Helping Manufacturers with Impact Washington

Curt Anderson  00:00

Hey, guys, happy Monday a Damon You look like you’re in a little different place here today. What’s going on?

Damon Pistulka  00:06

I feel like I’m what’s that guy Andy on the street or something? Or is it guy going on the street and talking to people when I’m on the road? I’m like you today, Curt. I’m out at a client site.

Curt Anderson  00:16

Well, I love it. Well, hey, Happy Monday to you. I came down last Monday of the quarter already. I don’t. I just feel like the year just started. Nelson. We’re coming to the end of the quarter. So we have a great wonderful conversation. We’re gonna dive right in. We we’ve got a manufacturing expert here. So Miguel, from Impact Washington, Miguel, my friend, how are you? Happy Monday.

Miguel Moreno  00:38

Happy Monday occurred. Happy Monday, Damon, I’m fine. I mean, it’s Monday. It’s Monday, I find

Curt Anderson  00:47

Buddhist leave it at that. It’s Monday. Right. We’ll get T shirts. It’s Monday. So ready to go. So we have a lot to cover today. So we’re gonna dive in, Miguel, you, I, you know, I’ve had the honor and privilege of working with you for the past few years. My respect, admiration for you off the charts. We’re going to dive into that. Before we go there. I want to kind of give a little lead up on to where this manufacturing extraordinaire came from, if you will. So Miguel, let’s start here. You’re when you were a little guy growing up in where did you grow up at? I

Miguel Moreno  01:22

grew up in a town in Spain school. That is in the south of Italy is literally 116 kilometers away from Africa.

Curt Anderson  01:31

Got it? Okay, so grew up in Spain as a little guy. And so you have a real fascinating tale, we’re going to figure out how you ended up in the state of Washington with impact. But when you were a little guy growing up in Spain, who was your hero? Who did you look up to? and admire and respect? Who did you look up to? As a little guy in Spain?

Miguel Moreno  01:52

Oh, my God, um I think it’s very typical answer, but my dad, I mean, it’s, it’s my, my dad had a fantastic work ethic, he was always preparing for the family. And he, you know, wake up in the morning, six o’clock in the morning, which is really helpful Spain and 730. And so it’s 730 He was he was already on the on the fields. My dad was being your foreman, and his life and he was managing 200 people. Yeah. Yeah, it was, it was, it was a big, big winner. And at some point, he was managing to honor people. And the fact is my dad, no one to never went to university, no, went to college. They went to high school. He grew up in the aftermath of the Civil War War and in Spain, and to work in Spain, and he had the opportunity to go to primary school only, and still have fantastic leadership skills. And he, his very stoic, very very short freshman. And but he gives me a couple of vendors. It’s you know, there are my nose started like, follow them. Follow those those couple sentences are all the time. Wow, awesome. Okay, in

Curt Anderson  03:32

what what’s dad’s name?

Miguel Moreno  03:33

My dad My dad was this nice

Curt Anderson  03:38

awesome man. What a great story that is man, people and just what a fierce just what an inspiration for you to follow and just looked up the dad and just kind of carried that work ethic and that Northstar just absolutely love it, Miguel. Okay. All right. So let’s dive in. So you grew up in Spain, I believe your work career you ended up in Mexico came to the United States. Take us through what how did you end up in North America? Let’s walk walk us through that journey.

