Starting an Automation Company With No Safety Net (Ft. James Butler) | Ep. #63

What does it really take to start an automation company with no safety net? In this episode of HIRED! The Podcast, host Travis Miller talks with James Butler about the leap from employee to founder, the risks behind starting Bridger Automation, and how leadership, hiring, and decision making change when it’s your business on the line.

// ABOUT OUR GUEST
James Butler is the President and Founder of Bridger Automation, specializing in warehouse automation, conveyor controls, electrical integration, and WCS software. He brings hands-on experience from electrical work to software integration and commissioning, with a focus on building practical, scalable automation solutions.

// CONNECT WITH OUR GUEST
⏵ James Butler
⏵ Bridger Automation
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#leadership #entrepreneurship #sales #engineering #careerdevelopment #hiring #automation #warehouseautomation #manufacturing 

Transcript

00;00;02;15 - 00;00;27;19
Travis Miller
Welcome to hired the Podcast. I'm Travis Miller and today happy to be joined by James Butler. James is the founder of Bridger Automation. James. This story starts in the electrical trades and whines through years of hands on work and automation before launching his own company and doing it all will be coming to new dad. He's grown. Bridger automation from 0 to 7 figures in its first year, handling controls and electrical integration for major warehouse projects nationwide.

00;00;27;21 - 00;00;39;25
Travis Miller
Going to dig deep into his leap from employee to entrepreneur, what's changing and automation hiring and how he's built a company culture rooted in hard work, communication and the great outdoors. James, thanks for being here.

00;00;39;27 - 00;00;42;02
James Butler
Absolutely. I appreciate you having me, Travis.

00;00;42;09 - 00;00;54;28
Travis Miller
Yeah. Absolutely. Indeed. James, my first question is, other than your role as founder and CEO of Bridger Automation, what's been the best job you ever had?

00;00;55;00 - 00;01;15;00
James Butler
The best job I've ever had would probably be the last job that I had prior to starting at, you know, starting Bridger Automation and becoming the president here. And and the reason that is, is, you know, it was a company called pending Automation. And I worked there for almost ten years. And when I started there, I'd say I was a young boy.

00;01;15;02 - 00;01;38;29
James Butler
And when I left there, I felt like I was a man. And and I kind of found what I love to do in life. Right. As you kind of mentioned, I love the outdoors, but as my profession, I love working in the warehouse automation space and I found that when I was at that company and part of my growth, there wasn't just about, you know, going from electrician to a controls engineer.

00;01;38;29 - 00;01;51;20
James Butler
I also learned so much about the business side of things. And, you know, I'll be forever grateful for that opportunity and what I learned there. And that really set me up to have early success at Bridger Automation.

00;01;51;22 - 00;02;06;01
Travis Miller
Take me back to the early days, the early days as an electrician. When did automation really start to click for you? And what was that transition in journey like? Yep. So for me.

00;02;06;03 - 00;02;37;16
James Butler
I, I was just a standard electrician that did commercial projects. Right. And I was working in hotels and I was working in, you know, schools. And I would see at that time the fire alarm programmer come in and, you know, he'd have his nice desk set up for him. He'd come in, he'd set his laptop up, he'd plug in, do his programing, and and that was something that really interested me and, you know, so I started digging around a little bit and trying to figure out, you know, at that point I wanted to be a fire alarm programmer.

00;02;37;19 - 00;03;05;12
James Butler
I didn't really know the different directions that you could go. And so I started reaching out to people and trying to figure out how to become a programmer. Well, then I heard about these things called PLCs, and I started finding companies that, you know, were looking for PLC programmers. But obviously at that point I had no experience. So one of the companies and it was actually the company I had bought that prior to starting Bridger, the founder over there told me, hey, go buy it.

00;03;05;12 - 00;03;25;14
James Butler
Click DLC, which is a brand that automation directories very cost effective and great to learn on. And so I went, bought one, and I started messing around with it in my basement. And you know, over a year period it was something I would do for fun, just, you know, learning how to program, you know, hey, if I hit the start button, the green light comes on and it stays on.

