Page 18 - May-June 2020 Vol38 No1
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Team Technology from page 16 Tell Me Something Good from page 5
of their communications. Discuss if their best practices And finally…from Hooch to Hand Sanitizers
can be successfully replicated within your team. Bryon Fortner, APWA Upper East Branch Director, brought to our
• Miscellaneous pro tips: If you’re a participant, mute
the mic when entering the meeting, and when not attention the work of his engineer friend, Greg Eidam, “who left his
talking (background noise can be distracting to the civil engineering career to become the head distiller for Sugarlands
entire group.) If you’re leading the meeting, perhaps use Distillery.”
a good set of headphones and microphone. Eliminate
distractions: close (and maybe lock) the doors around When the quarantine prompted public “panic buying” of certain
you, extract any animals or children, and turn down cleaning items, hand sanitizer became scarce. Eidam said the Federal
your cell phone if you’re operating by laptop, ipad or Drug Administration (FDA) allowed local distillers to “use an
desktop. Make sure you incorporate a time for questions alternative means of denaturing the alcohol. As a result, we can now
and answers at the end, so that any misconceptions make hand sanitizer…though only with a grain-neutral spirit we
immediately are corrected. purchase.”
• Email a post-meeting followup: A great best practice
is to email a TIMELY thank you follow-up note after Fortner was impressed at how fast Eidam, Sugarlands and other
each meeting, containing a brief summary of the group’s regional distilleries “pivoted” their work to produce a cleaning
call and its results: what you agreed to do, who’s doing product needed on the front lines, saying it’s “a great example of good
it and the timeline to accomplish that. This validates the ole American ingenuity to take what you’re already doing and modify
importance of the meeting, gives others an opportunity to meet a need…something Public Works folks have been doing for
to clarify any misunderstandings and shows that you’re centuries!?”
on the ball. They’ll be grateful.
• Try to embrace the “new normal”: While few things “And it’s of particular interest to folks like me whose facilities
can replace a firm handshake while looking someone maintenance functions are within Public Works. Our facilities guys
in the eye, or the power of networking before and after have been working overtime to keep us safe and properly supplied
a meeting, virtual meetings can have many advantages, with things like hand sanitizer,” Fortner said.
including saving travel time and costs, elimination
of event rental fees and enhancing effective social When we contacted Eidam, he chuckled, saying he never imagined
distancing…a new term that may be dictating how we the path his career would take him, going from civil engineering
communicate more frequently in the future. to becoming a head distiller, to more recently manufacturing hand
sanitizer in a pandemic. “I’m blending a batch (right) now for the
Gatlinburg Fire Department and Sevier County EMT,” he said. (A
batch of sanitizer, that is!!!)
And there you have it…thanks for telling us something good,
everyone.
18 TPW May/June 2020
