Culture as Alignment of Values: Jim Mayer on Manufacturing Culture, Automation, and Reluctant Podcasting
Manufacturing Happy Hour
In this episode of Manufacturing Happy Hour, host Chris talks with Jim Mayer, founder of TCO Strategies and host of the Manufacturing Culture Podcast. The central question is what "company culture" actually means in manufacturing, and why so many small and mid-sized manufacturers struggle with it. Mayer offers a definition that surprised the host with its simplicity: culture is the alignment between an individual's values and an organization's values. Over the conversation, Mayer explains how he arrived at that view, why he thinks culture determines whether companies can adopt automation, what concrete steps he walks clients through, and how an unwilling podcaster ended up enjoying interviews more than consulting.
A Bar Crawl Framing
The two had recently met in person over dinner at Wild Roots in West Allis, Wisconsin, when Mayer was in town for the Wisconsin Manufacturing and Technology Show. Mayer called the Duck Fat Burger one of the top five burgers he has ever had. He noted that he grew up in cattle country in northwestern Colorado. Asked where they would meet on his home turf, Mayer named Chelsea's Kitchen in uptown Phoenix, a staple for him and his wife, and Bourbon and Bones in Old Town Scottsdale, which he praised for its cocktails and bone marrow shooters. Chris then set the rest of the interview, figuratively, over drinks at Bourbon and Bones.
From Frustrated Field Employee to Culture Consultant
Mayer traces his interest in manufacturing culture to his own experience as an employee. Across the many companies he worked for, he often did not fit culturally. At one large corporation of about 4,000 employees, he would send ideas to the head office that he had already vetted with fellow employees and managers across the organization. He says he always got the same canned reply: because he was "from the field," the suggestion wasn't viable. He wanted the company to build on those ideas and find ways to use feedback from field employees.
The second turning point came during his work with the NTMA. On a trip in Europe, from Munich to Milan, he spent a lot of time talking with member companies about their biggest problems. By his account, the biggest problem for about a decade has been people. Yet he found that many companies still treated employees "like it was 1950, 1960." They were unwilling to look in the mirror and see why people didn't want to work for them. Mayer stressed that this is a broad statement and that many manufacturers do get it right. Still, he saw a common pattern. Companies accepted turnover and churn as normal, but they were not okay when they couldn't find someone to hire.
That observation led him to start a side business running anonymous engagement surveys for manufacturers, reporting back why employees weren't staying or weren't happy. A couple of years and another job later, he went out on his own to run TCO Strategies full-time. He is open about the difficult start. He says he saw a lot of failure in the first year and had to revamp his go-to-market strategy several times.
"Soft Skills Don't Belong in Manufacturing"
One of those go-to-market pivots came from an insight: manufacturers were tired of hearing about culture, engagement, workforce development, and workforce transition from people who had never been in a manufacturer's shoes, himself included. In the summer of 2022 he ran an email marketing campaign. Many manufacturers replied that soft skills don't belong in manufacturing.
Chris pushed back hard on that idea and asked for Mayer's blunt take on why anyone would say it. Mayer's answer was that they are afraid to change. In his view, manufacturers can measure the ROI of hard skills but believe they can't measure the ROI of soft skills. He says that belief is wrong, because soft skills can be measured through turnover, retention rates, and other metrics. To those companies, though, it looked like an unmeasurable change, and people are very uncomfortable with change.
The same campaign also produced plenty of positive replies. Many companies wrote back saying, in effect, that they had a phenomenal culture and wanted to explain how they built it. Mayer started calling them. He heard stories of leaders who took over family businesses, bought companies, rose through the ranks to become presidents, or came in as external hires. When he described these stories to a friend, she told him he had to start a podcast.
The Reluctant Podcaster
Mayer calls himself "the most reluctant podcaster." He says he has hated the sound of his recorded voice since hearing it on answering machines in the 1990s. Public speaking isn't the issue; he has done Toastmasters and enjoys speaking in front of people. What he dislikes is listening back to recordings. He also insists the show is about his guests, not about him.
To force himself to follow through, he built a website in mid-December and announced the podcast on LinkedIn, knowing a public announcement would leave him no way out. His first episode, recorded at the beginning of the following year, was with Christen Carlson of Peerless Precision in western Massachusetts. He says he fumbled through it so badly that he has since offered her a second episode, because he has gotten better, "not that I'm good." He now says he is having more fun with the podcast than with consulting, and that giving people the chance to tell their stories is the coolest job he could have. Chris described the show as on the rise and likely to share many listeners with Manufacturing Happy Hour. At the time of airing, it would be more than 40 episodes and about ten months old.
Redefining Culture
Chris asked what Mayer learned from the engagement surveys and what he has learned since starting the podcast. From the surveys, Mayer saw many gaping holes in the industry: problems people talk about often but rarely act on. At that stage, he believed culture was difficult and hard to define.
