Speaker 0 00:00:00 You can have the smartest people, the best technology, you're the largest customer base. But if you don't have a really good company culture, I don't believe that you're ever gonna be truly, truly successful.
Speaker 2 00:00:17 Hello, and welcome to the robot industry podcast. We're glad you're here and thank you for subscribing I'm Jim Beretta and our guest for this podcast edition is Sean Dotson. Sean Dotson, PE is the president and founder of R and D automation, a Florida native. He received his BS in mechanical engineering from the university of Florida. Sean's been in the industrial automation and robotics industry, his entire career, founding R and D in 2005 in 2020. He sold R and D to a private equity firm. And now serve as both R and D's president and Cass's holdings CTO. He manages the three divisions, R and D I automation and panel tech. Now retired. Sean used to compete in triathlons, ranging from Olympic to full Ironman distance, but he's now considering a comeback welcome Sean to the podcast we've been trying to connect for so long. And I'm glad that I've finally been able to pin you down.
Speaker 0 00:01:17 Yeah, thanks. Uh, thanks for having me on it. Uh, our, you know, everybody's got some busy schedules going on, so I appreciate you making time for me.
Speaker 2 00:01:24 Absolutely. And today we're gonna talk about culture and we all kind of talk about culture, but what elements do you think make up culture in a company?
Speaker 0 00:01:33 Yeah, I, it is a term that's tossed around a lot. Um, you know, people, a lot of people say they're, they have a very good company culture. Um, I think you have to tie your company culture into your values. You need to tie it into, um, a belief, uh, in, in your people, um, empowering your people. Um, it's not just, uh, little benefits, like, you know, extra vacation here and there, or, or, or healthcare or things like that. It's, it's truly making the workplace, uh, an environment where people want to come, want to collaborate and really want to give their best, uh, for, for the good of the company and for the good of the, uh, the mission of the company.
Speaker 2 00:02:11 And you've seen a lot of companies and like you're operating three of them. So how can you tell if a company has a poor culture?
Speaker 0 00:02:18 Um, yeah, I think some of the easy ways to tell our are quite frankly, hiss turnover. Um, if you see companies that are continually churning through, uh, employees, that's, that's usually one of the easiest and first signs, um, doesn't mean always that's the case, but it it's usually with a smoke there's fire. Uh, I think when you find people who are just not engaged, uh, in their, what what's going on in their company. So if you look at something like LinkedIn, if you, if you see a lot of employees on LinkedIn contributing and, and sharing out posts and things like that, it it's something that they believe in. And I think it's, uh, it provides evidence that there is a good, you know, solid culture there. Um, other, other, other companies, you, you hardly see any employees at all, uh, on, on their, uh, their social media, um, you know, on a more inward looking basis.
Speaker 0 00:03:07 Um, it's the smiles on people's faces when you walk around, um, if you walk into, uh, a company and everybody's just kinda got their head down and then, you know, type it away in their computer, uh, versus where you've got, uh, a companies we walk in, you know, again, our, our engineers, it's a little bit rare, but they they'll, you know, they'll smile and say hi to customers as they're walking in. And as, as you know, the engineers tend to be a little bit more of the introverts. And, uh, I think, I think that company culture helps pull them out their shell a little bit more too.
Speaker 2 00:03:35 So I was gonna ask you about a question, like how important is culture to your company and, and, uh, you know, I'm guessing I know the
Speaker 0 00:03:40 Answer. Yes, right? No, it is. It's super important. I mean, I, I believe that you can be the, the best, uh, at what you do. Um, you can have the smartest people working for you. You can have, you can be really successful in a lot of ways, a lot of metrics, but if you really don't have that good company culture, um, and you don't have people who really enjoy what they do, um, I think it's, you're missing. You're just missing that one little piece. That's just gonna make it that perfect company.
