Thomas Lamay brings it again. This time addressing the subject of masculinity and actions we can take to improve mental wellness in the construction Industry.
Plus we finally talk about the infamous Herby and bottle necks.
connect with Thomas at: https://www.linkedin.com/in/thomaslamay/
Engage with a community of Industry Professionals focused on expanding their leadership skills: https://www.depthbuilder.com/a/2147560101/25qqpH4D
Coupon Code JESSE
catch the previous videos of this conversation at: https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLnVikYCgUE4GewVfVwUKBgb_v6lSgzlot
Get yourself a copy of Lean & Love at: https://www.depthbuilder.com/5s
Thomas Lamay brings it again. This time addressing the subject of masculinity and actions we can take to improve mental wellness in the construction Industry.
Plus we finally talk about the infamous Herby and bottle necks.
connect with Thomas at: https://www.linkedin.com/in/thomaslamay/
Engage with a community of Industry Professionals focused on expanding their leadership skills: https://www.depthbuilder.com/a/2147560101/25qqpH4D
Coupon Code JESSE
catch the previous videos of this conversation at: https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLnVikYCgUE4GewVfVwUKBgb_v6lSgzlot
Get yourself a copy of Lean & Love at: https://www.depthbuilder.com/5s
oh yeah, that is Mr. Thomas Lame and I getting down on this collab session number three on the goal. and if you didn't catch it, yeah, we're absolutely talking about the book titled The Goal, and that's on the theories of Constraints. And there's a lot of depth that we're gonna get into there. And Thomas man, he took us way deep because we started talking about masculinity. We started talking about mental wellness. We started talking about the stigma that we need to break around mental wellness or mental toughness. A lot of us are suffering. We know that our industry is ill, and we have a mental health crisis until we change the stigma and get courageous and start talking about. Depression in men and start talking or even asking for help or raising your hand and saying, Hey, I have a problem. until we start doing that, we we're gonna keep repeating the same darn thing, and I know we're some problem solvers in this industry. So please, I invite you and challenge you to take to heart the ideas that are presented in this conversation Come up with an action. Like what is one thing you can do that would contribute to the mental wellness of another man out there? And yep. I am being biased. We are talking about, man, we are talk, talking about masculinity. And ladies, please, we need your help too. So maybe you can give us some pointers. Maybe you can set us straight. Maybe you can just check on us once in a while to make sure we're doing okay. That's what we need. We gotta give a shout out to all the patrons out there. If you're listening to this, you can't see this, so you wanna go jump over to our YouTube channel and check it out. I'm at a hotel in New Orleans right now recording this intro, and I got a fancy, like different colored light, and I got another fancy little light here to give it some depth and some shadows. It's because the patron's sponsorship and commitment to helping us enhance the image of careers and the trades, that enables me to go and get all these little gadgets and add a little extra value, a little extra possess. So patrons love you very much. Thank you for supporting us and believing in us. The rest of y'all love y'all just as much. and here we go back to the conversation. He's wearing the, the school guard, you know, the full brim? Yes. The school guard. He's wearing that. So where do people, like, where does that like stem from? The popularity, That hard hat, Is it that photo? It's very famous.. Ah, and then there's the third photo. It's Louis Hines. He's a very famous photo photographer from the kind of the Great Depression, but it was from 1920. He's a mechanic mechanical worker. He's working on a steam pump and he is all hunched over, but he's like, his muscles are jacked. The three most famous photos are, they're all men. They're all white. They're not in good ergonomic positions. Like all of them are hunched over or in like grave peril. This is this is how we identify in the United States in construction. Like this is the, this is the source code in which we we identify on. And it's not to say that being masculine or having masculine qualities is bad. It's, it's not, It's good. I say it's normal to be dirty, It's normal to be not working good ergonomics. It's normal to take risks. Yes. And in fact, it's like, it's so normal that like that's what we see and the most famous photographs reinforce that. So even, not only do we in construction as men identify that, but like everybody else, In world. That's what they identify us as being. So if we're not that, it's, it's weird. Yeah. So it's like if we're not that we're a against it. Yeah. So if you actually, if you go against it, you're automatically seen as not normal. Yeah. Less than. Yeah. So there's another, I'll just tell you now, I don't know if you read it , but I go at, I go after we've, we've normalized a male stigma before Pfizer did with Viagra, right? Yes. It's now normal to talk about, or at least have an advertisement on TV about erectile dysfunction. So like, how did we do that? Like Pfizer had millions of dollars in advertising campaigns and they made it normal. And over time, society has accepted that yes, if you have erectile dysfunction as a man, you can take medicine for that. And, and there's some studies with that. And they, they found that through the normalization on that, more and more people go and talk about that with their doctors. So it's like, how are we going to change the stigma in construction? We have to start talking about it. Yes. Again, and again, and again, and again, and again and again, and be weird. And that's what we have to do. If we don't do that, we will not change that., facing brutal facts. You have to do it. If you don't face the fact that Herbi is the slowest, you won't investigate his backpack. You won't see that he is overloaded. You won't see that he packed too much stuff. And you won't, you can't address the the problem. Yeah. You can't address the problem. Like, you can't take the load off of Herbie and tell you face, face the facts. So. Yes. Yes. And how do we do that? We normalize it. All right, so we're back after a little bit of a break. How was your vacation, brother? It's great. It's great. Yeah. Yeah. Went home well home. I went from where I'm from originally to Nebraska. And I saw family, I saw my parents and I saw my grandmother. Nice. And I saw my aunt and uncle and cousins. It's you know, you only get one, you only get one family. Yes, yes. And choose your friends. But it's it's good to see people and reconnect and be back and be able to do that and not feel like you're putting people at risk when you're traveling. So it's really good to be back and, and yeah. And have, and be able to do that and, and connect with family members because yeah, it's, it's, it's all you got at the end of the day. Your families are the ones who are closest to you. So, And one, one thing I've really, I've really kind of recently tried to do is, is try trini, make that a priority more than, Yeah. It's not easy, right? Like right now I'm at the Zen cabin. I'm in a little tiny home that Zen cabin. Yeah, Yeah. That's the name of it. The Zen cabin. You see the little Buddha over here? Let me see if I could give you a real quick tour. There's the stairway up to the bed up top, there's the kitchen and there's the closets in the door. Are you in San Antonio or where at? No, no, I'm in Canyon Lake which is just 45, 60 minutes out of San Antonio North near New Braunfels. But it's, you know, when I, when I went independent in lunch, my business that sounds so fancy one of the commitments I made was to take a few days off at once a month to get creative, to decompress, to just change my environment. And so far I'm batting three for three, but it's, it's uncomfortable, right? Like today, I realized I got here yesterday and I realized that impact my charger for my damn computer, . So I drove home. Like, if we didn't have this call scheduled, I would've said hell with it. Like, I'm just, I'm gonna more, more reason to chill but say, no, no, no, I need to go get it. And I called a buddy of mine that he used to work with Eric Stone, and he's like, You sound like you're on the road. I'm like, Yeah, man. Like I'm on vacation and I went to get my, my charger. He's like, Jesse, but if you're on vacation, what do you need your charger for? I'm like, Don't judge me, man., I'm trying to build new habits here. But it's so much time that we've spent, right? Like grinding and grinding in 12 hours, 16 hours. I got thing, I got this. I gotta deliver, blah. Taking time off is, is not easy. Yeah. It's good. But with repetition, we can get there. Yes. Well, you need two things. You need a reinforcing cycle. Yes. Right? Yes. And then you need a balancing cycle. So it sounds like you're doing the balancing part now. Mm-hmm.. Mm-hmm.. Awesome. Yeah, man. Good. So we're of what? Chapter 11? Chapter 11? Yeah. We're, we're just, we're just tearing through this book.. , I knows. Gonna be a, a, just a, that 25, maybe 30 part podcast. Maybe it'll just go forever. We'll just, we'll, just once we hit the end of it, and we'll loop back, Just start back over with the sec, the sixth edition. It's so like, ah, the book. It's so good. I mean, now I tell people, I'm like, we're talking about the goal and they're like, the goal, like, I'm like, you don't know. Yep. Let me tell you about, Actually no, I was gonna come out and you have to listen. We're gonna get in the juicy part. And it's juicy because it all, a lot of the theory now comes into practice and it, it and so if you're on a journey, you're gonna talk about a journey too. Yep. some Boy Scouts. But if you're on a journey, the first thing you have to do is, is you have to be open to learn. You have to be open to learn. So like, if I'm not open to learn, then I won't. I'll sh I'll shut it down. So first thing I have to do is be open to learn. And Alex Rogo does that. When he, he, he's like, I gotta get this, This Jonah guy is my old college professor. And now, now Jonah is this like, he's like yourself. This, this highly paid jet setting, business consultant globetrotting. And did you know Gold Rat consulted with Amazon? No. Yeah, yeah. Oh yes. And, and Jeff Bezos would do kind of what kind of what we're doing here in a way where they, they would get executives together and they would do study action teams in one of the books in the early days of Amazon was the goal. Yeah. And if you kind of, if if we're we're affiliated with a, an, a few Amazon, I, I can't exactly say what they are, but let's say, let's say that they're projects and now you kind, I you can't, I can't, You kinda see, you kind of see the, the connection. There's real connection there cuz yeah. So it's interesting. So I know this stuff works, . Yeah. What we're we're about to talk about is, is life changing for me cuz it change, like it changed my paradigm. And your paradigm is, is how you see the world. And we all have different ones, but it's the center of your experience, your beliefs and your thoughts and your mood at the current time. And that's, whatever that is at that very specific moment, that's your paradigm. And if it shifts through a changing of your, you know, your mindset and your attitude and your behaviors, you can change your paradigm. And, and this book help helped me kind of see that through this series of experiments that Alex and the, the team over there at Unico goes through. So let's just wanna just get into it. Let's do baby. I'm excited. I wanna Parum shift. Yeah. Yeah. There's a G in there.. . The G is silent. All right. So I I think it starts off Chapter 11. It's, it's him and his wife. And have you ever woke up because his, his son wakes him up and he is like, Hey dad, , what are you doing? Actually, no, no. He comes home, I'm sorry. He comes home and he is like, Oh, by the way, I have to go. I know we had this really romantic weekend and I promise I've been working like crazy hours, blah, blah, blah. I'm just making, I've been making excuses, but I have one more excuse at the last second. I have to take my son on a camping trip cuz I promised him and his scout troop. So he starts it off. And this is this is his wife Julie. She goes, Thanks for the advanced notice. If I'd known earlier, I would've told you. I say, Everything is unexpected with you lately. She says, Don't I always tell you when I've got trips coming up? She fidgets next to the bedroom door. I'm packing an overnight ba bag with which lies on the bed. We're alone. Sharon . Sharon is down the street at a friend's house. So she just bails on him and, and I can understand why this is. Yep. You just kind of, you're like, set the whole week up and now you're gonna bail on a romantic weekend with your wife Dave's at band practice. Like you're just like having this internal conversation with yourselves, , when is it gonna end? He's like, I stop midway from some underwear. From a drawer. It's so specific. I get, I'm getting irritated by the questions because we just went over the whole thing five minutes ago. Why is it so hard for her to understand? Julie? Why can't you read my brain? Yep. Julie, I don't know. I've got a lot of problems to solve. More fidgeting. She doesn't like. It occurs to me that she doesn't trust me or something. This is the, this is the moment where issues at work, they, they trickle right in to to your life. Whether you, whether you try and, you know, we talked about the membrane. There is no membrane. And if you have a membrane, it's permeable. That means that there's stuff that can flow through it. Does that ever, does that sound, I mean, that's, that's me. This is why I have multiple scrum boards in my house because I forget and I still, Angeline, I love you to death. I will go on record, but I often forget to tell you things and I often forget to listen. So we have to write stuff down and constantly remind ourselves with pieces of paper in the kitchen, in the bedroom, wherever. Just get it up there. Get it up. Start talking about it. Yeah. But have you ever had a problem that you brought home and it affected your personal relationship so much that the other person stopped trusting you? Oh, 100%., like, I don't know, 80% of my career , like just working. I think, well we have the book that the, the Lean in Love book, which is kind of based on that. And for me, where it was real, that's a like a big anchor point. Not the book necessarily, but how the book came about. It was a kick in the teeth. When me and that person were having arguments that I've had within other relationships, and like for me, the way it registered was like, Oh, it's not like they don't trust me. She, it's not that she doesn't trust me anymore, it's that she 100% trusts me to put work first., like she gave up on hoping that she would be a priority, and now she just expects me to make work the priority. Like that was the Yeah. Like, damn it man. I, I did it again. Did you do it like Alex and make a promise that your, your, your butt, can you, It's a top gun reference. You're making cash checks. What is it? Reference, The check. The reference I think of is I let my alligator mouth outweigh my hummingbird behind. Right? Like I overcommitted I committed to do something that I could not deliver on. And there were, I mean, man, there were some, I had this one discussion, maybe it was a debate, maybe not. I, I rescheduled on a date. I was meeting somebody, we're gonna go to dinner and we're gonna go dancing. And that afternoon, it was about noon, I text her and said, Hey, like, I gotta reschedule. I gotta, I'm gonna work late and blah, blah, blah. And a couple weeks later, the her friend that connected us was like, Hey man, I can't believe you stood my friend up. I was like, stood her up. I didn't stand her up like I called her, like I texted her and then we talked and she said, Okay, it's fine. We'll reschedule. So I still don't know if that qualifies as standing somebody up. But the fact is that's just another data point proving that I will always, well, I have always. Let work spill into my personal life. And it's always been a priority. And then it's funny cuz then I'll get frustrated