Latest / Learnings and Missteps by Depth Builder / The Goal Calabosession #2
Transcript
- 0:00, I get spare time to talk about the goal.
- 0:04And again, I'm not an expert, but I really, I really enjoy this book.
- 0:08It made, it certainly made some changes because I, I, I tried some experiments out.
- 0:14I had a whole lot of support and encouragement.
- 0:17Like it was good.
- 0:19But and like the, we were explaining last time, like the timing was right in my life.
- 0:23So like a bunch of stars align.
- 0:25So that's a, that's kind of a point.
- 0:27This is fun one because we get you're, we're doing it together.
- 0:31Right.
- 0:32You're have the courage to come out and record this thing.
- 0:35The idea was planted months and months and months ago.
- 0:38And, and it's actually finally happening everybody.
- 0:42I was looking at my emails.
- 0:43I'm like, man, I remember saying that we were gonna get started in my head January or February.
- 0:48We're gonna start recording and then like life was happening and here we are June and I'm like, okay, maybe a little off base, but again, like just the tenacity to continue doing it.
- 1:01But you know, something you said.
- 1:03That I, we often forget, I've forgotten many times and I've seen other like lean Francos or, you know, continuous improvement, minded people get frustrated.
- 1:13You said that when, like, when you read, when the goal came into your life, you were ready.
- 1:18It was the right time and you soaked it in and trans, you know, changed your trajectory.
- 1:25Same thing for me, when, when I got introduced to like the last planner system, I was ready for it.
- 1:30And so I was like, okay, I'm tired and sick and tired of whatever I've been dealing with.
- 1:35There's gotta be a better way.
- 1:36Boom.
- 1:36That's what we're gonna do.
- 1:37But when I go and introduce it to somebody else and they're like, eh, you know, hesitant or just straight up, don't want to do anything with it.
- 1:46I judge 'em right.
- 1:48I'm like, oh, you're just a red hat.
- 1:50You're just a blocker.
- 1:51Oh yes.
- 1:52Instead of saying, Hmm, how did I respond when I first got introduced to it?
- 1:58What's going on?
- 1:59This is the second installment, the second issue, the second recording with Mr.
- 2:04Thomas Lame on our collab O session over the goal.
- 2:09So far, the feedback on the first one has been amazing, and I kind of knew like, yeah, it's long.
- 2:14This one's almost as long, But it's so packed with his stories of how he applied, what he was learning, like in the moment.
- 2:25He makes references to his journal that he was keeping as he was going along, building this project in San Francisco and jotting down what he was taking away.
- 2:34His obs personal observations and the little experiments he was running on site.
- 2:38It weren't very little.
- 2:39They were actually pretty darn huge.
- 2:42I'm feeling like that little journal's gonna be worth some money at some point in the future.
- 2:47Hopefully he'll leave it to me or the LnM Family.
- 2:50He'll leave it to us in his will at some point.
- 2:53Anyhow.
- 2:53Another super cool thing like have you ever been in a situation where people are kind of dropping hints or doing something pretty awesome and you just kind of miss it?
- 3:02Well, that was me.
- 3:04Like the whole time Thomas has given shoutouts to the nobs tribe.
- 3:08Steve Martin, Jennifer Lacey, uh, Adam Hos the rest of the crew, and he keeps plugging like this book.
- 3:16There's this book out there, known as Lean In Love, and he keeps referencing it.
- 3:21It didn't occur to me in the moment, but going back and editing, I'm like, Man, this dude's just like.
- 3:26Just the kind of people you wanna be around.
- 3:28So if you haven't caught the first one, go back by now.
- 3:33The, the YouTube version, the videos, you can see our bright shining smiling faces will be available.
- 3:41So go check that out if you wanna see that.
- 3:43We got a whole bunch of clips that we've been posting on all the socials, just outtakes of some of his wisdom, some of my goofiness.
- 3:50Uh, we deeply appreciate the support.
- 3:52And speaking of support, we're gonna give a shout out to all our patrons who have been faithful in their contributions.
- 4:00And if you're interested in being a patron and contributing.
- 4:03To the effort of enhancing the image of careers and the trades, you can go to the learnings and missteps.com.
- 4:10Uh, click on the Become a Member, Click, click, click and choose the way you'd like to contribute.
- 4:15Also, any likes, any comments you make on, on the post that we have out there on the LinkedIn or the, or the Dick Talk, or the Facebook, whatever, those all help too.
- 4:26We are extremely grateful for all of the support, all of the encouragement, all of the takeaways, all of the things that you're doing with the knowledge that you get from these interviews.
- 4:37Uh, paying it forward and making things better for people out there in the world is exactly what we're looking for.
- 4:43And here we go a little bit more of Mr.
- 4:46Thomas.
- 4:46Lame.
- 4:47It ain't over because there's several more sessions to come.
- 4:55I rejected it also.
- 4:57And it was when I was ready that it all actually started clicking and coming together.
- 5:01If you go to.
- 5:03Judgment.
- 5:04You always go to control.
- 5:05So if you put label somebody, a hat, give them a hat, come in.
- 5:08you've already judged them.
- 5:10And it's hard to do.
- 5:11I'm not saying don't do that.
- 5:12Actually.
- 5:12I let's stop.
- 5:14Let's stop judging people, meet people exactly where they are.
- 5:17That's it.
- 5:18That's.
- 5:18So I wanna talk about that if you, if you care to be vulnerable.
- 5:22Absolutely.
- 5:24We're gonna talk about fear.
- 5:25Cool.
- 5:26Yeah, and it's there's a lot to be afraid of.
- 5:29Mm-hmm especially right now, there is a lot to be the afraid of fear is one of the most powerful emotions.
- 5:37It has a strong effect on your mind in your body.
- 5:41And as we developed as human beings, fear was one of those instincts that we had to have.
- 5:47We had to have very quick thinking, understanding of that's a save two tiger.
- 5:54I can see it in the dark, or maybe I can only hear it, but I know what it is.
- 5:58I'm free of that.
- 5:59Cuz we wanna preserve ourself.
- 6:02We wanna preserve and continue doing the stuff that we get to do.
- 6:05Like yeah, that's it.
- 6:07And right now it's, it's also a heck of a time to be alive.
- 6:11Absolutely.
- 6:11Oh man, all this stuff that we have, like.
- 6:14I have robots at work that's stuff we do with, with technology.
- 6:17It's just, I get out bed and I'm like, oh, what's up?
- 6:19What's new.
- 6:20So for me, when I was reading this book, I struggled with anxiety.
- 6:25Oh, I wanna talk about anxiety because it's a type of fear.
- 6:28And the, the word anxiety tends to describe worry, cuz you're worried about something or like, like you have a job interview where you have to have you're in like a competition or like, but you, before you do it, it's like it's the right before.
- 6:44And you're like, for me, I get like, I get a weight weightness, like heaviness.
- 6:49Right, right.
- 6:50And center of my, center of my mass because mm-hmm, I know I do it now because I I've studied it.
- 6:56And I've been studied by medical professionals, but I shorten my breath.
- 7:00I hold my breath.
- 7:01I literally hold my breath.
- 7:02When I'm anxious, I will hold my breath.
- 7:05and when I hold my breath, that's because I'm being anxious.
- 7:07The problem with anxiety is you feel that about almost anything you feel uncomfortable about things that aren't, they're not threats.
- 7:17Okay.
- 7:17Or so your, my mind just wanders it just wanders.
- 7:22What's what is your.
- 7:23Like feeling cause like we all, it's all different for every, every one of us.
- 7:27Let's different for everyone.
- 7:28My me, I hold my brain.
- 7:30I do.
- 7:30I literally hold my breath enough.
- 7:31I hold my breath.
- 7:32I will pass out.
- 7:34Cause you don't get enough oxygen to your brain.
- 7:36So in a panic attack for me, I will literally like brown out and it's, it's not good.
- 7:41That's, that's not good for being healthy.
- 7:43It's Browning out is also like as a medical event, like it's an acute medical event that you need seek up for.
- 7:50So I did thankfully.
- 7:53But how about you?
- 7:54You know, so I wanna say maybe the last six to eight years-ish my response is to like, let's go, let's do this.
- 8:06So when I feel that that challenge or that, that situation that gets me uncomfortable and like questioning like, oh, my response is like, oh, well, let's go do that.
- 8:16Like, let's just jump in.
- 8:18Let's just do it now that hasn't always been my response.
- 8:24I re like before six to eight years ago, My response was run like depart leave, sever connection, get the hell out of there.
- 8:33And that's exactly what I would do when I started seeing different signals.
- 8:37I would, okay.
- 8:38Boom, gotta go.
- 8:39Gotta get outta here.
- 8:40Got like, I'm not dealing with this.
- 8:42But there's a couple of things like there, there, I used to get like the anxi, like the overthinking, the anxiety thing again, that's another thing.
- 8:51Like I start, it's like, I'm, I'm running a gazillion scenarios.
- 8:55Cause I still do it trying to figure out what the other person might say or might prefer or might not like.
- 9:02And the reality is the only way to find out is by giving them the damn thing.
- 9:08So stop wasting time and just jump into it and hand it over.
- 9:12And then they'll inform me of what I need to fix or what they like about it.
- 9:17So, but that's, that's over practice and like I do it over and over and over again.
- 9:21And I get a lot of flack for like, man, you're not gonna like, no, I'm not like, I don't know what they want.
- 9:26What they told me, this is what this, the request they made.
- 9:29I got some clarification.
- 9:30This is my understanding of the request.
- 9:33They may not like it, but I'm gonna give it to them so they could tell me what they don't like.
- 9:37Like I can't read their mind.
- 9:39yeah.
- 9:40Yeah.
- 9:41And that's helped me.
- 9:42That that's one of the things that, that helped me take the leap and going into business for myself.
- 9:49Right.
- 9:49Because like it's working, , that's worked in my career at my job.
- 9:55You know, the one biggest fear that I have that I wrestle with on the regular is my fear is leading people astray, like leading people down a path that doesn't serve them.
- 10:08Wow.
- 10:09Okay.
- 10:10Yeah.
- 10:10That's my big, because I've done that in my past.
- 10:13Right?
- 10:13Like I've introduced people to what's the word addictive things.
- 10:18And so it ruined their lives and I was responsible for that.
- 10:22And, and now the way I function or since then, the way I function, I have a lot of responsibility and autonomy to make recommendations and just take like you decide Jesse just lead it.
- 10:38And so there's this weird, weird fear because I don't, most of the things I'm doing, I've never done 'em before.
- 10:44And I don't know that they're going to work or maybe I don't know exactly how to make it work.
- 10:50And so what if I lead people off a cliff, that's a real, that's like a, my daily check when I'm doing my afternoon inventory and reflection.
- 11:00Like did I serve appropriately?
- 11:02Where did I lead people astray?
- 11:04And what can I do to avoid that or correct that tomorrow?
- 11:07Because it, I it's, again, it's such a fear that I have.
- 11:10Dang.
- 11:11That's thank you for sharing.
- 11:12Yeah, man.
- 11:13so for, for me, and this is my, this is my method.
- 11:18Okay.
- 11:19This is my method.
- 11:19So for anxiety and you said it action, very anxious about something.
- 11:24Take action.
- 11:25So we're gonna talk about action versus just moving around in the coming chapters.
- 11:31Oh, I love it.
- 11:32Yes.
- 11:33So there's a, there's a, there's a, there's a, the Ridge, you gotta walk down when you talk act.
- 11:38Right.
- 11:39But if you're anxious about something and we're talking about fear, so we like label, why, why no red hats?
- 11:45Like, why don't they ever do this stuff?
- 11:46Like, this is an amazing met system.
- 11:49It's because they're afraid.
- 11:51Right.
- 11:51And if you make fun of them or judge them, it's like, boom.
- 11:54Oh, you're done now.
- 11:56Now you're, you're making me afraid and you're making fun of me and you're judging me.
- 12:00Like, I'm gonna, I'm already I'm off.
- 12:02I'm turned it off.
- 12:03Yes.
- 12:03So, and for men, like, we don't wanna be afraid.
- 12:07So we'll, we'll put up an armor.
- 12:09So for, for me, I can counter anxiety with action.
- 12:12Read stuff I can study.
- 12:14Like if you're on a project, there's a stack of drawings that tall look at 'em right.
- 12:21see if they match or, or do overlays or do so.
- 12:24Like you can, you can, you can counter anxiety through action and action.
- 12:29There's there's there's some steps.
- 12:32Yep.
- 12:32With action.
- 12:33We're gonna talk about that.
- 12:34And the other and fear, fear is harder because fear is, is threat threat level, right?
- 12:39Yes.
- 12:39So fear for me, this is only me.
- 12:42I can overcome fear.
- 12:44Most fear, not like direct threat.
- 12:47I have to run away problem, but for fear I have to, I can overcome it with focus.
- 12:52Ooh.
- 12:53Okay.
- 12:53So I can, I can, I can, I can control my breath.
- 12:56I can control my physical state, like where I'm sitting or standing most of the time, unless I'm like in an airplane, we're gonna talk about why anxiety airplanes.
- 13:06Because the reason why I have anxiety and airplanes, cuz I can't control my physical state.
- 13:11I'm out of, I'm out of my control.
- 13:12Right?
- 13:13I'm bound by laws and doors and people in front of me.
- 13:16Yes, yes, yes.
- 13:18But I can focus when that, in that moment I can focus on my breath.
- 13:21I can control breath.
- 13:23So my control for fear is, is, can be overcome.
- 13:29Focus.
- 13:29Nice.
- 13:30So we're afraid of things on our job sites.
- 13:35We're gonna talk about constraints.
- 13:37Yeah.
- 13:37Exploiting constraints, and then you can't make, you can't be afraid of those things.
- 13:42Like yes, we live in a, a very funky time with the supply chain.
- 13:46Yes.
- 13:46You can't just, we can't just report the news, but we can have conversations all the way, all the way up to the supply chain.
- 13:55It's harder.
- 13:56Right?
- 13:56You might have to speak new languages cuz those, the, the raw materials might be in the foreign country, but we can find out.
- 14:02And once we focus and we understand the constraints, you can like exploit them, be like, you know what we know now we know exactly where it is and we have a tracking mechanism.
- 14:14Now we can, and we can also control the things on our job site.
- 14:18Speed and installation and all this stuff.
- 14:21All of a sudden, we're not afraid anymore.
- 14:23We're in control.
- 14:24We're back in control even though the world is kind of funky and there's lots of conflicts out there and constraints.
- 14:30If we can overcome our fear through focus, man, it's so much powerful.
- 14:34So those are my two kind of systems.
- 14:37And I wanted to set it up before we talk about chapter seven because it, this is that this is the, the moment Alex goes home.
- 14:44And meets his family.
- 14:46so we talked about last time, like, and I said, there is no membrane work life.
- 14:50There is no membrane.
- 14:51Right.
- 14:52You just cause your life is all the time.
- 14:54So Alex goes home and meets his family.
- 14:57Right.
- 14:58Who loves him.
- 14:59And there's also frustrated with him.
- 15:01So he kind of does a little reflection.
- 15:03He kind of looks around and sees some, and I'll quote the fives in relationship series, but like relationship clutter.
- 15:10Yeah.
- 15:11Oh God.
- 15:12Like inventory, so to speak.
- 15:15And he, he thinks about his, his family's like other, like he does some comparison to his brother and his parents.
- 15:23Like they live on the other side of town and smaller homes, less exotic.
- 15:28They have simpler jobs.
