Latest / Inside Integration / Episode 114: Several Tools. Real and Virtual

Transcript

Episode 114: Several Tools. Real and Virtual · Inside Integration

• 0:02
  Cranking, cranking. Hog.
• 0:05
  Hog cranked. All right, welcome to the Inside
• 0:14
  Integration Podcast. My name is Chris.
• 0:16
  I'm joined, as always, by my partner Jason.
• 0:18
  What is up, everybody? We are plotting headlong into
• 0:23
  not having any idea what to talk about today.
• 0:27
  You know, I thought you're when you with your word plot.
• 0:30
  I was like, oh wow, there's a there's a lead in to the AI
• 0:35
  Notetaker conversation we were just having so.
• 0:38
  That's your that's your AI noting assistant.
• 0:40
  I mean, that's I keep I I feel bad for Jason because I keep
• 0:43
  literally like, you know, hammering him like, hey, is this
• 0:46
  thing good? Is this what do you think it is?
• 0:48
  What's this device and whatever. And I just got a nice, nice
• 0:52
  ringing testimony. Yeah, well, you know, it's
• 0:55
  tools. I think, you know, maybe we can
• 0:57
  make a, maybe we can do a podcast about tools, right,
• 1:00
  Having the right tools for the job.
• 1:02
  I mean, who better to talk about than than a couple of tools here
• 1:06
  we. Are really I was going to say
• 1:08
  I'm I'm I embody your comments, Sir, so I better be careful.
• 1:13
  No, and, and I, I think that's great.
• 1:15
  I think I think we could definitely dive into, you know,
• 1:18
  this, this AI note taker that's sweeping the nation that you've
• 1:21
  now convinced me to to to do and to.
• 1:23
  Spend $500 on YEAH, your wife doesn't.
• 1:30
  Listen, I was going to say if if you talk to my wife, it was
• 1:33
  $200. Yeah, well, physically the
• 1:36
  machine if you get the really nice one is 200 bucks and then
• 1:38
  you buy the package because the the 300 minute deal, you know,
• 1:43
  I'll just say this, this is not a commercial for plot, but what
• 1:46
  what we're going to talk about tools today.
• 1:48
  We can we can define it here a little bit, but it does come
• 1:51
  with a 300 minute a month package for free in perpetuity I
• 1:55
  guess. So you'll be able to do
• 1:56
  transcriptions for for the life of the unit for at least 300
• 2:00
  minutes a month. But when you think about what
• 2:01
  300 represents in terms of your day or your month or your year
• 2:08
  at work, it is a fraction of the time that you'll actually need.
• 2:12
  And you're, you're, you're back to, you're back to the old
• 2:14
  cellular phone days where, you know, nights and weekends were
• 2:16
  free and you had certain certain number of minutes a month or
• 2:20
  beeps, you know. Right, all incoming calls are
• 2:24
  free or out. What was it out incoming calls
• 2:26
  were free or the first minute outgoing was free or they've got
• 2:30
  some scam that they're trying to run on you to to get you to to
• 2:33
  make that phone call. Or I mean my prime Co phone with
• 2:36
  a little pop up ear set was quite the going back.
• 2:40
  Was quite the revolution in 1996 I got to tell you.
• 2:44
  I'm I'm pretty sure I still had a beeper in 96.
• 2:47
  I don't know if I had graduated to a phone yet at that point.
• 2:49
  I had had one of those dollar 99 beepers that you know.
• 2:54
  Quarter 99. Remember that, Remember that
• 2:57
  there was a whole like it was like beepers, whatever I want to
• 3:00
  say beepers.com, but.com didn't exist back then, so I don't
• 3:03
  know. No.
• 3:04
  Well, I had a Pactel pager. That was my deal with the.
• 3:08
  It was clear. It was like the jellyfish one.
• 3:10
  Yeah, it was very cool. Sure.
• 3:12
  Absolutely. Let me tell you how cool that
• 3:14
  thing was. Beat me and I'll meet you and
• 3:17
  give you the drugs. But.
• 3:20
  No. Was that your sales pitch?
• 3:22
  No, no. OK, did you have like a code
• 3:25
  next to the number? Oh, this is 86.
• 3:29
  That's 187, right? Yeah, there you go.
• 3:33
  Sure. No, man, that was I mean that's
• 3:37
  that's that's going back a ways for sure, that and Nextel.
• 3:41
  But no, So I think it's a good topic here.
• 3:43
  Like modern tools, right, Like, you know, we all we're all you
• 3:47
  know, from the install field. We're all used to using tools.
• 3:49
  And like when you find a tool, you, you know, use the crap out
• 3:52
  of it and you'll love it. You know whether it's your you
• 3:55
  know your your rhino labeler or your you know Brother P touch
• 3:58
  equivalent or you know whatever. Dymo bro dymo.
• 4:02
  Fuck Rhino. I'm I'm team brother.
• 4:06
  That's OK. There we go.
• 4:08
  That's. My joint right there weighs 50
• 4:10
  lbs, but you know, it works pretty good.
• 4:12
  But but yeah, you know, different things like that.
• 4:15
  And you know, like our like the AI note taker we were just
• 4:18
  talking about is, is, you know, modern tools, CRMS, you know,
• 4:22
  that sort of thing, You know, where, you know, what are we
• 4:27
  using to? I mean, I guess basically kind
• 4:30
  of augment ourselves. And especially like, you know,
• 4:33
  the more I've been thinking about this plot thing, it's kind
• 4:35
  of like not to bring the showdown, but like, I'm kind of
• 4:39
  faced by my own mortality. Like, hey, here's I used to be
• 4:42
  able to remember things. And now I've got, you know, this
• 4:46
  thing that's listening at all times and transcribing and
• 4:50
  basically putting it in front of me.
• 4:52
  Like are, you know, where are we and what are we, what are we
• 4:57
  using to, you know, to, to, to make our lives easier to look
• 5:01
  for, you know, patterns and to keep contacts and, and, and that
• 5:05
  sort of thing. And the AI note taker is a great
• 5:08
  example of it, right? Like, you know, and, and this
• 5:12
  is, this is a physical device. Obviously, you know, you've
• 5:14
  probably been on a, on a team's call or, or whatever.