His view changed after about 13 or 14 months of running TCO Strategies and starting the podcast. He concluded that culture is simply the alignment of values between an organization and its employees, and that when that connection happens, it is positive. This changed how he approached clients. In his survey days, he would tell companies they had a toxic culture. Now he argues that it isn't up to him or anyone else to declare a culture negative. What is toxic to one person may be perfectly acceptable to another, because people's values and what they want from work differ widely. Once companies accept that employees are individuals who experience culture individually, he says, they can start making cultural changes that ensure each person loves the culture, lives it, and wants to come in day after day.
Chris said he had never heard culture framed this way and was surprised he hadn't, because it made immediate sense.
What Forty Episodes Have Shown
Asked for his biggest realization from the podcast, Mayer said that some people in the industry are very ready for culture conversations and some are not. He described culture as the backbone of what manufacturers will be able to do in the future. Innovation doesn't happen without a culture of innovation, and winning doesn't happen without a culture of winning. By defining the values and culture it wants, an organization defines what success means to it, and therefore what success it achieves.
The Automation-Culture Paradox
Before the interview, Mayer had raised what he calls the automation-culture paradox in small and mid-sized manufacturers. His argument is that many companies aren't afraid of automation; they are simply not culturally ready for it.
He cited a figure that automation has been shown to change productivity by close to 2% across the board. In the recording he says "reduce or increase," and the context suggests he means an improvement. He considers that significant whether a company is making widgets or running a job shop. He added that the figure comes only from companies that have actually implemented automation. By his account, those companies tend to know who they are, who they want to become, and what they value, and they hire for cultural fit toward where they want to go. The paradox, as he frames it, is that many small and mid-sized companies haven't defined who they are or what they want their culture to be. As a result, they can't bring in the innovation that would make them more productive.
Steps Toward Cultural Readiness
When Chris asked how a company becomes culturally ready, Mayer first returned to his earlier point: cultural journeys are as individual as personal values. There is no magic bullet and no one-size-fits-all approach, because culture depends on the people in the organization. He then described the process he takes clients through:
- Define mission, vision, and values. Who are you now, who do you want to be "when you grow up," and what do you value?
- Choose two or three words that leaders want the culture to be known for, such as innovation, winning, human nature, or social responsibility.
- Go to the employees and ask where they feel the culture stands today. Only after that question does he bring up mission, vision, and values. He says about 90% of the companies he works with claim to have all three, but most employees can't recite them. If employees don't know who the company is, who it wants to be, and what it values, he argues, they aren't living its culture.
- Measure. Many tools exist for measuring culture and engagement. TCO offers one, and he noted that many other companies do as well.
Mayer stressed that measurement is only an early step. What matters most is what a company does with the data. If an organization starts talking with employees about culture and engagement and then does nothing, he warns, culture and engagement will plummet, and people will walk around disengaged and uninterested in being there.
Chris summarized this as two requirements: self-awareness about who you are today, combined with a forward-looking view of where you want to be, plus a way to measure progress.
Two Guest Stories That Shifted His Perspective
Mayer shared two stories from his podcast that changed his thinking.
The first came from Steve Tomasi of Boston Centerless. The company hires many people from outside the US, which Mayer sees as a good way to draw in talent from overseas. At the time of the recording, Tomasi counted about 16 nationalities in the workforce and dedicated an entire wall of the facility to their flags. Mayer says the goal was to help workers from other countries feel connected not only to the country they were working in but to the building they were working in. He describes it as a very intentional move to create alignment.
The second, which he called funnier, came from Devin Goff of a company in British Columbia (the company name is unclear in the recording). Their interviews end with one question meant to gauge cultural fit: "What's your favorite comedy movie?" While hiring a manager, one candidate replied that it was a stupid question. Although he was the most talented and best candidate on paper, that answer told them he wasn't a cultural fit, so they passed on him.
The story led to a detour into favorite comedies. Chris named Office Space. Mayer named Monty Python and the Holy Grail, Office Space, and Anchorman, calling Office Space arguably one of the best workplace movies ever. They joked that sharing Office Space meant they had cultural alignment. Chris added Mel Brooks's Young Frankenstein. Mayer added Blazing Saddles and Spaceballs and argued that none of these films, including Monty Python, Anchorman, or Office Space, could be made today and earn the same cult following. Chris agreed but said he looks forward to the next great comedy. He also said he plans to start asking his own guests the favorite-comedy question for the same reason.
Is It Too Late to Start?
Chris asked what Mayer would tell people who think they are too late to a crowded space. Mayer's first suggestion was to reach out to people already covering the topic and see if there is a spot on their show. He started Manufacturing Culture because, although many manufacturing podcasts exist, he felt most focused on technology and processes. He found none focused solely on people. In his opinion, Manufacturing Happy Hour was the most people-focused, but it wasn't dedicated to cultural journeys. He added that he could be wrong about this and joked that listeners shouldn't send hate mail. If you have a unique niche, he says, give it a shot.
