Making Huge Impact with Manufacturers at The Purdue MEP

Damon Pistulka  00:08

All right, everyone, it is Friday, and you know what that means. It is time for manufacturing, e commerce, success. I am one of your co hosts, Damon pistolka, that pretty gentleman right over there. Curt Anderson, is co host. Is going to take it away from here. Today we are talking about making huge impact with manufacturers at the Purdue MEP Curt, this is going to be great talking with art Thomas. I’m excited. Let’s get going.

Curt Anderson  00:41

Let’s get it rolling. Brother. So man, art, Thomas is in the house. Dude. Art, happy Friday. Man, how are you? Dude,

Art Thomas  00:48

doing awesome? Absolutely awesome. Yeah. Well, very

Curt Anderson  00:52

well. Well, this is an honor. What an absolute privilege to have you here you were on earlier this year. And so again, we you know how busy you are. We appreciate you taking the time and energy to share, you know, what you’ve got going on at the Purdue MEP. Now, last time, I asked you who was your hero, and you shared a phenomenal story about your dad. And so now, you know, give us a quick little for folks that missed it last time. Give us a quick overview on Dad. And then I just want to hit, you know, we’re talking a little bit about grandparenthood. So tell us a little bit about Dad. What an inspiration he was.

Art Thomas  01:27

Yeah, my dad was. First of all, he was he started preaching when he was 15. He became a multi millionaire. By the time he was in his early 30s, he started 13 companies, nine of which are still running today. I don’t own them, but they’re still running today. And just in general, he was a visionary. Most of the companies he started were origination of ideas. He started the first car wash, automatic car wash in the Tri County area in Pennsylvania. It’s still running today, still in the same location. He I just met with a guy, actually a couple days ago, who is building houses, modular homes that he can deliver. Well, my dad started a business called modern home living back in the early 70s, when it was, you know, module homes that they would put in, he built 60 of those in our local town. And so again, back in the early 70s, people had around our area, never even heard of a modular home. And of course, there was a big learning curve there for that. So he was very he had a great vision. I wish, I wish, I I wish I had his vision, but I don’t. And he just was very creative. He always put his ministry first, though he preached in all 50, all 50 states, except Hawaii, that’s the only one he didn’t preach in. And he preached in 40 foreign countries during his life. So traveled the world and, and, yeah, just, I mean, I don’t know how he and he died when he was 60, so I don’t know how he did all that in, yeah, 45 years. So yeah, many days I’m depressed just thinking about what he got done and the very little I’ve accomplished. So anyway, definitely an inspiration. Well, I’ll

Curt Anderson  03:32

tell you, you know, in passing, way young. I mean, it’s like he lived three lifetimes, you know, so probably, probably exhausted himself that he he’s like, you know, okay, I guess it’s time. But just what an inspiration. And I just, I want to hit again, like what you shared last time. You just hit 40 countries that your dad, your father, preach at. And I know you went on some of those just, you know, just, I just love for folks that missed it last time. Just share a little bit on your experience of going with dad to other countries, you know, especially like, you know, there’s conflicts around the world, just like, you know, from a global perspective, what did that do for you as a person? And you know, how do you view things differently with those experiences?

Art Thomas  04:08

Yeah, I mean, you know. And this was something my dad always said. He said that he felt like before, one of the things it did for his his ministry, was that it gave him a perspective on culture and what culture plays into some things that we may not understand other cultures do. So as far as with my dad, I traveled the Middle East with him. He He made 13 trips to Israel, and was there literally one year after the Six Day War. So it’s interesting that we’re seeing some of those developments again. But he was there one year after that, and I, so I was over there with him, and then I did do a lot of business trips into Asia. So Japan, China, Hong Kong, spent a lot of time in. Those three countries, but in general, it just gave me a very high appreciation for people. And you will find out, at least, I’ve witnessed this, that no matter where you go, people have some of the basic desires you know, of taking care of their family, loving their family, being able to raise them, invest in them. And so when you when you find out we have a lot in common, way more in common than what we do that that maybe isn’t in common. When you get down to real people, and it’s, you know, so often the real people are not the ones in the news either. That’s not, yeah, what we see is not the normal person in that environment. And so, yeah, so I gained a big appreciation for just people in general, and the fact that the differences make us unique, but it also gives us a way to see the world and help us to be stronger as as people. So really helped my dad. I believe that was one of the reasons he was so innovative, was because he traveled so much and was able to get ideas and places to be able to implement and so, yeah, been a huge, a huge blessing in my life as well, to get to travel to quite a few foreign countries.

Damon Pistulka  06:16

Yeah.

06:17

Well, what

Curt Anderson  06:18

a phenomenal perspective. Thank you. I tell you that I could, I could listen to stories about your dad all day. And so again, thank you for sharing that part, and you know, and you’re paying it forward. So again, I guess, you know, we’re here. We’re going to talk about the Purdue MEP. We’re talking manufacturing. We’re going to even get into a little AI. But you know, I love talking a little bit about families where, you know, so let’s go here. You know, I and, and I appreciate your humility. But dude, you are, yeah, grandfather of the year, yes. So just, I know you had a new edition recently, just share a little bit on what’s going on with the Thomas family, and then, and then we’ll dive. We’ll get back to business in a minute. But just what’s what tell us about the new addition in the family.

