Stay Curious: The Art of Lifelong Learning

Curt Anderson  00:00

Hey, happy Monday Damon, how are you my friend? Are you on mute?

Damon Pistulka  00:06

Oh, I am sorry. I’m doing great Curt rate and Raul. We were just talking about this beforehand. So I muted just so I would do that

Curt Anderson  00:12

you did that on purpose. Yeah. I know. I’m doing my friend. So, David, happy Monday. Hope you had. Did you have a great weekend you and Odin? Were you guys?

00:20

Good stuff.

Curt Anderson  00:22

Good stuff. Awesome. Okay, well, I hope you got some rest because we have an amazing, incredible guest today. We have Adrienne Temple Adrienne, happy Monday. How are you today?

Adrienne Temple  00:32

I’m doing awesome. Thank you so much for having me today.

Curt Anderson  00:35

We are just thrilled and delighted. I know, this goes back. I think we booked this months and months ago. And you and I’ve been connected on LinkedIn for quite a while. So I’m just I’m truly honored and privileged that you took time out of your busy schedule to join us. And we’re going to do a deep dive into what’s going on at the MEP network. So now, Adrian, before we go there you you’re at the South Carolina MEP manufacturing, Manufacturing Extension Partnership. But before we go there, I have a quick little question for you if you don’t mind. Sure. When you were a little girl growing up.

01:08

Who was your hero? When you were a little girl growing up? Who was your hero? Oh,

Adrienne Temple  01:14

yeah, this is this is gonna sound like a gimme. But honestly, my dad. My dad was my hero. Dave

Curt Anderson  01:21

and I are big girl dads. So we love that answer. Please. Share with us how what made what made dad so amazing.

Adrienne Temple  01:30

Yeah, he always has been consistently just invested in my success, my brother’s success. And, you know, he worked in manufacturing, he actually worked in maintenance for quite a long time. And, you know, he was just a hard working guy and anything that we needed, you know, anything that we were struggling with, I mean, you know, we used to go and get the, you know, back then they had all the books for trigonometry for dummies. I mean, we had all the books, we had all of the resources that we needed to be successful because he took her education so seriously, and he really supported us. And so he was my hero, because I thought, and I still think, you know, he knows he knows everything. He’s got an answer for everything. So I just have tremendous respect even more now as an adult. And having my own kids, I certainly appreciate what hero he was, you know, to me and my brother and continues to be he’s, he’s our biggest supporter.

Curt Anderson  02:17

Well, that that’s our favorite answer. And what can you please share What is Dad’s name?

Adrienne Temple  02:22

His name is Eddie Barnes.

Curt Anderson  02:25

Eddie Barnes will hate big shout out God bless many Barnes for being such a wonderful, amazing dad. And that’s what you know, Daymond I love that. Because, you know, it helps us you know, iron sharpens iron. We’re striving to be the best dads and I just I love hearing these stories. You know, I guess Damon, one of these days, maybe our daughters will will say that’d be a win for us. So thank you for sharing that wonderful story. So I want to slide in here. So grew up in manufacturing, Dad’s manufacturer, and just, you know, Hero just dedicated to helping you be, you know, really a fierce, you know, in name of our program. Right. Stay curious, the art of lifelong learning. So you just answered where we got that broke that title from right. Yes, exactly. So that came from dead now you found you brought your your academic Stallworth to NC State. And so you just fiercely wanted to get into manufacturing. Now you became you went into textile chemistry, do I have that right? Access? Right? That’s right. And who knew that was even a major right. So you know, that’s what drove you what inspired you to pursue a degree in textile chemistry at NC State?

Adrienne Temple  03:33

You know, I have to give credit to NC State for that one, because it started in engineering and went through and fully matriculated and just didn’t feel the passion for the things I was learning. I just didn’t get excited about it. And decided to change to chemistry, chemistry appealed to me. But some of the other things in engineering specifically just didn’t really energize me. So decided to pursue the chemistry route and just absolutely loved it. And if you’re not familiar familiar with the NC State, you know, Wilson College of textiles, I would strongly recommend you check it out only because everything that I learned, they had a full pilot plant in the downstairs basement, and our labs were on, you know, pilot size equipment for manufacturing. And you just You saw how it all kind of came together. And I think that’s one of the reasons that I stayed in that decided to graduate, my my focus was dyeing and finishing chemistry and actually went into a dye house. That was my first job out of college after I graduated, so, but you just got excited. I mean, you’ve got to have a tangible result from the things that you are learning real time and it really applied to industry, man, that same equipment was in places I ended up working later. So I just, it just gave me so much more energy around that. And, you know, again, I probably missed that timeframe where some of the textile jobs moved overseas. It was the very next probably graduating class I had a little bit more difficulty. So I was really blessed in that but it’s really served me well, long term. I’ve really enjoyed that that time and then being able to apply it real life and manufacturing.

Curt Anderson  04:55

Well, that is awesome. And we’ll give a little credit to dad on that one too. Right? So, for pursuing that, you know chemistry not the easiest thing on the planet. Now, you might be too young to know this if I say the name Jimmy Valvano what does the you get once you get warm fuzzies you’re gonna get warm and cuddly inside when Curt

Adrienne Temple  05:14

Kurt, you know, having that having the NC State men and women’s basketball team be in the Final Four at the same time that brought back all of our vana vibes that you could possibly imagine. But I’m a lifelong Wolfpack fan. And I was in the minority in when I was in school, you know, like going through elementary, middle high school people were all Tarheel fans was actually a fan as a child. I know exactly who Jim Valvano is. But I was really excited to see what happened with our basketball teams being able to go all the way to Final Four. That was epic. So yeah, it

Curt Anderson  05:48

was an epic, epic season in America. I don’t know where I was or who I was with and and we’re sitting and I’m like, Hey, wait a bit. I go, did you realize that the guys and the girls are both NC State? I mean, what what I don’t know if I don’t know when or if that’s happened. I think I actually looked it up. I don’t know if it’s happened before.