like, you know, why don't we, let's go do something fun. Like, or why can't we plan something fun? Well, because you always flake out. Yeah. That's why we can't plan something fun. See, it's, it is the erosion. Yes. The erosion perfectly said. Yeah. That's so good. That's so good. And if you're doing fives in your relationship , you would have an indicator of erosion when you did your standardization. Yes. Or even, even sorting cuz when you do sorting, be like, Hey, I have this thing, we have this planned out weekend on on Saturday morning and I'm gonna, we're gonna go to, we're gonna go to brunch. This is a very Texas thing. It's everywhere. I'm like kidding. Yeah. Go to brunch and be like, Well you can't go to brunch cuz you have the thing with Davey on Saturday morning. And you're like, You're right. Nevermind. You can't make that promise. So yes, it's Captain Tom Stinger in Top Gun, the captain. He's like the captain of the air wing. He's like, to Maverick, he's like, your ego's writing checks so your butt can't cash your, your body can't cash. Yes. You, I got another that's the that's, that's so, so plug fibers and relationships. And I'm, I'm not any kind of person to be, to be to be held on a high, high standard of doing this. But it's a, it's a practice. And it's a practice. Yes. I would say, And that's the thing about trust and that's how they start out. Chapter 11. This is a trust. Trust in relationships only given. You can only give trust. You can. It's only given. Yes. You can't buy it. Nope. You can't hope for it. You can't, you can't. Like maybe for a very short term, you can trick people in the trusting you. Very, very short term. Yes. But now trust, you have to give it, give it, and by giving it meaning, like you make a promise, you stick to it. That's how you, that's how you give it. That's that say do ratio, right? Yes. That's the trust. Yes. So the readers of the goal, let's go back to the book before we get too crazy , but the readers of the goal they're introduced to, especially in chapter 11, you're introduced at theory of constraints. T c if you're, if you're like legit. Yeah. If you, if you're in the lane, in Agile community, you call it t c I call it theory of constraints. You're introduced in chapter 11, we're gonna really get into it. But chapter 11 my kind of summary title is Dependent Events and Statistical Fluctuations. Ooh. Dependent Events. That means there's an event, then there's something that's dependent on that sec. So the second event, you need the first event to happen for the second time. Yes., It happens on airplanes, , and then statistical fluctuations, meaning that like this is the real world. Even in robotics, even in Amazon there's, if things don't work completely exactly the same, even if you try to do it. Yep. There are statistical fluctuations. So even if you make the most beautiful plan, statistical fluctuation, Just that's, that's Murphy. Yes. So Alex goes to New York City. He goes to the hotel lobby, if you've seen the movie. Have you seen the movie? No. Okay. You told me there's a movie. I'm like, Man, there's a film. There's only, You could buy it from the Gold Rat Institute, I think. I think that's where you can buy it. Okay. Probably on BHS . Yeah. Yeah. There's a few clips on YouTube if you want to go. The listeners want to go check that out. The gold just type in the gold, gold rat. And there's some clips. One of the clips is this scene where they're in New York City, jet setting. Jesse, here, you know, I gotta, I gotta chase you down, so I gotta go find you in New York.. Yeah. On your way to the United Nations or something. Yeah. Over coffee. So they, they meet over coffee and they both sit down and they the waiter's like, Hey, you can't just order coffee. And they're like, Well, we want a pot. Each Yeah. And a gallon of cream. So , they they talk about the two more, most important concepts of the goal. And that's the theory of constraints. So this is what Jonah says. He says, Most of the time, your struggle for high efficiencies is taking you in the opposite direction of your goal. Yes. Period. Yes. Most, Most. Okay. Let's break this down. Most of the time, your struggle for high efficiency is taking you in the opposite direction over your goal. So it literally, you trying to have efficiency and you're struggling with that, whatever you're doing to make something more efficient. Most of the time it's, it's the, it's the actual opposite thing you should do. Yeah. So his, his, his advice was like, whatever you're doing, do the exact opposite.. So if you have a huge ego, you hear that, Oh man, so that's, that's the first thing he says. And the second thing he says, A plant, which everyone is working all the time, is very inefficient, where everyone is working all the time. It is very inefficient. And why is that? Pent events and statistical fluctuations. So, so I wanna talk about, here we go. Gold rat in chapter 11 lays out the, the old critical path method versus production systems argument. He just lays it out there. He says, If everybody's working in a critical path method, you are incredibly inefficient. And this is an argument, This is in fact, right. I'm not gonna go there. But I'm just saying there is a theory as that, that, that we're gonna talk about that, that the, if everyone is working exactly, that means if you have, if you have activity A and activity A is two days, and activity B is one day, you need two days plus one day, that's three days for those activities. That's dependent events. Yeah.. So if you think of a process chart with boxes lined up and columns, and so if you think, if you can imagine a process map and you have a box and a box on a box, kinda like a pole plant, or if you've seen a process map where you have your series of win and then you have your. If, if they're happy to, at the same time you can stack them, right? So you have columns and rows. And then if you connect those boxes with arrows that says when this activity and then this activity, and then this activity, and then this activity, and then this activity, If this happens, and then this happens, if this, if this, then that, if this, then that logic. Yep. It's literally logic. It utilizes now CPM utilizes statistical techniques to manage defined activities of, let's say a project. That's where we live in, We live in a project, the strong emphasis of getting choked up. So trying to make an emphasis, you have to make a strong emphasis on defined activities. Yes. Defined definition. It is, you have to emphasize definition. If you don't understand the definition of the what's in that activity bar, the, you know, the description part your, your logic might be flawed. So the, and I, I have a couple examples that I wrote down. Install foundations, that's an, that's a, that's an event or an activity. Weld steel decking tape and finished drywall, energize electrical system with permanent power. That might be a milestone. Yeah. Yeah. That could be a milestone.. But these are, these are activities that are defined. They have a definition, like you can, you can, you can define what install foundations is like. It has parts and it has things, so you can put time to that. And then there's dependent events. You can't do this before you do that. So dependent events, if we, if we plan that way, We create two phenomenon according to Jonah. The first is dependent events. I keep talking about that. A series events that must take place before another begins, right? So it has to take place ahead. So that would be a I'm gonna get this. I'm gonna, there's gonna be schedulers that are gonna slaughtered me, but at, at an event, a dependent event and critical path method is a finished to start. Fundamentally, there's probably more than that. Fundamentally, I have to do activity A has to finish before activity B starts. And then there's a logic tie that's between two. Yeah. So that's the first phenomenon. You have to do that. It's like trains in a car. Imagine if there was a train. We're gonna start talking about trains here, but it's for a, for a train. Well, you're in Texas. You see trains all the time. Oh yeah. My mom lives like less than a block away from a railroad tracks. Yes. I live on the east coast. I see trains all the time too. I don't know what I'm talking about , but if you're waiting for a train, you see, you see this phenomenon happy in front of you. Right? Cause you see the engine and then you see all the cars go by it. And they're all tied together with logic or they're actually tied together Mechanically Yes. But the total, the total time that train is in front of you is from the time in which the arm goes down to all of the train cars and engines and tanks or whatever it is, until sometimes it can boost. I think they get rid of those years ago. Yeah. until that, that last train, car leaves and the arm goes up. That's the top. That's, that's, that's the critical. Of that sequence of events, , those are all dependent events. They, all those cars have to go by. So that's the first phenomenon. The second phenomenon is a little more squishy. It's statistical fluctuations. And I'm probably going to offend a whole bunch of like really smart math mathematicians and people with math degrees. And I barely even count with my fingers and toes. So , bear with me. But statistical fluctuations, the length of events and outcomes are not completely deterministic. It's like, it's not, you can't determine exactly to the micro millisecond how long that train will go in front of you because it depends. It depends, yes. Depends on traffic, depends on weather, depends on even like the temperature and humidity affect the length of the train because of mechanics and materials and, and temperatures. So there's, you can't completely determine. You can get pretty close. But if you've ever been in this phenomenon, you've waited for an airplane mm-hmm. because oftentimes the airplane is not only picking you up and flying to your destination. It's usually flying in from somewhere else and landing and offloading the people that were on there. And then you load on there and you go away. So if off, and oftentimes the, the, the weather, just the statistical fluctuation is different from geography, location to geography, location. So there might be a delay or sometimes there's construction on the road or sometimes, you know, there's statistics. So, so you can't perfectly predict with statistical fluctuations. Any, anything. Yes. So nothing is deterministic. Nothing is deterministic. And I'll go back to my example of the hoist. Yes. So, and oftentimes when we do vertical construction, there's a it's a, it's pretty common knowledge that when we go, we do more floors, we should get faster because we're just getting better at what we do. And that's partly true. That is partly true. People do understand there's patterns and behaviors and, and you un like, you start to communicate better. Like there's that, there's probably laws, and I'm offending production people now production laws. But but there's also statistical fluctuations that work against you because it's like, it takes longer to get up to that higher location. It takes longer for cranes to lift, it takes longer because the higher up you go, this wind, the wind changes. Yep. And there's like, there's lots of factors that we, we now have to take consideration, but oftentimes we don't. We just say, Hey, we're gonna, we're, we're on this five day cycle. We just get better Yes. So that's the issue with cpm. I think it's, I think it's fine. It's, it's a fine method to do primary planning. I think it because it's very effective. It's very quick. There's computer programs that work. Now, this is probably shocking, Jesse, right now that I'm from a proponent of cpm, but I use it all the time. And we, and then construction, it's, it is a very effective manner to figure out the, your combination of dependent events and fluctuations. Yeah. Cause you can you can run what if reports and all these kinds of things and you can add in logic and you add in buffers. You can do that. But one thing you can't do, you can't math away from the real world. You can't math it, you can't plan it, you can't you can put in contingencies. That's all you can do. Yes. But it's not to say that computerized logic and critical path is wrong. I use it. I've looked at it today,. It's not wrong or bad. However, it's extremely risky to only put your primary decision making process in that single method. It's extremely risky because if you're only, if you're only utilizing a very rigid system to make modifications. So that rigid system is incredibly time. Time, Oh God, yes. Consuming. Because you have to go and, and it's all manual. You have to you have to, you have to change the cars on the train. Mm-hmm., Right? Even changing the cars and the trains. Very manual process and it's, it's hard to do. Creates delays. It creates all that. So, so we're gonna talk about why don't put all your eggs in a CPM basket. Think about that. What do you think? What's your take? I, I know I loved your take when you were talking with lean builders, Keon and Joe, and, and that was, you had a great comment. I'll just let you, you know, don't remember I, you killed, you killed the argument. You said it was a respect and trust, bro. Yeah. This is chapter 11 in the goal. Yeah. I mean, so I remember that that conversation was, we started talking about this CPM thing and, and it, it's just my observation and it's, I just default to it. And I think it's because of my background as, as a tradesman and working out there kind of being the victim of these schedules. It's like we spend all this damn time talking about schedules and what's the best scheduling method and what, like, who cares? Cuz we have a people problem , we don't, What we need to be worried about is taking care of the men and women that come out and do this damn work that the life that we're stealing from them because of poorly designed work, the life that we're stealing from them, because we're trying to math reality out and math it away. Yeah. You can't math it away. Like, dude, that's like the old, we're gonna make t-shirts of that. You can't math it away. Like you gotta account for all the stuff. You gotta be prepared to absorb it and, and adjust to it. But instead we say, but the, the schedule says like, Okay, great, but guess what? Reality is telling us something else. If everybody is working in your plant, Alex, you are incredibly inefficient. Yes. People are busy and, and well the schedule says you gotta start here, so go ahead and start. It's like, yeah, but the tape and floater, still's gotta get up there and do their fire taping and I hang that duck and it's gonna cut 'em off. Well, too bad because they're behind. They should have had that done. Okay, now we're gonna, let's just elevate the risk to their life. Yeah. Now we just designed a, a system in which a taper has to go and climb on top of a duck to Exactly. Do his do his job. Yes, exactly. And take a risk schedule set. Yeah. Because the schedule set. So why is it not important? Why is it, why is it completely inefficient? If if everybody's working Yeah. And everybody's working. Hey, everybody's jamming. Everybody's jamming. Why are we so inefficient? So how often do you, do you hear of projects going longer than originally planned? Oh my god. So I'm gonna add in overtime as going longer, going longer than the original plan. Yeah. I think it's easier to think about the times that it didn't happen , like all the time. Always going longer than originally planned. You know, I used to have this discussion, well I've had it several times with people because they're celebrating whatever they negotiated as the extended duration of the project and we made it on schedule. Like we made it three weeks early. Yeah. Like it's not an accomplishment. Like that's a contractual obligation. Yes, you made it on schedule, but how many dates did you cancel? How many ball games did you miss? Right. How much real life did you sacrifice to make this date that you're claiming was the date? Which we all know was an extension from the original plan. That's right. So short answer is very, very few.. So the second question, how completed on time without the use of overtime or expediting or pressure that never I I can say that I've ever heard of that. Even heard of it. So it is even less than the first question, Correct. Yeah. Yeah. So yeah, that's that's a good one. And