Return to Papua

I spent the first part of this week in Papua for mandatory training on Ken Blanchard's situational leadership.  The training itself was very good, reinforcing and providing a framework for an approach I've always taken in my management approach.  I would have preferred having the training in Jakarta instead of Papua, but I'm glad I attended nonetheless.

The real story behind the trip was the trip itself.  After the security issues from two years ago, we made changes to all of our transportation procedures.  I left Jakarta at 9 PM Sunday night on what is, basically, the company airline.  When the inflight materials are our monthly publication and the seatcovers are emblazoned with our logo, I think that's enough to say it's our airline, even though we don't own it.

We use these flights to pickup and drop off employees on leave - one of the compensation benefits we provide to our Papua employees.  We flew from Jakarta, to Bali, to Makassar, and finally to Timika, Papua.  In theory, the idea is that we sleep on the flight and are ready to go to work when we arrive in Papua the following morning.  In reality, taking off and landing - and the required deplaning in Makassar - means you get at best, 5 hours of sleep.  I got three.

When I landed in Papua, my next step was to take the first helicopter flight from the Timika airport to our facilities up the hill in Tembagapura.  It's a one hour trip by car, fifteen minutes by helicopter.  This was my first ever flight in a helicopter, so I was pretty excited.  The helicopter holds about thirty people and, due to the noise of the propellors, we all must wear ear protectors. 

We started using the helicopters to transport people after the shootings two years ago.  We still have buses that travel with armed escorts in a caravan, but priority passengers take the helicopter.  Very few people are permitted to drive their own vehicles up the hill.

The flight rises from about sea level at the airport to 6100 feet above sea level flying over, between and around mountains climbing to 16,000 feet in height.  The only tropical glacier in the world dominates the landscape in the mountains towering over the city.  The land is rugged, lush, and spectacularly beautiful, marred only by native settlements that dot the riverbanks.

My helicopter landed in Tembagapura shortly after 7 AM.  I checked in at my accomodations - a guest house in the center of the city - quickly freshened up and changed my clothes, and arrived fifteen minutes late for my 7:30 AM class.  Three hours of sleep, no breakfast - a walking zombie.

Tuesday, clouds hung over the city the whole day finally dumping rain for most of the afternoon.  This meant no helicopter flights.  There isn't a real airport in Tembagapura, so all flying requires high visibility conditions.  If there is any cloud cover on the flight path, we don't fly.  Those needing to go to the lowlands or catch a flight out of Timika can either reschedule their meetings/flights, or take the 90 minute bus ride.  Most opt to wait for the helicopter flights the next day.

Wednesday was time to return home.  I woke at 5 AM, went to the helipad at 5:30 and flew down in the first helicopter at 6:20 AM.  Flying back to Jakarta took the route Timika, Makassar, Surabaya, Jakarta.  I left Timika at 1 PM and arrived in Jakarta at 6:30 PM (gaining two hours in time difference along the way).

That was the first trip I've taken to the mine site in my two years in Jakarta.  I think once every two years is an appropriate interval for that trip.

 

 

 

 

 

Challenges of working abroad

We are all products of our environment and our experiences. I often wonder which has the greater impact on behavior – past or present experiences. I would argue that with people we know, we tend to weight the past more heavily than the present, overlooking minor slights, or major improvements, if past history reflects a different reality. With the unknown, however, I think primacy is the overriding factor. If we recently had a death in the family, we’re more likely to say we believe in ghosts, or the afterlife.

In medicine, and science as a whole, they follow a principle known as Occam’s Razor. Simply put, the simplest explanation is the most plausible and likely explanation. More colorfully put, when presented with symptoms, think horses, not zebras. Last week, at our mine site, we received another frantic call from a driver who was part of a caravan of vehicles in the jungle. While driving down one of the more remote roads, he heard a loud pop, and the windshield cracked.

He hit the brakes and dropped to the floor, grabbing at his radio to make the frantic call. Police, security, and military personnel converged on the scene to investigate. Their findings? A rock from the leading vehicle had flown through the air and hit the windshield. Occam’s Razor. Experiential inference, however, whispered: “Gunshot!”

I understand how the driver feels. Having experienced two earthquakes, and witnessed a city in distress – almost in a panic – after the hotel bombings, I, too, am more jittery than usual. Case in point – air conditioning. In our building, it is loud. When the compressor kicks on, and the vents open, I hear the deep “boom” and feel the change in air pressure. It’s exactly what I imagine a bomb blast would feel like, and what an earthquake does feel like, and I jump every time. Speaking with other expats, I’ve learned I’m not alone. Anyone who was in the building when a bomb exploded outside the Australian Embassy some years ago talk of being scared of moving vans, delivery trucks, and, yes, air conditioning for months, some until today.

