RE: Master
In His Own Write
Dear Geoffrey,
You were blessed with one smart,
beautiful, and loving wife and four children who are mirrors of their
parents. Geoffrey II has enjoyed great success and so he should. He
is very talented.
Shura never sought fame or fortune. He just loved
his craft. Even with his own two sons he spoke so humbly about his work.
Both remarked to me over the weekend, “We had no idea our dad
was so highly regarded!” However, I am sure his family will feel
so proud that Shura will be remembered by your gesture as the great
journalist he was for years to come.
I think Shura and I in many ways were “joined
at the hip” because our chats always started at the outer boundaries
of airfreight and quite often from a contrarian point of view. Over
the years as we saw airfreight companies replace airfreight with logistics
in their names, we used to chuckle to ourselves—do the customers
see any improvements in service?
We thought JIT was more a costly pipedream than a
reality. We always believed outsourcing would do a complete 180 degrees.
We thought if airfreight companies concentrated on the meat and potatoes
way of doing business, we all might be making more money today. Customers
have forwarders on the run, and the rule of thumb is, the more that
is done for nothing, the better the customer likes it. Kilo millionaires
now abound!
I shall truly miss our weekly musings. Politically,
we were both left of center and I think it helped us remain grounded.
It is far easier on the soul to root for and care about the underdog.
Today airfreight is only left with Fred Smith. All
those heads of companies, e.g. John C. Emery Jr., John Robinson, Gunter
Rohrmann, Joe Berg, Larry Rodberg, Roger McFarlane, Peter Rose et al
are all gone. They were all strong, passionate personalities and great
leaders. Today by comparison, we are left with a parade of faceless
people hidden inside their bunkers!
Best regards,
Julian |
