Latest / The Inspired Stories Podcast / Matt Horine's Reindustrialization Mission: Building On-Demand Labor for American Manufacturing

Transcript

Matt Horine's Reindustrialization Mission: Building On-Demand Labor for American Manufacturing · The Inspired Stories Podcast

0:04
Welcome to another edition of the Inspired Stories podcast,
0:08
where leaders share their experiences so we can learn from
0:11
their successes and be inspired by how they've overcome
0:13
adversity. My name is Anthony Kotaspodi,
0:16
and today's guest is Matt Harine.
0:18
He is the head of Reindustrialization and Growth
0:21
Innovation at Variable. They are a software development
0:24
company founded in 2015. Variable provides an on demand
0:29
labor marketplace and workforce management platform helping
0:33
manufacturing and distribution businesses handle fluctuating
0:36
demand with more efficiency. During his time at Casper
0:41
Technologies, Matt spearheaded daily operations leading to
0:44
successful mergers and integration with commercial
0:47
partners. He also held key positions at
0:50
Intellicentrix, focusing on strategic growth there as well.
0:54
At Variable, he has played a critical role in managing
0:57
enterprise level engagement and developing market strategies,
1:00
resulting in meaningful cost savings and team expansion.
1:04
He draws on years of expertise to foster a culture of
1:07
innovation and continuous growth.
1:10
His passion for operational excellence and innovation makes
1:13
him a stand out leader in his field.
1:16
Before we get into all that good stuff, today our episode is
1:19
brought to you by my company, Add Back Benefits Agency, where
1:23
we offer very specific and unique employee benefits that
1:26
are both great for your team and fiscally optimized for your
1:30
bottom line. Imagine being able to give your
1:32
employees free access to doctors, therapists and
1:35
prescription medications. It even works for temporary
1:38
staffers. And here's the fun part, the
1:40
program actually puts more money into your employees pockets and
1:44
the companies too. One recent client was able to
1:47
increase net profits by $900 per employee per year.
1:53
Results vary for each company and some organizations may not
1:56
be eligible. To find out if your company
1:58
qualifies, contact us today at AD back benefits.com.
2:02
All right, back to our guest today, the head of RE
2:05
industrialization of variable, Matt Harreen.
2:07
Thanks for making the time to Share your story today.
2:09
Yeah. Thank you, Anthony.
2:10
Thanks for having me on. I want to make sure I got the
2:12
pronunciation of your last name correct.
2:15
That's OK. It's it's actually Horine, but
2:17
I've gotten it at several different ways so that that's
2:20
just fine. HORINE for those folks I know
2:25
that already want to go and look him up on LinkedIn.
2:27
Matt Horine glad we got it cleaned up.
2:29
OK, so tell us about the services you offer at Variable,
2:34
the non staffing staffing firm. That's a really good way to put
2:37
it. So you know, Long story short,
2:40
this is my second stent back at variable.
2:43
I, I started with the company about eight years ago in 2017.
2:48
I was there from then till 2021 and and I'm back because
2:52
variable is very different than what you would consider a
2:55
traditional staffing company or other marketplace company.
2:59
We are very focused on a specific vertical, which is the
3:04
umbrella term American manufacturing, but that covers
3:07
warehouse, logistics, distribution, operations.
3:10
And so we are an operations platform built for operations
3:13
professionals and that is really what makes us different.
3:17
We are not an HR tool. We are not something that is
3:20
used for a full time employee development candidate pipeline
3:25
or for basically matching headcount.
3:29
There's room for all that in operations, there's room for all
3:32
of that in business. But what we see is the idea of
3:37
this flexible on demand operator base, which is what we call our
3:41
workers that are able to be called in, in real time to
3:46
address your demand cycles, volatility, the macro
3:48
environment, whatever effects those in the supply chain and in
3:52
manufacturing. So if you're looking at your
3:55
business and saying we have a static headcount of 100 people
3:58
all the time, you're fighting everything from attrition to
4:02
your full time workforce to just finding people, which I'm
4:06
looking forward to talking about later about there being a labor
4:08
shortage. Our philosophy is there isn't.
4:10
It's much more about access and being able to bring people in in
4:14
a merit based system. And what I mean by that is the
4:18
operators, the workers are rated by the business and the business
4:20
is rated by the operators. And So what that does is in a
4:24
meritocracy drives performance, it drives operational KP is you
4:29
can address specific segments of your business through labor,
4:32
which is what we believe the fundamental constraint is in any
4:35
business. It's how do we use our labor
4:37
capacity to take on more orders, grow our business or just be a
4:42
better operational unit. And so that's at that very high
4:45
level how we differentiate from a temp staffing firm.
4:48
So good time to kind of talk about the play on words in terms
4:52
of the way your name is spelled. Variable is very able, so
4:57
VERYABLE. So I think tell me if I'm
5:02
getting this right, but variable, variable workforce,
5:05
right, you, you can kind of flux in and out depending on what
5:08
needs that you have. And then I don't know, your
5:11
platform makes it very able bodied people accessible to your
5:16
clients who need them. Yeah, it's spot on.
5:19
So it's, it's a play on words a little bit, but also the the
5:22
idea that labor traditionally has been viewed as a fixed cost
5:25
structure. And so this variation and demand
5:28
or variation and how you see and provide access to your workforce
5:33
is, is the play there. And it's something that you
5:37
know, makes a lot of sense over time if you've seen it in
5:39
practice. So conceptually I understand why
5:44
from your client side having access to a variable workforce
5:50
would be helpful, right heading into Q4, you know a lot of three
5:55
PLS, lot of warehouses, they have extra needs because of
5:58
everything that's going on with Christmas leading into Q4 and
6:02
probably part of Q4. Manufacturers have that same
6:05
sort of increase in need to be able to fill some of those
6:08
orders that are coming in. But on the employee side of
6:11
things, why would an employee want this sort of flex model in
6:17
their lives as opposed to no? I'm looking for a steady 40 hour
6:21
a week job that I can stay at for years.
6:24
That is a great question and it all ties back to the labor
6:28
access model that we see this through this that lens.
6:32
And what I mean by that is that there is a a big change in the
6:36
demographics and structure of the workforce meeting that,
6:39
especially in manufacturing. You know, the average age of the
6:42
American worker has risen over the past few years.
6:44
And people see that backfill need as something that is
6:48
business continuity, right? You look at it at the ownership
6:51
level, but at the employee level.
6:52
How do people go to work every day?
6:54
Well, over the past few years, there's been this element of a
6:58
gig economy mindset where people want to have a voice and be able
7:04
to choose what they want to do on a daily basis.
7:06
And that provides a few different benefits.
7:08
So one, it's more choice as the freedom to move about.
7:12
Our CEO and founder Mike Kinder has a great line about 1099
7:16
contractors being kind of the original state of man.
7:19
Like you're working for yourself, you're, you're doing
7:22
things and, and building an income and building and
7:24
providing. And so with that and the idea of
7:28
that, you get exposure to multiple businesses.
7:32
It's not the same thing every day, which in manufacturing
7:35
that's been the historical model where somebody, you know, like
7:39
my grandfather worked at ABF Goodrich tire Plant in Miami,
7:44
OK, for 35 years and loved it. And that was great.
7:48
But there was also some structural things around that,
7:50
some societal structure around that.