Speaker 2 00:04:09 So let's dig into this a little bit. Do you have a, like a code or written document? We
Speaker 0 00:04:13 Really don't have a written code. Um, of course we've got, um, we've got things like an employee handbook and things like that. Um, a lot of it is just kind of, uh, I don't wanna say it's unspoken because it is spoken it's, it's, it's, it's an unwritten, I guess you'd say, uh, code. Um, we do have some things that, um, 1, 1, 1 thing that we came up with years ago was the 10 commandments of communication. So it was talking about how do we communicate with each other, um, and, and some of 'em are, uh, express your expectations clearly. Um, it's your responsibility to follow up? Um, you know, don't, don't put off today, which, or don't put off to tomorrow, what you could be doing today. Um, another one is procedure will set you free. So, you know, if we have our procedure follow it, um, you know, obey the chain of command.
Speaker 0 00:05:02 So, you know, don't, don't, we're not trying to say you can only talk to the people, your superiors, but, you know, don't go around, you know, two levels down and ask maybe somebody to do something when you haven't talked to that person's supervisor, otherwise it creates a confusion. Uh, they might, there's always a big joke that I would, I would walk into a, a room and say, you know, something like, like, oh, I was thinking about maybe this idea, what do you guys think? And all of a sudden I'd have engineers giving me designs. And I was like, wait guys, I didn't, I didn't ask for that. And of course my engineering manager saying, what are you doing, Sean? I, it was the, the term they said was, uh, you know, your, your whispers a shout, right? So you have to be, you have to be very careful about that and make sure that you go through that chain of command, um, to make sure that all our communication is really effective.
Speaker 2 00:05:47 Maybe give me a little bit of an example of how your culture and maybe how it differs.
Speaker 0 00:05:53 Yeah. So, you know, as I spoke about before, so, you know, it's not all about just benefits, but I think some of those are important. Um, we've had, uh, an unlimited quote unquote unlimited vacation policy for 17 and a half years since I started the company. Um, a lot of people when, when I tell other business owners about that, they, they get wide eyed that they're like, how do you control that? How, you know, that sounds like a disaster waiting to happen. And, and I'll be honest with you with the exception of one or two small incidents here and there. It really hasn't. Um, we encourage, uh, people that, uh, to make sure that family is first, it's very important to us. You know, family comes first, if you have a sick child, if you've got, you know, a spouse that, that is, is having an issue or something like that, or, or, or childcare, you know, your, your, your babysitter or preschool, you know, closed down or something like that.
Speaker 0 00:06:43 We want you to take care of that first, because if you're at work worrying about those things, you're not putting your all into it anyway. Um, you know, we do a lot of even pre COVID. We had some work from home, uh, and remote, uh, possibilities going on that which prepared us for COVID. Um, we were, we were ready. We had that infrastructure already in place to, to be working from home. And now we've continued some of that hybrid, uh, work, uh, work schedules, which people really, really enjoy, and really like, uh, you know, programmers love to be just go home, put their head down and just bang out code. Right. And then come back into the office, put it in the machines and then see how things go. Um, you know, I, I think some other things are empowering people to make decisions. Um, you know, my management group, I've empowered to make a lot of decisions without me.
Speaker 0 00:07:30 Um, they come back and say, Hey guys, Hey Shawn, this is what we decided, this is what we're doing. You're good with that. Right. And I said, AB absolutely. Um, and it was a learning curve, you know, in the beginning it was more of a, we think we should do this. And I said, yep, I agree. You should do that. And then it was, we did this, is it okay. And then it became, we did this and we didn't tell you about it. And that was a month ago. So, um, you know, it, it, it is really, um, it's really wonderful to be able to have employees who are empowered to make those decisions and make the right decisions, as long as they know what the company's focus and goals are.
