA has been much maligned in the USA, but our hosts told us that the detrimental impact on Guatemala has been much, much worse. It empowers American corporations with tremendous influence over Guatemalan government and policy. Many people in Guatemala believe that the machinations of American corporations helped cause the 36-year civil war that just ended in the 1990’s. They also pointed to new Guatemalan laws that make the maximum penalty for copying DVD’s harsher than the maximum penalty for manslaughter.

- The US military has rights to enter Guatemalan land, air and territorial waters for drug interdiction. Can you imagine the US giving such rights to any other country? Years of paramilitary atrocities by local right-wing militias have terrorized the people. Our hosts told us that just seeing US military maneuvers on their soil hurts Guatemala’s chances for democracy.

- The US cultural influence is over-whelming. The value systems of America’s R-rated movies are replacing traditional values even in remote villages. I saw amazing evidence of this in my travels and will write more about it more in the future.

The Guatemalans I met were welcoming and friendly. They know and love the American people. Unspoken in their warmth was a simple question: “Why do the kind and gracious American people allow their government and corporations to behave in this way?”

They even had ideas on how to help things improve.  For one thing, they begged us to shop locally. They believe the big multi-national corporations are too powerful. By encouraging small family-owned businesses in our neighborhoods and communities, we undermine the powerful and help bring stability to the world.

And of course, this is a big election year in America.  There are many important issues at stake. We have our own economic problems, a health care system in shambles, and a war in Iraq that it increasingly seems no one wants. They asked me to add one more concern:  Remember that the decisions we make in November may affect them and other people in ways we cannot imagine.

What I learned in Guatemala is that I must live my life thoughtfully and remember that lots of good people in many places have a stake in every decision I make.

Next Week: Read about the tug-of-war between traditional values and modern culture.

Click here for more information on Bezaleel.

Learn more about Mennonite Central Committee, a non-profit relief organization.

Learn about Guatemala.

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Bezaleel means “under the shadow of God” and is the name of a school in Guatemala where Galen Lehman did volunteer work in July, 2008. #1 in a series of posts on what he learned there.

Our first stop in Guatemala was an orientation at the offices of the Mennonite Central Committee in Guatemala City.

There the whole group was stunned into silent attention by our local host, who announced with feeling, “Guatemala is a racist, sexist, classist society. You will see it everywhere you turn.”

Racist, she said, because while only about 30 percent of the population is “Ladino” (of Spanish descent), Ladinos control virtually everything. Guatemalans of indigenous descent (who North Americans would probably call “Indian”) can be easily identified by their non-European facial features. Generations of undernourishment have made them up to a foot shorter than everyone else in Guatemala. They are allowed to hold only low-paying manual labor and farming jobs. (The minimum wage in Guatemala is $4/day and is often ignored.)

Classist because just two percent of the population holds 92 percent of the land (and intends to keep it that way). We were told that there is virtually no middle class. The poor are very poor and have no way to advance. They have been pushed out of the fertile coastal plantation areas and onto the steep slopes of the central mountains. Higher education, freedom of choice and the ability to move on to better economic opportunities are severely limited.
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Recently Galen Lehman took several weeks off from his job as president of Lehman’s. He spent this time visiting suppliers and other businesses he knew and admired. The companies he visited ranged from 1 employee to 300 employees. Most were owned by Amish or Mennonite families. At each stop, he asked, “What is the secret of your success?” This is one of a series of postings about what he learned.

On the kind of sunny February day that makes you want to walk around in shirt sleeves, I visited the family that makes our wheelbarrow and goat carts.

The first thing I learned was that a product of amazing quality can emerge from a shop that is practically falling down. Like most Amish shops, it was poorly lit. Piles of sawdust and shavings covered everything. Narrow aisles ran crookedly between mysterious hulking gray machinery that seemed to placed at random angles around the shop. Stacks of pre-cut parts were gradually slipping toward the floor.

Yet, every piece of finished work I looked at was well-finished. Corners were smooth and snag-free. Small details that provide huge improvements abounded (like moldings that wrap the end grain of boards to improve both strength and appearance). When I got close enough to one of the falling down piles of parts, I saw that every piece was precisely and identically cut. In one corner of the shop, I saw an young Amish craftsman setting screws in a perfect straight line using a state of the art laser (which was quite an irony in this non-electric shop).

In fact, I have absolute confidence in products from this Amish-owned business. The wheelbarrow was covered in Time magazine because it was the only antique-style wheelbarrow they could find that could actually be used as a wheelbarrow (and not just a lawn ornament).

Their secret of success is to constantly invent. They often start by copying historical designs. Then, they incorporate changes that improve their strength and design. A constant cycle of re-inventing leads to steady improvements. A steady flow of new products are “in the pipeline” (as the big corporations say), some of which will be offered in future catalogs.

For this vendor, new products bring success. At Lehman’s, we’ve also tried to follow this path, adding new items at a pace of 1000 or more items per year. Are we adding new items too fast? Let me know what you think!

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Recently Galen Lehman took several weeks off from his job as president of Lehman’s. He spent this time visiting suppliers and other businesses he knew and admired. The companies he visited ranged from 1 employee to 300 employees. Most were owned by Amish or Mennonite families. At each stop, he asked, “What is the secret of your success?” This is one of a series of postings about what he learned.