• 5:17
  And, you know, suddenly somebody drops that turd in the punch
• 5:20
  bowl of like, Hey, Bill's AI assistant is, you know, now
• 5:24
  listening in. Like everybody kind of looks at
• 5:28
  each other and scratches her head and says, OK, and here we
• 5:32
  go, right? Like.
• 5:34
  Yeah. And it's like who is this note
• 5:36
  taker, you know, like what, what it, what is that?
• 5:39
  You know, whether you're like, I mean, I think it's fair to say
• 5:43
  that, you know, there is, there are no secrets anymore really.
• 5:47
  You know, like everything's getting out.
• 5:48
  I mean, shit, I mean the people in the government are saying
• 5:51
  that there's UFOs even though, you know, like the, the secrets,
• 5:56
  the secrets out the, the, the, you know, the toothpaste is out
• 5:59
  of the tube. Whatever the yeah, you're.
• 6:01
  Not getting back in there. Sure.
• 6:02
  No, for sure, you're definitely not.
• 6:04
  I mean, even now with the, with the, with some of the, and this
• 6:07
  is a total tangent, but now that they're talking about the, the
• 6:12
  cash, the cash market for prescription drugs, like it's
• 6:15
  all consumer driven now as opposed to being driven by the
• 6:17
  pharmacies in the medical industry.
• 6:19
  So we're just starting to see this, you know, convergence
• 6:24
  this, this collapsed kind of of some of the pillars that, that
• 6:26
  have held everything up. But when you think about how to
• 6:29
  circle back to our conversation about tools and thinking about
• 6:32
  the hardware and having the things that you need to, to
• 6:35
  execute properly. I mean, how many times have you
• 6:38
  said, fuck, man, I need an assistant, I need a team, I
• 6:41
  need, I need sure to help me with this.
• 6:43
  And for, we'll just say it for for only $200, Chris, you can
• 6:52
  stick one on the back of your phone that that rolls with you.
• 6:55
  And when you press the button on it, it records all of the
• 6:58
  conversations. It's, you know, it can highlight
• 7:01
  in detail and, and list out, you know what you talked about some
• 7:04
  of the bullet points. And if it doesn't know, it just
• 7:07
  puts everything into a miscellaneous, you know, bullet
• 7:10
  point line. And it's like oh Jason said the
• 7:13
  F word 4 times. You should you should let it
• 7:17
  listen to one of these shows and and.
• 7:19
  Oh my God, we. Can have a good laugh about how
• 7:21
  it points out how crappy we are at doing this we.
• 7:25
  Found these two talentless hacks that are yelling into the
• 7:27
  Internet. We'd really like to, you know,
• 7:33
  detail how bad they suck and all the reasons that they suck.
• 7:37
  Here's your action item. Here's your action items.
• 7:39
  Kill yourselves and. Wow, shop up your computer with
• 7:44
  an axe immediately and get away from civilization.
• 7:47
  Go live under an overpass somewhere with a shopping cart
• 7:51
  and. Right, that that is the kind of
• 7:54
  AII think I would pay for is something that's just that's I
• 7:58
  need to train an agent to just be that guy like here.
• 8:01
  Hey, here's your brutal feedback.
• 8:02
  But you know it it's it kind of Harkins back that they like.
• 8:06
  I don't know if you ever knew anybody like this, but there
• 8:08
  were, there were people throughout, you know, time
• 8:11
  memoriam that I can remember who had a little mini cassette tape
• 8:14
  recorder that, you know, used to bring these things with them.
• 8:17
  Before phones, before any of these devices.
• 8:20
  You know, you would have somebody who would be driving to
• 8:23
  a job site or driving to an appointment or whatever and
• 8:25
  they'd be dictating their notes. And then, you know, later on the
• 8:29
  the, the part that we've improved upon is that later on
• 8:32
  you would have to go and listen to that.
• 8:34
  You'd have to suffer through the sound of your own voice.
• 8:36
  That's number one, right? Like that.
• 8:37
  That would be my obstacle for sure, you know, and you'd
• 8:40
  basically do the work that the AI is doing manually, right?
• 8:45
  Here's some bullet points. Here's some things I can't
• 8:47
  forget. Here's some meetings I need to
• 8:49
  set up. This is what I promised.
• 8:50
  I need to make sure I deliver that kind of thing.
• 8:52
  And now we're in this magical world where, you know, AI has
• 8:56
  evolved to the point where it can do that and it can learn
• 9:00
  from your habits and, and that sort of thing.
• 9:02
  And, you know, it's it, it is, it's helpful.
• 9:06
  It's a tool. And to put it, you know, to put
• 9:08
  it the way you're putting it, it's a lot cheaper than having
• 9:11
  an assistant. And it probably doesn't make
• 9:13
  many mistakes either, you know, so.
• 9:16
  It's, it's been pretty solid, you know, I think, you know, as
• 9:20
  a force multiplier and a memory multiplier, certainly as, as we
• 9:23
  age and you know, people have had copious amounts of
• 9:27
  substances flow through their brains.
• 9:29
  In our youth, in our youths, in our, in our let's just make sure
• 9:32
  in our past, we're. You know, I mean, let's not kid
• 9:34
  ourselves. You know, I, I was having a
• 9:36
  conversation with, with one of my member partners here recently
• 9:41
  and he, one of his focuses is health and really kind of
• 9:44
  identifying, you know, what the crutch is for individuals,
• 9:48
  whether they're on his team or in our industry.
• 9:51
  And he's like, you know, there's a lot of commonalities.
• 9:53
  There's a lot of people having heart attacks and having strokes
• 9:58
  and dealing with chemical substance issues and trying to
• 10:02
  trying to balance that out. Everybody's got a crutch.
• 10:04
  It's a video game. It's a, you know, it's a shrug.
• 10:07
  It's a drink. It's a whatever that is.