then the third question is how often do you hear of projects going over budget, over the original budget? Oh my God, I, that's a high frequency, but I have been a part of projects that didn't go over budget. Mm-hmm. fewer. But it, yeah. It's, it's Is it, is it, is it less than the projects that are completed on time? Without over time and expediting? No, no, no, no. I think or more, I've had more experiences where the projects came within budget or even outperform the budget with overtime, like all that other stuff. What you're saying is like, that could have been priced in. Possibly. I may have waited on some of that. Yeah. No, so that's that's what what was saying is that like, we plan for this, we plan for the inefficiencies. Like the inefficiency is normalized. Yes. And that's not to say this is a lot of people that work really hard on keeping projects and there I don't wanna like trash on constructing industry. No, no. This is real world. We work in the elements. We work at heights, We work, This is no joke. We have, we got tough job. So yes, that's chapter 11. It's basically Jonah's like two things. Here's, there's two nice little nuggets. And he drives off in his limo. Mr. Consultant , he drives off into his limo to probably a high rise, a Fortune 500 company in New York City. But so we go on to chapter 12, and this is writing checks. Your relationships Can't cash. And I wrote this summary like around the time when like y'all were doing. Regular live streams with five of us relationships. So, Oh, like when I was putting this together, this little summary here, this was like very front of mine. So thank you for the influence chapter is, is thinking about, he's kind of like reflecting on a time before, like, you know, you didn't go down memory lane. He goes, There's a guy I heard about in Unico who came home from work one night. He walked in, his wife had taken everything, the kids, the dog, the goldfish, the furniture, the carpets, everything. Well, she actually left him two things, the clothes and a note written on, in lipstick on the bathroom mirror, which says, Goodbye You bastard . This is a good song by Blackhawk, by the way. Goodbye says it all. Yep. Big rag. Goodbye lipstick on the wall. What's your what's your favorite song about Texas? Random. Yeah. I guess country. There's, well, I don't know if this one's about Texas. So the, the easy one is all my exes live in Texas, which is, No, that's easy. Right? No longer True. That is not a true song. So I, that doesn't count. The other one, I don't know if it even mentions Texas, but it's a country song and it says, it's the kind of, the riff is I'm too young to be this damned old. Right. And, and when that song came out, I was, is it Garth Brooks? Yeah. Well, he, maybe he sings one rendition of it, but yeah, it's good. That's a good jam. Yes, yes. And I had just turned, man, I must have been 30, it was in like 20, between 29 and 31 years old. And I had just like had my second divorce, like all kinds of, that, these were like outcomes of my behavior with my relationship, rather with work the way I coped with the stress and funk of work led to me before 30 years old, having had, I was too young to be that damned old Like most of the people I knew, they were 50 and 60 and had the types of problems that I had. And, and I'm, I wasn't even 30 yet, and I like, man, I was on the fast track.. Yeah. Yes. There's a good line in that in that song I really like, it's talking about a worn out tape from Chris Lado and my sister lives in Buffalo, Wyoming. On the way to Buffalo, you drive through Casey, Casey, Wyoming, That's a map dot, but that's where the Lados are from. And there's a memorial there in Casey. So, but yeah. That's, that's great. Jan. But yeah, so, so goodbye says it all. Like that is a profound statement. So on page one 30 Alex's wife, she makes this statement, Your job has always been on the line. Always. So if you're such a marginal employee, why do they keep giving you promotions and more money out, out, say like, Oh man. So is this sound familiar? Like you ever lived and on a razor judge at work and still get promoted and, and, and raises? Oh, absolutely. Like, I mean there, yes. The one , this was my, my second divorce happened on this project. The whole entire time I thought I was going to be fired. Like we paid out. I mean, we were in the red, about 400 grand in the red, like not, We spent all the estimated margin and paid an additional 400 grand to finish the project. Wow. And so the entire time I'm thinking like, Man, I'm gonna get fired. And I was working crazy hours just trying to make up wherever I c I mean, just ridiculous. At the end of it, I was divorced. I'd been arrested again for dwi, Like my life was falling apart. And, and I, I remember we had like a debrief with the team and I'm like, Man, I'm sorry. Like, I completely understand if y'all gotta let me to go. And they're like, Let you go. Like, we, like, you're, you're the reason why we didn't lose double that. Like, you, you're getting promoted. I'm like, promoted. What do you, what's like, this was, I don't wanna have to do this to get promoted. Right. But that was, that was the firefighting was what was That's the expectation. Yes. Yes. Similar story. Never been, never been divorced. I'd have some commitment issues, so, but same thing. I've always felt like the, the social or the work pressure on me, I'm just like, I don't get this. I don't, I don't like make this happen and jam and get on people's cases and like, you know, just, just do the, the things that aren't healthy. There aren't, they're not building relationships or they're tearing down. I'm sure I've co I've like contributed to people's. Like they've take, like the, the interaction that we had at work, they've taken that situation home., and I've been promoted and given raises the whole, this whole time. Yes. Time all along. Like, every time I've been promoted and raised, the next cycle is like, you're, you feel back, you're like, Oh man, I'm getting canned tomorrow. Yep. It's a vicious cycle. Vicious, Yes. Vicious cycle. Yes. And like Alex legit calls out, or is Alex's wife legit calls him out on it and he's like, Damn. He like, I gotta, like, I gotta put some perspective into this. But I will say that, you know, I've worked with for, for many companies and they're all good, good companies, everyone. Yes. But it's at that moment when you make that connection between, is this, like, is this actually worth it? Yeah. And like when you, when you make the decision that now it's not worth it, that's when you move on. This has been, And although companies work for, they're, they're all great, they're all super profitable, unsuccessful, successful. But in that, in that situation where you get put in a box and says, Hey, is this, this situation is worth more than your livelihood. I'll choose my livelihood all day. All day. Yeah. All day. And that I haven't choose, and I haven't made that choice a hundred percent. I'm probably bating less than 500 in that realm. Yeah. But I've written many checks that my relationships can, can't cash. So. Now I do like the concept of like a, like a personal bank account. Yep. Or, or a social bank account or trust bank account, whatever you wanna call it. it's an extreme ownership every time that you go and take a, take a take a withdrawal. It's lowered. The account is lowered. Yes. If you have, your account balance is zero. If you have zero trust, if you have zero relationship, you have zero. Whatever respect, you can't, there's no margin. You can't get credit in a relationship. It's possible. You might, you might be able to, to take a, take a, what is it? A payday loan for a week. High cost. Yeah. The cost. Yeah. It's true. It's, So the payday loan from a financial standpoint is like the, the interest rate is extremely high. And it's the same, the same way with in a social interaction that if you, if you try to get ahead or whatever with nefarious means, or social pressure or stress or use some, you know, masculine behavior in which we're gonna talk about Yep. To do the chest bumping thing. We've all been there. It's ego that only works for a very limited amount of time. So does fear. So does, so does pressure. So yes, Alex legit, Alex's wife legit calls him out on, that's chapter 12. And that plays into the rest of the book because he walks into the next chapter, which is the hike. The famous, but he walks, he walks into that with that in the front of his mind, right? So, yes. And that's very important. And not, man, many people make that connection. And I actually had to read this book many times to make that connection. So that's right in front of his mind. That's like, Oh, I got issues at home. It's like, I'm gonna get fired. I got, They're gonna close a plant like this, gonna ruin this like our, my and this is his hometown and people's livelihoods, and there's people he cares about. Like the pressure is on Alex, man, He's feeling it, but he's still gotta be like a dad to his son, Dave. So why just do chapter 13? Let's do it . There's Do it. I'll do it off my phone. This is awesome. This is awesome. Chapter 13, The, this is DFA hike. Spoiler alert. And if, if you've listened to this point and you haven't read the book, stop now., read the book. Read the book. Go to Audible. Yes. Because this, now we will like everything before you can kind of be like, Okay, I get it from, from here on out, we're gonna lose people. So please pause. You can always come back to this podcast, , but pause. Go. At least listen to chapter's. 13 tw. Yes. So chapter 13 is the Hike. Davies son, wakes Alex up in bed reminding his, his commitment to the Boy Scout troop. I gotta hike 10 miles and then camp overnight. And then hike back 10 miles. So he gets, he gets there and I've only been the the scout. The kid. Not, I haven't ever been like the scout master. If people who are listening or I don't know if you, you've done it. People who work with children. Thank you. No joke, but the, these moments, these hikes, these little learning experiences, I remember they're greatly impactful. So like the pressure's on Yeah. Like these little moments they add up to a person's life. And if they're good, it's reinforcing. If they're bad, they'll, It's the same way. They'll be scarred for life.. So he is like, Oh, I'm worried about my life and my job, but I still gotta be like, the pressure is on, I gotta perform. And all the other parents bail and the scout master, that's not supposed to be their flakes out. So like Alex on his own with a whole troop of boy scouts, and I guess what, what are boy scouts? Like eight, 10. Yeah. So they're, they're, they're young, young boys. And they're, they're, they're wild, wild animals. Yes. You gotta keep 'em in check. So let's, so Alex, he kind of starts to figure it out. He's like, All right, you gotta get 10 miles. It does some quick math in his head. He's, he's trying to math himself outta the situation. Yes.. He goes walking two miles an hour, which is about how fast an average person walks in this rate. We should cover 10 miles in five hours, two miles an hour. That's, that's a brisk walk. You probably do some treadmill work, so you hit that 2.0. It's not hard, but it's not, it's not put putzing around. Right. So we should be able to cover 10 miles in five hours. That is. That's dependent events and trying to Yeah. Map himself outta the situation. It's eight 30 right now. Figure an hour and a half for breaks and lunch, man. We'll get to Devil's Gulch by three o'clock. No sweat. So let's stop here and talk about a glorious phase of construction. It's the part where we set the baseline schedule. It's glorious because it's at the beginning.. Where we all get along. Yep. Excited. Everybody's gonna make money. Opportunity. And it's the articles in the newspaper. Did you see it? It's like, yeah, the news is there. The mayor's gonna show up. The governor. I've had the president come multiple times now. There's just like humble brag there. But yes, , there's, there's ribbons involved, there's shovels, there's all kind of, people are excited. Like it's this feel good time. This, this is, this is exciting. So they call that optimism bias.. Yes. And optimism bias is a cognitive bias. It is a, it's a trick. Your brain. It's a trick. Our brains have tricked us for the entirety of of the known history of, of humankind. it's the tendency for individuals to be overly bullish about the outcomes of planned actions. You ever get that way? Oh, I used to all the time. And like the way I reconciled the fact that the, the outcome didn't happen was because everybody else didn't follow the plan. like, it wasn't my fault, it was everybody else's fault. But now I say, now I should say maybe here in the past three years or so, things are gonna happen the way they're going to happen and creating the conditions to facilitate learning, adaptability, and growth is where I choose to put my energy now. Right? Like if I can focus my energy on creating the conditions for people to build relationships, to learn, to grow, to adapt, we'll get there when we get there now. But my work is different, right? My work has been helping people learn new techniques and new methods and, and form cohesive teams. You can't, I can't put that on a schedule. I mean, I, when I look back and reflect, you know, I've seen some teams, it seems like around the six week mark, they start getting into flow and, and becoming more reliable in, in their communication and their commitments and, and all of that. And I think, I don't know why it's six weeks. I really don't. But that's only true if the team doesn't change , because you put somebody else in there, you take somebody out. The power dynamic shift the whole, like, you almost start all over again. Yeah. But oftentimes, and I'm, Your work is a little bit different than mine. Yep. Oftentimes when we start a project, the experts that do the organizing and, and setting the baseline schedule, like they're, I got some, they're, they're good people named Yeah. Hard workers. And they're incredibly biased.. Yes. And it's not a fault of. It's just, it's just how human, It's natural work. Natural. Yes. So there's another plug, another book Thinking Fast Slow. Yes. Annual Conman. Connie Noble Prize winner. Yeah. We might, we may cover that book in later series. Who knows? Yeah. That one's, that one's Beyond Me. We need need some experts on that one. But it talks about bias. Yep. In his book. And he calls optimism bias when we're excited and we're, we're like, and that's when we, Here's the thing about being excited. This is also the time where we set the baseline schedule. So yes, Alex is doing that. He's like, We're gonna get there at 3:00 PM I'm excited. I'm full of energy. It's eight 30 in the morning. I just ate a delicious breakfast. Yeah. It's, it's cool out. I'm feeling optimism, like I'm feeling some optimism. Like, We got it people. We got it. Yep. Nothing has happened yet. It's just the way it goes. And when we get in the grip of optimism, including experts. We are unaware of that. We're optimistic. And sometimes maybe we are where we, we've become aware that we're like, Hey, we're, they call it the honeymoon phase oftentimes. Yeah. And we make decisions based on an ideal vision of the future. Yes. Rather than on national weighing of realistic gains, loss, losses and probabilities. We get, we're like, Oh, this is awesome. We're gonna have the setup. And we got this, we have this beautiful logistics plans. And they're, sometimes they're animated . Yep. It's just like, this is gonna work perfectly and we're excited and we get. We get that in our brains and it programs our brains. So when we're setting these, the plan, or we're setting the we're making the decision about duration and logic and, you know, all of the things that we're about to go do, We haven't done any of them. We're mentally, we're mentally perished. We're mentally biased. When we make those decisions, that, that, is that terrifying to you? It is me. No. Here's what's terrifying to me, cuz that I think that's a natural thing, right? Like, I mean, here's, I'm gonna take a jab at Jennifer right now. Okay? Cause she's not gonna hear this for a month or so. Anyways, . But you know, we started working on the book and we've been working on it. And we're in the editing phase. We're on the, we're on the home stretch. Like right now, you can order the book. Right now the plumbers