Seven is coming up on its 2-year anniversary of hiring our first employee on a work visa. So, it seemed apropriate to repost the initial installment--from September 2006--in a seemingly never ending visa story. Here it is in it's entirety. I will post a follow up soon--once our latest round of visa craziness subsides.
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Worthwhile Path or Easy Road
Recently a Japanese frame builder contacted Seven, interested in the possibility of apprenticing with us to learn about our company and our unique approach to frame building. Understandably, we were interested in talking and mutually learning from him. He flew from his home in Japan to Seven where we spent a few days working together to determine if it might make sense to bring him on as an apprentice; we quickly found that we liked him and he liked us.
Understandably, his English is not perfect. However, because of our manufacturing system, our visual controls, and our really dedicated and skilled production team, he was able to quickly grasp our basic frame building techniques so he was machining and fabricating some frame elements within a couple days. As I have found again and again, good communication goes well beyond words--thankfully, since I have so much trouble with words.
All appeared to be good; everyone seemed enthusiastic about the opportunity to work with our new potential hire. We even had a couple people offer him a place to stay in order to ease him into East Coast life--no easy feat. We all believed it would be a great experience for everyone involved. He would learn from us and we would learn from him. If nothing else, the cultural immersion and understanding for us all seemed like it would be worthwhile.
Right? Wrong.