Bill Currence is a West Point graduate, former Army officer, and the guy companies call when everything is on fire. They got tired of watching big consulting firms walk in, bill millions, and leave nothing behind but a PowerPoint deck and a bigger problem. So they built CCO Brands instead.

Why American Manufacturing is Dying (And How to Fix it) | Bill Currence

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July 20, 2026

Why American Manufacturing is Dying (And How to Fix it) | Bill Currence

Guest: Bill Currence Runtime: 1 hr 14 min

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Description Chapters Transcript

So they built CCO Brands instead.

But getting there cost him. Bill watched himself lose his values in a plant he was trying to save, pushed by someone who called his leadership into question. When he was fired, he says it was the best thing that ever happened to him.

We covered a lot of ground in this conversation:

→ Why pride is the single obstacle keeping companies from getting fixed

→ How Bill turned around 30 plants in 4 years

→ The physics-based approach that reveals where a plant is losing money in real time

→ What it means to truly save someone's livelihood

Bill cares more about the people on the plant floor than the numbers on the report. And because of that, the numbers always get better too.

Bill, thank you for your time and being so open in sharing your story with our listeners!

0:00 - Introduction

3:28 - Bill's First Job After the Military: Cintas and Lessons in Operations

5:45 - The Six-Year Grind: From Quality Manager to Every Role in the Plant

7:20 - Climbing to Plant Manager and the Decision to Roll the Dice

9:12 - Scientific Injection Molding and the $250M Plant at Lear

14:19 - CCO Brands Is Born: Anti-Consulting and the Problem with Big Firms

20:31 - The Pride Problem: Why Companies Wait Too Long to Ask for Help

24:04 - Leadership Lessons: Football, West Point, and the Human Element

27:24 - The Moment Bill Lost Himself as a Leader (and Got Fired)

32:34 - What CCO Actually Does and Why It Works

38:00 - The Physics Framework: How to Find a Plant's True Bottleneck

48:18 - The Case for Manufacturing: Why Trade School Is Winning

53:30 - The Monterrey Moment: Why This Work Is Worth It

1:00:55 - Advice to 25-Year-Old Bill: Start Five Years Earlier

Bill: It was a fist fight. It was like Rocky IV. It was just such a battle.

Devin: Everybody that reports to you, you're responsible for their livelihood. You meeting your KPIs means they get to keep their job, means they get to put food on the table.

Bill: You gotta pull them into the vision.

Devin: I was so stupid to say, like, I can do it by myself.

It takes a village.

Bill: You have to develop that skill.

Devin: We all have struggles. Cool, leave it at the door. Come in, do your job, do your job right.

Bill: There's shades of gray.

Devin: There are tons of shades of gray. Everything isn't black and white. It's a real shift. Backbone people, let's begin your seat, take your shift

Devin: Welcome back to Talk Real Shift. I'm your host, Devon Froschizer. On today's episode, I have the pleasure of speaking with Bill Currence, managing partner of CCO Brands. One unique thing about Bill is he's single-handedly attributed to ending the [00:01:00] 2017 commercial trucking supply chain shortage.

Join me on this episode. You'll want to stay tuned as we hear and talk some real shift with Bill.

Devin: Bill, something interesting, which I don't know if you know, but you went to West Point and graduated with your bachelor's in civil engineering. I went to Wayne State and also graduated with my bachelor's in civil engineering, and I have done zero engineering in my entire career.

I feel like a fraud telling people that I'm an engineer, because I feel like that's a coveted, uh, position and job, but I- I've just gotta know, how does a civil engineer, a Army officer, start off post-military professional career as a quality manager at a tier one automotive supplier?

Bill: Well, we need to, to back up just a little bit.

First of all, I, I have to do this. [00:02:00] You, and I dealt with you, uh, at, at Frosch. You have an engineering mind, right? Yes. Were you not driving work process?

Devin: Yeah.

Bill: Were you not driving improvement? Yeah. It may not have been building bridges, but you were using those skills to manage entropy and waste out of your system.

Devin: Always. You're a trained problem-solver.

Bill: Yeah.

Devin: Right?

Bill: Absolutely.

Devin: That's what I used to say. Like, so I got my first job. I never... My actual first job was as a, an electrical engineer, and, uh, they're like, "What, why are you qualified for this?" I go, "We're, we're trained problem-solvers," right?

Bill: Don't discount yourself, because that's what the core of engineering is-

Devin: Yeah

Bill: is you're presented a problem-

Devin: Mm-hmm ...

Bill: and I, I have that same civil engineering degree. I've never built a bridge. I've never built a building, but we sure as heck have turned companies around for with using that same- Yeah ... physics-based, logical-based, mathematics-based approach. And you, I saw it play out in real time with your job, so- Yeah

you are an engineer.

Devin: Yeah.

Bill: But you're more [00:03:00] importantly, a leader, so-

Devin: Oh,

Bill: thank you ... that's the good thing. Um, let's wind back just a little bit. So quality manager is where I actually started to get some traction, but when I first got out, there was a, um, company called Cintas, and they really tried to, uh, hire JMOs, junior military officers.

Devin: Okay.

Bill: So when I made the transaction, it was pretty easy to make that transaction because these folks understood the value of that leadership skills, and they would put you into operational roles. So for the first, uh, year, I was a supervisor at Cintas, which they do, uh, they recycle uniforms, repair them.

Yep. So they rent uniforms out to, you know, Ford, GM, a lot of big companies. Mm-hmm. General Electric Uh, across the nation, a very big company. Uh, so I was able to be a second-shift supervisor, learn about operations, which I kind of... That's where I got the kind of draw to operations, and then, uh, was an assistant plant manager for a year in Columbus, Ohio, when automotive [00:04:00] industry started calling, and there was this, uh, former commodore.

Okay. So it's like a one-star general, but he was a Navy guy at GE. Okay. And he became very interested, 'cause he saw I lived in Circleville, Ohio, at the time. There was a big GE plant there. So, uh, he started to recruit me very hard for GE, and I said, "Well, might as well just see what else happens." Right. So, so threw my resume out, and, uh, guy was a awesome guy.

But GE... And I just got out of the military, having to move around, do a bunch of moves, said you have to do four different six-months projects, you know, to go on your fast track in different locations. Yep. And then on the fifth one, you finally get to stay for two or three years. I looked at my wife and it's, and, and we talked about it and said, "Do we really wanna be bouncing around like that?"

Um, we had already one young kid, and we were trying to have more. So, um, there was another opportunity came up with a little, uh, tier one injection molding and assembly facility, and I had an opportunity to be a quality manager, didn't know anything [00:05:00] about quality at the time.

Devin: But you know how to follow rules, you know how to follow discipline.

Bill: know how to read books, right?

Devin: There you go.

Bill: So that was the old QS9000 system, and they said, "Here, here's the six pack." Known as SPC, MSA, PPAP, APQP. And I just dove into the books and I said, "Okay, you know, if there's gonna be a contract or rules or whatever," and that's the engineer coming out- Mm-hmm ... is I better understand them.

Devin: Right.

Bill: So I did that, and then I kinda hit a snag. I did really well at the quality, uh, manager job there because I just learned and I just applied those process techniques. Uh, and then I had a, uh, thought I was gonna have a shot at plant manager 'cause where I was working for that first year, we had an interim plant manager, a guy named Skip Ryan, super good guy, who was bridging the plant until they found a full-time.

Well, there was three candidates internally, and I was one of them, but realistically, looking back at it, I didn't have enough experience- ... in automotive, but I probably had the most potential. Okay. But they chose the guy who'd been there, and rightfully so, for 10, [00:06:00] 15 years, right?

Devin: Yeah.

Bill: So, um, then I thought he persecuted me and was trying to willingly destroy my career because this gentleman, who in hindsight gave me the best gift ever, made me do quality manager, materials manager-

Devin: Mm

Bill: procurement. I was a controller for a year.

Devin: So

Bill: even finance. Engineering manager. Yeah, finance.

Devin: Wow.

Bill: Which got me intrigued because I w- was going back getting my MBA, I just went ahead and just, you know, decided to go ahead and get it in finance too. It was like 14 extra credit hours.

Devin: Okay.

Bill: So, uh, 'cause s- a lot of the financial stuff r- really with ERP systems and everything was weird and didn't check out.

Devin: Right.

Bill: So I'm like, "There's gotta be more to this. There's gotta be a deeper level." And then finally, when he got promoted, uh, after six years of me being there he's like, "You're, you're ready, so you can go up a notch." And that gift, he gave me a pers- a pers, um, perspective. You know, relativity- Yeah ... seeing it from the different, uh, [00:07:00] different viewpoints of each.

You know, it, now I know what the materials manager's thinking. Now I know what purchasing's

Devin: thinking.

Bill: Mm-hmm. Uh, the only two areas left out was, uh, sales and, uh, HR, so- I was going in with a pretty good foundation, and once that solid foundation, I could start to build stories. So that's where my career actually started to take off to where it is today.