7:52
That's changed rapidly over the era of globalization.
7:56
That's not how it is anymore. And so people want choice.
8:00
They may be looking for it in a flexible capacity because
8:03
they're student or they're a single parent and they need a
8:06
different shift structure or they are somebody who is maybe
8:10
semi retired, but they still want to be involved in the
8:13
workforce and be productive. So those operator personas and
8:16
those those profiles are very different.
8:19
And we have people who use the platform for their full time
8:21
earnings. They do just variable.
8:23
That's what they do and they bid and go places every day
8:26
somewhere different. And we have some people who
8:29
augment and and kind of build their own schedule across
8:32
different apps or maybe their own full time employment in the
8:34
manufacturing space and they're picking up extra hours to earn
8:37
extra income. So that's the the key to it.
8:40
Where there is been this buzz around a labor shortage, we
8:44
think it has much more to do with access and being able to
8:47
say how can I do that, get more people into the operation when I
8:51
need them and how can it benefit my business.
8:55
So it's a win win in that regard.
8:57
And that operator profile is something that we're seeing take
9:01
place more and more common as as you know, we started in 201617
9:06
and it's becoming much more of a mainstay in the in the workforce
9:09
environment. What do you mean by the societal
9:14
structure being different now versus when your grandfather
9:19
worked for the tire manufacturer?
9:21
It's a really interesting, you know, structure that we see a
9:26
lot of remnants of in the hiring process where people say we want
9:31
people here, we want them to join our family, you know, which
9:34
is great. That's a great company cultural
9:36
attitude and aspect to have or we want people here for the long
9:39
haul. Over the past five years, you
9:43
know, in the pandemic time frame, you saw how volatile the
9:45
supply chain could be. All of a sudden that becomes a
9:48
business decision versus, you know, what you would like it to
9:51
be, which is a family decision. If it's a, if it's your business
9:54
and you view it that way. Overall, over the past maybe 30
9:59
to 40 years, if you look back at manufacturing before and some of
10:03
the other structural changes that have taken place,
10:06
manufacturing jobs historically came with pension structure
10:11
where they came with a series of benefits and and types of things
10:15
that help people build, You know, what we consider the the
10:19
wealthiest time frame in our country, which is where, you
10:22
know, you could support a family on a single income.
10:25
You could send kids to college, you could, you know, buy the
10:28
car, buy the washing machine, you know, be a consumer.
10:31
That was, you know, both mindful and in a way that was
10:35
structurally sound, financially sound.
10:37
And so now, you know, wages have stagnated in manufacturing, you
10:41
know, off the top of my head, those numbers, they haven't
10:43
really risen in comparison to other assets or other economic
10:49
indicators like asset bubbles or like real estate or, or those
10:52
types of things. They haven't, they've been
10:54
fairly stagnant for the past couple of decades.
10:56
And so people are finding ways to supplement and use their
11:02
skill sets and still have that, that drive people want to work.
11:07
And there's, you know, a lot of dignity in that.
11:08
And so people are finding ways to to get more benefit out of
11:12
access to different types of work without that old school
11:16
structure where people have traditionally said, hey, we can
11:21
be at this one place for the long haul because the world is
11:23
moving fast and things change very rapidly.
11:26
So I, I allude to that because it's so important, because I
11:29
think the lens of a lot of companies when they, they want
11:33
to hire, they do want to just hire and not have it be a
11:36
recurring problem. But it's, it's not playing out
11:38
that way. You'll see a manufacturing site
11:41
or a three TL like you talked about that seasonal work.
11:43
They're doing this because they're flexing up in real time
11:45
with their demand. They've got to have the labor to
11:47
address the business need. But once the demand, the down
11:50
cycle hits, they need the agility on the business side and
11:54
the worker needs follow on opportunities.
11:56
They can't hang their hat on saying I went to work for a 3PO
12:00
in this warehouse and you know, just because we got to the four
12:02
Q rush, it's not as stable beyond that because businesses
12:06
have a real need to to address their operational throughput and
12:09
they have a real need to address the bottom line and having too
12:12
many people at least a bad situation.
12:15
So that's where we see the match and where people now have follow
12:18
on opportunity and more access to do other things.
12:20
So functionally, the way this works from an employee
12:23
perspective is they go into the app and they will see different
12:28
opportunities that are available to them and they'll say, hey, I
12:32
would like to work at that place tomorrow and sign themselves up.
12:37
And then they just show up for work the next day and they get
12:42
paid. How often and from who, and what
12:45
did I miss in this whole process?
12:47
You're pretty much spot on. There's a couple of technical
12:49
details and I'll, I'll kind of work that process out.
12:52
So what they do if they work through the variable app again,
12:57
they're, they're contractors. So they sign up, there's a,
13:00
there's an onboarding process. So they go through a background
13:02
check, they, they go through other, you know, onboarding
13:05
features, basically set up their banking, do a couple of other
13:08
things to where we facilitate that match in the marketplace.
13:12
And then what they do from there is they bid on opportunities
13:15
that fit their skill set, that fit their geographic area.
13:20
So you're not going to bid on something that's 50 miles away.
13:22
You know, that's something that we've we've seen pretty common
13:25
in metro areas and they're going to bid on places that have good
13:29
ratings. So if your business does well
13:31
and treats operators well and is a great place to be, they'll see
13:34
that. They'll say, hey, this business
13:35
is a five star business or 4 1/2 'cause you, you, you know, my
13:40
Uber ratings, not, you know, perfect five star.
13:42
So we get, we get the feedback game and what the business sees
13:46
when these bids come in is a roster of names and real people
13:52
that have a rating that have a digital resume of where they've
13:55
worked through the variable app. So if they've worked at, you
13:59
know, 500 different OPS across 10 different businesses, they
14:01
can see how many OPS they worked.
14:04
They can see their skill sets, that their skill sets are valid.
14:07
You know, if somebody says they're a forklift operator and
14:09
they have 100 forklift OPS on their profile, it's it's pretty
14:13
certain that the market has provided that feedback in a way
14:16
that is validating from another business.
14:19
So it gives it that a surety. So that is the nature of how an
14:25
operator would go about bidding. And what over time happens is we
14:30
all have preferences. And so businesses build what we
14:32
call your labor pool, which is a group of operators who are
14:36
familiar with their business. And that business has said, Hey,
14:39
we'd like to call this specific person back on demand when we
14:42
have it at the real time draw, which lowers kind of the
14:45
onboarding time and cycle. They're, they're building the
14:48
arc before the flood is how we, we phrase it.
14:51
So they're able to draw on a group of people that are
14:52
familiar with their business and constantly refresh that pool by
14:56
bringing in new people through the app to basically rate them
15:00
and say, Hey, we want to add them to our roster.
15:02
I've often compared it to like a farm team in baseball.
15:05
Like if we had to call up somebody to the majors, we, we
15:09
know what team they're playing for.
15:10
We kind of know their general stats.
15:12
We know, you know, they're they're good at their position,
15:15
bring them in and address the demand.
15:17
And so that operator, what they're doing from their their
15:21
vantage point is they're raising their hand.
15:24
They're saying, I want to work at that time for that pay in
15:28
that role. And that is that goes far beyond
15:32
somebody who is just going to on board and see how they like it.