Miguel Moreno  04:05

So um, when I was about to finish college, I saw a flyer in the campus and if you want to take internships paid internships abroad, I was like, Yeah, I want to do that. So through an international student organization called ASX. I ended in Mexico working as a consultant 18 months. At the time, my dad passed or passed away I had to return to Spain to fix his home and after working for 18 months a consultant you know, on the field and working with machines and been on the on the manufacturing world as it is, this is what I want to do. And nothing that I found in in my hometown was something I wanted to do. So I pick up the phone, call the consultant trying to say yes, there’s an opportunity but no hearing well, it makes no it makes it worse anyway. Well, I didn’t know anybody. Well, I hadn’t. I used to just say, Yep, I want to do that. So I moved to all that Hara I worked for probably two years as consultants with with some firm after that, what am I, then clients hired me as quality assurance and continuous improvement manager 500 People company. Then, after seven, seven and a half years, a friend of mine his father’s company needs someone to manage the company as a CEO. And they asked me what do you do for a living? Long as I thought it was I solve problems. That’s what I do myself, because it does what we need a promissory note. Okay. So they offered me a position. In the meantime, I met my note, my now wife, and after a few years, we got married and we want to start a family. And Mexico is a beautiful place. But we want to be close to somebody here. And so we moved to Denver first was soft landing, my mother in law was living the other time there. And after Denver, I met Tom booklets who was this the CEO of manufacturers edge, which is the NIST MEP center for the state of Colorado. Through Tom. I met Lauren, Lauren Lyon, we came to visit your friends, a couple of friends that we have here. When we’re living in Denver. We came to this a couple of friends here that have been Kirtland. And, you know, we landed, we landed in Seattle, I was one of those Seattle days that are absolutely strange, because he was at the beginning of the spring, but it’s a beautiful day, you know, probably 70 blue skies, but not absolutely blue or title, clouds. Everything was green, no traffic. No, no traffic.

Curt Anderson  07:17

That was the last time. That

Damon Pistulka  07:19

was the last time I was like

Miguel Moreno  07:24

I’m, we felt like come to this home, this home for this home in some zone. So when we flew back to Denver, we looked at each other and we didn’t say, let’s think about it, this meeting and say, you know, we thought you were going to sell it. Let’s do it. So we landed in Denver. Molly, my wife saw to look for jobs I gave notice. And one month later, we were here. Wow. That

Damon Pistulka  07:49

is when? man Yeah, yeah. Yeah. And

Miguel Moreno  07:53

then I went to I went to Washington. I think Lauren liked me. Because I got the position.

Curt Anderson  08:02

Well, they you must have done something. Right. So alright, what things I want to pack right there. So you know, I, Miguel, you know, I’d be I’d be disappointed myself. If I didn’t bring this up. You know, you and I are both big, blue ocean fans, we won’t go deep into it. But Damon, we talked about the Blue Ocean Strategy quite a bit on the show. Just you know, that whole concept and and so I’m talking with Miguel one day, Miguel, you have a funny story when you were in college, about the Blue Ocean Strategy. Do you want to you mind sharing that with folks?

Miguel Moreno  08:31

Well, it was it was short story. My that time I was the a student assistant professor to to the director of the of the Department of economy of the business. That’s that’s the direct translation. But anyway, so this, this professor gives me an article from the Harvard Business Review and said, You need to translate this. And I was like, what, if you didn’t say this? And we’re gonna go like, Okay, I’ll try it. And it was precisely about about the blue ocean strategy. And that’s, we’re talking that it was 1994. probably name a full name a five. When I read for the very first time, the blue ocean study. While I was reading that, I came back, it was clear to me that make absolutely sense if you have a big company, if you have a company that’s trying to find, you know, ocean with, you know, another 300 companies and fighting for the same piece of the pie, you’re going to suffer. And if you look for something that don’t, you know, have this big pie, there’s a small piece that nobody’s attending those people there. And instead of having to fight for $300 million, you’re going to be by myself, only 2 million, but you don’t have it myself. So I reduce costs, reduce stress, I can do better and I turn into the benchmark of the of the of market. Yeah, there was. It was very interesting. But the translation wasn’t easy.

Curt Anderson  10:10

I’m sure but a great way to learn language great rate to understand and learn the Blue Ocean Strategy whole concept in you’re just a fierce advocate for small manufacturers. We’re gonna dive into that. I’d like to so I want to I want to dive into who and what is impact Washington? Can you just share with folks what is the MEP network who is impact Washington what let’s go there.