He also cited numbers to argue the field is less crowded than it looks. He said he believes about 2.5 million podcasts on Apple have only a single episode, and that a very high share of podcasts are abandoned after around 12 episodes. Once you look closely, he says, there are far fewer active people than you would expect. The reason is that it's hard work. Chris clarified his own timeline: seven years since recording his first episode, but only about four years of running it as a serious podcast, marking roughly a four-year anniversary around October 2023.
A Deliberately Lean Format
Mayer described his own process as unusually light on preparation. He has just two scripted questions: "What's been your cultural journey?" and "What are three things you've done that have changed the culture within your organization?" The rest is about 40 minutes of natural conversation that follows from the guest's first answer. He does no research. Guests now come to him often enough that he holds a single intro call to make sure they are a good cultural fit and will have a good conversation. They send a bio, he writes his own version, they record, and he handles post-production and publishing.
Even so, he says, it's a lot of work, and he can't imagine adding research on top. He mentioned he is developing a research-based show concept with two other people and another concept with three others, and that aligning schedules alone takes significant effort.
Collaborate Instead of Launching Alone
From that experience, Mayer's advice to companies thinking about a podcast is to consider working with existing hosts. He says many hosts are looking for relevant content in their segments and are happy to help. He urges companies not to feel they must launch a show that lasts one, seven, or twelve episodes and then fades. As an example, he described an organization that wanted its own podcast but realized it might only get four episodes out of the idea. They approached him about doing a mini-series together, and he thought it was a great fit because it would focus on the people inside that organization. His broader point is that companies can get "new media" exposure without spending the time, money, and effort to do it alone.
Chris drew a manufacturing lesson from this. Whether it's a new product line or a new market, if you have or could build the competency, or could scale or pivot easily, he says it doesn't matter that someone else is already doing it. What matters is whether you bring a unique value proposition, as Mayer did with his show. Chris also said he has been considering a mini-series himself. He described his own format as a contrast: each episode has three themes agreed on with the guest in advance. Sometimes he sends questions ahead of time and sometimes not, depending on whether the guest wants to be fully prepared or prefers a single goalpost.
Turning the Tables
Near the end, Mayer took over with his own questions for Chris: the most exciting place he has been, the most exciting food he has had, and his definition of culture in manufacturing.
Chris named two favorite cities, tied for first: New Orleans in the US and Berlin globally. He said both have grit and an off-the-beaten-path character and are rich in culture. Berlin, he said, has the diversity of a global city and an energy shaped by reinventing itself in the roughly 30 years since the fall of the Berlin Wall. In his words, "the city doesn't have to try hard to be cool." New Orleans, he said, is a city that to an extent shouldn't exist, since it sits below sea level and had to be engineered into being. He sees it as an exporter of music culture, noting that every touring act wants to play there and has a story about how New Orleans music affected its career. For food, he chose a New Orleans po'boy, Gulf oyster, shrimp, or catfish on Leidenheimer French bread, dressed all the way. He also mentioned the Berlin currywurst with housemade sausage at Vanguard, his local bar in Milwaukee, where he recorded episode 153 with Terry Iverson.
For his definition of culture, Chris applied Mayer's alignment framing to himself. His mission is to elevate the top voices in manufacturing and help manufacturers tell their stories to their ideal audiences. The best cultural fit for him, he said, is with people who have a cause bigger than their own business or career and who want to elevate the industry as a whole. He described that as the spirit of Manufacturing Happy Hour.
Mayer said he couldn't have put it better. He credited Chris with giving people a "megaphone," then clarified the wording: everyone has a voice, but not everyone has a megaphone. He also explained that he had phrased the "place" question vaguely on purpose, expecting Chris to answer with cities. He called Chris "the Anthony Bourdain of manufacturing": someone who loves travel and good food and brings manufacturing along on the journey. He said answering that way was on brand and authentic.
To close, Mayer said listeners can find him on LinkedIn by searching his name, where his profile photo shows him in a bathtub of ping-pong balls. The show is at manufacturingculturepodcast.com, a URL he admits is too long, and on LinkedIn, Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, and TikTok, recognizable by a big blue logo with a gear and a brain.
Jim, I'm not going to lie, one of the reasons I'm excited for today's interview is you and I actually got to hang out and have not only some beverages but some burgers recently in West Allis, Wisconsin at Wild Roots. The Duck Fat Burger — tell the audience what you thought of the Duck Fat Burger. I've never talked about this burger on the show before, so it's a good first time to do it.
Okay, it was in my estimations, Chris, one of the top five burgers I've ever had. I grew up in cattle country, Northwestern Colorado, so I'm very familiar with really, really good cheeseburgers. This one was hands down one of the best I've ever had. That paired with the dollar oysters and the maple old-fashioned at Wild Roots, it was — and the conversation company, right, I can't forget that — all of those factors together, it was a great experience.