15:35
And then the company has sunk in, you know, a month of on
15:38
boarding costs and training and it didn't work out.
15:41
And for variable, if it doesn't work out, just end the op.
15:44
You know, that's and the operator will probably feel the
15:46
same way. Quite frankly, you, you get a
15:48
lot of honesty through a, for an open marketplace where people
15:50
say, hey, this isn't for me or the business can say that with a
15:53
little bit less structure around, oh, you know, I'm going
15:55
to hurt my attrition numbers or I'm going to hurt, you know, my
15:57
hiring perspective. So that's the difference.
16:01
And so then is there a scenario in which your client, the
16:06
company, the employer, like, you know, to use the farm team
16:11
analogy, they're like, oh, we really like these three people
16:14
out of the, you know, 40 that worked here.
16:17
We want to hire them full time here, Matt, let us pay you a a
16:21
fee because we're going to bring them in as AW2.
16:25
Yeah, the it's a question we get all the time.
16:27
And you know, our answer on that is good luck.
16:31
You know, if if you want to get married, that's fine.
16:34
You know, we're not a recruiting firm.
16:35
We don't we'll never send you a fee.
16:37
And we've had people do that often.
16:40
You know, people say I'm going to hire them and then they're
16:42
back on the platform. Both sides are back on the
16:44
platform within about 60 days because with the operator has
16:47
lost is the flexibility. They got married and they have
16:51
to be there for a standard shift.
16:53
There's no flexibility in the schedule.
16:56
You know, all of a sudden if they can't work a day now
16:58
they're taking vacation time, all that kind of buy in goes out
17:04
the window once you're an employee.
17:05
Now it has worked. I'm, I'm sure in certain cases
17:08
for the business. What that does is if you brought
17:10
in and you've changed the arrangement with somebody you've
17:12
grown familiar with and liked, you've changed the arrangement
17:15
on them. And so now you're getting a
17:16
different type of performance where it's back into that
17:19
traditional employee category. And that can be good or bad.
17:23
But for us, we, we say the real benefit is the flexibility that
17:27
both sides get where, you know, if you bring that person in 40
17:31
hours static across the entire week, there may not be any need
17:36
to address some type of productivity.
17:37
It may be a down week and they're sweeping the floor or
17:40
doing like, you know, kind of second tier stuff instead of
17:43
being really on the floor and then and, you know, addressing a
17:46
demand cycle. So it changes the dynamic a lot.
17:49
And you know, we're not hesitant to it.
17:52
We, our advice is don't do that. You know, you can put them in
17:55
your labor pool and they know that you've gotten positive
17:58
validation and they can be called back on demand.
18:01
But you once you change the arrangement, it's it's back to
18:03
the traditional employment structure.
18:06
Now I've had the good fortune to interview lots of different
18:11
employers and things have gotten better in the last probably year
18:16
or two. But I still hear from a lot of
18:18
folks that labor is really tight.
18:20
They use the term labor shortage and you've got a different view
18:24
on that, which you touched on earlier.
18:25
Can you explain in more detail? Yeah, I so there's a couple
18:29
layers to that, you know, 1 is that the manufacturing sector
18:35
has been in a, what I would call a recession for the past couple
18:38
years. There's been a lot of tap
18:41
dancing around that on the national level around.
18:43
We don't want to call it a recession.
18:44
You know, we don't want to spook investors or Wall Street or we
18:47
don't want to, you know, call things like they are.
18:50
But if you've been on the shop floor, you know, things have
18:52
been very different and the demand cycles are not what they
18:57
normally are. You know, you'll see some
18:59
businesses that have a traditional seasonal rush.
19:03
It's not there, but then something happens, you know, a
19:05
couple months outside of that and all of a sudden they spike
19:08
in demand for, you know, so that's that's one layer of it.
19:13
And the second piece of it is the labor shortage.
19:17
There's a lot of talk about talent and what people want
19:20
people to do for them. And that is squarely putting
19:24
something, you know, in a neat little box that says this is how
19:30
it's always been. And the world is a lot more
19:32
dynamic than that. So, you know, HR professionals,
19:35
even operations professionals know that their business is not
19:39
what it was five years ago. It's not what it certainly not
19:41
what it was 10 years ago. And it certainly won't be that
19:44
way next year or the over the next 5.
19:47
So the flexibility is really where we talk to a lot of our
19:51
business partners and say you've got to have some agility in the
19:55
operation. You can't just look at I need a
19:58
head count of 100 and I have to hire to 100 and maybe have, you
20:01
know, a reserve of 10 people I could hire at some point.
20:05
It's much more fluid than that. People are facing real life
20:08
challenges, you know they get the opportunity to.
20:11
Move on to a different position and in the hourly world, you
20:14
know, a couple dollars here or there is something that's a
20:17
mover and you see it a lot in, you know, geographic areas.
20:20
We have one, one business in Texas.
20:23
I won't won't say who, but there were five kind of manufacturing
20:26
plants in the same neighborhood and they were essentially, you
20:30
know, trading workers almost in a price war.
20:32
Like the hourly work dollar amount kind of went up, you
20:35
know, incrementally $0.50 at a time.
20:37
And you'd see the shift. And our perspective on that was
20:39
like, you guys need to make it flexible, you know, post for it
20:42
when you have actual productivity, address your
20:44
demand and, you know, you could pay them that.
20:47
And then when there's not any work, they're getting it
20:48
somewhere else in a totally different, you know, vertical.
20:51
So we again, yeah, I can't emphasize it enough.
20:54
It's about access to the system. And for too long, people have
20:57
been kind of boxed out by that 40 hour work week where they're
21:00
punching their, their time card. It's way more dynamic than that.
21:04
And so it's, it's a lot of fun. One other thing, you know, that
21:07
I should add here, it's a huge opportunity to upskill, huge
21:11
opportunity. And people, you know, one, when
21:14
we talk about worker shortage, it may have to do a lot with
21:17
labor utilization. If you're bringing a welder in,
21:21
people will tell me all the time they can't find welders or they
21:23
can't find CNC machinists. They've got some on staff, but
21:26
they need more. How much time under the hood is
21:28
that welder actually doing his job?
21:31
I've been into a lot of shops where they're not, they're
21:33
loading, they're prepping, they may be sweeping the floor.
21:35
They may be helping load a truck.
21:37
That's a welder that's a high skilled person who has been kind
21:39
of formed out to take care of things around.
21:42
They they want to stay busy, you know, and productive.
21:44
But if you bring in flexible labor to essentially address
21:48
those things that are sitting around the welder, you have
21:50
increased that welders up time and you've kind of addressed,
21:54
you know, other things that are going on. 2nd that that group of
21:57
people who've come in to do that are now getting exposure to
22:00
different parts of the operation.
22:01
And we've seen people move up from, you know, what would be
22:03
like a $12.00 an hour warehouse helper into a little bit more
22:08
specific machine like a pipe grooving machine.
22:10
And you've moved up not only in wage rate for that that
22:13
operator, but in skill rate. And they can take that person on
22:17
a journey through the business to learn their business better
22:19
and to get the skills that they're looking for.
22:22
You've got a bit of an unusual job title, Matt, head of
22:27
reindustrialization. I don't know that I've seen that
22:30
before. What does it mean?
22:31
Yeah, that's a, it's a really good question.
