BUSINESS C&EN
TALKS
W I T H
ROBERT WOOD Head of Dow's thermosets business discusses his unique background, business philosophy
A
PERSON ATTENDING CHEMICAL
industry meetings, press conferences, or trade shows is likely to come away with the impression that, more so than many of its corporate peers, Dow Chemical strives for— and achieves—diversity in its executive ranks. Although Dow is headquartered in Midland, Mich., a relatively small town in the American Midwest, there's a notable national, gender, and racial mix among its top managers. Dow's chief executive officer, Michael D. Parker, is British, and among the presidents of Dow's eight business groups are a Netherlander, a German, an
the plastics business, advancing through jobs of increasing responsibility there and in human resources over the next 10 years. In 1989, he moved to DowBrands in Indianapolis to become vice president of marketing for household products. It was while at DowBrands that Wood fell into an unusual side assignment: a halfyear stint as senior deputy mayor and chief operating officer for the city of Indianapolis. Wood explains that Steve Goldsmith, who was running in the 1991 mayoral race, lured him aboard his finance committee. Then, after he won the election, Goldsmith asked Wood to become COO on an interim basis.
The quality of your workforce is the one true lasting source of competitive advantage in a globalized world." Australian, one woman, and one African American. One of these presidents is Robert L. Wood, 47, head of Dow's thermosets business group. As leader of a Dow portfolio with annual sales of roughly $4 billion, Wood is arguably the highest ranking African American in the U.S. chemical industry C & E N talked with Wood recently about his time at Dow and about how he is drawing upon on a varied background to help the company respond to rapid changes in the markets for polyurethanes and other thermosetting plastics. Wood grew up in London, Ohio, a small town near Columbus, and joined Dow in 1977 after graduating from the University of Michigan with a bachelor's degree in history A placekicker for the Michigan Wolverines under legendary coach Bo Schembechler, Wood gained a bit of notoriety as the last "straight on" kicker in Big 10 football during a time when kicking was shifting to the soccer style that prevails today Wood was a "walk on" to the football team—a rarity even then—and says his intention through most of college was to become a lawyer. However, a Dow internship the summer before his senior year introduced him to the world of business, and he was hooked. After a short period in Dow's marketing development program, W>od joined 16
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"He asked me to take a leave of absence and do the job for six months," Wood says. "The company was very good in allowing me to do it—but without the leave of absence. So I ended up doing that job during the day and my Dow job at night and on the weekends." He's never regretted the strain on his time. "I love different experiences and have always been interested in politics," Wood says. "It was one of the most beneficial experiences I've ever had in terms of learning about myself and about how things get done in politics." Wood is forthright about his experience as a minority in the largely white male upper ranks of the chemical industry "I've never looked at being a minority in Dow or in the chemical industry as being anything—advantage or disadvantage," he says. 'At the end of the day, when you get to these jobs, you have to deliver." Wood acknowledges that discrimination exists—in the chemical industry and elsewhere—but he doesn't dwell on it. "Ifou can choose to look at situations in lots of different ways," he says. "I choose not to look at any incident as being racially mo-
tivated. I look at what I can do in a situation to make it better. Period." His own experience aside, Wood believes Dow's leaders have made "a huge amount of progress" over the past three years in acknowledging the importance of workforce diversity In particular, he credits William S. Stavropoulos, Parker's predecessor as CEO and Dow's current chairman, for embracing diversity as one of his legacies. Parker is now expanding on that effort with a comprehensive people strategy, Wood adds. "When you think about it," he says, "the quality of your workforce is the one true lasting source of competitive advantage in a globalized world where capital is readily available, raw materials are cheap, and technology can be duplicated or leapfrogged." On the business front, W)od has played a major role in Dow's strategy to strengthen its portfolio of performance chemicals and plastics. Under his watch, for example, Dow has 0 developed myriad new | uses for polyurethane 1 materials, including medical and clean room gloves, strawbased boards used in construction and furniture, run-flat tires (in a venture with Michelin), and a line of foam sealants sold in home centers and hardware stores. It has also created, primarily through acquisitions, a $600 million business in formulated polyurethane systems that is now the number two player in the industry Explaining the move downstream, Wood points out that Dow's historic advantage in polyurethanes was back-integration to the raw materials propylene oxide and isocyanates. But because isocyanate competitors such as BASF and Bayer now make their own propylene oxide, "today that advantage has gone away We need to better identify where in the chain value is created and capture it." Wood has been with Dow for 25 years and is one of a handful of executives mentioned as a future candidate for the top job some day He says he's open to anything that might come next. "I'm having a good time doing what I'm doing," he says. "My view is, you do the best job you can possibly do, you add value to the enterprise, and everything else takes care of itself."— MICHAEL MCCOY
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