It was fun. You were in town for the Wisconsin Manufacturing and Technology Summit, I think I got that right. I can't remember the exact acronym.
It's Show. It's Wisconsin Manufacturing Technology Show. That's right, that's right. I'll link up to them in the show notes anyway so folks know where to find it. But you were in town, I forget how it came up. I think I just mentioned that the show is happening or something. You're like, I'm going to be there too, you want to grab dinner? And I'm like, yes, I'll see you tomorrow. And based on your location I know exactly where that dinner needs to be. So we were at Wild Roots, but I have to ask you, if we were in your neck of the woods or anywhere else of your choosing, where might we have had our conversation? Or in the spirit of today's interview, where would we be having today's conversation if it were back over a beverage?
Yeah, so if we were in my neck of the woods, I would say we would be at either Chelsea's Kitchen, which is kind of Uptown Phoenix. It's a mainstay staple for my wife and I — great food, great cocktails, awesome patio once the temperature is appropriate here. That would be one, especially if you were anywhere near downtown Phoenix. If you were more over in Old Town Scottsdale, Bourbon and Bones would have been the place that we would go, for literally some of the greatest cocktails that you can have. And they have bone marrow shooters and just very interesting food and cocktail-forward place, but the ambiance is amazing.
Well, it's not always that we get three restaurant and bar shoutouts right in the first three minutes of the interview, but it's a bar crawl today. So let's say we're hanging out at Bourbon and Bones. I've got a question for you. I want to hear your story. What got you fascinated with manufacturing culture such that you consult on it, you've got a podcast on it now? How did you get into it? What drew you in?
Great question. It was my lived experiences, Chris. So I worked for a lot of companies over the course of my employed career, we'll call it that, before I went off on my own. And in those companies I found that I didn't always mesh culturally, right? In one of the larger organizations I worked for, I would send ideas to the head office — right, large corporation, one of 4,000 employees — I would send ideas that I had vetted with fellow employees, other managers throughout the organization, and I always got that, you know, canned answer: well, you're from the field, that's not very — you know, that's not really a viable type suggestion. Instead of saying, hey, let's build out on that, right? There are ways that you can incorporate feedback from your field employees.
And then really it was when I was traveling with the NTMA over in Europe. We were doing a trip, Munich to Milan, and as my role with the NTMA I had spent a lot of time talking with our members about their biggest problems, and their biggest problems for the last decade or so have been the people. And yet I was finding these companies were still treating employees like it was 1950, 1960, and not really willing to look in the mirror and say, this is how I treat my employees, of course they don't want to come work here, right?
And that's a broad stroke statement that doesn't of course apply to every manufacturer out there. There are a lot of companies who do get it right. But for the most part, the idea that people would just come work for them, and they were okay with the turnover, okay with the churn, but then they weren't okay when they couldn't find somebody, is what led me into starting what was a side business at the time, doing engagement surveys for companies in our industry, telling them the data on why their employees weren't staying or weren't happy, in an anonymous setting.
Fast forward a couple years and another gig later, I was very fortunate enough to go out on my own and do TCO Strategies, start TCO Strategies as a full-time gig. Saw a lot of failure in the first year, had to revamp my go-to-market strategy a couple of times. As part of that go-to-market strategy, I realized that people were really tired of hearing from me and other people that weren't in the manufacturer's shoes themselves about company culture, about engagement, about workforce development, about transitioning workforces. So I had done an email marketing campaign last summer, summer of '22, and I heard from a lot of manufacturers that soft skills don't belong in manufacturing. I've told that story a couple times on the Manufacturing Culture Pod.
Why, why would someone — I gotta interrupt — why would someone ever say that? That is ridiculous, that soft skills don't belong in manufacturing. Why would anyone say that about any industry? I want to just get your blunt take on this right here.
Because they're afraid to change, Chris. I think that that's really the biggest issue when it comes to culture, when it comes to soft skills, as it were. They can measure the ROI of hard skills; they can't measure the ROI of soft skills, or they don't think that they can, right? There are ways to measure that, and you can measure it through turnover and retention rates and a lot of other things. But to them it was an unmeasurable change metric, and people are very uncomfortable with change.
So that's why I got a lot of pushback on that. But I also got a ton of emails back from companies saying, we've got a phenomenal culture, here's what we do, here's how we do it, would love to have a conversation with you. So I started calling these companies, and I'd get these wonderful stories about these journeys in the industry, from the time somebody took over for family, or they bought, or they moved their way up and became presidents of organizations, or they came in as an external hire in some cases. And I was telling a good friend about these stories, and she said, you've got to start a podcast. And Chris, total transparency, I'm the most reluctant podcaster. I've told you this when we had burgers.
Yeah, you've talked about your resistance to the idea initially before, but tell us more here on the show.