22:33
I get, you know, I'll get some inbound spam emails that say,
22:36
Matt, we're talking to heads of reindustrialization.
22:39
You might want to do a little research.
22:40
I'm the only one. If there's another one out
22:42
there, please, you know, reach out to me.
22:44
This is my my call for it, but it's a very specific title for
22:49
our organization because we believe in American
22:52
manufacturing. We believe in this larger
22:55
reassuring and reindustrialization moment
22:57
that's going on in the country. And we have been saying it for a
23:00
long time. You know, this goes back, you
23:02
know, eight years ago where we believe that the United States
23:07
should be building our industrial base from the
23:11
position of it's a national security issue and something
23:16
that starts on the shop floor. So the capabilities that we see
23:18
in manufacturing, this is, you know, goes a lot of the
23:21
reindustrialization talk that we see is specific to the defense
23:25
sector or, you know, something, you know, bigger like advanced
23:29
manufacturing. It's the shop for its suppliers.
23:31
It's people who are trying to make and build here for a long
23:35
time. Labor arbitrage, you know,
23:37
'cause that to be offshored, you can find cheaper labor, you can
23:40
find cheaper material. We think that that can be done
23:44
here because the the era of globalization has shifted back
23:48
to where, hey, we're paying a lot of money to basically have
23:50
something shipped over here. We're paying very low wages, but
23:53
we're paying a lot of money to move it and put it at at risk in
23:55
jeopardy. We saw it during the pandemic,
23:57
especially all of a sudden, you know, things like toilet paper.
24:00
It's like, where do we get our toilet paper from or where do we
24:02
get our Tylenol from or where do we get, you know, a lot of these
24:06
things that we use in everyday life?
24:08
And so reindustrialization to us is talking about the supply
24:11
chain and compressing that and bringing it back to America,
24:15
which is, you know, who we serve as the American manufacturer and
24:18
the operational people out there who make it happen every day.
24:21
And so that's, that's our overall goal is to see a
24:23
stronger manufacturing sector. And so taking the buzzword out
24:27
of it, I used to joke about reindustrialization was kind of
24:29
like the, the dark alleys of X. You know, people were talking
24:32
about this in the back, you know, and it's come to the
24:35
forefront. But specifically what it means
24:37
for variable is how do we bring our supply chain back and how do
24:40
we get the the labor question solved?
24:44
Because it's not, you know, if it's your labor problem or if,
24:48
if you're, if you're having an issue, it's either labor or it's
24:52
a supplier. And if you go down that chain,
24:54
that almost decision tree like structure, if it's your
24:56
supplier, it's probably your supplier's labor problem.
24:58
They're not able to flex and take on more orders or have
25:01
capacity to, to do anything different than what they're
25:03
already doing. So that's over our overall what
25:07
we would probably describe it as.
25:09
So obviously you guys would benefit from bringing more
25:14
manufacturing back to the States and you are in the process of
25:19
supporting that as well by making that, you know, difficult
25:23
to find and fluctuating labor needs fit with your your
25:28
clients. Is there a deeper role for you
25:31
guys to play? Are you, you know, is there
25:33
something I don't know from a political or a legal or a, you
25:37
know, tariff perspective that you guys get involved with?
25:41
Yeah, I think there's there's a lot of that.
25:43
I think it's a one. You see a lot of people in the
25:46
market now talking about this reindustrialization movement and
25:53
effort and where we see ourselves as addressing the
25:57
fundamental, you know, root cause of what may have caused,
26:01
you know, more globalization or, you know, what's the challenge
26:06
in bringing it back. We believe that answer is labor
26:09
access. So, you know, back to what we
26:10
were talking about earlier, most people are looking at this from
26:18
the standpoint of I buy my materials from overseas or I
26:23
don't know where to look for my materials within, you know, a
26:28
domestic market. And so we have a lot of people
26:31
as a marketplace who are participating on a daily basis
26:34
by posting OPS for for labor where we say, how do we help
26:39
these customers talk to each other?
26:41
How do we get people? You know, one of the big
26:44
challenges we've heard, and it's it's kind of anecdotal, but a
26:47
recurring theme that I've seen is I try to call AUS based
26:50
supplier and I can't get somebody to answer the phone or
26:52
it's kind of structured in a way that there is a built in process
27:00
of ordering something. I hear a lot about it in the
27:02
metal space that there's like a service center you have to buy
27:05
from. You can't go buy straight from
27:06
the mill. So we look at this from the
27:09
perspective of how do we reduce bureaucracy?
27:12
How do we make things flatter, you know, in an organization.
27:15
That's why we talked to the operations groups in these
27:18
companies because the OPS guys know, you know, HR is great.
27:22
They are looking to fill headcount, but the operations
27:25
guys say I don't need 20 guys standing around or I need 20
27:28
more people, you know, in this operation over the next 72 hours
27:32
because we had this order fluctuation.
27:34
And so being faster. That's I think what
27:36
reindustrialization has to be about, taking down the red tape,
27:41
you know, the bureaucracy around how we hire people, where we buy
27:44
from, you know, some of the regulatory requirements that are
27:48
placed on businesses. You want to keep it safe and,
27:51
and keep everything, you know, on the up and up.
27:52
But being able to move fast means that you can't have those
27:55
constraints around you. And, and we view Labour as that,
27:58
that fundamental path. So you think that is one of the
28:02
core bottlenecks that up until now has been preventing to some
28:07
degree anyways, more manufacturing take taking place
28:10
here in the States? For sure.
28:12
I think it's it's, it's a recurring theme because it is
28:15
true in a lot of ways. I think that, you know, there's
28:21
a, a skills gap, there is a, you know, the people gap that people
28:28
talk about. It's real, but it's, it's
28:29
addressable and that's the difference that we see.
28:32
So, you know, one, a lot of businesses talk about investing
28:38
in, you know, training and those types of things.
28:43
They go to the Chamber of Commerce or they go to, you
28:46
know, some type of local authority and say we need people
28:49
that can do XYZ. That in this day and age means
28:52
there's got to be skin in the game.
28:54
And so for our model, it makes a lot of sense that if you're
28:58
bringing people in on an on demand basis and you're
29:00
upscaling and you're assessing and you're rating, you know,
29:03
you're building that meritocracy.
29:05
There is a lot more buy in from the worker side, the operator
29:08
side on in our case and there's more buy in from the business
29:11
saying I want to keep that person here and they're getting
29:13
paid. You know, on you had this
29:16
question earlier, they do get paid daily, which is part of
29:18
that faster theme that we were talking about.
29:23
So you're doing it at a pace that doesn't say I have a gap,
29:27
but I'm trying to do it the old way.
29:29
I'm trying to do it where I bring somebody out of a, you
29:32
know, technical school or I bring somebody straight into the
29:34
shop floor. And I can expect that they're
29:36
going to stay here for a decade or longer.
29:38
If you break down those walls and say they're just going to
29:40
want to be here because this is going to be so great and
29:43
awesome. And they're earning and they're
29:44
upscaling and they're increasing, you know, their,
29:47
their value. That's how you build the
29:51
structure for, you know, what we think is like the model for the
29:53
21st century. It's very different than than
29:55
what it was even 1020 years ago. So all those things do exist,
30:00
but they exist in a way that they are addressable and
30:02
fixable. So even if we're talking about
30:05
somebody who's making $18.00 an hour here in the States, you
30:08
know, there are Asian markets where $18.00 would actually
30:13
represent a really nice daily wage, right?