Art Thomas  06:54

So I have 12 grandkids now. The last one was born beginning of October little boy. And interestingly, that because he’s the second boy that was born with the Thomas name. And so they, they, I don’t my oldest son was named after me, but there’s not going to be another Arthur. So the last Arthur was my oldest son, and he was Arthur number seven. Now they all were juniors. Yeah, they weren’t all juniors, but they all there was Arthur’s going back for for seven. So that would have been another generation. Yeah. So anyway, but no, he’s but they did name him in such a way that the his initials are, are art, yes, so I’m hoping that turns into a little art, but we’ll see. Yeah. Anyway, yeah. So 12 grandkids, and very excited. And they all live within five minutes of my house, so we spend a lot of time with them and and all their cousins, and every they’re just, it’s, it’s awesome. It really is. It’s blessing to have that many of the kids right around, right around the house. So Right? Anyway, very excited, right?

Curt Anderson  08:20

Well, that’s awesome. Well, congratulations on the new edition and the 12 grandkids. And I know your dad is looking down super proud on what you’re doing and everything going on there. So let’s dive into the Purdue MEP. We’re talking the Purdue Manufacturing Extension Partnership, and just share with folks who are not familiar with the with the MEP network, or Purdue in particular, what is the MEP? What’s Manufacturing Extension Partnership?

Art Thomas  08:45

Yeah, so if you’ve not heard of any of the manufacturing extension partnership, it’s a national network that is has 51 different centers. Every state has one, and also Puerto Rico. They are each one is partially sponsored by NIST, which is part of the Department of Commerce. NIST is a National Institute of Standards and Technology, and the one for the state of Indiana has been at Purdue since 2005 and we serve the state. And again, we, you know, we’re very active in what we do. So, you know, we talked to last year, we talked to 1000 unique manufacturers. Now that’s not mass emails, that’s actual conversations. So we had 1000 unique companies that we spoke with, and we had contracts of about 500 of those. And if you include all of our workshops and the people that from different companies that came to our workshops, we actually touched 1500 manufacturers in the state last year alone. So we’re very active. We’re trying to to be the per the. The group that these manufacturers reach out to knowing that we not only can bring excellent services and insights and consulting and training and all those things, but we also we have a team that is dedicated to looking for grants that can help our manufacturers as well. So not only are we bringing the knowledge and those things, but we also go out of our way to try to find, you know, ways for manufacturers to benefit from money that might be out there that would help our manufacturers in the state of Indiana. So for instance, right now, we’re doing free CMM one, cmmc one and cmmc two audits and remediation. So that’s, you know, something that, again, that we’ve worked hard, and over the years, we became recognized as being able to deliver and also find those companies that we can help to get to that point. So that’s just one, one thing, but the point is, is that we’re we’re out there doing a lot of different things right now. One of our, one of the big things we’re doing is we are conducting a very large study to find out how Indiana manufacturers can position themselves to be involved in the semiconductor and EV business. Now, I do understand the EVs are, you know, kind of in a limbo right now, but that is going to happen. It’s just, it’s just timing, it’s that’s where we’re going. And so being able to help Indiana companies pivot, or at least take advantage of those opportunities. And so we’re doing a study to find out what is it that is required for manufacturers to get into that space, and what is, you know, what certifications, all those things. And then, with that, find out where our Indiana companies are. So we’re, you know, so we’re in a position to help them over the next five to 25 years, to be in those markets, and to, you know, be able to to profit from the large expansion that’s happening here in the state, especially in those two markets. So, and that’s, again, that’s another thing, you know, it’s a total so we have about 40 people that are full time with the center, and then we have probably another 40 to 50 other individuals and companies that we work with that bring in, you know, specific services, such as yourself, Curt and and, and you know that it’s just, it’s awesome because we work with good people. That’s, that’s our big thing is we hope that the services we’re bringing this isn’t just us going out and saying, Hey, here’s somebody, you know, they can help you. You know, we try to vet them, and part of the vetting is, is that we’ve used them, and we also vet through the network. And you, you’re aware of that. I mean, you’ve witnessed how the network, you know, vets each other. And so if we’re needing somebody, we’re going to check in the network and say, Hey, is there somebody that you guys really, you know? So it’s a very it’s a great opportunity for those people companies in the state of Indiana to take advantage of. So yeah, I

Curt Anderson  13:19

love it. Thank you for that explanation and so and what I’d like to do so, so folks just stopping by demon. We got a

Damon Pistulka  13:25

couple comments here. We got Usman stopping by. Said greetings from uzman. Thanks for stopping by today. We got Michael Larson here today. Mike with Schooley Mitchell on he said it, albeit a few minutes late, thanks for being here, Michael, if you’re out there listening, make sure to drop a note in here, and we will drop the comment online and and get it out there correct. This is, this is awesome. Man,

Curt Anderson  13:49

yeah, it is awesome. And big shout out to Mike for joining us at school. Mitchell, we’re good. Our good friend Adam Baker at school. Mitchell, he likes to pop on the show. So Mike, great work that you’re doing. And hey, and Rhea just popped in. Ria just

Damon Pistulka  14:01

popped in. Hello. RIAs, hi from Barbados. Oh, I bet the weather’s a lot nicer there than it is here, right? Yeah,