Yeah, this is not about me, this is about these people. And I've not ever been one to want this. I heard my voice in the '90s on answering machines. I hate the sound of my own voice; I think a lot of people do. And you know, I've done the Toastmasters, I've done those things. I love speaking in front of people. It's the recorded voice that I have to then hear back that I really don't like. So needless to say, I was challenged to start a podcast, and one day in the middle of December started a website, announced it on LinkedIn, because I knew if I announced on LinkedIn I wouldn't have any choice but to follow through with it.
And recorded my first episode with Christen Carlson at the beginning of last year, out of Peerless Precision in western Mass. I fumbled through it, so much so that I've now offered her a second episode, because I've gotten better — not that I'm good, but I've gotten better. And I've learned a lot of lessons along the way, and now I'm having more fun doing this than I have with the consulting side. I love giving the ability for people to tell their stories. That to me is the coolest job that I could ever do.
Yeah, and for the audience out there, Jim's being modest. The Manufacturing Culture Podcast is a great show currently on the rise. If you like Manufacturing Happy Hour, you're going to like the Manufacturing Culture Podcast. In fact, I'd be shocked if there weren't some overlap in our listeners already. I'm sure some people are listening to this today being like, yeah, duh, Chris, of course I already know about the Manufacturing Culture Podcast. But I want to go back in time a little bit. One thing that stuck out when you were giving us your background was you sent out those engagement surveys, and I kind of want to hear from you what you learned about culture then and what you've learned about culture since starting the podcast, now that you're, by the time this comes out, probably over 40 episodes in, been doing it for 10 months, you know. So let's go back in time. What did you learn from the engagement surveys about manufacturing culture?
I learned it in the very beginning when I was doing that as a side gig, Chris, that there are a lot of gaping holes in our industry, and ones that we tend to talk about quite a bit, but little action is actually taken, right? But I was convinced at that point that culture was something that was difficult, that culture was a hard thing to define. And it was an eye-opening experience when I started the podcast and had been, you know, doing the TCO Strategies stuff for about 13, 14 months, and I realized all culture really is, is the alignment of values between an organization and its employees.
Once that connection happens, it's positive. So it's not up to me or anybody else to sit out there and tell somebody that they've got a negative culture, right? And that's what I started by doing when I was doing these engagement surveys, was I would say to people, you've got a toxic culture. Well, what is toxic to me may be totally acceptable to Chris, because Chris, you've got different values than I do. Not saying that all of our values are different, but what you value in your experiences in the world of work are going to be vastly different than what I value, and so what I look for in an organization is going to be different from what you look for, from what anybody looks for. So once we realize that people are individuals and their ability to view culture is going to be very individualized, that's when we can start making that cultural change within our companies to make sure that each individual who works for us loves the culture and lives a culture and is able to be there on a day in and day out basis.
So culture is the alignment between an individual's values and a company's values. I'm not sure I've ever heard it phrased that way before, and I'm surprised I haven't, because that makes perfect sense to me. My question is, what's something you've learned about culture in the manufacturing space since you started your show? Like I said, you're over 40 interviews in now, so you've definitely picked up something along the way. What's maybe your biggest realization or surprise you've come across since then?
That people in our industry — some people are very ready for culture conversations and some people aren't. Culture is a backbone of what organizations are going to be able to — in the manufacturing industry specifically — of what they're going to be able to do in the future, right? So when you look at culture in the manufacturing industry, innovation doesn't happen without a culture of innovation. Winning doesn't happen without a culture of winning, right? So creating and defining what values you want, creating and defining what culture you want for your organization will define what success you have, because that will define what success means to you.
So I want to ask you a little more specifically about a topic you brought up before the interview. You talk about something called the automation culture paradox in SMB manufacturers. Let's say we're having those beverages at Bourbon and Bones — is that it, Bourbon and Bones? That's spot. All right, so we're having our second cocktail at Bourbon and Bones. What is the automation culture paradox in SMB manufacturers? Tell us as if we're having that drink.
Yeah, so that paradox comes down to the realization that a lot of companies aren't afraid of automation, they're not culturally ready for automation. Automation — it's been proven that automation can reduce or increase productivity by close to 2% across the board, right? Which is a big percentage when you're talking about manufacturing widgets or even job shops, right? 2% — that's only been measured in the companies that have actually implemented automation, and those companies are typically ones that understand who they are, who they want to be, what their values are, and they hire on a cultural basis, right? They hire the right people to fit the culture of where they want to get to. That paradox, the cultural automation paradox, comes to the idea that companies, especially those small to medium-sized companies, they're not ready culturally. They haven't defined who they are and what they want their culture to be, so they can't then bring in that innovation to then become more productive.
So what is — how does one become more culturally ready then? What have you found in terms of people that, while they might not be culturally ready for automation and a technology evolution today, what are the steps they can take to get there?
