Here at LECO, we have been celebrating Farai-Day (Fri-day) every week for fourteen years! Our new Director of Separation Science Customer Success, Farai Rukunda has been a force of positivity and solutions ever since he accepted his first position as a training specialist. Farai joined host Andrew Storey on LECO’s podcast: Measured Science.
Farai was living in Dayton, Ohio (in the United States), with his wife when a recruiter left a voicemail offering him two positions: managing a lab in Louisiana, or teaching in Michigan. After spending fourteen years in a university research lab, donning a lab coat, gloves, and respirator day in and day out, Farai was ready to put the PPE aside in favor of teaching. He came up to Michigan for an interview and had his first encounter with LECO.
Saint Joseph, Michigan, had a lot of perks for Farai and his young family (Lake Michigan is certainly a big draw!), but LECO impressed him with its commitment to handling everything in-house, from designing and manufacturing the equipment customers would use to solve problems to the after-sale support and service. The people at LECO intrigued him with their dedication to customer success. « LECO succeeds when the customer succeeds » was a true refrain.
Farai’s passion, whether on the job or off the job, has always been making differences in people’s lives. From training specialist to being in charge of the training division of Separation Sciences, to adding service beneath his wings, to becoming the Director of Customer Success, Farai would get a real sense of satisfaction when he could make someone’s life just a little bit easier. That passion extended to his community too, whether it be building 300 desks for local urban students who had to learn from home from their floors or beds during the COVID-19 pandemic, or helping children in his home village in Zimbabwe build a new high school, with desks and clean water and text books. A non-profit he helped establish through his church, Living Beyond Hope, now supports 300 children in southern Africa.
Farai finds it heartening to see that no matter what the news story might be, LECO’s instruments can always be trusted to be part of the solution. The BP oil spill, the Boston terror attacks, the development of the Impossible Burger… even COVID-19 treatments have all touched LECO instruments.
After all, when it’s Farai-Day, there are never any problems: just solutions.