- 15:30One's a general manager of like a, a, a small grocery store.
- 15:35I think his parents are retired.
- 15:36They used to run the store.
- 15:38Yeah.
- 15:38So it's like thinking about it.
- 15:39It's like, what if I just did that?
- 15:41Like, is that, that just be easier?
- 15:43but it's, he is like looking around his house and he's like big shot.
- 15:47Like he's the general manager of a, a manufacturing facility, like probably does pretty good.
- 15:52But he like, when you, when you do that and I have the same problem, like how much is enough.
- 15:57The whole man stuff is enough.
- 16:00And then you, so you have lots of stuff.
- 16:03And for me, it's clutter, cuz it clutters up.
- 16:05It's like, I gotta change the oil on the Buick and this cut the grass and da, da, da, like if we start to clutter our lives up.
- 16:13Yes.
- 16:14What do you think?
- 16:15You introduced this to me?
- 16:16This concept.
- 16:17I didn't understand until Dan and Jess introduced this concept, the chapter seven, just right over my head.
- 16:24well, thank you man.
- 16:25That's all my story about seeing clutter in your personal life.
- 16:30There's two that come to mind.
- 16:31So one, cuz I'm looking at like relationship clutter and quotation marks and I don't know why I'm going down memory lane.
- 16:39But when I was in high school, I was popular with the ladies and I was selfish about that and, but I thought I was like super smart.
- 16:47Right?
- 16:48Cause I, if I had a, I didn't date anybody like after my freshman year, I didn't date anybody from my high school until like my senior year.
- 16:57And whenever I did date a gal, they just made sure they went to different schools because the likelihood of me getting busted like was zero, except I didn't factor in football games.
- 17:09And so we had gone to a football game.
- 17:11I can't remember who was playing and, and I went with the gal super nice, super sweet young lady.
- 17:18So we're watching the game and, you know, we're there and my group of friends are there.
- 17:21And then another friend shows up with his cousin who went to another high school that we, she and I were familiar and I'm like, oh, damn.
- 17:32Like it was, we weren't like boyfriend and girl, but you know, it's, it's just, wasn't cool that I was doing that anyways.
- 17:37So she looks at me and I'm like, oof, okay.
- 17:41Super, super uncomfortable.
- 17:43And then another gal we went to we went to the damn concession stand and I see another one.
- 17:50So those of you who were born after 1990, this is the phase that we called it talking.
- 17:55We're like, Hey, we're just talking.
- 17:57Yes.
- 17:57Because Facebook, social media didn't exist.
- 18:00We had to talk.
- 18:01So this was the talking.
- 18:02Yeah.
- 18:03Oh, that, you know, we're not, so yeah, this is the, I am dating myself very much, but I went, I went to high school in the 1990s and we called this was the talking phase.
- 18:14So, yes.
- 18:14Sorry to interrupt.
- 18:15I just wanted to interject a case.
- 18:17Some.
- 18:18Millennials are younger.
- 18:19You lost them, so yes.
- 18:20Can please continue.
- 18:21That's perfect.
- 18:22No, no, that's a perfect clarity.
- 18:24Cause yeah, like we, that's what we did.
- 18:26We talk on the phone and we flirt and hang out when at parties or whatever.
- 18:30And, but, and we were in person quite often.
- 18:32And, and so when we were the first gal, when she showed up, my date was she could tell like something was up and then that other gal was like, Hey, I need to talk to like, oh, she gave me a hard time.
- 18:44And she's like said, no, like it's fine, whatever.
- 18:47Then we go up to the concession stand and there's another one from another school.
- 18:52Like, what is she?
- 18:53She like, she really didn't no re she was there and she just runs up hugs me and kisses me with, with this other nice young lady next to me.
- 19:03And I'm like, oh, damn like this it.
- 19:05And she just looks at me and she's like, you're just not the guy I thought you were . I'm like, okay, you're right.
- 19:11So anyways, clutter, I didn't need all those.
- 19:15I didn't need to be talking to all of those young ladies because the reality was in that situation, that was super extreme.
- 19:23But the reality was keeping track of who I was with and who I made a commitment to, who I was gonna meet somewhere.
- 19:29What I told.
- 19:30That was like, talk about extra processing.
- 19:33like, it was all this energy and stress that I didn't need.
- 19:39So it took a few more years for me to maybe another decade for me to like, stop, figure that out and stop doing that.
- 19:45But the other thing that, that comes to mind, like clutter in my personal space, and you touched on it, there was a time like when I was a foreman all the way to when I was a superintendent for the trade partners in my mind, if I had a two car garage, three bedroom house, a truck, a car vacations, all those shiny things.
- 20:08Like all of those things like that was going to be, that was life.
- 20:12Right.
- 20:12That was the goal.
- 20:13That's when things were gonna be amazing and awesome.
- 20:16And the reality was accumulating all of those things for my prison, because with those things was that right?
- 20:25Like I had, oh, wow.
- 20:26Yeah.
- 20:26Like I got 'em.
- 20:27I had to finance the house and to finance the car, the truck, cuz I, I don't mind driving no beaters.
- 20:32So it's like whatever going on Vaca, like all the, having all furniture and TVs and like all the junk that you gotta have in a house was debt.
- 20:40And so I, my job, I was hating my job because it was always the same story, always the same arguments.
- 20:47But I needed to do the job to make the income, to live the life that I thought I needed.
- 20:53And, you know, a lot of things happened at that point in my life.
- 20:56And my focus after that was like, okay, I need to get outta debt.
- 21:01And as soon as I get outta debt, I am going to find and do a job that I love do some meaningful work.
- 21:08And I did that.
- 21:09And I'll tell you, Thomas, from, from that point in my life, I can trace it to where I'm at today.
- 21:15And what I mean by that is the depth of fulfillment that I'm experiencing today.
- 21:20Is it direct, it tied directly to that decision I made.
- 21:24So I decided to filter out all of these superficial collectibles that enabled me to get outta debt, which enabled me from that point forward to always choose the work that I do always choose my boss and always choose the people that I work with.
- 21:41But I had to sort all that junk out, man.
- 22:24yeah, it's enough.
- 22:26Mm-hmm it's enough.
- 22:28I, I I'm the same way.
- 22:30Yeah.
- 22:31Luckily I've met a really amazing person.
- 22:34I better have angel who, an architect who kind of who designs our life.
- 22:39But so I wrote down.
- 22:41Some things.
- 22:42I think that some listeners could take away.
- 22:45I wrote, I wrote eight things and I, and I, and I wrote this kind of after listening to five relationships.
- 22:51So this is a little gold rat, little Jen and Jess little sprinkling.
- 22:55What does the number one make a decision about what you value most in life as a person?
- 23:01It's, it's a decision because we're gonna the chapter eight, we're gonna start getting into throughput and inventory.
- 23:08So you have to take an inventory.
- 23:10Yes.
- 23:11Personal finance, especially like if young people please learn how to balance sheet, please.
- 23:17I wish I did.
- 23:18Yes.
- 23:19But so make a decision.
- 23:20What you value, what you are, what are the value things make a list of two, once you do that, evaluate your relationship at that moment.
- 23:30Oh yeah.
- 23:31Like the current state of the relationship and it's, and it's that focusing step?
- 23:36Cuz you do like, these are my values.
- 23:38Yes.
- 23:39So you kind of put yourself in the framework and at that point you have to do the, you have to do the inventory.
- 23:44First, second thing you evaluate do the, do the reflection.
- 23:48Steve, Steve Martin do a reflection.
- 23:51evaluate and it's looking in the mirror cuz you it's on it's here and.
- 23:54The only time you can see yourself in the mirror is when you're stand in front of it.
- 23:57And it's easy to reflect on the happy times, right?
- 24:01It's like, oh yeah, this is exciting.
- 24:03But you gotta, it's the, it's the sour in this week.
- 24:06You gotta think about the painful times too, because this is, and that's because of bias yes.
- 24:13So it's like, these are my values, my priority matrix, whatever you want to call it.
- 24:18And based on that evaluation, let you do that evaluation remove anything that consumes your emotions or lowers your self-esteem.
- 24:25Ooh.
- 24:26Yes.
- 24:27Is the, and that's the, this, this takes immense courage where this takes almost, it, it like you need somebody to let their hand on your back.
- 24:35Like what I would say when I was a lean manager, once you make an improvement, drive a freaking wedge under that thing, make it sick.
- 24:44Like don't let it roll back.
- 24:45Then the only way to drive a wedge is take whatever you were doing last time, straighten a bin.
- 24:50Yep.
- 24:51Straighten a bin.
- 24:51throw that thing in a dumpster, whatever it is.
- 24:53If these things that you want to remove in your life are, are people or family members.
- 24:58Yes.
- 25:00So you have to set boundaries yes.
- 25:03Around yourself and start saying no, or start saying yes, but.
- 25:08Or saying no.
- 25:09And those kind of things.
- 25:11And it's, you have to do it, these for me, again, this is not like life hacks with Thomas lame, but this is kind of like my learning from listening to Jen and Jeffs and, and, and whole bunch of stuff.
- 25:23Yeah.
- 25:23But you base that base set evaluation on two things.
- 25:26If it's consuming your emotions, right?
- 25:29In a, in a, in a negative way, I should say.
- 25:32Right.
- 25:32Or if it's lowering your self-esteem, if you do something that, that makes you feel bad, stop doing it.
- 25:38Yes.
- 25:38And it's hard.
- 25:39Super hard.
- 25:40So, and then, so this is the step, step four increase the quality of inner interactions.
- 25:45And I, I am terrible with interactions.
- 25:48So in any, any increasing of equality is probably measured in micro millimeters, but it's like turning off the TV or focusing I'm listened to you.
- 26:00I'm gonna look at yes.
- 26:02I'm not good at that.
- 26:03I, I will tell everybody right now, I struggle with this.
- 26:06But, but my thing is like, if you evaluate something, you truly value it focus the quality.
- 26:11So quality is if you're with someone you're not staring at your phone, so then it's like, okay, if you're trying to.
- 26:18Your interactions.
- 26:20There are quality of interaction.
- 26:21There's gonna get some constraints, start to pop up.
- 26:24And we're gonna talk about chapter eight.
- 26:26So treat your relationship like a garden.
- 26:29If you have a garden, do you have a garden?
- 26:31I, not currently, but I have had gardens in the past.
- 26:33Yes, I have.
- 26:35I live in North Carolina, so everything just grows like crazy here.
- 26:38So I'm like constantly, but you think about it or think about a farmer.
- 26:42They prepare the soil.
- 26:43First thing they do is prepare the soil plant at the right time, remove the weeds, water, and fertilized, and then adjust.
- 26:52You gotta look at the dang plants.
- 26:54If they're drying out, give 'em some water.
- 26:56If they're looking spiny, they need some sun or whatever, but you have to look at it and make some adjustments from there.
- 27:03And so how do you do that?
- 27:04You give first that's step six.
- 27:07Oh yeah.
- 27:08First and expect little.
- 27:10Yes.
- 27:12And for me, that's my ego.
- 27:13Just, just, oh man.
- 27:15I'm like, Hey, Hey, wash the car, give some loving, right?
- 27:18Like, thank you for doing the thing that I wrote on the scrum board a week ago.
- 27:23Congratulations.
- 27:23You can move it to so the, so my thing is that's I call it smart.
- 27:32But if you're doing like a pull plan, it's that I give, I get yep.
- 27:36Or if, if you have trouble, if you have a, if you have a terrible ego, like flaw person, no, I I'm right there a hundred percent.
- 27:42Like, but if you, if you have that, if you have that inner struggle where you're like, ah, give some kudos once in a while, then do a little like ninja moves called smart compromise.
- 27:53And it's like, Hey, I give, but I get, and then last thing is empathy.
- 27:58So it's like, how do you, how do you knock it outta the park?
- 28:00Once you've done the first seven empathy is a critical human ability.
- 28:04And if you, if you get stuck, seek professional help, thank you, Jen, Lacey, for teaching you that, you're stuck in your relationship.
- 28:13And I need, I need professional help in my garage right now.
- 28:16Like I need a cleaner I'm like, yeah, come in and just throw just all of it.
- 28:20Just throw it away.
- 28:21Just throw it away, saving that for, I don't really know what throw, so I need professional help or third party friends, neighbors take stuff away.
- 28:29So yeah.
- 28:29So if you have clutter and you get stuck see help.
- 28:33It's clear to me that doing it in order.
- 28:37Is going to reap the best results because it's like the first one facilitates the second one and so on that like all the way down to empathy and, and you're right.
- 28:48Like empathy's not the easiest thing in the world and getting help may be necessary.
- 28:53Well, actually we'll say, I'll say it differently.
- 28:55Getting help is only going to increase the, the depth of the empathy.
- 29:01Right.
- 29:01Understanding from an objective perspective, because I could tell myself I'm empathetic.
- 29:07I could say that.
- 29:08Yeah.
- 29:08Yeah, yeah.
- 29:09But I need objective an objective perspective to confirm or deny that.
- 29:15Yeah.
- 29:16So you have to do it in that order, at least for me.
- 29:19But, but before we get to chapter eight, I I'd use that analogy because it's, it's all these prescriptive steps.
- 29:26And if you follow them in order you will, you will improve.
- 29:30You will improve.
- 29:31So nice.
- 29:32Do chapter a cause we're this is the step.
- 29:35This is that this is the first step in fear.
- 29:37Because you, you confront it the only way to overcome fear.
- 29:42You have to face it.
- 29:43So chapter we're gonna go back to Lou and some accounting principles.
- 29:47And I like young people listening.
- 29:50If you wanna like network within your company and grow like your bounds, find a controller, find an accountant, find a finance manager, find someone who is not in operations and ask 'em what they do and listen.
- 30:04It's it's really awesome stuff.
- 30:06Yes.
- 30:07So Alex, he goes to his parents' house and he's like, I need Jonah's personal phone number.
- 30:16And he is like, it's in this notebook.
- 30:18And I, I wrote the number or some kind of contact information in a notebook when he was in grad school probably.
- 30:25And he threw it in his desk at his home.
- 30:28So he goes home.
- 30:28He tears the house apart.
- 30:29Speaking of clutter.
- 30:31And he finally, like, he finally gets a hold of Jonah and he goes, and they, they finally, I don't know.
- 30:37I think they talk on the phone.
- 30:38I think what it's and Jonah says he won't, he goes and tells Alex that he won't make any improvements to his plant by following the same old methods.
- 30:49You can't.
- 30:49And Einstein has the same thing.
- 30:51Like you can't make any improvements to the situation by using the same amount of effort you have to use more effort to improve, or you have to use new methods or you have to seek professional help.
- 31:03Yes.
- 31:04Right.
- 31:04You have to because like you'll fall into the same traps, cuz it's really hard.
- 31:09We're all we're me mortals.
- 31:10So so Jono gives Alex three measurements.
- 31:15This is really cool.
- 31:16Because I actually tried, tried to do this when I, when I read this chapter like 10 years ago.
- 31:23But it's paid 60.
- 31:24So it's three measurements, a measurement not clearly defined as worse than useless yes.
- 31:31So if it's like, Hey, we're going, we need to improve our, profitability, profitability.
- 31:36We need improve that.
- 31:37Like, okay, what does that like?
- 31:39What's what does that mean to me?
- 31:40Yes.
- 31:41I mean, we like, we have to like, so there's three number one, throughput, accounting principle, one controller throughput.
- 31:49The rate at which the system generates money through sales sales, not production sales.
- 31:55Yep.