Great question. Going back to an earlier question, cultural journeys are very individualistic. Just like for you and I, our values are very individualistic, so are the cultural journeys of organizations. There is no magic bullet, there's no one-size-fits-all approach to developing culture, because it depends on the human nature of the employees within the organization. So the steps that I help organizations through is, a, defining their mission, vision and values. That's step one. Define who you currently are, who do you want to be when you grow up, and what do you value within your organization. Then from there we can identify two to three words that are what the leaders want their culture to be defined as, right? From there we go to the employees and we talk with the employees: where do you feel the culture is here today?
Now after I ask that question, then I talk about the mission, vision and values, because 90% of the companies that I work with, they say they have those three elements, but most employees can't recite them. And so if your employees don't know who you are now, who you want to be when you grow up, and what you value, then they're not living the culture of the organization, right?
So quick hits, quick tips for people: identify who you are now, who you want to be when you grow up, and what you value. Identify what you want to be known as, what your culture — you know, is it innovation, is it winning, is it, you know, human nature, is it social responsibility, whatever it may be. And then measure that. There are multiple tools out there on how you can measure your culture, you can measure your engagement. TCO offers a solution, but there are other companies out there — there are tons of companies out there that can help you measure where you currently are with your culture.
That's only the first step though, is measuring — or I guess the second step, technically. It's what you do with that data afterwards that's so important for an organization's cultural journey. If you start talking about culture and engagement and what you want that to be with your organization and with the employees, and then you don't do anything with it, your culture is going to plummet, your engagement is going to plummet, you're going to start having people walking around completely disengaged and uninterested in being there. So measuring and defining where you want to be is only a portion. It's what you do with that data afterwards that's really important for organizations, especially in our industry.
So if I'm hearing you right, there's got to be a level of self-awareness there and a future-looking perspective to know who you are today and where you want to be
tomorrow, like that's step one. And I imagine there are people that are going through this without having that fundamental covered. And then when you start evolving, you need to have a way to measure progress, if I heard you correctly.
So Jim, another question I have is around some of the individual lessons you've pulled from your podcast, because the way I'm thinking of this is in the context of earlier in this interview, you talked about how culture is alignment of values of the people and the company. I've never heard it phrased that way before. It's one of those things where it's like, gosh, why did it take that long to hear that? But I think of that as one of the moments that's happened to me on this show. So I'm curious, despite being very involved in manufacturing culture up to this point, what is something that shifted your perspective? Maybe a specific story from one of your guests.
Yeah, so I've got two that really jump out at me, Chris. The first one was Steve Tomasi, Boston Centerless. He has an entire wall dedicated to the flags of the people who work for him. He does a lot of hiring of people who are not from the US, right? And to me, that's a great way to draw in talent from overseas, right? And Steve saw that he had, I think it was at the time we recorded, 16 different nationalities, and so he dedicated an entire wall of his facility to those flags so that those people who came from overseas, from other places, felt connected not only to the land that they were working on but the four walls that they were working within. And that was a very intentional move on Steve's part to make that alignment happen.
One that's a little bit more funny is Devin Goff from Drops Brockets up in British Columbia. When they do their interviews, they have one question at the very end, and it determines the cultural fit of that person. And that one question is: what's your favorite comedy movie? And he told us the story on the podcast about how they were looking to hire a new manager within the organization, and that one of the candidates said, "Well, that's a stupid question." And even though he was the most talented person, the best person on paper for the role, the fact that he answered the question that way meant that he was not a good cultural fit for them, and so they passed on him.
Yeah, I mean, the correct answer is Office Space anyway, so, you know.
So I went with a couple: Monty Python and the Holy Grail, I went with Office Space, and I went with Anchorman. Those are my three favorites. But I'm glad that you and I align on the Office Space one, because that is arguably one of the best workplace movies ever released.
Yes, you and I have cultural and personal alignment in that capacity, absolutely. I do love Monty Python. Anchorman is also on my list of top comedies in the last 20 years. I do have to give a shout out to Mel Brooks as well. Young Frankenstein is also high on my list. I'm glad the conversation went this way. I'm glad you took us down this path.
Well, let's go Blazing Saddles, Spaceballs. I mean, any of those Mel Brooks from the late 70s and 80s were just amazing movies that you could not make today. I mean, there is no way that in this world you could make any of those movies. Even Monty Python, even Anchorman, even Office Space, I would argue you couldn't make in today's world and have the cultish following that each of them had at the time and still continue to have today.
Absolutely. You know, you're totally right. I do look forward to whatever the next great comedy is, because there's still plenty of good humor ahead of us. Those are excellent stories. That's a great question. I'm gonna start asking people their favorite comedy movie as well, for that same reason.
In the meantime, though, let's talk about starting a podcast a little bit, because relatively speaking, a 10-month-old podcast is a newcomer podcast to the game, and you mentioned you were reluctant from the get-go. Do you feel now... or let me make this more actionable, the way I'm going to ask this question: what do you say to people that think they might be too late to the game when it comes to a new idea or concept, that people might default to saying, "Oh well, it's already been done before, there's no room for me anymore"? What's your response to that?