A severe case of the jitters is not the only oddity one can enjoy working in Indonesia, especially at our mine site. We have a particular individual who stopped showing up for work over two weeks ago. Per our policy, we accept a three-day, unexcused absence as a voluntary resignation. One would think after two weeks we could post the position as open and fill it with a new person. Not so. Because this individual is a native to the island, we must obtain approval from the local tribal representatives. Technically, per policy, this is not a requirement. The labor agreement we have with them does not require it, either. The board that approves posting positions, however, will not allow us to fill it until the conversation happens.

Another example is when a local resigns or changes positions in the company. As soon as the local tribal representatives learn of a position vacated by a local – even if that local voluntarily transferred to a new position – they call to verify our intentions are to fill the vacancy with yet another local. Mayhem ensues if we do not.

Our annual report to the various national and local labor boards include itemizing the percentage of expats, percentage of Indonesians, and the percentage of Papuans. We have specific targets we must maintain of each classification. This should sound familiar to anyone who has ever heard of Affirmative Action.

Finally, and I have to be cautious how I word this for feel of being sent to jail, the application of the electronic defamation laws in Indonesia are interesting to observe. Back in June, I posted about a woman who went to jail for complaining about her hospital visit. Now, a TV host turned soap opera star used twitter to complain about entertainment journalists and has been reported to the police for defamation.

What an interesting world we live in.

The natives are restive

It's been a nervous week for anyone with a quick anxiety trigger.  In Papua, where we have our mine site, Indonesian police killed Kelly Kwalik, the purported leader of the Papuan Freedom Organization.  Many believe he was the mastermind behind the recent killings and other mayhem around our mine site earlier in the year.  After his death, many Papuans began to strike and/or demonstrate.  We received security alerts advising us to avoid Timika, the small town containing the airport we fly into when visiting our site, due to potentially unsafe activity.

Then came the reports of increased security at Christian churches throughout Indonesia.  For those of us who are new to the area, this was a bit surprising.  I view Indonesia as a well blended melting pot of religious tolerance.  Indonesia celebrates holidays from four religions and companies and employees alike have, by all accounts, displayed nothing but respect for religious differences.  So, when I first read about enhanced security, I was concerned that something new must be raising alarms.  Nope.  This is fairly common practice and has occurred since at least 2001, from what I've read.

Like any normal person, when confronted with this information I decided to work on my golf game.  The last two weekends I've spent Saturday mornings at a local driving range.  My first outing was horrible.  Today's actually went pretty well.  I felt good when I finished hitting a round of 100 balls (hopefully I won't hit that many on the course). 

Driving ranges in Jakarta are a little different than those in the US.  The one I chose to visit, like many in the US, is not attached to a golf course and has two storeys.  I was surprised to find that they also had caddies to take my clubs from the car to my reserved tee.  More surprising was how they collect the balls.  I'm accustomed to seeing a small, motorized vehicle that resembles a lawn-mower driving around the range collecting the balls.  Here, several men wearing construction helmets and dressed in what look like large, heavily padded rain coats that hang to mid-calf wander around kicking the balls into several piles.  Then a different man comes along with a large ball scoop and collects the balls for delivery to the tees.  Instead of one person driving a machine, they have roughly 15 people running around in padded suits.  When labor is cheaper than innovation, innovation doesn't occur.

Odds and Ends

Television in Jakarta is horrible. On the plus side, this means I read a lot more (see below). On the downside, it means I am missing the only sport I have an interest in - the NFL. What passes for sports here is Soccer, Cricket and Formula One auto racing. Occasionally I am able to catch an Australian rules football game, or even a rugby match, though I can't quite appreciate these sports like I can those I grew up with.

Before boarding my flight from Singapore back to Jakarta, I bought two books: "The Richest Man in Town" and "Outliers". Each book I read in their entirety in less than 2 days. Great books. Anyone who aspires to have great success, or wants to be an entrepreneur, must read "The Richest Man in Town". "Outliers" is the third book by Malcolm Gladwell - his first two books being "The Tipping Point" and "Blink". I think "Outliers" should be required reading for anyone with children.

Shootings started up again at our mine site this week. We had one on Wednesday, and another on Saturday morning. Even with the presence of 600 military troops, the capture of whomever is attacking our buses and employees remains elusive. What remains to be seen is if the continued tension will cause people to break, or will they begin to accept it as just another hardship of living in Papua and working in a mine.