• 10:10
  Yeah. Yeah.
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  So just, you know, there's, there's layers to this business
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  and, you know, having the right tools and having the right
• 10:19
  influences I think are are really important.
• 10:22
  I think something like an AI note taker will keep you honest
• 10:26
  because, you know, it, it was said, you know, and I think, you
• 10:30
  know, getting on the etiquette of, Hey, I'm going to record
• 10:32
  this meeting with a note taker and, and kind of getting used to
• 10:36
  those beats. All that stuff is, is kind of
• 10:40
  kind of the same old ground, but also kind of new ground.
• 10:42
  I, I had a flash of like, I don't know if it's Caddyshack or
• 10:45
  one of those movies when you said, you know, pop out the tape
• 10:49
  recorder. It's like Doctor Beeper, you
• 10:51
  know, pulling out his thing to, to take notes on a, on a,
• 10:55
  whether it's a dentist or whether it's a, you know, a
• 10:58
  doctor like, oh man, I, I, I'm not going to save anybody's
• 11:01
  life. I can tell you that right now
• 11:02
  with my AI note taker. And I'm trying to make sure I've
• 11:05
  got meetings lined up and make sure that, you know, everything
• 11:09
  that we talked about is is, you know, captured for, for in
• 11:12
  perpetuity, but. No, I, I think, I think that's a
• 11:15
  valuable tool because, and I think that one of the things
• 11:18
  that necessitates that is we're all a lot busier than we were.
• 11:22
  Our, our focus is in 30 different places at any one
• 11:26
  time, right? Like if you're, you know, if
• 11:27
  you're a business owner and you're doing this or, you know,
• 11:29
  if you're working this field, right, like you're, you know,
• 11:33
  you might have 15 conversations a day and being able to keep
• 11:36
  those straight. You know, you, you sort of, you
• 11:39
  know, just the very nature of everybody multitasking these
• 11:42
  days. And, and you know, you might,
• 11:44
  you might have a phone call while you're driving and
• 11:46
  obviously you can't really take notes while you're driving
• 11:49
  unless, you know, you got some self driving set up, you know,
• 11:53
  right. Like it's not, it's, it's, it's
• 11:55
  not so easy to keep that focus and that attention.
• 11:58
  And it is, you know, these are, these are tools and, and, you
• 12:02
  know, say what you want about AI and OK, it's making us Dumber as
• 12:06
  a society and all these other things that, that all may be
• 12:09
  true, but this is, you know, it's, it's making you more
• 12:13
  effective as a person, right? Same thing with, you know, all
• 12:17
  the other little gadgets and gizmos, right?
• 12:19
  Like you're, you know, ACRM system, you know, to store all
• 12:23
  your conversations and keep all of that stuff straight and be
• 12:26
  able to, you know, take some data and look for a trend and
• 12:29
  say, OK, well, you know, these, these people are having a
• 12:32
  problem with this. And now you've identified A
• 12:35
  trend, right? And you don't have to really do
• 12:37
  that within the confines of your own skull anymore.
• 12:40
  And it leads to better service I think.
• 12:44
  I would agree with that. And I also agree with the, you
• 12:48
  know, it's not the 9:00 to 5:00. You can't just disappear from
• 12:51
  your phone for the weekend or you can't.
• 12:54
  You know, it's just, I mean, you could, I think people still try
• 12:57
  to strive to do that. But you think about how far away
• 13:00
  you have to go from civilization to not have a cell phone at
• 13:04
  least as an option in your pocket.
• 13:06
  And then of course, you've got the satellite option or what
• 13:09
  have you, right? So.
• 13:10
  Yeah, there's no place to hide anymore.
• 13:11
  It just isn't. It's just not a thing.
• 13:13
  Can you? Imagine just leaving your phone
• 13:15
  behind for a weekend though. Like just leaving the phone at
• 13:18
  home. So I mean.
• 13:20
  It's funny you mention that because first of all, there are
• 13:24
  a lot of people who very consciously do exactly that and.
• 13:27
  Sure, I'm not one of them, but no.
• 13:31
  I've, I have, I have made strides.
• 13:33
  I will tell you I'm, I'm a phone addict for sure, like a lot of
• 13:36
  people just like me, you know, and if it's not, you know, if
• 13:40
  I'm not looking at LinkedIn, I'm looking at Reddit.
• 13:41
  If I'm not looking at Reddit, I'm looking at, you know, the
• 13:43
  news stories or what, or whatever it is, right?
• 13:45
  Like, you know, there's always this, this poll to doom to
• 13:49
  doomscroll and and you know, it's a thing, you know, I've
• 13:53
  been consciously making an effort to leave my phone in my
• 13:57
  car, like if I'm watching my kids soccer game or, or
• 14:01
  whatever. And yeah, you know what?
• 14:03
  It's it takes an effort, right? Because damn, these devices are
• 14:07
  so easy and we're all addicted to them, right?
• 14:11
  Like we're all just every, you know, like Pavlov's reaction,
• 14:15
  right? Like that thing buzzes or Dings
• 14:16
  and you're picking it up and like, drooling.
• 14:18
  You're right, it's. Time to eat, you know.
• 14:22
  Oh my God, absolutely. Oh, that's crazy.
• 14:25
  Yeah. I was thinking about some of the
• 14:26
  other tools that that are available now too, just outside
• 14:31
  of the AI and maybe to stick to this conversation a little bit
• 14:33
  back to kind of more of the pragmatic side of, of what we
• 14:37
  do. You know, the, the power tools
• 14:40
  and the battery operated world of, of, of equipment out there
• 14:45
  has so dramatically changed from the days.
• 14:49
  I mean, certainly I remember having like, you know, the 12
• 14:51
  Volt DeWalt and then, oh, you're, you're a big boy now.
• 14:54
  You got the 14.4 Volt DeWalt, you're ready to, you're ready to
• 14:58
  RIP through top plates with this drill and you're going to do all
• 15:01
  of this stuff. And I mean, now it's 48 Volt,
• 15:03
  now it's. Yeah, You know, I mean, your
• 15:07
  Milwaukee. Yeah, your Milwaukee ho Hog used
• 15:10
  to have to have, you know, a plug and power and now there's a
• 15:14
  cordless version of that thing that you could really do some
• 15:16
  damage with if you're you know that that blows my mind, right.
