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Deutsche Bahn, the German national railways, is the second largest carrier in the world. 30,000 DB passenger and freight trains operate every day. Standing on the platform of one of the DB's 5,700 stations is a single commuter check their watch. He or she does not care about the size and power of their train companies. This is Germany. The minute is expected to be Deutsche Bahn trains on time.

According to help "Deutsche Bahn at a glance," 290,000 employees move 1.9 billion customers and 341 million tonnes of freight by 787 tunnels and all 33,721 km/20,993 km track, each year. In return, DB was 29.3 billion euros in revenue, earning € 1.7 billion in revenue.

A former boss, Hartmut Mehdorn, recently resigned as CEO of Deutsche Bahn. When he led the Heidelberg, a commercial printing giant, Mehdorns meeting format was exciting. He really liked the debates and motivated managers to hot couples argue proposals in front of 40 colleagues, until Mehdorn heard enough. With a stroke of his hand, silenced the room. Mehdorn has taken the decision. No one dared to second guess.

Deutsche Bahn is needed for its strength and nerve at a time when the West and East German railways merger. There were different tracer scales and tariff after decades of gap. Undoubtedly, there were lots of debates and hand slaps.

Mehdorn's DB never lost sight of demanding individual customer stands on a breezy platform, repeatedly check a clock. DB installed additional clocks to count the seconds and minutes for the customer in the rare times a train was late. Ability to meet the high demand of a single German citizen be comfortable and punctual giving Deutsche Bahn its power.

The United States are interested in building a high-speed network. They will probably look at Japanese, Chinese or French are doing. America should speak with Deutsche Bahn. Hartmut Mehdorn may come of retirement to present how 290,000 employees successfully to ensure that each customer gets home in time. It's a good debate.