The fasting is nearly over. The devout have been fasting for over three weeks. It appears that by the third week, lack of consistent food and water takes its toll. Traffic jams are much louder with blaring horns. People are more apt to criticize the behavior of others. Jakartans are just more on edge. Oh, and traffic is still outrageously bad.

Transferring to Singapore

Many of you have commented that we should move to Singapore to avoid the violence at the mine site. I say that's like moving from Seattle to Vancouver because of the violence in Miami. Ineffectual and unnecessary.

Sentiments aside, I learned this week we have an office in Singapore complete with video conferencing. Starting in September, my plan was to commute every other weekend to Singapore while my wife and daughter lived there awaiting the arrival of our son. My plans have now changed. From September through November I will be working out of our Singapore office 50% of the time. My plan is to alternate between Singapore and Jakarta every two weeks until they can return with me. Nothing to do with the continued violence in Papua.

Regarding Papua, we have now had 4 incidents in 5 days. It started Saturday with the shooting death of our Australian employee and has continued with the latest event being a gun fight yesterday. The Associated Press has published a history of violence near our mine site.

The continued violence has required drastic measures, and some bold strength by our executives. First, because we have shut down transportation up the hill, we've told our people stuck in the lowlands to just stay home. Second, some of our senior executives have flown in from Phoenix to demonstrate that it is safe enough to continue working. This has been a major morale booster for the staff. So many of them have fear in their eyes when you talk to them. Having a high ranking official come to the site demonstrates to everyone we believe in our business, we believe in safety, and that work can continue.

Meanwhile, the theories continue to fly. The one gaining the most support is that the military forces in Papua are committing the assaults because they are upset over losing the lucrative security contract. As expected, they are denying involvement. Our party line, for obvious reasons, is we do not comment on conjecture and assumptions.

Every day we receive both an update on the incidents and an update on transportation restrictions. I haven't asked how others are taking it, but I'm tired of the boilerplate memo we are using. I'm sure there are legal reasons why it contains everything it does. The video message from our CEO and our division president, I think, were more effective. Senior management keeping their family at site sends an even stronger message. Overall, I think we are doing the right things we're allowed to, and doing the wrong things we are legally required to do.

Oddly enough, this is very similar to when I worked for Security Trust a few years back and they were giving us frequent updates on whether or not the government would allow us to exist. The memos that went out were not nearly as effective as the town hall meetings where we could ask questions and management gave tough, honest answers. Honesty allows people to feel like they are in a position to make their own decisions, even if they really cannot. I'm glad we're doing all we can in this respect.

The other aspect that has been refreshing is we are overcommunicating on what would typically be very mundane activities. For example, when we sent a lot of people off the island, we explained to everyone why they were leaving. The people we sent home were visitors (employees on business trips) and contractors. People who were taking up beds that we badly needed to provide to displaced employees. We overcommunicated so rumors wouldn't spread that people were being shown favoritism in their ability to leave.

These are the elements of stressful situations that bad companies overlook. Our management has been through this before and knows what to do. This is preventing a bad situation from getting worse. Even though I am not involved in the discussions on what to communicate, I am learning a lot from what the organization does communicate.

Finally, on a lighter note, our daughter has been entertaining us with her observations and perspective on what it means to be her. Two days ago, when she returned from the pool with my wife, our maid, Jumentin, was sitting in our garage conversing with another maid from the neighborhood who happened to look very similar - short black hair, older, short. Our daughter very matter-of-factly said to my wife: "I guess we have another Jumentin", and walked into the house like it was a very normal thing to just add another person to our household.

I don't know what she's going to think when we get back home and mom and dad are doing the driving and the cleaning. She laughed out loud when our maid ironed her clothes. She'll probably think it is very strange that mom and dad know how to drive.

The Siege Continues

Events inside the company are getting to the point where I know things before the press does. I'm going to err on the side of caution and only update what the press already knows (with links where possible) and anything I personally experience that does not come from internal communications. There is likely to be a mere 24-hour lag between what I know and what the press knows. I'm not at the job site and am not on the Emergency Response Team (ERT), so often the press will know more than me.

I feel comfortable I'm not violating any policy by informing everyone that we had another incident today. I was in a video conference with colleagues at our mine site when a member of the ERT interupted to inform us that they had received a report of shots fired and were shutting down all road access until further notice. Later, an internal communication went out apprising everyone of the incident and providing further details regarding transportation, travel and access restrictions. This incident resulted in no casualties, so our safety measures are paying dividends.

We now have armed escorts for caravans moving up and down the hill. The articles I've linked to discuss the increased police, military and anti-terrorism forces sent to provide security. After the gun fight that occurred during the last attack, it's pretty bold to continue firing shots at our vehicles.