Miguel Moreno  10:34

So MEP stands for Manufacturing Extension Partnership. We are a group of organizations we all share mission, the same mission we want to do is to help companies to become better, to more efficient to make more wealthy to make money, but at the end of the day, we’ll train them to do is to hire more people. We are passionately federally funded. So we received money from Congress through the National Institute of synapse technology. And empower Washington specifically is the MEP center for the state of Washington. So you’ll have one in at least one or maybe centrally each in each state. We are here in Washington was volting we are last time I count we are like 16 people nice I think bed we reached entire organ the entire states. And it’s it’s a lot of fun. I have I work with a fantastic team, just unbelievable talented people that wishes and mission helping small manufacturing small and medium sized manufacturers in the state of Washington and Sullivan is extremely extremely fun.

Curt Anderson  12:04

Well, that’s fantastic. And that’s and I want to back up one second so you mentioned continuous improvement you came to us they came to North America in an internship you can pick a lot of different industries to choose from what what really inspired you to pursue a career in manufacturing what what was so excited about manufacturing now you’re like, Man, I’m going all in on this.

Miguel Moreno  12:26

Oh my god, I’m, I’m I miss memorize by the ability of transforming materials to something completely different. I’ve been involved directly in with metal manufacturing, plastic manufacturing, chemistry, manufacturing foundries, and every single time I can spend this son, this thing, this concept sounds kind of dumb, but I can spend hours just watching machines, it just mesmerized me that the ability of the people to transform a simple sheet of metal in something really complex. The people that work in the CNC industry is just it’s absolutely fantastic what they do, right big blob of aluminium and they end with something with holes and extremely complex and you have what is this this to put indeed a verb please do is absolutely great. And every single time they go to a new company and I read for and like it i Every I do almost every single day. You learn something new every single day and it’s just ad infinitum is fantastic. Yeah, well,

Curt Anderson  13:57

that’s wonderful. And so background in manufacturing, you talked about manufacturers edge that’s MEP in the state of Colorado. We’re now talking to you in the state of Washington, you’re covering the state. Now let’s talk about some of that. You have an incredible team as you discussed with some a couple of your teammates before we went live, but just you know 16 Strong you hire third party providers. Talk a little bit about some of the services on your menu. I know you do Lean operational excellence. Let’s go there like what are some of the things that like some of the Amazing how you help elevate and lift up manufacturers in the state of Washington.

Miguel Moreno  14:32

I always say this easier to say the things that we don’t do. Yeah. We I had a call it they used to say we’re ready to help the manufacturers in whatever they want to be held. And whenever they want to be held. We do a lot of fun, especially for super small companies as my my my my world. Yep. I do a lot of a lot of planning for the future. A lot of strategic planning Succession Planning for small companies, if you don’t have a plan, you don’t have a career, you don’t have a path for success, right? Marketing is a big, big need in the in the world of civil small companies, you have a lot of small manufacturers that are fantastic tours. But off the market, here’s people that you go knock on the door. Do you have any strategic marketing plan? Yeah, I do. What do you have a Facebook page? Yeah, yeah. Ling is a big component also, of sometimes you you get into a company and you open the door is like you close a time portal. And you go back to the 1970s. And is quite shocking. And obviously, quite a management system, AAA is now 100. D, for obvious reasons. And what we do is bringing value to the client. At the end of the day, if the client needs, I have a small, small company they’re looking for they’re, they’re fantastic dudes. And that’s a matter of factors. But they recognize they don’t have VSP, the expertise to manage a full company. And they said, What we need is someone to help us with that. So what they need is a contract CEO. So that’s what I’m looking at right now is completely out of ruling scope is not something that is not even listed in our services, but I’m going to try to call them. And on top of that, they when we send you promotional one be successful. If we don’t collaborate with ecosystem partners. We don’t have the resource internally, if we don’t have the resource with an employer, Washington, what we’re going to do is just put these companies in contact with the rest of the ecosystem we talking about EDB is the Department of Commerce, they the SBA, the MBDA, they own web E and all the acronyms you can imagine at the end of the day, we are successful, if our customers are successful, and if to reach their success, we need to contact I don’t know, the EDB in Oakland County, I got to pick up the phone and call the DBS. Hey, we need to talk I have a client in your area that need help. Right.

Damon Pistulka  17:25

Right. Yeah.