I would say if you feel late to the game, reach out to people in the space that you want to cover and see if there's a spot for you on their show, right? The reason Manufacturing Culture started was, while there's a lot of us in this space, a lot of the focus has been on technology around the processes. I didn't find one that focused solely on the people. You know, yours is the most people-focused of the podcasts in our space, in my opinion, right? I could be totally wrong, so don't send me hate mail, don't at me on Twitter. To me, that's Chris's. He was the most people-focused, but he wasn't necessarily only telling cultural journeys, right? So if you've got that unique niche, go ahead, give it a shot. There are, I think, 2.5 million podcasts on Apple right now with one single episode.
Sounds right. Yeah, I need to look at... Yeah, and the amount of podcasts that get abandoned after 12 episodes or something like that is also extremely high. There are a lot of stats that, while the amount of podcasts might seem daunting, once you really dive into the numbers, you realize, oh yeah, there are a lot less people here than I initially thought.
Yeah, because it's hard, Chris. I mean, you've been doing... I don't know how long Manufacturing Happy Hour has been around. Is it 12 years at this point?
No, no, no, no. I was much later to the game than that. I wish it had been 12 years; that would have been really forward-thinking on my end. We're actually, I mean, really I'm at seven years since recording the very first episode, but it really didn't turn into something more serious or a podcast until three years after that. So the way I look at it, we're really celebrating our four-year anniversary right around this time here in October 2023.
Yeah, that's huge, man. Congratulations to me. It's hard, it's hard work. You've been doing it for four years now on a regular basis, seven years overall. You know, for me and the Manufacturing Culture pod, the good news is I don't do a lot of preparation. So behind the curtains for all of your listeners: I have natural conversations. I have two scripted questions and that's it: What's been your cultural journey, and what are three things that you've done that have changed the culture within your organization? Other than that, it's 40 minutes of just conversation between two people about culture in manufacturing based on their first answer, right? So outside of that, I don't have to do a whole lot of prep. I know other podcasters like yourself, there is a lot more preparation, there's a lot more research that goes into it. I don't do any research. At this point, people are coming to me enough that they want to be on the podcast that I have one intro call with them, make sure that they and I are a good cultural fit, that we're going to have a good conversation. Outside of that, they provide me their bio, I write one of my bios, and then we're off to the races. We record, and then I do the post-production and I post. That's still a lot of hard work just with that, right? I can't imagine throwing the research into it.
I mean, I have another show that I'm working on, a concept with two other people, and it's research-based. I've got another concept that I'm working on with three other people, and that's, you know, aligning schedules. There's just so much work that goes into this that if you've got an idea and there is already that topic out there, reach out to that person. See if you can join, support, do whatever you can to help them.
And if you're a company that's looking for a podcast or looking to start your own podcast, my advice: there are so many of us out here that are looking for relative content for each of our different segments. We're more than happy to help you out. Reach out to us. Don't feel like you have to start one on your own that lasts an episode or seven episodes or 12 episodes and then it falls off. Work with us. I'm working with an organization right now. They wanted to start their own podcast, or they had an idea, and they realized they could maybe get four episodes out of it, so they reached out to me and said, "Hey, would you mind doing a mini-series with me?" And I said, "That's a phenomenal idea, let's talk about it." So we talked through it, and it's going to be a good fit because we're talking about the people within the organization. So I think that there's a lot of ways that people can get the podcast exposure that they're looking for, this new media, quote-unquote, exposure, without having to take the time, money and effort to do it on their own.
Yeah, there's a lot in that answer there. I'll highlight a couple things. I think your assessment about, hey, you know, I didn't see a podcast that was specifically the manufacturing culture podcast, which is very correct. It's one of the topics that comes up on my show, you'll hear it on other manufacturing shows as well, but there's always more room at the table. You chose to go the route of doubling down on that. And to bring this into a manufacturing lesson for the audience: know that, whether it's a new product line or an area you want to expand into, if you've got the competency or could have the competency in that space, or the ability to scale or pivot to that direction easily, I would say who cares if someone else is already doing it? Figure out: do you have a unique value proposition that you can bring to the table, same way that you brought your own unique value proposition to your podcast as well. So I like that. Lot of great ideas.
I have been toying with that mini-series idea as well, a little behind the curtains on my end. You know, because you bring up some good points, right? There's more than one way to do a podcast, there's more than one way to run a business. You have your two questions ready to go. I go the route of having, for the listeners out there, I think they might know this, but I have three themes essentially for every episode. I make sure my guest and I are aligned on what those themes are going to be. Maybe I'll send them some questions in advance that'll be associated with those, maybe I won't. It really depends on the guest, right? Like, what are they comfortable with? Do they want to be extra prepared, or are they more like you? Do they want to be like, "Hey, just give me one goalpost here and I'll do my best to hit it once I'm on the show"? So yeah, a lot of different ways to do it.
You know, as we get towards the end of our conversation, we've talked podcasting, we've talked culture. Is there anything you wish I would have brought up that I haven't brought up yet?
