Why Foreigners Are Welcomed In The USA

Another nonproductive implemented change was that Darth informed me he was
organizing a series of management meetings which was to include myself, Ralph Simpson, Bill James, head of production, Dave Lipton, head of the computer room, Jay Wells, head of technical services, and of course Carl Host, the titleless wonder. Darth explained that he was conducting a similar series for the sales department and wanted to do the same for production/laboratory managers. He also made it a point to tell me that everyone thought the management meetings was a good idea, except Ravi. Ravi had opposed my attending the meeting. I was surprised at Darth's statement because he was just fueling the problem and he was keeping me in an insecure position by telling me of Ravi's opposition.

My inclusion to the management meetings supported the story that I was to be a manager and, in fact, that was how it was presented to me. I was to be a manager in the future. However, all of the other attendees were managers with appropriate titles and responsibilities, except for Carl Host who just seemed to float around the laboratory, production and technical services. While inclusion in the management meetings seemed good for me on the surface, I would learn in time that the purpose of these meetings served a much more sinister purpose.

In September of 1976, Buzhoha Yazzi returned to Gamma Supplies from Iran. Buzz, as everyone called him, was an Iranian citizen who had worked for Gamma Supplies for several years and then had returned home and had stayed there for six months before returning to Gamma Supplies. Darth had told me in August that Buzz would be returning, but no effort was made to introduce me to Buzz when he finally showed up in the laboratory one day. Finally, I went into the lab and introduced myself. It was apparent that Buzz did not consider me his boss, and there was no indication that he had been told that was the case.

Buzz was a diminutive, outspoken man who was to become another one of my
antagonists. Buzz's general attitude was summed up one day when he said, “You
Americans have too much freedom.” However, when it came to Iran, he believed Iranians should have more freedom under the American supported tyrant, the Shah of Iran. I guess I should have asked him if he didn't like in the U.S., why didn't he stay in Iran.

As time and events went on in subsequent years, I found Buzz was to be the first of several foreign nationals that American industry and government found to be more valuable than native American citizens. It is not surprising then that illegal foreign workers today have become a major political problem.

Buzz quickly decided he did not want to work in the main laboratory across from my office where John, Jeff and I worked, but instead, he wanted to work in what was called the lower quality control laboratory. Since that laboratory was separated from the main research laboratory by a fire door which was always kept closed, he was virtually hidden from all observation in that location. This made it difficult for me to keep track of the work he was doing. I expressed my concern at his working in the lower laboratory, but like everything else, I was powerless to take any corrective action. In fact, Darth quickly sided with Buzz and said there was no problem with Buzz working in the lower laboratory. Later, Buzz's relationship with Darth was to become much like John Mason's relationship with Ravi.

The subtle failures by Darth to back any of my recommendations in the beginning was to escalate into direct criticism of my actions. I was having difficulty dealing with everyone. Ravi was openly hostile, John was openly and aggressively antagonistic, Buzz was uncooperative and Jeff was generally lethargic. Coincidently, the first management meeting was to offer an explanation for all of my difficulties.

The first management meeting was held on September 27, 1976 in a rented room at the Red Carpet Inn near the airport. Darth talked about how the Gamma Supplies organization and his philosophy on why the company should grow. He talked about making acquisitions and how it was best to expand in hard times. It was like a stockbroker telling you the way to succeed in the stock market was to buy low and sell high. Everyone knows that but the key is in execution. Still, Darth made it sound as though he was revealing some sort of magic formula for company growth.

This was followed by the main theme of the first meeting which was that the Gamma Supplies organization was a horizontal, and not a vertical hierarchy. Management was done by persuasion and all people had equal say in things. Management by decree was not acceptable. Later one of the participants called what Darth had described as “bottoms up management.”

As part of the management meetings, we were given short texts to read in advance, and then we were asked to make an analysis of the scenario depicted. The first story we were given to analyze was was about a new manager in a company who wanted to make a change. To effect the change the manager sent out a memo detailing the procedure he wanted followed. The story went on to explain how no one followed his instructions and how his actions had disastrous consequences. Darth used this to expound on his theme that Gamma just did not operate that way. The analogy to my situation and my memo on monthly reports was hard to miss, and of course the obvious implied conclusion was that I had acted incorrectly.

I found it curious that Darth took most of the meetings time to dwell on a subject that really only applied to me since I was the only new "manager" in the group. He could have spent ten minutes in private to tell how he wanted things done. But instead he did it through suggestion and implication. (I was to learn much latter that the use of suggestion and implications are key to mind control and mental torture.) I thought to myself that maybe I was suppose to wait for the people in the laboratory to decide they wanted to write monthly reports! I felt like telling Darth to take his job and shove it, but somehow I got the feeling Darth knew I was trapped economically and had to put up with his BS.