Adrienne Temple  06:04

I don’t know if it has, but I mean, it was one of those things that really just every single Wolfpack fan was so over the moon, and they started pulling back clips from Jim levanto. Way back in the day. So again, yeah, it just just gives you goosebumps. It’s an exciting time. Well,

Curt Anderson  06:19

you know what, I don’t know if I I don’t know if I’m sorry to digress. But you know, I’m over 50. And so when Jim, Jimmy Valvano, if you’re under a certain age, you know, Google or search, Jimmy Valvano and look up his last speech on ESPN and like I can’t even I’ll get choked up, like even talking about it. But he says three things if I’m not mistaken, right, Damon, I think and you and I talked about it. When you feel like Jimmy Valvano kind of brings my ear I’m I’m going totally off script here. Adrian, I’m sorry. No, that’s fine. I think correct me if I’m wrong, I think he says laugh every day. cry every day. And tell somebody you love them every day. And I just man if you just do those three things. We’re like, what simple and easy advice to live by Adrienne, what are your thoughts? Yeah,

Adrienne Temple  07:03

well, I absolutely agree. And that was a really heartfelt speech that he gave and a lot of people you’d still talk about that to this day and how he talked about just never never gave up? You know, if you could if you could be that way and live your life every day. That way. I think you’ll you’ll definitely have a rich, rich life. Yeah. Because when

Curt Anderson  07:21

you’re a guy and you and your Damon right when you’re over 50 You just do cry on a commercial. I cry all the time on our show. So it’s just you know, and I’m like, hey, if anybody says anything, I’m like, Hey, Jimmy Valvano told me to cry everyday. So I’m doing it.

07:34

Yeah, check that box. Got it.

Curt Anderson  07:36

How can I? How can I not take Jimmy vinyls advice? So okay, we did a deep dive and we can talk NC State all you want. But let’s let’s go here. So dad’s a hero, NC State chemists. Textile chemistry, not easiest, you know, certainly not agree that they would have taken me on that one. So you decide to bring your talents, your pursuit, your interests, your passion into manufacturing, just walk through post college, let’s take what was the Adrienne, what was going through Adrian’s mind at that time?

Adrienne Temple  08:06

Yeah, I was really eager to get started in manufacturing was really excited to work in the dye house that I did. I just, you know, you’re, you’re wide open, right, you’re just ready for all the experiences and a lot of it, you know, it’s not always easy, because again, you’re you’re going in with fresh, you know, perspective and you’ve got your education, you’re ready to change the world, right. But at the same time, you have to be adaptable, and you’re learning new processes. And so it was been a huge learning curve in a lot of ways. You know, it was good that I can apply my major because a lot of times people don’t have that advantage to have some of that background when they first get a job. But at the same time, it’s there’s a lot of other things that’s just sort of the, you know, real life that you have to learn in manufacturing, too. So a lot, a lot of great life lessons in those early years in my career, just out of school.

Curt Anderson  08:52

I love it. And I believe shot industries is where you took your talents, is that correct? Yeah. And, and I, if I’m not mistaken, you’re very passionate about six sigma, continuous improvement. Just share a little bit on your corporate career. And then what I want to do is I’d love to slide in right into when you decide you took a big transition. You joined the South Carolina MEP, then we’ll do a deep dive in what’s going on there at South Carolina, the South Carolina MEP. Sure.

Adrienne Temple  09:19

So really early in my career, Shaw was very deeply invested in Six Sigma at that time as well. So probably within the first year of being there, they were sending people through six sigma black belts. I had the opportunity very early on to kind of learn about those tools. I know a lot of folks now in college get that experience well in advance even going into their final position in their career, but started getting exposed to that and lean tools and use those quite frequently. Throughout the time that I was in manufacturing. I worked at three different plants over the course of my career at Shaw. And so I got a chance to kind of explore, you know, five s and continuous improvement and managing six sigma projects as their black belt so you can I got into it and saw the value of of getting, especially to me, the one thing I would say, for anybody that is in manufacturing, especially this early, there’s just so much untapped potential in the people that work on the floor. So if you’re doing continuous improvement, or you want to change something, or you really want to make a difference, the folks on the floor that are they’re doing the work every single day, they are absolutely critical to anything you want to launch or you know, implement, and they have such great input and they want to make a difference. So it got me exposed to that very early on, they’re just, you know, the LS make it better. I have all these ideas. It’s like, you just don’t realize how much untapped potential you have. In your workforce on the shop floor.

Curt Anderson  10:41

Yeah, on tap potential man, that might be our first drop that mic moment right there?

Damon Pistulka  10:47

I think so.

Curt Anderson  10:50

Absolutely. So Adrian, we have these little goofy things called Drop the mics when people are dropping brains. And that’s the thing is we love, you know, here, you know, there’s, we feel strongly, there’s a wonderful renaissance in manufacturing, and you’re really a pioneer pioneer, because you were in it, you know, X number of years ago, and it’s just wonderful. You know, we’re seeing women in manufacturing, and just a lot of different, you know, we need all the talent we can get into manufacturing, and just wonderful how, you know, can you guide in such an early stage, then you took a pivot, you brought your talents to the South Carolina and EP, for our friends out there that are not familiar with the MEP network, please share, what is the manufacturing extension partnership network.