The organization has been very good with communicating both internally and externally. This is one of those situations where we have to exercise spin control to prevent false information from creating undue concern. We are also hammering home the message that the safety of our employees and their families are of paramount importance. Our actions are reinforcing this message.

The Jakarta Post had two articles today about the situation in Papua: an update and an editorial. This one appears to be an update from yesterday's news. Another article from Bloomberg.

An expat working for another company in the same building as myself noticed the Freeport name on my security badge as we were heading up in the elevator and started asking me how everyone was taking the news. Some of the other expats my community have asked me a few questions about the event, too. When people start going after foreigners, it reminds people of the riots in Jakarta about 10 years ago when they started going after the "wealthy" expats - mostly Chinese - and there was much looting, raping, and beating. We are very much insulated from any threats here in Jakarta, but people still feel it.

Thoughts on Singapore

A 3 PM international flight coupled with three tired bodies who slept in meant we didn't have time to do much in Singapore today other than eat breakfast, buy a few essentials we can't find in Jakarta - like M&M's and vitamins. We did pause to allow my daughter the opportunity to play at the playground in the mall, as well as a playground at the airport during lunch. At the airport, she had fun playing with a local who introduced himself as "Jeremy, One Smart Boy". Other than that, it's just been taxi rides, standing in lines, and waiting to board our plane.

I'll summarize our trip to Singapore with the following:

1) We were still a minority, but we didn't feel like one. We think it is because the only difference we really share is appearance. In Jakarta, we different in appearance and economics. The more time I spend overseas, the more I realize it is truly the economic differences that divide us, not racial, religious, or physical differences.

2) The Singaporeans speak English, but I had trouble understanding them. One of our cab drivers said they speak "Singlish", which I think is a combination of English, Malay and Chinese. This wasn't too big an issue until this morning. I ordered a strawberry smoothie. The woman behind the counter said something about "ice cream", and then pointed to a board behind her. I replied with "mango", thinking they would use "mango" ice cream or yogurt in my smoothie. I ended up with a mango juice.

3) On a clear day, you can see Malaysia from Sentosa Island.

4) You see a lot of people in surgical masks. We first noticed this on the flight from Jakarta to Singapore. We also saw this on the subway, at the zoo, and again in the airport.

5) Singapore is very small. It is a city, state and nation all in one (much like Australia is a country and a continent). I think metro-Phoenix is larger than Singapore by quite a lot.

6) Two weeks in Singapore is enough to know your way around and make the most efficient use of mass transit. The subways are clean and efficient, though you'll need to be prepared to walk from your destination to find one. In Paris, you can catch a metro at nearly every corner. In Singapore, they are not quite as available. Buses seem more accessible. One of the best things about the mass transit is the transit cards are transferable. Subway our bus, one pass.

7) Singapore is expensive. I haven't kept track of our spending - I've been afraid to. With cab rides averaging $10 USD, and dinner about 15% more than US prices, I'm sure we spent more than I wanted to. We didn't look into the cost of services like massage, tailoring, etc.

8) We often felt like we were in a US city. The malls, the restaurants, even the brands in the grocery store were a welcome reminder of home.

9) We ate at every US restaurant we could find. Subway was our staple for lunch. Dinners were at California Pizza Kitchen and Black Angus. It's amazing how comforting familiar food can be.

10) The people in Jakarta are friendlier. My theory is that the more money you make, the less dependent you feel on the future kindness of strangers, so you are less compelled to be amiable. Singaporeons are not rude, by any means - pushy, maybe, but not rude. Indonesians just seem to be much more interested in being friendly, helpful, and welcoming to others.

11) Our daughter is demonstrating that she wants to lead (or at least be bossy). At dinner, were discussing what we were planning to have for dessert. When the waitress came back, our daughter promptly advised her what everyone would be having. In cabs, she would always tell the driver where we were going and, when we were done for the night, would tell them "you can go home now".

I'm glad we had the opportunity to visit Singapore prior to coming here for delivery. I am very comfortable with the medical care we will receive here, and that there will be plenty to keep us entertained while we await the big day. I'm also very comfortable that my wife and daughter will be safe without me for the 8-12 weeks they will be living there while I am commuting back and forth from Jakarta.

We are now safely back at our home in Jakarta. The big news on the front page of the Jakarta Post is that an assumed sniper has killed a 29-year-old Australian near our mine site. He was an employee and seated in the back seat of the vehicle. I'm interested to see what our internal communications has to say about this tomorrow morning.