- 31:55So sales effort I'm we get into a business agreement.
- 31:58So you're gonna buy a hundred units.
- 32:00Can you pay me for that?
- 32:01A hundred units?
- 32:02That's throughput.
- 32:03So it's sales equals acceptance production or excuse me, sales equals acceptance.
- 32:08Sales is acceptance.
- 32:10Like you've fulfilled the deal.
- 32:12Yep.
- 32:12Production is just the work you put in place.
- 32:15That's a county principle.
- 32:16Number one, according to, and again, this is not financial advice.
- 32:19This is according to the book pay yes, yes.
- 32:22To inventory inventory, all the money that the system has invested in purchasing things.
- 32:28Cluttered your truck out, parked out in driveway.
- 32:31And maybe I had to go to the bank and borrow my report that my vehicle or my house or the couch, and like all of your inventory, it's all it costs money to buy it, purchase it, move it, move it, get it on yourself.
- 32:46So if we have inventory lane around job site, that's not installed.
- 32:51Generally speaking, generally speaking, I don't want to upset some of our financial gurus in the construction industry, but generally speaking, we bill for that material once it's set in place.
- 33:03Yeah.
- 33:03Typically speaking, yes.
- 33:05There's probably some, some bills that are going.
- 33:09Or this was the second of the month.
- 33:11So they're probably being reviewed right now.
- 33:13But if it's being delivered to the job site often we can charge for that.
- 33:18We can, we can put in a bill and say, this is, we have fulfilled the material portion of this order.
- 33:24It is on the job site we can go for.
- 33:26So that, that now represents throughput.
- 33:28But now we have inventory sitting around place.
- 33:32So inventory is money that you've spent in things, operational expense, number three, operational expense, all of the money the system spends in order to turn inventory into throughput.
- 33:46Yeah.
- 33:46So that's hiring plumbers.
- 33:49Yep.
- 33:49It's hiring an architect.
- 33:50That's hiring Thomas to go around and take pictures of trash.
- 33:54that's that's yeah.
- 33:56That's all of the, all of the stuff we gotta, we have to get permits.
- 34:00We got to burn diesel and we have to have electricity.
- 34:03We need water.
- 34:04We need sewer.
- 34:04We need, we need stuff.
- 34:05Mm-hmm we need internet.
- 34:07We got, we got bills to pay, right?
- 34:09Swag.
- 34:09You need project swag, right?
- 34:11Swag.
- 34:12Dinners, all of the stuff to turn inventory into throughput.
- 34:17So those are the three rules.
- 34:18So in construction, the equivalent of throughput, inventory and operational.
- 34:24Are exactly the same as manufacturing threw me wrong.
- 34:28no argument here, sir.
- 34:29Okay.
- 34:31And yes, yes, there are nuances obviously.
- 34:34Sure.
- 34:35But in the fundamental of those things, inventory, operational expense and throughput and I'll, I listed three here.
- 34:41So application for progress, payment inventory, operational expense throughput, like we have we percent to complete on this task or this operation.
- 34:51We have these sets of materials on site or in bonded warehouses.
- 34:56Here are the photographs or the drone video that proves it.
- 35:00Right.
- 35:01Operational expense, here's the backups, the pay stubs, all the stuff.
- 35:04So we, yeah, we paid these suppliers.
- 35:07This is our application for progress payment.
- 35:09I put it all there.
- 35:10Boom.
- 35:11Submit it over, please.
- 35:12DocuSign this and then wire me money.
- 35:14yes, that's that's the application.
- 35:16That's the first application two.
- 35:18Sometimes we order stuff that is manufactured.
- 35:22Prefabricated systems.
- 35:23I work for a company.
- 35:24We have many factories within our own within our own control.
- 35:29So we have material and prefabricated systems and procurement and delivery.
- 35:33The stuff needs to move towards us, but sometimes prefabrication is like the job site, but we put the job site in Arizona or Florida or California, or up in Northeast, and then labor in general conditions, operational expense.
- 35:48Right.
- 35:48We have to hire Jesse, we have to hire electricians.
- 35:51We have to hire things and then we have to put electricity to drive the hoist up in there.
- 35:56So those are those three things.
- 35:58What do you think Dr.
- 35:59Gold doesn't measure in his concept about throughput.
- 36:03The schedule.
- 36:04Yeah.
- 36:05PPC.
- 36:05Yes.
- 36:06Yes.
- 36:07I don't want, I just a little teaser there.
- 36:09I just teased it.
- 36:10Yeah.
- 36:11Yeah.
- 36:11We have a CPM schedule and, and we also, if we're using last planner, we have some other metrics.
- 36:16Yes.
- 36:16But we're only talking right now about accounting principles in chapter eight.
- 36:21So what do you think about those?
- 36:23Or should we just get into that?
- 36:24No, no, no.
- 36:25I have a thought about it.
- 36:26So my thought about that is when I think about schedules and like full disclosure, I am not a, a CPM schedule master.
- 36:35I am a CPM schedule critic.
- 36:39because I've, I've had so many of them that I had to like, what the hell are we think?
- 36:43But it's not the it's, it's the thing, right?
- 36:45It's the way we use it, et cetera.
- 36:47But I think we treat them like they're actually measuring throughput, but if looking at this thing, what they really do is give an up at best, give an update of the current state of inventory and operational expense.
- 37:02They have it, that's it like it, it doesn't accomplish anything else.
- 37:07That's my thought.
- 37:08Got it.
- 37:09We're gonna get into that.
- 37:10Get your steak knife out.
- 37:12So I really want to talk about, so chapter nine cuz now we know, we know Jonah's basic measurements in there, like, okay, I got Lou, I got printouts, we got a computer.
- 37:22We got, we got machines.
- 37:24We can, we got, we got stopwatches.
- 37:26This is the eighties with actual right hands.
- 37:30So they go back to the plant in chapter nine.
- 37:33And my summary was sometimes new and improved is biased.
- 37:39yeah.
- 37:40All the time.
- 37:41Right?
- 37:41It's like, oh, let's try something new.
- 37:44And it's like, that's a trap too.
- 37:45So when, so it's two things you get, you get stuck in this weird.
- 37:50Where it's like, Hey, we don't want to go back to the old ways, according to Jonah.
- 37:54But if we get super excited and we we, we try all this new stuff.
- 37:59Ah, we might lose sight of things.
- 38:02So I wrote myself a note.
- 38:04I gotta find it.
- 38:05I gave this is I did my a self-diagnosis number one in my self-diagnosis.
- 38:11And I was like, I was, I was reading this, maybe not this chapter, but one of the chapters, I did little self-reflection.
- 38:17I wrote a note to myself.
- 38:18I said, number one, daily conversation is, oh, no, this is this, not this again.
- 38:23this is the daily conversation.
- 38:24Oh no, not this again.
- 38:26That's in your notes.
- 38:27You were writing is back down self analysis and then number two.
- 38:32Oh, this sounds cool.
- 38:33I wonder how it will work out, like being optimistic.
- 38:35So you have this, I had this weird inner monologue in my, its like I foreign between this conform.
- 38:43I wanna follow industry standards.
- 38:45Boom, blah, blah, blah, boom.
- 38:47I wanna try new thing.
- 38:48Yeah.
- 38:49So what I did, I was like at a seminar or something, there were like, they built the empire state building in New York city in 18 months.
- 38:58And I looked at my schedule and I'm like, this, this building is half as high and it's 18 months.
- 39:04Like, what are we, what are we doing?
- 39:06What are we doing?
- 39:07This is the 1930s.
- 39:09So I went, I got a book that showed all of the methods that the empire state building did.
- 39:17I don't want, cause I'll go an hour just on that, that book but one of the things was line of balance schedule, we call it flowline.
- 39:26Yep.
- 39:26So I was like, there it is, this, this is the way right.
- 39:30Young Thomas was like, they were doing line of balance with like, they didn't have Excel.
- 39:35They had, they had drafting tables.
- 39:37So, but you can measure flow.
- 39:39So in that book there's a whole bunch of 'em and I was like, oh man.
- 39:43Yeah.
- 39:44So let's go back to the book.
- 39:46They go back and they challenge the team about the NCX 10 robot has been done.
- 39:51Like tell like, what is this robot?
- 39:54Like?
- 39:54Like I wanna challenge it.
- 39:55I don't think we, we have these accounting principles now Jonas spun me all around with like spun me in circles, thinking like this is.
- 40:03I'm running my plant into the ground, cause I'm not looking for the right thing.
- 40:06So they calculate the new technology has only been efficient in its local department.
- 40:12Like this, like this, this it's probably like a CNC milling machine, I imagine.
- 40:17So it's computer driven, but so they can, it can crank out some parts and milling, but it doesn't improve all the other fabrication steps after it.
- 40:26So it hasn't led to overall improvement.
- 40:28So what it does, it just pumps out stuff.
- 40:30Yeah.
- 40:31Locally and they face, they face the reality that the NCX 10 causes more problems because I'm inventory mm-hmm because it costs more money to run the dang thing.
- 40:42Cuz it piles up inventory.
- 40:43We gotta, we gotta keep buying raw materials and pumping it into this machine and it cranks it out.
- 40:48It's a robot.
- 40:49Yeah.
- 40:49You can run it three shifts, but they they come to the realization that the, the robot is a constraint.
- 40:56They're like, oh my God.
- 40:57Like they look at it.
- 40:58and so I go back to the empire building if you chart production in a vertical building.
- 41:05So if you, you know, you stack the terms of in flow line scheduling for line of balance.
- 41:13There's a pitch, right?
- 41:14Cause you go, you go from location one to location two, and if you're X, X, so that's the Y axis is on your location.
- 41:22So floor 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, all the way to 88, I think the empire is maybe it's 89 and your X axis is time.
- 41:29You can plot as built progress in vertical or in location and time and it's, and it makes a pitch.
- 41:38And I read that in that book and I was like, I gotta, I'm building a vertical building like these guys in the thirties, they got it.
- 41:44So I I tried it and I measured each crew for like a couple weeks and I just charted it.
- 41:50And the pitches weren't the same.
- 41:51They were not the same Jesse.
- 41:53Oh, was there a lot of deviation?
- 41:55Right?
- 41:55Their pitches were not the same.
- 41:57So they would, so when the flash line of balancing, when they touch or they cross problem that's problem.
- 42:04That's a big problem.
- 42:05Yep.
- 42:05And I read it in that book.
- 42:07Wow.
- 42:07So that was my realization of the theory of constraints.
- 42:11It's probably the wrong for the TOC experts out.
- 42:14There was probably the wrong realization, but , this was my realization that if we have, we have a system of, of locations and production and if we can chart them and we'd look for the locations where they, they bottleneck.
- 42:28Or they actually cross and that's they stop, then they stop.
- 42:32That's a constraint.
- 42:33And I was like, oh my God, this is, this is it.
- 42:36This I'm an expert now.
- 42:38what was, what was your realization, man?
- 42:41It, I don't know if it was ever, I, I don't know if I can call it a realization cuz I know that I repeated it over and over and over again.
- 42:49And then I just got like sick and tired of that.
- 42:52What was happening, but what I would do because so I think I was I was transitioning like I was on the transition phase from form into superintendent.
- 43:02And so what that mean is I had multiple projects.
- 43:05Like I was the like specifically just the plumbing foreman put on multiple projects.
- 43:10And what I would do is I would get my team or get additional personnel and work to a bottleneck and then downsize the team, take 'em to another project.
- 43:22Like I just kept working to the bottleneck.
- 43:25The problem with that is it was peaks and valleys in labor.
- 43:29And so for me, I didn't care.
- 43:31Like I just called the office and said, Hey, these fools are gonna be back.
- 43:33Find 'em a job for next Monday.
- 43:35Right?
- 43:35Like I called Tuesday, you got four days find 'em a home.
- 43:38Well, but what would happen?
- 43:40Like I felt like I was winning.
- 43:42Right.
- 43:42I'm catching up.
- 43:43I'm I'm waiting on you.
- 43:44I'm waiting on you.
- 43:45I'm waiting on you, but what would happen.
- 43:47is those bottlenecks would clear up sometimes at different rates, sometimes all at the same time and the worst part was when it opened up all at the same time, because I could not resource them.
- 44:00And now I'm getting yelled at now the pitch, your pitch goes flat flat because I'm not, I can't, I can't get people over there.
- 44:08I'm taking care of this bottleneck and that kept happening.
- 44:12And I was talking to, to Jim he's like, Jesse, what are you doing?
- 44:16And I, so I I'm telling like, yeah, you know this job, but that's son of a gun.
- 44:19And I, I stuck.
- 44:20You just really bragging about it.
- 44:22And he is like, well, you realize that you're creating your own problem.
- 44:25Right.
- 44:25That fire, fire arsonist fire Arsen firefighter.
- 44:29Yes.
- 44:30Cause I'm creating my own problem by rushing to the bottleneck and create like stopping at bottlenecks everywhere.
- 44:37And there's, I have no influence over their rate of, of opening up.
- 44:43And so they would open up whenever they opened up and boom, all of a sudden I got three projects saying, where the hell are you?
- 44:48We're ready for fixtures?
- 44:49Where are you?
- 44:50We're ready for test and balance where like all these things like, oh, and that's, I'm like, ah, he's like, you need to like, look at your whole thing and manage your production.
- 45:02So that you don't have to pull people off the job and I'm like, oh, so back to the pitch, right?
- 45:10Adjust my production, adjust the, the head count, whatever I needed to do to maintain an even pace so that I didn't hit the bottleneck because the problem was when I pulled people off, I wasn't always gonna get the same people back And when I got a different crew back there, even though they were being production or productive, it wasn't like their rate of production was low because they were still learning the damn job learning, you know, where the porta potties at, where do we park where's lunch.
- 45:37Like all of those things that are important, getting to know everybody, the painter and everybody's life story, like the production was killed.
- 45:45So that was you're talking like you're talking like Fred Brooks, right.
- 45:49With his law.
- 45:51yeah.
- 45:51If it's hard in the beginning, if you throw extra people at it, because you gotta learn no job.
- 45:57Yes, yes.
- 45:58A hundred percent.
- 45:59You gotta learn the project.
- 46:01It's not like you just plug them in and they, everything happens.
- 46:04Yeah.
- 46:05So when I realized that I actually had the had someone in our organization at the time who knew how to do line of balance very well.
- 46:18Ooh, very well.
- 46:19Yes.
- 46:19Janie winning.
- 46:20Thank you, Janie.
- 46:21If you're listen.
- 46:23She put our, our, our CPM schedule into a computer program that, that did the visualization and it was Jesse.
- 46:30It was like choirs of angels, really?
- 46:33So, because I was like, now I have my own charted line of balance schedule.
- 46:39That was the baseline.
- 46:40And I was like, oh, they, and they were not parallel lines.
- 46:44Our plan, our original plan.
- 46:47They were, we did it.
- 46:48We did the study because early on we knew, but I was like, eh, what is that?
- 46:52But I didn't understand flow the flow line part.
- 46:56Yep.
- 46:56Until I came to that realization.
- 46:57So we went back, we pulled that thing out.
- 47:00We're like, oh, this is interesting.
- 47:01Can you load the last month's update into it and see, and it was it looked like spaghetti, but here's the thing about confronting the facts.
- 47:12Mm-hmm now it's not like the stair crew.
- 47:15He is slow, man.
- 47:16They're slow.
- 47:17Like we're looking at stair crew.
- 47:18No, they're they're they go, eh, stop, eh, stop, eh, stop.