00;03;25;14 - 00;03;45;17
James Butler
And when I hit the red stop button, the green light goes off for throwing in variations into that hey, when you hit the start button, the green light flashes at a one second interval, and then when you hit the red button, it stops completely. So I had a lot of fun doing that. And that's really where my interest started to peak in and where I began this PLC journey.

00;03;45;19 - 00;03;59;15
Travis Miller
Interesting. So so what skills other than that natural curiosity helped you make the leap from tradesman to technologist?

00;03;59;18 - 00;04;21;15
James Butler
I think really the electrical background helped me a lot in those early days, right? Because to be a good PLC guy, you can't just understand how to program a PLC. You have to understand how those sensors and devices are actually wired back to the PLC. And I didn't have that all figured out early on. But you know, once I started learning, it really helped me out.

00;04;21;15 - 00;04;39;13
James Butler
And I think that that even helps me be a good PLC programmer, too today, right? When I'm, you know, as the president of bridge or going to help out or do a job that were, you know, handling for a customer, and we have an issue with a sensor, a being able to work through that instead of being like, hey, I'm a programmer, you're the electrician.

00;04;39;14 - 00;04;44;26
James Butler
Go figure it out. Well, my background allows me to help out with that and, you know, give a lending hand.

00;04;44;28 - 00;04;58;25
Travis Miller
And what was the impetus at such a wild time in your life to go out and push you over the edge to say, I'm ready to hang my own shingle, I want to go do this on my own. Well, it was.

00;04;58;25 - 00;05;23;00
James Butler
Something that I've always wanted to do. You know, my dad kind of always instilled in me that, you know, you should try to work for yourself. And it was just something that was always in the back of my mind. And, you know, at that point it was just, hey, I'm. I'm getting up there in age, right? I'm, I'm 31 now is 30 at the time that I started Bridger and I was like, hey, it's time to make the jump.

00;05;23;02 - 00;05;45;22
James Butler
And now I think you mentioned that I was a I'm a dad now. Well, that happened after I started Bridger. Right? So two weeks after I started Bridger Automation and decided that's what I was doing, you know, and even put in my resignation at my last company, I found out that my wife is pregnant. And so, you know, if everything happens for a reason, it was supposed to happen in that order, right?

00;05;45;22 - 00;05;52;23
James Butler
Because if I would have found out that my wife is pregnant prior to that, you know, who knows what would have happened? I might not have made the joke.

00;05;52;26 - 00;06;00;07
Travis Miller
What's been the biggest shock or surprise for you is, the owner of your own business.

00;06;00;10 - 00;06;36;29
James Butler
So the biggest shock and surprise for me is all of the background stuff related to HR, accounting and banking. Right? So I, I, I and, you know, the, the hiring of people, right to the HR aspect of like, hey, when you do hire somebody, these are all the things that have to happen in the background to, to make it so that you're legally hiring them and doing the right things, you know, with whether it's, you know, withholding taxes and unemployment and things like that, because, you know, before I kind of handled everything from project start to project finish.

00;06;36;29 - 00;07;07;20
James Butler
Right? So I was part of the inception of the whether was quoting or helping design to turn in that the keys over to the end user and saying, see you later. Call us if you have an issue. And I never really did get into the, you know, the process after we decide who we're going to hire, what happens after that in the background, you know, going and getting lines of credit and working with our vendors to establish that so that, hey, when I get an order in, I don't have to send you a check immediately to get my parts, you'll send them to me.

00;07;07;20 - 00;07;17;00
James Butler
And then, you know, I have net 30 terms, right? So dealing with all that has been something that I've definitely had to learn and has been a struggle. But, you know, we're we're figuring it out as we go.

00;07;17;03 - 00;07;27;09
Travis Miller
Who helped you? How do you how do you figure out all of the back office HR legal implications, implications, stuff that nobody ever teaches you?