30:16
So I see how you know variable is solving a component of this,
30:23
but where else do you think help is needed to bring more
30:27
manufacturing back here? It's a really good point because
30:31
a lot of what this theme, you know, centers on is
30:35
globalization. And there's a lot of different
30:39
ways to to slice that up. But you you hit on the most
30:43
important one, which is labor arbitrage and moving production
30:47
and manufacturing to low cost countries.
30:49
From the the wage rate perspective, what happens there?
30:52
If you take a look at China over the past 20 to 30 years, their
30:56
wage rates have risen to the point where a lot of things are
30:59
moving to, you know, Vietnam, Thailand, other places in
31:03
Southeast Asia where it was like it was in China 20 years ago.
31:08
And the ultimate problem with that is that, you know, one, in
31:12
China's case, particularly, you are building the economy and
31:18
infrastructure around what we can perceive as a geopolitical
31:20
foe. You know, I, I don't want to,
31:22
you know, point fingers or, or do anything like that.
31:24
But what I, what I mean by that is that they have a goal for the
31:27
21st century to be, you know, a superpower, which, you know,
31:32
they, they are there or they're near there.
31:34
And we helped build that by outsourcing our own industrial
31:39
capacity and what's happening now through tariffs, which are
31:42
just levers to pull, you know, to basically, you know, flatten
31:46
in a reciprocal way, trade back and forth.
31:50
You're seeing people move out of China to go to third party
31:53
countries and they still maybe running things through China,
31:56
but it's going to other countries and coming back to the
31:59
United States. So they're chasing the wage
32:01
rate, which is great. You know, I, I'm all for, you
32:05
know, developing countries and countries that are in that
32:07
position raise the standard of living in their own countries,
32:10
But there's also this element that you will continuously chase
32:14
that over a period of time. That's a never ending cycle.
32:16
Eventually, if you get to, you know, 20 years from now and you
32:20
look at these third party countries that are taking on a
32:23
lot of the, the work because China's wage rates have risen,
32:26
risen, or, or whatever the reason, they will be in that
32:29
same position 20 years from now. And so you'll be chasing the
32:31
next low cost center until eventually you've kind of
32:35
hollowed out. You know, it starts here.
32:38
You know, we've seen a hollowing out of the manufacturing sector.
32:40
It will happen in China. It's just a matter of of time
32:44
and and cycles and then it will happen in the next place.
32:46
And So what you do by that is you look at our industrial base
32:52
and you say how do we do this in a way that increases
32:55
productivity of the worker. It maintains a standard wage
32:58
rate and it helps the business in a way that they can take on
33:04
more business and have, you know, some type of continuity
33:07
where they're highly productive and where they're paying a good
33:11
wage to workers in the manufacturing space.
33:13
And that's a good example of that is textiles.
33:15
Textiles over the past 30 years have become what I would
33:22
consider in the US 10 times more productive than they would have
33:25
on machines from the 80s or 90s. And that means, you know, for
33:29
every 10 workers, maybe there's one or two workers, but those
33:31
one or two workers are maintaining the wage rate of,
33:34
you know, $25.00 an hour or whatever the the current number
33:37
is. And so you build that out by
33:40
building more of that. And so there's more of it, which
33:43
increases, you know, I, I don't hate the point to GDP, but you
33:46
rebuild the textile industry. It's not as many jobs as it was
33:50
before because there's not a, you know, 100 workers sitting on
33:52
the floor at the sewing machines.
33:53
There are, you know, 5 to 10 highly productive, highly
33:57
skilled workers who are making a good wage and turning out
34:00
product that is of the highest quality.
34:02
And so that is kind of how you rebuild the structure, you know,
34:06
going forward, it's never going back to the way that it was.
34:09
It was chased to China for that reason because the wage rate was
34:12
low and you could have 1000 workers on the factory floor and
34:16
that was a a lift for them. But you know, there without the
34:20
transfer of that. And what that I I think one
34:22
other important thing here is to say, you know, 10 years ago, the
34:26
learn to code mentality was, was very common.
34:29
People were saying that. And now we're looking at an
34:31
environment where American software engineers are are
34:35
having trouble coming out of college finding a job because of
34:38
AI. So you kind of say this thing of
34:41
the past, it's not going to be that way anymore.
34:44
You have to learn to do this. And the time cycle is getting
34:46
shorter. That was 10 years ago.
34:48
And we're now in a position where AI is doing, you know, XYZ
34:52
and we have software engineers that are having trouble finding
34:54
work. So you have to build these
34:55
things to last, and you have to build them in a way that
34:57
increases the productivity of American businesses and pays for
35:00
the worker. OK.
35:02
Let's stick a pin in that. We may come back to that topic,
35:05
but I want to better understand how it is you guys approach your
35:09
own growth. I'm assuming with your model,
35:12
you know it's sort of a chicken egg like you want to go, you
35:16
know from Houston to I'll make it up Austin.
35:19
We want to be in the Austin market now and maybe you guys
35:22
are already there, but you know you need obviously a client base
35:27
there, right? You need one or more
35:30
manufacturing, three PL. you know, warehouse companies and
35:34
then very quickly you need to find the labour to help support
35:39
them. So talk to me about how you
35:42
approach that process of of identifying new markets and how
35:46
you go in there. It's a very interesting dynamic
35:52
because it's a dual sided marketplace.
35:54
The fundamentals of supply and demand apply here.
35:58
So like in in most places in life.
36:00
So if I were to go into a market, one, we view a
36:04
geographic market as something that has to be supported by a
36:08
team. You know, it's supported by by
36:10
people who are helping operationally coach businesses
36:14
on the way to do this. This is not AB to B SAS concept.
36:18
It's not something that you're going to call, you know, a call
36:22
center as a business and hope to get an answer on how you work,
36:25
you know, your operational platform through variable.
36:28
You have to have people who know the market.
36:31
You know, a good example of that is Detroit famous for being
36:36
automotive, Houston, famous for oil and gas.
36:39
You know, you look at those kinds of, of sectors, the
36:42
fundamentals of manufacturing still apply and, and what I mean
36:44
by that is that type of work, you know, you have to build
36:52
layers to it where the operator, the worker has choices where
36:57
they can bid on work and the businesses have to have peers in
37:00
the market that are also participating in it in order to
37:03
build it up. So if I'm a business and I'm
37:06
posting and I'm getting all new operators all the time, I'm the
37:09
initial assessment every time on that, that person, it doesn't
37:13
work that way. So the parity of it is if I'm
37:17
working in a more mature market and I can look at an operator
37:20
profile and say this person has worked 20 OPS at three different
37:26
kinds of businesses, that is the validation that kind of builds
37:30
the marketplace. And so, you know our growth has
37:34
been fueled by we are US based, we're in our marketplaces.
37:39
In some cases, we could support remotely.
37:42
You know, those are all yeah, in today's world, it's it's almost
37:44
required. But in the sense that we are
37:47
going to teach the business how to leverage this as an
37:49
operational tool versus just a product where it's not like an
37:53
Uber launch. You know, it's not something
37:55
that if you remember back, I think Uber's everywhere now.