Speaker 2 00:08:04 And you do, uh, you actually do a shutdown. Like you're not one of these rare companies that actually do a shutdown between Christmas and, and new
Speaker 0 00:08:10 Years. Right? Yeah, that's correct. We've, uh, again, we've been doing that since the very beginning as well. Um, what I found is, again, people, you know, they wanna take time off anyway. Uh, a lot of our suppliers, a lot of our customers are on skeleton crews. They may not be completely shut down, but they don't have a large, you know, large number of staff. Um, people have a lot of other things on their mind, you know, uh, post Christmas, uh, especially, you know, building up to Christmas. They're so hectic trying to get ready for it, uh, that we just decided, you know, what we're gonna do. We're just, we're gonna shut down. It's a, a paid it's about a week, usually, you know, off, um, and people really, really enjoy it, really look forward to it. Um, and, uh, when they come back, they are, you know, refreshed, ready to go the beginning of the year and, you know, firing on all cylinders
Speaker 2 00:08:53 And you too. Uh, and I love this idea about, um, celebrating a machine shipment. So maybe just gimme a, a little, a little bit about, about
Speaker 0 00:09:01 That. Sure. Yeah. Uh, so every time a, a project goes out, um, we, we have some sort of celebration, uh, and it's, it's usually something, uh, you know, themed, uh, we try to try to make it fun. So we'll get everybody together towards the end of the day, or like right after lunch and we'll do ice cream sandwiches, or we'll bring in a, uh, snow cone truck, or we'll do, uh, um, we actually have an employee who makes amazing cheesecakes and he'll make like five or six cheesecakes and bring those in. So, um, of course it sends always be food themed, but, um, we try to celebrate for everybody, everybody who's not just involved in that project, but everybody across the board, because, you know, no matter what project that it is, everybody has some sort of, you know, hand in the success of that project. Even if they're just working on another project to take the load off the engineers who are working on the one that's shipped. Uh, so we wanna make sure everybody's included, uh, we all get together, you know, spend a nice hour, just, uh, trying to talk about things other than work and, you know, eating some ice cream or, uh, or snow cones or something like that.
Speaker 2 00:10:06 So do you hire for culture?
Speaker 0 00:10:08 Yes. AB absolutely. We have actually turned down employees that were, um, I'm gonna say technically superior, I mean, incredible engineers and incredible machine designers and things like that. But if they're not gonna fit in with a culture, if they, if they know that they're smartest guy in the room and, and won't listen to, to anybody else's ideas and their ideas are always right, it, it's not gonna work. Um, you know, we encourage people to bring ideas to the table and we want you to be passionate about your ideas, but we also want you to be able to listen to what other people have said. Um, some of our, really most of our success, I would say from machinery design is getting a bunch of really smart people in a room and throwing ideas up on the wall, uh, you know, brainstorming and, and it, it's so great to watch somebody's idea, start to go down a path, and then somebody else will go, wait, if we take, if we take Doug's idea and mix it with Chad's idea, what if we do this and they'll go open the board and draw something, now that you've got this third, you know, mixture of ideas, um, and it's even better than the first two, you know, put together.
Speaker 0 00:11:13 Um, so it, it, it's, it's really important to be collaborative, to be open-minded. Um, but at the same time, if you know, you're right, 100%, it's, it's a, it's a calculation. It's a fact, it's a, whatever you need to stand up for that as well. And say, guys, look, I've done this before, that does not work, or here's the danger of doing it that way. And I, and I really recommend we don't do it that way. I want to hear that as well.
Speaker 2 00:11:37 So there's some downsides to kind of being kind of
Speaker 0 00:11:40 Picky. Oh, absolutely. Um, you know, trying, trying to hire, um, is a little tough sometimes. Um, you know, we've been accused before by, you know, some, some recruiters or, or some, some HR, uh, staff of, of us saying like, look, you guys are just being too, too picky. We've gone through, you know, four or five, you know, candidates. And, um, you know, it's our belief that you have to find the right people. Um, if you don't find, if you, if you just settle for whatever's the best out there at that moment, um, one of two things are gonna happen. One, somebody amazing is gonna come along at some point, and, and now you maybe don't have the, the budget or the, or the work to hire that amazing person, um, or the person that you just kind of settled on is not gonna live up to expectations.
Speaker 0 00:12:25 And, and it's gonna be, you know, it's gonna be a tough fit. Um, so, you know, we are, we are picky when it comes to hiring, uh, but it served us well because we have very long tenured employees, you know, and what, uh, we, we had an engagement survey recently. We had, um, you know, I think it was 95% participation. I think there was only one person out of the entire, you know, company that didn't participate in the survey. And we had a 92% positive rating, which according to industry metrics that we, this software compares it to is, is far above most, most of our other, uh, you know, peers and competitors.