I want to know where... and this is my question to you, this is my little cultural takeover moment for Chris. Chris, where's the most exciting place that you've been? What's the most exciting food that you've had? And, oh, I had that third one: what is your definition of culture in manufacturing?
All right, most exciting place I've been and most exciting food I've had. I don't know if I've shared this with the audience yet. I have two favorite cities in the world; they're tied for first. New Orleans is the one here in the US, and then Berlin is my global city.
Those are like opposite ends of the spectrum, bud. I mean, tell us more.
A little bit, a little bit. They both have grit. They both have, let's say, a bit of an off-the-beaten-path character, a little bit. They're both very rich in culture, I would say. Whereas Berlin brings a lot of that diversity you'd expect from a large global city, particularly one that's come up in the past, is it just over 30 years? Yeah, just over 30 years, where it's kind of had to reinvent itself since the fall of the Berlin Wall. There's just a vibe there and an energy that you don't get anywhere else. The city doesn't have to try hard to be cool; it just is. And it's nowhere else like I've been in the world. New Orleans also has that grit, like I mentioned, right? Like, you're in a city that to an extent shouldn't exist. It sits below sea level, right? They had to engineer their way to make the city exist. And their culture, I think it's most summarized when I go see a touring act or a local act in New Orleans. Every touring act wants to play there. Every touring act has a story of how New Orleans or New Orleans music has impacted their careers. So I look at New Orleans as a town that is just an exporter of music culture.
And then, where's my favorite food? I mean, New Orleans-style po'boy. I go on record all the time saying, like, sandwiches are my favorite food on Earth in general, 'cause a peanut butter sandwich on the ski slopes tastes really good in that moment. But I would say there's no finer sandwich than, like, a Gulf oyster or Gulf shrimp or catfish po'boy on Leidenheimer French bread in New Orleans, dressed all the way, as it should be. But since we were talking about Berlin, my local bar here in Milwaukee is a place called Vanguard. We recorded episode 153 there with Terry Iverson. That was a lot of fun; you've had him on your show. And they serve a mean Berlin currywurst. They do housemade sausages, so.
Wow. All right, next time I come, I want to go there. Next time I make that trip to Wisconsin.
It probably would have been my first pick had you not been right down the street from Wild RS, to be honest. So what was your third question, because I went on that monologue? The third question was more culture related, correct?
Yeah, what's been your cultural journey, and what's your definition of culture in manufacturing?
Yeah, I think when you talk about aligning your values with company values, when we're talking about that type of cultural fit, you know, my mission is to elevate the top voices in manufacturing and help manufacturers tell their story to their ideal audience, their ideal prospects, etc. So where I've found culture has been the best fit for me in the manufacturing space is folks that are out there with a bigger cause other than just their immediate business, their immediate career. They're looking to elevate the industry as a whole. And that's really what the vibe of Manufacturing Happy Hour is. We're here to elevate those voices that are doing incredible things, not just for their companies but for the industry as a whole. So that's my answer to that question.
I love it, I love that. And I couldn't have said it better myself as to what I've gotten from your show over the years. You do a phenomenal job, Chris, of elevating the people who may not have that voice, or may not have that megaphone, let's rephrase that. They all have a voice; they may just not have a megaphone to be able to get it out there. And that's why I've loved your show in the past, the guests that I've listened to. I really appreciate the work you do, and am very honored and humbled to have been a guest myself now. So thank you very much.
I do have to ask you, and you asked where are my favorite places. Were you talking about, like, cities like that, or were you actually asking about, hey, what manufacturing company has jumped out at you? I kind of just went my route on the city path.
Look, Chris, in my estimation you have been, since I started following you, have been connected with you, you're the Anthony Bourdain of manufacturing. So I asked that question intentionally vague, not knowing where you were going to go with it, but having an idea that you would go the city route, right? I didn't know what the two cities were, but you are that Bourdain. You're the guy who likes to travel, who likes to have good food, and you bring manufacturing along with you on that journey. So it was very on brand for you to answer that question the way you did, and I love it. I just appreciate your authenticity. Well, one last
Question for you: where can people find Jim Mayer and the Manufacturing Culture Podcast?
Yeah, so LinkedIn, search for Jim Mayer. I've got a big picture of myself in a bathtub of ping-pong balls on LinkedIn. You can find Manufacturing Culture Podcast at our website, manufacturingculturepodcast.com. That's too long of a website, I've got to work on that. But we are also on LinkedIn, Facebook, Instagram, we're now on Twitter, TikTok, haven't made the jump to Twitter yet, or X. We're also on YouTube. You can just search Manufacturing Culture Podcast on any of those platforms, you'll find us. Big blue logo with a gear and a brain and all that kind of fun stuff.
And we will have plenty of spots to connect with Jim over in the show notes page, all those spots he just rattled off. With that, Jim, thank you so much for jumping on today's podcast.
Article published