- 47:22Cuz they would run out of structural steel to land their stairs.
- 47:26And they were, they were telling me this, right.
- 47:29Like, but I wasn't listening.
- 47:31Nope, Nope.
- 47:32Oh yeah.
- 47:32I got all kinds of stuff.
- 47:34And then we got into this overtime discuss.
- 47:38Ooh, because some of our trades weren't in, we didn't say tacked then I guess we tried to, we didn't understand that, but they weren't parallel with everybody else.
- 47:48So if they were more flat, if their, if their flow line was more flat, they had to, they had to get to the next level.
- 47:56So they had to work overtime.
- 47:57Yes.
- 47:58That'll work Saturdays and Sunday.
- 47:59Geez.
- 47:59We work our steel decking crew seven days a week.
- 48:03Yeah.
- 48:03Seven days a week.
- 48:04Just go, just go, go, go, go, go, go.
- 48:06And it's nasty work.
- 48:08Yeah.
- 48:08I don't know if you've ever, I'm sure you have that deck saw.
- 48:11Oh yeah.
- 48:12It that's.
- 48:12They cut it opening.
- 48:13It's loud punch.
- 48:16Yep.
- 48:16They're banging around.
- 48:17They're banging and clanging.
- 48:18People that do steel decking.
- 48:20Like I, yes.
- 48:21Thank you.
- 48:22That is a, I mean, you're, you're on the top of the, you're doing roofs.
- 48:26You're basically standing on a mirror all day and don't matter what floor they're on the sun under you're the, it's not ergonomic.
- 48:34Like you're not walking on the concrete floor.
- 48:35You're walking in the decking, right?
- 48:37Yes.
- 48:39So we realized that and we're like, we gotta go talk to Carlos.
- 48:43Carlos is the decking team like Carlos man.
- 48:45He's like, I'm like, I've been looking at this all wrong, Carlos.
- 48:48Like we, like we're, we've been running you guys raw and blaming you for are problems.
- 48:55Yes.
- 48:56And like he's, I don't know.
- 48:58He was probably.
- 48:59She like what?
- 49:00This is egghead , but he was like, yes.
- 49:02And I'm like, Carlos, let's figure out how it make you move faster.
- 49:07Before we start talking about a hike in Herbie, I want tease it.
- 49:14Cause Carlos was our was, was our herbi and in the, in the upcoming check and and I'll leave it there, but we started that discussion.
- 49:23I'm like, look, look at the chart.
- 49:25Like you're clashing with the steel guys.
- 49:27And you're also clashing with the concrete or the rebar and the other trades.
- 49:32Because you have to constantly go back, like you're doing up and down too much movement.
- 49:36You're going back.
- 49:37And he's like, yeah, like some of this information, Thomas, I'm not getting until late.
- 49:41I'm like, okay, I'm gonna control the information flow.
- 49:44So, and I tease that, we'll go back to Carlos.
- 49:47But I came to that realization there, cuz that was the constraint was information and I'm like, boom that's that's that's our job to get Carla's information.
- 49:57So number one, why do you think prolonged overtime is dangerous, man, because you get damn tired, right?
- 50:04I mean just fatigue in itself.
- 50:07When we're working overtime, there's only been a few times in my career.
- 50:11Like maybe four times.
- 50:12That we worked overtime because it was going to have big benefits for us and big, like it was not under duress.
- 50:20All the other times we were working overtime.
- 50:22It was under duress to like we're behind everything else is in like trades are stacked and six, seven days a week, you never get to recover.
- 50:32And now you're being exposed.
- 50:35Your exposure to risk goes up, cuz you're physically present longer to whatever the hell that risk is.
- 50:44So the likelihood for injury starts skyrocketing.
- 50:47It is sleep is important.
- 50:50Yes.
- 50:51And especially in the bay area, the workers don't live near the work.
- 50:57Oh yeah.
- 50:58Cuz the, yeah, so they're so expensive.
- 51:01So, and it's a super commute.
- 51:03Some of our workers out there commute two plus hours from Modesto and inland.
- 51:09So, so when we prolong our work hours, usually where they make that up is in their sleep.
- 51:15Cuz they have to get up at four 30, make start making their way into the bay area.
- 51:19and it's like, Hey, we started at seven.
- 51:21We have all these rules.
- 51:22We have the meetings right out of the gate.
- 51:23So if you miss, if you're late, you miss everything.
- 51:26So, so being prompt.
- 51:28Is important, but it is dangerous to yes.
- 51:31Prolong and it's very easy.
- 51:33And, and I've done this to turn when you're doing your CPM schedule, turn the calendar to seven days.
- 51:41Yes.
- 51:42Like I want a seven day calendar on these three activities.
- 51:45Yep.
- 51:46These are words I've said many times.
- 51:48And it's, it's easy.
- 51:49It's like, yeah, sure.
- 51:50We save three days.
- 51:51Cause it's like work Saturday, Sunday, weekends, you turn off all the time off.
- 51:56It's a struggle.
- 51:57Yeah.
- 51:57It's a struggle.
- 51:58And I will say that it's, it's it's all the time.
- 52:01It's every day.
- 52:02It's not like we're, we're, we're being malice or whatever.
- 52:05There are just constraints that we're faced with.
- 52:08And oftentimes we use the easy button of overtime yep.
- 52:11To make up for the, the makeup for our unparallel flow lines.
- 52:16So that's that's one way.
- 52:18How about inventory?
- 52:20Oh, Jesse, you might, you perhaps have a story about this.
- 52:23Have you ever flooded an entire floor of duct work?
- 52:27Because the duct guys and gals said it would be faster for them.
- 52:32So, it's ki yes and no.
- 52:34So yes, I would flood the project would duck not because we said the team, the install team said it was faster.
- 52:41Most of the time that I did that was to hog up space so that the plumbing and piping didn't have any other trade underway either.
- 52:51so, because we were, you know, mechanical contractor, oh, you're doing both.
- 52:55We did all three.
- 52:56We did plumbing, the hydraulic piping and the sheet metal work, the duct work.
- 53:01So the best way to keep everybody else out of our damn space was to flood the damn job with sheet with duct.
- 53:08And, and we'd shake it out and lay it out on the flood.
- 53:10Like, no, no, no, no.
- 53:11Just lay it out.
- 53:11Just stage it.
- 53:12Just stage it.
- 53:13Be like we test, we can hang.
- 53:14I was no, no, because as soon as it goes up, the framers and everybody else is gonna come in and we still gotta run all this pipe.
- 53:20So let's just, and that's why I did it.
- 53:22I did it to hog space.
- 53:24Did it really slow anybody else down from coming on the project?
- 53:27No, what it did was I got yelled at all the time and our stuff got banged up and kicked around and pushed around and we had to work over it.
- 53:34Like, yes, I flooded the project all the time.
- 53:38I thought I was winning.
- 53:40And when I had to come back and take things down and there was damage dug and there was damage insulation, cetera, et cetera.
- 53:47I didn't get ahead.
- 53:48Like, and all I did was piss everybody off right out of the gate.
- 53:52Yeah.
- 53:52So that's, that's one way , I'm, I'm worse.
- 53:55And I have a story teed up of teasers, but we're gonna start talking about controlling flow with limiting inventory.
- 54:03So I, I would slow, well, I'm sure the statute of limitations over, but I'd slow trades down by limiting their access to loading dock.
- 54:14Ah, so it would be like, and limit I'd limit their time.
- 54:19And that is in some ways that's also smart to do but I would be nefarious about it.
- 54:24I wouldn't tell them what I was doing.
- 54:25No, that's a good point.
- 54:26Like it, they were, when, when everybody's aware they would be frustrated.
- 54:31Yeah.
- 54:32Yes.
- 54:33Cause they didn't know.
- 54:34Yep.
- 54:34Carpet carpet installer was special.
- 54:36Yes.
- 54:37I am sorry for doing that.
- 54:38They're so fast.
- 54:40Yes.
- 54:40Especially, especially rug type.
- 54:42So the way to slow down finish flooring trades is to limit.
- 54:47Cause once they run out, they're done, they go home.
- 54:49So number three, rework, talk about talking about constraint.
- 54:53So I have a constraint.
- 54:54I have an, I have an information problem I have, or there's a change or there's a alignment problem or there's a clash.
- 55:02We skip past that.
- 55:03We're like, ah, I can still do the whole floor.
- 55:06Let's not worry about that.
- 55:08We'll come.
- 55:08We'll do the go back thing.
- 55:10Yep.
- 55:10Why is that dangerous to human beings?
- 55:13And I.
- 55:13My note here was because when you go back and do that work, it's no longer designed the same way when you were gonna do it first time.
- 55:21So the ergonomics, yes.
- 55:23Especially at height.
- 55:25Yep.
- 55:25Especially at height.
- 55:27And especially if there's other encumbrances yes.
- 55:30Around your head.
- 55:31Yes.
- 55:31Those are the trades that work above their head.
- 55:34Like that's, that's some hard work.
- 55:36And thank you for doing that.
- 55:37But like one thing we could do to help serve those people is if there's a problem, we don't put more stuff in their way.
- 55:45So they have to do like yoga poses right.
- 55:49Or worse, like put themselves in harm's way, because there's really no physical way to safely do that task.
- 55:56Yep.
- 55:57Very, very hard and time consuming.
- 55:59It's hard on a human body.
- 56:01And often we do that.
- 56:03We, we design that system for that person.
- 56:06Right.
- 56:06We put them in that we create the condition and say, go do it.
- 56:10And then we walk the job and say, what the hell are you doing?
- 56:12Isn't there a safer way to do it?
- 56:14Like, yeah, there was, there was last month when there was nothing here.
- 56:19So it's, it's it's this is, these are constraints.
- 56:23Yes.
- 56:23These are constraints and there's consequences.
- 56:25To making decisions to go around stuff.
- 56:28I'm not saying we can't do that.
- 56:30We can't make smart choices and we can't use contraptions to protect ourselves from falling.
- 56:36But Hey, if there's a issue we have to get in front of it before we put a person up there.
- 56:42So that's, that's the thing.
- 56:43So, oh yeah.
- 56:45And then I put number five.
- 56:47Don't ever sit next to me on an airplane.
- 56:50and the reason why when you get onto the airplane is if you ride Southwest.
- 56:55Get on.
- 56:56You get, get on onto the airplane.
- 56:58Cuz it's very important for airplane to leave on time.
- 57:02Cuz they have to there's a cycle time they have to achieve.
- 57:05Yes.
- 57:05Cause they have to reach their next destination and hit that same cycle time.
- 57:09Deboarding I think is or Delan doesn't matter because they got other stuff they gotta do.
- 57:14They gotta gas up the plane.
- 57:16They gotta take the luggage out.
- 57:18They got, they got time and they know about how long it takes.
- 57:22But if you're me sitting in like row 22, the way people deboard.
- 57:27The planes is there's ABC D F on typical like 7 30, 7, 6 seats.
- 57:34All those people have to de deplane.
- 57:37And they're like, they gotta get up.
- 57:38They gotta figure out.
- 57:39I was like, oh, did I leave my phone here?
- 57:41All this variation.
- 57:43Mm-hmm And it's like there's, there's a way better way.
- 57:47And the Army's already figured this out, how to get off a dang airplane and a hurry as you get off in columns.
- 57:54So all the A's go, go.
- 57:57Nobody else get up just the A's and you get off the, the, you get off the plane, like paratroops or Rangers or Navy seals and they get off and they go off and roast and you go to all the beats.
- 58:09So I'm sitting there and I'm like, and I know this and I have anxiety and I know this method of, of getting out the plane and, and I just get frustrated yeah.
- 58:19With that.
- 58:19And so it was a funny story that someone was like, I bet you, like when you're sitting in the airplane and people are getting off, like, I bet you scold them.
- 58:28And I'm like, I'm like, I literally pulled people back down.
- 58:31Just, just, just, just chill for, for a second.
- 58:33You're you're giving me anxiety.
- 58:35I bet I tell em, that story.
- 58:37That's awesome.
- 58:38So I guess you really like, did you like the pictures?
- 58:41I said too, of deep board who sent me one too the same day.
- 58:45Oh, did he I guess I'm probably like gonna.
- 58:47Everybody's gonna start texting now you're gonna guys pictures.
- 58:51Yes.
- 58:51just, just please United Delta Southwest.
- 58:55Just eboard the way you onboarded.
- 58:58Yes.
- 58:58If you're in section five, leave in section five and that way, if you're like, oftentimes I'm trying to connect to another flight and I get anxious about it.
- 59:07I can't control it.
- 59:08I can't focus.
- 59:09I'm going on crazy.
- 59:10So I start to start to try to, you know, fix the situation and use best known practices from the United States army.
- 59:19Get off the dang plane in columns.
- 59:20All right, I'll get off my soapbox.
- 59:21Let's do chapter 10.
- 59:23Let's do it.
- 59:24Chapter 10.
- 59:25Ooh.
- 59:25Ooh.
- 59:26This guy, you know who this guy is?
- 59:28Demy Demy oh yeah.
- 59:30Actually I work with a gentleman who went to Dr.
- 59:34Deming's seminars.
- 59:36Really?
- 59:37It's so fun.
- 59:37Yes.
- 59:38That's awesome.
- 59:38So chapter 10 links.
- 59:41It starts to talk about the new economics.
- 59:44So Alex, I'm just gonna very, very briefly summarize this cuz we're getting along.
- 59:48I love this book.
- 59:49Alex explains the principles.
- 59:51So the new economics, it's a whole bunch of principles about changing the way we, we look at how we manage.
- 59:59Here in the United States and there's, there's other methods that are non-traditional to the United States at the time when he wrote that, I think in 1950s or sixties.
- 1:00:09And he said, we need to, we need to evolve into this, this state of economic.
- 1:00:14So at chapter 10, Alex faces these same issues and local optimums don't matter.
- 1:00:21So if you're locally Optima, you're, you're just, you're just knocking it out.
- 1:00:25It feels good.
- 1:00:26It does.
- 1:00:27Yep.
- 1:00:27But it really, in the grand scheme of things and new economics, they don't matter.
- 1:00:31And this is a tenant or maybe a principle of theory of constraints.
- 1:00:34So lo local optimums don't matter results must always be measured against the goal.
- 1:00:40Yes.
- 1:00:40So any results that you have that you've that any KPIs dashboards?
- 1:00:47And I do, I do with this every day and I constantly, and trying to focus a project teams or a business unit into always trying to measure yourself against your overall goal, whatever, all of your other metrics, those are good.
- 1:01:03But if those aren't talking to the goal, then that's, it's a distraction, right?
- 1:01:08So it's a local Optim.
- 1:01:10So if, if we need to do, we need to look at that and we do this constantly that's, that's why it's such a good time to be alive.
- 1:01:17Throughput, inventory and operating expenses should be reflected in financial metrics.
- 1:01:22And the reason why financial metrics are really good because they're controlled they're they're yep.
- 1:01:26They are principle based accounting laws.
- 1:01:30And and the best thing is like, if the goal and the goal in this book was we wanna make money because once we have money, we can pay people.
- 1:01:39We can we can keep the plant open.
- 1:01:42we can keep doing our job.
- 1:01:44So we need to make some money.
- 1:01:45So the goal of whatever, whatever your, your primary goal is, if you set your financial controls to those same goals, like if you're, if you're personally trying to save some money And personal finance, you start to take inventory of all your expenses, right?
- 1:02:04Yes.