Curt Anderson  14:08

I think maybe just, just a just a little but Alright, so as we’re as we’re diving in, as art is explaining for our friends out there, our manufacturers out there, there’s a thing called the Manufacturing Extension Partnership, yep. And as art is explaining just what an incredible, powerful resource art. What I’m going to do is, I’m going to share my screen, and here we are at Purdue. And a great thing is, you know, not every MEP is parked at a university, but it’s what, what’s wonderful in the great state of Indiana is that here you guys are parked at, you know, probably one of, you know, if not the one of the top engineering schools in the United States, right at Purdue. And so again, what you can do is you can go to the Purdue MEP website, and are, you know, just checking this out, like, like you’re saying, like, just the dedication, just a relentless drive of and passion for helping manufacturers, you know, like this program right here. I love this one. You know, three. Quick ways to take care of me as a manager like I think that’s a great topic. But are there any particular, you know, all these programs look phenomenal. Anything in particular that you want to hit on? Well, I

Art Thomas  15:11

would, I would just say there. Should, you know, we, we have been really trying to help companies in the in the in the space of AI, we just completed several of those workshops. We are also very excited about when you’re looking at the leadership of really looking at, how do we take care of the people that are working in a facility? So even though maybe on maybe the workforce, you’re now where you need to be as far staffing, you still want to be in a position where those people like working there. I know for the last, you know, year two, three, whatever you know, workforce has been hard to come by, and so people were very focused on treating their their staff correctly. But don’t let the fact that maybe now staffing might be a little bit easier get you away from still looking at that leadership aspect and and realizing that they’re still your greatest asset, because we know that, you know, one of the things we’re seeing is, is, how do we transfer knowledge? Has been a big question, and we’ve been working on that, how do we transfer knowledge? And so, you know, that’s been, been also a big thing. If you go, if you know, when you go down through our workshops, we are, we assign, we get these workshops set up based on input from that local area manufacturing group. So we’re not just out there flinging, hey, let’s put this up. Let’s put that up. We’re actually listening to our the people and some companies say, Hey, we’ve got two people. How do we get two people through these programs? And so what we do is we say, well, no problem. We’ll set one up in your local town, and then we’ll invite other people. Because if you have that need, it’s very likely that the people in that surrounding area also have that that interest, and so that’s really how these these workshops are set up, is by listening to the clients and just seeing where they’re at and what they need so

Damon Pistulka  17:11

well. And it’s great because you being part of the MEP network, and MEPs in general can set up those regional things. It’s very specialized training that you, just, like you said, multiple manufacturers needed in the area, and now you’re bringing 610, 20 manufacturers into this one place. It makes it, makes it a good, a good opportunity for everyone to get that specialized training they need. And everybody benefits as as is the goal of the MEP to help everyone go. So

Art Thomas  17:44

now he’s that Curt’s on there right now is by city, so you can even go in there and look and see, and again, that’s that changes based on, you know, where the cities are that need it. And so we’re very active. This is constantly a dynamic set. And we don’t have a schedule where we just go, okay, every you know, quarter this is going to run, and every you know, we’re really in a mode of saying we want to, we want to serve the needs of the local community.

Curt Anderson  18:15

Yeah, I love and it’s great, you know. Like, say, for example, like I’m mousing over Elkhart, you know. So for folks aren’t familiar, I believe that’s like the RV capital of the country, right? Art, you know, so, like, their needs, what’s that? Well,

Art Thomas  18:30

no, we, I was just gonna say, I just ran the report last this week, and Indiana is a number one RV manufacturer in the United States.

Curt Anderson  18:39

Yeah, yeah. And, you know, if you drive by alcart, it’s, you know. So like, what’s going on there might be completely different than, like, what’s going on in Kokomo, you know, another wonderful industrial city, all the way down to, say, Columbus, you know, where Cummins is located, you know. So, you know, what I love, what you’re seeing is, like, you know, different communities have different needs. So it’s not a one size fits all. So you’re really hitting up that particular community. Um, hey, Damon, I’m going to stop sharing real quick. I think we got a couple more.

Damon Pistulka  19:07

Oh, we got a couple comments here. Drew mark in the house. Drew Great to see you here. Dave, hi from core business solution. MEPs are a great resource for manufacturers. We were just talking to. Drew yesterday. It’s awesome. What they do there? Yeah, Drew,

Curt Anderson  19:23

I don’t know if Drew. And the folks at Purdue, you guys need to connect. They do wonderful work with ISO, with ITAR, with cybersecurity, and so they work with multiple MEPs around the country. And so art, as a matter of fact, I might have introduced you to Drew at the MEP conference in Chicago. I was, I was when I had my little table there, Drew was at the table right next to me, so I think I might have connected you guys. So then we got

Damon Pistulka  19:46

Phil Miller here today. He said, joined a little bit late, but he also said, I just met a few people from the MEP, and that’s awesome, because getting out there and meeting them is the start, and you will soon find out how many resources. Courses they really have for manufacturers. And it’s quite mind boggling. I

Curt Anderson  20:03

will say it is. And let’s go here, as you mentioned, you know, one of the great things, and you know, I give a shout out to your team, my good, you know. And I’m always afraid to do this because we’ll leave out somebody, but from Kyle to Renee to Gene Julie, you know, top the but, you know, your director, just top to bottom. You guys really have the who’s who, just a phenomenal team. Let’s go there. Just share a little bit on on the expertise, the passion that you guys have at Purdue, when someone, when a manufacturer, reaches out to you, you know, what does that look like?

