|
|
American Woman Motorscene
Helen Petrauskas
Ford's Top Woman Champions Safety and
Health Issues-and Does it With a Smile
If a highly sophisticated individual's
gestalt could be captured in a single
phrase, Helen Petrauskas' might be
"Let's reason together."
The brilliant scientist turned
lawyer has succeeded in the
emotionally charged arena of
environmental and safety debate,
regulation and litigation with a
fundamental belief that clear
reasoning can overcome
confrontation.
Petrauskas, Ford Motor Company
vice president of Environmental and
Safety Engineering, has built unprecedented
cooperation with calm words,
and always with consideration for the
interpersonal side of even the most
technically complex issues.
"Helen Petrauskas has gained the
respect of government,
environmentalists, consumerists and
the toughest group of all, Ford's own
scientific community," said Lou Ross,
Ford vice chairman.
"She is the rare person who can
raise sensitive issues with out raising
voices. Helen wins people over with
precise facts and irrefutable logic,
and with a warmth that's both
non-confrontational and compelling."
Petrauskas has been convincing.
She has convinced government that
new environmental technologies
should be phased in to best serve the
public...convinced Ford to lead the
industry in airbag
implementation...and convinced
Eastern Bloc countries on the best
way to establish environmentally
benign legislation.
Petrauskas is uniquely qualified to
bridge the communications gap
between diverse research and
political cultures. For bridging
cultures- philosophical, national and
even gender- is a skill she has learned
through necessity.
Born Helen Olena Slywynskyj in
Lviv, Ukraine, she was just three
days old when her family escaped in
a horse-drawn wagon just hours
ahead of the advancing Soviet army
in 1944.
The Slywynskyj family was well
educated and politically active, both
facts that would place them at great
risk under the coming communist
regime. Her father, Osyp, was a
lawyer and intellectual, her mother,
Maria, a concert pianist. Family
members unable to escape, including
her grandfather, who was a high
school principal, were sent to Siberia,
where they eventually died in the
labor camps.
After spending three years on a
farm in Austria, the Slywynskyj
family was sponsored to come to
America by Mary Beck, a long-time
Detroit councilwoman and active
member of Detroit's large Slavic
community.
Blending into the fabric of the
American tapestry wasn't easy for the
Slywynskyjs. Osyp, unable to practice
law here, got a job in a tool and dye
shop. Maria developed a heart
condition that kept her bed-ridden for
most of Helen's formative years. With
a brother, Mark, five years younger
than Helen, the family endured.
"What I remember most about
those years was the example my
parents set. They never complained,"
Helen said. " They made the most of
what life gave them, and retained a
remarkable enthusiasm for life.
"It also taught me that a person is
defined by more than what he or she
does for a living. Even as a machine
shop worker, my father retained a
rich intellectual life. I've always
appreciated the lessons my parents
taught me, and tried to emulate
them."
Helen spoke her native language
at home and in the Ukrainian
community, which became a problem
when she entered public school
without a firm basis in English. "I
excelled in math," she said, "only
because it was the one subject I
could understand."
When Helen was 13 years old, she
and her father went to the Federal
Building to be sworn in as U.S.
citizens. While they were away at the
ceremony, her mother died. "We held
together as a family after that," Helen
remembers. "All of us pitched in and
got through it as a family."
With outstanding performance in
math and science, Helen was given
the opportunity to attend Cass Tech
High School, Detroit's hub school for
concentrated studies in the sciences.
From there, Helen entered Wayne
State University in Michigan, and
with the help of small scholarships,
loans and many menial jobs, was able
to pay her tuition. One of her after
school jobs, as an assistant in a
doctor's office, was a great influence
on her life.
"Dr. Sol Meyers insisted that I not
just do clerical work, but actually
learn about medical procedures working
for him," Helen said. "I remember Dr. Meyers"
saying, "Time passes whether you
learn anything or not, so you might as
well learn.'" Yet it was more than that.
Helen became a voracious learner, a
characteristic she would retain
throughout her career, always wanting
to know and understand all of the
facts, no matter how seemingly
peripheral.
"It's obsessive," she admits,
laughing. "I can't stop reading. I even
read the cereal box if there isn't
anything else at hand."
At Wayne State, Helen became
more social, as well. She got involved
in International Student Activities,
and thoroughly enjoyed the mixing of
people from extremely different ethnic
backgrounds. It was at an International
Student function that she met
Ray Petrauskas.
"Ray had an immigrant
background, too. He was
Lithuanian," Helen noted. "What
drew me to him was his boundless
curiosity. He wasn't afraid to try
things. He'd take anything apart to
see how it worked, then put it back
together." Ray, a law student, and
Helen were married in 1969.
