Welcome to the October 2007 issue of Business & Industry Connection (BIC), America’s largest industrial, environmental and construction magazine.   

BIC has been blessed with steady growth for 22 years, particularly the past 10.  I say “steady” in that we have enjoyed many consecutive years of growth, but in none of those years have we had an exponential or astounding growth rate. It has been slow and steady.  

Over my career, I have seen many companies grow at an astounding rate over a year or two. Visiting with these business owners, sometimes I become envious, wishing somehow I could enjoy such wild gains. I think it is a very human response.  

Recently, a friend I hadn’t heard from in some time called and asked me to lunch. Knowing BIC Alliance operates a recruiting firm, Ind-Viro Search (IVS), he wanted me to help him find a job. Less than a year earlier, he had quit a job in sales management where he was well thought of and where he had just begun to reap some of the cumulative effects of repeat business and flattening his on-the-job learning curve. On the outside of his situation, I remember thinking he was leaving his job at the wrong time, but he had already quit by the time I learned he was even considering it.   

He had left the sales management position to start his current job — one that promised to grow his income at an astounding rate over a year or two. Like many home-run swings, only a few connect. His new job hadn’t worked out a fraction as well as he had hoped. 

A review of his résumé laid evidence to a clear pattern of moving from one job to another, not for a better job or even a higher salary, but to seek a home-run hit. This guy, like most of us, wanted to get rich fast. His sorry state of affairs made me think of two principles of success in my life that I hope you can apply to yours.  

First there is another race to run outside of the Rat Race. When we make consumerism, acquisition and pursuit of perfect financial status the goal for ourselves, we are running the Rat Race. And who has won the Rat Race? Nobody. It is a meaningless pursuit. Whoever loves money never has enough money; whoever loves wealth is never satisfied with his income. Fortunately there are other races to run, other goals worthy of achievement (and achievable with effort). Think about your own goals and dreams. What race are you running? Would you like to get out of the Rat Race and into another? Should you? 

The second principle recognizes that we must and suggests how we go about earning a living to support the pursuit of the goals more worthy than the Rat Race. I’ve always thought it interesting that the Bible teaches, “If a man shall not work, he shall not eat.” By definition, everyone in the Rat Race is willing to work to some extent. Personal industry is a virtue. It is how we exercise that virtue that gives us a framework for meaning and success. Ancient wisdom instructs that “he who gathers money little by little makes it grow.”

As I said, BIC has been blessed with slow and steady growth for 22 years. Our goal has been to provide the best communication service to the process industries, not to simply make a profit, and it has served us well. We have grown into the largest multi-industry, multijob title publication in the United States.

Over the years, we have worked, tweaked and reworked a proven formula, providing a niche service in a niche market, under an unrelenting monthly production schedule. Our business model includes a broad scope of useful and industry-friendly editorial, which sets us apart from other publications.  

Typical of the comments I receive on our publication, a maintenance foreman at OSHA’s VPPPA conference in Washington, D.C., recently said that BIC magazine was one of the only publications that he could put on the control room table. His company’s guidelines (like many others) restrict publications in the facility to reading material that is deemed useful to the workers in the scope of their work. Other magazines simply don’t make it to the floor, he said. 

For many years BIC has carried editorial on behalf of various associations. Dave Meyer, national chairman of ABC, has continued ABC’s Construction Industry Update in BIC magazine started by former Chairman Tom Musser more than six years ago. His use of BIC as a communications tool to reach ABC membership and other key industry decision makers has served as a fine example of how BIC is being utilized in a positive fashion by industry.

Texas Chemical Council (TCC) President Hector Rivero has published a general TCC update column for a while now. Similarly, the Louisiana Chemical Association provides editorial each issue in the form of a commentary in the department “Chemical Connections.”

In recent months, we have published contributions from other associations such as the National Petrochemical & Refiners Association, the Society of Maintenance and Reliability Professionals, the Independent Liquid Terminals Association, the Western States Petroleum Association, the American Society of Safety Engineers, the Interstate Oil & Gas Compact Commission, American General Contractors, the American Society of Mechanical Engineers, and the American Subcontractors Association, among others.  

Still further, many professionals within manufacturing and service companies make the extra effort to share their vast experience with you, submitting guest articles on a myriad of topics, such as safety, environmental issues, maintenance, purchasing, turnarounds and technologies to name but a few. 

We at BIC are fortunate that so many qualified individuals and associations recognize our publication as the right tool for information sharing and dissemination.  This has been our race to run, and we have not done it alone. You have been critical to our success. Thank you all for your incredible efforts to network and share information and insight with your peers, inuring to the greater good of our industry, and ultimately, our country. 

If you, your facility, company or your association would be interested in having some news or an article published, or perhaps even interested in sponsoring a subject matter column similar to what ABC or TCC/ACIT is doing, please give me or BIC’s Editorial Director Kaye Benham a call.  

This issue of BIC features insight from industry executives Charles O. Holliday Jr., chairman of the board and CEO of DuPont, and John Martinez, plant manager for Air Products.

This issue also includes the BIC Safety Roundtable, an overview of training offered by BIC Alliance partners, an introduction to the Canadian Chemical Producers’ Association, and articles focusing on a variety of industry hot topics from available training grants and tax incentives to the need for quality training in NDT.

Next month, Earl will be back in this spot. Meanwhile, we hope that you will refer your friends and colleagues to www.bicmagazine.com, where BIC magazine is being read in its entirety worldwide.

To contact Thomas, you can e-mail him at tbrinsko@bicalliance.com.