Art Thomas  20:33

Yeah. Well, let me, let me just start with Renee. She’s our executive center leader, director, and I want to brag a little bit on her. She was just last week, was at the White House, was invited there as one of the people to talk about workforce development. And so we are recognized, you know. And there was Sep, I want to make sure there was, there was, I think six or seven, maybe MEP centers represented there, but we are definitely one of the top ones when it comes to, of course, Indiana, as you know, number one GDP. GDP from our state is manufacturing, so we certainly but in addition to that, she’s a great collaborator, and she’s got another special engagement that’s coming up that we just found out about the other day, so that’ll be coming out as well. But in addition to her, then, you know, when you look through our staff, you’re going to find a that the people are very industry savvy. You know, they’ve been in the industry. We’re not talking about just people that have book knowledge. We’re talking about people who have been in the industry, have been doing what they’re talking about, and then when you get into the different locations, you brought up Kyle. I mean, great background in advanced manufacturing. Great background with a lot of things to do with, how do we advance, helping companies get automation? Well, now he’s he’s also one of our industry advisors for the central west part of the state, so but all the way through, when you go up and down, when you look at gene great background in the Navy, and was captain of a submarine, and just and now works for the Purdue MEP and helps us with, you know, the military and getting companies set up. He also runs our cyber security portion. Has a lot of knowledge in that area. So again, it’s just everybody, and that’s that’s here it I’ve told many times, I tell our own team, but I’ve told a lot of people, it’s the best team I’ve ever been a part of. And you know, through this list, you just got Aaron Bailey, one of the, one of the, literally, one of the experts in the MEP network. I’m not exaggerating that he gets hired by other MEPs to do workforce, to do Salesforce programs, and you see that Stalin right underneath him. Stalin is, is it’s hard to explain Stalin. He was voted as the by the National MEP as the new last year he was the new he won the award for the the best new employee for MEPs. But he but he is. He gets ratings almost five out of five all the time when he’s out there doing instruction. So anyway, you can just go through this list. It’s never ending. And if you go in and look at the profiles on these people, it’s it just blows your mind of how much time and of what you’re really getting when you get MEP to come into your facility, you’re, you’re getting a wealth of information. And, yeah, it’s very exciting. Best team I’ve ever worked on, for sure.

Curt Anderson  23:53

Well, man, I’ll tell you, dude, you are blessed. And I’d say, here’s our dear friend Julie. So I gotta, if she’s listening, we gotta give a dear friend. Are you? We need to work on her. We’re trying to get her on the show. The show sometime. But Julie’s phenomenal, does a lot of the marketing. We got. Deitra, you know, does amazing work with your manufacturers. And again, like, right up and down the list, Damon, we’ve had numerous of his teammates on Jeremiah came on a couple of summers ago and, like, just completely smashed a home run for us art. So, you know, again, what the with the with the comment here, what the point is, is, just like, look at the wealth of talent and expertise that an MEP brings to a manufacturer, where, for small manufacturers, you know, say, you know, say you’re 10 employees, 12 employees, you can’t cover every angle. You’ve got blind spots. And what’s awesome is you have a team like the MEP network that comes in. They identify those blind spots for you with an objective viewpoint to help you move the needle, to help take your company the next level and just to keep manufacturing great products. So it’s just, it’s just awesome. And

Damon Pistulka  24:56

one more thing too, and I just got to bring this. Up you’re sitting here looking at the Purdue MEP, but it doesn’t mean that if you’re in Montana or Texas or Arizona, you get to tap into the Purdue MEP as well. If they don’t have the expertise in your local state, they are more than happy to reach out to the MEP network and find the expert, not not an expert, the expert they have in their network to help you in your specific situation. And we’ve had people on the the company we talked to from Alaska, specialty manufacturer and was going to go out and buy some equipment. Didn’t really know, but doing like business, most business owners do go out and I’m searching, I’m reading the doing the Google thing, figuring out who makes this stuff. Well, she contacted the local Alaska MEP. They contacted the local national network. They found a specific expert, and I don’t remember from where they’re from. It

Curt Anderson  25:59

was from Jersey. They found a third party provider in New Jersey, yep.

Damon Pistulka  26:05

And then they were able to find the equipment that she needed for half the cost, or something like that. It was like $50,000 less. And this is a small business, so we’re not talking about this is like life changing or business changing money for this company. And I just want to say real quick, you know, this MEP team is accessible by you from wherever you are in the United States, as a manufacturer,

Curt Anderson  26:32

that’s so cool. Yeah, and art you would have loved, you know? So we brought this, this woman on. It was a client, yeah, we had worked with Damon. I actually met her at a workshop that we did at the Alaska VP. Absolutely delightful. She started a tea company, you know, like, who thinks to start a D company in Alaska in the middle of covid? Yeah, yeah. What an inspiration. That was. And she, anyway, she, she, because the MEP on our live show we didn’t, you know, know she was going to go there. She saved $60,000 and she said the MEP allowed me to start my company debt free, and it was just so wonderful. And I know you guys have tons of stories. Our dear friend Renee, she’s been on the show before, so big shout out to your director here. And so are anything else you want to add, because then we’re going to slide we’re going to dive right into have a we’re going to geek out. Have a little AI conversation. Any other comments we want to make about Purdue, MEP, your team? Anything there?

Art Thomas  27:24

Yeah, I mean, I could talk all day about her, probably just honestly, it’s, I know it sounds, you know, cliches, but it’s the truth, and it’s what I’ve told people forever. We have an unbelievable team, and it’s just exciting. That’s just great. Yeah,

Curt Anderson  27:44

and we’ve, we’ve actually and we’ve had clients of yours on the show in the past, we’ve had a popular foods and we’ve had other folks, you know, we’ve talked to Steel City steals, we’ve done webinars with the team there. So, you know, it’s been a privilege and honor for us have a front row seat just to see the impact that Purdue can have with manufacturers. Let’s slide into that AI conversation. You know, I don’t know, Damon, you, a couple people around the country have been talking about AI, just a little bit here and there, right? Has heard about it? That a thing, right? Yeah. So what’s let’s go there. What you know, what’s going on with manufacturing, what’s going on at the Purdue MEP from an AI perspective?