Adrienne Temple  11:30

So the MEP national network is focused on the health and well being of manufacturers across the nation, you know, South Carolina, is focused on our state and making sure that every single manufacturer in the state is equipped to, you know, be profitable to thrive and to grow whenever they’re ready. And so that can be delivered in a lot of different ways. Using a lot of different resources. You know, for us here at SC MEP, we cover pretty much the full value chain, and we use a lot of third party partners to be able to execute at that level to serve. On average, it’s close to 500 manufacturers a year that we engage with, and we’re doing that anywhere from, you know, sales and marketing to exit strategies for those that are aging out and deciding they want to transition the business to continuous improvement logistics, you know, procurement supply chain, it just, you know, soup to nuts is kind of what we say is soup to nuts, we do all the things, but the thing is, is every manufacturer has different needs. And regardless of their phase of their journey, you know, we have ways that we can best support them to get them to that next level.

Curt Anderson  12:39

Excellent, great explanation. Let’s go back to you talking about being famous. It’s all about Adrienne today. Right? Adrienne, when you had a great corporate career, what what attracted you to join the South Carolina Manufacturing Extension Partnership.

Adrienne Temple  12:55

So I’ve actually been exposed to smep while I was in manufacturing, so I knew a little bit about them, they had come and done their free competitiveness review assessment for my department and a couple of other adjoining departments. And so I had some exposure to it. But I just reached a point in my career, to be honest, that, you know, you’re thinking at what are my options to go to that next level? How can I better contribute, and just didn’t really see those opportunities for myself. And I’d been with a company for 13 years, and was just genuinely curious about the opportunity with SCP and I happened to be one regionally, where I could potentially interview for it. And, you know, it’s the best decision I could have made, because I’ll be honest with you, you being in a certain organization for a long period of time, you have a very narrow view, you’re so used to the way that things operate. And then you go out and you realize, you know, you’re going into a five man machine shop, and it’s like, where’s the HR person? Have one, it’s like, you’re sitting there go, how do you function without an HR person? How do you even handle this? And it’s, you realize it gives you perspective, and you get to see lots of different processes, lots of different applications of technology, and it’s just amazing. So I mean, it was, it’s been a great experience for me, I’ve learned so much and gotten a much broader view of kind of where manufacturing is, you know, you get very fixed in your your view of things and think everybody’s got these resources. No, they don’t, they’re not built that way.

Curt Anderson  14:21

Well, fantastic point. And, you know, on average, I believe it’s 75% of all manufacturers, and you probably say all small businesses, but 75% of all small manufacturers are 20 employees or less. And so, you know, when you have 20 employees or less, you know, odds are the person in accounting is the person in HR and they probably are doing all those social media, Ernie, the marketing and the person doing purchasing is probably doing customer service and five other tasks, you know, and when they need to, they’re probably on the floor, doing whatever, you know, it’s like, everybody’s thrown on a lot of different hats. And I think that’s where the MEP network plays such a vital critical role. It helps the business As owner not have to, you know, it lightens the load on him to play throwing all those multiple hats where you can come in and pull some of those things off their plate. Sure, a little bit of just, you know, like a deep that you mentioned, you mentioned a number of things on your on your menu that you offer lean, continuous improvement, marketing, that type of thing. Let’s walk through like an example. You walk into that five person 10 person machine shop, what type of engagement are you going through? How does that process work? A

Adrienne Temple  15:25

lot of times, it’s going to start with discovery. Because again, you don’t you don’t go in there with a perspective of what you think needs to be done without really understanding where the manufacturer is, because to your point, they might have multiple hats on, they might have multiple things that are inhibiting them from maybe they want to grow, or maybe they’re, you know, working with only two customers, you know, if the majority of your businesses with only two customers, you know, you’re at risk at this point, right? Because anything could happen. So a lot of its discovery, so we’re often having conversations to just understand a little bit more of the general climate, what’s business? Like? What types of things are going on right now, you know, how many customers do you have, sometimes we’ll use a more formal process, because we do have assessments that are right SAS to different manufacturers, the really small ones, we use a different assessment is kind of pared down. So they don’t feel overwhelmed by it larger organizations, we have a free assessment that we do this a lot more comprehensive, because they typically have more systems. And it makes sense to explore that a little bit deeper. But either way, we’re going to do a discovery process first and try and identify what those key pain points are, and see how we can get them to where they want to be next. Because again, everybody’s got a different mission. To be honest, we have some people that are like, I want to stay this size, I’m comfortable with this, but I need to grow profit, well, that’s a different situation, then I’m trying to grow my portfolio, I want to expand in terms of the number of customers and I want to grow that way. So different conversation, different needs. And I think everyone needs to be approached at that individual level to understand that. Well,

Curt Anderson  16:57

that’s fantastic. Instead of you know, and again, it’s you know, instead of coming in, you know, hey, this is what you need to do. It’s just really diagnosing and absorbing, listening this in, again, back to the title of our program, staying curious, right, the art of learning. And the best way to learn is just, you know, you know, I learned we have two ears and one mouth, right, is do a lot of listening, ask great questions, and then help them guide you to where you want to go. Little I’m going to go here, agent, can you think back any some of the owners that you’ve worked with just some really fun, exciting stories? Just you know, maybe you get that note? Like, Adrian, thank you so much for like, you know, a particular order when, what were some of the fun wins or successes that you’ve experienced through your career, ses MEP.