Curt Anderson  17:30

All right. So let’s say good nurse up further, you’re a huge advocate for You’ve mentioned a couple of times, you know, the small manufacturers, and you know, there might be a misperception you know, manufacturers are huge, hundreds of employees. I think it’s 75% of all manufacturers are actually 20 employees and less. Yeah, with a lot of manufacturers that are two employees, you know, handful of employees. And you know, and I’ve had a front row seat, Damon, when Miguel comes on his like, it’s a masterclass when you do a strategic plan with Miguel, I can’t tell you how much I learned consistently just being on an awesome, but Miguel your suit, you’re, you’re exceptionally passionate for those smaller manufacturers. Can you share? Why? Why some? Why are you so passionate for those smaller manufacturers, and just, you know, enlightened folks that maybe aren’t familiar what goes on at a 10 five person 10 person manufacturer, you know, what is it are some of the challenges that they’re facing that they need help with every day? That’s always the challenges

Miguel Moreno  18:23

and then I’ll go why, why I tried to help so much. Small manufacturers, they face so many challenges, but you can summarize in two, they don’t have time is just flat out, you go there, and you knock on the door and say I’m here to help you blah, blah, blah, and wouldn’t you know what? Talk fast because I have five print waiting, I have to pay my people, I don’t have time for you. Because I need to make money to give making money later on. So they don’t have time. That’s that’s flat out. And the second thing is normally, they’re really, really, really shown cash, they don’t have money to hire consultant to pay a consultant, you know, 200 500 hours to do whatever they want, whatever we can do. But on the other hand, those manufacturers are extremely important for the economy in them. If you go to a rural community, they have a manufacturing facility, they are maybe 20 people, 30 people 15 People that is economic anchor for that community. And that manufacturing for the facilities appears is it’s a great problem. A fantastic problem for the for the economy of the community. That manufacturing facility needs industry services needs. The people work there He brushes, you know, banks everything. And the manufacturing this moment of factors. They’re not like the big, big big companies where they’re looking at the tires of the of the of the whole of the shares. And they make decisions accordingly, the pace of the prediction in three months, is more than factors are going to keep the team as much as possible. And if they have to cap the salaries, they’re going to do that. Trying to keep the team they just, they’re fighting by themselves. If I can help them to create a one job, I have a small company that double the size. double the size, because we help them with with a project. What is double the size that went from one employee to two employees? But yeah, maybe one, Miguel, when you’re talking double the size, they will only hire one people one person? Yeah. Maybe for us not big deal. But let me tell you for them is huge,

Damon Pistulka  21:09

right? Yes, that

Miguel Moreno  21:10

is that is important. Those, again, the MEP is measured by the impact that we have with clients, if you talk to the person as the impact of having an impact Washington helping them, right. They’re gonna say they helped me to double the size. Right. Um, and on top of that, this is very to feed my ego. Pure and simple. It’s extremely rewarding. Yeah. When you talk with these people, and they say, Miguel, thank you so much. The ego you start to begin, you know, take some time, it’s the only air in the room. It’s extremely rewarding. And you met amazing people, you meet amazing people doing amazing, amazing things, sometimes out

Damon Pistulka  21:59

there making it happen. Yeah, it’s

Miguel Moreno  22:01

so much fun. It’s so much fun. It’s a fantastic job. But

Curt Anderson  22:06

Miguel, let’s take it. So again, you know, I’ve had the honor and privilege of working with you on several projects do you know so the one that doubled it’s all relative, right? If a company goes from 1000 to 2000, a company goes from one to 210 to 20 It’s all relative it’s still you know, that’s a that’s a dramatic what a win just in and I love what you’re saying it’s very it’s just so admirable, respectful, respectful of what you do helping manufacturers and like you said they’re the backbone of our economy. You know, that little manufacturer can be like the you know, that is the main employer of that small community when you go let’s go here so say there’s a manufacturer out there like hey man, I’m you’re piquing my interest I want to work with Miguel, the guy what you know cheer a little bit like I said, when I’m on a call, like I just I’m a sponge just learning listening. When you when you go into that manufacturer walk it walk us through a little bit, what does that first engagement look like? What are you looking for? What are opportunities? What are blind spots that you’re trying to plug?