- 1:02:05And your inventory, and be like, Hey, this 62 inch Samsung TV that I never watch.
- 1:02:11That's a, that's the inventory I could sell that.
- 1:02:14Mm-hmm . And, and turn that into some throughput.
- 1:02:16So if you reflect, if you reflect that in financial metrics, and this is what happens in chapter.
- 1:02:23You can optimize because you can, you can see where you're spending money.
- 1:02:27So when the plant Alex is like in CX 10, we got a milling machine.
- 1:02:32We have all kinds of due adds and gizmos and manufacturing processes, heat stuff up and cut stuff down and all this kind of stuff.
- 1:02:43Install components.
- 1:02:45Yeah.
- 1:02:45We build factories.
- 1:02:47So I get, I at least get to see the friend, but explain the great project manager versus the superintendent argument regarding schedules, budgets, staff, and working weekends.
- 1:03:01This is the this is the PM and super conversation because talking about goals and traditionally speaking project managers care about the business deal.
- 1:03:13Mm-hmm right.
- 1:03:14Keeping the client aware of the situation, maintaining the schedule, maintaining the controls, making sure things are being paid for making sure, making sure the business end that the deal is being managed.
- 1:03:27That's they're managing the project.
- 1:03:28Generally speaking, they're oftentimes a leader, but they're main focus is managing the business in the deal.
- 1:03:34Superintendent.
- 1:03:36Their primary mission is manage the physical operations.
- 1:03:40Right.
- 1:03:40Of all the, the operations.
- 1:03:42So all the physical things that are happening out on the job site are about to like, they're coming towards the job site.
- 1:03:49We're managing that.
- 1:03:50So you have kind of differing sense of values, so it, we deal with this all the time.
- 1:03:56It's like, it's like this, this constant tug, like you're like open your dang wallet so we can buy a, a crane to install the things on the roof.
- 1:04:06Like, we want us to float this with air balloons or what do you want me to do?
- 1:04:09Oh, God, I got a great story for that.
- 1:04:11Okay.
- 1:04:12So there's a, there's there's differing sets of values and that's why metrics come into play, but tell the story.
- 1:04:20Oh man.
- 1:04:20So classic right project manage.
- 1:04:23We had we had a team.
- 1:04:24It wasn't a big, it was a small retrofit.
- 1:04:27They were changing out the chillers, putting in brand new chillers.
- 1:04:30They had a totally enclosed chiller yard that did it allow enough space for us to fabricate the chill water supply lines in that space.
- 1:04:40It was just, you know, everything was in there.
- 1:04:42So we had to fabricate them outside of this space and we needed a.
- 1:04:47A crane.
- 1:04:48Like the ideal situation was to fabricate, like minimize the number of welds we had to do in the chiller yard.
- 1:04:57And so we wanted to build it all out and we were like, Hey, project manager, we need a crane project manager.
- 1:05:04Like hadn't even walked a job, his responses.
- 1:05:07Well, it's not in the budget.
- 1:05:08Okay.
- 1:05:09Well, in order for us to make the labor budget, we're gonna have to do all the fabrication out here and not in there.
- 1:05:16And so there was this argument back and forth.
- 1:05:18So anyways, the team, the install team decided, you know what hell with it, we're gonna fabricate it.
- 1:05:22The way we know is best for us and to help us get the thing done.
- 1:05:26And then it came time.
- 1:05:27Like we needed, like, it's go time.
- 1:05:29We were supposed to be starting these chillers up in a few days.
- 1:05:32We need to get, we need to get the damn crane again.
- 1:05:35It's not in the budget.
- 1:05:36So what the guys did, it was awesome.
- 1:05:38They went to wherever and bought some balloons, helium balloons, and tied them around the.
- 1:05:45And took pictures of it and say, Hey, we tried the cheapest route possible to get this pipe into the chilly yard and it's not working.
- 1:05:52I think we're gonna need a crane.
- 1:05:56it was, it was awesome.
- 1:05:59But that picture got around and, you know, went further up the, the org chart and the, our, the boss was like, get the damn crane.
- 1:06:05Well, we're gonna have a crane for a day.
- 1:06:07What are we talking about?
- 1:06:08Couple thousand dollars.
- 1:06:09But the argument was there's it wasn't there wasn't a line item for the budget.
- 1:06:14Can't they just, you know, put, hook up a grasshopper and, and take it around the bend and our leaders like, no, like yes, they could, but look at how much risk is there.
- 1:06:24They can get hurt.
- 1:06:25They can damage the existing space.
- 1:06:27Like that's not a good idea.
- 1:06:29Spend the $2,000 just because it wasn't a budgeted line item doesn't mean you can't spend that money.
- 1:06:38And so anyways, that was that was the deal.
- 1:06:41It was, it was amazing.
- 1:06:42I loved it.
- 1:06:43Yes, we, so this it's operational expense.
- 1:06:47The, the, so always the argument, we're not arguing about inventory.
- 1:06:51Well, let's not go there cause there's oftentimes there's pressure on a project to get inventory moved to the site.
- 1:06:59So we can bill for that so we can have cash flow.
- 1:07:03Yes, that's important.
- 1:07:04But if we, if we, if we're not careful bring in too much inventory, we can't move.
- 1:07:09There's this struggle and it's a dance and I know how to dance.
- 1:07:13Yeah.
- 1:07:14Yeah.
- 1:07:15There is a support club for all the project managers who have worked with me in the past.
- 1:07:20so if you're, if you're interested, they, they talk and commiserate together.
- 1:07:24Cause I know how to dance, but but the reason why is because I learned their metrics yes.
- 1:07:32Learned their language, right.
- 1:07:33Learn their language.
- 1:07:35So mm-hmm chief code for every super enterprising superintendent.
- 1:07:40General superintendent.
- 1:07:42Yes.
- 1:07:43How to level up level up your argument game, learn their language, look, look for their cash flow reports.
- 1:07:49Look for, I mean, they leave this stuff on their desks or yeah.
- 1:07:52So yeah.
- 1:07:53Or they have, they go to lunch and they leave their screen open, but it's there learn it's available.
- 1:07:57So learn, learn the metrics and even better learn to share.
- 1:08:01So.
- 1:08:03If we can share those important metrics being like, Hey, like we need to make cash flow this month.
- 1:08:09I know like we've, we've curved this out and like, we need to, so like, we need to get some inventory on the site so we can, we can have, we can, we can pay our, our trades on time and not like put ourselves in a financial problem.
- 1:08:23Then we have to do other kinds of financial stuff.
- 1:08:26So and that's a local optimum thing, right?
- 1:08:29So we like look at the job site over overall.
- 1:08:32I know, I know it's really important to get the, this operation and you're really into it, Thomas, and there's an entire system, entire project that we have to worry about.
- 1:08:41So there's a give and take.
- 1:08:43And we talked about that, that smart compromise.
- 1:08:45When we're talking about 5s in relationships, there is, this is, this is what happens in real life.
- 1:08:51You have to make some compromises.
- 1:08:53So it's, it's incredibly important to share your metrics.
- 1:08:58So if I'm the superintendent, I'd be like, I got this planned out.
- 1:09:03Here's the steps.
- 1:09:04Here's the logistic plan.
- 1:09:06If we bring in this, if we bring in this air handler, so the we can pay train or Marley or whoever and pay the mechanical trade with that bill, cuz it's, it's, it's probably a big ticket.
- 1:09:20Yep.
- 1:09:20Yep.
- 1:09:20So we can have some cash flow.
- 1:09:23We're not gonna spend the owner's money, not wisely.
- 1:09:26Right.
- 1:09:26We need, we need to have stay cash positive and be like, well, it doesn't work because we're doing this other thing, but you know what, like what if we set that thing there and we changed our schedule so we can put the dang thing on roof where it needs to go.
- 1:09:41Yeah.
- 1:09:42That, that would be like, you know what?
- 1:09:43And matter of fact, we need the thing up there anyways.
- 1:09:46That's we're just burning off work.
- 1:09:48Now we can do that later and we can, we can get that crane.
- 1:09:53Yeah.
- 1:09:54Both.
- 1:09:55Yeah.
- 1:09:56It's like, Hey mechanical trade.
- 1:09:58How much money did you have in your budget for hoisting?
- 1:10:01Yeah.
- 1:10:02Yes.
- 1:10:03We had this, this amount.
- 1:10:04Okay, awesome.
- 1:10:05Now give you change order.
- 1:10:07I'm spending, I'm now spending our owner's money very wisely because I'm not double paying for two cranes, right.
- 1:10:15One time.
- 1:10:16So, but if I wouldn't have known that as a project manager, if I didn't talk to the field operations staff and vice versa.
- 1:10:23There was no compromise.
- 1:10:24So we have to just share our metrics visibly and without redaction, this is hard cuz it's there's strategy, right?
- 1:10:32There's strategy.
- 1:10:33Yeah.
- 1:10:34There's a whole other conversation about, yeah.
- 1:10:36I'm not gonna go down that road.
- 1:10:38Drive poor behavior, right?
- 1:10:41Like when, when like it, it baffles me now back then it didn't.
- 1:10:45But now all of these players don't understand it.
- 1:10:49They all have the same goal to build the stupid building.
- 1:10:53Yes.
- 1:10:53But they're combating against each other.
- 1:10:55Cuz wait, I need to protect my budget.
- 1:10:57I need to protect my schedule.
- 1:10:58I need to pro like no, no, we need to build the building.
- 1:11:01yes.
- 1:11:02That's what we need to be doing.
- 1:11:04Yes.
- 1:11:04Yes.
- 1:11:05So I mean, yeah, the goal is to build a building, but if we run out of cash, we can't pay your trades.
- 1:11:11Yep.
- 1:11:11Then the trades go away.
- 1:11:13Yep.
- 1:11:13Yep.
- 1:11:14We're like, oh wait, we're not making payroll this month.
- 1:11:16All right.
- 1:11:17See you later.
- 1:11:18So, we have, so we have there's there's a business end of the thing that we have to understand.
- 1:11:24Yes.
- 1:11:24And we have to take that into consideration and that's what I wanna upset the experts again with w Edwards ding who I was wrong.
- 1:11:33He was, he was working in the fifties and sixties as a I think he was a consultant for the United States government mm-hmm but he wrote new economics in 1993 after the goal, by the way, 10 years.
- 1:11:45So well, Dr.
- 1:11:46Damon maybe took a lesson or two by Dr.
- 1:11:50Gold at maybe.
- 1:11:51But Dr.
- 1:11:52Deming, he derided traditional Western management techniques and said, and what he said was what we need is cooperation and a transformation of a new style of men.
- 1:12:01This is that.
- 1:12:02Yep.
- 1:12:03This is that.
- 1:12:03Hey, you got metrics.
- 1:12:05You've got a schedule.
- 1:12:06You've got a strategy financially.
- 1:12:08You got a strategy for operations.
- 1:12:11We gotta, we gotta talk about, we gotta use our words.
- 1:12:15Yes.
- 1:12:15Put stuff on like draw pictures on walls, like S-curves of cash flow.
- 1:12:20Mm-hmm and perhaps a Gantt chart or perhaps a sticky note or two yep.
- 1:12:25On the wall.
- 1:12:26So how can you control flow on your job site?
- 1:12:29Through the management of inventory?
- 1:12:31We just talked about that.
- 1:12:32Yeah.
- 1:12:32Well, yeah.
- 1:12:33Story.
- 1:12:35And I did it, this was a poor, like, it helped me understand we're doing a renovation of a brewery here in San Antonio and I, it was the first project.
- 1:12:45Wow.
- 1:12:45You know what?
- 1:12:45That was the very first project that out of the gate, myself, my project manager, we decided, okay, we're gonna do last planner system, full last planner system to the best of our understanding.
- 1:12:58And, and I know that that means something different to everybody that's doing last planner system out there and we're gonna do fives and I'm gonna do just in time delivery.
- 1:13:07Like we're gonna do all of these things on this project.
- 1:13:10And, and so I challenged my team.
- 1:13:13I said, guys, we are going to do this project with zero conexes, zero storage containers on site.
- 1:13:19And of course they, they looked at me cross side, cuz we're used to having six, eight damn storage containers, but they were all just dumpsters, right?
- 1:13:28Like dark and hot dumpsters.
- 1:13:31So we compromised and said, okay, we're gonna have one Conex.
- 1:13:35And what I did like this, this inventory management, we broke down all the work that we were doing.
- 1:13:41We had isometrics for every single, all this stuff.
- 1:13:43And I released material based on that.
- 1:13:45And I knew what we were gonna be working on the next week.
- 1:13:47So I would receive the material the, the week, the Friday proceeding.
- 1:13:52And it was just for the work that we planned to do next week.
- 1:13:55And it was, there was no bundles bundles of copper.
- 1:14:00It was all TA bagged and tagged specifically for an area.
- 1:14:04And this helped, right.
- 1:14:05We didn't have a lot of clutter minimized our time on the, on the, the buck hoist.
- 1:14:09Like it was clicking until we started, like, I don't know what it was.
- 1:14:14It could have been, I miscounted how much pipe, a particular package needed or it got left lane around somebody snagged it and took it to sell it like who knows?
- 1:14:24But we started running outta copper.
- 1:14:27I didn't have any inventory.
- 1:14:29So they were working and if they didn't install it exactly as I drew it per the ISO.
- 1:14:34So for example, if I drew in their nine inch and a half nineties, and they had to route it differently or didn't follow the isometric drawing, I didn't have an extra, yeah.
- 1:14:43I didn't have an extra and half 90.
- 1:14:45So what they would do is like, we go to home Depot every time I try to you got it.
- 1:14:50And so they would go to the package that we're supposed to be installing Wednesday or Thursday and pull scab out of that.
- 1:14:56And so at the end of the week, the weeks, like Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, we're smoking Thursday, Friday, we're sucking like, what is going on here?
- 1:15:04Why are we short, mature?
- 1:15:05So my takeaway from like, it, it helped minimize like deliveries.
- 1:15:10It was super awesome.
- 1:15:11Except for that, we, I had to get a small amount of inventory to be able to absorb those kinds of decisions that they actually had to make so that it wouldn't stop production.
- 1:15:23And, and it was the guys.
- 1:15:24And again, we are trying, it was like, we're gonna do everything that we ever read on this project.
- 1:15:30and son of a gun man, was it painful?
- 1:15:32And my team was like, Jesse, you're making our lives miserable.
- 1:15:35I'm sorry.
- 1:15:35We're we're learning guys like shut up.
- 1:15:37I don't wanna Yeah.
- 1:15:39No, but it's real.
- 1:15:41Yeah, actually that's that's So I, I was reading my notes cuz I had the same kind of realization.
- 1:15:49What I was figuring when I was doing my flow line or my line of balance studies, one of my notes is, put, put the cost of downtime on the balance sheet.
- 1:16:00That's the cost of downtime.
- 1:16:02That was that's my note.
- 1:16:03Yeah.
- 1:16:04And again, this was like early in my journey.
- 1:16:06I don't think I understand, but my next note on the next page, I said the cost of getting better should net less than zero, because if you do any improvement, it shouldn't, it shouldn't cost.
- 1:16:18It shouldn't be more.
- 1:16:19Right.
- 1:16:20Right.
- 1:16:20Like if, if, if you're, if you're, if you're doing process improvement and your, and your downtime or whatever, your metrics, your financial metrics are increasing your profit, whatever, all those, if they're not, if they're not increasing and your, your cost that operational expense of paying people to stand around.
- 1:16:40Yes.
- 1:16:41So what I did and I'll go back to my little walk up the hill study.