Adrienne Temple  17:43

So yeah, it’s actually there’s one that I worked with several years ago, continue to have a great relationship with them, even though I’ve moved out of kind of business development role, but, and we spent a long time back and forth, let’s get this assessment. Let me come in, let me talk to you. And we finally got it pinned down probably six months or so later. And they were really in a position where, I mean, it was one of those things, inheriting the business and taking things over and just realizing I just, I’m not sure where we’re going with this. And we did the assessment. And we actually based on where they were helped them to get some funding to offset the cost to be able to do some, some different things there to help them and they are still in operation today. We have a strong partnership continue to work together on a regular basis. They’re definitely advocates for us because of the experience that we have. But yeah, that’s the rewarding work. Right. I mean, you know, I think one of the things that so many people, I mean, maybe even in corporate America to make a sweeping generalization, but I think people really struggle with like, what is the purpose of what I’m doing, like, what’s the fulfillment and what I’m actually do. And I think that’s one of the benefits of what we do here is that chance to really make a difference, you know, to really help someone and sometimes it’s to be honest with you guys, it’s sometimes it’s not even the services that we provide, because we’re also a connector. I mean, South Carolina in particular is is resource rich, and there’s lots of programming, lots of resources that are dedicated to industry business at large. And we try and put everybody at the table when there’s opportunity. It’s not just about what we can do, but it’s, you know, if they’re struggling with other things that we know, they could probably take advantage of and get somebody in there to talk to them from another program. We’re going to do that right. We’re going to do all the right things to make sure they have every resource at the table possible to be successful, but it’s it really is just so uplifting to know that you were able to make a difference and help someone get closer to where they want to be. That’s an amazing feeling.

Damon Pistulka  19:41

Yes, and that’s the nice thing about the MEP really because you guys can come in and go let us let us understand your business. Rather than this is what we want to help you with and and it’s like that the person that has a hammer everything’s a nail You know, that way with the MEP, it’s like, Okay, what’s what’s your what’s really a challenge today that if you solve, it will make a big difference. And you can work on from there. It’s a great part about the MEP across the United States. And then I really enjoy to the way that if your MEP, your state MEP is not a center of excellence for something like that, you go to the other ones, and they have it. It’s, it’s just such a wonderful resource for manufacturers.

Curt Anderson  20:31

And I’ll piggyback on this statement, so we just we interviewed a couple amazing folks from the Illinois MEP last Wednesday, Adrienne, and I’d love to get your feedback on this, they were going into Jamin work for a hearing aid manufacturer in his previous life. And you know, just when we think about like hearing aids, you know, think of the lives that are changed, where the baby that hears for the first time or you know, he gave an example like the teenage girl that could hear her boyfriend blow a kiss for the first time, or, you know, some as a senior citizen who has spent decades on his planet. And he he equated the the lives that were changed at the hearing aid manufacturer, he left there to the iMac, the Illinois MEP, because he felt it was a similar transition, where he could change lives and fight for a greater cause. And I feel that’s almost exactly what you’re describing is like you’re coming into that manufacturer, and it’s really a cause beyond yourself. It’s trying, you know, because it’s not five people at that, at that machine shop, it’s five families, and they’ve got their first mortgage and somebody that has dance lessons or little league team, a child on a little league team, or you’re just you’re some of them on a personal side, how rewarding it is for you.

Adrienne Temple  21:44

A really, it really is. And it’s close to my heart. Because whenever, you know, I was younger, my mom started her own business, not manufacturing, but she started her own business. So she was a small business owner. And you have a real appreciation for how difficult that can be and how many burdens a person carries. And again, that was that was a livelihood that helped our family, right. So I have a real heart for small manufacturers. But it is I mean, in manufacturing, the one thing that I can say I miss the most about being in the plant. I mean, I’m not one of those people that left manufacturing, I would never want to work in manufacturing, again, I just want to you know, I just want to help with the on the outside looking in I you know, I love manufacturing, it’s the people, the people that I worked with back years ago, I still get to see some of those people. And when I do it is just so uplifting, because you you really do care about the person. I mean, that’s what it’s all about. It’s about people. I mean, the the journey is one thing, but it’s the company that you’re in when you’re on that journey, right. So I do deeply care about the folks that I meet and work with you. And again, I mean, you know, to your point, my dad was my hero, I’m invested in their success, how can I not be like I want to be helpful, I think everybody can be successful, you know, if they have the right resources available to them. So there’s just Yeah, there’s definitely a genuine interest in doing that. And so much fulfillment and making a difference, and especially whenever it’s a private business owner, as many things as they encounter, you know, hard choices are made, you know, if they’re not as profitable as they could be, it puts people at risk, they don’t want to cut jobs, because they didn’t have a good year. I mean, you you really appreciate that this is there’s a lot of people involved in this and a lot more than just like you said, the employees at hand, it’s you know, families are affected in, you know, even the business owner, nobody wants to have to cut jobs or shut down for certain days because of lack of work. So anything that we can do their, you know, you really want to prevent that from happening, you really want to see them be stronger, and really be able to weather different changes and be successful long term and really thrive.

Curt Anderson  23:46

Well, that’s fantastic. And again, just like your dad, you know, the heroes of our economy are in our humble opinion, our our manufacturers, and so it’s just great, you know, how you’re supporting them? What are some of the trends? Like what are some of the challenges, you know, during COVID? Obviously, you know, very heavy supply chain disruption workforce was a challenge. What are you what’s hot and heavy? What do you see now?