High on a round bump in southern Pennsylvania that locals call the red hill stands an Amish farm house surrounded by a jumble of outbuildings. Each of the outbuildings is dedicated to one part of the process of efficiently producing the best clothes drying rack in the world.

There’s a shop where dowels are turned out from raw lumber that was milled on-site. In fact, each component of the racks are made here…nothing but the screws is bought from any other vendor. (That’s right, rustproof plated screws, not cheap staples that rust like on competing dryers.)

In another building the frames are cut, planned, drilled and sanded. A custom-designed homemade conveyor system delivers the parts from one work station to the next, something I have never seen in an Amish-owned shop before.

Like most Amish shops, the entire operation is non-electric. Modern cutting equipment and the dust vacuum system have been converted to run on motors powered by hydraulic oil pumped by a huge diesel engine.

They know things about drying racks no one else does. For example, they use maple because it’s a good, fine-grained local wood. But oak, another fine local wood, is never used because it can stain your clothes.

Every step in the assembly has been analyzed and fine-tuned to eliminate wasted labor, wasted material and inefficiencies. In fact, they’ve done nothing but make exactly the same drying rack here for 30 years. During that time, they’ve constantly improved the process so that in all those years, the price has increased only slightly. This is the case even though the quality has gotten noticeably better.

The secret of their success is a single-minded focus on making one product in the best way possible. This is one business where new product ideas are not entertained. They already have “their” product. The only question now is how to make it more efficiently.

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Recently Galen Lehman took several weeks off from his job as president of Lehman’s. He spent this time visiting suppliers and other businesses he knew and admired. The companies he visited ranged from 1 employee to 300 employees. Most were owned by Amish or Mennonite families. At each stop, he asked, “What is the secret of your success?” This is one of a series of postings about what he learned.

To visit our Amish wagon maker, you really must travel “over the river and through the woods.” His “factory” (really just converted farm buildings) is on the farm where he raises his family. All of his employees are family members.

This ensures a level of commitment to quality that you just won’t find from other manufacturers. Everyone wants to do a good job because everyone is in it together.

I talked to him about the seductiveness of growth.

“Our people,” he said, meaning the Amish, “like to keep things small.” I knew what he meant. Church rules banning electricity and computers make it very hard for companies to grow past 10 or so employees.

The Amish like to keep things small because staying small means they can minimize undesirable contact with outsiders. Being able to provide employment and income for the entire family brings self-sufficiency. Family stands as a single unit, pulling in one direction.

In fact, when I arrived the first person I met was his teenage son. When I introduced myself, he said without resentment, “Let me get my dad. He’s the boss here.”

While he fetched his dad, I weighed his words. What was the meaning behind them? Dad rules the roost? Dad’s a bully who demands respect? Once I met the “boss”, I knew for certain it could not be the latter. He was one of the gentlest men I ever met. I finally concluded that it was just the sons way of humbly stating, “I honor my father,” and, “This is a family business.”

His father told me that at one time they had as many as three employees. But, he didn’t think that worked very well. He found them hard to manage and hard to motivate. In the end, he felt that working with family was just a lot more fun.

And, this is a family that knows how to have fun while they work.

The sign below is displayed in their display area. I asked his wife if it was true that he made a lot of mistakes. Without hesitation or a trace of false humility, she laughed and said, “We all make mistakes!”

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Recently Galen Lehman took several weeks off from his job as president of Lehman’s. He spent this time visiting suppliers and other businesses he knew and admired. The companies he visited ranged from 1 employee to 300 employees. Most were owned by Amish or Mennonite families. At each stop, he asked, “What is the secret of your success?” This is one of a series of postings about what he learned.

The smallest business I visited had one employee and two horses. Ok, the horses weren’t employees. But, they very definitely made their presence known. The shop reeked from the smell of their urine in the stalls next door. My breath caught in my throat as we stood in the shop and talked that cold February morning.

I found the maker of our Popular and Favorite Clothes Dryers down a curvy country lane deep in Pennsylvania’s Amish country. Even finding this place was an adventure. I drove by the farm twice because there was no sign or any indication of that manufacturing was happening there.

When I went to the door, I felt like an intruder from another planet invading their privacy. They greeted me with the typical reserve many Amish have for outsiders. Even when I introduced myself by saying, “We buy your dryers,” they didn’t immediately warm to me.

Ultimately I did get a tour of the shop with its antique equipment stretching out in a row along the line shaft that powered it. A single gasoline engine drives the shaft. Pulleys every few feet along the shaft send power from the engine to each piece of equipment.

Before long, we were engaged in good conversation filled with the regard and genuine interest I often see from my Amish friends.

The owner started making the dryers at an age when most men retire. He inherited the business from his Dad, who had been making the dryers for us from 1970 until his death last year. His father died while at work in the very shop where stood just a few days short of his 90th birthday. This led to an interesting conversation about success.

“I’m a farmer,” he said, “I’d rather be outside. But, at my age I need something slower to keep busy.”

Success doesn’t always have to involve a lot of money or prestige. But, everyone needs to feel productive. “Keeping busy” really means “being productive.” Sometimes, we end up doing things that aren’t our first choice. But, the feeling that you’re making a difference is often enough to make it all worthwhile.

My desire to make a difference is what gets me out of bed every morning. I hope that in some small way (whether you are an employee, customer, friend, family member or acquaintance) that I’ve helped make your life a little better.

Am I doing a good job of making a difference? What are some of the ways you try to make a difference?

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