Helen graduated from Wayne with
majors in mathematics and chemistry
and found a job as a chemist at
Sherwin Williams paint company in
Detroit.
"Sherwin Williams was a small
operation where you got involved in
everything," she said. "My lab was
just around the corner from
manufacturing, which was just
around the corner from sales. I
remember thinking then how
unsophisticated such a small
operation was. It was only a year
later that I realized what a great
opportunity it had been to be
involved with an entire business-
from research right through to going
out and serving customers. It was
great."
Helen's first assignment was to
deal with an environmental challenge.
Federal regulations were just emerging
then, and a major challenge was solvents
in paint. Helen developed and patented a
water-based paint for automotive applications.
At the same time, she wanted to
go to grad school at night. But she had a
problem. "Math was my specialty, and
while I could to the equations and come
up with the right answers,
I never 'got' it. My brother
Mark was also a math major, and he
had the ability to see the entire
concept in his mind. I felt that
without the ability to see the big
picture, my future in science would
be limited."
Ray had just graduated from law
school, and he discussed his studies
with Helen at home. Soon she began
taking law classes at night at Wayne
State. "I took to law naturally," she
remembers. "Here was the challenge
of seeking to describe the rules by
which people choose to live together...
the balance of the rights of the
individual with the rights of the
whole. With law, I could see the
broad interrelationships, the big picture.
With law, I got it."
Her life at Sherwin Williams was
increasing its demands as she worked
with a new automotive electro-coating
customer to see her patented
water-based paint into production.
The second life was at night, in the
intensive final year of law school.
And the third life was within her;
Helen was pregnant.
"I wasn't sure which would happen
first, Job One on my paint project,
final exams or delivery," she
laughs. "It was Job One, which I finished
just before Laura was born.
Two weeks later, I took my final
exams. "
Helen graduated Magna Cum
Laude from Wayne State University
Law School in 1970, and immediately
began looking for a new career
challenge. In May 1971, Helen began
as a corporate lawyer in Ford's Office
of the General Counsel.
Because of her background in
chemistry and the sciences, she was
drafted immediately to serve as legal
advisor to research and engineering
on upcoming environmental regulations.
"It was a difficult time in the auto
industry," Helen recalls. "Government
and the environmentalists
weren't willing to reach out to us.
They were to busy yelling at us and
at each other."
Helen apprenticed with Herb
Misch, Ford vice president, government
affairs, whose perspective she
admired. "One of the things he
taught me was to look at problems
from the other guy's perspective.
If a society says it's a problem, it is.
Whether it's logical or scientifically
valid is an entirely different issue.
Societal goals aren't a matter of scientific
consensus."
Misch and Petrauskas took on
their first major challenge in the mid '70's.
Government regulators had
developed an "all-at-once" approach
that mandated that a new, untried
technology be applied on all vehicles
at once. "Only a fool jumps head first
into unfamiliar waters," Misch said.
"We felt we had to fight for phased-in
technologies, time to perfect them
before making millions of customers
our final testers.
"Government," Helen added, "was
simply asking the wrong question. It
asked, 'Can you do it?', And the only
answer we could give was 'yes, and
no.' Yes we can do it, but no, not
without a reasonable timetable for
implementation."
Ford's environmental team argued
its case to the regulatory agencies and lost,
then took the argument to the courts,
and won. As Helen said, "It was a
victory for common sense."
Helen's reputation within the
company and the environmental
community was growing. Her
personal style was especially
appreciated by the engineers and
scientists with whom she worked.
Petrauskas moved up
through the ranks, as Assistant
Director in 1979, to Director in 1980,
to Executive Director of
Environmental and Safety
Engineering in 1983. Promotions
created a new challenge for Helen.
On the legal staff, everyone worked
independently, writing their own
papers, developing strategies. Now
as Executive Director, she was
manager of more than 300 people.
Petrauskas recognized that her new
role was to "provide a context" in
which individuals could develop and
mature.
The management style she eventually
made her own was Socratic: asking
questions, eliciting ideas, assisting
people through a reasoning process
to get, to conclusions. "A lot of
old-time managers expect leaders to
go right to simplistic, bottom-line
conclusions. That's not Helen's
way," said Kelly Brown, director of
Vehicle Environmental Engineering,
who has worked with Helen for more
than 15 years "Her answers are
thoughtful, complete, not sound
bites."
Petauskas proved to be a
tough negotiator in and outside of
Ford when she championed airbags.
She believed strongly that airbags
combined with seatbelts were the
right direction for the industry, even
though General Motors, Chrysler and
American Motors were taking
public stands against air bag technology.