Adrienne Temple  24:08

I think some of those things have have endured a bit. So you know, supply chain, I think brought up a lot of questions about what are we going to do differently. So there’s been a lot of mobilization and and I’m sure if you’ve talked to other MVPs, quite a few of them have started to invest in using the connects database. So we’re all about trying to create that connectivity amongst manufacturers, so that not only at the state level, but you know, at the national level, you know, maybe you could have a supplier more regionally located. So again, there’s still a lot of mobilization around supply chain because I don’t think anybody’s completely figured that out. I mean, we had a lot of vulnerabilities at that time. So that continues, people trying to make really good solid business decisions around that workforce continues as well. You know, it’s it’s a, it’s a shifting landscape. So you know, some of the things that we’ve had issues with before in terms of just finding the right, the right amount of people able to do the jobs but also, you know, adopting technology where you think that you can’t source the person, is there an opportunity for a cobalt or automation, those questions are now coming up because again, it might pay dividends to do that, so that you can use a truly skilled labor for other things and utilize them in places that add the most value and leverage technology where maybe you can’t seem to find a candidate. But then also for us in South Carolina in particular, I think one of the things and we spoke briefly about that before is, you know, electrical vehicles, and just the disruption that that will cause to the automotive industry at large. We have a lot of automotive here in South Carolina. So you start looking at process shifts and how you’re gonna adapt and any of the regulatory impacts of that anything environmental, you’re gonna have to manage or from safety standpoint, but also your workforce development, you have a workforce already, it’s very accustomed to the type of work they were doing for traditional vehicles, as opposed to now moving to from an internal combustion to evey. So a lot of lot of moving parts still, but some of the things that we saw during COVID still endure, though, again, it’s getting better, but it’s it’s making people really think long and hard about what am I going to do differently to make sure that I’m insulated from that risk moving forward? Yeah. Right.

Damon Pistulka  26:18

So much there. Sorry.

Curt Anderson  26:20

It shook up a lot. I you know, you gave us a nice little tutorial, a little one on one on, you know, a lot of the exciting trends in manufacturing in South Carolina before we went on live, you just hit how you know how, like, you know, some folks around the country might not realize when they think South Carolina, they might not equate that with heavy duty. Automotive. Sure, some of the other you know, aerospace. And I

Damon Pistulka  26:44

mean, is there just so much happening and the father of all racing, oh my goodness. Karolina as you if you haven’t seen that, um, that was one of the funnest things about being in that area of the country when I was is the racing influence. And they just how that that’s everywhere. But

Adrienne Temple  27:06

yeah, I’m originally from North Carolina. So NASCAR was a regular Sunday activity for me.

27:14

So I could appreciate that.

27:17

Oh, awesome. But

Adrienne Temple  27:18

yeah, I mean, if you if you look at what we have going on to your point day when we do have aerospace as well, I mean, obviously, you Boeing is here we have Lockheed as well, in the state. We have again, automotive was one of our has always been one of our major clusters, as BMW landed here years ago. And it really again, explosion of supply chain, and all those folks that are building assemblies or any of the interiors for BMW, but a lot of things going on in that space. Because with Eevee, to your point earlier, we were talking is, you know, component manufacturers, things start really shifting. And you know, we have others that deal in transmissions directly, they build transmissions for internal combustion engines. And so now it’s sort of, again, big shift to turn to go to evey that’s not a lights on lights off kind of thing. That’s a, you know, transition, and then understanding the climate for the consumer side, you know, where’s the demand? Do we have it? And how do we start to migrate to have the right balance. So there’s a lot of things there. But even tire manufacturers, which was sort of a blind spot for me, but but Michelin brought this up. And it’s a valid point, we have a member kind of like the tire capital, I mean, we have all of the tire manufacturers here in the area. So for them product design and understanding how to build tires to that type of application for evey as opposed to an internal combustion engine, you don’t have as much resistance, a lot of power is going to go to the tires, right? So how quickly they weigh or down how they need to be designed to endure that. Those are things that I would not have thought about. But again, it’s that’s a very relevant change. And that could be a disruptive for the tire industry as they do product development as well. So a lot of things is all across, you know, the entire value chain of manufacturing and automotive is going to be adjusting to sort of this shift towards Eevee, or this interest in evey.

Curt Anderson  29:12

Well, that’s fantastic. I know, hey, we past the top of the hour. So if you’re just joining us, we’re here with Adrienne Temple and Adrienne, you’re the vice president of training programs at the South Carolina and MEP Manufacturing Extension Partnership, we strongly encourage you, we invite you, we welcome you connect with Adrienne on LinkedIn, she’d love to hear from you, especially if you’re a manufacturer in the state of South Carolina. If you’re coming to us from outside the state man, check out your local MEP. And I’ll tell you as an entrepreneur, you know, I’m a 30 Whatever, I’ve lost track Adrienne, but however many years you know, it’s just it’s just so wonderful having access to a resource. And what’s funny is we’ve interviewed a lot of your colleagues that were were previous manufacturers, either own manufacturers or in manufacturing didn’t know about the MEP network, found out about the MEP network, some or your relationship, and then join the team. And they all say, Gosh, I wish I would have known about the MEP. Or I could have taken advantage as an entrepreneur, like you said, Your Mom’s an entrepreneur, just having that resource kind of overlooking your shoulder, just saying, hey, entrepreneur, I have your back. You know, we’re pointing out some blind spots here. And we, you know, I realize you only have 510 employees, but we’ve got a deep bench of resources to help you. I know, I’m going to pull up the website, and we’re going to point out a couple of resources that you have before we go there. How about a shout out to some of your team, you have a wealth and abundance of talent on the team at the South Carolina MEP, your fearless leader, any car, you want to give a shout out, or just some of the resources that you guys have, that you spread and share with South Carolina manufacturers? Yeah, so

Adrienne Temple  30:45

we’ve got, we’ve got five internal delivery people, we call them process improvement coaches that we send out all across the state to work directly with our manufacturers where rubber meets the road to help them out, say, Susan Whitehead, David woods, Steven DS, Jim Woody and Chris Wayne, they’re rock stars, and we love them. And they are always ready to do whatever is necessary to make people successful. We’ve got our RBPS as well, they are amazing folks, all from manufacturing, just deeply dedicated to supporting their territories. We’ve got some folks that are highly tenured with us, we’ve got some brand new folks have been for year for two years or less. So got a good mix of the team there. So shout out to Rhonda Huskins. She’s, she’s gonna be leaving us soon for retirement, she’s gonna stay a little bit longer, but she’s been with us, I think it’s been 25 years or more and the MEP, she is amazing. And I just want to give her a shout out for all the hard work she does, because she’s gonna miss us. But we’ve got an awesome team, we could not do this without Andy’s leadership. And also we our Director of Operations, Tony Morris been exceptional. So just you know, I’m blessed to work with a team like that, because it’s very rare to have people that are fully dedicated to the mission and everybody rowing in the same direction. But we definitely have that here. And it really makes the difference. That’s what makes us successful as our people for sure.