Speaker 2 00:13:02 And what's happening at your companies right now, are you on a hiring spree or is it very healthy or what's happening kind of from a big picture perspective?
Speaker 0 00:13:11 Um, I'd say like most, you know, early this year, we, well, last year and earlier this year, we did do a lot of, uh, a lot of hiring. Um, I'd say that we, we've kind of, we've tapered off a little bit, uh, right now. Uh, but we are still looking for a couple, uh, critical roles, uh, in the company. Um, so I'm seeing in the industry right now, um, automation just, obviously the last two years has just been on fire, taking off, you know, people having record record year after years and numbers. Um, I'm seeing a little bit of softening right now. I think obviously mainly due to fears of recession and interest rates and midterm elections and things like that, which if anybody who's been in this industry for long enough has seen this cycle over and over again. So I'm not really worried. Um, I just think it's a little bit of a slowdown. The growth curve is still up. It's just not as up as it has been the last, uh, year and a half, let's say. Um, and a lot of us in the industry too, have enormous backlogs already. Uh, the, you know, work that's gonna carry us through, you know, into next year easily.
Speaker 2 00:14:18 And I think being, uh, a company that has a great reputation that has a reputation for making that cultural fit, I think it makes you a, a better place to work. Do you?
Speaker 0 00:14:28 Oh, I, I think so. Um, I think, uh, you know, talking to my employees, um, you know, they, they're happy. I'm, I'm very open with my employees about what's going on in the business. Um, I encourage them to be very open with me about how they're feeling. Um, a lot of times that I, we do get that feedback. Um, somebody will come to us and say, Hey, really enjoying my job. I really, I really like this, but you know, you've got me on this one project and I've been on this project for a year. I'm just, I'm kind of getting a little tired of it. You know, I, I I'd like to do something different, so that's great. Let's, let's go ahead and maybe, uh, you know, phase you outta that project, somebody back into a, to, you know, backfill your role in it and let's keep you onto something else.
Speaker 0 00:15:07 I don't, I don't want you coming to work, you know, you know, dreading working on that, that project over and over again. Um, so, um, you know, we've got some feedback as well from employees that, um, in this market right now, you know, you can, as you've seen in the, in, in, on LinkedIn and all that, a lot of people moving around, a lot of people getting offers at other companies. Um, we really haven't seen that. We have not seen anybody, you know, going, going out, looking for, for other positions, which, which tells me that, you know, they're happy here, um, which is what I want them to be. That's, that's, that's my key, uh, goal is when you have happy employees who really are passionate about what they do, you produce a superior product.
Speaker 2 00:15:50 Well, and I think too, that there's some, uh, other things going on there, uh, as well, uh, where people can, maybe they're working in healthcare when you do a lot of work in med device. And I think there's a certain, uh, I'm working to save people's lives or I'm making to, uh, I'm working to make people's lives a little bit better. I think that there's kind of a cool thing there too. What do you think about that?
Speaker 0 00:16:10 There, there is, um, you know, a, a lot of the products, uh, that we automate are medical device. Um, but we also do some other, you know, we do, we do other industries as well, consumer products, um, industrial goods, you know, hydraulic valves and automotive sensors and things like that. Um, and, and regardless of what it is, um, the healthcare aspect, certainly, yes, I think a lot of people are, are very proud of the fact that the products that we're automating are, are going out and helping people be healthy or, or saving their lives or helping with surgeries, things like that. Um, but there's also some consumer products that very popular brands that you can walk down, you know, any retail store and the employee can kind of point out to their, their spouse or their kids. Like, Hey, you see that package of whatever it happens to be our machine made that package or our machine assembled that device that's inside of that package. Um, so, you know, I've heard countless stories about that. Um, there's a, there's a very popular, uh, glassware company, uh, down here in Florida that we've, we've done a lot of workforce. So pretty much if you buy one of those, one of those cups, um, you know, it came off our equipment. So, um, it's always a, a nice, uh, icebreaker, especially in Florida where a lot of people have this particular type of, uh, a glassware,
Speaker 2 00:17:26 The, um, the other part of that conversation about medical device and, and such that I know you do work with, um, is, is the part that employees get to learn about such a fascinating array of assembly technology and ultrasonics and, uh, and, and, and other parts. And I think that that's a real big motivator for, uh, company culture. Do
Speaker 0 00:17:45 You? Yeah, absolutely. One of the reasons I got into, well, I guess as you say, got into, because I kind of stumbled into custom automation, but, um, you know, I stayed in custom automation is because every project is unique and you're learning something new on every single one of these projects you're learning about, as you said, all these new technologies, um, you're, you're becoming a subject matter, the, the second best subject matter expert next to your customer, uh, your customer's always gonna know their, their, uh, their product better than anybody, but, uh, you end up knowing the product, you know, almost as well as anybody else out there. So we've done a lot of work over the years for, you know, contact lenses, um, you know, hydraulic valves, um, you know, me, medical, medical implants, things like that. And you, you become an expert on those particular types of things. Um, so it really, um, it allows the employees and, and everybody who works here to, to, to really learn a lot about a lot of different things, um, and really make yourself, you know, more, more valuable in just, I mean, education is always, education is always an attractive thing I believe to, to, and culture. Um, people always want to be learning new things, and if, if you're not learning new things, you get stagnant and that's when that's when you become unhappy.
