Judy Warner Blog postings
November 29, 2012
Recently, I had the pleasure of meeting with a gentleman that, though now retired, spent a long and illustrious career in marketing and advertising. Some of his best known clients were Wendy’s restaurant, Budweiser and Coca cola. Since part of my job is marketing (in which I have no formal training) I took advantage of this opportunity to learn all I could. As he was going through some fundamentals with me, I was having trouble applying the theory to our printed circuit board business.
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June 13, 2012
A couple of years ago, if you had asked me if I would ever consider using Twitter as a business tool, I would have told you yes, right after I got a Harley Davidson tattoo—or when pigs fly—whichever came first. My opinion of Facebook pages for business wasn’t much better. I believed they were only for retail industries and big brands (B2C) and had zero relevance for the technology (B2B) industries. In fact, my perception about almost all social media was that it was designed and largely used by self-absorbed teenagers and Hollywood types. Honestly, my ignorance was profound! I had a Linked in account, but I never used it.
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June 6, 2012
In my last post, I left you with a rather long list of comments from RF/MW PCB designers about what they liked and disliked about working with PCB suppliers. I pointed out that at least 70% of those comments had to do with communication….real communication. Not just a barrage of emails that fly back and forth between customer and supplier. I meant communication which delves deep into a customer’s needs and prevailing issues with a mind to partner and problem solve.
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(Effie Trinket, The Hunger Games)
May 21, 2012
As promised in my last post, I want to share with you some of the feedback I got through Linked In groups and from a dozen or so folks that recently attended a talk I gave at the Del Mar Electronics and Design show entitled How to Fall in Love with your PCB Supplier.
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May 14, 2012
By the time we round the corner into 2013, I will enter my 20thyear in the PCB and Electronics Industry. I find myself often gravitating to other’s like me (50 years and older) to swap nostalgic war stories of days gone by. My journey in the industry, unlike my cronies, is marked by a 12 year hiatus that began around 1998 when I made the decision to stay home and raise my two young daughters full time. I resurfaced in 2010, with nearly grown kids, totally clueless about the state of an industry that I had all but forgotten.
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2012 Tradeshow Season in Full Swing
April 13, 2012
The spring thaw is well underway, and that means tradeshow season is in full swing. It is an exciting time and also a time when I start feeling like I am precariously scooting along the narrowing ledge of my physical and mental limits as the season marches forward. For this reason, I have become far more intentional and strategic about how I use my time during the Spring and early Summer tradeshows. With age (hopefully) comes wisdom and I thought I might share some things I've learned along the way to make this time of year more focused, effective and less harrowing. I am speaking mostly to attendees here, but exhibitors might pick up a trick or two as well!
March 9, 2012
I have been discussing surface finishes for the last couple of posts, and I would be remiss if I didn’t cover the crucial topic of copper surface roughness and how it specifically impacts high performance PCBs. Most substrates are copper clad with either Rolled Annealed (RA) copper, Electro deposited Copper (ED) or Reverse Treated copper (RT). I have put some links below should you want to learn more about each type of copper and the resulting surface roughness of each.
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February 8, 2012
As promised, we are off to the races, untangling the convoluted subject of PCB surface finishes. This is a complicated subject, so bear with me as I try to break it down into bite-sized, manageable portions! This week I will discuss each available surface finish and the pros and cons of each one.
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January 11, 2012
If you are a fan of John Wooden, the celebrated UCLA coach, you will know that he had more than his share of clever sayings. My husband who played basketball all his life, and who went to college on a full-ride scholarship—nearly worships Coach Wooden. For this reason, I have heard many of these wise and witty Wooden-isms over the years. One that comes to mind is: “Be quick, but don’t hurry.” With the speed of advancing technologies, we all have to be quick, but we cannot afford to hurry—or be hasty—putting revenue and market share opportunities at stake....
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November 23, 2011
Before I begin my blog-rant, let me wish you and yours a very happy and healthy Thanksgiving! While I hope you enjoy your holiday, and stuffing yourself with turkey, I wouldn’t want you to look like a turkey at work. So, I thought I would share a bit of insight offered to me recently. As I mentioned in an earlier post, my friend Michael Ingham of Spectrum Integrity and I recently spoke at PCB West, and co-authored a paper to discuss some of the challenges of RF/MW PCB Design and Fabrication. Michael helped me to understand one of the...
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