37:57
But you know, a decade ago, Uber was launching in Dallas, where
38:02
they were launching in, you know, Phoenix or whatever the
38:04
city. They were doing that and they
38:07
were supporting all of it from you're probably their San
38:10
Francisco headquarters from a a bigger capacity, but they had to
38:12
have just drivers and supply in the market.
38:15
Businesses are local, their problems, their challenges are
38:19
local and their success is local.
38:22
So that's that's something that we believe is fundamental about
38:26
American manufacturing. And so building that supply
38:28
demand parity is, is critical for for our business model.
38:33
And so how many markets are you in now?
38:35
We're in about 30 across the US, so primarily in Texas, the
38:41
Southeast, the Midwest and a little bit in the Northeast.
38:45
A lot of that has to do with the demand of those areas with with
38:50
manufacturing. It also has to do with you know
38:54
the regulatory environment. Is this something that we think,
38:56
you know, from a regulatory environment and from the
38:59
perceived the perception of the businesses regulatory mindset?
39:04
Can they do it? And those places have, you know,
39:07
just like in manufacturing, they've led on that.
39:09
So it's something that we see as very different in every region
39:15
of the country. Like I was mentioning earlier,
39:18
you know, you look at the Midwest, which is the heartland
39:20
of American manufacturing, they do a lot more automotive than
39:24
they do in, you know, say Texas. There's a couple plants here in
39:27
Texas, you know, not to, you know, cast them aside, But so
39:32
those are the places where we see the demand for this type of
39:34
American manufacturing in this type of model.
39:37
Are you in Columbus, OH? My home?
39:38
We are. We are in Columbus, OH.
39:40
OK. So when you first came here, I'm
39:42
going to guess the first thing you have to do.
39:44
You got to find the clients, right?
39:45
You need one client. Do you need two or three?
39:48
Is it important to you that you have multiple stakeholders?
39:51
It is. And So what you know ends up
39:55
being the the smoothest path to what I would call like a market
40:00
launch is usually driven by some type of demand.
40:03
And we have a lot of business users that have locations across
40:06
the country. So if you look at a distribution
40:09
network or you know three PL. or you know any type of major
40:13
supplier, they have locations and they say what's good in you
40:17
know in Dallas or Atlanta is good for Columbus, OH when we
40:20
have a plant there or we have a, a facility there.
40:23
And so we we have built so much depth and traction with a lot of
40:29
our business users in other parts of the country that they
40:32
ask about the next region of the country.
40:34
And once you get a couple of those and of course that's all
40:37
new, you know, kind of blue ocean, if you, if you go to a
40:41
new market, there's infinite amount of potential new
40:44
entrants. You can start out with
40:46
businesses who know your model and you're standing up a market
40:48
and you're building that supply demand balance.
40:51
And so that's that's been generally our path and and how
40:55
you know our customers, we follow you know the customer and
40:58
we follow the business demand for it and that has worked out
41:01
very well. And then in terms of finding the
41:03
workers, I don't know, you're running like Facebook, TikTok
41:06
ads to try to recruit people. I, I don't know if we're, I, I
41:10
don't know about TikTok. I, we, and that might just be a
41:13
thing for me. I'm, I'm not on TikTok.
41:14
We could be. But you know what?
41:16
This started out as very early days was almost like traditional
41:20
recruiting saying, Hey, we've got this platform, this is how
41:24
it works. Would you be interested in in,
41:26
you know, making a living this way?
41:28
And people signed up for the app to try it.
41:29
And then they got exposure to businesses and then it becomes
41:31
much more organic. I can think of one really great
41:34
example. There is a, a company in Wilmer,
41:38
TX, which is just South of Dallas.
41:41
It's building, you know, you, you drive through Texas now and
41:43
you see a lot of industrial space going up.
41:47
But what ended up happening as that business was building their
41:50
labor pool was you would see some same last names popping up
41:54
in the labor pool or from our side, you know, which is hidden
41:58
some same addresses. Maybe it was the same apartment
42:00
complexes, same St. same, you know, geography.
42:04
And so the word of mouth is really what started to to carry
42:08
it. And in a way that's become much
42:10
more organic. And that's, you know, kind of a
42:13
testament to the success of the model, which is, hey, we don't
42:17
have to go direct recruit. Like that's not something that
42:20
most people in marketplaces do. It is very early.
42:23
You know, maybe eight years ago there was some element of that.
42:26
But also we partner with a lot of different industry groups, a
42:30
lot of different companies have also found this as a way to
42:34
build their own pool. So they take our platform and
42:37
they say, hey, we don't, we're not hiring full time, but we we
42:40
want to put this person on a roster and use them when we need
42:43
them. That's a way to to build bridge
42:46
the gap and address that productivity that we were
42:47
talking about earlier. So it's it's very fluid on the
42:51
on the operator side, we see people come in, you know, kind
42:54
of exit for a little while, maybe they went back to full
42:55
time employment or but they'll come back.
42:58
And so it's it's very dynamic. What are the regulatory hurdles
43:02
that might keep you out of certain markets?
43:06
The there's two ways to answer that.
43:08
You know, one, I think from the business perspective, it's
43:10
something different. So we we do see a lot of
43:13
businesses say, is this for us? Is this something that we could
43:16
do? The answer is yes.
43:18
And you know, it just kind of requires a, a different mindset
43:22
from the regulatory side, just like a lot of other, you know,
43:27
companies have maybe found some challenges in over regulated
43:32
environments. And I, I say that, you know, I,
43:34
I love those places and I've been there, traveled to some of
43:37
those places. But if you look at, you know,
43:39
California, Illinois, maybe New York, maybe some others, you've
43:43
seen it in the news with things like Uber or with Lyft, they see
43:48
this is kind of like a displacement of a traditional
43:50
structure. And they say, is it, you know,
43:53
1099 work? The answer is yes, because
43:56
you're not posting a job and having somebody come work under
43:59
your direction. You're posting for a specific
44:01
scope of work that has a start and an end time frame, almost
44:05
like you're calling in, you know, a plumber or an
44:08
electrician. You're not, they're not your
44:09
employee. They're, they're somebody that
44:12
you're hiring or you're not hiring, but there's somebody
44:14
you're calling in or bringing in to do a specific job and an
44:17
under specific scope for a specific amount of time, which
44:20
is very different than an employment relationship.
44:21
So there's been some of those challenges just because people
44:23
aren't familiar with how to do this, but we've overcome that in
44:27
most instances. OK, so I understand what you're
44:30
talking about. Yeah, like Uber and Lyft, lots
44:32
of discussion, disagreements over whether folks should be
44:36
considered full time workers, if they should be AW2, which opens
44:40
up a whole can of worms in terms of, you know, benefits and other
44:43
things. And so the states that you would
44:46
stay away from for the moment anyways are the states that, you
44:49
know, kind of have legislation that's not so friendly to this
44:52
discussion. So given that most of your
44:56
operators are 1099, they're getting paid directly from your
45:04
client. So the the way that that works
45:08
is that our model because they get paid daily.
45:11
So if they work today, they're going to get paid tomorrow,
45:16
that's bank processing time. And you know, that of course can
45:20
be adjusted by the business up or down if they, you know,
45:23
worked more or less. And so the we pay, we facilitate
45:30
that payment and the business pays very.
45:32
So it's not, you know, that's a lot of the.