- 1:16:45Yes.
- 1:16:46Yes.
- 1:16:47Cause I was like, we have to maximize the crane, the hoist and the loading dock.
- 1:16:53Because all of these are fixed, these are all fixed.
- 1:16:56They can only be used in a, like the, especially the, the loading dock, because we had, we had rules about cuz we're on Howard street in San Francisco.
- 1:17:05We couldn't close all the lanes.
- 1:17:07So we're limited on the time we used that, that area.
- 1:17:11So I figured that out, I wrote it out and I time blocked deliveries.
- 1:17:16Yeah.
- 1:17:16And what I did, I came to the realization was when I did that flow line study, I also tried to figure out when they did the delivery, like the raising gang on the, and it created this little chart in Excel and it said the delivery.
- 1:17:30And then what, like what the, the expected production was that.
- 1:17:35So if it was steel delivery, it was number of pieces.
- 1:17:39If it was decking, it was square feet.
- 1:17:41If it was stairs, it would be number of number of floors.
- 1:17:45If it was, mechanical pipes, it would be number of floors if it was boom, boom, boom, boom.
- 1:17:51I went down, I created this little list.
- 1:17:53I was like, and I went from raising gain.
- 1:17:55So setting steel frame all the way through concrete placed.
- 1:18:00And then on the side of that, like, so I did the chart and then on the next thing I did was said every time it was some, something was planned to be delivered.
- 1:18:11Based upon this rate, there was a real date, cuz I knew the dates on our schedule when things need to be done.
- 1:18:17So I said, this needs to be delivered no, no later than mistake for us to make that.
- 1:18:22So I did a very, very simple calculation and this is probably some T trains happening in my brain.
- 1:18:28I was like, I need to know how much time it takes to drive a truck in, pick the, pick it up from the crane, drive it over and load it down.
- 1:18:37And so I started to look at the cycle time in the crane.
- 1:18:41So how long it would take to move on.
- 1:18:43I'm like, so I would talk to the crane operator and be like, how many moves?
- 1:18:48Cause he's, he's doing this stuff.
- 1:18:50Like he's making those and be like, Hey Brian, about how long are you doing action?
- 1:18:56And about how long are you just sitting there not moving mm-hmm and he, he was honest.
- 1:19:00He'd tell me.
- 1:19:01And I'm like, okay, this is cool.
- 1:19:04What we did.
- 1:19:05And this was like experimental we were like, what if I gave you.
- 1:19:09The loading plan.
- 1:19:11So like the, the crane operator was separate from the rest of the trades.
- 1:19:16Like they, I think the crane worked for the steel tors.
- 1:19:19Right.
- 1:19:19But then we bought time with the other trades.
- 1:19:22He was like, you can do that.
- 1:19:23And I was like, yeah, I'll give it to you.
- 1:19:25So I gave him the spreadsheet.
- 1:19:26I'm like, these are date the first week.
- 1:19:28It was like, he was like, this thing sucks.
- 1:19:30Like all, nothing worked.
- 1:19:31Of course.
- 1:19:32All of, all of your proposed delivery times, no one followed the rules.
- 1:19:37I was like, good.
- 1:19:38And it was really good feedback.
- 1:19:39Like he wasn't, he wasn't a pain about it.
- 1:19:42So I was like, okay, we need to have something that's more agile than Excel spreadsheet.
- 1:19:47And I print it out and I give it to him at five in the morning while he is climbing up the hoist or climbing up the crane.
- 1:19:53Yep.
- 1:19:53And at that time, Google calendar, ah, was kind of a thing.
- 1:19:58It was very early for me.
- 1:20:00And I'm like, I'm gonna create a Google calendar and we're gonna time block the, the loading dock.
- 1:20:07So everybody at 20 minutes, half hour, whatever it.
- 1:20:10And everybody got a color, but then if we made like minor changes, like, oh, this truck is stuck on a bridge or this truck like slide this up, slide this guy around, usually what normally traditional construction we'd talk on the radio.
- 1:20:23We'd be like, yep.
- 1:20:24Hey crane operator, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.
- 1:20:26And then that way they know, but I was like, no, we're gonna shoot it into his eyeballs from his cell phone.
- 1:20:31yes.
- 1:20:32Yes.
- 1:20:32And so do I, we, like, I made that note, I'm like, we need to optimize.
- 1:20:37Cause that was the bottleneck was the hoist.
- 1:20:39It wasn't the crane, the crane sent idle.
- 1:20:41The hoist.
- 1:20:41It was, was moving up and down.
- 1:20:43Yep.
- 1:20:44And when it worked yeah, but, but the loading dock was the bottleneck.
- 1:20:49So I'm like, we have to optimize there.
- 1:20:51This is the spot.
- 1:20:52Cuz what I was seeing was we weren't following the rules.
- 1:20:55We were not disciplined about the loading dock.
- 1:20:58We were just like, use it or lose it.
- 1:21:00I was like, Nope, no longer.
- 1:21:01This is no longer use it or lose it, your schedule.
- 1:21:04And we're, we're going to be very militant about and what we did, guess what we did said crane operator, he's got the hook, right?
- 1:21:12Yep.
- 1:21:12So if it wasn't your time, you don't get the hook.
- 1:21:15woo, woo.
- 1:21:16Yes.
- 1:21:18And Brian he's great guy.
- 1:21:22Probably still, probably sitting on a crane right now, but.
- 1:21:25He was, he was like, no, this is, you're not on the schedule, like go away.
- 1:21:30And yes.
- 1:21:31So yes.
- 1:21:32So that way we wouldn't back up or have major lulls.
- 1:21:35So people started to, once we were very clear that, Hey, when it's your time, you get the crane.
- 1:21:42No, no factor.
- 1:21:43But when it's not your time, it's not your time.
- 1:21:45Go drive around the city.
- 1:21:47go back when it's your time.
- 1:21:49And people align to that very quickly, very quickly.
- 1:21:53So then we got less downtime on the crane.
- 1:21:56We had this much flow.
- 1:21:58Like it, it, our increased this much more flow.
- 1:22:01So we did that for like a month and I was like, Hey, I just read this book about metrics and financials.
- 1:22:08Like, how are we doing in our, I guess it would be operational expense and inventory.
- 1:22:14Like, how are we doing against that?
- 1:22:16Like, cuz we're billing for inventory.
- 1:22:17I guess we're billing for throughput stuff is getting up into an install and we're like, our cashflow is ahead right now.
- 1:22:24I was like, mm-hmm, interesting.
- 1:22:26Interesting.
- 1:22:27Like I was like, I was probably like, I went home and I was all bragging about it, but oh yeah, head.
- 1:22:32But I was like, that is really interesting.
- 1:22:34So it was a minor experiment, but we found, it found its way to our financial.
- 1:22:41Yeah, because we did, we were, we started to get ahead of our original planned billing cycle.
- 1:22:47Yeah.
- 1:22:47Because of, of a little bit of Optim optimization.
- 1:22:51Yeah.
- 1:22:52Yeah.
- 1:22:52So it was the new economics.
- 1:22:54So that's, that's that's that's session one, by the way.
- 1:22:58Woo.
- 1:22:59If you wanna keep going, I could keep going, but I wanted to say, let's say this cause I wanted to go back to the theory of constraints and there's five steps.
- 1:23:07And we kind of talked about all of them.
- 1:23:08Number one, identify your systems constraint.
- 1:23:11You have to confront fear.
- 1:23:13You have a constraint.
- 1:23:14It's something you're uncomfortable about focus.
- 1:23:17Do action, focus, do action, focus, do action.
- 1:23:20If it's very, very, very, very threatening get professional help.
- 1:23:25Right.
- 1:23:26Talk to your vice president of operations or, or principles of the trade companies or the crane operator or yeah.
- 1:23:34Hoist operators or your safety personnel like or project manager, project like elevate, I guess that's the next step coming up here to decide how to exploit constraints.
- 1:23:46Right.
- 1:23:46Once you say like Thomas figured out the floating dock is the issue in this particular phase of the.
- 1:23:53Yep.
- 1:23:53All the downtime associated with the, the, the tower crane was wasn't being utilized enough because it was either we had a traffic jam of trucks or we had major windows of nothing.
- 1:24:06So we can, we can optimize that.
- 1:24:08So you have to decide how to exploit it.
- 1:24:10And the exploited example was Brian left the hook 400 feet in the air that, nah, not your time.
- 1:24:17you have to make that decision three subordinate, everything else to that decision, right?
- 1:24:24Yes.
- 1:24:24That's not like the, when plumbing four was like Thomas, all of your pipe for level 22 right here.
- 1:24:30It's right here, man.
- 1:24:31It's coming, babe.
- 1:24:32Load it right now.
- 1:24:32Why did it load it now?
- 1:24:34I'm like, no, it's rebar.
- 1:24:36This is rebar for 30.
- 1:24:38Yes.
- 1:24:39I guess it was that tall of a building.
- 1:24:40this is rebar for 28.
- 1:24:42That's and, and they're right behind you.
- 1:24:44So you have to drive around the flip block and get behind the rebar.
- 1:24:47That's the deal that, that is cuz it's for our flow for us to get into line.
- 1:24:54We have to subordinate.
- 1:24:56That means when you feel conflict and you feel anxiety, you feel pressure.
- 1:25:01You have to go back to your first decision.
- 1:25:03We're optimizing this, this this tower.
- 1:25:06Right.
- 1:25:06So , you have to be steadfast.
- 1:25:08That means steadfast.
- 1:25:09Like you have to not wave like hand.
- 1:25:12Good.
- 1:25:13So that's like, that's power, like being steadfast is being super calm in the face of university.
- 1:25:20That's power.
- 1:25:21Not being violent or like going around the corner and beating somebody up.
- 1:25:25That's not our, no.
- 1:25:27Right, right, right.
- 1:25:29And then if you're, if you get stuck on step three and you can't subordinate your decisions, elevate it, go level up, go two levels up.
- 1:25:38And you have to take, you can't hand the problem to your, to the person above you.
- 1:25:44but saying like, but you, when you come into that situation, figure out the issues.
- 1:25:49Do some study being like, this is the thing, this is the thing we need you to, we need a referee to make a decision so we can move forward.
- 1:25:57And once, once you get to that point and you make that decision it's leadership, yes.
- 1:26:03That is the leadership step.
- 1:26:04So if you, if, if, if you're a leader listening to this and somebody comes to you and they're stuck and they have, they've done the study, they have they've figured out the root cause they've, they've, they've talked to people.
- 1:26:16You don't make a decision.
- 1:26:17You put it back on them.
- 1:26:18That's bull.
- 1:26:19That's BS.
- 1:26:20Yes.
- 1:26:21You're a poor leader.
- 1:26:22yes.
- 1:26:23Yes.
- 1:26:24So like no BS with Jen and Jess.
- 1:26:26That's BS that we talk about straight you're confronted with a decision and you, and I'm not saying you make a bad decision or good decision.
- 1:26:34I'm not saying that.
- 1:26:35I'm just saying, if you put it back on the person being like, no, go figure it out or nah, or like, eh, or don't take action worse.
- 1:26:43Oh, that's BS.
- 1:26:45cuz that way you've just, you've just elevated the constraint.
- 1:26:48yep.
- 1:26:49You've not fixed it.
- 1:26:50You've not relieved.
- 1:26:50It you've just made it worse because now it's sitting in corporate land.
- 1:26:55That's how we lose trust in each other.
- 1:26:57And that happens.
- 1:26:58So if we can make that decision, if, if you get a, if you get a constraint that's elevated to you take it very seriously.
- 1:27:04And so the trick is the fifth step that Dr.
- 1:27:07Gold teaches us and he says, this is, this is inertia.
- 1:27:11And this is the new economics thing.
- 1:27:13Says, if all of those steps didn't work, you didn't remove the constraint.
- 1:27:17You've elevated to principles of companies.
- 1:27:20You've, you've done all kinds of studies and you've, you're stuck because of policy or a business deal or.
- 1:27:29Just, just some kind of red tape, tertiary thing.
- 1:27:32Yep.
- 1:27:33Yeah.
- 1:27:34It'll get stuck there.
- 1:27:34So , if, if that happens, you can't change laws.
- 1:27:38We can't get Congress to act fast.
- 1:27:41Right.
- 1:27:42It's so hard to get through red tape.
- 1:27:43If that happens, go back to step one.
- 1:27:45Yep.
- 1:27:45Okay.
- 1:27:46Go all the way back to step one and see like you're at the, you, you didn't find the constraint.
- 1:27:51You didn't go back to cause and effect cause and effect.
- 1:27:53You found a, you found a route, a problem that it was a business deal that we made, or it was a, you know, it's like a policy or it's a safety concern.
- 1:28:04Like, Hey, we need to get this crazy zoom, boom, contraption.
- 1:28:08That's really expensive to do this safely.
- 1:28:10Do this work.
- 1:28:11That's not the constraint constraint is we didn't design the work to be easily installed.
- 1:28:16Yes.
- 1:28:16That was the constraint.
- 1:28:17So, and it's not, it's not the budget.
- 1:28:19That was the constraint.
- 1:28:20It's our planning process.
- 1:28:22And so we have to go back to step one and start over.
- 1:28:26It's hard and it's it's but Dr.
- 1:28:29Gold rat says, do not allow inertia to cause a system of good strain what's inertia to you, movement or lack of.
- 1:28:38Right.
- 1:28:38Like, if I'm moving in a direction, there's just a natural, there's gonna take energy for me to slow down or divert my path.
- 1:28:46And so that's, that's the, that's when I feel the inertia.
- 1:28:50And so if I'm moving in a path of, eh, that's just the way it is, like, that's I gotta combat that.
- 1:28:58That's the inertia.
- 1:28:59It's the way it is.
- 1:29:01Yeah.
- 1:29:01That's the inertia.
- 1:29:02So when you're confronted with that and you get to that, it's really hard to make changes.
- 1:29:09Right?
- 1:29:09People dig their heels and when you get to inertia, so don't get resentful, don't get frustrated, go back to step one and look for new constraints.
- 1:29:19that's, that's the advice.
- 1:29:21And that's what they do in the book.
- 1:29:22They go back.
- 1:29:24And that's the next chapter.
- 1:29:26Wanna keep going one or two more?
- 1:29:28Well, before we go, I'm gonna say like, I don't know if you, you may not be able to, cause I'm listening to you and I've worked with you and I see the way you care, you represent and the way you show up, like these are all system processy things, but for the listener, like if you're not picking up on.
- 1:29:45Thomas' humility and openness, like the fact that he went and studied, watched from the hill and then went and talked to the crane operator.
- 1:29:56And when it talk, like knowing all of these processes and these laws is, is it's a only the tip of the iceberg, because if you can't connect with the human beings yes.
- 1:30:09Talking to Carlos, the decking foreman.
- 1:30:11Yes.
- 1:30:12You're like, Hey, we need all of your, your openings.
- 1:30:17We have to detail all of that.
- 1:30:19This a mold, they're building a mold for concrete, right?
- 1:30:21Yeah.
- 1:30:22So we need to close the mold and there's funky curtain wall dimensions.
- 1:30:27I call 'em critical dimensions.
- 1:30:28It's all that need.
- 1:30:30If you don't have the, what I mean by critical dimensions, if you didn't have the dimension could not, you're either gonna do it wrong.
- 1:30:35You can't move forward.
- 1:30:36Yep.
- 1:30:37So, and decking, they do all the detailing yes.
- 1:30:41Around open.