Devin: Okay, so let's, let's talk about that career. And I have to say, I called it, like, the, like the, the triangle method, right? Like, you started, uh, very wide very, very quickly. A lot of rapid movements in six years, and then your career just, it, it accelerated exponentially because you did have that background.

So you have those roles, you get promoted to plant manager, then what happens?

Bill: Well, I had options then, right? Actually, it's funny how things are, the world's small. An opportunity to go up and give up the plant manager role and take a step back to a much larger plant for the same company in Romulus. [00:08:00] Okay.

They were opening up a plant, brand new plant. And then I also said, "Well, you know, I'm gonna roll the dice here." Uh, don't really like not being the top guy because I spent this seven years earning- ... the title. It's

Devin: like, yeah, right.

Bill: And, uh, there was a particular personality of the guy they picked, um, that was just not my speed.

Okay. Just not, not able to, you know, accelerate the organization, so I thought that might not be a great fit. So I put my resume out, uh, spent a year at a GKN facility. Uh, and that was, uh, stamping, centering meta- center metaling, everything else like that- Mm-hmm ... and, you know, gears and stuff for GM, for Ford.

Uh, so that was a really good experience in some really hardcore foundry-type manufacturing, forgings, uh, hot forging, stuff like that. But, uh, then there was this interesting guy, Terry Gould, and he won't mind if I mention the name. Uh, he's iconic in the industry, so he was my main mentor. Uh, came calling, and it was a [00:09:00] Lear plant, and they had picked up that I knew injection molding pretty well.

Well, I spent seven years- Right ... at a smaller injection molding company, and during that time, engineer coming out in me-

Devin: Mm-hmm ...

Bill: I learned how to do scientific injection molding. Figured if I was gonna be running the plant, I better know how we can do it better than everybody else.

Devin: Right.

Bill: So they came knocking on my door and said, "Hey, would you be willing to go run a plant in Huron, Ohio for us?"

And I said, "Well, sure." I said, "What's, uh..." You know, but, and that's where I wanted to make sure I was, you know, progressing my career. Right. So I went from, like, a $50 million plant, a $15 million, that, you know, took me seven years or six years to get there, to about a $50 million plant. This is about a quarter billion dollar plant.

Devin: Oh, my goodness.

Bill: So I'm like, "Sure." Well, it has three business units, but the main driving force is injection molding.

Devin: So- Your, your expertise.

Bill: Yeah. They recruited me in, uh, and I was able to, uh, take over, run the operations at that plant. And from there, [00:10:00] that relationship is where I met Scott, my best friend.

It was briefly. We only had a couple, like, plant manager meetings where we'd get together quarterly. I didn't know him that well, knew of him. He was actually a director, so he had six plants, but they were... We had 12 plants in the division, I believe, but he had the other six plants.

Devin: Okay.

Bill: Uh, great guy, CEO of Central Motion, Karl Beckwith, so that's another great company, uh, that Karl's running now, was my director.

And, uh, had a great experience at Le- or at Lear there in Huron, Ohio. I never actually left. I mean, now my, all, all paths pointed to Detroit.

Devin: Right.

Bill: So that was where my career was going. But that great leader wind up, uh, leaving Lear for another opportunity. He was the, uh- senior vice president, he had an opportunity to become a president, president.

That's Terry. So he moves up to another company, and he said, "Hey, I don't know how many of you guys I can take with me." He goes, "I can tuck you in, or you guys can go find something [00:11:00] else, and I'll bring you in over time." Well, that was a good trigger point for me to say, "What's next?" Right. So I went out and, uh, had a little bit more autonomy running a plant in, in Belleville.

Is it Belleville? Yeah, Belleville, Michigan- Mm-hmm ... right across from Ro- Romulus. And, uh, kind of waited for something to happen when Terry got resettled. And so I went out, ran a plant, had a ton of fun there. Uh, injection molding plant again.

Devin: Okay.

Bill: And, uh, for about two, uh, two and a half years. And then here comes Don Stebbins, Terry, these guys calling from Visteon, and that's where I went into Visteon.

Oh. And, uh, that's where it's like, okay, you know, you've been a plant manager like, you know, four times here. Time to do something different. Yeah, step up. And I just... I remember Terry. He's, he's, he's a really excitable guy. He's like, "All right. Time to put your running shoes on. We're gonna, we're gonna run around the world.

We're gonna fix all this stuff." And he wasn't kidding.

Devin: Yeah.

Bill: So that's where my career really started to [00:12:00] accelerate- Okay ... as I made connections all over the world. Every broken factory, it seemed like in the darkest, deepest corners of the world, myself and then eventually, you know, probably a little less than a year later, they brought Scott back- Okay

who's my best friend, who's my business partner. Yeah. Right. And we were say- We had certain titles. His was, like, global OPEX. Mine was, like, global manufacturing engineering. But the true ti- the, the true essence of, "Go fix it, guys." So we're like, "Go fix this plant. Go fix that plant." And so we went all over the world fixing...

I think we fixed about 30 plants in about four years.

Devin: 30 plants in four years?

Bill: Yes.

Devin: Unbelievably impressive. And you know, I've, I've learned, because I think I took for granted that that's how my brain worked, right? I don't wanna go into this well-oiled machine. A well-running plant is kind of a- It's boring

boring. Yes, it's absolutely boring. I want something that's broken, where there's like no rules, and I get to make the [00:13:00] rules, and I get to fix it.

Bill: Engineer.

Devin: Yeah.

Bill: Engineer.

Devin: 1,000, 1,000% Build it and she runs. Yeah. But like, that was my draw and my love to operations. It is this natural adrenaline high that you can't get anywhere else, right?

When you walk into something that's so broken, and you rally a team to do the impossible, and you ship more pieces, you make more widgets, whatever's going, you know, out that door, right? Stuff comes in one door- Even- You do stuff and it goes out ... even when you see the light bulb going off

Bill: in the team's head-

Devin: It's everything

that's so rewarding. It's everything, right?

Bill: You know, that was

Devin: my fondest moments as a leader, when you get to give people that like, that a-ha moment. But there is, there's something about manufacturing, operations, logistics, when you're on that plant floor, that you just love. So 30 plants- Four years, you've taken these broken machines, you've supercharged them, they're well running, [00:14:00] then what happens?

Bill: Well, actually, my partner split. Okay. So Terry actually goes from being a group president, and again, one of the most remarkable guys, to CEO of Key Plastics. Okay. So he takes over. Uh, private equity owned. Um, it's a step down from his scope that he had at Vistian, a step up in title. Okay. And he was more than ready.

Uh- Yeah ... I'd, I'd follow Terry right off of a cliff. Still today, I'd give him the shirt off my back. And same for my partner, Scott. So the need over there was, uh, OPEX, OPEX deployment, manufacturing process systems. They had pretty decent, uh, manufacturing engineering, and there was kind of a drug deal cut, uh, that you could take one but not both- Okay

between Don and Terry.

Devin: Yep.

Bill: So I stayed and got moved into our largest, uh, division, which we took on about in our 15, 20 plants over about a three-year period, and I worked for an incredible guy named Dave Alkenoff, who's now the CEO of Benchmark Electronics. So he's awesome guy, too. I had great [00:15:00] bosses. Uh, and when, uh...

So I stuck around, I brought a lot of people in.

Devin: Mm-hmm.

Bill: And we continued on, but Scott and I never stopped talking. I do have to opine here a little bit. Some of the most annoying things, and I won't mention the names of these big five or six consulting companies, is when those guys were thrust upon us, and you have a bunch of whiz kids that's never worked a day in the plant.

Devin: Yeah. We're

Bill: talking Shift here, right?

Devin: Yeah. But this is, this is real Shift, right?

Bill: Yeah. This is real Shift,

Devin: right? So this is where we're gonna transition. We're talking real- Real Shift ... Shift. Yeah. Leave that sh- leave that other shift behind.

Bill: That's right. And so all it was was a bunch of shift. You know, when they came in, they had no idea- Yeah

the complex interdependencies. Um, and so we had to deal with that during the, the, as we moved along, saying, "This is worthless. We're paying tens of millions of dollars-

Devin: For nothing ...

Bill: thousands of dollars an hour for a PowerPoint presentation and a big bill," because, you know, a- and that's what set the mind up.

So why, I said Scott and I was [00:16:00] talking. Ah. He was running operations at Key globally- I was still over there running, uh, was, started out with manufacturing. I picked up Scott's old job with, uh, Op Ex.

Devin: Okay.

Bill: You know, I picked up, uh, manufacturing launch manager. Mm-hmm. Assigned a handful, and eventually toward the end, I wound up picking up running manufacturing operations because my boss had moved up, picked up quality, and the rest of P- PD engineering.

Okay. So he said, "Hey, you know, just cover this for me." So it was still good progression. Mm-hmm. And, you know, having a good boss means everything, right? So-

Devin: It really does ...

