THE GOLDBERG BROTHERS

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The four Goldberg brothers, Lowell, Norman, Hiram, and Max, invented and developed the first automobile air-conditioner. On July 17, 1946 , the temperature in Detroit was 97 degrees.

The four brothers walked into old man Henry Ford’s office and sweet-talked his secretary into telling him that four gentlemen were there with the most exciting innovation in the auto industry since the electric starter.

Henry was curious and invited them into his office.

They refused and instead asked that he come out to the parking lot to their car.

They persuaded him to get into the car, which was about 130 degrees, turned on the air conditioner, and cooled the car off immediately.

The old man got very excited and invited them back to the office, where he offered them $3 million for the patent.

The brothers refused, saying they would settle for $2 million, but they wanted the recognition by having a label, ‘The Goldberg Air-Conditioner,’ on the dashboard of each car in which it was installed.

Now old man Ford was more than just a little anti-Jewish, and there was no way he was going to put the Goldberg’s name on two million Fords.

They haggled back and forth for about two hours and finally agreed on $4 million and that just their first names would be shown.

And so to this day, all Ford air conditioners show —

Lo, Norm, Hi, and Max — on the controls.

99% perspiration

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Malcolm Gladwell: Major success stories, whether in music, business or life, have much in common. They usually share a path of extended trial and error; overcoming severe adversity; continuous experimentation; and perseverance. Those behind the successes require a modest level of ability to get into the game. But once you possess that base, the only differentiator is what you put in, not apparent genius.

A suggestion from a human resources manager

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A suggestion from a human resources manager – how to properly place new employees:

  1.  Put 400 bricks in a closed room.
  2.  Put your new hires in the room and close the door.
  3.  Leave them alone and come back after 6 hours.
  4.  Analyse the situation.
  1.  If they are counting the bricks, put them in the Accounting Department.
  2.  If they are recounting them, put them in Auditing.
  3.  If they have messed up the whole place with the bricks, put them in Engineering.
  4.  If they are arranging the bricks in some strange order, put them in Planning.
  5.  If they are throwing the bricks at each other, put them in Operations.
  6.  If they are sleeping, put them in Security.
  7.  If they have broken the bricks into pieces, put them in Information Technology.
  8.  If they are sitting idle, put them in Human Resources.
  9.  If they say they have tried different combinations, they are looking for more, yet not a brick has been moved, put them in Sales.
  10.  If they have already left for the day, put them in Management.
  11.  If they are staring out of the window, put them in Strategic Planning.
  12.  If they are talking to each other, and not a single brick has been moved, congratulate them and put them in Top Management.
  13. Finally, if they have surrounded themselves with bricks in such a way that they can neither be seen nor heard from, put them in Parliament.