Carl F. Thelin

            FALL OUT AT CAL   

            CAL was an innocent victim of all that national publicity that described me as the whistle blower who helped Nader to “get” General Motors.  The clients of CAL were almost entirely people from government and industry who expected CAL to conduct private research and provide the results only to them. Now, the top CAL brass told me, the clients were concerned that I was might tell their competitors about what secret research was going on at CAL.

            In the mean time, big brass from the Senate had warned CAL management that any threats to a government witness like me would be a treated as a federal crime. Even better, big brass from GM called CAL brass and told them that I had really helped them a lot (and not to reveal that) and not to punish me in any way, secret or not. Well, maybe so. Affairs did get chilly with our DOT clients. Maybe they would not harm ­­me, but they could withhold business from CAL.

             WHO LOVES YOU?

            Here is something I began to understand after I left General Motors and went to Uniroyal. When I was at CAL the observation was confirmed. At GM and Chevrolet, I felt that most people looked down on me as the nearly-deaf dummy. I had got used to that from childhood on. Deaf and Dumb. Yeah. I was surrounded by mechanical engineers and draftsmen. A graduate engineer is a scientist – that is what the S in BSME stands for. No one treated me like that before I got to Uniroyal. At Uniroyal, there were also some engineers and draftsmen and technicians. Almost all the leaders of the departments had a Ph.D. in physics or chemistry. Even the other engineers had a master’s degree. I was the dumb guy for sure, but I did my work well and quickly. People treated me with genuine respect. How refreshing.

At CAL, the same thing was apparent. Just about everybody else there was smarter than I was. Yet, they all treated me with respect because I could get my work done right and on time. So, what did I learn? Do not seek approbations from people at your level or below. The people who are smarter than you have no jealousy and are free to say “Thanks” by showing respect. Even better, I saw that these people were great mentors. Mentoring me meant that I learned what mistakes they made earlier. I could avoid those. I was encouraged to make my own new mistakes. This is what I told CAL people later, when I became the mentor.

NEXT: Big break at CU