00;07;27;12 - 00;07;59;25
James Butler
Well, to be honest, I probably have pretty fortunate, but I use ChatGPT for just about everything. Any question that I have, I that's the first place I go to write. And I'll talk with talk with it back and forth honestly, and they'll give me at least a good idea. And then if I still have questions and and typically, even if I don't have questions, you know, if it's about bringing somebody on and all the accounts I have to have set up with the state of Maryland to, you know, for the withholdings, I'll going to talk to my tax lady or if it's, you know, a subcontractor agreement, I'm, you know, going to be signing

00;07;59;25 - 00;08;15;11
James Butler
with one of my customers. I'll actually have ChatGPT review it. Give me some points, but then I'll also have my lawyer look at it. And, you know, that's kind of the learning process. And I've learned a lot doing it that way. And, you know, I haven't learned everything. There's going to be tons of stuff that keeps coming up.

00;08;15;11 - 00;08;19;19
James Butler
But I think it's been helpful and has been a good way to go so far.

00;08;19;25 - 00;08;25;19
Travis Miller
How much hiring were you involved in before you started your own company?

00;08;25;22 - 00;08;45;14
James Butler
I was pretty involved with hiring, right. And I, you know, so I would put out campaigns to help find people that we wanted to hire, whether it was project managers or controls engineers. And, you know, I would go through the candidates have interviews and, and, you know, be a part of the final decision of who we were going to bring on.

00;08;45;17 - 00;08;57;11
Travis Miller
What's been the biggest difference between being part of a team and helping hire for your employer versus hiring, and you're the one right in the checked.

00;08;57;14 - 00;09;18;03
James Butler
I'd say the biggest difference for me is that as an employee, hiring, you don't really. You know, you obviously don't want to hire the wrong person, right? You want because that makes your life easier if you get the right guy. As the manager who that, you know, employee will be working under, they can make your life easier.

00;09;18;05 - 00;09;37;25
James Butler
But now, as the owner of the company, you know, I want to make sure I get the right guy for the fact that if I go spend the next six months training him and he ends up being the wrong guy, well, I just spent six months of wages, you know, on on the wrong guy. And now I have to go spend six months more on hopefully the right guy.

00;09;38;02 - 00;09;59;04
James Butler
And I'm really still trying to figure out the process. Right. And I always think about chick fil A and you've probably, you know, you've probably heard other people say it, but when you go to chick fil A, like they have, the best employees anywhere I go, right? They're always so awesome. They treat you right. And I'm trying to nail down how exactly do they do that?

00;09;59;04 - 00;10;03;19
James Butler
Right. Because there's a there's a types of people that we want to bring on here for automation.

00;10;03;21 - 00;10;13;19
Travis Miller
And I got to ask how much of that is, you know, nature versus nurture. How much is it that they're hiring the right people or training the right people? The right way?

00;10;13;21 - 00;10;32;17
James Butler
Yeah. No, absolutely. I mean, training is definitely, a huge part of what Chick-Fil-A does. And I, I have, you know, my wife's cousin, he actually work there. So I've, you know, he wasn't, like, high up there, but I'm, like, drilling him with questions. How do they make every person say, you know, have, you know, thank you so much or whatever?

00;10;32;20 - 00;10;43;28
James Butler
I forget the term that they use there. But I'm like, how do they get everybody to be so aligned and be so awesome at what they're doing? Right? Because I really want that to be part of the culture here. And what we're doing.

00;10;44;05 - 00;10;46;13
Travis Miller
Did he give you a good answer?

00;10;46;15 - 00;11;05;08
James Butler
Not really. He said. We have a he said we have a lot of training documents and things like that. And, you know, one thing he did say is and this is definitely something that I probably could work on, is he said they're strict, right? So if you come into work and you aren't following the dress code, you get written up.

00;11;05;11 - 00;11;31;20
James Butler
If you, you know, you come in again and you aren't following the dress code, you get written up a second time and then the third time they fire you. Right? And so they are strict. And that's probably, I'd say in my management experience in my past, I'm probably not, the most strict manager and I don't want to be, but I think sometimes you have to draw a line and be able to, you know, hold people to certain expectations.