Art Thomas  28:21

Well, this is, this is one of my, my passions right now, and it has been for probably the last year. I’m very, I’m very excited and concerned. I believe manufacturers are really missing a huge opportunity if they are not looking into AI. And I, you know, I’m not. I am not the guy who designs AI or knows how to develop it, but I am. I am a person who is, is probably as a user, a very I educate myself on on how it works, and I use it every day, every day, multiple times a day. And so I look at this, and I the way I look at it is that there’s really two different levels that a manufacturer needs to be aware of. The first is, is the user side, meaning there are people in your company that can take advantage of AI at a very distinct, just a normal user level. And let me just give you some ideas of what I mean here. And again, I’m not talking about sharing, you know, proprietary information, or doing anything that’s like, Oh my goodness. This is just going to be, you know, I’m going to put out my, my next design mode, or not. No, not any of that. I’m looking at this saying, what? Okay, let’s just look at purchasing. Okay, I’m working in purchasing, and I’m a I’m a buyer, and I’m getting ready to buy from a company, a new company, and I want to find out what their policies are. And so I look up and I take their their supply manual or so. So, you know, and say, I can look it up and say, Where are the things that there’s distinct things. I can just put it in there and say, give me the distinct things that that they focus on in their quality manual. Are they? ISO? Are they? You can just start asking all these questions by taking their quality manual and simply letting AI tell you what’s in there instead of trying to read 50 pages. The same thing, if you’re if you’re going in to sell to someone, what are the requirements for a supplier? And I’ve done this numerous times, numerous times, and helped clients understand how to do this. The other thing you can do is you can maybe put two of those manuals in there, right if you’re in your own quality let’s say you’re running the quality department for a company, and you say, Well, I really want to have a quality manual, and I want to have this and that. Okay, well, you can put in multiple quality manuals, and you could say, hey, take the or show me every component in all of these. So now you get to breeze through quickly all the different elements from multiple manuals and see which ones you might want to use. And there, it just goes on and on. If I’m in, if I’m in receiving, okay, I may want to look and see what. You know I’m having this issue. Well, you can get on there and very quickly start finding out, is this something that’s common? Is other people talking about it? Is this an issue? And so it goes on and on sales, of course, I mean, if you’re in sales, and you’re not using AI, I don’t know what to tell you, but you’re you’re wasting a lot of time that you could be getting back. So the point I’m making is that’s a that’s at a personal level. You’re not bringing in a brand new system or spending a bunch of money, you’re just literally educating your people on how to do their jobs more effectively and efficiently using AI, okay, so to me, that’s one level, and then the other level would be okay. Now you’re talking about a large learning language model in your facility, right? And developing, okay, how am I going to to work through, you know, put all my work instructions in there, so instead of somebody having read, you know, all these documents, which they’re not going to do, okay, anybody that’s written work instructions knows nobody’s reading them. But if they could just put in the question they want to know at that particular time and get an answer. Well, now that’s valuable, right? And so, you know, customer service then becomes a big thing. You know, as we build this and we learn customer service, even if you Yeah, even if you say it’s not going to be a bot, you’re going to keep your customer service people. Why not shorten down the time that that person has to be on the phone, by allowing them to develop and understand I can just type in a question here. And anytime we’ve ever had this happen before is now in the system just it’s just amazing. And so I have a lot of passion that if people are not engaging in this, and small companies, especially, they’re going to get need out because they’re going to have to have too much overhead.

Damon Pistulka  33:06

Yep. And when you talk about these things like customer service and people, people think, Well, is it replacing people? I always come back to the fact is your customer service is probably one of your highest turnover areas in the first place. So and in manufacturing, we have so many people retiring. So you’ve got your senior customer service people that have amassed 2030, years of knowledge, sometimes that are leaving. And there’s no way that that transfer of knowledge can come into these other customer service people, first of all, which I think if, if you could figure out how to get that into a model, it would be awesome for the existing customer service, but then if you see that, that’s a position that we simply can’t keep people in, and our turnover is high for whatever reason, a bot might be a way for you to take off half of the work that’s just answering simple questions in your large language model, your customers be able to access answer their questions and let your customer service people do the important things where that interaction, that one on one interaction, really adds value to to you as a company and them as a customer. It I think it’s going to be fun seeing how that turns

Art Thomas  34:21

out? Yeah, absolutely. One of the other services that we’re doing for people is taking their work instructions and turning them into videos. And so one of the things you’re going to see as you bring in a new generation is they, they generally don’t like to read. I’m saying there’s not some that do, but most of the people you hire don’t want to read, and so being able to take and take all your work instructions that you’ve spent years developing and get them into very short animated videos that people can learn from is another way to also drive and improve your ramp up time for your employees. Employees and to give them a knowledge base to draw from. So that’s another thing that’s that may that may not fit in in some small businesses, but think about, instead of sitting down and say, Hey, here’s your, you know, your 10 foot thick book of work instructions, you just say hey, and here’s a website with and basically you just type in, this is what I’m looking for. Here comes a video. It’s, you know, three minutes long, and it tells you, literally, what’s in a procedure and but it’s done animated and it’s done, maybe in some cases, we were able to use videos that actually show that, you know, animate it being done. So I mean that other side so you have, I feel like there’s two sides. I think it’s the stuff that your employees can literally currently go access, if they’re trained correctly. And then the second part would be your your internal systems, and looking at integrating AI into your systems, right? Yeah, and so in both cases, I’m very passionate, because I believe that if small and medium this is, this is one of those areas that, if you don’t take advantage of, I promise in the next five to 10 years, your overhead will kill you, because going to drive a lot of overhead down. Well,