• 15:20
  Like I remember hauling a generator to a job site and
• 15:22
  stringing a cable throughout the job site to make sure I had
• 15:25
  reliable power to drill out, like you said, top plates with a
• 15:28
  ship auger and go through the entire place.
• 15:31
  And, you know, hopefully you had gas, right?
• 15:34
  Like now you're just you pop a battery and, you know, switch it
• 15:38
  in, switch it out. I I mean, I go as far back as
• 15:41
  the you remember the old I've been on Ting teal since the the
• 15:45
  one that you would load like a handgun.
• 15:47
  Remember that thing had a battery.
• 15:48
  Oh. Yeah, I was.
• 15:49
  I was a car stereo installer, so pop.
• 15:51
  That sucker in. That that was my era for sure.
• 15:54
  Like you, you started out with the Ryobi and then you got fully
• 15:57
  hazed by all of the guys in the store.
• 16:01
  They're like, oh, cool, what do you got Fisher Price there?
• 16:03
  Are you going to be playing in cars today or I can remember, I
• 16:08
  can remember the absolute shelling that I took the first,
• 16:14
  first real car stereo shop that I worked in.
• 16:17
  And I quickly realized that when the Snap On man came through, I
• 16:20
  was going to be. Hand over your check.
• 16:23
  Signing up for a line of credit with the snap on man.
• 16:25
  And let me get that. Let me get that badass Makita
• 16:29
  with the with the quick break on it.
• 16:31
  And you know, it'll be nice and light, but it'll be 12 Volt and
• 16:35
  you'll think you're fancy. And then of course smoke will
• 16:38
  roar out of it one day because. The magic smoke will be
• 16:41
  revealed. You have way overestimated the
• 16:46
  abilities of said power tool. But you know I have dress to.
• 16:50
  To, to tie all that together, I do, I remember one of the first
• 16:53
  days that I was on a job site doing a pre wire with, you know,
• 16:55
  I was, I was paired up with, with a more experienced guy and,
• 16:59
  and I showed up with my little Ryobi homeowner style drill and
• 17:04
  I'm like, I'm 19. I don't know any better, right?
• 17:06
  Like I've never, I've never been in this world.
• 17:08
  My tool pouch is brand new and you know, and yeah, just trying
• 17:14
  to, you know, busting that thing out and I mean, that guy must
• 17:16
  have laughed for an hour, right? Like when I put that auger bit
• 17:22
  in that thing just. Oh, just he's just like, oh, do
• 17:25
  you want to just leave the Chuck, like, hanging from the
• 17:28
  plate? That's not going to.
• 17:30
  That's not going to work, son. My God, Can you imagine?
• 17:34
  Just absolutely paper mache drill, just like coming apart
• 17:39
  just. Yeah, it just, I mean it, it
• 17:42
  would just blow apart, right. I didn't, I didn't get that far
• 17:44
  'cause obviously it was like, all right, well, you know, hey,
• 17:47
  all right kid, here's a here's a three quarter inch paddle bit.
• 17:50
  Give it a whirl with this first before, before we work on
• 17:53
  drilling top plates and beams. But you know, hey, and the
• 17:59
  lesson in that is, you know, make sure you guys are going out
• 18:02
  there prepared, right, Because nobody, nobody wants to show up
• 18:05
  and feel like, you know, they don't know what they're doing
• 18:08
  right If this is. Negotiation.
• 18:10
  I think it's fair to say that you know, there's room.
• 18:13
  You got to give grace to people that are just starting out.
• 18:15
  Of course, you don't have a job. You don't have the money to buy
• 18:18
  these tools. You don't have no, whatever it
• 18:21
  is, if you're, if you got a greenhorn, guess what?
• 18:23
  They're going to be green and you got to work your way around
• 18:26
  that through that and you got to make sure that they understand
• 18:28
  that there is a difference, you know, and this is where you suss
• 18:31
  them out. Good news.
• 18:32
  You only spent 300 bucks on that entire bag of drills and shit.
• 18:37
  You're not cut out for this. You're only, you're only like
• 18:39
  300 bucks down. You're only, you're only behind
• 18:41
  the 8 ball by a little bit here. But as opposed to the guy that
• 18:44
  shows up with a bunch of red batteries and he's in Milwaukee?
• 18:48
  He's ready to go. He's got the yeah, he's got the
• 18:51
  Milwaukee jacket that he saved up for with like Milwaukee
• 18:54
  points, you know, like, whatever, whatever the
• 18:56
  equivalent is, you know? His dad has the Marlboro Miles
• 18:59
  jacket that's. Exactly.
• 19:00
  It's the same kid. Right, it's.
• 19:02
  The same. It's the same kid with the
• 19:04
  Marlboro Fanny pack and the Marlboro leather jacket.
• 19:08
  Who's? Those are worth so much money
• 19:09
  now. Oh my God.
• 19:11
  Oh my God it's crazy dude. I used.
• 19:14
  To let me, let me sidetrack this whole thing again, walking home
• 19:17
  from walking home from the bus stop every day.
• 19:20
  I had AI had a real long walk from my bus stop because my
• 19:24
  parents thought private school was for me.
• 19:26
  So I had to, I had to walk far and you know, obviously along
• 19:29
  the side of, you know, major roads or whatever.
• 19:31
  And here's, you know, here's me 13 years old, picking up
• 19:36
  Marlboro packs, ripping the miles off of the thing, throwing
• 19:38
  the trash back on the street and saving, saving all of those
• 19:42
  things. I was I was the coolest 14 year
• 19:45
  old in my school with my Marlboro Zippo.
• 19:48
  Like, man, you don't. You don't think that that was
• 19:50
  intentional? I mean, come on, dude, RJ
• 19:54
  results. Come on to these guys.
