Estimated reading time: 5 minutes

It's Only Common Sense: A Sad, But True, Story

Editor's Note: To listen to Dan's weekly column, as you've always done in the past, click here. For the written transcript, keep reading...The young salesperson had been waiting patiently for the buyer for almost an hour. He was a bit nervous and also excited because he was finally here. It had taken him months to get here. He had worked very hard with prospecting, research, cold calling, and leaving messages and unanswered phone calls, but he had persevered and, in the end, it paid off. He finally got an appointment with" Mr. Big," a buyer for one of the largest defense contractors in the country. He had his presentation memorized, he knew that his pitch was perfect, and there was no way he was going to fail.

Mr. Big arrived and motioned him to follow him into one of those little rooms off the lobby.

Mr. Big: OK, kid, you’re finally here, I’ve got to hand it to you--you’re one persistent little SOB, so tell me what you’ve got.

Eager sales person (ESP): Well, sir, let me tell you about my company.

Mr. Big: Hold on now, son, before you do that let me ask you some questions to make sure we can even do business. After all, we are the largest defense contractor in the country. We are the defenders of not only this country, but the free word. we can’t have just anyone build our printed wiring boards. Are you ITAR-registered?

ESP: Yes, sir, we are.

Mr. Big: And, of course, you have ISO?

ESP: Yes, of course, sir.

Mr. Big: And you have your 55110?

ESP: Yes, we do.

Mr. Big: And you need your AS9100--you have that don’t you?

ESP: Yes, sir, we do.

Mr. Big: And 31032--do you have that? 

ESP: Yes, we have that.

Mr. Big: And NADCAP...you have your NADCAP, don’t you?

ESP: Yes, sir, we do.

Mr. Big: And your company has instituted Lean manufacturing?

ESP: Yes, sir.

Mr. Big: And JIT?

ESP: Yes we have all of that. (The young sales person was looking excited things were looking good for him now.) 

Mr. Big: How about a laser drill and an LD? Do you have that equipment as well? Can you do HDI microvia work?

ESP: (Looking a bit confused) Well, yes, we have invested almost $4 million in the past year to make sure we could do HDI microvia, but I didn’t think your company bought HDI microvia boards...

Mr. Big: No, we don’t, but we require all of our vendors to be top of the line in case we decide to go in that direction.

ESP: Oh, do you think you’ll be doing that soon?

Mr. Big: I doubt it. But let me ask you: Do you meet our company’s new qualification so that you could qualify as one of our suppliers?

ESP: (Crestfallen) No, sir, we have not done any business with you yet so we didn’t start on that qualification.

Mr. Big: (With a bright glow of satisfaction in his eyes) Aha! Well, son, you’re going to have to go back to your company and make sure that you qualify to our new spec before we can even talk. I shouldn’t have even met with you today.

ESP: (Trying be upbeat and not show his disappointment) So, let me ask you, sir, once we have that qualification will we be able to do business with you?

Mr. Big: Whoa! Hold on there, son! I can’t commit to anything right now--there are steps we have to go through, you know. This is a process. After you meet all the spec requirements you have to fill out our survey form and then you have to build five sample sets of boards--free of course--and then we do a site visit and then you have to submit some sample quotes and--if you do all these things in a satisfactory manner--we’ll consider putting you on the AVL and sending you some live RFQs. Finally, if you can turn those quotes around in a timely fashion and if your price is the very lowest of all of our qualified bidders you might get an order. But there are no promises, son. As I told you, we are the largest, and I might add most important, defense contractor in the country. Our products are used to defend the free world--we have to be very careful who our vendors are, right?

ESP: I see, sir. I’ll go back to my company and we'll do the best we possibly can to be your supplier. Thank you for your time.

Mr. Big: Okay, but don’t come back until you are fully prepared and qualified to be one of our vendors…

ESP: I know, sir (he says wearily). You are the largest and most important defense contractor in the country and you are saving the free world.

Mr. Big: (As his cell phone rings) That’s right, son, you got it. See you later. I have to take this.

The young sales person leaves dragging his briefcase behind him as Mr. Big answers his cell phone. 

Mr. Big: Big here...what can I do for you?

Mr. Big’s company’s lead PCB designer (PCBD): Can you get me 20 of those 82113 cards as fast as possible?

Mr. Big: Probably, but those are really hard to build. When do you need them?

PCBD: We need 20 of them in five days.

Mr. Big: Are you crazy? It takes at least five weeks to get those cards. I can’t help you with that.

PCBD: Well, we need them or we’re going to be late on the first system. What am I supposed to do?

Mr. Big: Well, dummy, why don’t you do what we always do when this happens--go to one of those "no touch" sites that advertise in the back of the magazines!

PCBD: I would, but I thought all our vendors had to be fully qualified, especially to our new spec? Hell, we’re not even sure where those boards are actually built.

Mr. Big: Oh, forget about that...if you need the boards, get them from one of those websites. That’ll be good enough…good enough for government work.

They both laugh.

End of story.

Great story, right? The problem is it’s not just a story--this happens every single day on our industry. Now, for this one time only…this is not common sense...it makes no sense.