The Smart Consultant Story

1961

A True Story

Written 09/2016 * 822 Words

#157 By Howard Yasgar

This true story was told to me in 1961 by Abe Zion.

Abe Zion was one of the smartest people that I ever had the privilege of meeting and working with.

Abe was involved in many things in his long career, and one of them was working as a business consultant.

As a consultant, Abe somehow had the ability to see things that others could not. I was always amazed at how he came up with simple solutions to very complex problems.

As a freelance consultant, Abe was available to come into business and advise the business owner how he could improve it.

Usually, Abe was called in when a business was failing, people called him in the hopes he could save the company.

However, that was not the case in this true story I am about to tell you.

One day Abe was in New York City having lunch with a friend.

As they sat in the restaurant, Abe’s friend recognized a fellow that he knew, he was a fellow that had a highly successful candy manufacturing company.

He called the fellow over to introduce him to Abe.

The candy manufacturer winced as soon as he heard Abe was a consultant.

He said his candy manufacturing operation had already been studied by all kinds of consultants and engineers and it was the most modern candy manufacturing plant in New York City.

Abe asked if someday he could stop by to see his candy operation as it was possible Abe could learn something from it.

The candy manufacturer was hesitant, but eventually he said yes,

So, the next week, Abe did stop in to see him.

Abe told me that he was impressed with the operation, the company had over 400 employees, and the owner took Abe on a walking tour.

They started the tour where the raw materials like sugar, chocolate and the various flavors were mixed.

It appeared that the company had the latest and most modern candy making equipment available.

There were several heated tunnels where the candies were covered in chocolate and then came out on conveyor belts.

There were women sitting there, making pretty swirls on top of each candy to identify what flavors were inside.

From that point Abe watched as the candies cooled and then went to the packaging department.

As the candy reached the end of the production line it was a thing of beauty to watch how everything was smoothly orchestrated.

40 pieces of Candy boxes came in on a conveyer and the top of the box was removed by an employee.

Automated machinery then put 40 assorted chocolates into the box.

As the box was filled, the employee inspected it, placed her inspection tag inside, then replaced the top of the candy box and it went on to be plastic wrapped.

Other than the women inspecting, and putting the candy box top on, everything was pretty much automated.

The factory owner proudly told Abe, “You can see why I don’t need advice from any consultants”.

When they were back in the office, Abe thanked the owner for allowing him to see his operation.

Then Abe said, would you give me $3000.00 if I could increase your production and it wouldn’t cost you a cent .to do it.

Abe said that the factory owner gave him a dirty look and said, “No”, so Abe gave him his business card and told

him if he ever changed his mind to call him.

About a week later, Abe got a call from the factory owner, he said he had looked over his operation several times since Abe had been there. Both his plant manager as well as their staff engineer said no one could increase their production.

But both of his employees had said that the owner should challenge Abe.

If Abe increased production, he would get $3000.00, but if there was no discernable increase in productivity, Abe would pay the factory owner $3000.00.

Abe came by the next day, and with everyone following behind him they walked to the final packaging line,

It was where the candy boxes with the little compartments were stacked by the hundreds.

Abe walked to the next stack of candy boxes coming down the conveyor line, he removed the cover from the top candy box and threw it into the trash.

Everyone in the room watching him was flabbergasted.

Now the packers no longer had to remove the cover off the first box before filling it.

Once the candy box was filled and inspected, the cover from the next box was put on the first box.

Abe got his $3000.00, and I have never forgotten the story.