Speaker 2 00:18:57 And that's a good segue to my next question, which is what can potential employees do to position themselves as, as kind of good cultural fits for an automation integrator, or, and I'm assuming here that builders want innovators. Um, so you mentioned education, what else?
Speaker 0 00:19:11 Um, yeah, education, uh, you know, op as I, as I kind of mentioned before being open to ideas other than your own, um, you know, obviously we've got a lot of really smart engineers, uh, but you, you've gotta be able to collaborate and work with other people and, and, and see somebody else's perspective. Um, you know, definitely you wanna listen to the lessons learned from those who have been there and done that before. Uh, we've got a mixture of some, some very experienced, uh, designers and engineers and, and, and procurement people and, and some very young, uh, engineers, you know, really fresh outta college. Uh, and it's really great to see the younger engineers working with the older engineers, learning from them, and at the same time, teaching them some things. So, you know, you've, you've got maybe one of the, uh, more experienced engineers.
Speaker 0 00:20:01 And the other day, one of the, the younger engineers, he was doing something on CAD. And he's like, why are you doing it that way? In the, in the, in the more experienced engineer was saying like, well, I've always done it that way. He's like, well, if you do it this way, it's a lot quicker. And he did, he showed him something in CAD that, you know, he'd been using this CAD package for 15 years. I never knew, you know, about this one little shortcut. So, um, it was, it was really cool to see, you know, each generation really teaching the other generation.
Speaker 2 00:20:26 And that's, uh, a good segue to a question around innovation. So what about innovation and innovation in your business? Is, is it everything or, or what's your thoughts on that?
Speaker 0 00:20:36 Um, I think it's a lot, but I don't think it's everything. Um, you know, there, there's a couple terms we've used around here. We, we wanna be on the, the leading edge with an L, not the bleeding edge with a B right. The, the bleeding edge is that, that edge technology hasn't really been proven yet. Yes, it's really cool. It's really slick. It's got a lot of sexiness to it, but there's always that potential for failure or potential for some unintended consequences of your decisions. The, uh, you know, any manufacturer wants good technology, but they want it to be rock solid. So that's why, you know, we want to innovate, but we don't want to go really, really, too, too far away. So, you know, I incur, for example, um, you know, with, with, with the lowering cost of robotics, now you can put a robot on a machine cheaper than you can design a mechanism.
Speaker 0 00:21:32 And, and I've always told my engineers, if you design a mechanism of some sort, the first time, it will not work the second time it might work. And the third time you'll get it to work, but you don't know how long it's gonna last, right? So then you gotta do some life cycle testing on it. And all, meanwhile, we've got robots that have, you know, tremendous meantime between failures with multiple axes, all built in. You can do pretty much everything you want with this robot. So let's not get fancy with all the cams and all, yes. Like I level old machines that are all cam driven and, you know, they make that great sound and, and they, they really just click along real fast, but the flexibility and the ability to innovate is built into some of these, you know, robot and servo technologies and cameras and things like that.