• 19:57
  Absolutely, dude. Absolute scumbags, but hey, you
• 20:01
  know I I digress. I will say though, you know,
• 20:04
  that is, yeah, that was for sure scumbaggery.
• 20:07
  For sure. The scumbaggery in the modern
• 20:10
  times is a lot more subtle and a lot more slick, and it's.
• 20:13
  Called Pokémon cards and. It's it's that and get kids
• 20:17
  addicted to Instagram and comparing themselves to, you
• 20:20
  know, body dysmorphia and all this other stuff.
• 20:22
  But we've, we've truly evolved as a species in, in ways that
• 20:27
  we're able to fuck over our, our children and, and fellow men,
• 20:30
  right? Well, I mean, looking back at
• 20:34
  it, I mean, let's just say, you know, what is it?
• 20:39
  Tobacco Cash. Seems kind of quaint.
• 20:42
  Tobacco tobacco currency see tobacco currency is something
• 20:47
  that they have in jail and we're.
• 20:49
  Oh, whoa, whoa, whoa, right. We're not, yeah, no, we're not
• 20:53
  going to be passing anybody around for a cigarette.
• 20:55
  Yeah, 1 Lucy per hole. But it's, it's, it's, you know,
• 21:01
  hey, that's, hey, we've evolved as a society, right?
• 21:05
  Like obviously those companies have paid their dues.
• 21:07
  We've devolved, I think is the right word.
• 21:10
  I think we've devolved outside, outside we've.
• 21:12
  Definitely devolved this conversation into.
• 21:15
  We definitely have. Barbara Miles steered away.
• 21:17
  Sorry. I was just thinking too though,
• 21:21
  like outside of the, the tools that we talked about, obviously
• 21:25
  you know, we've got the new stuff with, with AI and then
• 21:28
  you've got like your hard physical tools, you know, your
• 21:30
  Klein's and your wire strippers and your drills and all that
• 21:35
  stuff, you know. We're a screwdrivers and what
• 21:38
  not. Yeah, you got it.
• 21:39
  I mean, there's like, there's such AI don't know.
• 21:42
  There's such a weird aesthetic to all of that, such a weird
• 21:44
  like hierarchy where people are like checking each other out.
• 21:47
  Like oh guys got those shitty Stanley screwdrivers.
• 21:50
  What a dork. There's there.
• 21:52
  Is there is an instant judgment when you see, when you see
• 21:56
  somebody roll in with some Harbor Freight, you know, wire
• 21:59
  stripper, it's like, OK, that'll work.
• 22:03
  Sure. Yeah.
• 22:04
  Why don't you borrow my clients? Thanks.
• 22:07
  Harbor Freight wasn't even a deep wasn't even a thing when I
• 22:10
  was an integrator. When I think about that, like
• 22:11
  the cheap tool store was like a swap meet or like a flea market
• 22:15
  or something, right? Like there was no I.
• 22:16
  Got this from my grandfather's workbench, right?
• 22:20
  For sure, yeah. Absolutely.
• 22:22
  You had that one red and yellow Craftsman stubby screwdriver
• 22:26
  that everybody had from, you know, from the Craftsman kit
• 22:30
  that they got for Christmas. But you know, outside of those
• 22:33
  tools, you know, think about some of the other things that
• 22:36
  are out now. Now we've got, you were showing
• 22:38
  the label maker. I think that's a pretty critical
• 22:40
  one for anybody that's doing infrastructure.
• 22:43
  You've got validators and Wi-Fi testers and all of these
• 22:47
  handheld devices that just were not even maybe not even a
• 22:52
  thought in anybody's mind, but talk about what your tool kit
• 22:56
  needs to look like now as an integrator.
• 22:57
  Like what? What is it?
• 22:59
  I mean, are you are, do you have an RTA somewhere?
• 23:03
  Do you have you know, are you, are you running around with a
• 23:06
  microphone for, for Dirac? Are you, you know, do you have a
• 23:11
  like, you know, again, validator, field tester, you
• 23:14
  know, some of the handheld devices out there for making
• 23:16
  sure that you've got, you know, a Wi-Fi map that works in the
• 23:19
  house, like. Sure, sure.
• 23:21
  It you know, I mean the list goes on and on.
• 23:23
  Even even going towards, you know, borescope cameras, right,
• 23:27
  like a lot of you know, I started carrying one of those
• 23:29
  around on my van, you know, at the very end, right, but like a
• 23:32
  tiny camera that connects to an app on your phone that you can
• 23:35
  send into a, you know, into a, into a pilot hole in a wall to
• 23:40
  see what's going on like that's is there a.
• 23:42
  Fire break in here that's. What I mean right?
• 23:44
  Like is there 2? Fire breaks in here.
• 23:46
  Fuck. OK, first fire break.
• 23:49
  Let me get the diverse a bit. I'll feed that in.
• 23:51
  Let's see where this goes. And and the second one.
• 23:55
  Oh no. Well, yeah, I mean, and even
• 23:57
  knowing again, I think this maybe there's a long ways to
• 24:02
  look, you know, to look at this. But I think even knowing that
• 24:05
  those are tools that you need to have, you know, for for somebody
• 24:09
  that's uninitiated that comes into this thing and goes, OK,
• 24:12
  well, I'm a technology integrator now.
• 24:15
  Now what? You know, like.
• 24:16
  The, the good, you know, I, I would say that, you know, the,
• 24:20
  the, the good plan that I've seen is that, you know, when
• 24:22
  you're, when you're bringing somebody on board and they're an
• 24:25
  entry level position, right? Like they're coming in with the
• 24:27
  expectation they're like, all right, you're going to be a
• 24:28
  helper for a little while. You're going to help this guy
• 24:30
  help that guy. Here's a list of things that you
• 24:34
  need, right? Like this needs to be in your
• 24:36
  personal tool collection. We will provide, you know, we'll
• 24:40
  provide the big stuff. We'll provide the Sawzall, we'll
• 24:42
  provide, you know, the, the, you know, the, the upgraded land
• 24:46
  tester, like whatever. You know, you shouldn't be
• 24:48
  expected to own that stuff on your own that the business
• 24:50
  should own that. That's a capital investment.