edition is out, meaning there's a ton of typos. There's, there's a ton of gaps. The flows jacked up, but we're refining it, right? We're getting the, the grammar and the English and all that punctuation. And so I got super excited because things were clicking along. I didn't anticipate or I didn't account for the realities of the edit. Time is not big. It's the life stuff that keeps happening between Jen, myself, and, and, and Kim who's helping us with the book. Like she has a business. I have a business like it. I didn't account for those. So it's taken longer than I wanted it to take. But what's scary to me is not when people are planning in ideal situations, these fabricated ideal situations, which is what I did. What's scary is there are those experts out there that are putting together a schedule and saying, There's no way this is going to be a nightmare. And somebody within the organization is saying, It's okay. We can, They're going out and making checks that their butt can't cash. They're committing to the client, Yes, we can do it. And everybody that's going to be doing that job is telling them There ain't no way. Yeah. That's the scary part. And they'll do due diligence. They'll go out and we'll, we'll talk to experts with trades and with designers Yes. And through parties. Yes. And the building department and the county. Yes. Right. And we're, we're all incredibly amazed, so we have to understand that.. We underestimate benefits, we underestimate costs. Yep. We involuntarily spin scenarios of success and overlook the potential for mistakes. And miscalculations. It is counterintuitive.. Yes. You know, and I heard Tony Robbins, I think I heard Tony Robbins say it and I'm not sure where it originated, but anyways. Oh, I gotta, I'm digging. I'm digging. Yes. Oh, there it is, man. You got the library ready to I unshakeable. I don't, you're I probably should stop doing this cuz I'm gonna No, it's awesome. It's perfect. Yeah. No, the, the quote I heard was, we overestimate what we can accomplish in a year and we underestimate what we can accomplish in 10. And, and I was like, Oh my God, that is so dead on. Like, I, like, you know, get big ideas and, Oh, I got, I gotta get all this stuff done. Nope. In a year. But if I look back and reflect on the decade, like, holy moly, look at all the stuff that I got done. Right. And, and so it's this, maybe it's that failure to account for all of the stuff that's going to impact my plan, but it, when I look at it over a broader time horizon, those impacts really aren't that big. And I underestimated what I could do cuz I have like, I don't know anybody that really spends a lot of time n maybe excluding business planning, like, as like an individual development plan. What am I going to target a decade down the road? Right, Right. In terms of growth, like I can target income, I can target. A collecting junk, right? Like cars and boats and whatever. And, you know, my fleet of limousines,. But in terms of personal growth, that's not anything I've ever thought about. Like, what am I going, how, how will I better serve in 10 years? To what degree will I impact other human beings in 10 years? Like, that's the question. Yeah, that's, that just blew my mind., dude, I went off, I went off the real, so I guess I was Tony Robbins, but still. Yeah. Wow. Lost my train of thought, but Yeah, but it's true. It's true. So we set, and it's not to deriv, Preconstruction, man, We've got some great preconstruction. Absolutely. Yeah. They, they can, they can take a napkin sketch and be accurate within like 10, 10 or 15%. That's crazy. So yeah, so pre-construction people are like, Thank you. Is not a easy job. It's completely, and it must be very frustrating oftentimes, but and the reason why is cuz you're working in a highly biased environment. Yep. It's just, and it's designed that way. And if we didn't, you can't say that if we can't make plans and an unbiased environment, it's impossible. Right. It's like impossible. We would never set any goals or set any durations and then it would just be chaos. We have to make those decisions, but we also have to understand according to the goal and according to Daniel here, or Dr. Nobel Prize winner. That you have to design some, you have to understand that, hey, we're being, we're biased here. Oftentimes we might, we might overlook the fact that there might, we might run into problems. Yes, we might have issues or there might be a problem in the supply chain. So we all have to, we have to understand that that's, that's kind of the, that's kind of the point. And that's the point that Alex fails in his initial plan. Yes. In the hike. Totally whiffs on that one. But he's gonna learn the hard ways., Yes, he's gonna learn the hard way, but he is gonna learn. So let's go back to the book. So they're hiking, hiking with children in a forest. This has to be terrifying. This is the eighties, so Yeah. Probably not so much . But you, you're doing a boy scout hike with with a, with a group of boy scouts in there. They're hiking. You get 'em, you get 'em in the line, and they're making, making the line. And he is, Alex is like, after a few minutes, I turn and look back, the columnists of scouts is spread out instead of a yard between boys. There are now larger gaps, some larger than others. Alex decides by himself, by the way. There's no staff sergeants in this in this column, , he assigns the lead scout, Ron, to set the pace. He's like, All right, nobody passes, Ron. He's got the map. Understand everybody understand nobody passes. Ron, Ron's in the lead. He's our lead, lead scout. And then he says, Is this fat kid? And he already looks a little winded. Yep. And he's way in the back behind him. Well, he is not all the way in the back. Behind the fat kid is the rest of the group. And they're stuck because they're walking down a single path. Yep. He says, What's your name? Kid says Herby Herbi. Let me let me let me frame Herbi for a minute. Number one, he is a human boy scout. Yes. But he is a different shape than the other boy scouts. He's, he's not typical two. He's got the same function. He's a human boy scout and he's hiking. He's got the same function as the other process. Steps three. He's walking the trail at a different pace. And, and Alex describes him, like he would walk and then he would noticeably get tired, so he'd slow down. But then the gap would get big and people would be like, Hey, Herby, you're holding us up. So we'd run. Yep. So he is walking at a different pace.. Statistically, maybe, perhaps. Mm-hmm. four. He's bogged down with issues. He's tired, he's hot, he's heavy, he's bogged down with things. He's got this big heavy R act on. And the stress. Like the stress. Yes. So others are blaming Herbi. Yes. Yes. For their own. So for the source of their own delay. And then six Herbi feels that stress. Yes. And he, he's trying to make up the, the difference, you know, cuz he is getting behind. He starts, but running, this is the person who's can't walk. I'm overweight, so I, I I can feel the pain. You're like, Oh, I gotta like, pick up the pace. And you start running, but you're already tired. So it's like . Or you're a runner. Yes. Right. So do you, you try to maintain a consistent pace, Very consistent. Why is that important to, to conserve? Because the speeding up and the slowing down exhausts my energy. Like I learned the last marathon I ran, I discovered that when I listened to music, my pace varies based on the music. I didn't, I wasn't my coach at the time, she told me, she's like, Jessie, why do you do that? I'm like, I don't know what you're talking about. Let's look at your times. I'm like, Oh wow. So the last one, I listened to a book for the first 20 miles and my pace was solid, like mile after mile after mile after mile. And, and it keeps me from speeding up and slowing down and speeding up and slowing down because even though I was slowing down, it's still costing the energy. You're telling me that the fluctuation is making you less efficient? What's that? The fluctuations are making you less efficient. Yes sir. That's exactly what I'm saying. We just prove a theory, perhaps, perhaps. Anyways, . Yes. Thank you. I'm glad. I'm glad you're a marathon runner. Cause I was gonna use that analogy, but I'm like, you can't, I can't. Like I don't have that . Oh yeah, . So we start, so back to the book and back to Alex and he goes, We start out again. We haven't gone 30 yards before. I notice gaps starting all over again. Damnit, we've gotta be running and stopping all day long. If this keeps up, half the troop is liable to get lost if we can't stay together. Yeah. These children, these are people's children and they're getting stretched out in the wilderness. Oh man. Oh man. So Alex does rapid retrospective. He's a good manager. He knows when to, he knows when to do retrospective, which I actually give him major pro prompts. So he goes, he stops it. I don't know if he stops, but he's doing this in his brain. He's like, every time Herbie gets a step behind, he runs for a step, extra step. Got it. Mental note. I see Davey slow down for a few seconds adjusting his pack straps. If one of the boys takes a step that's half happening shorter, then the lead scout takes the length of the whole line could get affected, right? Yep. Because if, if the lead scout is taking regular steps and and somebody behind them is taking a shorter step Step after step after step after step gets, It's shorter or I guess the line gets longer. Don't these minor differences though, Don't they average out? He's asking himself this question. Yeah. And he said, Can I, at the end of line shorten the overall overall length of the line? Cuz Alex eventually he goes to the back of the line. It's gotta like focuses, right? It's gotta looking all the children. He's like, if, if I, I can, I can shorten the gap because I'm at the end of line. Like I can, I'm the caboose. But I, I'm the last in line, so I can only catch up to the, the kid in front of me so he can only shorten like limited amount. So it makes a connection to the plan's production. He goes, each of the troops is a set of dependent events. Does it matter what order we're we're in? We have dependent events. No matter if we switch the order of the boys. Right. If you put Davey in the middle, you put 'em. That's just everybody is walking single file. We can't change, nobody can pass each other cuz you can't. I suppose you could, but you'd spend more energy. But. Going through the jungle. Wherever this tal hike is happening. So that's throughput. So it's like from the front lead scout to the end of Alex, the time it takes for that entire line of, of scouts to move past a single location that's throughput. Yes. So what about the amount of trail between Ron and me, the lead scouts, Ron, what's, what's the amount of trail that's inventory? Yes. It has to be inventory. Ron's consuming raw materials. Ron, lead scout raw trail in front of him. He's, he's consuming the raw trail. Yes. And then we all process it behind it. He's starting to make these connections Yes. To his factory operational expenses, whatever, lets us turn inventory into, into throughput. So operational expense in a hike or operational expense in your in your, what's it? 26.2 miles. 6.2. Yep. That's your energy. Yes. That's what you expand. You expand. Energy is probably glucose some something. And you can't quantify that model except that I know Alex knows that he's getting tired and he could probably see fatigue in, in the scouts. Yep. Right.. It's like, that's, that's a hard one cuz it's, it's a whole bunch of other factors cuz it's human condition, but people eventually you get tired, You cannot hide for infinity. You cannot run Who's the ultra-marathoner? Oh my God, there's a bunch of them out. Steve Turner would bring Turner the trades. Yeah. 250. I think he just ran like a 250 mile ultra-marathon. And guess what? He did have to sleep. Yeah, you have to sleep. Yes. I, I know, I also know a couple older marathoners and Yeah, you have to stop to eat. Yeah. It's like, it's a whole process, but it's the, if you're consuming that trail, So just imagine Steve Turner running, man. Like actually I can't imagine like you, like you were human to me. Yes. But you're consuming inventory in front of you and your operational expense is your energy. So to consume 250 miles, you gotta you're gonna expand all the energy in your reserves and you have to sleep to replenish and also probably eat food and Right. So that's all operational expense. That's really cool. So like, like the goal makes the link, if the distance between Ron and me is expanding, it can only mean that inventory is, is increasing. Cause if, if the trail, the length of the trail between number one and number last is expanding. That's all inventory. Yeah. And throughput's my rate of walking. So if it's, if it's two miles per hour, that's throughput. We're gonna, it takes us two miles per hour., which is in, But here's the thing about throughput. It's influenced by fluctuation. So the slower the average fluctuations accumulate, they do, they, they add up and they're, it's like, it's like the scout in front and the scout behind them takes an inch. A half inch.. Let's say it's an inch. Just to make it easy. Yes. After 12 steps, that's a foot. Right. So if you take a, if you take an inch shorter step every time, and if you're walking at the same rate, it's a foot longer and that adds up. And that's one scout. Yep. And I guess it could, the scout behind him could make up that house, but then he runs into him and then he has to slow down and gets, gets all screwed up. And one of the reasons why I left San Francisco Bay area was because of this phenomenon. Yeah. You've ever driven across the Bay Bridge either direction. You get to experience this constantly. Yeah. Or even if you're in the use bart, But the person in front of you, they tap their brakes, you tap their brakes, the person behind you taps their brakes. It's, it compounds. And all of a sudden we're, we're at a complete standstill. Yes. We're not moving even on eight 80 South is one of the reasons why I moved to a place where I can, like Charlotte, like from here to here is about 15 minutes. Nice. No matter, I mean, at the worst of times to get from this, the, the eastern part, I guess this would be the western part of the city to the eastern part of the city is about 15 minutes shoot down North Tryon Street. But that's statistical fluctuation and it screws stuff up. Yep. It screws it up. And you worked in the trades. Yes. So, you know this in a, in a work situation more than me. Yes. I've only, I've only been a supervisor, so I can't, I've never like sat or been in it from a work standpoint. So like how does it feel when you're in this. Go stop. Go stop. Hurry up. Slow down, hurry up. Slow down. I'm, I'm the guy I guess doing the Hurry up. Slow down. Hurry up. Slow down. Yep. So how does it feel as a human being to be in this phenomenon? It feels you. Well two answers. So one, you, I felt helpless, right? Because no matter what I do, I'm going to be accused of being behind. I'm gonna be the, because I'm gonna be the bottleneck because of this fluctuation. And when I'm the bottleneck, it's all my fault, even though it's not my fault. And so when I say, Hey, I know that your schedule says we're supposed to be sheetrocking tomorrow, but it also said I was supposed to start in Wall Ruffin four days ago, and I only started two days ago. All of those are facts. The response I get is, I don't want your excuses. Like these are not excuses, these are facts.. Like, so that's, that's one. There's this help like defeated helpless, like, okay, I'm just gonna not even argue with this person. That's ignoring reality. Now when I started paying attention to the dollars that we were spending on labor, that was a whole nother level of stress. Operational expense. Yes. Because now I'm like, Oh my God, I got six people here. Our crew rate is 38 bucks an hour, and we're not gonna be producing anything, so we're gonna go get busy and do stuff. But I know production, my production rate, we just blew it. And if this goes on for more than four hours, it's gonna be held to recover. And because Herby, you gotta run back. You gotta run, I gotta run back. Yeah, no, we're gonna work super late and, and here's like a really, really disrespectful way to handle that. We're gonna work late, We're gonna pull a Herby and Sprint to catch up.
