March 2014
D i g e s t
The Official Publication of the Kiawah Island Community Association
Dialogue with a Director: Will Lehder
Near the end of each KICA director’s
first year of board service, Digest
interviews the director about his or
her background and first year on the
board. This issue features Director Will
Lehder; Larry Kreyling’s interview will
appear next month.
Digest: What prompted you to serve
on the board?
Will Lehder (WL): I believe in serving
the community. I have always had a desire to give back. When I lived in
New Jersey, I served on my local school board for four three-year terms,
which taught me how to be an effective board member. I have been active
on several KICA committees, and I chose last year to run for the KICA
board for two reasons in addition to just wanting to serve our community. I
had just finished a year and a half on the Amenities and Services Task Force,
and I wanted to be sure that the recommendations of the task force were
adequately considered and represented. Also, I waited until my wife Diane
finished her term as president of KPOG, the Kiawah Property Owners
Group, to avoid the challenges that might have presented.
Digest: Is New Jersey where you lived and raised your family before
coming to Kiawah? Did you grow up there?
WL: No, I grew up in New Orleans, however, except for a three-year stint
in Columbus, Ohio, Diane and I raised our family in central New Jersey. I
worked primarily for AT&T Bell Laboratories in research and development
from 1967 until my retirement in 1999.
Digest: What was your path from New Orleans to New Jersey?
WL: Both of my parents came from long-time New Orleans families. Our
family had only a modest income; my father was a government worker in
the US Customs Service who didn’t have the opportunity to go to college. I
attended an academically rigorous Jesuit high school, and I credit that with
my future academic success. Math and science were my strengths, and I
was interested in engineering. Because of our family financial situation, I
knew I’d need a scholarship to attend a top-notch university. The Navy
ROTC scholarship I applied for and received paid only for tuition. At
my father’s suggestion, I enrolled at Tulane University, lived at home, and
had the opportunity to join a fraternity to be sure I had a well-rounded
college experience. I think I applied myself better by living at home. It was
important that I did well academically to maintain my scholarship.
I graduated in 1962 with a four-year obligation to serve in the Navy. The
Navy didn’t have an electrical engineering specialty, so I became an officer in
the Navy’s Civil Engineering Corps. That meant I never went to sea. After
two years based in Jacksonville, Florida, I arranged my second two-year
assignment near New Orleans. Because I knew the Tulane faculty, I was able
to pursue my Master’s degree in electrical engineering during this time. I did
another year of research at Tulane, primarily working on my thesis, before a
friend arranged an interview for me at Bell Labs in New Jersey.
Digest: What did you do at Bell Labs, and were there aspects of your
work that benefit your work on the KICA board?
WL: I spent my career as an engineer and manager in research and
development, primarily in systems engineering. Our customers were various
phone companies and large business customers, and we created products
to meet their needs and arranged for their manufacture. I had to talk three
languages - the customers’, the product developers’, and the manufacturers’.
I learned to analyze problems, collect the necessary background information,
determine customer needs, and reach reasonable judgments and conclusions
about what should be developed. This is also closely aligned with what the
KICA board does. My comfort with and interest in technology is a plus for
KICA, as well.
Digest: After you retired from Bell Labs in 1999, what did you do until
your move to Kiawah?
WL: Bell Labs was a great place to work, with challenging assignments
and very smart colleagues. However, after the Bell break-up began in 1984,
the culture started to change. We had more guidance from the marketing
people. In 1994, Lucent took over Bell Labs and we were given the choice
of staying with our parent company AT&T or going with Lucent. I chose
Lucent. I was working on business switching technology and that part of
the world was Lucent’s. I decided to retire when Lucent offered incentives
in 1999 as part of a downsizing. By then I was one of the older guys and it
made sense for me. They hired me back as a consultant for two additional
years after my 1999 retirement.
Digest: At what point did you meet Diane?
WL: I met her over a bridge table at Bell Labs in NJ. We were both
new to the company, and this was her first competitive bridge game.
We married about a year later and the first of our two children was
born in 1972.
Digest: When did you first come to Kiawah and why did you decide to
retire here?
WL: We have a house in Vermont where Diane’s family had summered
since she was an infant. Through her brother, a realtor, we also
acquired a time share there, and for years we swapped those weeks
with time shares in potential retirement areas. I still had family in New
Orleans, and our adult children were
Continued on Next Page...