Eddy caps four-decade career by leading Rubber Division beyond COVID

KNOXVILLE, Tenn.—For the chairs of the ACS Rubber Division, the International Elastomer Conference they preside over in the fall typically is the peak that leads to the end of their yearlong reigns.

But for James Eddy, who served as Rubber Division chair this past year and oversaw many of the festivities at the IEC held Oct. 10-13 in Knoxville, it's almost like the event put an exclamation point on his more than four decades in the industry.

While he plans on staying on a couple committees, he is planning to move from the Detroit home he has lived in since 1986 to build a home on a 20-acre parcel of land he owns in New Mexico. He and Michael Morrow, another former Rubber Division chair, used to joke that Eddy was moving to the Southwest to start the Guayule Farmers Rubber Group.

"It's been a very enjoyable experience, and this week in particular has been very gratifying," Eddy said during the IEC.

Eddy's career in the rubber industry started in 1980, when he began a 10-year stint with DuPont. That was followed by short stops at Hoechst Celanese and Nylon Corp. of America, before he planted roots at Zeon Chemicals, where he worked from 1994 until his retirement in May 2019.

He led automotive market and new applications projects for much of his professional career, with a high level of expertise in the use of elastomers and plastics in automotive powertrain and chassis applications.

Eddy worked almost exclusively with non-tire automotive applications, first with the Detroit-based Big Three and then later with global auto makers to write and review specifications. He said a large part of the job was understanding what automotive customers wanted and needed.

"I always said it was kind of half educator and half influencer. It's a different type of selling than what most people in this industry mean when they use the word sales," he said. "I think of it's more like being an adviser or counselor."

The areas where Eddy worked are the areas where part performance is critical.

"Sometimes they have problems and they're not sure how to fix them," he said. "You compete to be the person they talk to first.

"And the critical areas are changing because—depending on your time scale—they're either steadily moving or rapidly moving from internal combustion vehicles to electrical. And that will change the types of elastomers you use."

In both his personal and professional lives, Eddy never was afraid to jump in and help out. That included coaching teenagers in sports, mentoring and providing career guidance for youth, and interviewing prospective students for his alma mater, Washington University in St. Louis.

Professionally, that meant volunteering in a number of areas. He's been on the board of the Detroit Rubber Group for 29 years, a role he will relinquish at the end of 2022. Eddy also is a five-time past chair of the group, and held every officer position at one time or another.

He also served as area director of the Detroit Rubber Group from 2011-16, and was an area directors' representative in 2016 and 2017.

He then was elected as Rubber Division secretary, which started the five-year commitment that led him to become Rubber Division chair for 2022.

The two years he was in the area directors' rep positions meant time served on the Rubber Division's Executive Committee, and that gave other association leaders a chance to see if he may be suited to one day be chair.

"People get to see you, and see your ability to get things done and your willingness to pitch in," Eddy said.

He was approached by two other former chairs—Leo Goss of Lanxess and William Stahl of Rainbow Master Mixing L.L.C.—to run for secretary. Eddy knew the five-year time frame would overlap with when he planned to retire from Zeon, but he liked the idea of having a "staged retirement."

Eddy and Morrow, who also was chair while being semi-retired, agreed that they enjoyed being able to fill the role without the obligations of full-time employment.

"We feel like we were fortunate to be able to serve at a time where we could give the division all the attention it deserved, and all the attention we possibly could give it," Eddy said.

Each Rubber Division chair sets an agenda of goals that they want to achieve, and Eddy said he kept his simple under the theme, "Steadily Stronger: Pulling Together in Challenging Times."

One of the goals was to "get the division back up and running post-COVID, and operating as a division. The pandemic was tough on the non-profit organization financially, as it had to stage a virtual IEC in 2020, and had far fewer attendees than normal at its 2021 in-person conference and expo in Pittsburgh.

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Eddy said he was gratified to see participation spike back close to normal for the IEC in Knoxville.

"What we saw this week was people are strongly motivated to get back together and reconvene," he told Rubber News in Knoxville.

As can happen when going through difficult times, there were some concerns raised by board members, he said, largely over what priorities the division should have. "I think we've worked through a lot, and I'm happy with the progress we've made this year," he said.

He characterized the Rubber Division's finances as being "on their way back."

"And we had a rainy day fund, which we learned was what we needed," he said.

Eddy said he was bolstered by the support he received during his time as chair, particularly from those who previously held the position.

"The community of past chairs has been a wonderful, mentoring support group, because leading this division is such a unique experience," he said. "It's not the sort of thing you can go back and talk to your circle of private friends and have them give you any useful counseling. The group of people who can give you useful advice is indeed the group of past chairs."

Some of the high points during his year as chair were his visits to each of the 13 U.S.-based and two Canadian rubber groups. Eddy said there were several things he was looking to find out during these trips.

"I was concerned about how they were coping with COVID," he said. "Were they getting their routines and events back to normal, or back to some new normal? And if the new normal was substantially different, what did that look like?"

Second, he wanted to know if they were rebounding financially from the pandemic.

"I would say many are back to normal, probably an 80-20 thing," Eddy said. "Some are struggling, but most are either back to normal or back to some new normal. And many are doing a really great job of leadership development."

That was important to Eddy, because the next generations of leaders are not only for the rubber groups, but also "in a real sense, sort of a farm system, if you will, for developing future leaders of the division."

Besides gathering information, the visits were a new experience for him. "Doing what I did working with the auto makers, I was kind of tied to the Detroit Rubber Group," Eddy said. "It was kind of neat for me to get to some of the other rubber groups and see some of their unique traditions."

The Rubber Division did its ceremonial "passing of the gavel" in mid-November to Anthony Mariniello of ChemSpec Ltd., who will preside as Rubber Division chair for the next year.

Eddy's advice to his successor is this: "I think the big lesson for me this year is that leadership is about courage, and it's about having the strength to stand in the middle. A lot of this year has been about sorting priorities. There are many different viewpoints on what should be the division's overarching priorities.

"But to kind of stand in the middle of that storm and be a pillar of leadership—and yet a pillar that listens to everybody's perspective, and weighs things before they make a decision. But at some point you have to make a decision."