So we're gonna work till 7:00 PM tonight, which is overtime. And then I'm gonna get a call from my project manager that tells me, Hey, let everybody go home early on Friday because we don't have overtime in the budget. And it's like negative on that one. Like we just made them cancel, Stand up their wives, stand up, their kids, cancel their plans, and now we're going to say, go home early. Like, no sir, that is not okay. So that's what it feels like. Yeah. And they've probably been like, Hey, we're gonna work late all week. I'm already canceled my Friday night plans. Yes. Right. Yes sir. Yes sir. It, it's like not a good deal. So I learned how to mitigate that and yeah, I had a, I would often tell people like, sometimes a butt chewing is worth $10,000 because they would want me to go, I'd get there. You need to be out here schedule. You're supposed to start today. Okay. So I would show up by myself and like, What are you doing? Like you're supposed, where's your crew at? Like, I, I'm going here to check to see if you're actually ready for me, , if you're not ready for me, I'm not bringing a crew out here cuz I'm already setting myself up for failure. And the emails would fly and the threats would happen and I would coordinate to mobilize when I could see that they were going to be ready. Because at the very least, when the team showed up, they were gonna be able to produce, they weren't gonna be doing busy work. And, and that, that helped me maintain trust with my team. But I got to get my butt chewed. But it saved us $10,000 in lost labor, showing up, pitching washers until whoever was ahead of me got their stuff done. Cause of dependent events. Mm-hmm.. So you just got nailed and got yelled at from two angles. You got behind. So you're, you're getting it from Thomas the gc. Yep. And then you're getting from the home office Yep. Or running, running over your operational expense and they make a executive decision to shut off the work that you've already planned. You guys, you're literally trapped. That's a hundred percent. God, that's, that's a, that's a bad spot, dude. You know, I think, I still think the foreman role is the worst role. The trade foreman role is the worst role in construction because that this situation that you just painted, the GC hates me. It's mad at me. My office is on my butt, and now my team is not happy with me. Like no matter what. Oh, yeah. I didn't even think about that. Yeah. Everybody is, I'm everybody's, I'm the villain in that entire situation for every stakeholder, and I had nothing to do with it. You're in a system, right? Yes. Yep. And you're in the middle. You're her. Yes, Yes. Herbi all day long. Herbi feels stress. Yep. He feels it and he tries to make up with it. The only way he, it's only way he can by working harder. But it's actually, it works against Herbi because he gets more tired. Yep. Cause his heart rate goes up even though he wants to work harder, he's trying harder. It, it makes it hard. It it like he's stuck. The only thing that you can do makes it worse. Yes. Do you think that contributes to mental Oh my god, Thomas? Yes. Yes. Mental, mental problems self medication, the whole thing. Yes. 100%. Like, you know, there was one, the very last project that I was on that I took over, cuz at the time, my part of my responsibility was assessing financial forecast and labor forecast from the superintendent. And I would assess like, how, how close are they? And when they were way off, like, oh, oh flag, let me go see what's going on. So I went out to the project and it was in bad, bad, bad shape. We ended up finishing, like the whole entire project was, went about five months over schedule. And there weren't any new design. Like it was just because of just a horrible situation. So at that point in time, I was, I was dating an amazing woman and I called her and I said, Hey, I'm gonna be taking over this project, so I am not going to be as available as I have been. Like, I'm gonna be almost not available. And she said, Okay. In my head that meant. I'm not going to call you or text you for a couple of months, but only in my head. Right. Because in her mind she's thinking, Well, you know, maybe we won't go out every during the week and hang out. No, it was completely gone. So three months later, four months later, once we got some light at the end of the tunnel, I call her and I know like, Oh, she's probably gonna be mad. And she was mad I hurt her. And she asked me, she's like, Jesse, I don't like, I understand, but I really don't understand why you had to cut me off completely. Like you weren't working 24 hours a day. And I was like, Oh my God. And I knew the answer. The answer was because I was going to be swimming in failure every single hour of every single day until we finish that project. Yeah. The only thing you can do, just like Herbie, the only thing that you can do to remedy the situation makes your personal situation completely worse. Yes, absolutely. That was it. That was it. Yep. And that every, there's hundreds of people, thousands of people in that situation right now. Millions. Millions. Millions. Millions. Yeah. There's 11 million people in construction. Yeah. At least 1 million of those are in that role. Yep.. Yep. So think about that. The experience, the foreman who I have worked with, Yeah. They all have this, this guard armor. All, everyone of them. Some have less, some have more. And there's, I, I know all the combinations to Yeah. To break through it. Well, not all of them, but I know most of them. Yeah. But That is real. Yes. I haven't experienced that. Cause I've never been in that position. I skipped it. I skipped it. Yeah. Cause I've only been in general construction, so I don't understand. I can only emphasize, but I work with for foreman, for person, whatever you wanna call them. People who run crews who they don't run a project, they run crews. Yes. And they are, they're in this super vulnerable position. Herbi. They're herbi. And if you are herbi, it sucks. And the only thing that you can do makes the situation even worse.. So Herby needs some help. Yep. He needs some help. He's gonna get it here. Yes. Yes. He's gonna get it. But I wanna, I I really wanted to focus on Thank you for sharing that situation because that is the bullshit Yes. That contributes to suicide. And it's fleeting. It's, it's it's little teeny. Yep. Tiny cuts. And I was having this conversation with my, my father two days ago, and he, he was he's a veteran. He was in Vietnam. He experienced combat. We experienced, he experienced stress. I was like, I can't, I've never experienced that. I've never experienced that amount of stress. I've never experienced a situation where not only was my life at stake, but I also like had to be in a place where I had to fight back and be Yeah. And be present with that and be comfortable with that. I've never experienced that. So those who have done that, like. Seriously salute. In construction though? In that form and slide. It's different in your, And I haven't, I I was trying to explain this, I was like, it's different. It's not that level of, of trauma maybe. Yeah. But it compounds. And if it's year over year, year over year, year over year, year over year. And it's your job, it's your livelihood, it's your identity. It's, it's everything. Yeah. It's way worse. What do you think about that? I know that it's horrible because it's, because it just, it's like what's the things in PAs, stalagmites and stag? Like it's just coding of calcium and it's just year over year. They just, it just keeps growing and it just weighs on you and it weighs on your psychology and it weighs in your health and your sleep and your relationships. It just, it just Yes. Right. It, it, it wears you down and it's not as, It's not as, I, I, I, and I haven't experienced either, so I can only empathize, but I was trying to explain it and because he hasn't worked in the trades. He has, he doesn't work in construction. He's retired from Right. But he has experienced combat. So we were trying to like figure out like, what's the difference? Yeah. And I was like, It's, it's year over year, over year, over year, over year. And it's slowly, wheres you down until you can't cope anymore And you, you're now Herby. Anything that you do only makes this situation worse. And you know it, but the way the system is designed, What else are you like? That's all you, You can't do anything else. Yes. Right. Need help. That's you need help. Let's go back to the book. That, that for me. I wanna help. I want to help. And, and you So do you So does a very growing community. Yep. That's so, the, the no BS with Jen, That's the bs. It's the, it's the, it's the erosion of, it's the every single day. It's why we do a daily huddle, because I don't want another day of eroding someone's psychic. I want them, I wanna tell them everything right here and right now. Yep.. So so they'll go back to the book and so the slower the average fluctuations accumulate, they work their way back to the end of the line, which means I have to slow down if I was Alex. Yep. All of those statistical fluctuation. Yep. They add up and they add up. Where do they add up at the end of the line. So no work workers ERs, painters, painters, poor guys, electricians, people who work at the, in the finished trades. Oh yeah. We need to have Veterans Day for finished trades. Seriously? Because you feel the pressure and like it it's already on, on the day that you show up Yes. There to install the carpet Yep. Or to polish the concrete floors because Herbie's already down is damage. He's rolled through, bro. Yep. So, so, and the reason why is because relative to the growth of inventory, the spreading out of the, of the, of the the troops throughput for the entire system. It goes down the rate. Yes. You're no longer going two miles per hour. You're going like less than that. If you, if you, if you take your overall throughput and the, So here's the reason why projects rarely finish on time against its original agreed upon date. I'm not saying projects don't finish on time. Cause we do, we finish, we really try. I'm company I work for try to finish on time, but problems happen and we have to make adjustments and that's just how the world works. Yep. Right? And so that's how CPM works as well. That's okay. But we also have to understand and design in that, hey, there's gonna be problems, there's gonna be statistical fluctuations and we need to have a system that incorporates that. Yes. That's harder. Yes. But that's the lesson that, that, that we learned from Herbes Hike. And that's the most important lesson in this entire book. So spoiler alert . Yeah. Herbie's Hike is the most known lesson taught by the goal. It's Herby is the slowest walker. The goal for the whole troop is to finish the hike. Yep. But the try, but the troop does not finish until Herbi, The slowest Walker finishes. Yes, sir. Yes. It is a simple case study. Independent events with statistical fluctuations. It's the same thing. We don't finish the project until the, the tile is set and cured and routed and, and and sealed and we set. Right. And you're a plumber, so you're always waiting on the tile guys. Yep. Oh yeah. To set all the, the China, I call China. Yep. But it's all the porcelain. But you feel it, You feel. You feel the pressure? Yes. And the pressure over time leads to, for me, I wasn't, I didn't feel it. I was usually giving the pressure. Yeah. And like, listen, I'm, I've been promoted many times. I'm still not the prime decider of the project . Right, Right. So I can't like change the course of the schedule. I can't, I'm sorry. I wish, I really try. We have conversations, We do make adjustments, but I can't, still can't make, So even as let's say a general superintendent, there's still like, they're the number one person on the organizational chart in terms of like field operations, but they're not the primary decision maker. Right. In terms of like, decisions. So even then as, even as the, the highest field operation person in terms of like decision making, you don't have complete agency of your project Yep. because you have other dependent events. The design is incomplete or there's a permit issue, or is a payment issue, or there's a backlog with a nickel mine and we can't mine nickel in Eastern Europe because of a geopolitical situation happening. Even at those positions, you still, you still feel the heat, you feel the pressure, you feel like Herbie. And it weighs on you. And it did for me. Hell yeah. Absolutely. And I, I controlled it with a whole bunch of controlling behavior, numbing trying to like like distract yourself with other stuff. Yep. Or for me, like I get crazy with Lane because it's like, Oh, I can check all this stuff out and like not have to face reality. If we understand two concepts from this book and from the hike dependent events, scout one, scout two scout, three scout, four scout, five scout in minus one. Like Right, like total throughput requires from scout one to scout last. That's your entire throughput. So the rate is determined upon how Well, number one number last go through Yes. Throughput, operational, expensive, your energy, that's everything that you spend to move that inventory through the length of the trail. Yes. The length of , of, of your, of time, I guess in this case, that's your inventory. Yeah. And so if your inventory is ever expanding that your throughput will will inverse dive. Yep. Yeah. Yep. So I'm gonna talk, tell a story about my love hate relationship with self checkout . And then I already told the story about commercial airplanes. And by the way, how do you get off of freaking commercial airplanes? You get off like Army Rangers, all the Ds get off and columns. All right.? Yes. The hell off the plane. If you're next in the aisle, go. If you're the third one and you wait . Yes, we can move fast. Anyways, get off, I'll get off my commercial airplanes because, and the reason why I I thought I was crazy because that used to give me anxiety. Like being in self checkout or even just normal checkout, you get behind somebody and I would, I feel anxiety. I like, I get super uncomfortable.. Yeah. And, and the reason why, if you, if there's no line or if you're in first class Right. Feels good. Yeah. Is why, cuz there's no dependent events. Yeah. Somebody's like you, you get on plane first, they hand you a drink. there's an attendant just for you that's comfortable. Yeah. And it's the same thing if you're in a line and self checkout and there's, there's, let's say you go to self checkout and it's 10 o'clock at night at Home Depot, there's like 12 stands. They're all open, man. You can, you can breeze through. No. Sway. Yes. However, dependent events. Yes. If you're forced to behind somebody with complications, Yes. More than, more complications than you have, you're forced. That means you're dependent. And if you can, if you, and especially in self checkout, if someone is unfamiliar with the system being like, where do you scan the thing and you're like standing there, you're like, like you're feeling. Yes. I get my anxiety gets, it gets, I get triggered. And for me, I feel constrained. Yeah. And if, if you've ever been physically constrained, sounds like you have maybe one or couple times with law enforcement. Oh, several times. Yeah. If you're physically constrained it's a very stressful situation. Yes. And I feel that way with my anxiety. I feel that way mentally. I feel physically constrained. That means like, so for me, I feel it right here and I will hold my breath and now I can, I can label that and I'll be like, you're just standing in line at Home Depot to like, we're, we can, we can persevere , but I have to label that. And then I'll be like, Yeah, this guy in front of me. I'll be like, Hey, the, the thing it's on, like into your two by four over here. And then I'll, I've, I've just remedied