Bill: you know, I had Terry, I had a guy named Kurt Jensen, who's now running Concord, uh, Stamping, a plant, a big supplier for Toyota. Wow. Awesome boss.

Devin: You are the company you keep.

Bill: Yeah, you are the company. And all those, those mentors-

Devin: Mm-hmm ...

Bill: taught me and helped me. And the thing is, is I could've been prideful. "Oh, I know more than them," or, "I'm smarter than them." Being smart, and this is where we'll probably get to a little bit more in the podcast, being smart is learning your shortcomings, learning your [00:17:00] blind spots, and ha- Yep

and not being so arrogant that you don't let other people teach you, especially in areas where you don't know as much. And so the fact is, is, and there was a few times I wanted to bristle up and- ... stick my chest out, and it's like, "Hey, not doing this because I'm your enemy. I'm doing this because I want to develop you."

And those people were meaningful, but Scott and I started to get this feel like these other, you know, big-time consulting companies, they don't get it because they're not in the, you know- They're

Devin: not in the chaos ... they're

Bill: not in-

Devin: They're not sweating on the floor ... they're not in the shift, right? They don't, y- yeah.

They don't- They don't feel-

Bill: They've never been there- ... the struggle ... for a 24, 36-hour breakdown of a clutch- Right ... on a big stamping machine. They

Devin: haven't slept on the, they haven't slept in the- In a truck, yeah ... in the, in the office underneath their desk b- with a pillow made out of their, their, you know, coat.

Not that I'm speaking from experience or anything, but,

Bill: you know. Well, that's what planted the seed, so we kept talking, saying, "There's gotta be a better way." But, uh, eventually my time ended. I left on my own volition for [00:18:00] Visteon because my boss at the time, who's now running Benchmark, um, said, you know, "Hey, you know- I don't see this as being my next step.

I, I s- you know, for me to move up another tier, I got people above me. I'm gonna have to leave." He gave me a pretty healthy warning, and so I, uh, I decided to say, "What, what am I gonna do next?"

Devin: Right.

Bill: And, um, that's when this all started to come to fruition, is like, can we help people with real help? Not consulting.

I, I, it's a point of anti-consulting. I love that. Really get boots on the ground, get in the trenches, because so many of the folks that had helped me in my career were now off to other companies, but we had built that trust. And, you know- Right ... we had delivered, uh, for them when we were all working together at the same company, and they understood the need that, you know, bringing in somebody who could actually transact and execute and knew what the real issues were.

Hmm. You know, most of the folks out there in the space, especially if they haven't worked in plants and they [00:19:00] haven't worked in supply chain- Yeah ... logistics, purchasing, they wanna try to cure the cold with Kleenex.

Devin: Yeah.

Bill: And, and you can't do that, right? No. You need to understand what the root cause is, and so we just said, "We're gonna put together a team that knows and, and kills the root cause."

And a lot of times people are like, "Oh, man, this plant's a disaster. Um, my warehouse is a disaster." Within 90 days, most even the greatest disasters can be fixed if you have the willpower and the volition, and you subordinate to the pri- processes, it can be fixed quickly. And that's also another misnomer is if you truly align the team and you're all chasing, rowing the boat the same direction, chasing- Yep

the same goal- Yep ... and you have superior process and process subordination, so that means, hey, everybody's gonna be held accountable, they know what they're gonna be held accountable for, those are the things that really cause you to accelerate your organization and get out of Dutch. But too often, even still today, the biggest thing that we compete [00:20:00] against is not necessarily our competitors.

Devin: It's ourselves.

Bill: Yeah, it's- it's the company itself. Yep. "I can fix it." Well, for six to 10 months or two years, your cash flow's been going down. Mm-hmm. You haven't fixed it yet, so what makes you think now that, you know, your boss is poking, saying, "Hey, we wanna use these guys," you're wearing three hats already, and you're in the death spiral.

So that pride and arrogance is probably the most significant factor, but once you've blown through that, hey guys, we're not your enemies. We're here to shoulder up and help. We're not here to upstage you. We're a hired gun. You have to get the calories in. You're sitting here on life support dying- Yeah ... of anorexia because you don't have the resources in the right spot, yet, you know, you want to sit there and, you know, kinda shake your fists and say, "I- I'd rather, you know, go down in flames than to take on the calories I need because somebody else is, you know, putting them in the IV."

Devin: Right.

Bill: So that's- that's what... it's just kind of a shame. Uh, but, you know, [00:21:00] in today's society, it's... Americans are ultra-competitive. It shows a sign of leadership and better strength if you accept help when you need it. Yeah. And that's the lesson I had to learn, even my arrogant self, is that I had some mentors that had I not had them in my life, I wouldn't be where I am today, and I had to learn to listen.

I had to learn to accept help

Devin: That, now that is some real shift, right? Because I've personally struggled that in my, in my career. Coming across as, as arrogant or knowing it all, particularly as a female in a male-dominated world. Mm-hmm. But it was more so because I didn't want to admit that I didn't know, right?

My tenacity said, "If I just work hard enough, I'll figure it out." But when you don't bring people on the journey with you, you don't build that network. You don't get to learn what you don't understand. Because I can study a book, I can dive into it, but somebody else has already [00:22:00] lived it, and I was so stupid for so long to, to, to say, like, "I can do it by myself."

It takes a village. It takes a team. Well, especially- That's why there's a whole team in a

Bill: plant ... being a female in the industry, because you have, you know... You are actually have more challenges because, let's face it- You know it ... manufacturing, especially hardcore manufacturing- Yeah ... and the worst thing you could do, and you've learned that lesson, right?

Mm. I, I did it myself, you know? I mean, I just thought, you know, I got the West Point degree, I'm gonna be the plant manager when I first started, and then-

Devin: Yeah ...

Bill: six years later, I'm finally the plant manager- ... after all these experiences.

Devin: But- Which is still a very fast trajectory ...

Bill: I, I looked at it as, "This guy's killing my career."

And now I look back and say, "Thank you, Bill Silberis. You made my, you know, career path- Yeah ... because you caused me to have patience," right? And to learn- Mm ... from different viewpoints. Uh, same thing, though, but [00:23:00] the other thing, though, too, Evan, I'm gonna flip the coin on you. So-

Devin: Let's do it ...

Bill: but this is a problem with people around you as well, too, and this is where I've had to learn.

And I, I'll tell you a personal story where I felt really, really stupid now, in hindsight. But how many times are you actually right? Probably the majority of the time. You're brilliant, you're bright. Totally. You had the right solution- Thank

Devin: you ...

Bill: and then you just get agitated because people wanna buck you, they don't wanna listen.

Devin: Yeah, they just don't wanna, like, they... Like, you know it.

Bill: So

Devin: I- You know it. But- Just listen to me. For goodness sakes, like, just listen. Like, I, I was hired for a reason, right? Like, I'm not completely incompetent. Like, I know what I'm doing.

Bill: Yeah. And, uh, it's just, you know, you know, let go, you know, let go of the scruff of my neck, I know what I'm doing.

Devin: Yes.

Bill: But one of the things, and this is a personal story, that I've had to learn of- I was, you know, big, bad football player.

Pretty, pretty good football player, division one at West Point, so played, uh, [00:24:00] Army. We were pretty decent back then. We weren't great, but we weren't horrible. We beat Navy, though, I gotta get that in there. So, um, the, when I was going through, God gifted me with some pretty good intelligence. Kinda go through and just pretty much ace my science and my math classes and stuff like that.

Uh, I was a big, bad football player, and I thought The human element, psychology, philosophy, sociology. I'm like, "I'm gonna look stupid if I get anything more than a C in this class. I'm gonna feel like I- I'm bad, I'm big. This is all, this softer stuff is nonsense." Doesn't

Devin: matter.

Bill: Right?

Devin: Yeah.

Bill: And as I got more into my career, and there was a lot of times earlier on, it's like, "I'm right, doggone it, and you're gonna listen to me."

Devin: Mm-hmm.

Bill: And, you know, a phrase that always stuck with me is, "People don't care how much you know until they know how much you care." And so the shame- Mm ... kind of overwhelmed me for a while, [00:25:00] saying I just completely missed it. When I was at West Point, I was almost with volition or purposely making sure I didn't get a B or an A in those classes because it would not, I, I would not look macho.

Devin: Yeah.

Bill: The human connection is everything. So as I've got older, and we're both wired the same way. Yep. We're go-getters.

Devin: Yep.

Bill: Is to soften the delivery or to make sure I take a breath and explain and pull them into the vision. Mm-hmm. And really, a, the time I was really learning that lesson was about the time we started this.

And there's still struggles even today because some people are gonna be so hard-headed that you can't help them, right? Yeah. But if you can show them a vision or a light, and that's your softer side of the leadership that has to be there.

Devin: Mm-hmm.

Bill: Because you can be right all day long, so you gotta pull them into the light, and that is something that, I don't know if...

I mean, some people are better than others, but you have to develop that skill over time.