Internally Helen formed an alliance
with Lou Ross, then North American
Automotive Operations' chief executive.
Together they argued to develop a
large demonstration fleet by selling
airbags to owners.
Externally, Helen had to break
ranks with the other auto
manufacturers. She appeared before
Secretary of Transportation bearings
on passive restraints and surprised
everyone by proposing a mandatory
four-year demonstration project on
airbags. Many people in the industry
credit Petrauskas for influencing an
entirely new direction for Ford on safety
issues.
Helen worked to build alliances for
her position, first gaining endorsement
from the Insurance Institute for
Highway Safety, then encouraging
General Motors to change its position
and back the Ford demonstration
proposal. Once again, Helen Won.
Her achievements also were recognized
internally, and in March 1983,
Petrauskas was elected to vice president.
"Being named an officer of the
company made me far more aware of
my responsibility to represent Ford. I
was no longer just speaking for Helen
Petrauskas. That was a sobering
thought."
There was yet another aspect of her
vice presidency she hadn't considered.
Petrauskas was now the
highest-ranking woman at Ford, the
first female officer of the company. It
brought her onto every committee for
"diversity," and forced her to reflect
on her role as a woman in a
traditionally male industry. "Frankly,
women my age really don't give a lot of
thought to differences in treatment.
We tend to ignore it, and sometimes
use it to our benefit," Helen said. "But
I've heard a great number of young
women expressing themselves lately,
and it's forcing me to rethink diversity.
One thing I'm certain of is that we've
got to see diversity more positively-
with women and people of different
races-as strength, not a potential
interpersonal problem area. The more
unique and distinctively different
perspectives we can bring to every
discussion, the more creative and
innovative Ford decisions will be.
That's the strength of diversity Ford is
beginning to apply. It's an exciting new
age."
While her office placed even more
demands on her time, Helen and
husband Ray decided to add a new
measure of diversity to their own
lives. "As lawyers, both Ray and I
worked with our minds all day, so we
felt a need to get outside and do
things with our hands," Helen
explained.
They bought a 70-acre farm 40
miles beyond the Detroit city limits,
and changed lifestyles entirely. "I
always hated fall and winter until we
got the farm," she said. "Now I see the
beauty in the seasons, and I can tell
you the time of year by reading the
wildflowers."
Her daughter Laura, now in
graduate school at the University of
Southern California, is far more of a city
person, yet both women have much in
common. Laura loves music like her
grandmother and is becoming a lawyer
like her grandfather, mother, father,
and uncle. Yes, Helen's brother Mark
eventually gave up math and became a
lawyer, too.
"Laura isn't that interested in the
farm; she's too young for that," Helen
said. "But we share our love of
learning. One of the greatest
experiences of my life has been when
Laura introduces me to new authors
and new ideas. It's a sense of
completion; you open the world to
your child and now she opens worlds
for you. It's a miracle."
Petrauskas completed the circle in
another way when she was
appointed by President George Bush
to represent the U.S. in Eastern
Europe with the Environmental Law
Institute.
For three years, Helen shuttled
back and forth across the Atlantic
frequently to attend one- and
two-week sessions helping to set up
a Regional Environment Center in
Budapest, Hungary. On these trips,
she was less than 300 miles from her
birthplace in the Ukraine, yet she
never once visited.
"I was too busy with the work of
the Center to go sightseeing," she
said. "There's much to do in
establishing environmental goals for
the emerging market economies."
While Helen hasn't returned to
her Ukrainian home, she returns
frequently to the institutions in
Detroit that have helped her find a
home here. Petrauskas is active in the
Wayne State University Alumni
Association, is on the Board of
Directors of Sherwin Williams
Company (her first employer) and is
involved in and supportive of the
Ukrainian community in Detroit.
Petrauskas has new challenges to
keep her more than busy, for in 1994,
Ford Motor Company completely
restructured to focus on global
growth opportunities and to
establish new markets around the
world.
"People don't think of
environmental concerns in emerging
economies. Yet it really is essential to
establish long term goals from the
beginning."
Yet to Petrauskas, the truly
exciting aspect of Ford's dramatic
restructuring is that it's removing
barriers between Ford people,
allowing the company to more fully
leverage its global wealth of human
resources.
"This is really an exciting time to
be at Ford," Petrauskas said. "We've
restructured to bring people from
tremendously diverse backgrounds
together in cross-functional teams.
That richness of perspectives is
bound to mean more friction, but also
more enlightened decisions."
If Helen Petrauskas'
contributions-tempered by her own
rich cultural background-are any
indication, Ford Motor Company has
a world of opportunity ahead.
Want more information? Search the web!
Search The Auto Channel!
|
|