the situation. So for me, and I guess we already talked about finished trades, but they always feel the schedule the most. Yes. Or even like as a plumber. Yes. You have to put all your fixtures in last, cuz you need, you need the finished trades to go through and set the tile. Yes. You feel the same pressure because they are often the scouts behind Herbie. Yes.. Yes. So it's, it's like gr on the wall please. So it's Yeah, gr it like, and I've been like the guy, I'd be like, Just bury him. Just go, Right. Yeah. And then they, you gotta take it all off. Like, it just, it just compounds. So the, the hike we go to chapter 14, if you wanna keep going, at least do the chapter 14. Let's do it. Because the reason why the hike is such a good story is because we get into chapter 14 and to have courage that requires confronting the conflict. Yes. If you avoid the conflict or you delegate gate. That's the worst. You delegate conflict. You are not courageous. You're a I'll save my, my adjective. Or maybe it's you're a coward. Yes. So if you do not confront conflict, and if you do not confront, like we have a Herbie. If we say, Well, let's just make fun a herbi and just bash him. You're a coward. You're a bully. That's bs, right? Yes. Yes. You are not being courageous. Being courageous requires you to confront the conflict. And confronting conflict makes you vulnerable. Yes. Because you're doing something that's different. Yes.. So in chapter 14, Alex has to confront the conflict. Like literally, he's like, Oh shit. Like we're not gonna make, we're not gonna make camp by dark. You, He starts doing the calculation. He's like, According to the schedule the troop master gave us, We're supposed to eat lunch at 12 noon. Like, the kids are dropping out, they are beat. And they're like, It's noon now. Herbi, Herbie is like Herbi. He needs, he needs lunch. Like, Yes, let me know. I know. Like, I can't miss a meal. Yep. He's looking. He's like, Boom, is, we have to eat lunch, Alex. So chapter 11 and 13, they introduced dependent events and statistical fluctuation. Chapter 14 breaks it down. And I, I like this stuff. This is cuz like you have to confront the brutal facts. Yes. Confront the brutal facts. That's good to, Great. That's Jim Collins. That's another book we might cover, but No, that's an amazing book. Yep. McKenzie, I like McKenzie. We work with them. They're a management consulting firm and they publish an article that I copied and it says to Aspire is essential to innovation. And they wrote President John F. Kennedy in 1962. He said, Go to the moon in this decade setting the goal. That's the goal. Yep. That's one shot. That's literally where we got it. And that goal, JFK 1962 motivated a nation Yeah. To unprecedented levels of innovation. And it's innovation. It's far reaching vision. And that's why we really celebrate JFK in a lot of ways. Yes. And because you say he has such vision and is he's such a catalyst for that. Yep. And if you have a far reaching vision, it can be compelling catalyst providing this, realistic enough to stimulate action today. Yes. So in 1962, it was a goal, but it wasn't crazy. The technology was getting close. We had, we had a space program going. I just needed little, I'm like, JFK is like not quite a little nudge. Like it was like get to the get to the moon. Yes. Before the end of the decade. So they had to get there before 1970. Say years. Yes. It's a moonshot. Oh yeah. So establishing a quantitative innovation aspiration is not enough. This is McKenzie, not me.. The, the target value needs to be a portion to relevant business owners and cascaded down to their organizations in the form of performance targets and timelines. Anything less risk, encouraging inaction, or the belief that innovation is someone else's job. Like we need to set realistic goals. Yep. And they need to be cascaded throughout the organization. So like, we have, we're gonna do this, There's an accounting piece we've already talked about. There's a financial part of, of production. We need to have the safety group, Right. If we're gonna reach this goal, we can't hurt anybody or, or worse, Yep. If we're gonna reach this goal, we need to grow part of our, this business. Right? So like, we gotta set goals. We can't just say, Hey, we're gonna get to the moon. You guys figure the rest down. I'm out. Yep. Like, no. We also have to work with, so I guess in, in the sixties, like we have to work with nasa, we have to work with Congress to get the, the funds approved. We have to work with land developers and Yep. In South Florida to, to get this area built. And we have to work with whole bunch of trades people to build these rockets. Oh yeah. Like they were all built. They didn't just magically happen. They were built plumbers and electricians and carpenters. Yes. And so we have to set these goals. So in other words, great leaders must inspire, inspire others. Take action. Like, good. Not even. Good. Good. This is Jim Collins. Good. Good. Leaders set goals. Great leaders inspire others to take positive action. What do you think about. Kenzie's words, man. Yes. I, I, I, It's easy for me, it's easier for me when I think of it in terms of action. Like Adam, Adam gives me credit for this quote. I don't think it's my quote, but I know I say it a lot. Like the cemetery is full of ideas, Right? Like, we all have ideas. Some people have amazing Yeah. But the path, the path, the hell is paved with good intentions. Exactly. Yes. And so the, for me, my observation is this, the difference is action, right? And to bring up another book leadership and self deception, right? When I deceive myself, can't see it, or, or violate myself by not taking action on what I'm called to do, what is presented to me in the moment, I am violating me. And when I do that over and over and over and over, it degrades my whole identity. Now, a hard and real example, you were there when we all had dinner with Davis and Walker and Adam and Jen, and they had an idea, right? This, this lean symposium that's turned into a panel discussion that now we are on the calendar instead of Yeah, we're on the calendar to have a panel discussion at Clemson University. Clemson. Yes. And we have a commitment to have this same discussion at Texas a and m and College Station. That does not happen without action. I'm sticking with the scc. I see no wait, Ace, I guess Clemson's, Ace, never. I have no idea . But the vision, the long we transcend conferences, but with's action, yes, it's action, but the vision is a conference of that happens on a regular cadence where we're bringing industry professionals to come and share their knowledge and experience with young professionals, people getting educated that are fixing the end of the industry and expose them or introduce them to a different way of building. That was Davis Hamrick thinking. Davis Hamburg has no, Maybe, maybe he's got connections at Clemson, but he was sitting at a table with someone who has need connections. Exactly. Adam. Yep. He's like all of a sudden an idea and a goal. Yep. We can turn that in. Actions. And it's realistic. Yes. It's like, Hey, I know. Yeah. We got, we have a venue. We can do this, We can serve. Yeah. Boom. Yep. So, great. I'm just gonna back it up. Great. Leaders must inspire others to take positive action. Yes. That's it. That's all you do. If you, if you're a leader and you stress somebody into action, or you, if you coer or you , Yes. Put someone in a box. You are not a great leader. Not sure you're even good leader. Mm-hmm., you might be effective for this long. Yes. And it's happened. It's, there's so many examples. Of that of that happening. Yeah., well, hell, I did it. Yeah. Right. Yeah. And you have to inspire others cuz it has this compounding effect. Yes. This is what Alex does in this chapter. Yes. And what he does, he plays a game. You ever, you ever do a simulation to change people's mindset by Oh my God. Simulations are the best way to do that. Yes. So I got a summary of the, this game, the simulation that Alex does with the with the scouts. And it's, it's Professor Martin, James Martin in I think he's retired now, but he is a University of South Florida, and that's where Adam Hoots, by the way. Yep. Graduated from college, perhaps Adam and James. Huh? Adam, I'm not calling you out, but if you know Professor Martin or can make a connection in South Florida. Yep. I also work in the Tampa Orlando vicinity. And we can, we can make a connection. So here's another goal. Let's make a connection with, with James Martin. But he basically, he, he breaks down the, the simulation that Alex runs with the with the scouts Yeah. And is so good. And you do a simulation with the Lego. And, and probably many others. There's, there's a wood block game. These are not silly games. These are simulations meant to change people's mindset. So let me like, Gonna pause and I'll be like, These are simulations to change people's mindset. And it must come with the, that weight, that level of seriousness. When I ran the Woodblock game, I don't think I gave it, I don't think I gave enough. Yep. Two, two, do that simulation. But go back to Dr. Martin game involves, So this chapter they're taking a break. They're, they're eating lunch. And Alex is like, I need, I can't do this on my own anymore. Herby can't do this on his own anymore. Like, we gotta figure this shit out. So he goes, I need, I need bowls, I need matches, and I need one dye from Paradise. And if you go camping with me, we're bringing some dice. Yes. We're gonna play something with dice. But so, so usually there's a paradise involved. So there's enough they, like, they go searching through the, the scouts packs and that'll come into play here in a second. But they get bowls, they get matches, and they get dyes, scouts, bowls. They represent individual workstations. Okay. A series of bowls line'em up, matches inventory. Yes. And then the dye statistical fluctuations. roll a dye and, and statistics will tell you, you will, it, it'll roll. And then the top number on the dye is, is the number. So that's fluctuation and that whatever the number that you read is the performance of each workstation. This is also known as the parade of trades game. Yep. If you played this and, and salute to Dr. Tomlin at University of California Berkeley, who, who taught me this personally or, and has a really good white paper that about why this applies in construction. Yeah. But this is, this is the exact game. Perhaps Dr. Tomlin and Dr. Martin need to confer. Yep. Yep. But maybe not. So the bowls, they're set up as a production line and they, they represent dependent events. Step one, step two, step three, step four where each operation has the same capacity. Six products. So the goal is like, you go six products per day, and on the dye has numbers one through six. So the most you can roll as a six, the least you can roll as a one, right? Yes. So the, i the goal is like move match sticks. You can end like, and in the individual workstation, you can only have six in there. Yep. I believe So you start rolling the dice., how do you work it? You roll the dice and you each roll the dice several times. And then every time you, So if you roll the dice, I get a six I put six out of the, the bra materials. I put 'em into the first workstation. Second workstation, they roll a three, they take six. There's six in the inventory. I take three in the inventory, right? The next guy rolls a four, but there's only three in the inventory. Mm-hmm.. Oh, we got a problem. Yep. We got a bottleneck. Uhhuh. So chapter 14 introduces the law bottle. Yes. So if I have the capacity to do four matches, yet there's only three in the My dependent, my partner over here slacking, only got three. Yes. There's going to be a different set of productions. Yes. The problem with the dye rolling, the bottleneck never stays the same. It moves. It moves. So they play this game, they play a couple rounds, and they, each role of the dye several times represent the, the production rate and the bottleneck nearly always appears at a different operation. Yep. Someone always rolls a two or a one. They're like, Ah, come on, you're killing me. You ever do that in afraid of trades? Oh man. You hear that. You hear it. The, the first time we played it, I, I, if we were at the, if we had a couple of beers, we would've been fighting me and, and my buddy Jeff cuz I'm like, Dude, you, you're horrible. You suck. Like you don't know what you're doing. We're rolling Dice. Yeah. But yeah, I, it gets, it gets heated. It's, and that's real life. It is true. Does that ever happen on the job site? Oh, 100%. A hundred percent. Yes. A hundred percent. And then I'll come by and I be like, Cause I'll have my favorites and be, and I'll defend. Yep. I won't defend Herbie. I'll defend my favorites. Yep. And not because I, they're my favorites because I'm highly biased cuz I'm be like, I need to achieve this goal. But back to the book, The Game Works and back to Dr. Martin's beautiful summary. The game works to prove Alex Rogan's assumption that if each operation is a sequence of dependent events and has the same amount of capacity, then the variations in between the dependent events will cause bottlenecks to move from operation to operation. Right. So if everybody, if you have dependent events and you have statistical fluctuations, The bottleneck will not be the same. Yep. It'll move around and that'll drive you crazy. Yep.. Yep. Firefighting baby, boom. Yep.. Yep. And that's what happens. And if there's, if you have constantly moving around bottlenecks, and we'll go back to Unico, you remember the earlier chapters they had, they had full-time people. Yes. These, they had, they had mechanical engineers, These probably people with graduate degrees who were expediters, who could, who had to look at the situation and be like, make a quick calculation and be like, Hey, we need to move this, take this operation and move this ahead. And that was designed into the system. Yes. And all of a sudden Alex is like, with matches and bowls and dice and in the middle of a forest, , no computers. And he's observing floating bottlenecks. Yes. It's, this is why simple sim simulations are effective teaching methods. Yes. Because all because you can see it. It's hard to see in a factory. It's even harder to, to see it on the site. Right. Cause it takes time. But if you see a simulation, it happens really rapidly in front of your face. And if you have if you do it very effectively and do it very seriously and you don't joke around these simulations, they prove these theories, they prove them out. Yep. And you'll see the bottlenecks show up and people get angry with each other. And of course we're like, the stakes are pretty low, but Right. You get some liquid courage in you. Maybe, perhaps, we would've been fighting, I promise we would've been fighting. So floating bottlenecks were occur because the effects of variation in the system. So if you go on to study Dr. Gold rat variation becomes incredibly important. Variation is like the scourge to production. Yes. According to Dr. Gold rat . Yes. It's not dogma, I'm just saying according to Dr. Gold Rat, his theory of constraints, floating bottlenecks will occur because of the effects of variation. Yes. It just, it will move around. Just when you think you got it figured out it, something over here will be messing around with the system. Two, because of floating bottlenecks, it's difficult to know where the bottleneck will show up next. Yes. So you therefore lose the ability to fully manage any process. You're just reacting. You can only react. Yep. So if, if you have floating bottlenecks and you don't understand what's the causing the statistical fluctuations, the, the, you lose your ability to manage. You lose command and control. Yes. You lose the red Gantt chart . It's gone baby. The red, the, the red line