It’s time for our meeting with one of the largest companies in the world of forestry. It’s at Pioneer Square that we’re greeted by Allan Bradshaw, VP of Engineering at Weyerhaeuser’s new office. Offices of modern and refined style, the new premises of Weyerhaeuser are up to date and doesn’t leave people indifferent to the beauty and majesty of them.
Following Mr. Bradshaw’s warm welcome, we headed to the 8th-floor meeting room where we were waiting for appetizers and drinks. During the dinner, we had the opportunity to introduce ourselves and get to know the seven Weyerhaeuser employees who have concocted this memorable day of exchange and learning in the field of engineering.
During the lunch, we learned that the secret behind Weyerhaeuser’s success was based on three main elements. First, this forest company adopts well-defined fundamental values: safety, integrity, responsibility and sustainable development. Secondly, ideals such as the development of manpower and the relentless pursuit of improved process efficiency are adopted. Finally, five essential behaviors are recommended. Among these required employee behaviors are conviction, responsibility, courage, favoring simplicity where possible and creativity. Such a type of speech is held by the majority of engineering companies, but through presentations made during the rest of the day and questions we were able to ask the various employees present, we were very inspired to find that Weyerhaeuser seems to be a company with a clear vision and values that are really important to them.
As Weyerhaeuser works in the forest harvest, several environmental issues are present in the values of the company. In fact, since 1925, before this became a global issue, the company had already started replanting trees where it was harvesting forests. This is the first company in America to have started replanting trees after commercial deforestation. Woodcutting represents only 2 percent of the available wood on their land each year. This means that Weyerhaeuser is concerned about the environment and that the preservation of their forest is important to them. Over the last 10 years, 1 billion trees have been planted by the company to counter the deforestation caused by logging.
An interesting fact presented by Ms. Kristen Sawin is that logging is useful for reducing the carbon concentration in the air. The explanation is that logging can grow many new trees that act as batteries to store carbon for hundreds of years.
During the presentation of the engineers of the automation department, we had the chance to learn more about their current issues. The engineers presented the problems, proposed solutions and their plans to implement them in the factories concerned. With the help of technical drawings and diagrams, they allowed us to have a first contact with the wood products processing industry and were able to answer our questions about the different stages of the transformation processes.
It is with our heads filled with new insights and ideas from discussions with Weyerhaeuser staff that we leave the offices in the heart of the beautiful Pioneer Square neighborhood. Everyone agrees that doing an internship at Weyerhaeuser primarily in the new Seattle office would be a great opportunity for any engineering student.