Miguel Moreno  23:05

Well it’s it depends on the situation of the company, sometimes they come with, with a pre made, I knew this. I like in my first conversation, my discovery meeting, I like to learn about the history of the company, and about the background of the owner. That gives me a lot of hints what’s going on underlying there. We talk we discuss about you know, the current situation the current challenges, and I always say you know what, I know that you’re going to tell you that Tom, you need more clients, you need more cash and you need more people and when I’m aware of those three things, that’s yeah, that’s across any industry. But let’s talk about you know, your your reaction rate, let’s talk about your cost structure. Let’s talk about you your plans for the future. This talk about your marketing let’s talk about was it was your management style on the shop floor. Once we have done that discovery meeting, and you know, it’s a good match for them, then we go to a tool that is developed by Mr. Washington is a proprietary tool that we have is the business evaluation and in that business evaluation is an electronic tool to help us to look under the hood and that’s where you have that conflict between the needs and the wants. I want to have more clients Yeah, and that’s great. But you know, right now the in the way that you production is set up your capacity is at 80%. Now that is you don’t have a hidden capacity you have it but right now if I for any reason could put you in contact with I don’t know Costco you’re gonna die by success because because arrives we got one 1 million parts and USA I can’t All right. So the once we do the business valuations when we get into the, into the discussion of the needs and wants, and that’s where the magic happens. That’s when I give reality checks to the company. I, I use all this terminology. I’m a first time parents. So I have a kid. And you know, when my daughter was born, my daughter, for me was the cutest and this mod is and you know, the most fantastic thing in the world? But maybe she’s not, but I’m

Damon Pistulka  25:37

Yeah, yeah. You

Miguel Moreno  25:38

know, when you have these gatherings when some distant uncle comes to the come to the party, and your uncle is planned to never doesn’t have a good relation with you and look at the kid, and hey, man, you kid is ugly. And you look and everyone’s again, what do you say to each other? While the kids sound good, but nobody’s wanted to say that nobody wants to be you know that breaking through the nose is not. I went up to about businesses. I’m the guy who drives a right to your company and say, yep, you have an incumbent, you have a problem to your company. And you never saw because you’re like this, you’re entrenched in your day by day operation. And you don’t have time to, you know, raise your head and look around the Yeah. So that’s a roll. Sometimes. It’s nice. Sometimes people have reality shock. And it takes a bit of time to tell them. Yeah,

Curt Anderson  26:45

so Alright, so let’s dive into that a little bit. Sometimes you got to play bad cop tough law, right? However, we want to describe it. And as entrepreneurs, you know, it’s our baby, right? Like, this is our baby. And you know, like you said, we’re probably a little blinded, or you know, and it is tough. When somebody points out a flaw on your child, AKA your business. Do you have any tips or advice on how do you do? Do you have polite ways of giving that tough love? Or, like, how do you approach that with with a business owner?

Miguel Moreno  27:17

Um, well, I had a boss, I used to say, use a sandwich. Good, bad. Before him, I was like, no, he’s bad, bad, bad. And just, you know, we talk, but I learned, you need to be more soft, if you the first and foremost, if a company has been in business for more than, you know, more than three years, you did something good. So you have a positive sense that things are that keeping you from growing. So I saw without it, so recognizing the distance of the company, but then we go today to the problems and I’m a fat guy and the fat guy. So if you have something that is preventing you to be successful, I’m going to point out and say, this is this, this you know, this is a debt way that you have in your company, right? That we need if you would get rid of this, you’re going to jump to the next level. And funny enough, once once we get into that honest and Absolutely. Truth conversation. Most of the business owners, most entrepreneurs, they say yeah, you’re right. Yeah, you’re right. I know that I have to do something I knew there was a problem but I never addressed i They need someone on some a third party and say yep, you need to fix it. And then they move on into trying to fix it.

Curt Anderson  29:04

Alright, so then at that point, now you’re playing quarterback so when you when you can point out the flaw on their child and and hopefully that they’re open to it receptive and say, Yeah, I get your right Miguel i There is a challenge right there. Yeah. And now you start quarterbacking, whether somebody internally externally you’re going to bring in that person that’s going to help fill that gap? What does that process typically look like from your you know, I know like could be lean could be cyber could be operational excellence. You guys offer like you said, it’s what don’t you offer, but your point is you’re diagnosing it, and then you discover okay, this is the blind spot. What for folks out there that are new to them, EP network, just kind of walk through like okay, what are next steps of engagement for impact Washington?