• 24:52
  Like totally get that. But, you know, hand tools and
• 24:55
  that kind of thing, you need a good screwdriver, you know, you
• 24:58
  need to get like 9 and one right?
• 25:00
  Like you need a good stubby, you need, you know, all the diagonal
• 25:04
  cutters and strippers and that kind of thing.
• 25:05
  Like, yeah, the, the good, you know, it seems like the good
• 25:08
  plan is you give a list and, you know, maybe make some
• 25:11
  recommendations or whatever. Like say, hey, listen, you're
• 25:14
  going to spend, you're going to drop some money on this, but
• 25:16
  this is whatever, you know, Or when you hire somebody, you give
• 25:19
  them their first set, right? Like that's how you eliminate,
• 25:22
  you know, maybe, you know, maybe you eliminate some of those
• 25:24
  variables by, OK, here's, you know, here's whatever you pick
• 25:29
  out, whatever, you know, whatever backpack or whatever
• 25:32
  tool bag or whatever works for you.
• 25:34
  But here's the stuff you're starting out at.
• 25:37
  Here's your, you know, welcome to the team.
• 25:39
  Here's your, you know, here's your basic stuff that you're
• 25:42
  going to need. And you know what, the right
• 25:43
  candidate or the right, you know, the right person who's
• 25:46
  really into this stuff, they'll get wrapped around the axle on,
• 25:51
  on having better stuff. They'll get excited about it.
• 25:54
  They'll say, all right, you know what, this one, this one served
• 25:56
  me well for the first two years. I need to, I need to move up or
• 26:00
  I need this or whatever. And you know, that's a good way
• 26:03
  to scope the right candidate. You know, like, let's see that
• 26:06
  enthusiasm. That's a great, that's a great
• 26:09
  way to put an attitude. You know, it's funny, I was, I
• 26:12
  was recently in Nashville for my new, for my new role.
• 26:15
  And one of the partners that we have there is, is Lincoln Tech
• 26:19
  and I got a chance to have a conversation with the people at
• 26:22
  Lincoln Tech. And you know, I'll have to say
• 26:25
  this kind of initially, I would have dismissed that kind of
• 26:28
  offhandedly just because it's like, well, how could this
• 26:32
  national education organization be really aligned with what our
• 26:38
  industry needs, right? And then you look at the Lincoln
• 26:41
  Tech site and it's like, oh, hang on a second.
• 26:44
  The the for for my, for my tuition, I'm going to leave
• 26:49
  there in, you know, 13 months or 18 months or whatever it is.
• 26:53
  I'm going to have a bunch of hands on experience.
• 26:56
  I'm actually going to leave with the tool kit, which I didn't
• 26:59
  realize, but that's one of the things that that is part of the
• 27:01
  tuition is that hey, now you're actually getting a tool kit with
• 27:06
  not, you know, with not right Harbor freight level gear in it
• 27:11
  like you're no. It's good stuff.
• 27:13
  Manufacturer sponsored. Sure.
• 27:15
  Absolutely. So you're going to have your,
• 27:17
  your, your wet appetite wet for these key brands of tools that
• 27:22
  are quality materials. You're going to have some
• 27:24
  experience, you're going to know what a top plate is.
• 27:27
  You're going to know kind of, you know, the infrastructure of,
• 27:30
  of the way the home is built. If you're doing like electrical
• 27:33
  or low voltage. I mean, they actually have
• 27:36
  curriculums, you know, around technology integrator.
• 27:39
  And it's like, do you decide is it, am I an IT professional or
• 27:43
  am I see. That's so great to hear.
• 27:47
  Dude, amazing. I'm, I'm so happy to hear that
• 27:49
  because that is, you know, that the trend here is like, man, I
• 27:53
  mean, try and get a programmer job now, right?
• 27:55
  Like they, they really beat into people our age, like go to
• 27:59
  school for computer science, learn how to program, learn how
• 28:01
  to code, learn how to code. Well, OK, if everybody's doing
• 28:04
  that, then, you know, wages are suppressed.
• 28:07
  It's slim Pickens, But for what it's worth, you're always going
• 28:10
  to need a plumber. You're always going to need an
• 28:12
  electrician, you're always going to need somebody who can do
• 28:15
  communications stuff, right? Like who knows network switches.
• 28:19
  And, and this is, I mean, it's really, I, I mean, I am so
• 28:24
  impressed that you know that, that the pro source is doing
• 28:27
  that with them and, you know, super impressed.
• 28:29
  I mean, Lincoln tech, I remember watching the commercials when I
• 28:31
  was a little kid for Lincoln Tech and it was all like auto
• 28:34
  repair and HVAC. Oh.
• 28:35
  My God dude, I wanted to go and and do a lot of bondo the way to
• 28:42
  get in there and sand. Yeah, your your tool set when
• 28:46
  you leave there for auto body is whatever bondo you can smuggle
• 28:49
  out under your fingernails and in your nostrils.
• 28:52
  Oh my God, it's it's it's really, it's good to see.
• 28:55
  First of all, that Lincoln tech is still around and and second
• 28:57
  of all, that they still do the thing, you know, with the tools,
• 29:00
  right? Like you're paying to get into
• 29:02
  this place and you're learning what you use and, and doing it.
• 29:05
  We need as an industry, we need a pipeline, right?
• 29:08
  We need people pumping out. You're not going to find a right
• 29:11
  candidate most of the time for an entry level thing on
• 29:14
  Craigslist or indeed or wherever, because people don't
• 29:17
  know that we exist, right? So if you've got this curriculum
• 29:20
  where you know, maybe you've got, I've told the story so many
• 29:23
  times, You know, my partner and I back east, we were looking
• 29:26
  for, we needed to expand. We needed people.
• 29:28
  We need some, you know, entry level folks.
• 29:30
  So we went to our local county run vocational school and we
• 29:34
  talked to the person who, you know, ran the electrical program
• 29:37
  and we said, hey, you know, you guys don't really have a low
• 29:40
  voltage or, or telecommunications track.