00;11;31;23 - 00;12;04;09
Travis Miller
Yeah. It's, it's a challenge for small businesses. I think, businesses like ours, because at a large company like chick fil A or Rockwell or Siemens or AB, there's always people applying and there's always people coming and going. There's people, people resigning, there's people retiring. And you are able to, I think, be stricter with policies like it's policy.

00;12;04;09 - 00;12;32;10
Travis Miller
You didn't you didn't follow the dress code three times you're gone. I'm sorry. That's that's the policy. You didn't hit your numbers two quarters in a row. I'm sorry. You're gone. It's policy. I can't do anything about it versus you and I, intimately involved in these people's lives. And you see the things happening behind the scenes that may be causing these challenges.

00;12;32;13 - 00;12;54;00
Travis Miller
You get to know a lot about you. You're about the doctor's appointments and the family challenges and why people are missing significant time or the challenges to make their sales numbers or complete their projects on time. And I struggle with myself. How how do you cope with the.

00;12;54;03 - 00;13;13;04
Travis Miller
Need to combine your empathy and understanding with your need to run a business that's profitable not only for you, but the people who are counting on you to continue to supply employment?

00;13;13;07 - 00;13;30;06
James Butler
Absolutely no, I completely agree. And that's stuff that I had an issue with. You know, myself, right? It's like I be I feel like the people that come on like they're not just an employee to me, like they're my family at that point. Like, you know, we're we're together for it, you know, and we're all fighting for the same goal.

00;13;30;06 - 00;13;50;10
James Butler
So I definitely can be like, oh, man, I know what you're going through at home, you know? And I think really the the thing that can maybe get past that is like being able to show people that, hey, what you're doing is important. The reason that's important is this. And and if we're not doing this well, then our customers aren't going to be happy.

00;13;50;15 - 00;14;10;09
James Butler
And if our customers are happy, then we're not going to be bringing cash in. And and this whole thing falls apart at that point. Right. And if you're able to deliver and you know and still why those small things can be important. Not even just a small ones, the big ones too. And get everybody towards a line towards that goal that that can be helpful.

00;14;10;11 - 00;14;39;15
Travis Miller
How do you tell your story to, new employee? You don't have a significant track record of success. The I'm sure that the vision and future is, despite any efforts, is still a little murky. It's unproven. How do you sell your story, your mission, your vision to somebody enough to get them to say, yeah, James and Bridger automation are the place I'm going to call my my work home.

00;14;39;15 - 00;14;41;20
Travis Miller
I'm I'm I'm making this bet for sure.

00;14;41;27 - 00;15;03;05
James Butler
Yeah, absolutely. You know, I actually I'm having this same or not the same, but, this issue bringing you on somebody that I really want to hire, he's, he's he's the guy. He's got the right attitude. He's he's awesome. He's he bought the quick DLC, right. And he's doing it at his house, but he's scared to come on because of the size of Bridger.

00;15;03;05 - 00;15;26;13
James Butler
And he, he wants like long term comfort. And you know, how do I sell it? I tell him my story and how I got here, and I tell him I didn't get here by not taking a risk. Right. That when I went to the company that I worked at before I had, I worked at a well-established electrical company, and I left there to take a risk at, at a smaller size company.

00;15;26;13 - 00;15;48;00
James Butler
And, and for me, it paid off, you know, not for the fact that, you know, now I am Bridger Automation, but the work that I did at that company, I really loved it. I was a part of a team there. I was a part of the growth there, and I thought that was really fun. So I kind of try to tell everybody about the ride that I have been on, you know, since I was 21 years old to now and, you know, sell them on.

00;15;48;00 - 00;16;07;12
James Butler
Hey, that could be you, right? You're coming into Bridger. At the time that I went into that company, and, you know, who knows what will be in ten years from now. You know, if you come on, I want you to work here forever. Obviously, like you're my family, like I just said. But, you know, you could learn so much, about business.

