Synergy

When I first read about Hirshberg's concepts, two things immediately came to mind, the saying “THE WHOLE BEING GREATER THAN THE SUM OF ITS PARTS” and that of my experiences working with a man that I’m honored to call friend. 

                It all started back in summer of 08, I was a hot shot analyst a year into my new position, with unlimited raw talent, but very limited experience.  My boss had mentored me and taught me everything she knew, but when she became the head of contract management, she needed support with respect to financial information that she couldn’t produce on her own, nor did she have the knowledge to teach me how to get it for her.  She hired a 50 year old financial analyst Ed, he was to provide us with the financials we needed.  Quirky would be a vast understatement in describing Ed; Louis Vuitton belt, wallet, and planner, giant gold rings and chains, Bruno Magli shoes, skin tight Italian shirts, this guy was something else, completely different from my reserved, mild manner, crew cut straight from mass maritime.  Ed was a brilliant accountant, he should have been a manager, but as he expressed to me a several occasions, the powers that be didn’t think he “fit the mold”. 

                Soon our department took on the role of planning and scheduling resources for the entire company.  There was tremendous pressure from the senior VP to get our hands around the 100 million dollar annual work plan, because no one did.  No one knew what work was actually on the plan, when it needed to be done by, nor how many workers were available to do it.  The company had data on hundreds (that I was aware of) spreadsheets, and a thousand-armed octopus of oracle data warehouse, with even thousands more Crystal reports.  It was “Data Paralysis” at its worse, Ed and I went at it full steam, he knew the business and what information we needed to present to paint an accurate picture.  My lack of formal analytical training proved to be my greatest asset in that I was always thinking out of the box, how could I not I didn’t know the standard practices.  The synergy Ed and I had as a team was unstoppable, we created a central database that tracked work orders, dates, hours, dollars, personnel, and you name it.  Working side by side our relationship had built in checks and balances; he would constantly push the envelope of innovation, I was the more thorough one, making sure everything was practical and feasible, dotting all the i’s per se.  Unfortunately my friend Ed passed away, leaving behind a wife and 2 kids, just 5 weeks after I left the department; but the time we shared was priceless, he influenced both professionally and personally.