Curt Anderson  36:20

our I absolutely love your passion. I’ll tell you, that’s one thing. I think we’ve been kindred spirits since the time we’ve met. Where, you know when I’ve been on calls with you, like, you’re very you’re tactful, you’re plight, but you’re firm. We’re like you. You know what he just said? Like, he’ll I’ve watched art say that to clients like you guys, really, whatever you do, whether you do it with us or whoever, like you need to do something now to be competitive, to remain competitive, and I really admire how you tackle that, just so this is now, Damon, for me, selfishly, I love what you’re talking about, the sales portion. Are you comfortable? Could we go down a little bit of a deeper rabbit hole here, like, let’s say there’s a person out there, they’re in sales, and their ears just perked up. You know, our buddy Drew’s here and again, guys drop us a note. Let us know you’re out there. We’re here with art. Thomas from the Purdue MEP, very passionate about digital transformation. I’ve seen art do a presentation in front of hundreds of people. Art, you’re, you’re a wonderful presenter, and very passionate about this, especially with AI, there’s a sales folks, sales folks out there, and I’m raising my hand at me, included, what are you mentioned? A couple of the tactics. What are some how can we take that in a deeper dive on how AI can help our salespeople out there? Can you go there for a minute?

Art Thomas  37:31

So at a very basic Yeah, I’m gonna let me give you several levels to me, at a very basic level, right? It allows you to research an industry or a company very quickly. So if I’m going into a company, yes, I can go in. I can purchase, you know, you know, is biz, or I convert, you know, purchase DUNS and Brad, whatever. But you can also just literally type in a company name and say, what’s been the news in this Sunday, or what industry are they in? What industries are they in? What type of companies supply to this industry. I mean, you can literally take that company that you’re going in to see, and you can look up line from that of like, who their suppliers are, what kind of suppliers talk to these types of companies or supply. And then on the other side, who are they selling to? What kind of companies are they selling to? And so immediately, with very, you know, quickly, you can discover a lot about the company you’re going in to see. And go in there intelligent about the problems they’re facing, right, or the challenges and and also going there, understanding, hey, this may or may not be, you know, a good time to talk about this or the other, right? Sometimes what you say that you shouldn’t say is a bigger deal than what you didn’t say that you should have said. So that can always be overcome. But if you say something you shouldn’t say, You ain’t getting out of that one very easy so, so there’s a lot of those kinds of things that come out, but then let’s say you go to the next level and you’re like, Okay, I want there. I know that they’re into this product, or I know they’re this, okay, now I can go in and find out what are these things being used for. If you get below that, you say, Okay, well, I know this company. I really believe they need our help. I’ve been trying to get in here, hey, all of a sudden you can use for very little money. You can find things that have, that have, that are linked in with LinkedIn, and you can find, and be able to start finding individuals that are with this company, but also be able to find out, how do I get a hold of that, right? Because LinkedIn, you know, you can’t, in many case, can’t get an email, you can’t get anything, which is fine, and this isn’t going to be like a mass where you’re going to be able to go out and just find a mass amount of information, but that’s not the way you should be approaching it. Anyway. You should be looking for specific people in that company that you know. That’s the person you need to talk to. And so there’s help there for that. The other thing I would say. Is when you’re what happens if you know, for us, okay, we have regions, and sometimes we have to travel a ways to get to that region. And yes, we can get on a map, and we can go through and we can say, what are the Well, man, the nice thing with this is you can win there and say, Hey, I’m going to this area. What type of for us? What are the manufacturers that are located within five miles of where I’m going, and all of a sudden, boom, I’ve got these names, and I can go in and start researching. And so I’m just telling you, I use it all the time, and I’m just giving you the stuff that is either free or very, very inexpensive.

Damon Pistulka  40:38

Yeah, well, I tell you, a $20 subscription for the premium chat GPT just takes you light years ahead. You know, at most, at most, and the free version is, is awesome as well. So, yeah, it’s amazing what it’s done for for me, I mean, you talk about, you look at all the different places, right? Even if you’re in accounting or you’re in engineering or something in quality where you got to do heavy Excel work, one of the things that I didn’t realize is you just tell it what you want to do, tell it what columns it’s in, tell if they’re trying to do and Bing, bang, boom, the formulas come out. And you go, I have never seen that formula in Excel before, and I’m someone I started using, like, way too long ago, before Excel was a thing, right? And it’s coming up with stuff. You go, I cannot believe it does this. And, you know, so these time saving parts of of AI now it’s just, just just to distill ideas, even,

Art Thomas  41:40

yeah, it’s so let me give you. We’re running a new workshop that’s going to be ran in Elkhart. I don’t think it’s on our website yet, but it’s going to be happening in December. So your your people are getting a heads up on this. That’s going to be called AI, the spreadsheet killer. So it’s going to be running up in in El Park, and we’re going to be literally going into how we’re going to be having people bring a spreadsheet and how many hours they spend working on it, and then literally be able to show them, this is what, this is what you’re talking about. And so, but you’re exactly right. Damon, I mean, you know. And here’s the thing, let’s just say you are you love Excel. You don’t want to do it in AI, whatever. What about when you have to write, let’s say, visual, basic code to do something in Excel? Well, you can sit there and key it all day if you want to, or you can just go in and ask chat. GPT, hey, could you code me something that does this? Bingo, out comes the code. You can modify it, then paste it into the, into the into the program, and bingo, you ready to go. My son is a programmer. My youngest son, and he he has told me multiple times, dad, once I learned Python, all these other you know, everything else he’s learned, he said it cuts my time down from running, you know, writing 100 lines of code, I can literally get 100 lines done in two seconds and then go through and modify, right and so again, it’s just like there’s no to be using. This is just mind numbing, because it literally will change your life and change,