00;16;07;12 - 00;16;28;01
James Butler
And, you know, in ten years, maybe you start your own company doing something as well. And, you know, I want to I want to you to grow professionally and personally when you work here, I want you to be successful as a, you know, a man, a husband, father, as well as a control engineer. Whatever role you're playing here at Bridger Automation.

00;16;28;03 - 00;16;57;22
Travis Miller
I think there's a there's such a fine line and empathetic understanding in great leaders to want people to work at your company for, for their entire career, but to also acknowledge and be aware that this your company for the rest of time is not the best place for everybody and their career, no matter what I remember, this is ten years ago now.

00;16;57;22 - 00;17;17;08
Travis Miller
I tried to recruit a guy for a job and he said, no, thanks, Trev, I appreciate it, but that's that's the job I was doing 10 or 15 years ago. I'm. I'm the old fart. I'm way or qualified for that. But let me get you the names and numbers of some of the people on my team who I think might be a good fit for this role.

00;17;17;11 - 00;17;33;03
Travis Miller
And I paused them and I said, wait, you mean people who used to be on your team who are stars? I know that everybody that works for me isn't going to work for me forever. You did a good job selling me on the opportunity. Could be a good fit for some of the people here on here on my team.

00;17;33;05 - 00;17;43;08
Travis Miller
And I'll tell you, I was not able to recruit any of those people. With a leader like that that supports them that much. They weren't going anywhere.

00;17;43;10 - 00;18;05;28
James Butler
Absolutely. That that's awesome. And, you know, that's a good perspective to have. Like, of course you want them to work for you forever, right? But you can't control them. And you want what's best for them. So if they see another opportunity that that is better for them and fits what they're looking for in life. And, you know, I want them to do that because I want the best for them.

00;18;06;00 - 00;18;22;25
Travis Miller
It's so healthy. It's it's so healthy. So you've been, you've been running Voyager for a little over a year now in hindsight, any big mistakes that you made or anything you wish you would have done differently as you were starting it?

00;18;22;27 - 00;18;53;10
James Butler
I would say the number one thing that I wish I would have, done differently when I started is probably have a little bit more capital at the beginning. And, you know, I was able to, you know, get some contracts that helped out with that. But, you know, and the reason is, is hiring guys when you don't have capital is like the scariest thing in the world, because if you don't have, you know, money, money in the bank, you know, sitting there ready to pay them or you don't have to work, you know, what are you going to do?

00;18;53;12 - 00;19;16;06
James Butler
You have to make sure those guys are getting paid. So having that would just be a nice safety cushion. And that was, you know, kind of my biggest fear when when I went out on my own and for a while I kind of ran a solo thing. Right. It was just me doing different, you know, projects, whether it was service calls or, you know, I found a company that needs some help on a startup, you know, on one of their conveyor systems.

00;19;16;06 - 00;19;32;02
James Butler
And I did that. But, you know, really, I, I would have liked to say, hey, I have all this money, I'm going to hire this team immediately, and we're going to go out and sell our idea. That would have been probably a little bit better than how it went.

00;19;32;04 - 00;19;39;28
Travis Miller
Well, I would say a few more or a few less sleepless nights. But you got a one year old. There are no such thing as sleepless nights.

00;19;39;29 - 00;19;43;14
James Butler
Yeah, right. That's that's the truth.

00;19;43;16 - 00;19;44;12
Travis Miller
Some nights, some.

00;19;44;12 - 00;19;46;06
James Butler
Nights we get lucky, but, not often.

00;19;46;13 - 00;19;48;23
Travis Miller
Yeah, well, those are the nights you're traveling.

00;19;48;25 - 00;19;53;22
James Butler
Yeah? Yeah. Okay. Don't tell my wife that.

00;19;53;24 - 00;20;03;16
Travis Miller
What's been the biggest, It's the biggest challenge. They're starting a new business. Well, well, also being a first time, brand new dad.