Curt Anderson  32:06

Yeah. And it’s great. And again, for folks that might be new to the MEP network. It’s nice, because you can come into a project with objectivity, which is hard to do, right like Damon gate. You know, David, that guest the other days, you know, gave the hammer nail. Yeah. And so, you know, the wonderful thing is you can come into a project. And so you have your deep bench. And then you also have, as David just mentioned, you have a there’s 1300 of you around the country at different states, we’ve had case studies on our live show, where, you know, one state partnered with another state and have the manufacturer saved 1000s of dollars, because of collaboration and teamwork. So there’s this end, you have access to third party providers as well, which is also huge. Web. So I’m going to, what I’m going to do now is I’m going to share my screen. You guys can see that okay, right. Yep. Okay, so first, why don’t we start here? We’ve got the Advanced Manufacturing Technology Resource Guide, Adrienne. Sure. A little bit what’s going on here? Okay,

Adrienne Temple  33:05

so this one, this resource just dropped. And really what we’re trying to do here is kind of like I talked about before, when you look at manufacturing and sort of the challenges that they’re facing, you know, we’re getting to that point where there’s a question about embracing technology and advanced manufacturing, I think one of the biggest question marks is, you know, how do I get started? Where does this make sense? I mean, where are the resources that if I need them, so we tried to provide a resource guide to bring that all together for manufacturers to refer to because we do see the value in embracing technology where it suits your use case, and makes good business sense. But sometimes it’s the adoption, that’s the hard part. So this is just a way to kind of give good information, you point folks in a direction give him something to work with. So that just recently dropped in the last couple of weeks. So I strongly encourage anybody who’s interested in downloaded it’d be very useful information around advanced manufacturing technologies. Very cool.

Curt Anderson  33:57

That’s fantastic. So again, we dropped it in the chat box, in case you don’t see it, just go to scmep.org. And you just check out their guides. And then I believe we have another guide that we want to pull up here. Right there. This one right here, we’re gonna go to the workforce development playbook. Boy, this is priceless right here.

Adrienne Temple  34:21

Yeah, this one is really awesome. It’s been around for a few years now. But one of the things that I think anybody could benefit from is the fact that it’s written from the perspective of talking to different manufacturers with all the challenges in workforce, you know, what are you doing around recruitment, retention and reputation. The three R’s basically is how it’s categorized. So it’s about what manufacturers have been doing to address some of their challenges and resources they may have used and then it points to, you know, their state programs that help with that. It gives some great input on ways you might be able to do the same thing at your company. So so many people struggle around workforce still, I never Want to make that seem like that issue solved. And I don’t know if it ever will be right, because it’s a shifting landscape. It’s very dynamic. But sometimes, to your point about us being a best kept secret that we don’t want to be a lot of our statewide programs and in other states, very similar programs probably exist, I don’t feel it’s just South Carolina for this one. It’s written from South Carolina. But you know, there are programs out there that are intended to help whether you’re an entrepreneur or whether you’re somebody who’s just landing in the state, or you’re someone who’s about to go through a major expansion, or you’ve got potential layoffs, or challenges, or apprenticeship programs, all those things exist, but they’re not very visible. And this is a way for people to be even more aware of programs that are at their disposal. I mean, they’re there to help you. But if you don’t know about them, and don’t know what they really do for you, you don’t take advantage of them. So the Workforce Development playbook goes into a lot of that depth, it points people to those resources so they can get connected.

Curt Anderson  35:53

Yeah, you know, you’re making a fantastic point there. Adrienne, you know, as, as an entrepreneur, maybe in manufacturers, a lot of times we get a little bit skeptical when we hear you know, oh, there’s a there’s an agency, there’s an organization, there’s a nonprofit, there’s a something that’s going to help me in there, like, alright, what what’s the catch, right? There’s no, and again, justifiably, there might be a little, you know, skepticism of like, okay, what you know, but again, take advantage of these incredible resources here. Adrian, what are your thoughts? Would it be worth our time you want me pull up connects, you want to take a peek at that real quick, you

Adrienne Temple  36:27

can certainly show that as well, because some folks may be interested in that. And there’s quite a few MEPs that are participating in this program at this point. I think we’ve been doing it for the past year and a half or so. But, you know, connects is that database that, again, I’m trying to think current how many MEPs are now using, it’s quite a few, some are further along than we are. But what it’s doing is, you know, fully vetting and putting together, you know, this opportunity for b2b with manufacturers. And so there’s nationwide access, you know, they’re statewide access. So in South Carolina, we have a lot of folks that are using the statewide access. But that means that and there’s a lot of discovery in that, because there’s a lot of manufacturers that believe it or not, you know, it’s a couple of counties over but because you’re not in that county, you don’t know about it. So all of a sudden, you’re trying to source something, you know, from California, and you run into all these challenges and cost burden, but you didn’t know there was somebody that was two counties over that can also do that for you. It’s about the sustainability of your own supply chain, right, and creating those opportunities to connect and no, these are vetted resources, and all the data is there, and you get really solid leads from that. So we’re trying to encourage manufacturers to embrace that program, because again, we learned a lot and COVID. Right, we learned a lot about what we didn’t really know. And this is an opportunity to get us better connected nationwide. And statewide. Yeah,

Damon Pistulka  37:50

this, this is one of the programs, I think that’s understated a bit with the MEPs. Because just, you know, from a manufacturer standpoint, they have no idea who’s in the next county usually making exactly what they want, or if they’re even there. And, wow, it just connects it. And I’m not like you said, I’m not going across the country around the world to get what I need. Right.