Damon Pistulka  43:23

yeah, it’s like, it’s like an encyclopedia at your fingertips to do whatever you want, and then the output is, is yours. And even, like, Kurt, we had, we had that person on from the what was it a pump or a gear manufacturer who we took a lot of their spreadsheet like calculators. This is, if you’re going to do this kind of thing, this kind of thing, you need this gear ratio, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, pumped it into chat. It. It made a CSS code of whatever you call it, HTML page for Yeah, HTML page. So people could do it online. So there, there are people out in the field, or customers could say, I want less than this. And it kicked out all the specifications. It was insane and and it was like, you said, it was like, bing, bang, boom. It’s done, modify it, and you’re good to go. Right?

Art Thomas  44:14

My passion is really that manufacturers see this, right? Yeah, yes. There’s individuals like myself, like you, Damon, like a curt, there’s people out there that are doing it themselves. That’s great, and that’s wonderful, and I’m excited. But what I’m really passionate about is helping manufacturers understand to educate their people inside their organization on how and what they can do to help that company make more money. That’s what I’m all about. I’m all about that small company being profitable, and that’s where I feel like we’re kind of missing the boat. Because, yes, we’re the early adopters are already there. They’re already doing stuff. In fact, people. Probably say the next level of adopters, right? The but my point is is there’s still a lot of people manufacturing are not using this tool, and I know that from personal experience.

Damon Pistulka  45:10

Yeah, yeah. I mean, if you could imagine a production supervisor, shipping person, or whoever it was that had a salute, some a problem they were trying to solve. And go into chat GPT and say, This is the problem I’m trying to solve. What are some of the solutions that have been used elsewhere in the world for this? Just that? Yeah. How much? Yeah. How much would they go from I’m sitting here trying to figure this out to now, I’ve got six ideas that, and two of them are actually pretty relevant. So let’s work. Let’s take a look at those. It’s yeah, it’s going to be cool when it’s then it really gets adopted widely.

Curt Anderson  45:50

Yeah, and hey. And Drew drops another comment here. Damon about Yeah,

Damon Pistulka  45:55

yep, Drew, Drew. Markley dropped another one and said, great information regarding AI, we’re starting to receive interest in ISO 440, 2001 from small to medium sized manufacturers, and he dropped the ISO certification page in there. That super cool, super cool to see that people are doing that.

Curt Anderson  46:17

So let’s go here. And I’m keeping it way over time. I appreciate it. So let’s go here. What’s, what’s, you know, you talk about your dad being so innovative. I’ll tell you, man, you’re you. You definitely got that innovation bug. Because, like,

Damon Pistulka  46:30

you know, we’re not well,

Curt Anderson  46:31

I’ll speak for myself. I’m not a young guy, but you know, you know, you’re just really leading the charge on, just staying ahead of the curve in your passion and contagious enthusiasm is just so inspiring. Of helping manufacturers and guys, if you connect with art here on on LinkedIn, his headline helping small and medium sized businesses in Indiana to be more profitable, and that’s what you just said that two minutes ago. What’s inspiring you? What like? What’s driving you to stay ahead of the curve to help your manufacturers?

47:00

Well, I

Art Thomas  47:01

look at it two ways. One is, I feel like when you quit learning, you’re dead, right? And I’m just, I’m a lifelong learner. I’m not going to go through the degrees that I’ve got, but I will tell you, I’m 57 and in January I started my doctorate degree. Oh, did you? Yeah, so I now do, I think all of a sudden I’m going to be like, you know, a world renowned No, I’m just, I just, I want to learn. And being at Purdue, of course, I have, there’s some funding to help with that, so I feel like I’m crazy if I don’t take advantage of it, because I want to learn. And so the number one reason I want to stay ahead of is I want to continue to learn. The second thing is, though, is that I, I spent my whole life in small business, small, medium sized businesses. I did everything from when I started in in janitorial when I was 19, till I was Vice President of Operations. I’ve done almost everything in between there, and I have been in those situations, wishing that somebody could help me, and I didn’t know who to call, and I did want to get roped into some company that’s just out there to make money, because then you can’t get rid of them. They never stop calling you. And so I was very and so I’ll be honest, when I was 26 so that’s been a long time ago. 30 years ago, I actually used what was then called BMT, which is now Purdue MEP. BMT was business modernization and technology, and I was in quality, and I was a brand new quality. I was actually in control of a Metrology lab. And I needed help. I need people come in and help me, and they were there to do that. And I look at it now as as me trying to help those people that I know where they’ve been, because I’ve been there my whole life, and I just, I’m very passionate about that. When I walk into a facility, you know, I’ve been there, I’ve walked into a facility where the guy met me at the door, the production manager was like, Dude, I can’t meet with you today. One of the places that does our plating burnt down last night, and all of our parts were in there. Okay, I get it. I totally get it. Like, okay, this is like, World War Three to that company, right? Because now they’re fighting battles, customer battles, supplier battle. I mean, it’s, it’s, it’s crazy. And so I’ve lived that, and when I go in there, that’s who I see. I see those. I see me. I see me there. So I feel like when I’m helping them, I’m helping me be better and learn, and I’m in the position where I can spend the time to learn, because I’m not in that everyday rat race of just getting production out the door. They a lot of times when you’re in that position, you don’t have time to learn, you don’t have time to invest in yourself, because you have no time and even your family suffering. So I look at it as me giving relief or giving assistance to those people who need time back in. Their life.