on the CPM jumps around like crazy. Yeah. Ever see that? I see it all the time. Ah, be like, okay, alright. I got it. Start to start minus five. And like we try to like, we need to keep the. We have to keep the critical path on this particular trade, keep the heat on them. I've done this. Yep. I've done this. We've manipulate the schedule. I'm not saying we do this now, we try not to. This is not, it's not effective construction management, but I have done this in the past where we will manipulate the project schedule to keep the critical path on a particular sequence of events. Yeah. That is, that's just the way it is. Yes, yes. You know, is it wrong? Yes. I had a, I was working with the team in Kansas City, and what they did was, and there was heavy electrical, heavy, heavy, heavy overhead work had to be done, and it was pretty tight space. They started framing all the walls before any of the overhead went up. And I'm like, Whoa. Like, what are you, Why are you doing, Help me understand why this is happening. And the answer I got was, Well, because it's the critical path. I said, Okay, who created the schedule? Oh, well, I did. Like, okay, so you indicated that this task was critical path. Like No, that's what the schedule said. Okay. Well, who created the, So it was this circle of the critical path was defined by him.. He created the schedule, or it's probably Yes, yes. And so the, the reasoning behind putting the framing up first was because he said so. Right? Like, I mean, for me, that was my distillation, the whole situation. Do you realize that you've just multiplied the amount of time it's going to take to get the overhead work done that must be complete so that you can get your in wall done and cover these walls? Like are you not seeing that? And we went round and round and round, couldn't see it. Trade showed up, they were very unhappy, lots of screaming and yelling. And he finally landed like, Okay, on the next half of the building of this floor space, we're gonna do overhead first. And he was doing it to prove that he was right.. But he learned, he was like, Oh my God, I didn't realize. And my whole point was, bro, we made this schedule. If we made it, we can change it like that. We did like it was made in a, in a, in a vacuum and we didn't understand all the other things. We can arrange our bowls. Yes. However we manage. Yes. We can get dice that roll threes and fours. Yeah, you can, you can buy dice that roll threes and Awesome. Let's we gotta do 15 today cuz it's, Let's do it. It just, So and this is important to me and that was I already said like, like I was in the midst of when I was writing this summary, I was in the midst of five in relations. This is back in May. Man, this talk about like how long it takes statistical fluctuations. It's hard, but No, this is April, I guess, right? When you're, Yeah. February and April, March. Wow. So chapter 15. I'm not even gonna recap it cuz I just want to get into, let's go the issue. And I just wanna take a minute to raise awareness to a major problem in the construction industry. It's major and that's mental health. Yes. And I will start with what I believe, and this is only me. What contributes to our identity as men in construction? I, I'm not a woman. Like, I, I can't, I can only empathize, but I am a man in construction and I do identify with many of the things I'm about to talk about. So arguably, and this is arguably, there's three very famous photographs of the construction industry, at least in the United States of America. There's very three and the first one, everyone knows this. Yeah. At least in construction. 19 32, 30 Rockefeller Center, 11 construction workers, they sit on a beam. Yes. In, in I guess that's Midtown Manhattan. And I've been to the top of 30 Rock. Like, it's cool. It's like yeah. Cause you look down, you see Central Park. So you see this, see this site, and they're sitting on the beam. None of 'em are tied off. Nope. one guy's got like a, a flas of a whiskey, but they're eating lunch and they're so confident. If you lean back and like the scene, maybe you'll have to like add this to the show notes or something, but everybody's seen this photo. It's, they're at, they're in grave peril and they're just so confident and they're like, Oh, we're eating lunch. And I think it's been, it was go through the history, like it was very stage photo like that. I think the newspapers only it was off, but it's New York City iron workers sitting on a beam. They're just so confident. And that's, that's the first one. And there Allman, Yes. None of them were in, There's no safety gear to be seen. There's none, no one's tied off. There's no hard hats. Half the people aren't even wearing shirts. Yep., That's, that's the first photo. 1932 19 42, 10 years later, there's a photo of a carpenter and he's using a I don't, what do they call these? It's like a drill, but it's man It's a very famous photo of a carpenter. He's working on the Douglas Dam in Tennessee, 1942. So this would be World War II kind of timeframe. Yep. But the, the, the unique piece of this photograph is, and it's, it's, it's their very 1940s, but he's wearing that skull guard, The, the composite. Yep. Skull guard, hard hat. Every carpenter, I mean, any carpenter who's cool. Yep. It's, it's the orange Skull guard composite hard hit. And it's, it's on a tilt and he's got his leg up and he is wearing overall muddy. Yep. And he, he is working hard. Like it, his face is scrunched and that is the ideal carpenter. He's make, I'm drilling into timber, I'm building a dam. This is contributing to, I imagine Manhattan project. Like this is, this is, this is big deal. That is our ideal. The third photograph, and it's Louis Hines and he's, he take, this is in 1920, so this is way before even 30 rock filler. This is he's, this is a mechanic. He's installing a steam pump. So this would be a mechanical steam fitter, I imagine. Right. It's very respective trade, especially in 1920, especially now. Steam fitters, no joke. Like shit. Yeah, Yep. Mechanical, Mechanical trades. Like yeah. Like, but he's hunched over and he's he has this giant wrench, Lewis Hs. He's working in a powerhouse and he is working on steam pump. And he is, he's tightening bolts and all of these photographs, they depict men. Yes. And they depict men with masculine qualities. Yes. Right. They're all, none of 'em are in ergonomic. They're not in good, they're not in safe places. None of 'em are safe. But they're all this ideal, like this is what men do. We get after we work in, in, with big tools and we work with our hands and we sit on beams and it's considered typical and appropriate. It's typical and appropriate. That's expected of men and, and boys. Yep. And I'm not here to say that that's bad. That is my ideal too. I I, I have that ideal, that ideal was invested into me. That it's the best man for this job. And if you get paid for the work that you put in and sometimes work, is that ergonomic? It's not clean. You're gonna, it's, you're gonna hunch over and that's the way it is. Yes. And that's a masculine I that, But here's the thing about that. These are famous photographs that get, they're in museums. If you go to New York City, you're gonna see this Julian Times. I might have, I might even have a picture. Yeah. I might even have the, the, the worker, the iron workers. But it's and that, especially the iron workers, that that has been replicated many times. And that is our ideal, It's aren't ideal. And that is a masculine thing. And that's tied to construction. All of those are trades workers. Yep. They're wearing that iconic school guard composite hard hat. We still wear it today. I still think it's cool. Yes. I gotta wear one that's got advisor and all kinds of stuff.. But it's our ideal. So traits traditionally viewed as masculine western society include strength, courage, independence, leadership, and assertiveness. Yeah. Those are, these are the, the traits of that have been studied that are masculine traits. What do you, what do you think about this? I can't disagree with those traits because they're valuable traits. The problem. Is the disregard for human life, right? Like these men, they, they were on the edge. They were a bump away from tragic circumstance. Yeah. Yeah. Like if, if you fall from that level and, and 30 Rockefeller Center, it's still there. That beam still exists. It's Yep. Could be somebody listening to this on that floor. Yep. Perhaps. Yep. If you fall, you're falling into that the street. Yes. Yes. So you're put at peril. Yeah. Yeah. Absolutely. And the work, the, the credit. I, I had a awesome coach, Bryant Sanders who helped me shift my, my, my vision of what hard the definition of hard work is. And he said it this way. He's like, Jesse, what you consider hard work is abusive, disrespectful, and neglectful work. I'm like, Whoa. And that's our industry. Right? That's so, the traits that you mentioned, valuable traits, but if I were to say, and I've said it, I was out on a project one time, were cutting into a sanitary, sanitary riser in a hospital and we were all just gonna do it, right? Cuz they told us to do it. That was part of our job. And I said, Wait a minute, above us is the icu, and people are up there with, who knows what kind of disease, and they're putting that into this pipe that I'm supposed to cut. Like, that's not a good thing. Yeah. We need, like, we, what precautions are we going to? Especially the person doing like the dumping end probably has like ppe? No, we didn't have any of that. No, no. The person who is doing the dumping Yes. Into the pipe. Yes. Totally. Yeah. Yes. Right. The, the hospital staff had the proper attire, proper PPE to protect their health. Once went into the pipe, Well will, right now we're supposed to cut into this thing. And I'm like, hold on. Like, no, no, no, no, no. What kind? We need gear. We need, we need stuff, shots. I don't know what, like whole, I'm not just gonna cut into this pipe. And in my head I'm thinking like, the company is going to appreciate this because I'm bringing a risk issue to the surface. That's not what I got. What I got was, you're a problem. You need to stop being soft and stop complaining and cut the damn pipe. And I said, Okay, I'm not gonna cut the pipe and I'm not gonna instruct anybody else out here to cut the pipe. So I got switched to another project. But you were being courageous. Yeah. I don't know. I was assertive. I was saying you were being assertive. Yes. One of the, one of the ones look at one of the traits is assertiveness, right? Yes. No. Like assertiveness is, I don't stand for this. Yep. We are not gonna do this thing. You were being masculine. Yeah. But it was also was masculinity at risk. Absolutely. I knew, I said, Man, I'm gonna make a big deal. I'm gonna say something and they're gonna make, All I expected was people to make fun of me. I didn't expect to get transferred off the job and be labeled a whiny boy. So my masculinity for those people, well, not all of 'em, but a bunch of 'em. I was less manly because I wouldn't take that risk. And that's, that's the thing that we deal with out there, right? Like, Oh man, come on, Just, just get in there. You don't need shoring. What are you scared of? Oh man, just climb up there real quick. Like, don't be such a win. Like we use. And I say, I've done that in the past. Like, Oh man, come on. Really? You need a water break? Right? Like, hey, you know, dude, pick it up like it's 105 degrees and we're working on an underground roughing where there's absolutely no shade. It's two o'clock in the afternoon, people are exhausted. And I'll tell like, Hey, yeah, you're down in a ditch with no breeze. Yeah, no, no breeze, just misery. And I'll say like, Man, did you drop your purse? Like, pick it up her, We, we got, we gotta get done. And so there's all these, you used it earlier, right? These little micro cuts. And I would attack people's masculinity instead of appreciating the human being that's in front of me. And so that's kind of the twist. Yes, those traits are amazing, but we gotta appreciate the human being. And the pictures that you're talking about, this, this persona that we aspire to is a also never complains, just jumps in, doesn't check for themselves, doesn't check for the person next to them because that is feminine. Being worried about somebody else is considered feminine. It is the inverse of masculinity. Yes. Or I shouldn't say that. It's not the inverse, it's just not masculinity. The ideals are femininity, caring, compassion. Yep. Right. Teaching. Yes. And that reason why I bring that up, because. I recently had a identity kind of shift. Ah, because when I was, you know, looking at this, I was like, Hey, like, and I was reading this to my better half Angeline, and she asked me this and it cut me just to the, I remember you tell talking about this. I was just, I'll tell it publicly now. Yep. She goes, and I've, I've moved on from this, but it cut me down. She goes, Do you think that those traits in that identity of construction is the reason why you got into it? Yes. And I was like, Is that like all of a sudden you start that's it's like that Yes. Danger, risk being dirty, grinding it out. Yep. And swallowing your emotions and these ideals is also the reason what draw me in. And I was like, Yeah, absolutely. Like, what? Are you kidding me?? Yep. Like, yes, absolutely it was. And I had, I had a, a minor crisis. It wasn't, it didn't like it ruined me, but like, I was like, I started a question, I'm like, like, is this, is this healthy? Like, is this, And I was like, No, we need, as men, we need to be assertive. We need to be leaders. We need to be independent, we need to be courageous. Yes. And we need to do these things. And not in a, in a, in a, in a way where it's, where it's negative. Yep. We can do, we can be courageous in a way that is positive. Yes. Right. We can be assertive and help other people. Yes. Right. Yes. We can be assertive and teach somebody, be like, Hey, hey, tie off now. Right? Yep. We can, we can be leaders and have those great leadership qualities and also be men. Yes. And have masculine quantities. This isn't a, a, a die tribe not tearing down masculinity. We can do all of these things Yes. And still be really men and men. Yes. And so, I, I, I, there's a study published in the Psychology of Men and Masculinity. There's a study, there's a journal about this. Okay. A medical journal about the psychology of men and masculinity. There's a publication you ever wanna dive into it? It's actually pretty good, but the researchers found that men with higher levels of traditional masculinity, ideology, So that's the, It's not that I embody, Right. These idea. Like, I don't, I don't, like, I'm not an I'm not Jocko, right? Yeah.. Like, everybody's like, Whoa. Yeah. Family man. Right. I'm not, I, I, I haven't, I'm not been moving in the Navy Seals. I'm not even close. I lived in San Diego. That was the closest I got. I've been to Coronado, I've visited. But but the researchers, they found the men with higher levels of ideology so that, that there weren. They didn't embody these traits. They just had the ideology. They also tended to have a more negative opinion of seeking psychological help. And they also noted that a man who was surrounded by a supportive group of other men, like a church group that encourages members to share problems and seek support they might be more likely to seek help than a man who's only social network discourages such sharing. And there's another note I say men, and this is researchers. Men are more likely to seek help for problems they think are normative. That is problems that many other men share. Mm-hmm.. So this is like, these are normal problems. Like, Hey, I got bad hips and knees. Yep. Like, Right. Like, that's pretty normal thing for men. Or like, ah, like I got, I tore my ACL or something