Devin: So I used to be told all the [00:26:00] time, "You have to stop being like a bull in a china shop." I think my mother told me that as a kid. I was told that in, throughout my career, right? It's that softer side. I attribute finding that softer side to after having my daughter, and it changed my perspective because I was a very black and white leader, right?

There's right, there's wrong. There's a process. We follow the process to the T. Like, that's what you do. We all have struggles. I can list off my battle card of trauma. You have yours. Cool. Leave it at the door. Don't care. Come in. Do your job. Do your job right. But that's unrealistic. And when I had my daughter, it opened up the world in my eyes to the fact that everything isn't black and white.

When I- There's

Bill: shades of gray,

Devin: right? There are tons of shades of gray. And when we're vulnerable, and we're appropriately vulnerable- We start to connect with people in a very different way, [00:27:00] where we build that network. We have a team. We have an army behind us that's cheering us on, that's supporting us.

What was your pivotal point? I mean, no shift, the real pivotal point where you made that transition from macho football army officer, West Point graduate, to the leader I know.

Bill: Well, the, the leader job, um, it was a trauma. I would have never in a million years would have, um- Which actually goes back one job before that.

God caught up with me, right? And I'm just gonna say it out loud.

Devin: He does it in amazing

Bill: way,

Devin: doesn't he?

Bill: So I, I was running a GKM plant, and thank God, uh, Terry came calling and bailed me out. But I was... It was a union plant. I always wanted to fight with the president. I always wanted to fight. [00:28:00] Uh, you know, I had a really bad guide that basically called my manhood into question, who was a consultant that was there that they had, that I was gonna take, you know, running the operation, that consultant's place.

Devin: Okay.

Bill: And I'm not gonna mention his name, but he said, "You're too soft on these people." So my going in point was right, because I just spent seven years, a year as a plant manager, but six years getting to know people, and we had a family. So I knew better. Yeah. I came in, and this guy challenges my manhood, and so I'm gonna show him that I can run him over and everybody else.

And I lost myself, and I just started fighting with everybody. It was firing people. And yes, did I fix the plant's PNL maybe for two or three months. I was at a point where I d- couldn't even look at myself- Wow ... in the mirror, and I just wanted an escape. So what happened in that case is, here comes Colin.

It gives me an escape [00:29:00] hatch. That plant was not gonna be sustainable for very long because the, just the destruction I had left- Yeah ... getting us to the, just the brutal cutting of heads and everything.

Devin: Yeah.

Bill: Because my manhood was challenged, affected so many people's lives negatively. And then I'm like, phew, just, uh, dodged a bullet there.

Devin: Right.

Bill: I wound up having a similar leader, it was in between me and Terry, at Lear, that did the exact same thing to me. I'm like the- But

Devin: you were smarter this time.

Bill: But no. No. I got it. I got fired.

Devin: Oh, no.

Bill: And it was God saying, "You ran away from this." It was like chasing- You don't get to do that ... like chasing Jonah, right?

Devin: Yeah,

Bill: yeah. It's like, "I'm gonna give you exactly what you gave those people. You're not gonna escape it."

Devin: He was calling you out on your shift.

Bill: So I had a very bad leader- Wow ... that bad interpersonal skills. But yeah, he called me out, and it was a traumatically emotional [00:30:00] experience- But I understood you got me, right?

Yeah. And I'm not gonna be able to escape it. At that point were... And it was two events that led to the recognition, that going forward, you can be firm and hard. So when we lead turnarounds, I just go, right? Yeah. I just go and, and- Full

Devin: speed ...

Bill: if you're caught in the wake, but if you sit there and you try to pacify people or over talk or, or too soft-

Devin: You can't

Bill: you know, they'll, they'll, they'll, they'll get more trauma, then we're gone, right?

Devin: Yep.

Bill: You know, and I'll pull you if I need to, you know, you can ride on my shoulders for a little bit, but we're gone. But you also have to take the time to understand the human element, and those two events were I, I got away with bloody murder, and then I tried to change and do the right things for the right reasons, and then bloody murder got me.

Devin: Yeah.

Bill: Got back up.

Devin: Wow.

Bill: Um, was, was life-changing for me. It's like there's always has to be a balance 'cause I can't stop being me. You can't stop being [00:31:00] you. Nope. You're a driver, you're a leader. Right. But at the same time, we always have to have that trade-off of understanding the human element- Yeah ... while we still don't lose speed because of drag of, you know- Right

to accomplish a mission.

Devin: Right. Wow. Bill, that's, that's some true, like, talk real shift.

Bill: Well, you're dealing with true people, right? I- That I am ... so there's people on every one of those shifts that we- That- ... that depend upon us, right? Us.

Devin: That's, and that, you know, everybody wants to be a manager, right? You hear that, especially as I, as I kind of mentor and see in, in women in manufacturing or, or as I'm part of the Automotive Women Alliance Foundation, and I'm talking to people that are up and coming in the industry.

They wanna manage people, they wanna manage people. But I always challenge, "Do you really know what that means? Do you understand what you're asking for?" Because everybody that reports to you, you're responsible for their livelihood, right? You meeting your KPIs [00:32:00] means they get to keep their job, means they get to put food on the table, all of those things.

And when they don't perform, you're also responsible for addressing them, and that's, that's not easy. But you took that human element, you took all of these things that you learned, and you started CCO. And that's where I met you, right? It was, what, probably three, three, four years ago now? Um, I, I was in procurement.

I'm at Yanfeng, a tier one automotive plastics injection mold supplier. I have no idea what I'm doing because I've never worked in procurement, right? But much like you, it's like, "Okay, I'm j- I'm gonna figure it out." You're

Bill: smart enough, you're gonna figure it out,

Devin: right? We're gonna, we're gonna figure it out, right?

It doesn't matter how many contracts I have to read, it doesn't matter how, how late I stay up at night trying to figure out labor law, like, I'm, I'm gonna figure out what I need to do to support my plants. Um, [00:33:00] and what they needed was exactly what you said. They needed anti-consultants. They needed what, what we coined on-demand labor, where you pick up the phone and you're like, "We're tired of the plant failing.

Come fix us." And that's your eight years into managing CCO, right? Probably about that time- True ... 'cause you started in 2015? '

Bill: 12 now. '12? So, yeah. Okay, so 12 years. 2014 was the inception point. It actually went under a different company name for about a year.

Devin: Okay.

Bill: We had two parallel companies going on simultaneously, um, but that year was, um, and the, the first company, or CCO, did really nothing.

Okay, so this other company that Scott ran was called VIP, Value Implementation Partners. So you had CCO here marking time, um, and that time was for me to go through, and I had nothing to do with VIP other than, you know, helping, you [00:34:00] know, uh, Scott as a friend, right?

Devin: Okay.

Bill: So I had a year non-compete, non-solicitation.

Once that year was expired, CCO kicked into gear. Ah. And, uh, so that's where June of 2015, CCO starts to replace VIP. So there's a little bit more of a story in our timeline, but back to this- Ooh ... yeah, we've been doing this pretty much a dozen years now. So.

Devin: Wow. And, and you're, you're good at it, or I wouldn't have sourced you the business, I can guarantee you there, right?

'Cause, you

Bill: know- Yeah, but- ...

Devin: I didn't play around ...

Bill: e- even during that situation, I wish in hindsight I would've been more involved. And this goes back to, 'cause I have a history with Yanfeng. I mean, we were together when I was at Visteon. Yanfeng Visteon was part of my oversight for support, okay? Mm-hmm. So I didn't run it.

There's a super good guy named Bob Pyle that was over there, and Bob's the CEO of a packaging company now in Pennsylvania. Another great leader. Um, but with, uh, with, uh, my [00:35:00] responsibilities, there's a lot of people that are still there today or, you know, a few holdouts-

Devin: Yeah ...

Bill: that, uh, I was instrumental with, with helping.

Probably should've been more to step in. Yes, we can provide, uh, the labor. We can provide it quickly. We can provide the right talent for what you're asking for. The issue in some of these cases is- Again, like I said, you're putting a Kleenex on the cold. That a lot of our own clients, and this is where we're trying to be, you know, more, uh, intentional, is that do you really know what the problem is?

Because you can't put a Band-Aid on a sucking chest wound. In that case, you know, or other cases, it may be more assembly, or it may be more injection molding- Mm-hmm ... or it may be more paint. So, um, but yes, we can turn people very fast. We can turn the right type of people. It's taken us years to get that database.

We got welders, stampers, you know, CNC experts, injection molding experts. It takes time to build that.

Devin: Yeah.

Bill: Uh, our goal here is when the [00:36:00] flag goes up, we're not only quick, but we're on target, you know, for that talent. And so, and I owe you a lot and appreciate you in believing in us in that mission- Of course

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Devin: You know, one of the things that, um, kind of sold me on CCO was this concept that you guys weren't just coming in as consultants, right? We didn't want somebody that would sit in an office somewhere, tell me- Or in a

Bill: conference room-

Devin: Yes ...