- 1:30:42So the, the mild steel, the, the rusty iron looking stuff that gets set around elevators and stairs, but around.
- 1:30:52Mechanical openings and other smaller openings.
- 1:30:55Oftentimes that's done with gauge metal or sheet metal.
- 1:30:59Yep.
- 1:30:59And that has to be, and that dimensions also have to be done.
- 1:31:03And so we have to give those dimensions.
- 1:31:06And at that time, the, it wasn't good enough.
- 1:31:09The big openings were fixed.
- 1:31:10Like we knew that as you can set that up, but this was an office building still being designed and developed.
- 1:31:17So changes were constantly happening.
- 1:31:19So Carlos and this gang got spread out.
- 1:31:22So they were having to go back, go back down.
- 1:31:24And we were working them on crazy hours, crazy hours.
- 1:31:28And they were getting, getting burned up.
- 1:31:29So then I was like, how are you guys slow?
- 1:31:31You're tired playing.
- 1:31:33And but when I went and I talked to them, he was like, Hey, when we cuz they have lots of gear, they have Nelson studs.
- 1:31:42Oh yeah.
- 1:31:42It's heavy.
- 1:31:43Right.
- 1:31:43And they have welding leads.
- 1:31:45Yeah.
- 1:31:45That's and they have welding machines, they have lots of stuff.
- 1:31:48And when they're done on a floor, they gotta get all that stuff off and move it up.
- 1:31:53Well guess who's in control of the hoist mm-hmm right.
- 1:31:56Boom me.
- 1:31:58So we had that conversation.
- 1:31:59I was like, yeah, You have a human being connection, that's it caring and about?
- 1:32:05And it wasn't about, Hey, we're behind schedule, blah, blah.
- 1:32:07We were ahead schedule at that point.
- 1:32:09It wasn't.
- 1:32:09It wasn't about being behind at that point.
- 1:32:12It was about now all of a sudden we weren't, we weren't panicked about time.
- 1:32:16Yep.
- 1:32:17Because we were doing optimal things.
- 1:32:18We were starting to optimize things and get things in the flow.
- 1:32:23So at that time, and I thank you for bringing this up because then it was like, we no longer have to look at things.
- 1:32:30We can look at people, human beings.
- 1:32:32Yes.
- 1:32:33And Carlos, seven days a week, Hey, a long, a big part of their when they go from Florida to floor, they have to take all their gear.
- 1:32:42And if they have to go back down, they have to take their gear from boom, boom.
- 1:32:46Yeah.
- 1:32:47Well, that's that?
- 1:32:48That's not right.
- 1:32:49like, no, that ain't cool.
- 1:32:50We do better.
- 1:32:51Like how can we do better?
- 1:32:53So saying, Hey, when we move our stuff, we need some help.
- 1:32:55We're like, Hey, I have some, we have labor.
- 1:32:58Like we have, we have, we can optimize a hoist and just monopolize it for decking team and just do that.
- 1:33:05When they, when they need to make their move, we can make it very, very efficient for them.
- 1:33:10So they're not sitting there waiting for hoist and stuff like that.
- 1:33:12And that happened with human connections conversations and observing their work in a, in a objective manner.
- 1:33:21Meaning like, I don't, I'm not going down to that floor and thinking that they're slow.
- 1:33:26I'm going down to that floor and thinking, how can I help them?
- 1:33:29Yes, yes, yes.
- 1:33:31That's that's what that's but that's it optimizing does.
- 1:33:35Yes.
- 1:33:36That's what optimizing does.
- 1:33:38All of a sudden, we're not arguing over lines on a piece of paper we're arguing about, Hey, we need a, we need a, I need to get a, a hoist at 1230 and park it on nine so we can load our gear and then take it up to 12.
- 1:33:53Yes.
- 1:33:53It's like, boom, put that on a Google calendar.
- 1:33:56We got so all of a sudden we didn't even only had it for the grain.
- 1:34:00We had a Google calendar for hoist, both cars.
- 1:34:03There's two, yeah.
- 1:34:05One color, one color.
- 1:34:06We had it for the parking parking or the, you know, the loading dock.
- 1:34:11Yeah.
- 1:34:11Where like we started to use colors.
- 1:34:15To designate it.
- 1:34:15Cuz you like, it takes too long to read.
- 1:34:18Yes.
- 1:34:18What's on the little time block.
- 1:34:20So use the color being like, oh the hoist.
- 1:34:22And it was like, the hoist was painted red.
- 1:34:24So we made the hoist blocks red, the crane painted yellow, made the crane yep.
- 1:34:30So it made it really easy.
- 1:34:33But yeah, like we all, the only way we did op optimizing was through study of the work.
- 1:34:40So we'd go observe.
- 1:34:41We would make, make human connections being like, Hey, was this, this seems.
- 1:34:45Seems to take a long time, or this seems to take you extra time.
- 1:34:48And we we're seeing that in our metrics, like our flow lines are colliding or we're getting behind in cash flow or those kind of things.
- 1:34:56Like we, we can start to see that.
- 1:34:58And once we do that, there is no blame.
- 1:35:00Right, right.
- 1:35:01There's no blame, right?
- 1:35:03No.
- 1:35:03Cause we can all redesign the work.
- 1:35:06We can redesign the work, the people period, period.
- 1:35:09Yeah.
- 1:35:09So step four.
- 1:35:11Yep.
- 1:35:11Yep.
- 1:35:11Your gold right.
- 1:35:12Go back.
- 1:35:13Or I guess step five.
- 1:35:14If, if you can't, if you're completely stuck and you're, you've run against science or law, go back and find a new optimization.
- 1:35:23Yeah, yeah.
- 1:35:24Yes sir.
- 1:35:25Well, I think we wrap on that, Tommy.
- 1:35:28Okay.
- 1:35:28Yeah.
- 1:35:29I think we actually did.
- 1:35:30Oh, here I'll do the visual.
- 1:35:32In terms of time covered four chapters, you can get a screenshot on my flow line.
- 1:35:37Oh, let's check it out.
- 1:35:38So simple.
- 1:35:40Maybe I'll take a screenshot and then I'll do a brief discussion and see if it works.
- 1:35:44This is my early sketch.
- 1:35:46Cause I didn't even know what was didn't.
- 1:35:48You can get it.
- 1:35:49No, come up.
- 1:35:50Oh, no, hang on.
- 1:35:52I'll turn off my Oh, here we go.
- 1:35:53Oh, damn it went away.
- 1:35:55I can see your fingertips.
- 1:35:56That's it.
- 1:35:56Give me a second.
- 1:35:57I'll turn off my background.
- 1:35:58Okay.
- 1:35:59Oh that's oh, there we go.
- 1:36:01I see it.
- 1:36:02Got it.
- 1:36:03Mm-hmm oh yeah.
- 1:36:05Full plan.
- 1:36:05Yes.
- 1:36:06So you see the inputs.
- 1:36:08So I was trying to be like, What you're seeing there as I was trying to think about, and I have very poor handwriting, but I was on, on one sheet.
- 1:36:19I was writing, what are the inputs to, to planning?
- 1:36:24Ah, schedule.
- 1:36:25This is our CPM schedule.
- 1:36:27So I said, I it's the business deal, right?
- 1:36:30Say what you want about CPM.
- 1:36:31They are linked to our contracts with business deals.
- 1:36:34We have to.
- 1:36:34Yep.
- 1:36:35Every, we have to be addicted to them and make them 5,000 lines.
- 1:36:39No, but we have to do that for business tickets required by contract, right?
- 1:36:43This is how the world works.
- 1:36:45yes.
- 1:36:45Two, the master schedule sets up your strategy.
- 1:36:49So if you have a, if you, if you do it very well, you can set up all your location, all your locations, all your location data is set up in your work breakdown structure in your, in your, in your P six gig.
- 1:37:01So you build in your location base.
- 1:37:03So that sets up your Y access.
- 1:37:07So now I have both and now I have my X axis in time and I have Y access in locations.
- 1:37:14So now I can, I can train a computer program or you can do even do an Excel, right?
- 1:37:19You can do it by hand back, like yep.
- 1:37:22Shout out to empire state building.
- 1:37:24They would chart it out by hand.
- 1:37:25But if you understand location and you understand time and you understand when things are completed, you can chart that out.
- 1:37:33Yep.
- 1:37:34And last planner system comes into play.
- 1:37:37So I wrote that one input was your poll plan, because there's not enough information in, especially that project.
- 1:37:44We didn't have tons of items in our master.
- 1:37:48But, but we had, it gave us, the structure, gave us our milestones to do poll planning.
- 1:37:53So the input to adjust our location data, because there wasn't enough information in our schedule to get more data points and finish plan starts and actual finishes.
- 1:38:06We had, we had to get the, the look ahead plan input.
- 1:38:10And then we also had our, what the cartoon input was our visual management system.
- 1:38:18So that was our zones.
- 1:38:20So we planned the work in vertical, in chunks based on, based on your production rate.
- 1:38:27So like a steel rectors, their columns were two stories high.
- 1:38:31So there their zones.
- 1:38:33So everybody was in that, that phase of work in super structure, you worked in two floor zones.
- 1:38:39And then if you were in mechanical or plumbing or H B a C, or most of the other trades, you don't work in two floors.
- 1:38:47You work one because you have you're installing stuff to deck.
- 1:38:50You're installing stuff to walls.
- 1:38:52You're working out one floor at a time.
- 1:38:54Yep.
- 1:38:54So the, your zone chain.
- 1:38:56So another input for that was was our cartoons.
- 1:39:00We call 'em cartoons, but other people would call them.
- 1:39:03I don't even know T trains yep.
- 1:39:06Color ups.
- 1:39:07And then the, the one on the right.
- 1:39:08I could barely read it, but it was it was our productivities.
- 1:39:13So it was our plan productivities.
- 1:39:14And we got that from our BIM model.
- 1:39:17So if we knew our, if we knew location and we knew, and we knew time, we needed to know the number of units.
- 1:39:25Yes.
- 1:39:25Number of, and luckily we had this project, this is why it was like, kind of like the golden era.
- 1:39:31We had really good VDC manager, Nathan, he would pull all this metric, not metric.
- 1:39:37He would pull all the quantities.
- 1:39:39Yeah.
- 1:39:39Yeah.
- 1:39:39Quantities out.
- 1:39:40Be like, this floor has 320 concrete.
- 1:39:43This floor has this many tons of steel.
- 1:39:46And it was like, yes, we can back into rates.
- 1:39:48Yes.
- 1:39:49Yes.
- 1:39:49Right.
- 1:39:50So only question we asked that pull plans was number of number of head heads, number of people.
- 1:39:56Yeah.
- 1:39:56That, so I was like, then we can, we can, we can back into productivity rates and we were damn close.
- 1:40:03Yeah.
- 1:40:03Looking and, and I did once the project was over, we, we did a couple LCI Congress studies.
- 1:40:11This is all published.
- 1:40:12We went back and we crunched the data and we looked at variation between plan and actual.
- 1:40:17And that's kind of another story.
- 1:40:18Maybe you go back and look at the, go, go back into the archives at LCI.
- 1:40:23But but the other input, the input coming in from the bottom, I don't know if you saw it.
- 1:40:29It says trade partners provide produ predictions.
- 1:40:33right.
- 1:40:33So we did the poll plan, but we actually, we, what we did was we figured out our rates and we had our pitch lines and it wasn't like, super, this was not, this was Thomas, like I'm from Nebraska.
- 1:40:44Like I don't, I'm simple.
- 1:40:46So we just had simple conversation, but we're like, Hey, can you predict based upon this information that I'm giving and we know about your rate of, of production, we know your throughput, we figured out throughput close.
- 1:41:00Can you predict where your next move is gonna be?
- 1:41:03And that, yeah.
- 1:41:05Tell we did that until we made that human connection because they know they know all of the stuff, they know how long it takes to roll up the leads this, right?
- 1:41:14Like this is if we don't, if we don't include our human beings into these production systems, they won't be accurate.
- 1:41:23Correct.
- 1:41:24They won't be accurate.
- 1:41:25They cause you're not including because there's a human.
- 1:41:28And that's what we learned in the goal was yes, you have a robot it's super productive and it just cranks out stuff, but it's only local.
- 1:41:36Yes.
- 1:41:36So the out, so those were all inputs and the output from doing all of that study was a six week.
- 1:41:41Look ahead.
- 1:41:42Yeah, we did this in Excel.
- 1:41:44Like this was nothing fancy.
- 1:41:45Yeah.
- 1:41:46And there was like, why don't you put it into this robust?
- 1:41:49I'm like, I don't have to, it's not gonna move.
- 1:41:51We're good.
- 1:41:52Right.
- 1:41:52We're good.
- 1:41:53Once we have optimized and we've done this now, I, now I know like, like Jason Schroeder does this in Excel.
- 1:41:59Now, you know why you don't need any logic once you've done all of that study and you put all your tax drains and it looks like a waterfall.
- 1:42:06The reason why that works is because it's super reliable.
- 1:42:10Yep.
- 1:42:10Super reliable.
- 1:42:11And it's not gonna move.
- 1:42:12And even if it does, it moves like little bit and you use your buffer, let, let put a buffer on the end of the buffer, eat it.
- 1:42:19Yep.
- 1:42:19Yep.
- 1:42:20And that's, and and we did the LCI Congress event and you can see our, our PPC just went skyrocketed.
- 1:42:28It went into, and I get the number cuz the number doesn't matter.
- 1:42:33It doesn't matter what the number is.
- 1:42:34I'm saying it was the same week after week after week after week after week.
- 1:42:40And, and we had some issues beyond our control, whether.
- 1:42:45There was some union rumblings at the time and you can see, and, and I charted it, the dates when those things happen as well.
- 1:42:52Mm-hmm , that's when we had the variation.
- 1:42:54Yep.
- 1:42:55yes.
- 1:42:55So the number, whatever our PPC didn't matter, I'm not gonna brag about it cuz it doesn't matter.
- 1:43:01The, the metric was that it was flat.
- 1:43:03Yes.
- 1:43:04So reliable and reliable when we got and the, the first, what are we in chapter 11?
- 1:43:11yep.
- 1:43:12I learned all of that in 10 chapters or at least learned how to like go look for stuff in the front half of this book.
- 1:43:20And that's why I'm so compelled to talk about it.
- 1:43:23Yeah.
- 1:43:23And, and I'm not saying it did happen on one project and it happened again and again and again.
- 1:43:28Yeah.
- 1:43:28It's every project is not the same because we didn't have all the optimizations.
- 1:43:33Right.
- 1:43:33Because other constraints, but I will say we found success and we, we were made incredibly reliable through those inputs and I'll word freedom again.
- 1:43:43So your, your visual visualization, you do pole planning, like last planner steps.
- 1:43:49You get quantities out of your BIM model.
- 1:43:52Get the actual quantities, actual quantities, linear feet of pipe.
- 1:43:56Yep.
- 1:43:57Tons of rebar cubic care is concrete.
- 1:43:59Get those, get those quantities.
- 1:44:01And then once you do that, go talk to your trades.
- 1:44:05Yep.
- 1:44:05have individual conversation with trades later.
- 1:44:08Iris Tomlin has this whole prescribed method that she would teach me to do this.
- 1:44:13This would be years later.
- 1:44:14Yeah.
- 1:44:14But but so then once you do all that, do your optimization only then do you print a look ahead?
- 1:44:23Yep.
- 1:44:23Look ahead.
- 1:44:23Plan.