Adrienne Temple  38:14

And that helps when you look at smaller manufacturers made again, you might have big OEMs of certain things. But at the end of the day, you know, the supply chain is made up of law that is smaller manufacturers, right, they’re cogs in a very big wheel. And this offers opportunity for them to be more visible to other people that could use their same services, because maybe they could be in different clusters. They could be in different industries, supporting folks, but the opportunities don’t present themselves. And if you’re a smaller business, it’s a lot harder to pursue those opportunities, right? I mean, you just don’t really have a time when these things get connected. There’s just a better chance for some fruitful conversation between businesses. So hopefully that helps to really strengthen the supply chain, you know, here in the US and then definitely at a state level as well. Yeah,

Curt Anderson  39:02

yeah, totally agree. And they do amazing work. So they will reach and get these guys on the show. I think it’s perfect. Adrienne I do. We do our live show at the annual MEP conference. And I We caught one of the guys from connects came on the show and I was actually at the Alaska MEP in person doing a workshop and I was talking to him in a workshop with a gentleman from connects. So they do great work. And as you’re pointing out, you just you might not realize who’s literally down the street or one or two counties over as you mentioned, who does exactly what you need, or vice versa, right? What if somebody two counties away is buying something from across country and here you are you’re like hey, I could I could offer that product or or that solution. So this is great. Anything else that you want me to pull up real quick here on your website.

Adrienne Temple  39:48

So one thing I’ll bring up it would be under the training and professional development. If you click on that for me real quick and I want you to go to the SCP online. I just want to point this out because we were talking about it COVID and things that we’ve kind of learned from that as well. So that may be loading, loading, or

Damon Pistulka  40:07

did open into another window.

40:10

It did probably go, well.

Adrienne Temple  40:12

Good, thank goodness for Daymond. Right.

Curt Anderson  40:17

Keep going, Adrian, I’ll get it in one second. Yeah. And I

Adrienne Temple  40:20

just wanted to point it out, because it was one of those things of you looking at, you know, us trying to evolve over time, whenever this all happened, you know, up until 2020, we did not have online content available. And we do a lot of professional development training for, you know, from the floor level, all the way up to executive level. In 2020, before the pandemic really became a major thing we had already set out. Under our previously or Chuck Spangler, who unfortunately passed away a little over two years ago, he’d already set out that we were going to do online. And so when I became the VP of training programs, it was really this was the first project is get us get us online, get us able to provide access to folks that might not be able to come to our regular training classes, you know, you think about the rural manufacturers that travel a far distance to get their folks trained and things that they don’t have access to. So smep Online is just another way for us to provide training to manufacturers across a lot of different topic matter. You know, we’re doing leadership, or We’re also leveraging a lot of third party content around technical things, you know, so your tooling, u SME, provide some content, we’ve got some folks that do injection molding as well. So maintenance or reliability training. And what we’re trying to do is, you know, we don’t want to assume to that point of that individual conversation with the manufacturer, we don’t want to assume that every manufacturer has the bandwidth, the financial capability to upskill their people by driving long distances, right. So let’s take that barrier out, let’s, let’s still make it feasible for you to upskill your workforce, but maybe then we’ll ever have to leave the plant. And let’s make sure that everybody has access to it. So big shift for us, you know, big paradigm shift for us as well. But we do have an online platform that’s been going strong for about four years now. And just, you know, DMS about us trying to adapt to some of those changes as well. And I think a lot of other MEPs are in similar situations they learned from COVID. You know, how do you how do you make it more accessible, and especially with small manufacturers and the number that we have in our states? You know, how do we provide the same level of skill development for them whenever they do have those barriers of transportation or cost limitations to pay for overnight travel? You know, let’s let’s remove that from the conversation, make sure everybody gets the opportunity to do the right thing for their folks.

Curt Anderson  42:35

Well, excellent. And what a plethora of topics here, women in leadership, Lean thinking for digital processes, navigating ISO 2701 27 27,001. I mean, just wonderful, wonderful topics here. This is fantastic. Kudos to you. And I do want to give a shout out to Chuck, I never had the honor and privilege of meeting Chuck personally. But I know I was very familiar when when Chuck moved on to another life. Boy, people, just the amount of love that was showered, you just you just got a great sense of the huge impact he had on your Center and the National MEP as a as a whole. So, again, you know, sorry for your loss. And what a great legacy. It sounds like he’s love for you. Yeah,

Adrienne Temple  43:18

he absolutely has, I would say he really, he set us up for success. And we continue to carry that torch, you know, and and Andy worked with Chuck for a very long time. And so again, you know, the, our core principles where we operate, you know, that has not changed. And that’s really a blessing. But me Chuck had the vision, and he was, he was a force to be reckoned with. And we miss him every day. But we’re so blessed that he set us up to continue on and be successful and still stay true to our mission. Well,

Curt Anderson  43:47

man, that is very inspiring, Adrian, I’m gonna butcher the quote, or however it goes, you know, you know, thank God you had that, you know, though, it was cut short, thank God, you had the opportunity have had the impact of Chuck, and how he’s, he’s, I’m gonna get that quote, nailed down one of these days, but you know what I’m talking about. Right? So, you know, this. I’m, gosh, Adrian, I could talk to you all day. And I still have a couple more questions. And I know we’re running over time. I want to be respectful of your time. I know how busy you are, aren’t the, the title of the show is the art of lifelong learning. And these courses are, you know, perfect tie in to what we’ve been talking about. For you personally. Or maybe overall, you know, as you’re out there just pounding the pavement helping manufacturers, any tips advice, like like, what do you want to share as far as like, what’s the key what’s, what are some tips for success, to have that art of lifelong learning?

