Word: swirbul
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...gregarious Grumman atmosphere workers constantly walk in, to buttonhole Roy or Jake directly, arguing, complaining, or whatever. Says Swirbul: "They don't have to talk to a lot of monkeys along the line." When the office becomes too cluttered with workers, Jake moves into an office next door, where he and Roy also have desks side by side, and 160 model planes dangle from the ceiling...
...Technology for training in aeronautics. When he was discharged, he was expert enough to get the job of general manager of the Loening Aeronautical Engineering Corp. at $4,200 a year. In 1929, the flurry of plane company mergers made Grumman's job a poor one. Jake Swirbul, who was works manager at Loening, and Bill Schwendler, just getting started as a designer, were in the same boat. The trio decided to start their own company to repair planes. Grumman plunked $16,875 into the new company, Swirbul $8,125, and Schwendler...
Hellcat Birth. Shortly after World War II began, Grumman heard that the Wildcats, which were in production, were having trouble with Jap Zeros. So Swirbul hopped to Pearl Harbor, buttonholed Navy flyers ("just calling on the trade," says Grumman), listed their complaints. Back at Bethpage, he cocked his feet on the desk, read them to Grumman...
...Five months later, the production line began to tick them off. This was unheard-of speed in an industry which used to need years to translate blueprints into planes. When a Navy brass hat dropped in to tell Grumman that he should expand to take care of Hellcat production, Swirbul pulled a mess of blue prints from his desk, said: "We are." When the officer said he would rush priorities for steel, Swirbul said: "I've got steel." And he had it, from Manhattan's razed Second Avenue elevated railway. But Grumman was still crowded for space. Wildcat...
...shortest time. As a result, neither absentee ism nor lack of manpower, the plagues of other war plants, have been a Grumman problem. Turnover, for all causes, including the draft, has been a small 2.3% so far this year, about half of the aircraft industry's average. Swirbul is fond of saying: "We're cold-blooded about all this, simply go out in the plant and tell the boys: you work a little harder and the company will make more money. If it does, then we'll give you more money...