Miguel Moreno  29:47

Well, the next steps is, first we define the client and then empower Washington. I want to be absolutely clear, we are not prescribing the solution, we point a solution and we discuss with the client is that the right thing to do? So we defined a High Scope A high level scope of work. And with that we will I look in the Rolodex of all the potential experts, subject matter expert who is going to be the right person to deliver the day the service that client needs. We have an initial meeting where we check if the VA first, if we have personality match, sometimes Heinz have a very Berkey. And they want a specific type of person. And during that meeting, also the subject matter expert resource partner, as we call it, RP, the RP has the possibility to ask more questions that I haven’t asked. I have been fortunate to work with a lot of people that are way smarter than me. And they can ask very, very good questions. And that helps the RP to define a more concise and more fine tune the scope of work. Once we have that we present to the client that define that clear scope before we’ve called with challenges. And in timeline, we present a proposal to the clients, the client decided that’s what they want to do. Yeah, me, this is what I want to do. Okay, perfect. Then we move to the contract phase. And during that process, we try to find if this, we did find a funding source. Remember I working with super small companies, normally there is Bootstrap, they don’t have cash. So trying to find some funding source to pay for services. Sometimes easy, sometimes it takes time. Sometimes the clients say yeah, I’m going to pay myself. But one thing that I’m I always stress is that this any project that that any client is doing with us is not a cost is an investment for the future. is an investment. Yeah, it’s an investment. The numbers are there, as it is just I’m being I’m being lucky that all my products have been successful. And all my products are generated, increasing in the impact.

Curt Anderson  32:07

So I Miguel, a couple more questions. I know you’re super busy, I want to be mindful of your time. But you and I were on a call together where I experienced that that Damon I experienced that tough love with Miguel. Yeah, he was diving in, and very just the professionalism, the care, the compassion, you know, for the client, however, still structuring. So Miguel, let’s just say for an example, hypothetically, kind of asking for a friend of you, all right, let’s say there’s a manufacturer, they’re, you know, they’re getting a little bit all over the board. They’re trying to do a little bit of this. And like you said, not really, you know, they really haven’t got this system down. Now they’re going to jump into another product line, or their new piece of machinery, you just find that they’re getting, you know, and again, I call it that entrepreneurial curse, man, I struggle with it literally daily, ADHD, or shiny object syndrome. How do you I saw it firsthand, can you share with folks? How do you help kind of real people in

Miguel Moreno  33:01

it, I’m gonna use an analogy here. I love beer. I had a business that when I was living in Mexico vehicles, and what we did is, we teach people how to drink beer, which is a fantastic job that you drink to be able to send to you. Right, but at the time, the craft brewery industry, Mexico is starting to grow. And you have a lot of small brewers across a across the UK as well Hara and you how people tend to do a lot of things, they’re going to make any I’m going to make an API, they’re going to make a lager and they’re going to make a double book. And I was thinking, You know what, you need to control one recipe, and you need to control one Brad’s been doing very, very good before moving. Because if you change all the time, you never perfect one thing, right? The same thing, if you have a line of business, and you’re jumping, before consolidating, before having a foundation, we’re gonna jump to the next one jump to net what’s gonna happen, then you are not growing network, you spread too thin. So let’s work in something that you control perfectly. That turns into natural that you don’t have is effortless to be successful. Once you get there, you move to the next one. And also, be it be aware of your needs. If I know if you don’t see if you’re a CNC machine, a machine shop and your revenue is $400,000. And you know, you have a sales representative for a machine shop, a machine, a CNC machine company says hey, I have the last you know, the latest machine cost $2 million and you have production you can launch you know $2 million per hour. I said yeah, I’m gonna do it because you know, I’m gonna be they’re gonna be the king of the cannabis tree. Yeah, do you need that right now? Yeah. If you buy the thing is going to increase He sells already, you have a good machine. And don’t get me wrong. I love machines, right? I can live couple of hours just looking at moving. Great. But before doing that, apply the tool that cheaper that can get you to the next level. And when you have perfection, you perfections the way you do incense, you squeeze all the capacity for your machines, and you have enough cash to move to the next thing, then do it. But, you know, if you look at all the shiny objects, you don’t have lost.