45:34
Administrative, it's just, yeah, I was going to say,
45:36
administratively, it would be a nightmare if each of your
45:38
individual clients had to be responsible for that, yeah.
45:42
Right, right. And so that's, that's the, the
45:44
power of the model is that, hey, you, you have the ownership of
45:49
adjusting any time or adjusting, you know, if they're doing piece
45:53
work, you know, adjusting that actual pay rate to let us know
45:58
what to pay them within a 24 hour window.
46:00
And so that's the ownership component of this is if I'm an
46:04
operations manager and say I wanted to pay somebody more,
46:07
which is often what is the case, I need to adjust that up so that
46:11
my worker, my operator gets paid and then variable facilitates
46:15
that payment and the businesses pay variable.
46:19
Matt, on this show, we always like to ask our guests about a
46:23
particular challenge that they've overcome in their lives.
46:27
And for most folks it's a a specific event.
46:30
I think for you, it's something that's more ongoing that you are
46:35
addressing on a regular basis. Can you walk us through what
46:38
that is and how you approach managing that?
46:42
Yeah, it's, it's something that I, I think about probably every
46:45
day in a lot of different ways. And I think a lot of people do
46:48
too. It's the idea, I think, that
46:51
there's a buzzword around it called imposter syndrome.
46:54
And people don't think, you know, they should be where
46:59
they're at or they should know what they're or they know what
47:01
they're doing, right. And the more I've gone on in my
47:04
career, whether it was my time in the military or, you know,
47:08
early on in my career as an OPS manager or somebody, there were
47:12
many times where you say, I don't know what I'm doing.
47:14
But if you are confident in yourself and understand that
47:18
people make mistakes and that nobody's perfect, that is where
47:22
you learn. And so I've been very fortunate.
47:25
You know, I didn't when I came into variable, I was very
47:29
fortunate because, you know, two people who founded that company
47:33
saw something in me. And, you know, Mike Kinder,
47:36
who's my boss and our CEO and Noah Labhart, who's our our CTO,
47:40
They were the ones taking the risk and saying we're going to
47:44
build this. Do you want to be on board?
47:46
And that is the moment where you say, hey, these guys are are
47:49
taking the risk and they're building something.
47:51
And I want to be a part of that because you learn something.
47:54
I go back to my time in the Army.
47:56
I was an infantry guy, you know, historically, you know, I wasn't
48:00
an athlete and somebody who was, you know, like in tip top shape,
48:04
but I was in the infantry and that was something that I wanted
48:06
to do and I did pretty well. You know, I spent four years
48:11
doing that. I wasn't, you know, the top, you
48:13
know, you know, super soldier or anything like that.
48:15
But I had the opportunity to lead A-Team to serve, to be
48:18
with, you know, people who were better than me and I learned a
48:21
lot from. And so you take that, you know,
48:24
all those experiences into into play.
48:28
And you say, how do I use that experience to build on to the
48:31
next one with the fundamental truths that I learned.
48:34
And some of those fundamental truths include if I work hard,
48:37
if you're honest, and if you are looking to do the best for the
48:41
people around you, most of those things work out, you know,
48:44
pretty well with business performance.
48:45
So they work out really well in your daily and personal life.
48:48
So, you know, I've been at start-ups, I've been at places
48:51
where is this thing going to work?
48:52
I've been at a business where maybe you take something on and
49:00
it wasn't what it was written out to be.
49:02
You know, I've been in a particular situation where the
49:04
financials of the business were not what they were reported to
49:06
be. And so that requires you to
49:08
take, you know, integrity and operate and try to win and then
49:13
find ways to build continuity for people because they're
49:16
counting on you. And so you will come across that
49:19
in every facet of life. But I think particularly what I
49:22
think of as those moments of self doubt are probably a time
49:25
for reflection and saying, Hey, the sum total of my experiences
49:29
tell me in my gut instinct is this, let's do this and be, you
49:34
know, be very firm in your belief.
49:37
And I, I joke often about, you know, there's a, a meme that's
49:41
on acts and it's called the concluder.
49:42
And it's, it's like a, you know, strong beliefs, loosely held,
49:46
you know, I've, I believe strongly in this, but I'm very
49:49
open to, you know, learning something or doing something a
49:52
different way. And as you get older, you know,
49:54
finding that different way, sometimes you lean back on your,
49:57
your experience a little bit more and say that's not how it
49:59
was. But you have to be open about
50:01
that. And that's I think what adds up
50:02
to the sum total of your experiences.
50:05
You know, the idea of imposter syndrome has been talked about
50:08
many times on this show and it's always interesting to me.
50:12
It surprised me initially at first, some of the people who
50:15
brought it up, very successful, leading large companies come
50:19
across as, you know, very bright and very confident, much as you
50:22
do today. And they were, you know, out of
50:25
their minds nervous just about doing the interview today.
50:28
Like, you know, why does anybody want to listen to what I have to
50:31
say? And I'm like, are you kidding?
50:32
Like, you know, look at look at everything that you've done.
50:34
And, and so I think it's helpful for other folks out there to
50:38
hear that, you know, you're not the only ones that are doubting
50:41
yourselves, right? Even people with the, you know,
50:44
the top of the heap, it happens to them on a regular basis.
50:48
I had one guest in particular who actually told me that
50:54
imposter syndrome is what he considers to be his superpower.
50:59
And that's a separate question. I like to ask, what do you think
51:02
your superpower is? And I'm like, no, no, no, no, we
51:04
haven't gotten to that. Like you're you're sort of
51:06
mixing these up. And he's like, no, no, no, no.
51:08
Let me explain myself. He says that feeling that I get
51:12
every day when I wake up, like I don't know what I'm doing, like
51:15
all these people looking to me like I have no idea.
51:18
I'm making it up as I go along. But that for him is the thing
51:23
that lights a fire under his rear end every day.
51:25
To get up and to figure it out and to perform and not to hit
51:29
the cruise control button. I see you nodding your head.
51:31
Does this make some sense to you?
51:33
It makes a lot of sense. There's, you know, one other
51:35
thing that I believe is, is a fundamental truth and it ties
51:40
directly what you're saying is there's nobody coming to save
51:43
you. You know, you have to have this,
51:45
this element of self-reliance that you have to be confident
51:48
enough. And that's how you you beat
51:50
imposter syndrome, but you have to do it in a way that you
51:52
recognize others are trying to help you.
51:54
There's nobody who can really solve all of your problems for
51:57
you except you and being very open minded about the resolution
52:01
in which those problems are solved.
52:04
So that's, you know, I, I kind of, you know, sync up a lot with
52:08
that guest and say, yeah, lights a fire under me in in business
52:12
and in life to say, you know, I don't know what I'm doing, but I
52:14
have to figure it out. And there's no really way out
52:17
but through. And that is, I think what, you
52:20
know, if I could say anything and you know, my advice is what
52:23
it is, but it's you have to do things that make you
52:27
uncomfortable and you have to do things that are not easy
52:32
everyday. If life was easy, that would be
52:33
great. I mean, you figured you didn't
52:34
have to make tough decisions, But that's not how people build
52:37
new things. It's not how we, you know,
52:39
progress. And I think there are people
52:40
who've been through a lot more challenges than I have.
