Quality Control Engineer Wins Westlake Friendship Prize

On September 24， 2009， days before the 60th annual celebration of the founding of the People’s Republic of China， Zhejiang Provincial People’s Government held a medal ceremony in Hangzhou， the capital of Zhejiang Province， to present 2009 West Lake Friendship Prize， an annual program launched in 1997 to reward foreign experts in Zhejiang for their outstanding contributions to the social， economic and cultural development of Zhejiang and China. Thirty foreign experts from 12 countries including USA， Germany， Korea， Japan， Australia and Italy received the honor for 2009.

Malcolm， an American quality control engineer with Wanxiang Group headquartered in Hangzhou， was one of the 2009 West Lake Friendship Prize recipients.

Malcolm was excited to receive the medal and certificate from Chen Jiayuan， vice provincial governor of Zhejiang. This honor recognized his work over past three years in quality control at Wanxiang Group.

Professionally， Malcolm grew from an engineer in charge of development of quality control tools for assembly lines to a senior auto parts quality control expert. In 2006， he began to work with Wanxiang as a technical support in quality control on behalf of a Wanxiang client. His contribution was greatly appreciated by Wanxiang management. Wanxiang finally hired Malcolm to head its technology center and serve as director of project management and quality improvement.

The 58-year-old American is fully dedicated. His Chinese colleagues praise him for his all-around presence in regular project managers meeting every afternoon， English and technology sessions， and quality control meetings. He hosts these in-house programs. In the evening， he often appears at the English corner at the headquarters.

Nearly 1，000 employees at Wanxiang have taken part in his quality training courses. Many Chinese colleagues have greatly improved their language proficiency and fluency. At the Wanxiang Technology Center， all the executives and engineers speak English with Malcolm. With the language barrier down， the center now works most effectively.

Foreign experts at Wanxiang usually have independent offices of their own， but Malcolm chooses to share a large office with dozens of colleagues. The only difference between his cubicle and those of his colleagues is that his partitions are a little bit higher. Malcolm mixes well with his colleagues and three of his colleagues have become his close friends.

Over the past three years， Malcolm has successfully introduced a quality， cost and delivery system into all manufacturing plants of Wanxiang. Data and graphics are used as control tools to monitor quality， cost and delivery. With his help， technical and quality control solutions are found for seven major quality problems and a databank of 450 cases has been established. Over the past three years， he successfully led the development of many auto parts programs for major international automakers in America， Germany and Korea and other European countries. These programs now contribute RMB 200 million in sales volume per year to Wanxiang. Under his leadership， Wanxiang Group has improved its project management and product quality by a large margin. Wanxiang now serves as a major international tier-one supplier to Ford， General Motor， and Volkswagen.

Malcolm looks like a typical American cowboy， but he has a tender heart. He chats with his wife twice a day through Internet video software. He donated 3，000 yuan in cash to the victims of Sichuan earthquake in May 2008. Colleagues reveal that he is sponsoring a college student from a needy family in Ningbo， but he wants to keep a low profile on his support of the student. He once asked a colleague to help him continue to support the college student if he went back to America.

Malcolm has learned about Chinese culture and he is able to understand some simple Chinese conversations about everyday life. In his days off， he and his Chinese friends play badminton， fish， travel， and picnic. When he is on home leave in America， he sends photos back to share with his Chinese colleagues in Hangzhou.□