Bill: playing solitaire and putting- You ca-

a PowerPoint presentation when somebody comes in Thank

Devin: you. Don't give me a PowerPoint presentation. I can put a PowerPoint presentation together. And goodness sakes, nowadays, we can have AI put a PowerPoint

Bill: presentation together. I think there's some co- consulting companies that's in trouble with AI coming out.

Devin: Oh, I'm sure. They've got to be. Um, but you went back to this fundamental concept. Like it, it, there's some Industry 4.0, there's some OPEX, but really, it comes down to o- [00:38:00] one key word with you.

Bill: I want to hear what you guys could say. Well, for me, there's four things that run an organization.

Devin: Okay.

Bill: There's discipline, accountability, due process, execution.

Okay. There's four things. Now, you have to have the human element in there.

Devin: Always.

Bill: And there's 10 intrinsic orders that always reoccur that you need to be tuned into. That's a whole nother discussion with our fundamental intrinsic theorem or our FIT operations. So they always play out. You can't escape them, 'cause physics is physics.

But-

Devin: Ah ...

Bill: you have to have accountability. So what was your word?

Devin: I was gonna say physics. Physics. Because it all comes back to physics.

Bill: L- let me just go a quick opining on this. So AI's coming down the pike, and everybody's wanting to depend upon AI.

Devin: Yep.

Bill: If you can't... And this is what we're doing to get out in front of it for our clients, because we love our, our, our clients are our partners.

I don't look at them as being a bu- And so they're [00:39:00] starting to fall suspect to wanting to go out and, "Oh, AI will fix it." Does AI tell you what your OEE is for plant, or press one, seven, and eight, and paint line three? Do they te- does it tell you what your- ... downtime and scrap items are? Does it tell you if your cycle time efficiency, does big AI, open AI tell you that?

I, and I use, I got the highest account level for ChatGPT. I do crazy things with it, but there's limitations because- There is ... it doesn't understand the personality, and based on the level of PMs, the level of maintenance, the level of type of products. Let's take injection molding, 'cause we're both familiar with it.

Devin: Yeah.

Bill: You know, if I have one type of material, I may have a barrier screw, I may have a s- hardened screw, I may have a general purpose screw on something else, like polypropylene. All those things over time change the performance- Yes ... and if you're not on top of it. So I may have one particular root cause [00:40:00] in one press and a OEE of 54%, and this one may be 73%.

Very rarely are they ever 85% or above where they're quoted- Mm ... because of neglect, because of lack of focus. But until I understand the probability distribution of that press, say, because if I'm averaging 54% OEE, that means some days I'm averaging 20.

Devin: Right.

Bill: Some days, at best, I may be averaging 60. So that's the physics, and you have to define physics and probability and statistics.

Over time, what we do is we go in and we identify what those probability curves are, and then we do one other thing a little different. You have to remove the noise, because you would know as well as I do, you have step A, B, C, D in a lot of these processes. You have to

Devin: have a process.

Bill: You know, it goes-

Devin: Standard operating procedure

Bill: is like key one

from this press, these parts go to this press, then they go to the paint line, then they go to final assembly. So it's not good enough just to know my downtime and my scrap.

Devin: [00:41:00] Mm-hmm.

Bill: And I need to be able to start to go a level deeper. Well, what type of scrap is it? But more importantly, where is it? But on downtime, there's even a bigger step into it, is I have to do two or three other things.

So I got maintenance downtime. I had 45 minutes of maintenance downtime, and most accountability rooms will be like, "All right, well, what happened?" Well, we had, you know, a prox switch that needed to be adjusted. Okay? This is where CCO has figured out for our clients, we gotta go another level, and this is where our digital twin maps what's on the piece board.

Okay, so let me see. Operator says the press is down for something. Door's not opening or closing or whatever. Mm-hmm. It's a proximity switch or let's, you know- Yeah ... a lot of times it's small stuff like that.

Devin: Right. Somebody hit it. So- It's crooked. It's whatever.

Bill: And this is the accountability thing we're talking about in mapping physics.

The operator knows that if they don't push the button when they know the press is down, it's operator downtime on them. It's part of their scorecard.

Devin: Mm-hmm.

Bill: No supervisor [00:42:00] screaming. It's part of their scorecard. So we call it benign accountability. 20 minutes later, because it immediately calls maintenance, 20 minutes later, the maintenance guy shows up, right?

Why? And so then a KPI that a lot of people don't do is, what is my maintenance response time- Time ... for the call?

Devin: Yeah.

Bill: Because if you're in cooking a meal for your husband, your daughter, you know, your kids and stuff- Mm-hmm ... and you're trying to do the right thing, and you spill some grease accidentally on the, the k- the kitchen counter and you can't find the fire, you know, extinguisher- For

Devin: sure.

You can't

Bill: put water on it. You, you call the fire department. So if they respond in two minutes, you might have to replace a couple cabinets, possibly a stove. What happens if it takes them a half an hour?

Devin: That could be your whole house.

Bill: The whole house burns.

Devin: Yep.

Bill: Right? So you gotta go a step deeper, and you gotta say, "Okay, two minutes is the KPI."

It's, the, the plant's only so big, so if you're not responding in two minutes, it's one of two things. You're either, you know, uh- Looking over and engaged in some other fix- Yep ... [00:43:00] which means I may not have enough hands available. Or people, yep. Or 95% of the time I didn't respond in time. Watch that happen one time, and then what al- uh, invariably happens, they diagnose it two minutes.

"Oh, it's a prox switch. Well, I gotta go back to the MRO crib and get my toolbox." 20 more minutes goes by.

Devin: Right.

Bill: When if I would've had- If they are ready ... 40 employed at MRO and had tools up there- Mm-hmm ... which the company needs to pay for that because the downtime is much more costly, I have what should've been a two minutes response time, two-minute diagnosis, and a three-minute fix, and so I lose 38 minutes out of the 45 minutes that were unnecessary.

You gotta go deeper. And then one more thing you gotta do is you gotta take out noise from our system. So if I get blocked or starved From, you know, so let's say I get blocked upstream because there's some other kind of problem. You can't assign that responsibility to that upstream process. You can't.

Right. And here's why. Because that's not the fault of that process. I get starved, so, uh, [00:44:00] you know, it's all for buffer sizing. So if I know physics, what those probability distributions are, and I remove the downtime for blocked and starved, now I start to see how it would perform on an island, and that automatically reveals where my true bottleneck is.

And th- we have a whole IP of physics approach that clears this out once you get about... Statistical relevant data is about 30 shifts. So within about two weeks, if you're working five days a week, most of the time you go in, it's working seven days a week.

Devin: Yeah.

Bill: So within two weeks, you know, you got 21 shifts in a week, two weeks you got 42 shifts, and then you can see all the variation between the shifts.

Say third shift, hey, Sue operates a lot better than Bob here. So all that stuff we have the capability to sift through quickly. Mm-hmm. Some of it's noise. You can't look at one event, but man, we can change that dynamic fast. And where a lot of people just tune out is if you don't map your own internal micro AI for physics, you're lost.

You can use all the open, you know, [00:45:00] the open AI, the big AI. You have to hook into your plant, and you have to also commit to the process. And I'm telling you, it's incredible how fast you can accelerate your plant and how fast you can open up market share. And then one more little thing, you have to sync your open capacity that you just were wasting before.

How do you get your salespeople? Right.

Devin: Right.

Bill: So all that stuff- Yep ... has to be synchronized. Like that's all the physics of it, right? So that's where we developed this, and it wasn't because, "Oh, look at us, we're so smart." I mean, there's also- But

Devin: you are ...

Bill: all kinds of problems with the ERP. It is, "Hey guys, if you, if we engage with you and you truly, you know, wanna go for this ride, you're gonna, within six months to a year, dominate your market, and you'll be able to grow, and you'll be able to accelerate your cash flow."

But a lot of people ask for that pride, or they just don't want to take time because everybody's this.

Devin: Everybody's that, and, and, and they

Bill: don't

Devin: wanna

Bill: invest in it. Or they have ADHD, right? And so it's like you have to take a few minutes here to [00:46:00] focus and- Yes ... understand what's gonna happen, and then you have to stay focused.

You can't be back on Twitter or something all day long during the workplace. So these are some of the challenges we face today, but I can tell you right now, almost every plant that we face I, I can't recall one that couldn't have been fixed. If, if, i- i- you know, maybe you have to get external funding.

Mm-hmm. Maybe you have to go through a, a, a quick in and out bankruptcy or a Chapter 11 and get some investment, bankers, if you're that far gone.

Devin: Yeah.

Bill: But all of it's fixable. You just have to have the willpower and volition, but you have to also understand the process, and you can't have a short-term attention span, and you have to follow the physics.

Devin: Because it's all about the physics.

Bill: It's all about

Devin: the physics. It's, I, it's... As I said, it's one word. It's just, it's physics.