when I was playing high school football or something. Yep. So like, these are normal things, like we can talk about this. But there's, it's, it gets more difficult. So if men perceive being depressed is not normal, then if they do try to get help, they might feel dysfunctional. Yes. So instead they might try to keep their depression quiet. Yes. And then maybe self-medicate with drugs or alcohol and how do I know? Yep, same. Yep. Right. So if, if it's not normal being like, Hey, I got, I got, I didn't, you chewed me out and I, I feel like crap, but I'm not gonna tell you that and I'm just gonna go home. Yep. And like self-medicate. But here's the thing about normalization. It's been done before. Yes. There's marketing campaign by a company we work with at dpr Pfizer, and over, geez, two decades now, they've been normalizing a social taboo. It's erectile dysfunction and men. Yep. They've been normalizing this, this is, this is probably the most private of private issues.. Yes. Right? Yes. This is a, this is a, this is a private, very, very private. This is a very, very private issue. And this is now an issue that's on TV all the time. Yes. Because there's medication for that. And for decades now that there's been Viagra and Seattle and like, that's on the news. Yep. And it's in the, it's in magazines and there's a marketing campaign. Millions of dollars were spent to normalize this taboo issue with men. And they went right at the psychology of it because if, if we don't normalize this issue, men are not likely to talk about this issue with their doctor. In a, in a, you go to your doctor, like you're in a room with a door closed, like, and they're. Legally obliged to not tell anybody. Yeah. Right. Like this is a conversation who should be just like, Hey, I have this problem with like, my intimate situation. Yeah. Like it but since it's this very taboo social stigma, we don't confront that brutal fact. Yep. And even though there is a prescription that could be written and there's medication that you can take and it, and it helps to resolve that that drug was invented and it wasn't being prescribed because it's such a taboo situation cuz it wasn't normalized. But over the years we've become we even know what like the pill looks like, right? Yep. What color is it? The blue, blue pill. The blue. Yep. Right. And it says Pfizer on it. And we've now normalized that problem and we can now talk to our doctor about that situation. Yep. And, and how do I know that? Because there's, there's research that's indicated that when we admit our problems and clearly identify negative factors contributing to them after the ads and after the Viagra drugs, there's so much awareness about it that you can talk freely about it. Or maybe not freely, but like, if, if I can lower the, the, the being weird or being taboo just this much., you can seek professional help.. But we have to, to seek professional help. We have to admit our problems. We have to confront them. And we have to begin to take positive steps to remove those negative factors. Yes. And, and taking positive steps to remove negative factors mean like, Hey guys, like I know it looks pretty cool to sit out on that beam, but none of you guys are tied off and we have a rule here That we have a zero tolerance policy for anything over six feet., you secure yourself with a fall arrest, some kind of fall arrest system. Yeah. And that is, that is our policy and we have zero tolerance for that. So everybody please pack up your stuff and go find work elsewhere. We are Yes. Assertive to that. Right. We can also be strong and courageous and be like, Hey, we have a problem with tie off on this project. We have, this is an issue. We've, is become normalized that it's it's cool and it's, it's like Right, like it's, we're taking pictures with the newspaper. Be like, I I'm being courageous. I don't stand for them. I'm gonna be independent and I'm gonna be the one who's like, You know what, I'm hooking up my D ring and I'm gonna, It don't matter. Maybe all of these workers over here, they might be fine. And they may have maybe have, they worked for 25 years, but no incident. That's great. I can only control myself, so I'm gonna be independent. And even though they're gonna ra me and say, Oh, safety Sam over here . Right. Or, or like whatever it is. If, if we don't normalize that behavior, we can never overcome it. Yeah. We'll always be, always be, always be fighting it because why the ideal. Construction worker sits on a beam and has lunch. And that's what we put in museums that celebrate. And I'm not saying the workers that did that were wrong. That just is what it was at the time. And we should celebrate it because they, they're, they because they did their jobs. We can do our jobs now. Yes. But now we understand the risk. We understand the issue. Yep. And we understand, Hey Herby, you got an issue. You're slower than others. What is, what is it about your situation that we can help? And the only way to do that is to be courageous. And, and you have to be like, even, and in the book, Herby is like, No, don't look at my bag. Like, No, you can't, you can't touch my stuff. Once they open the bag, they're like, You gotta bake beans. You got, you got iron skillet in here, You got all kinds of stuff. And then until they admitted that Herbi was the slowest, then they all had to agree. But they also had to agree that Herbi is critical to our success of our goal. We can't leave Herbi behind because if we leave Herbi behind we don't accomplish the goal. Herbie is back there. Yep. We still coming in. So we have to accept the current condition as it is Right now, as a situation and lower the stigmas of, of just, just grind it out. Just figure it out. Just go faster. Just run your heart rate up. Like what are you, bring your purse, And we can be men and be leaders at the same time. Yes. Two critical thoughts that are in my head. One is, you know, it's easier for me to think about it in terms of just being a better human , right? Like, because the men, the masculinity and all the identity stuff like that can, that's, that had me playing a different way and I was playing a bad game. But thinking in terms of how do I apply those traits to better serve another human being? It's a different view. How can I serve somebody? And then like this whole Herby situation, the question was not how do we go faster? The question was how do we help herbi? Yes. What often happens is Herbie gets cut and replaced, Right? Ignore the problem, ignore the problem, ignore the problem. Yeah. Just fire herbi. Give another one to Herbie. But guess what? You're gonna have somebody else come in and they're still gonna be one slowest person all the time. It's gonna move around. It's gonna move around. So to your, to using your words, except the current condition as it is, and help the person with the problem. And, and we gotta surface it, right? I mean, you know, I think of people that I've lost in my life to suicide and a very recent situation, and I knew he was suffering. I could see it 100%. And you know, the number of times that I said, Hey man, I can see that you're hurting. Like. If you need or when you need somebody to talk to, I'm here for you. The number of times I did that were zero. Right. And so the appropriate thing to do would have been to say, Hey brother, I see you suffering. How can I help you? But we don't do that. Yeah. Right. We, we don't say, And we can see it , we see people suffering in their performance. Yeah. And we don't ask, how can I help? Or even if they if they say I'm fine. Be like, I'm not accepting that. Right. Right. Cause we're courageous. Yes. Absolutely strong. Yes. Different. It's a shift. It's a total shift in mindset. How can I help you versus self preservation and how can I replace you? I have to, I can say the same story. Yep. And many of us can. Many of us can. And you asked those questions after the fact. Yes. Right? Yes. How do we do that? We we, we, we'd be like, Alex and I'll, I'll end this chapter with what he does. And he confronts the fact, he says, Herby slowest, What's in your bag? Herpes. Like, Nah, it's mine. I'm fine. I'll keep going. Nah, nah. What's in your bag? Open it up. And they're like, they pull all this stuff out. They give it to the fast kids. Like, Here, you take this, spread it out. There's like 20 scouts spread out the love. Yes. Which I mean, spread the load out. Yes. And it's. Having an extra can of pork and beans in your backpack. Not gonna slow you down much. Might a little bit, but not much. Right, Right. But having all of that burden removed from her. Yes. Yes. And not only did they do that, they took Herbie, put 'em in the front, the line. That herbi, you're the most important scout out here. You're number one. You're going front and you're gonna lead us. Yes. Can you imagine what that did to number, like, take, take the burden off of Herbi. And they were making fun of, They're calling em names. They were. They were like, Well, you're slow. And like, and it's like Alex is the leader. He's like, he makes this statement. He's, the idea of the hike is not to see who can get there the fastest. It's the idea that we get there together. Yep. We're not a bunch of individuals out there. We're a team. And the team does not arrive in camp until all of us arrive. Yes. And when a leader makes that kind of statement . People freaking fall in line. Yes. And be like, Yeah, give me the, gimme the iron skillet. Give this boom, boom, boom, boom. Herbi front of the line. That's how Herbi feels. Herby felt at that moment. He's like, Yeah. Puts his pack on. Oh yeah. And then he is in front, so he is like, There's no pressure. And they're like, they start encouraging him. Say, Herby, let's go. You got it. Like, they're, they're not, they're behind. We're behind you. We can't go faster. We're not gonna leave you in the dust. We're a team.. And I'm, I, I wanna leave it on that. Because when we do that, And I'll share examples. We found Herbi on my project. Yeah. Actually we found multiple herbes and we started to, instead of firing herbi. And just gimme another one. Just gimme another one. We made some a ments. I like to drop the J. We made some adjustments to our decision. And did it require changing the cpm? Yes. Did it require my job? Got put on the line. They're like, Hey, you're gonna do this like it's on you. And I'm, and I'll tell the story of the next session, Once we relieved the constraint on a series of bottlenecks reduction. Throughput increased. Yes. And I learned that, I learned this theory from this hike, and then I, all of a sudden I confronted resistance because there are people who are in greater power than I who were tied to that initial biased . Original plan. And if I wanted to change it based on current condition, I'm gonna have to take this responsibility on my own. And if it screws up, it's, it's on your ass, Thomas. And I'm like, I don't care. Like I already figured it out. Like, we're gonna be rock stars and spoil our alert. We did . Yeah. But that took a whole bunch of being vulnerable and having courage. Like admitting the current situation. Like, Hey, we have constraints, we have problems. And like not being a coward about it either. Right. Like, could we have fired this trade? Yeah. And gotten a new one. Maybe. Would that have helped the situation? No, absolutely not. Taken a few times long, it would've made it worse. So, , what do you think? Like what are your final thoughts about the hike and kind of like what we talk about? Cause there was a lot unpack there. Yeah, I mean we, we talked about, kind of started with the paradigm shift, right? And so paradigm shift is how do I serve for me? And talking about the distribution of the burden. Like I guess maybe to the individual out there that is like taking it off of the job site. Those people, cuz I used to be one of 'em. And every now and then I like to do it that are carrying all this burden all by myself. It's okay to ask for help, right? It takes en like, it's difficult for me to let people look in my bag and help me with all the garbage that I'm carrying. So it takes courage, but it's what I need. And so for people out there that are carrying that burden all by themselves, invite somebody in to share the load. And for other people that see people carrying that burden, that weight, reach out and offer, lend a hand. Yes, Be strong, be strong and the, and you're gonna have a stubborn, proud Jesse that's say, Oh, I'm good. I got it back off. Buying your own business like. Be strong, be courageous, and say, No, let's look in the bag and let me unload some of that with you. Let me carry this with you. Let's share that. We do that metaphorically, or we do that, like for real, If I see somebody carrying a 10 foot stick of four inch cast iron pipe, like get on the other end of it. Get on the other end of it. Yeah. Hold the door. You just, Yeah. Open the door. Yeah, hold the door. You got it. Yes. Yes. Like help them. Cause yes, they can do it, but not for eternity. And it's human to help somebody else. And so back to the point you made about normalizing if doing those small actions on a regular basis, you start normalizing this, this behavior of compassion and appreciation for another human being. And it's gonna be uncomfortable. You're gonna look like the big softy, the babysitter, but you're not a babysitter. You're a human helping out another freaking human. Like, come on man. That's it. Those are my thoughts. Yeah. Woo, man, didn't I tell you that was some deep, intense, really meaningful conversation. Um, all I gotta say is man, surround yourself with amazing people. Like Thomas really brings out the best in me. And I'm looking forward to the change that we're gonna cause here in this industry. Thomas, myself, the LnM Family, the no BS tribe. Everybody, baby, like we're banding together. We're gonna make something happen. Uh, like Miss Christie Powell says, hashtag better together. Uh, so let's keep this ball rolling. Also, I wanna give a shout out to the LnM Family member that gave us some feedback, this one, this one hit me right into rings. This one comes from Ms. Maria Martin. She and I kind of stole this so I don't have permission. So if y'all hear this, y'all gotta let her know what's in here. Her comment is, it's the thoughtfulness and intention that y'all put into everything you do. That does it for me. Looking forward to the reflection. That's amazing. And so that's a little teaser. Also, we're working on a reflection journal to compliment the lean in love book that's already out there. Uh, and so we sent out a little, the prototype of it right now to the folks that have signed up for the Learnings and Missteps monthly newsletter. So if you're interested in getting in on some of this stuff, go to our website, learnings and missteps.com, sign up for the newsletter, and I send stuff out once a month. Every now and then I'll have some goodies in there. Uh, and in this case, we sent out the prototype. Of the journal and several of the LnM Family have responded and given us some amazing feedback to tweak and adjust so that it can be a very useful and meaningful tool going forward. So again, thank you very much. I know we're flooding you with content this next month. Probably got another month of it between the goal and our regular interviews. Uh, so keep in touch and we'll talk again soon. Peace. Oh my goodness. You're either driving down the road or just so enthralled with, uh, with this whole podcast that you went all the way down to the very, very, very, very end of it. And we appreciate you and just, we're going to take this as an indication of your dedication so we got a little special request of you, a call to action, because everybody tells us that like, you need to have a call to action. So here's the call to action. Be kind to yourself, go out there and share a smile with someone