52:42
I've been very fortunate. Like I mentioned earlier, you
52:45
know, my career has been very fortunate and I'm very fortunate
52:48
to be a variable because it's a product that, you know, not only
52:51
I believe in, but it's an idea that people should have the
52:56
flexibility and the ability to have more say in their own
52:59
lives. And so that's that's a lot of
53:01
it, right? Is, hey, you know, I want to
53:03
have that say in my own life. I don't want events to direct
53:07
me. I want to probably be in a
53:08
position to control a little bit of my environment.
53:10
But you have to be comfortable with when that doesn't happen.
53:13
And so, you know, it makes a lot of sense what you mentioned
53:16
about your other guest. Matt, you host your own podcast,
53:20
right? What's what's the name of that?
53:22
I do. It's called US manufacturing
53:23
today. It's sponsored by variable
53:27
where, you know, I work in my my day job re industrializing.
53:30
So we're this is our first year of the show, but it's, you know,
53:34
ideally something where our customers or people who have
53:37
worked with us are close to us as part of that, you know,
53:39
overall manufacturing network can come on and talk through
53:42
things that they're seeing macro trends and maybe something
53:44
really insightful about their business that could help, you
53:47
know, a manufacturer out there out there trying to find their
53:50
way. I'm.
53:52
Curious if this holds true for you.
53:54
I've done a good fortune to have done hundreds of podcast
53:58
interviews now on this side of the mic.
54:01
And I've been asked many times to be on the other side of the
54:04
mic. And most of the time I say no.
54:08
The handful of times that I've said yes, I felt very
54:10
uncomfortable with it. I'm very uncomfortable on the
54:13
other side of the mic. And I think it's a lot of that
54:15
imposter syndrome. Like what?
54:17
Why do people want to hear what I have to say?
54:19
Like, I'm pretty good at asking questions and, you know, helping
54:22
people tell their stories, but I don't know, it's my story story
54:25
really that interesting. What was it like for you sitting
54:28
on the other side of the mic today?
54:29
That's that's a really funny question because you know, one
54:35
of you asked great questions. So too, you know, that's
54:38
something that I am very comfortable bringing people on
54:46
to our show and letting them talk about their business and
54:49
what they like to do. And you, you nailed it.
54:52
I you get a little bit of that imposter syndrome.
54:54
It's like, why would anybody want to hear what I have to say?
54:56
I'm hosting the show and I want to ask good questions, you know,
54:59
and so that's, and that's another funny thing is like, I
55:01
need to ask more questions. I think about that all the time,
55:04
but. See, here you are doubting
55:06
yourself again and. Exactly you can do.
55:08
It but in, in, in like a good way, like in a constructive way,
55:11
like you could beat yourself over that, you know, beat, beat
55:14
yourself up over that or, you know, you've just identified
55:17
like, oh, like I'm I think I could probably ask more
55:19
questions. I could ask more questions.
55:20
Yeah. So it's, it's a great
55:22
opportunity to, to one, think through a lot of what you're
55:25
saying because you do get in a pattern of saying, hey, this is
55:30
how the show will go. It's about that control thing,
55:32
right? You're trying to beat the
55:33
imposter syndrome or something with a level of control.
55:36
I'm going to ask the questions. I'm going to, you know, do XYZ
55:41
or put out this point of view. And when you're talking where we
55:44
had a great conversation, you know, a lot of things come out
55:47
that maybe you're a little bit more free form and they were top
55:49
of mind. And that's the good stuff that
55:51
that comes out. And I always tell people I don't
55:53
know about about you, but I always wish I'd left the record
55:56
button on, you know, a little longer than I did because
55:58
sometimes people let it all out as after the end.
56:01
Hopefully I left it all on the on the field today, but you know
56:04
that's it's a good thing to change up every once in a while.
56:07
What's something fun you like to do outside of work?
56:10
Well, right now I am a dad. I've got a three-year old and so
56:14
a lot of my fun time is whatever he whatever he thinks is fun.
56:20
So I love being a dad That's he's he's 3 and he's awesome.
56:24
It's a really kind of reflective thing of life.
56:27
You know, you get to a place where you can kind of remember
56:29
when you know, your dad was that age.
56:31
It's like, wait a minute, life happens pretty fast.
56:33
So that's what I'm doing right now.
56:36
Outside of that, you know, lot of family stuff and, and kind of
56:40
just taking it easy on the weekends when we're not busy
56:44
during the week. All right, so here's another
56:46
question I'd love to ask. What is your superpower?
56:50
You know, I, I don't know if I would call it a superpower, but
56:55
I think it is something that has shown up in my career where it's
57:00
kind of like a, how can I do things for people that either I
57:05
wish had been done for me or I know were done for me and it
57:08
meant a lot. So, you know, in, in my career
57:11
and I don't think empathy is the right word, but I think it's
57:13
something more along the lines of taking a, it's like a big
57:17
personal interest in anybody that I'm working with and seeing
57:20
how, you know, I can kind of bring them into the fold.
57:23
And we didn't really get into this.
57:25
My time at another company, you know, we had a pretty big
57:28
mandate of bringing people on board quickly.
57:31
They had been historically understaffed and, and
57:33
underserved. And we grew the team by 15
57:36
people just by bringing in different experiences and trying
57:39
to patch that together. So pretty loose answer, but you
57:42
know, that's what I try to do is, is listen.
57:45
And I did a lot of talking today, but hopefully I I can
57:48
listen as well. Matt, I've just got one more
57:51
question for you today. But before I ask it, I want to
57:53
do 3 administrative things real quick here for the audience.
57:57
Anybody who wants to get in touch with Variable OPS, you can
58:00
find them on the web, variableops.com.
58:04
And remember that it's spelled very ableops.com.
58:09
Also, you can find the company on LinkedIn.
58:11
Search for the same word, very able variable and you can find
58:16
Matt Horine HORINEI get it right that time.
58:20
OK, Matt Horine variable OPS find them on LinkedIn.
58:24
Also, as a reminder, if you want to get more employees access to
58:27
benefits that won't hurt them financially and carries a
58:30
financial upside for the company, reach out to us at
58:32
adbackbenefits.com. And finally, if you'll take just
58:36
a second to leave us a review or a comment on your favorite
58:39
podcast app, you will hold a special place in my heart
58:42
forever. Thank you.
58:44
Last question for you, Matt. A year from now, you and I
58:46
reconnect and you are celebrating something big.
58:48
What's that big thing you hope to be celebrating one year from
58:51
today? That is a really good question.
58:56
I'll go the professional route on it.
58:58
I would like to see a lot more businesses and a lot more people
59:02
involved in American manufacturing.
59:05
And, you know, it's kind of seeing the tide of that follow
59:08
the buzz. And, you know, right now it's
59:10
very easy to talk about a lot about all this, but as
59:14
manufacturers know, it's it's probably more the doing that it
59:17
really catches up to people. So I would like to see that in a
59:20
year from now, I would like to see people, you know, really
59:24
adopt this this concept and bring a lot more success to
59:28
their business and, you know, opportunities to the American
59:30
worker. Matt Horine from Variable.
59:33
I want to be the first to thank you for sharing both your time
59:35
and your story with us today. I really appreciate it.
59:38
Great, thanks for having me on and really really enjoyed it.
59:41
Folks, that's a wrap on another episode of the Inspired Stories
59:44
podcast. Thanks for learning with us
59:45
today.