Bill: Yeah. I've seen lean- Everything goes back to it ... get misapplied towards the theory of constraints environment. I get theory of constraints, it can't define the entropy, right? Yeah. And that's the number one thing.

It was built by a physicist, and the guy was super smart. He elevated the game, Eli Goldratt, right? But he was never able to quantify. I used to make fun of manufacturing people, [00:47:00] saying, "Well, you know, you guys are manufacturing experts. Why does it take an Israeli physicist to show you guys how to run manufacturing?"

But why does it take an old manufacturing guy like me to be able to say, "Hey, what you missed is physics. You have quantification of the entropy, and where and how to manage it to go to..." So it's a little, you know, all this barminy chair, but the reality is, is you have to quantify the flows of entropy.

You're always gonna have it. Yep. See, lean always says eliminate all forms of waste. Impossible. It's a violation of the second law of thermodynamics. You will have waste. Waste. You will. It's just how you deal with it- Yep ... to be able to get the best outcome. And we have all that in our package. The key, the shame of it is, is like, I'm gonna get to be an old man, and I'm gonna get past retirement age, when right now we're at a point, and especially with the adaption of AI and using it right, we can change the world.

We can change American manufacturing better. Because you mentioned earlier, you know, there's a technology gap. There's a resource gap. A massive

Devin: gap.

Bill: You wanna talk about that? Because I know you guys, you're [00:48:00] emotional. I,

Devin: I do. I do. So I wanna, you know... It's Talk Real Shift.

Bill: Yeah.

Devin: So I wanna hear your, your Real Shift story that would resonate with people that are considering possibly going into manufacturing, operations, logistics.

Because we know there's, there's this, there's a huge talent gap. It's not a glorious job. You typically don't get to sit in office, although there is, there's office-facing jobs, right? Sales, marketing, finance, sometimes those are, are, those are office-facing. Um, but people don't want to go into it. And it's what's made America.

It's an honest living. It has wonderful growth potential, whether you have post-secondary education or, or not. What's your Real Shift story that you wanna share that would inspire the masses?

Bill: I go back to mid-days Visteon, which was my stop before Scott and [00:49:00] I started this, pretty much my last big stop And, uh, the world's changed.

Okay, so, uh, yeah, and I'm, it's not really as much, I mean, if you wanna talk about the thing where I fell in love with this or I know the value of it was all the way back in Visteon. We had a car, uh, plant, our plastic's down in Monterrey, Mexico. And Scott and I lost part of our soul in Monterrey. We were working 18-hour days.

Devin: Wow.

Bill: It was just the most screwed up plant ever. And, you know, the kind of the, it, it's all worth it moment to me or why this is a honorable profession, it was so hard, the days. And we were both tasked, and I would go down for two weeks and be back a week trying to do my day job, my other global day job- ... in Romulus.

He would go down for two weeks, come back for a week, and we would overlap, like, a couple days in between- Okay ... those weeks, so there was always one of us there. And it was a [00:50:00] fist fight. It was like Rocky IV, you know? We were fighting Drago, right? It was just such a battle. Um, but-

Devin: Why?

Bill: We, you know, it was everything.

We had negative contribution, prime contribution stuff where the labor and material cost more than the piece price.

Devin: Mm.

Bill: We had to fire customers. They had no idea of process control. They had a strategist, really good guy, there was a plant manager, never got out of his office, got on the plant floor or

Devin: something.

Bill: Ugh. The deterioration, dilapidation of equipment, we had to tear that down. We had 8 to 10% OEEs across the main bottlenecks.

Devin: Okay.

Bill: It was complexity. You know, there are rear lamp assemblies where you had rotating platens on the mold, and you had two shots, one shot over another, and-

Devin: Okay ...

Bill: so a lot of complexity down there, and no process adherence.

So we had to set all those things up. We had to define all those processes, but we had to live it. And then at the same time, you're chasing trucks out the door- ... to fast track the 15-minute drive over to [00:51:00] the Apodaca Airport, you know- Mm ... Monterrey airport, just to get on a air freight to go to Puebla, to get to VW, to go somewhere, to get to GM, to go somewhere, because we were so far behind- You were-

we were shutting down plants, right?

Devin: Wow. So you were, you're flying

Bill: everything. We were thrust into this. But as we turned the corner, and you saw those light bulb moments, uh, and it was when Don and Terry came down, and Terry's all excited. Yeah. He's like, "Ah, I wanna show you." And, and he, you know, he allowed us to have the capital that we needed to, you know, spruce up the plant.

You know, clean it up, put some paint on it. You know, get some little racks, get DR stuff. Was a small investment to the opportunity. We, you know, it was $160 million plant losing $120 million a year when we went

in. Oh. How do you do that? Kind of an issue, yeah. So we got it back, and, and the handoff point, we were losing $4 million. Wow. We went down from $168 million plant to about $130 million plant, we were losing $4 million, and we had the trajectory to go across break even, [00:52:00] and we handed it off to another guy. Um, that was one of our, our counterparts once Scott and I did the turn.

Terry's out there running, Don's the CEO, and he's like, "Come on, Don, I want to show you what these guys did. I want to show you it. This is awesome." And Terry look- turns around and looks all pissed off at Scott and I saying, "What are you guys doing? What are you falling behind for?" Blah, blah, blah. So Scott's limping along, and I'm limping along.

And there's blood. It was like that Curt Schilling moment coming out of Scott's

Devin: socks. Ugh. Nope. Mm-mm.

Bill: And, uh-

Devin: I don't do

Bill: blood well ... our fee- our feet were just hamburger, right? Ugh. For s- you know, just six months ago. And then it's like, blah, you know, pump your side in. Same thing, right? Ugh. Blisters everything.

We just had worked so hard. And I'm thinking to myself, "We made it." But then the people element. So a- at that point, I'm like, "There's nothing greater than this. There's nothing harder than this." Right. "There's no other challenge." You know, and we, we saved these... They may not have been American [00:53:00] citizens, but they were still citizens of our team.

They

Devin: were still people.

Bill: We helped save their jobs. They're people. Right?

Devin: Yeah.

Bill: But then the human element, and then our lesson learned is, "I'm sending you guys back on the corporate jet." And I'm like, "Oh, thanks," you know, get a corporate jet ride for, you know, six months of our lives down here. That wasn't the big thing, but Don and Terry had sent a bouquet of flowers and a bunch of other stuff, sweets, everything, to our wives and said, "I want to thank you both for allowing us to take your husbands away from you- Mm

to change the lives of these people." So that was the moment I knew-

Devin: Yeah ...

Bill: manufacturing operations was something special. Now, fast-forward to the criticality of this. Back then, having a college degree meant you were gonna make out of the gates 20... There, there wasn't the, there wasn't the resource gap-

Devin: Right

Bill: that there is. So now things have changed, and what I tell young kids is this, that- [00:54:00] Today, we've got kids, and this is why I bought a training company, me and Scott did, in Tampa. They do training in the plants. They, they have, uh, all kinds of testing. Uh, it's m- mechanical, electrical, pneumatic, hydraulics.

Devin: You know- All

Bill: the skilled trades

all, all the skilled trades, and also robotics, controls, uh, automation engineering, all that. Right. We have courses for all that because, you know, now if you're a young... Not only is it an ex- exciting career. If you like playing Minecraft, you'll love, you'll love playing Plantcraft.

Devin: There's a-

Bill: Right?

Devin: If you like video games or Tetris, there's n-

Bill: You're problem-solving.

Yes. And when you're in those video games, you know, especially for those guys and girls wired like that, you can solve these problems, right? Right. So the, you know, the opportunity now is I can invest a third of the money to get to trade school and to learn these skills and make almost twice as much. I mean, some of these [00:55:00] kids that we're paying that are really good, they're making- Oh, I

Devin: know

Bill: 50, 75 bucks an hour, and they got all the overtime they could possibly get. Yes. They're making two bills a year, 100, 200,000 or plus a year if they're willing to work.

Devin: Right.

Bill: And they don't have all the debt to go for it. So that dynamic has completely flipped.

Devin: Shifted,

Bill: yeah. Look, our birth rate is 1.56 for United States.

That is catastrophic. In a generation or two, there's not gonna be any of us left, right?

Devin: Yep.

Bill: These younger kids, or these younger kids that are getting to marriage age aren't getting married. They're having kids later. They're having fewer kids.

Devin: Yes.

Bill: So we have to do two things here. We have to train what we have now, these kids that are learners.

We have to convince them to come over- Right ... and understand this is a fulfilling career.

Devin: It's an am- and

Bill: it's a, it's a- Amazing, and it's gonna pay more- It's a great wage ... than people with college degrees. Yes. But number two, we have to bridge the technology gap because these kids that learn this are gonna have to do twice as much as what we did- Yeah

with the technological advantage- Yeah ... [00:56:00] because there's no other way, 'cause there's not enough people.

Devin: Yeah.