• 29:43
  Can you, you know, can you do us a favor and maybe, you know,
• 29:46
  maybe refer some students who might not want to get
• 29:49
  electrocuted for a living. Maybe they want to hang ATV
• 29:52
  instead, or maybe they want to do network work or whatever.
• 29:53
  Like, and we started getting in leads from, you know, this guy
• 29:57
  who ran a program like, hey, this person might be interested,
• 29:59
  you know, you might want to talk to him.
• 30:01
  And like that, I mean, that saved our asses.
• 30:04
  We were able to bring in, you know, the right people and
• 30:07
  interview the right people and, and move them up.
• 30:09
  And the fact that you can identify potential candidates
• 30:14
  from some kid who might be in Lincoln Tech for electrical and
• 30:19
  might not even know that that other path exists.
• 30:22
  That's hey, you know, that's the biggest thing too.
• 30:24
  And with campuses around the country and that kind of stuff.
• 30:27
  Again, I, I knew what Lincoln tech was, at least I kind of
• 30:30
  thought I did. But when I actually dealt, you
• 30:34
  know, did a little bit of a deeper dive into it and it's
• 30:36
  like, Oh, well, like, yes, there's automotive, yes, there's
• 30:39
  HVAC, there's those mechanical options, but to have the new
• 30:43
  home construction and to have electrician and to have those
• 30:47
  other, you know, disciplines as part of that capability.
• 30:51
  And again, to be able to roll up to your local.
• 30:55
  I mean, there, there, there's campuses all over the entire
• 30:58
  country to be able to roll in there and be like, Hey, I'm Joe
• 31:02
  so and so and I'm, you know, I'm hiring for this.
• 31:07
  And to I think that like there's like there's going to be a bunch
• 31:12
  of people scurrying around trying to Curry the right people
• 31:15
  to get in front of you for that opportunity.
• 31:17
  And I mean, you don't roll out of the door at Lincoln Tech with
• 31:20
  anything other than like that. You know, that certification
• 31:23
  that you, you've passed their curriculum, but you made the
• 31:27
  investment in and it's not, I mean, it's, it's not college
• 31:31
  level investment, but it's certainly not, you know, free.
• 31:34
  You know, you got to, you know, you got 10s of thousands of
• 31:37
  dollars tied up in your education.
• 31:38
  You're going to want to look to, to recoup that as quickly as
• 31:41
  possible and to have that, to have that kind of similar
• 31:46
  mindset with, hey, there's somebody here that needs to pay
• 31:49
  this money back and needs to get back on the horse.
• 31:52
  Or maybe, you know, mom and dad paid for their college or
• 31:55
  whatever, but they're, they're ready to get out there and start
• 31:57
  earning at a, at a higher level and performing at a higher
• 32:00
  level. Certainly like I, I can't
• 32:02
  imagine a better fit than, than something like that for, for
• 32:06
  people that are looking for, for talent outside the industry.
• 32:08
  Because you and I both kind of represent the, the graying, the
• 32:14
  graying nation of our, of our industry.
• 32:18
  And to know that there's younger people out there that want to
• 32:21
  come into it or maybe need to be shown that, you know, luxury
• 32:25
  home building, custom home building is still a viable
• 32:28
  opportunity for them to provide for themselves and for their
• 32:30
  families. It's exciting to have that kind
• 32:34
  of backstop and that you know where, where do these people
• 32:38
  come from? Well, a lot of them might come
• 32:39
  from Lincoln Tech or Wilotech or some similar technical school.
• 32:42
  Yeah, And, you know, and, and it goes back to, and this is a
• 32:45
  deeper conversation, like college isn't for everybody,
• 32:47
  right? Like college really wasn't for
• 32:49
  me, you know, it just wasn't my thing.
• 32:51
  You know, I, I thought I could, stupid me, didn't really have a,
• 32:55
  a guiding force back then, you know, thought I could make more
• 32:58
  money delivering pizza than I could with a college education.
• 33:01
  And here I am, you know, how'd that work out?
• 33:05
  You know, on and off, it's good and bad.
• 33:09
  But sure, really, if, if anything, it's it's, it's made
• 33:13
  me drive my children into, you know, more serious academic
• 33:17
  pursuits. If anything else, sure.
• 33:19
  I would say the same for me as well.
• 33:21
  I was a bit of a leaf on the wind and yes, I did go to school
• 33:24
  and yes, I did get a degree. But to say that you have to
• 33:28
  squint a little bit to see the correlation between television
• 33:34
  and video production to what I do now.
• 33:36
  Sure. But you know that there is a
• 33:38
  there is a through line there, I guess at some point along the
• 33:41
  way. Well.
• 33:41
  And, and with, you know, somebody who's, you know, a kid
• 33:44
  who's in this program and I, and I say kid, I know that they take
• 33:46
  adults too, but the shorthand is, you know, it's a, it's a kid
• 33:48
  starting out their journey, you know, in, in, in a trade school
• 33:52
  or in a vocational school. You know, that's a real good way
• 33:55
  to figure out if they're going to be at this in, you know, for
• 33:59
  the long haul, right? Like you spend 2 years doing
• 34:01
  this stuff in a trade school, you're pretty committed to
• 34:05
  sticking with it. You're probably not going to,
• 34:06
  you know, leave that trade school and then just, you know,
• 34:10
  work for somebody for six months and move on, right?
• 34:13
  Like, you're probably going to stick with it and at least, you
• 34:15
  know, stay in, you know, stay in the field and keep chugging.
• 34:20
  So again, yeah, invaluable and did not mean for this to turn
• 34:23
  into a commercial for Lincoln Tech, but.