Damon Pistulka  35:45

Adam, Adam mentor when I was very young, I was a young engineer, and I loved equipment. I always loved it. And he helped me see that very quickly. He was like, Yes, that’s a really nice piece of equipment, and he would take the time to go through Well, it’s while it would be a good investment. If we were at where you said, Miguel, it’s not right now. After about two or three of those, it was like okay, I understand we need to go back and improve until we’ve done we’re done improving and then we need it.

Miguel Moreno  36:15

I mean, if you like motorcycles, and I do you want to get in? You want to ride 11 1100 cc street motorcycle, but if you never get in line, what are you gonna you’re gonna kill yourself. So yeah, that was all we did. And now I’m, I have an 1100 t and this happiest boy in the world that says small and grow. Don’t try to run before learning how to crawl. I think there’s logic but you know, I’m guilty too on that. Well,

Curt Anderson  36:57

I’d say the manufacturers are very fortunate very blessed to have your expertise and your passion. And again, I just I love having a front row seat. And just you know, when Damon when we get to listen when he’s chat, man, I just like I’m all ears just observing. So, Miguel, you’re talking earlier about, you know, ego and China. You know, when When, when, when I’m going to ask you to not be humble? Can you probably don’t be humble. You’ve been an impact Washington as yours if I’m not mistaken, give or take since 2016 or so. And even if you want to go further back one year, if can you if I don’t know if one comes right to your mind, one of your greatest accomplishments, one of your biggest wins wonderful success stories. What was one of the first ones that come to mind that you’d love to share?

Miguel Moreno  37:44

I’ll say that I saw companies, small companies in rook in Yakima that went from I think it was 20, probably 19 employees to 40 employees right now nice. That went from I think it was like 1.1, something like that $7 million in four years. Because of the work that we did, up, let me rephrase that. We help to reach that goal with the work that we did. Yeah. And with the with the assistance of the RPS those are the artists are the ones that are there, creating that success. Yeah, I’m a facilitator. I’ve been with companies that have small company right now, right now the wheeling approach, we’re doing a project and it’s a solopreneur with a great product here in Seattle, in talking to her and discussing, you know, basic concept of manufacturing, cost structure capacity, and every single time that we we can we complete a session or we completed a session. She was like, I’m learning something new. And you know, you put again that file to keep going and to keep going and to keep going. That’s, that’s great. And then we have this small company that doubling the size and they turn into the word clients and our friends and people don’t look I look for and just want them to be extremely successful. I want my own clients will be millionaires. Yep. Mainly because they will you know, abroad and go to the villas in you know, yeah, yeah. Yeah. Okay, but I want my clients to be successful. Because if they’re if they are successful, then I’m successful. Well, yeah, man.

Curt Anderson  39:51

Goosebumps on that one, Damon or what? Oh, yeah. Go Yeah, I’m ready to run through a wall right now. So yeah, it’s Miguel is we start why? And then down. Where can folks find you? Obviously, we’ve got impact Washington if they just Google impact Washington, you’re here on LinkedIn, any anything that you want to share as far as far as finding you guys connecting any events, anything that you want to share as far as that? Yes. Well, thank

Miguel Moreno  40:13

you. Always your website, ww www.in, Washington, full spell.org. That’s our main website. If you want to read more about who we are, and as president of the company, you can go to the About and check their device of the entire team. You’re not going to be disappointed. As I said, when I say that I work with fantastic group individuals trust me. I have people that have been business owners, CEOs, it’s just unbelievable. This every single time that you sit and talk to them is like, you break brain explodes. If you’re looking for if you’re a small manufacturing company in the state of Washington, if you are less than 20 employees we have fantastic right now we have antastic program is called a small manufacturers growth and support program. I’m going to introduce my commercial here. We are offering up to 80 hours of consulting and asked to the market value of services between 20 and 25,000. Wow, you’re offering that thanks to the board of directors of Washington. They did say to fund this problem. But that’s if your company is less than 20 employees if you are above that threshold 20 employees, right. My colleagues are ready to help you with you know all the services and my time is free. to clients. I speak manufacturing, my colleagues manufacturing and email, my email is always open. M Moreno m n o r e n o at Empower washington.org Shoot me an email. I’m ready to help. Love it a