Bill: So what we've invested in at CCO Brands- Mm-hmm ... is, you know, we've gotta train the next generation. And I'm telling you, and I can look right in the camera on this- ... it's one of the most rewarding careers you could ever have, and you p- you have problems to solve all day long, different types of problems.

Devin: You're never

Bill: bored. It's getting into manufacturing, supply chain, logistics, that whole area. Yeah. The industrial area is n- but now, it's also the best paying careers.

Devin: It

Bill: is. So, so all you have to do, I mean, if you can get yourself off the couch and off of pushing buttons, you'll be pushing buttons on, you know, ladder logic in a plant, right?

Devin: Yeah.

Bill: And you'll have just as much or more fun because once you've done it there, it's not, "I just built my fortress in Minecraft. Oh, I'm really happy." It's, "I saved 100 jobs-

Devin: Yeah. Yes ...

Bill: because I fixed this."

Devin: Which is unbelievably gratifying.

Bill: Gratifying.

Devin: And, and the cool thing about it too is you can be transient and move all [00:57:00] over like, like you have, or there's so much opportunity to stay put, likely close to home.

And when we look at Michigan, we're the top automotive manufacturing state in the country, right? You can throw a stone and hit a manufacturing, logistics, warehouse, distribution, somebody, right? But it's, it's close to home. You can grow within a company. You can change companies

Bill: and grow. It's not hard finding jobs- No

uh, if you're gonna get into the technical space right now. I mean, there's such a demand supply gap. The supply, and it's dw- dwindling even more, so you can almost pick your price. Uh, I was telling my daughter this. Now, I live down in Frisco, Texas for part of the year. I have a Frisco office down there, and the cranes and everything else and all the growth, I mean, it's not like here.

This is pretty stable.

Devin: Yeah. Yeah.

Bill: But it's just like they can't suck in enough-

Devin: Talent ...

Bill: environmental engineers, environmental science, industrial engineers, civil [00:58:00] engineers. Um, uh, but they also have to have the skilled tradespeople- Yeah ... and that's even more of a gap is- Yeah ... and so those people are down there making, like, 75 bucks an hour straight time, and then they have all the overtime they get.

Time and a half. They just make a ton of money because they have to have those resources. So, you know, please, please, if you're listening to this podcast, I mean, you know, the, the shift is worth it, right? You put up with a lot of shift.

Devin: Lots of it.

Bill: But it's fun, and you feel like you're accomplishing something in life.

Yeah. Nothing better than saying, "I helped make those parts in that car," right? There- "That's part of my plant, and I've got a piece of me in these cars or these trucks or this widget or that widget"

Devin: You know, when I, um, managed a team, whether at GM or Amazon, even when I was at Yanfeng in procurement, I used to tell my team, when you're a doctor, which is an unbelievably noble profession that I could never handle doing, right?

You can only [00:59:00] see and help so many patients.

Bill: Generally one at a time

Devin: But even within a lifetime

Bill: In a lifetime ...

Devin: there's, you can only do so much. The amount of people's lives that you touch, everything that we're looking at, right? This, this microphone, this notebook, our clothes, the hairspray I put in, every single thing was made by people somewhere.

Bill: Yes.

Devin: There's nothing that impacts more lives at such a grandiose scale-

Bill: Somebody made these microphones. That's jobs behind it, right?

Devin: Yes.

Bill: I mean, it's, it's ex- you're exactly right. And doctors, this is a misnomer. You can- ... you can spank me for this. Doctors never really save a life. They extend a life, and they extend the quality of life, right?

Fair. 'Cause the human mortality rate, entropy, and this is part of the physics, eventually, given enough time, entropy always wins. Yes, it does. So how do we fight the battle with entropy? But truly, you can ruin [01:00:00] a livelihood, and it's ruined, and it could be- Yeah ... forever a death spiral. Um, we, and, and you've done this in your career too, help save the livelihoods of- Yeah

you know, it could be 1,000 people or more in a plant-

Devin: It- ...

Bill: if we make the right decisions and engage. I mean, it's such an honorable profession, what we do- It

Devin: really is ...

Bill: in, in this role.

Devin: It really is. I mean, that's, that's why I came to this role. That's why we have the podcast. It's why I personally joined Team Sense, right?

It was about actually making a difference in people's lives, making a difference in the front line- And I'm happy for you,

Bill: too ...

Devin: making a difference. Thank you.

Bill: And you will. You will.

Devin: Thank you.

Bill: You're very talented, and-

Devin: Aw. Yeah ... you're too kind to me.

Bill: Yeah. I'm sure you'll have some other really, really good guests.

Devin: Listen, fingers crossed. Um, okay, if you could go back and talk to 25-year-old Bill, what advice, what would you say?

Bill: Hmm

Devin: Would you do anything different? [01:01:00]

Bill: Yeah, don't eat so many cheeseburgers and-

Devin: But don't you wanna do that when you're 25? Listen, because it starts going downhill really fast.

Bill: You know, my, my w- life has been pretty well blessed.

I, I don't regret- Much of the experience I've had, the good and the bad, and I've had some bad ones, and a lot of them I've created myself. What we're doing now, I say you're gonna be proud of what you're doing. Start five years earlier. Don't wait until you're- Ah ... you had enough. There was a certain point where my cup was full enough with seeing people all over the world building connections.

If we'd have made the break when Scott left, Christian went to Key Plastics to run global ops there, I already had enough of- Your network built ... being all over the world, enough of the network built. Um, most of it was just re-dealing with people in that same network.

Devin: Right.

Bill: And I could've had five more [01:02:00] years where we could've had this thing going and helping people.

Not ashamed of anything we do. What we do helps stock prices, mutual funds, people's retirement funds, their jobs-

Devin: It's their livelihood ...

Bill: the business owners. When you bring that up and you eliminate that waste, that they're just, they just don't know until they know, right?

Devin: Yeah.

Bill: So ignorance doesn't mean stupidity, but stupidity means if you wanna stay ignorant, right?

So there's people who engage and embrace the process will always get better.

Devin: Yeah.

Bill: But how many more lives could we have touched in a positive way had we- Mm ... started a little earlier? I know it sounds like a kind of a skipping around the question, but that would probably have been the best advice. You're gonna have a break point when you and Scott are gonna separate ways, and one of us had to get it started, so he, he was gonna go over there, run ops.

I would have probably made the break then. But I will say this, the thing that was the appeal is I had such a good [01:03:00] guy as a boss I was going into Dave Maldonado. Makes all the

Devin: difference.

Bill: And, you know, again, I'd do anything for the guy today. I'm so proud of him. He's the COO of a large company, Bench- Benchmark El- you know, Electronics.

And to see his career progress. The good guys sometimes win. You know, the good gals sometimes win. But there's a lot of folks I see that are good, that because of politics, get their career shoved down.

Devin: Right.

Bill: So it's good to see a few of those good guys win, so that was the appeal. But knowing what I know in aftermath, I would have mortgaged that, even though I love the guy, that relationship, to have been able to be out there a little earlier-

Devin: Make a difference faster

Bill: and have this. Yeah. And the, the other thing, too, is I should have brought the bit operations, the entropy management, physics-based, and I'm still struggling with this. How can we accelerate that to the market? There's also some tremendous, not intentional, fallacies with ERP systems that don't match up to reality.

Yeah. And [01:04:00] I feel like, still today, I'm in the sludge to bring that forward quickly enough to market, because if we do it- This will change the dynamics and the performance level of everybody, you know, and all boats rise when the tides come up.

Devin: Yeah.

Bill: I gotta find a way to get that moon tugging and get that tide coming up, and it seems like a personal failure sometimes on my part.

It's like, how can I get this done faster? Uh, and so that's one of my biggest challenges today is, how do we get not only the word out there- Right ... how do we get the technology buttoned up to enough where you have a complete package, you just took it in, you throw out the old ERP system or it talks to the ERP system.

Right. And now you have- Complements

Devin: it ...

Bill: a real time, physics-based, activity-based, dynamic costing system where you know every day where you're at. You don't react to little noise, you react to trends and stuff.

Devin: Mm-hmm.

Bill: That automatically guides you, gives you IRR and net present value, uh, returns on. You can Monte Carlo it where you can say, "Hey, if I buy tools and put 'em up at the [01:05:00] press, or impact wrenches, or if I do this or that."

And, and some of those struggles that nobody can ever get through-

Devin: Right ...

Bill: you just put it in there and it says it's, uh, 3,421% IRR. You got a five-year time horizon as the maximum, as things change in five years. Yep. You're an idiot if you don't do it, right? Right. But right now, there's so much of that struggle 'cause people only see, I call it the left side of the business equation, because operations people aren't finance experts.

They don't know how to do IRRs, N- No. So they'll say, "Hey, I need $50,000, it's gonna be good." So the finance guy doesn't wanna get caught with their folks and they see just the one side of the equation. Right. They don't know the other side is- Yeah ... $2.4 million over five years.