00;20;03;18 - 00;20;25;29
James Butler
So probably the biggest challenge is, is the split time with my wife, right? Because she owns two companies as well. She does, like wedding photography and videography. And then she has a company where she rents, you know, furniture, goblets and backdrops to people for their wedding. So we've really had a fight for time. You know, I go on a week long work shrimp, and then I have something else.

00;20;25;29 - 00;20;43;02
James Butler
And she's like, how it used to go on another trip. I have to do stuff for my company to how am I going to have time to do any of this? So really, we've been, you know, we've been working on it and communication is the number one thing, I think that, you know, gets you through that. I'm not very good at that.

00;20;43;02 - 00;21;09;06
James Butler
I'd say she's much better than I am. So yeah, we're we're working on it though. And then really you in our industry, I've done five projects that are within an hour of my house in the past ten years. It's always traveling to California, traveling to Las Vegas, whatever big city or even small cities across the country. So it is, travel intensive job.

00;21;09;08 - 00;21;25;17
James Butler
And that's kind of what I signed up for, though, you know, I like I don't necessarily like the travel part, but I like the work. So this is this is where it takes me and takes me to other cities across the country. And, you know, I've gotten to do a lot of fun stuff because I travel for work.

00;21;25;17 - 00;21;42;16
James Butler
And, you know, we're going through a tough period now, but in the future will probably be pretty cool because, you know, hey, she's 2 or 3 years old work. I'm doing a job in, you know, Las Vegas. I'll fly the family out for a weekend and we'll go up to, you know, Zion National Park in Utah, things like that.

00;21;42;16 - 00;21;46;23
James Butler
So we're just trying to make it through right now that we've been and we're managing.

00;21;46;25 - 00;22;02;12
Travis Miller
Yeah. Yep. I remember I remember that well that first year, even the first for us, the first two and a half, three years, those are those are tough. But the moment they kind of become a sentient person, it just changes.

00;22;02;19 - 00;22;22;24
James Butler
Yeah. No. Absolutely. And you know, we're we just hit one year, right. She was born on October 29th. And you know so she's a couple of weeks passed. One year we're still going through. And and I think we're going to still be going through it for the foreseeable future. But you just got to keep going and and communicate and work together and know that it's never going to be perfect.

00;22;22;24 - 00;22;25;18
James Butler
We just, you know, keep our heads down and doing what we're doing.

00;22;25;18 - 00;22;59;19
Travis Miller
Yeah. I want to, circle back, to something we were talking about a little bit earlier. And that's the difference between hiring as an employee versus hiring as the employer. But I want to talk about the difference in your strategy. Has it changed at all what you're looking for in individuals, in people, how you how you interview them, how you hire them and what you expected them once they're on board?

00;22;59;21 - 00;22;59;28
Travis Miller
Yeah.

00;22;59;28 - 00;23;25;26
James Butler
So I'd say what I'm looking for it in a person. And what I expect once they come on board has not changed too much. You know, in the current state of the company, I'm not looking to hire any guys who have been doing this for 30 years and, you know, have a well-established resume. I'm looking to really bring in some younger guys who really want to hit the ground running.

00;23;25;26 - 00;23;50;03
James Butler
They have that curiosity, and the goal is they come in and they're not super experienced. Maybe they have a little bit of experience and I'm able to train them into what we need them to be. And then, you know, at some point they're able to start going out on jobs on their own and completing those jobs. And I'm able to sit back a little bit more and, you know, reach out and help them as needed.

00;23;50;05 - 00;24;12;22
James Butler
The expectations will still be the same, right? It's it's ultimately about communicating with the customer. And being a good person really is are the two number one. And two things that I look for in a person is good communication. And being a good person. And I think, you know, there's always going to be hiccups in projects. Nothing's ever going to give perfect, you know, in the first run.

