Curt Walker, Structural Models Artist

How long have you been with TSI?

9.653 years

What did you do before you started working at TSI?

Operations/Maintenance at Grain Elevator
Cut Trees
Made art

What do you do at TSI?

Build museum exhibits, silly.
No, really I’m involved with most aspects of the fabrication process.

What do you like best about TSI?

Variety of tasks, like-minded folks

What’s your favorite TSI project?

Probably Eli Lilly or the Pegasus or Audubon

Eli Lilly Sculpture

Why?

They’re most closely related to my personal type of work, just refined.  Felt like the type of work I was meant to make.

What’s something your coworkers don’t know about you?

Top Secret

What’s the favorite part of you day?

Depends on the day.

Tony Taylor, Metal Shop Lead:

How long have you been with TSI?

10 years

What did you do before you started working at TSI?

Industrial welding

What do you do at TSI?

Metals Lead, Safety Coordinator, & Jack of Most Trades

What do you like best about TSI?

The variety of our projects.

What’s your favorite TSI project?

Kenosha Public Museum, Kenosha, WI

Why?

We got lost and drove around rural roads with a giant Dunkleosteus “Dunk” on a trailer asking for directions.

What’s something your coworkers don’t know about you?

I don’t like my hands to smell like food when I’m done eating.

What’s the favorite part of you day?

In the morning, when I wake up our twins and 10:00 at night when I can work on projects.  (Like the ones here)

I have talked with many business owners who offer incentives in some fashion.  I have also heard stories of how many of these have backfired or the owner is frustrated with the entitlement mentality that develops.  I will share my story.

Many years ago, one of my managers proposed an incentive he thought would highly motivate our sculptors on a particular project.  I thought it was a good idea and we presented it, in writing, to a few of our lead artists.  We told these artists that if they beat their time goals by 5% we would offer so much, if they beat them by 10% we would offer them a little more and if they beat them by 15% we would offer even more.  Beyond that we thought quality would suffer.  Their work had to be approved by our Art Director.

The project went very well.  The work was some of our best and the team beat their time goals by more than 20%.  As we had agreed in writing, I gave out checks to this small group of artists for the 15% bonus amount.  I had also recently given an end of year bonus that was quite large.  Right after giving out the checks the artists came into my office together.  They had checks in hand and demanded more.  I was shocked.  I thought I had been extremely generous.  I paid them more than our agreed upon salaries to do what their job descriptions required in the first place.  I had just given out other bonuses, too.  They took home several thousand dollars more than usual.  I, of course, said “no” to their demands and was hurt that they were not more appreciative of the extras I had given already.

On the next several projects, productivity and attitude spiraled down hill with some of these artists because  I was not offering the same incentive.  I assume they thought they should share in all profits going forward.  Of course, they didn’t think of paying for the losses and taking the risks, too.  Behavior really began to become unprofessional as time went by.  One of the artists wrote FU on the back of a groundform we fabricated.  Another took a knife to insulation in one of our newly constructed buildings.  Their attitude and behavior was shocking.  In the end, after several months, two of them were let go from the company.

I have never offered this type of incentive again.  Since then, I have read articles like the this one by Alfie Kohn that discusses why incentives don’t work.  Daniel Pink’s latest book Drive also discusses how some rewards do not motivate us.  Personally, I have been motivated by potential rewards.  For instance, I chose to study business instead of equine science, so I could buy my own horse.  Even so, I am still leery of offering incentives.

What motivates you?  Would you offer incentives?

Last Year my mother asked, “What do you want for Christmas?”  I answered “Why a cigar box and yardstick of course.”  Box and yardstick in tow, I searched for scrap wood, a slotted spoon, a fork, a skeleton key, some suspenders, a belt and whatever else I felt thought I could use. Within a few weeks, I had a good sounding acoustic three-string guitar and a whole new appreciation for common utensils. I then took on the challenge of amplifying the guitar since I play live music every weekend and I wanted this thing to be heard. I learned about alnico - a system of five magnets, thread size wire and the workings of magnetic pick-ups.  I cut a bobbin out of wood, put six to eight thousand wraps of wire by hand around it, soldered tone and volume knobs, plugged it in and let her rip.  I couldn’t believe all the great sound that came out of that little box. It was capable of producing sound that was sparkly clean all the way to the heaviest of distortion.

I’ve been playing the red one quite a bit and it almost never strays out of tune and it’s extremely durable. 

I plan to keep making a variety of these unique instruments to sell so that other people can have fun with them too.  Thanks for checking them out!

Tony T

Tony is our metal shop lead and has been with TSI for 10 years.  Check back soon for his bio in Meet the Staff Mondays.