Devin: And that's a, that's a thing that I, I, I, I struggle, even as we talk to, like, you know, TeamSense customers- P- showing them that there's the ROI, right?

Like, it's not hard, in my mind, in my mind, it's not hard to prove out, because it's how my brain, my brain works, right? Yeah. Like, everything's a

Bill: math problem. You're wired [01:06:00] a little differently. Everything engineer, right?

Devin: Yes.

Bill: But here's the thing. You knew intrinsically, but you still didn't have all the pieces of the puzzle, but you knew what the puzzle looked like in the end.

Yeah. So, and, and, and the finance people want to see every piece plugged into the puzzle, right? Right. The issue here was, for us, are we gonna be cost more, which the answer's gonna be yes.

Devin: Yes.

Bill: Are we gonna cost more than your fully fringed wages? 100%. Maybe 20 to 30% more. Yeah.

Devin: Yeah. Right?

Bill: But the butts aren't in the seat, the parts aren't being made, the ball's not going- You're losing the

Devin: money anyways

Bill: the ball's not going in the end zone, I'm not getting paid, right? So if I have to pay, what's direct labor on your budget? Probably 8 to 10% of sales is probably what it was, right? Mm-hmm. So I'm gonna pay a 20% increment on 20% of those people. So I'm gonna pay 20% more on 20% of 8% of sales. So I'm gonna pay less than a percent more, and I'm gonna wind up having all that upside by getting that contribution margin by putting the [01:07:00] ball in the end zone- Right

getting the parts out the door. Right. And also, the premium freight, the off standard sorting costs,

Devin: all of- There's so much

Bill: to

Devin: it ...

Bill: and all that is part of that equation, but the finance folks say, "Ah, Devon, I don't know if you should spend this, because on 8% of our overall budget, which is direct labor, we got a 20% gap, so I need 20% more people, and I'm gonna pay 20% more than our fully fringed rates."

Once you start to break it down into elements, absolutely there's no argument. I gotta get the people in, 'cause I can't get the parts out the door. But, yeah- But

Devin: you need the right people ...

Bill: and that's what our systems are gonna do in one fell swoop, is you don't even have to do the math. It does it for you.

Devin: Wow.

Bill: Yeah. It does it for you.

Devin: How amazing is that?

Bill: Well, it's only amazing if we can, uh, A, get it really smoothed out, which we're pretty well smoothed. Yeah. I mean, I can walk everybody through this, but if we don't get the word out, people are still gonna be in that impasse and struggling. You think the finance person trying to protect the company's doing a bad job?

No, they're just trying to do their job. They're doing their

Devin: job.

Bill: But until they have those other elements, you're [01:08:00] trying to do your right job in purchasing, 'cause you know intrinsically- I do ... our plant's struggling. We're paying premium freight, we got all these issues. Get the butts in the seat.

Devin: Mm-hmm.

Bill: So if we can take all that noise out where we're all looking at the same problem the same way from our different perspectives-

Devin: Yeah

Bill: and agree, that makes things so much easier, and you preserve the most valuable element in any business. There's only one main most valuable element

Devin: in any business. And it's our most expensive, and it's our most high risk.

Bill: What's that?

Devin: It's people.

Bill: I'm gonna... Now, this is gonna be a learning moment. Oh. There is- Okay,

Devin: bring it on

Bill: so I will say this. I will submit to you the most important dependent variable- dependent variable, though- Fair ... put your- Okay ... put, put your hat on. Yeah.

Devin: Okay.

Bill: Your engineering hat.

Devin: Yeah.

Bill: Is people.

Devin: Yes.

Bill: But you've seen people come and go on- They do ... people come and go on. Is Zhang Shufeng still there? They're probably less off, you know, without your talent, but are [01:09:00] they still there working?

Yeah. Absolutely. People come and go.

Devin: Yeah.

Bill: There's only one thing in life you can never get back, and once it's gone, it's gone forever.

Devin: Time?

Bill: Time. Whoa. That's the center of the hub.

Devin: Okay.

Bill: So you can never get that time back. So if I waste that time and I don't get the ball to the end zone-

Devin: Yeah ...

Bill: the time's came off the clock, I, I can't get that time back to put the ball in the end zone or do a replay.

And so eventually time runs out. Interesting. So time is the center of that hub because it's a universal, independent constant. And if I'm expending that, how many times have you seen a organization get behind and then the checkbook comes out and they're just writing checks to catch up because- Right ... the SOP date's coming?

So-

Devin: Yep ...

Bill: you know, and how many times have finance departments been complicit in that, not because of bad intentions, because they don't wanna cut capital- Right ... or they're trying to make the cash flow numbers look better-

Devin: Yep ...

Bill: or they don't have a good IR. They're trying to balance it. So they're asking [01:10:00] operations who are out there, who, who, who, you know, making parts, to give me an IR net present value so I can justify this to the board, or I'm gonna get fired.

And so you get all these silos that build up, and so what our systems do is just-

Devin: Breaks it all

Bill: down ... breaks it down, where everybody is cross-connected. You build a neural network so every th- part of the organization... 'Cause in purchasing, you're a big part of the organization, right? Yeah. And supply chain, a little different.

People wanna make 'em the same, right?

Devin: Mm-hmm.

Bill: So moving stuff around- They're very different ... and buying stuff is very different. It's very different. You know, and then you have operations, making stuff- Yep ... is different. Quality, it's your liver and kidneys, right? Mm-hmm. Purging out stuff, making sure you're clean.

You know, the heart beats your machinery, right? But in purchasing and supply chain, that's the food you eat to supply the blood- Right ... in the organism, which is the cash flow. Mm. That's the equivalent to blood. And then what's the brain? Which a lot of times that's to be questioned. Is your executive staff and your leadership staff, right?

Okay. And so if those neurons aren't firing and talking to each [01:11:00] other-

Devin: All

Bill: at the same time ... and what's your strength, right? Your people. Right. So if you don't go, "I'm putting my hand on the stove," and I never recognize 'cause my n- my nerve endings are dead, I'm gonna burn my hand off- Yeah ... and, and probably die or, you know, have to chop an arm off.

So how is your accountability process communicating down to the bottom, you know, to the janitor, and all the way back up and getting a feedback loop saying, "My hand's on the stove."

Devin: Mm.

Bill: So those are all things that are imperative and, you know, when you're talking, talking shift.

Devin: Absolutely. Bill, this has been phenomenal.

I appreciate you sharing some, some RealShift stories with me. Before we close out this episode- Yes, ma'am ... I want to ask you, what is your, your call to action, your ask that I can help you with?

Bill: Spreadin' the word.

Devin: Okay.

Bill: Uh, this always works. I'm that confident because physics don't change. I don't think there's a black hole comin' into-

our solar system that's gonna change- I sure hope not. ... that's gonna change the dynamics of the way physics... But [01:12:00] even then, it's definable. You know what they're gonna do.

Devin: Right.

Bill: So we can fix every situation if you're willing to engage. So the spreading of the word that we're here to help. We're not here to try to, we're not a used car salesmen.

Nope. We're not charging huge markups. We want to see you succeed. And that we have tools that no one else has. I go on AI all the time saying, "Is there somebody in the, their basement or in their, in their garage?" And they haven't got there yet, and it's because of the way the approach, uh, is. So, you know, our mission, and again, I can't shovel, if I make billions of dollars, I can't shovel up my grave at the end.

It's how many people show up at your funeral. I want to help these companies. Amen. That's the, that, you know, so-

Devin: Yeah ...

Bill: helping, just doing this is very beneficial to be able to get it out to your viewership that, you know, help is out there. And you, you, don't be so prideful you don't have partners, because we've taken years to specialize in this.

Now, if it's, I've learned here of lately, understanding the [01:13:00] legal speak- ... or, you know, if it's something, you know, I mean, like lawyering is something, uh, I don't want to do. Consulting's another thing I'm really not that interested in because I don't like pontificating. I like gettin' stuff done.

Anti-consulting's more of our, our speed. Yeah. But there's professions out there that, you know, I'd be sittin' here lying to you, but if you're in any type of supply chain operations, distribution, you know, we have spent years, and we've seen all over the world refining this. We absolutely can help you have better performance, and I appreciate you helping us get the word out.

Devin: Absolutely. And I will now speak into the camera, and I will confidently say I can speak from experience that Bill and the CCO team know exactly what they're doing. I've personally used them when I was in procurement. Uh, I've sourced a lot of business over my career to you, uh, because I watched it work.

I saw what it could do. I saw it help turn around the business, and I know you can do it for other people.

Bill: Thank [01:14:00] you. Thank you, I appreciate that.

Devin: Yeah.

Bill: That's what we're here for.

Devin: Absolutely. Well, Bill, thank you so much. Uh, this has been another episode of Talk RealShift, and until we meet again, I'll see you out on the floor.

Bill: See you out on the floor.

Devin: And a special thank you to TeamSense for sponsoring this episode.