Curt Anderson  42:13

big round of applause for Miguel Moreno here today for just absolutely crushing it. Thank you. So Miguel, we’re I Damon. I do have one last question for Miguel. All right. I do have I do have one now. All right, so fierce advocate for small manufacturers just champion of helping folks. Great stories here. Again, guys, go back hit hit the replay button. Just so wonderful, wonderful stories here to share. Miguel by any chance. Are you a baseball fan?

Miguel Moreno  42:44

I’m not. I tend to. I tend to watch sports too. As long as my daughter allows me, we are more in this house. Fans of Louis. But I like I like to follow baseball. Follow me as

Curt Anderson  43:05

well. You’d like to follow baseball. Okay, so you so you follow these two, you’re hopefully you’ll get this analogy. So somebody sent us. Somebody sent us this question this morning, Miguel, so we’ll go there. So let’s say the mariners are playing and they’re playing the dreaded I don’t know who do you guys hate the angels Damon who tried to angels maybe? And we’ll just say that it’s bottom of the ninth inning. Okay, it’s Bob in the ninth inning. The mariners are playing. It’s a tie score. There’s somebody on second base. By midnight. I score two outs and Seattle needs a hit to get the winning run. Okay, Seattle needs a hit to get the winning run. The manager looks down the bench and says hey Miguel. Get up to the plate and hit in the winning run will you please So you stand up you walk over you grab your bat you grab your helmet you’re walking to the plate to hidden the winning run so the mariners win what is your walk up song Oh my Oh, what is your walk up song? Winning Run for the mariners.

Miguel Moreno  44:11

Oh god. Oh, God. Oh, that’s that’s that’s that’s tough question. I don’t know. We were racking that I love to pop up. I used to listen to ACDC shuffle feel. There you go. It’s it’s something that put me in the mood to do almost to take a you know, daunting tasks.

Damon Pistulka  44:48

That’s right. Yeah. All right. Yeah. So

Curt Anderson  44:50

we’re gonna awesome old school AC DC to hit winning run. So Miguel, thank you for playing along with a little fun question. We’ll start winding down Damon any takeaways thoughts from your perspective with our conversation today with

Damon Pistulka  45:03

Miguel? Well, you know, I just love thanks for being here today, Miguel, it really, really enjoyed talking with you. And, and this just reinforces to me, you know, how the MEPs like impact Washington and Washington State are helping manufacturers in helping small manufacturers really become competitive, stay competitive, be more competitive, make even more money, land new opportunities and do things better, and really working with them, to make it economically viable for those manufacturers so they can do do more and, and stretch their money farther and stretch their efforts. But every time we talk to a MEP, participant or people that are helping in the MVPs, NBP advisors, I mean, I’m just always blown away at their dedication to helping manufacturers. Thanks. Thanks, Miguel. It’s just It’s awesome to talk with you today.

Curt Anderson  45:57

Alright, Daymond Well, hey, travel safe this week, my friend and can’t wait to see you back in the office. Now we’re going to be off. It’s a big weekend. It’s Easter weekend. So we’re going to take good Friday off, we won’t be here next Monday. So we will be back a week from Friday. So we just give everyone an amazing, wonderful, incredible week. And what love to encourage you to do just go out and be someone’s inspiration just like this fine, young man here. Miguel Moreno it was for us today. So we’re gonna close out and thank you guys. God bless you. Thank you for joining us ever. Again. Thank you, my friend for sharing your passion, your truth. Your madness was just so good. So we’ll close out Have a great day and we’ll we’ll see you soon. Hang out with us one second again. Thank you