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September 19, 2003
Egged faces the suicide bombers
How do you manage a bus company day after day when your customers
and employees are being killed?
JESSICA STEINBERG SPECIAL TO THE JEWISH BULLETIN
Lior Baratz is a driver for Egged, the sprawling Israeli bus company,
and although he's been on the job only three years, the 26-year-old
is an Egged veteran in the most graphic, indelible way.
In April 2002, Baratz was at the wheel of bus No. 23, his regular
route through Jerusalem. He was waiting out a red light on a Friday
afternoon on Jaffa Road, in front of the bustling Mahane Yehuda
outdoor market. Across the intersection, Egged bus No. 32A was coming
the other way.
As Baratz looked through his windshield, the No. 32A bus exploded.
The blast was so powerful it lifted the bus up off the road. The
boom of the explosion rolled over Baratz and his passengers. There
was a moment or two of total silence. Then the screams started.
By the time Baratz got to the other bus, Israeli emergency personnel
were already there, attending to the injured and dead. They took
Baratz aside, then sent him to be checked at the hospital, where
he talked to a counsellor before being sent home.
Less than 48 hours later, Baratz was back behind the wheel of the
No. 23, running his regular route, right through the intersection
where the bombing took place. "After a bombing, we act as if
nothing happened," said Baratz. "Our mentality is that
we don't like to look inside ourselves and think about it. We're
not like that."
During the last three years, since the start of the second Palestinian
intifada, Egged has been a company under attack almost as directly
as the nation of Israel itself. Since March 2001, suicide bombers
have blown themselves up inside, or alongside, more than 20 Egged
buses. The goal of the attacks has been to turn one of the most
ordinary, reassuring, reliable objects in the landscape – a
city bus – into an object of uncertainty and terror, to lace
a ribbon of fear through any trip or errand where an Egged bus is
visible.
The company has responded in a typically pragmatic Israeli way.
"Buses are the easiest target with the highest number of possible
victims," said Arik Feldman, the company chairman. "But
we live with it. That's our harsh reality. And if a bus blows up,
it doesn't stop us from running public transportation. It gives
us more courage to continue so no one can prevent us from living
here."
There is no business-school case study on how to lead a company
that has become a target of war. As much as any particular security
measure or management plan, what has kept Egged's executives and
managers going during the intifada is the attitude Feldman expresses.
It's not simply persistence or determination; it's a refusal to
be a victim, even of circumstances that can't be controlled.
Founded in 1933, Egged is older than Israel itself. Every day, it
carries one million Israeli residents (both Arab and Jewish). The
bombings have reduced ridership 10 per cent in the last three years,
but they haven't forced Egged off the road. Its corporate response
to being a target of terror – week after week, month after
month, for three years – is essentially the same as Baratz's
response to being one red light from disaster: Grab the wheel and
keep driving.
The company has not surrendered a single route in the face of the
terrorists, and Egged says not a single one of its drivers has resigned
as a result of the bombings. Instead, drivers and managers have
learned to adapt to the realities of the situation.
Reuven Rotchild, 46, has been an Egged driver for 18 years. Before
he gets on his bus, Rotchild pauses most days to say the traditional
Jewish morning prayers. He isn't particularly observant, but he
started saying the prayers for peace of mind, that "someone
should watch over us." The ritual is not uncommon among Egged
drivers these days, he said. "On every trip, you feel like
you could be the next target."
Rotchild has never seen a suicide bomber, but he never stops looking.
He appraises every passenger at each stop, running through his mind
the list of tip-offs to a bomber: a man wearing a heavy coat, especially
in warm weather, to hide bulky explosive belts; someone carrying
a large bag that could contain a bomb; a man dressed as an ultra-Orthodox
Jew in a place where they aren't common; an odd wire sticking out
of a pocket; or simply someone with a nervous look in their eyes.
In the past, drivers weren't allowed to decide who boards and who
doesn't, any more than they would in the United States; but Egged
now gives them that latitude.
Still, drivers must also be careful not to overreact. Recently,
an Arab teenager in Afula approached the door of a bus being driven
by Shai Halevi. The boy was dressed in a heavy coat, laughing and
pretending he was about to detonate himself. Halevi brushed it off
as a typical teenage prank. And when an Arab passenger he recognizes
gets on board, Halevi makes a point of putting on a show of friendliness
for the benefit of the other passengers.
"You're like a psychologist in this job, thinking through every
scenario so that no one gets scared," Halevi said. "I
can't put everything into fearing this situation, because if I did,
I wouldn't be able to get up and work every morning."
Jessica Steinberg is a writer with Fast Company.
Founded in 1996 and published monthly, Fast Company covers
ideas, trends and individuals devoted to managing change in today's
economy. You can read the full version of this story in the September
issue of Fast Company or at www.fastcompany.com.
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