Curt Anderson  50:04

Drop the mic. That was, how do you even top that? Damon, that was just, just, dude, I don’t know how you pull it off. Man, I don’t know how. So you got, you got a lot of that preacher from your from your dad’s awesome. Love it. So, hey, we’ve got, uh, let’s before we wind down, Damon, we’ve got a comment from our buddy Skyler out there.

Damon Pistulka  50:25

Skylar, he said, Do MEPs provide grants for these type of tools to be created? And I believe they do. They have grant opportunities. As you said when we started into this art, you’ve got a complete team that’s looking for different grant opportunities to help offset some of these costs for manufacturers when you’re trying to develop these tools. And it is one of the things that I really think is is incredible about the MEPs too, is they, they, they feel the pain of of trying to keep current with these manufacturers. And really do go out and try to find grand opportunities to help offset some of these costs.

Art Thomas  51:02

Yep, absolutely. And a lot of times, you know, companies come to us all the time and they’re like, Hey, this is what we want to do. Do you know? Do you guys know of any grants that are out there? And we go, I’m telling you, probably at least twice a month I’m on a phone call with a company that we’re helping go to get a grant that they need to make their business grow. And so we’re there to help. We’re there to give assistance. We’re there to look, and we have agreements with people that can use AI to go look for the grants as well. So, absolutely awesome.

Curt Anderson  51:38

Well, I’ll tell you what, man Damon, I’ve got, like, a full, you know, page of notes. Here are, this was a master. Thank

51:44

you. Yeah,

Curt Anderson  51:45

I tell you, gave me tons of ideas. Damon, we’re going to be implementing these. That was just absolutely brilliant. I hope our manufacturing friends, anybody out there right now? Or if you catch us on replay, if you anything that you missed, man, go back and hit that replay button, because cart dropped tons of golden nuggets here and again. Like, this isn’t super sophisticated, off the charts, the you know, art you were just talking like basic AI tools that are sales folks, production folks, HR, customer service. I mean, like you dude, like you hit like every box. It’s awesome.

Damon Pistulka  52:16

Hit the spot. Hit the spot. So, alright,

Curt Anderson  52:19

we’ll wind down any parting thoughts, words of wisdom. Folks can find you on LinkedIn, at the Purdue MEP. Any parting thoughts, words of wisdom that you want to share with everybody as we close out,

Art Thomas  52:29

I think I would just say to the to to companies in general. And again, I don’t feel like I’m like, you know the person that’s got all the insights, but I will tell you this, you know, there are, I think, in general, for the MEP, I’m very I’ve been to all of the, you know, the big shows, and I will tell you that behind the scenes, as well as what you see, it’s the same the MEP and the M people in the MEP are very concentrated on helping manufacturers make more money, and so again, just excited that you guys off, you know, offered me this opportunity. And certainly, if anybody wants to get a hold of me, if you even if you’re not in Indiana, feel free. I’m I’m open. You can post my email if you want to, if that’s something that people want to have. I don’t know if you want me to put in chat, or if you just want to me to say it. Either way, I can do that. Whichever one is best.

Curt Anderson  53:29

Yeah, go. So connect with art raid on LinkedIn art, if you want to go ahead and share your email, that’d be great. And while he’s doing it, as we mentioned, you know, connect with the Manufacturing Extension Partnership. Connect with MEP Yeah. So and art, and we’re super excited we have the interim director, the acting director, Nagesh is going to Yeah, so this Monday. And so we’re just super excited, just to hear, from an overall view, what’s going on with the MEP network. So that’s such an honor for Damon and myself that’s gonna be right here on Monday. So alright, let’s start winding down. Damon, I want to give a big thank you to you for being our co host. But Damon, how about a big round of applause and a staying innovation for our dear friend art Thomas for just giving us a masterclass on not only his passion for manufacturing, but also for AI mister transformation. I’ve seen the guy in person, and I’ll tell you, he is just a rock star. So thank you for that. Want to thank everybody in the chat box today. And so Damon, as we close out, as I always like to say, just be someone’s inspiration, just like our friend art, and you’re going to make the world a better place. So alright, alright, hang out with us for one minute. Damon, why don’t you take it away and close us out.

Damon Pistulka  54:42

All right. Well, art, thanks for being here. Man. It was great talking about the Purdue MEP and then getting into the AI conversation here near the end. It was so helpful. And if you got into this late like Kurt said, go back to the beginning. Listen to listen to art, talking about the Purdue. MEP, the MEP network, and how they can help you. And you will find there’s a lot of gold there. If you’re a smaller manufacturer that really wants to help, or you could be in a bigger manufacturing, you just want to get some help with some something that that they can help you with. So go back replay, get the get the information out of this thing and learn more about the MEPs, because they’re in all 50 states. They’re there to help, and they they will make your company better, if they all can. Thanks everyone for being here. We will be back again next week with manufacturing, econ success art will finish up offline, and everyone else, as Kurt says, Have an awesome weekend. See

Art Thomas  55:43

you all later. Thank you.