Speaker 2 00:22:18 So can you reward innovation?
Speaker 0 00:22:20 I think you can encourage it. Um, and I think by encouraging it, the reward is allowing the designers and engineers to, to, to do something unique. Um, and that gives them a sense of, of, of self satisfaction. Um, you know, I suppose you could reward it in a way, if, if, if one of the engineers came up with something that was very patentable or very, uh, you know, very super innovative, nobody else has ever done it in the industry. And all of a sudden, you know, you've cornered a market. Yes. You could certainly reward that in some sort of, you know, monetary way or, or through a promotion or something like that. But, you know, I, I really believe that it's the little small rewards that, uh, help encourage the engineers all the time. So, you know, when we do a design review, when they show us something on, on, on the screen that, uh, that's, we really hadn't thought about before and they decided to do it some way that was, you know, a little bit more creative. We're always very, um, very quick to point out like, wow, that's a great idea. You know, we, that nobody thought of that. That's, that's super, I'm glad you came up with that. Um, so it's those, its those little confidence boosters, I think that are, that are the reward.
Speaker 2 00:23:30 Yeah, absolutely. And I was the, well kinda my last question on this series is, is do you think that customers reward innovative companies?
Speaker 0 00:23:38 Um, I think they do. Um, as I kind of mentioned before, they don't want things that are maybe a little too bleeding edge, you know, we we've we've, we've had some customers actually push back on robotics before too. They said, look, we have no robots, we don't have any training. We really don't. We really don't want that. Um, and we have to, we have to try to educate them and explain that look, it's not that difficult. We can help you with the training. There's other training you can get. But at the end of the day, if they just really don't want to step that far, then we respect that. And we'll, and we'll, we'll design something maybe a little bit more, um, a little more traditional. Um, mm-hmm, <affirmative>, you know, I do believe that though. Um, the other hand that, you know, we have won contracts because of our innovation, um, despite the fact that maybe we were at a higher price point than, than somebody else.
Speaker 0 00:24:30 So you have to know your customer, you have to know what their risk tolerance is. Um, you know, how much automation do they already have in their facilities, how, how comfortable they are with it. And typically the larger corporations that have a lot of automation, they're willing to take a little bit more, you know, risk in innovation, um, you know, to get a, a better or a faster piece of equipment, uh, than maybe the smaller, what I'm gonna call the, the, the mom and pop shops, even though the mom and pop shops nowadays are still, you know, they're, they're 50 to a hundred million dollar companies, but, uh, uh,
Speaker 2 00:25:01 And just a, a general question too, about industry right now. Um, what are companies kind of talking to you about more? Is it, is it uptime? Is it, uh, is it, um, speed? Is it flexibility? Is it all of those things?
Speaker 0 00:25:15 Um, I think it's all of those things, you know, I've never had a customer say I wanna run slower. Um, so speed is always important, you know, waste ergonomics. Um, right now though, we are seeing, um, a lot of requests for, and this has been for the last several years of, uh, low volume high mix. So customers have, you know, 30 different SKUs of this particular, I'll just say, you know, hydraulic valve, um, and they need to be able to run lots of 50 or a hundred, which, you know, traditional in traditionally in automation, lots of 50 or a hundred's like, why would you automate that? But when you have 30 different, lots of a hundred, okay, it starts adding up. So they want equipment that is able to, um, and a lot of times, you know, zero change over, they want push button change over to go from product a to product B.
Speaker 0 00:26:07 Um, so we've been pretty successful at coming up with some designs and some standard platforms that allow for that. Um, now if that comes with typically increased cost and maybe a little increased complexity, but, uh, when you are able to literally fulfill orders on that day, instead of having to batch orders together, or, well, we're not running that product for another three weeks, so sorry, customer, you're gonna have to wait a month, they can run a batch of 50 and, and get that customer their order. So, um, we, you know, we call it mass customization. Um, you know, people are really looking for that. Um, I mean, even down to units of one, you know, orders of one, we've had customers before that my, my order quantity is anywhere from one to 1 million automate that. Right. So, uh, it becomes challenging, but it's also fun.
