Factory Electricity BlackOut
After graduating from the top Engineering School, I worked in a big multinational Consumer Goods company and was stationed in a factory around Jakarta's outskirts in Indonesia. I was given the responsibility as a Line Manager for a medicated candy production line and the plant’s Utilities, specifically supervising the Boiler and Generator engines that serve the entire factory.
Initially, I had this imposter syndrome. I studied Geodetic Engineering within the Civil Engineering Faculty at University, so I certainly was not an expert on machines and production processes, compared to other peer Managers who mostly graduated in Mechanical Engineering, Chemical Engineering, and Industrial Engineering. But, isn't it at the University that we learn how to learn?
That was when I realized that I depended on my team of 32 people. And as the youngest member of the Leadership Team, I have to be nice to my senior peers, so they would teach me. I depended on soft skills, logical thinking, and willingness to learn.
Fortunately, the culture of building capabilities was very strong in the company. My early months were fully occupied with training, onboarding, and 1-on-1 coaching. One of the best coaches that I would always remember is my first boss, the Plant Manager - let’s just call him Robbie, an expatriate from the Philippines.
One day, I got a call from Operator Utilities in the early hours of the morning at around 4 AM. While sleep-drowsy I replied, "Hello, what's up?". The Operator reported, “Morning Sir, sorry to disturb your sleep. This is my Lyman from the Utility Room. The electricity at the factory went completely off, Sir, but the generator failed to run and couldn't be fixed.” I replied, “OK, I'm going to the Factory right now. Please call Uncle Herry so that he can come as soon as possible.” Uncle Herry was a Senior Technician at the factory who was the best at troubleshooting.
As I was driving in the wee hours from my home to the factory, my brain was deep in thought. During a total power failure, the entire factory's production process stopped. The target for achieving production volume would not be achieved and all Shift-3 operators were practically unemployed.
It was dark too. There could be safety issues. How could I explain this to the Plant Manager? The generator was my responsibility, despite I was just a few months working there as New Hire. Come on, National Electric Company, how come the electricity blackout happened for so long?
Arriving at the factory, it was still pitch black. My team and I tried to solve the problem, but it still did not work. For solving technical problems my team was the experts, so my role was more towards guiding the team so that the troubleshooting was done systematically, not randomly. It was like, if a car broke down, don't immediately disassemble the tires without knowing the root cause of the problem. Check first, who knows if the spark plugs are wet?
We finally found the root cause of the Generator failure. It seems that one component of the circuit breaker was damaged. Uncle Herry recommended bypassing the electric wiring. Was it safe? I asked him. He assured me it was safe, just a temporary fix.
Under pressure to get the factory up and running again, I decided on the spot to take the risk to bypass the electric wiring. Finally, the Generator engine turned on around 8 am to power the whole factory again, just as the Front Office employees arrived to work.
Feeling guilty and somewhat panicked, I walked to the Front Office to report the matter to Robbie the Plant Manager, my Boss. In the corridor, the other Line Managers looked at me with blaming eyes. Understandably, because their production line was stopped for 4 hours, and the volume target for that day was not achieved.
Then I met Robbie in the corridor, and I immediately reported him, with a bit of a stutter because of panic, starting from the chronology of events from 4 AM, the temporary fix that we applied, and the permanent fix that we planned - the supplier will come to replace the damaged components that afternoon. I was mentally ready to be scolded.
But surprisingly, Robbie only said one short sentence that I still remember ~20 years later, “You solved it anyway!” he said while smiling, as he patted my shoulder.
That was amazing! I felt so relieved. Instead of blaming this New Hire for shutting the factory down for 4 hours due to the Generator issue, he patted me on the shoulder and cheered me on! What a Leader!
I documented the Lessons Learned from the problem and took systemic actions to avoid similar issues in the future. My confidence in problem-solving was growing. My loyalty to the Leader was getting stronger. From then on, I was determined that if I wanted to be a Leader, I wanted to be someone like Robbie!