- 1:44:24Yes.
- 1:44:24And after that, I mean, I think the last planner, they call that making work ready?
- 1:44:29Make ready planning.
- 1:44:30Yep.
- 1:44:30Yep.
- 1:44:31Because then you don't have to worry about making new schedules every freaking week for hours and hours.
- 1:44:36Now, all the, all of a sudden you have time to go look for other stuff.
- 1:44:40And like all of a sudden you can go to your baseball, Carlos.
- 1:44:44Hey, yes.
- 1:44:46We'll help you roll up your welding leads or, Hey, let's go to the baseball game.
- 1:44:51Yeah.
- 1:44:52Like go home.
- 1:44:53Let's go home.
- 1:44:54Let's go home before 9: 00 PM.
- 1:44:56Let's go home before 9: Let's go to my, my cousin's baseball game.
- 1:44:59Let's go home before 9: Now you can really do some really meaningful stuff.
- 1:45:01Let's go home before 9: Like, and we had, yeah, we would, we would have conversations yep.
- 1:45:06Let's go home before 9: About not work stuff.
- 1:45:07Let's go home before 9: Yep.
- 1:45:08Let's go home before 9: And so the, so my thing was what is the reliability?
- 1:45:13Let's go home before 9: The feeling it's a vibe.
- 1:45:15Let's go home before 9: It is a vibe it's energy.
- 1:45:17Let's go home before 9: Yes.
- 1:45:17Let's go home before 9: You can see it in 10 seconds.
- 1:45:19Let's go home before 9: Yes.
- 1:45:20Let's go home before 9: Yes.
- 1:45:21Let's go home before 9: You don't even see it.
- 1:45:21Let's go home before 9: You feel it.
- 1:45:22Let's go home before 9: Yes.
- 1:45:23Let's go home before 9: You feel it in the air.
- 1:45:24Let's go home before 9: So if, if there is, if you have flow and not like perfect Nope, no, cause won't have it.
- 1:45:29Let's go home before 9: But if you have flow, people are generally interested in fixing stuff.
- 1:45:35Let's go home before 9: Yeah.
- 1:45:35Let's go home before 9: Right.
- 1:45:36Let's go home before 9: Or being like, Hey, let's go study this issue or let's go talk to this third party.
- 1:45:41Let's go home before 9: Like they're generally people generally get in interested over that last, that self assessment I did to myself.
- 1:45:47Let's go home before 9: Right?
- 1:45:47Let's go home before 9: Yeah.
- 1:45:48Let's go home before 9: Like, Hey, let's, let's be optimistic at things and try it and see what happens.
- 1:45:52Let's go home before 9: Right.
- 1:45:53Let's go home before 9: Or on the flip side of the coin.
- 1:45:55Let's go home before 9: What's the, what's the indicator for, for, for poor, poor metrics or poor leadership or bad flow.
- 1:46:02Let's go home before 9: It's another vibe.
- 1:46:03Let's go home before 9: Oh, hell yeah.
- 1:46:05Let's go home before 9: Yeah.
- 1:46:05Let's go home before 9: That's the common vibe.
- 1:46:06Let's go home before 9: That's the bad part.
- 1:46:08Let's go home before 9: That's the most common vibe out there.
- 1:46:10Let's go home before 9: And what usually works in that environment is the loudest person.
- 1:46:16Let's go home before 9: Absolutely.
- 1:46:16Let's go home before 9: Yes.
- 1:46:17Let's go home before 9: Or leveraged deals.
- 1:46:19Let's go home before 9: Right.
- 1:46:19Let's go home before 9: We make leveraged deals.
- 1:46:21Let's go home before 9: And what I mean by leveraged deals is like, we will, we will pick favorites.
- 1:46:26Let's go home before 9: Yes.
- 1:46:26Let's go home before 9: And then everybody else is second, second.
- 1:46:29Let's go home before 9: And then start playing, pitting them against each other, like, oh yeah.
- 1:46:33Let's go home before 9: Like that's most of my career Thomas.
- 1:46:35Let's go home before 9: Yeah.
- 1:46:35Let's go home before 9: I've worked all over the United States and it's exactly the same.
- 1:46:38Let's go home before 9: I haven't worked.
- 1:46:39Let's go home before 9: Yeah.
- 1:46:39Let's go home before 9: It's, it's not that we mean to do it.
- 1:46:41Let's go home before 9: That's just how the system works.
- 1:46:43Let's go home before 9: Right.
- 1:46:43Let's go home before 9: Which we're all pitted against each other.
- 1:46:46Let's go home before 9: Cuz it's super complicated.
- 1:46:48Let's go home before 9: There's all kinds of moving parts.
- 1:46:50Let's go home before 9: And if we're not optimizing we'll have problems.
- 1:46:53Let's go home before 9: And if we don't face those problems because we're afraid of them and not because like we're scared, like we're weak.
- 1:47:00Let's go home before 9: It's that we are uncomfortable.
- 1:47:02Let's go home before 9: Cuz we have anxiety around confronting our issues.
- 1:47:05Let's go home before 9: If we don't confront those problems, they won't, they get bigger.
- 1:47:08Let's go home before 9: They did bigger and bigger.
- 1:47:11Let's go home before 9: Yeah man.
- 1:47:12Let's go home before 9: Awesome.
- 1:47:12Let's go home before 9: So take away folks, if you're listening, humility, be cool.
- 1:47:17Let's go home before 9: Talk to people.
- 1:47:19Let's go home before 9: And then at this last end, you're talking about how you, you collected the quantities, you collected the different inputs to create this beautiful plan.
- 1:47:28Let's go home before 9: And then you talk to the traits again.
- 1:47:30Let's go home before 9: Right.
- 1:47:30Let's go home before 9: And so I, I gotta go there.
- 1:47:32Let's go home before 9: I gotta hammer that because all of those other things, I think people are very skilled at.
- 1:47:37Let's go home before 9: They know how to like, okay, let me pull quantities.
- 1:47:39Let's go home before 9: Let me go count.
- 1:47:40Let's go home before 9: Let me go measure.
- 1:47:40Let's go home before 9: Let me do all those things.
- 1:47:42Let's go home before 9: And then they produce a.
- 1:47:44Let's go home before 9: They never talk to people.
- 1:47:45Let's go home before 9: It's hard.
- 1:47:46Let's go home before 9: That's the hardest step in last planner is that make ready planning session.
- 1:47:49Let's go home before 9: Yes.
- 1:47:50Let's go home before 9: Because you need, and it's hard because you have to gather all those people together.
- 1:47:54Let's go home before 9: Yes.
- 1:47:55Let's go home before 9: You need, you need iron worker, you need concrete, you, and like you have to get everybody focus together at the same time and care about each other.
- 1:48:04Let's go home before 9: Yep.
- 1:48:05Let's go home before 9: But what I, what I I'll say on that particular project, the, the stars kind of aligned and we got along.
- 1:48:12Let's go home before 9: And then, then all of a sudden it's like, it lowered the barrier of entry.
- 1:48:16Let's go home before 9: So when we did our trade partner, meeting our coordination, our make ready session, people gave us really good input.
- 1:48:24Let's go home before 9: Like it was really helpful.
- 1:48:26Let's go home before 9: And when we got that input, cheap code, the reason why it's hard is if we did all this work and we VDC was involved and we talked to like, we were, we talked to the accountants, right.
- 1:48:38Let's go home before 9: It's like we did all this work.
- 1:48:40Let's go home before 9: And then the trade was like, no, like I can't, I can't do that.
- 1:48:43Let's go home before 9: That doesn't, that doesn't physically work.
- 1:48:46Let's go home before 9: And Jeff Landry called me out in a meeting, Jeff Landry, Harrick, Harrick steel called me out.
- 1:48:51Let's go home before 9: And he's like, this, this is, this is wrong, Thomas.
- 1:48:53Let's go home before 9: This is, this doesn't work.
- 1:48:55Let's go home before 9: And I was like, damn, okay, go check.
- 1:48:58Let's go home before 9: But you know what, you know what we did, we changed it.
- 1:49:01Let's go home before 9: Exactly ex that's the, yes, you did all those steps.
- 1:49:04Let's go home before 9: And at that last point, if you don't change right.
- 1:49:08Let's go home before 9: Step, step five of, of theory of constraints, if you don't change and inertia happens, go back to step one.
- 1:49:17Let's go home before 9: Yes.
- 1:49:17Let's go home before 9: And so that's why, why make ready planning is so incredibly hard cuz it takes all that effort.
- 1:49:23Let's go home before 9: Yeah.
- 1:49:23Let's go home before 9: And at that last moment, that last planning moment yeah.
- 1:49:26Let's go home before 9: I guess the last plan would happen at the, at the huddle, but at, at a particular moment, if you don't make that modification to your plan, all of that is for wasted.
- 1:49:36Let's go home before 9: It doesn't matter.
- 1:49:37Let's go home before 9: It won't happen anyways.
- 1:49:38Let's go home before 9: You want an incredibly reliable plan.
- 1:49:41Let's go home before 9: You have to do all that stuff.
- 1:49:42Let's go home before 9: Do all that study.
- 1:49:43Let's go home before 9: Cuz you need all that information to make a determination and you have to give it to the trade so they can make a decision.
- 1:49:49Let's go home before 9: Yes.
- 1:49:50Let's go home before 9: In, in a very simple and easy to digest manner.
- 1:49:53Let's go home before 9: Yes.
- 1:49:53Let's go home before 9: And just throw worksheets at people.
- 1:49:55Let's go home before 9: So we have to use cartoons.
- 1:49:57Let's go home before 9: Yes.
- 1:49:58Let's go home before 9: And spreadsheets and graphs and charts and colors and patterns and all the, all the, all the focusing steps.
- 1:50:05Let's go home before 9: Yep.
- 1:50:05Let's go home before 9: Evaporating clouds.
- 1:50:07Let's go home before 9: Yep.
- 1:50:08Let's go home before 9: Once we do that and then we make the change.
- 1:50:11Let's go home before 9: So in the book they're like, we need, we gotta figure something out about this robot.
- 1:50:15Let's go home before 9: This is not this isn't this isn't the, this is the bottleneck.
- 1:50:17Let's go home before 9: This is the constraint.
- 1:50:19Let's go home before 9: Yep.
- 1:50:19Let's go home before 9: So in, in the next few chapter, They take steps to, to around the robot, which was a big no-no at corporate, at the HQ.
- 1:50:29Let's go home before 9: Right, right.
- 1:50:30Let's go home before 9: Yeah.
- 1:50:31Let's go home before 9: So that's the, that's the fear.
- 1:50:33Let's go home before 9: That's why I wanted to start with fear was like, when you're confronted with fear, you can take action.
- 1:50:38Let's go home before 9: Yeah.
- 1:50:39Let's go home before 9: And you can also focus, like these are two things you can do if you lock up or we revert back to our traditional methods, we won't get any better.
- 1:50:47Let's go home before 9: Oh, I love that.
- 1:50:48Let's go home before 9: Yeah.
- 1:50:49Let's go home before 9: I love the, had a potential client ask me, well, like, do I have a guarantee around, you know, the, the improvement that's gonna happen?
- 1:50:58Let's go home before 9: I say, yes.
- 1:50:59Let's go home before 9: So you, this is my guarantee.
- 1:51:01Let's go home before 9: I guarantee if you con, if you choose to leave things as they are, you are guaranteed to continue getting the results that you're getting.
- 1:51:10Let's go home before 9: that's my guarantee.
- 1:51:12Let's go home before 9: Oh, all right.
- 1:51:13Let's go home before 9: Well, we'll wrap it up next time.
- 1:51:14Let's go home before 9: We're starting on chapter 12, 12 chapter 12, baby.
- 1:51:20Let's go home before 9: It's Coleman.
- 1:51:21Let's go home before 9: .
- 1:51:21Let's go home before 9: Oh man, what did I tell you?
- 1:51:22Let's go home before 9: Like it's just the storytelling of what happened on the job.
- 1:51:27Let's go home before 9: , he never really said it directly.
- 1:51:30Let's go home before 9: But like his true care and compassion for the human beings and the discovery he had around connecting with the people out on the job.
- 1:51:39Let's go home before 9: Yes.
- 1:51:39Let's go home before 9: All the processes, yes, all the magical formulas.
- 1:51:44Let's go home before 9: But when it really came to life was right after he started really spending vulnerable, intimate, courageous time with the folks out there on the job and.
- 1:51:55Let's go home before 9: Y'all know me.
- 1:51:56Let's go home before 9: That's the way I roll.
- 1:51:57Let's go home before 9: It's all about the people.
- 1:51:58Let's go home before 9: People before processes, all the time, every time.
- 1:52:02Let's go home before 9: That's how you make the processes work.
- 1:52:04Let's go home before 9: So, man, I can't wait for the next one.
- 1:52:08Let's go home before 9: And we're gonna give a shout out to our LnM Family member.
- 1:52:11Let's go home before 9: I didn't get permission for this one, so I might get in trouble, but y'all know I'm okay with that.
- 1:52:15Let's go home before 9: This one comes from Ms.
- 1:52:16Let's go home before 9: Christine Fuentes.
- 1:52:17Let's go home before 9: She sent me a text and, and it just lights me.
- 1:52:22Let's go home before 9: Her text says, Started reading Lean in Love.
- 1:52:25Let's go home before 9: Uh, you and Jen, y'all's short term goal on page nine, and I had to let you know that I feel you have accomplished it said.
- 1:52:35Let's go home before 9: And the goal is to help enhance the quality of life for at least one person.
- 1:52:39Let's go home before 9: She says that one person.
- 1:52:42Let's go home before 9: Is her in a sea of many, Like I have tears already, right?
- 1:52:47Let's go home before 9: Like when I read it I was like, Oh my God, this is amazing.
- 1:52:50Let's go home before 9: She also goes on to say, I also am a working professional and care for folks in and outside of work.
- 1:52:57Let's go home before 9: I'm not giving myself enough credit, but will continue to work on those ripples of impact.
- 1:53:04Let's go home before 9: Thank you Christine.
- 1:53:05Let's go home before 9: Cuz yes, that is the goal to help one person and you and I have worked together and so being able to contribute into your life and, and you giving that feedback and letting me know.
- 1:53:18Let's go home before 9: Um, letting me and Jen know that we have helped you in some way is like the ultimate.
- 1:53:23Let's go home before 9: I appreciate that.
- 1:53:24Let's go home before 9: The only ask I have is that you pay that forward because you got plenty to offer to the world, and so does the rest of the LnM.
- 1:53:32Let's go home before 9: Family Keep on making them ripples of impact.
- 1:53:35Let's go home before 9: Let people know you care about them.
- 1:53:37Let's go home before 9: Let them know what you appreciate about them, and then the rest will take care of itself.
- 1:53:43Let's go home before 9: Thanks again.
- 1:53:44Let's go home before 9: Be cool and we'll talk at you next time.
- 1:53:46Let's go home before 9: Peace.
- 1:53:51Let's go home before 9: Oh my goodness.
- 1:53:52Let's go home before 9: You're either driving down the road or just so enthralled with, uh, with this whole podcast that you went all the way down to the very, very, very, very end of it.
- 1:54:02Let's go home before 9: And we appreciate you and just, we're going to take this as an indication of your dedication so we got a little special request of you, a call to action, because everybody tells us that like, you need to have a call to action.
- 1:54:15Let's go home before 9: So here's the call to action.
- 1:54:18Let's go home before 9: Be kind to yourself, go out there and share a smile with someone