Speaker 2 00:26:53 Also, are you finding that your customers are asking for their machines to be easier to use?
Speaker 0 00:26:58 Oh yes, absolutely. Yeah. Um, you know, right now obviously manufacturing, labor, um, you hear throughout, you know, every news article about how people cannot find manufacturing, labor. So, um, you know, the old ROI calculations of, you know, how much per hour, fully burdened and how much does the machine cost, what my ROI, as well as your labor, if your labor rates go to infinity, you know, ROI goes to zero, right? So, um, more and more customers are, it doesn't matter how much what the ROI is. I just, I can't produce product if I don't have people there, I can't produce, you know, those products. Um, so, you know, they are asking for, um, they're asking for a lot of flexibility, they're asking for a lot of innovation, but they're also asking for that at, as you say, as a level that's really easy to use.
Speaker 0 00:27:52 Um, example of this is about, probably about four or five years ago. I, I, I, I looked at some of our HMIS and I said, guys, this is the, this is the two thousands. And we're, and we're, you know, are these HMI still look at their back from 1980? They're not easy to use. They're not, you know, they're not sexy, they're not glamorous. And so I, I pulled out my iPhone and I said, there is no user manual for an iPhone. It does not exist. There's not a manual. You can't go look up, you know how to do something in a manual. That's what our HMIS need to look like. You know, cuz a toddler can pick up an iPad. I think we've all experienced this, you know, a toddler picks up an iPad and starts playing around with it and they figure out how to use it pretty quickly.
Speaker 0 00:28:28 I, I want the HMIS to look like that with, you know, slider switches and, and play buttons and stop buttons. And um, what we found is it, it, it helps the operator figure out what the error is, how to work their way out of it. And a side effect is it also helps with language barriers cuz we build a lot of equipment that goes down into to Mexico into the Caribbean. Um, we've got some machines in China, um, when you don't have to translate everything when with the stop symbol or the play symbol is kind of a universal symbol operators understand that intrinsically
Speaker 2 00:29:00 It's a very exciting time for your automation and thank you for, uh, filling us in on some of the things that are happening. Uh, Sean, um, uh, thanks for coming on today. Uh, how can people, uh, get a hold of you if they'd like to follow this up with some other, uh, uh, conversations,
Speaker 0 00:29:14 Um, you can get ahold of us by going to, uh, R N D automation.com that's uh, Romeo, November Delta automation.com, um, or just, uh, find me on LinkedIn. Um, I'm pretty, uh, uh, I'm pretty active on LinkedIn. So just search for my name and uh, send me a, send me a message and a, uh, a LinkedIn request and I'd be happy to, uh, further the conversations.
Speaker 2 00:29:37 Thanks so much for, uh, uh, helping us to talk a little, little bit about the culture and innovation and automation today.
Speaker 0 00:29:44 I appreciate it. Thanks for having me on
Speaker 2 00:29:46 You have a good day. You too. Our sponsor for this episode is Airhart automation systems. Airhart builds end commissions, turnkey, automated solutions for their worldwide clients. With over 80 years of precision manufacturing, they understand the complex world of robotics, automated manufacturing and project management, delivering world class custom automation on time and on budget contact one of their sales engineers to see what Airhart can build for you at
[email protected] and Airhart is spelled E H R H a R D T. I'd like to thank our partner a three they're the association for advancing automation. They are the leading automation trade association for robotics, vision and imaging motion control and motors and the industrial artificial intelligence technologies visit automate.org to learn more and like to recognize our partner painted robot painted robot builds and integrates digital solutions. They're a web development firm that offers SEO, digital social marketing, and can set up and connect CRM and other E R P tools to unify marketing sales and operations. And you can find
[email protected]. And if you'd like to get in touch with us at the robot industry podcast, you can find me Jim Beretta on LinkedIn. We'll see you next time. Thanks for listening. Be safe out there.
Speaker 2 00:31:10 Today's podcast was produced by customer attraction, industrial marketing, and I'd like to recognize by nephew Chris gray for the music, Jeffrey Bremner for audio production, my partner, Janet and our partners, a three painted robot and our sponsor Ahart automation systems.