Adrienne Temple  44:41

I think it really comes down to I mean, again, if you’re someone who’s going to stay curious, you also have to stay humble, right? So there’s things that you don’t know. But always be open to opportunity to learn something that might be outside your comfort zone. I mean, that’s where you’re really going to grow right? I mean, you can kind of stay in a certain place. hasten and really not expand your horizons a bit and learning new things because of the fear of being very vulnerable in that or feeling, you know, silly for not knowing those things. But you know, there’s so much more opportunity for tree growth in development and continuing to ignite your passion for things by stretching yourself beyond. I mean, I do the same thing. So again, I walk the talk, I don’t, I’m a chemistry person. And I was in sales. And that was a, that was a weird space for me. And I learned a lot from it. But it was me taking that first jump and saying, I don’t know a lot about this, but why not? And, you know, same thing goes today, I’ve done a lot of professional development on my own and in marketing, because I’m curious, and I’m interested, and I think it’s a really cool thing to learn. So for anybody, you know, I really think that you just have to recognize that there are so much more beyond your comfort zone, then you probably realize and a lot to be gained from that. So just in staying open to learn something new and, you know, throw aside assumption or hesitation, you know, be open because there’s a lot to be gained from that. Well, I

Curt Anderson  46:11

love it. dad’s legacy is certainly staying strong. You know, being that fierce educator, and just, you know, you know, having other books, the book for dummies and all these, you know, everything that he had on yourselves and just, you know, instilling that in you and your brother is we wind down I Damon, I do have a question here today. I do have so I can’t help myself. I have to ask. I have a baseball question. So now, when we’re talking to somebody from South Carolina, I have to pull this up. Don’t Don’t don’t want to have to pull up my, my Yes, you do. Now I know. It has a lot to do with manufacturing. Right. Savannah? Bananas? I don’t know. Maybe they make baseball bats, are they? They’re manufacturing? A lot of fun in Savannah. We are right, Adrian? Yes, absolutely. Here’s my hypothetical, your big NC State fan hypothetical for you. If if you were called to they they’re like, hey, Adrian, we need you to play on the savannah bananas, just hypothetically. Okay. And you grab your bat, you have your helmet, and you’re on your way up to the plate. What would be your walk up song at a savannah banana game? How about that question?

Adrienne Temple  47:24

Wow, that’s a really interesting question. You’ve been sitting on that the whole time. Was that the surprise that you had?

47:29

by little? So now,

Curt Anderson  47:31

we ask every year we ask every guest that question, but I never told them ahead of time.

Adrienne Temple  47:36

I’ll tell you why. And I’ve got a good comeback, which is very rare, but I can poke fun at myself. So I would say it would be I have the tiger and it’s because my name is Adrian and I grew up everybody said so I Yeah. Let’s just embrace that wraps. The Tiger from Rocky Yeah.

48:02

Hey, God bless you. That is gonna go there. That is that just embrace that and go with it? Yeah,

Adrienne Temple  48:09

just you know, at this point, I kind of have

Curt Anderson  48:11

I have the tiger and I’m even I’m thinking of rocky running up the stairs at the library. Yeah, no. Yeah, the whole thing. So hey, we’ve got a couple of comments here. Damon very happy Monday. It’s much easier to be a perpetual learner. When you have great trainers and teachers it’s obviously you inspired learning Adrienne. And Schuller says Amen to that. So guys, thank you for the comments. And thank you for joining us today. We drink we’re gonna close out any parting thoughts words of wisdom that you want to share with folks out there today

Adrienne Temple  48:43

I’m gonna leave this with you and this is actually my dad. But you guys will appreciate this. So whenever he was still working in the plant on his whiteboard, he put in bold letters as K ask and it stands for always seek knowledge. And that is what I would leave anybody with is always seek knowledge

Curt Anderson  49:10

there it is. Boom. Adrienne we so not we have dropped the mic moments but then when it like when it gets off the charts, we call them moments of silence. So we just want to we just, we just want to savor that and forgive me What’s dad’s first name again? Eddie. Eddie. So all right, big shout out lots of love to Eddie Tom Tom You know friends of our big Jimmy Jimmy V fan said big hello to Dad Eddie. So thank you for the brilliance always seek knowledge always seek knowledge best business advice right there

49:47

Damon What do you think of that one?

Damon Pistulka  49:48

I think it is good stuff.

Curt Anderson  49:50

So hey, what we’re gonna do we’re gonna close out i Courage you invite you welcome you. You just You just saw you. You heard the fire if you miss anything you Do yourself a favor, go back, hit the replay button catch all this wonderful inspiration from Adrienne. If you want to take that conversation further, please connect and reach out to her on LinkedIn. Stop by the SC mep.org website, tons of information, all sorts of things going on there. So Adrienne, thank you. We appreciate you as mere fact. Amen. How about let’s give a big standing ovation for Adrienne just absolutely crushing it hitting the ball out of the park. She has the Eye of the Tiger gave a little rocky reference. I love it. That you made my day with that one. So we’re gonna we’re gonna close out Adrian, we’re gonna ask you to hang out with us for one second. We just We in man, David, are you ready to run through a wall or what man was fine. We just encourage you guys go out and be someone’s inspiration just like Adrienne was today. We’re gonna be back here Friday. We have another amazing, wonderful guest with us as we are just dedicated helping manufacturers. So have a great rest of your day. Rocket the rest of the week and we’ll see you Friday.

51:02

Have a great week. Thanks.