• 34:25
  I am I'm. So impressed it's really, really
• 34:29
  a great thing, you know, and if you're an integrator, man, reach
• 34:32
  out to your local Lincoln Tech because that is a great source
• 34:34
  of, you know, I know DeVry is that like there's there's quite
• 34:37
  a few, right? Lincoln Tech does this, ITT does
• 34:39
  this, you know, but Lincoln Tech really seems to be the one who
• 34:42
  has zeroed in on this kind of curriculum that we're just
• 34:47
  specifically talking about. And, you know, it's a great
• 34:50
  source, man. It's the, it's the greatest
• 34:52
  problem in this industry right now is getting new people into
• 34:58
  it to sustain it and keep it going and moving forward, right?
• 35:01
  Like we don't want to be. We talked about Idiocracy.
• 35:03
  It's the beginning of the show and in buildings.
• 35:05
  Over the rope. Yeah, in in reference to AI,
• 35:08
  right. And like we're going to get to
• 35:10
  the point where the people who built this stuff are long gone.
• 35:14
  And if we don't have the crowd coming up behind it, who knows
• 35:18
  how to, you know, fix it, maintain it and improve it,
• 35:22
  that's going to be, you know, that that's we're, we're going
• 35:27
  to be in deep shit. That's basically what I'm trying
• 35:29
  to tell you. The, the training ground that
• 35:31
  was 12 Volt and custom car audio is definitely shrunk, right?
• 35:34
  Because all that stuff is, is slapped together.
• 35:38
  I mean, shit like now there's a harness for everything.
• 35:40
  Now there's a a module and you just got to talk to it with a
• 35:43
  computer. And yeah, I mean, you got to
• 35:45
  take the car apart and put it back together and do that kind
• 35:47
  of stuff. But the, the creative thinking
• 35:50
  and the how do I get from here to there through this thing?
• 35:53
  Just the improv skills, right? Like what?
• 35:56
  What? To do when it doesn't go your
• 35:57
  way, you know exactly these are. Critical this is.
• 36:01
  This is not gone to plan. What do I do now?
• 36:05
  That's kind of how I, I, you know, I kind of position that in
• 36:08
  my brain. But it's exciting to think
• 36:10
  about, you know, younger people coming up in the industry.
• 36:14
  It's also exciting to think about again, having the right
• 36:19
  tools for the job. What a great way to have an
• 36:22
  education that really susses out a person's skill set.
• 36:27
  And they've done some personality testing on and
• 36:30
  they've observed in the field, right.
• 36:32
  If you're getting, you're getting input from somebody's an
• 36:36
  instructor or Oh yeah, you know, we saw, you know, we saw Sally
• 36:40
  out on the on the job site. Nobody gave her the time of day,
• 36:42
  but she drills top plates and, and hangs mud rings faster than
• 36:46
  anybody in here. And they're always level and
• 36:48
  they're always in line with the other outlets.
• 36:51
  I mean, you can think of 25 different things that would, you
• 36:54
  know, kind of suss all the the the factors out for the for your
• 36:59
  for your new hire. But you know, again, I think
• 37:02
  when we talk about the right tools for the job, people would
• 37:06
  be. Biggest one.
• 37:07
  Right, right at the top of that list, right.
• 37:09
  Doesn't matter what's in the tool kit, doesn't matter what's
• 37:11
  in the on the computer or any of that other stuff.
• 37:14
  If you get some shithead that doesn't know anything about it,
• 37:16
  or they're just they're bidding their time or they're they're
• 37:20
  schmoozing you or what, you know, think of all of the things
• 37:22
  that have happened to business owners out there, you know, Oh
• 37:25
  yeah, I've got all these skills and they show up and they don't
• 37:27
  know anything. Oh, happens far too often dude.
• 37:31
  Oh. My God, my my girlfriend applied
• 37:33
  for this job for me and I didn't think I was going to get it, but
• 37:36
  I got it. So like who you interviewed for
• 37:38
  this job and you got it, but she applied for it, you know, like
• 37:41
  whatever that looks like, but. You didn't want it.
• 37:43
  Like, oh, wow, that's the greatest thing to hear as a
• 37:46
  business owner is like, oh, you don't want to be here.
• 37:48
  Great. I feel so great about signing
• 37:50
  new checks, Sir. Yeah, exactly.
• 37:52
  So yeah, I just, I think about, you know, the right tool for the
• 37:55
  job. I think we've we've determined
• 37:57
  on this podcast the right tool for the job is first of all,
• 38:00
  starting with the right people. It's always people, always
• 38:02
  people all comes back to people, which is a great place to leave.
• 38:05
  This is we, we started at artificial people, artificial
• 38:08
  assistance and we're, you know, got right into meet space and
• 38:13
  and true meet people. So, so as as always, you know,
• 38:19
  yeah, we didn't. We didn't really stick to the
• 38:21
  topic, but hey. We pretty meandered the right
• 38:24
  tools for the job, you know. That's how we.
• 38:27
  We're a couple of tools, just two.
• 38:28
  Genuine tools, idiots coming up, coming up.
• 38:32
  Agreed. Shit to talk about every week
• 38:34
  and if you like our show, I don't know why you would, but
• 38:38
  please by all means subscribe to us on Apple podcast forgot to us
• 38:42
  on Spotify wherever you listen. There's a mechanism to do that
• 38:45
  it helps with our metrics and it helps make sure that you get the
• 38:48
  the latest episode of this horseshit.
• 38:51
  You know right as it posts and. This.
• 38:53
  Not this podcast, not this episode.
• 38:55
  No, this. This was banger.
• 38:56
  Yeah. Absolutely.
• 38:58
  There's, there's many. I mean we've done so many.
• 38:59
  There are many certified bangers.
• 39:01
  Check out our back catalog. It exists.
• 39:05
  Yeah, you can. You can fall asleep every night
• 39:07
  listening to my voice or your voice or Sean Sorensen's voice.
• 39:11
  Occasionally the. ASMR tones of sometimes.
• 39:14
  Sean Sorensen. Yes, for sure.
• 39:16
  Hey, everybody. Yeah, drop us a drop us a line
• 39:21
  on Instagram at Inside Integration.
• 39:23
  Hit us up with an e-mail to inside.integration@gmail.com.
• 39:26
  And thanks as always for joining us, folks.
• 39:30
  Take care everybody. Bye bye.