00;24;12;22 - 00;24;28;03
James Butler
But it's how do you overcome that. Right. Hey man, we saw this issue. It occurred at this 2 to 1 merge over here. You know we're working on that now. We're just working through some of the issues we saw versus, you know, so some other guy might just, you know, hey, I don't even care. I'm not too worried about that.

00;24;28;03 - 00;24;45;28
James Butler
Right. It's just it's all about how you communicate with the customer and showing that you care. Right. And kind of one thing that you hinted at and this isn't a huge thing, but somebody who cares about the outdoors, right. Because that's that's somebody that I'm looking for now. They don't have to be super into it like I am.

00;24;45;28 - 00;25;07;16
James Butler
But one of the initiatives of our company is giving back to the outdoors, whether it's donating to the Theodore Roosevelt Conservation Partnership or, you know, donating to some local wildlife agency or, you know, even spending time, you know, going out and helping Rocky Mountain Elks Foundation do some fence work out in Colorado. And that's kind of part of the brand I'm trying to build.

00;25;07;16 - 00;25;15;16
James Butler
So I want people to kind of care about that, you know, hey, our goal isn't just to do a ton of conveyor projects. It's it's to help wildlife along the way.

00;25;15;18 - 00;25;25;11
Travis Miller
I've seen you referenced Teddy Roosevelt, a number of times in some of your social media posts. How did he become kind of a go to figure for you? So.

00;25;25;13 - 00;25;45;02
James Butler
You know, he kind of was the founder of National Parks, right? And in today's world, we have kind of a battle over public lands and things like that. And I'm a big believer in public lands. You know, I don't own Thousand Acre ranches or thousand acre farms here in Maryland. So I, I spent a lot of time in the outdoors.

00;25;45;02 - 00;26;03;08
James Butler
You know, I'll go on trips to Montana and Colorado and you know, go on public lands, you know, on hunting trips. And so him being kind of the founder of the public land mindset, he's somebody that, you know, what he's done is something that I want to protect and be a part of.

00;26;03;11 - 00;26;32;25
Travis Miller
So you said the ability to communicate with customers, being a good person and curiosity are some of the most important things that you look for. I'm pretty skilled at interviewing for good communication. You know, somebody can talk to you. They most likely have that skill, but the other two are tougher. How do you interview for curiosity, and how on earth do you interview to try and uncover in just a couple hours, a couple conversations?

00;26;32;25 - 00;26;34;28
Travis Miller
If someone's a good person?

00;26;35;01 - 00;26;54;09
James Butler
Yeah, 100%. And I think the good person can just be kind of like a back and forth when you're talking to them and really like the vibe you get off them. Right? Like, I feel like every person has energy and you're able to kind of feel it when you're with them that you're not always going to hit 100% when you're you're going off a vibe or a feeling.

00;26;54;12 - 00;27;13;27
James Butler
But I don't know that you can ever, you know, mining, data mining, get that information on if they're a good person, you kind of just are throwing a dart and hoping your your gut was right. Now, the curiosity, that one that I have always kind of ask people is like, what do you do for fun? Or like, what's your best if you could do anything on a Sunday, what?

00;27;13;29 - 00;27;34;21
James Butler
What is your Sunday look like? And if they're like, oh my best Sunday, I'm going to I'm going to wake up at 11 a.m. and I'm going to sit on my couch and scroll through Facebook or, you know, something like that. You know, it doesn't. It's obviously they probably aren't going to say that in an interview, but like doing absolutely nothing on a Sunday, that's what I'm going to do.

00;27;34;21 - 00;27;52;00
James Butler
And that's my best Sunday. That kind of like makes me think, well, you know, what do you do for fun? And if you're like, oh, for fun, man, I'm in, I'm into drones. I like flying them around. I'll take them up to the state park and I'll go take pictures of wildlife or, you know, get pictures of people there and get their information and send it out.

00;27;52;00 - 00;28;01;15
James Butler
Like, I feel like that question can inform me on, you know, what's your curiosity? Not just about what we do, but just about things in general.

00;28;01;17 - 00;28;06;00
Travis Miller
Well, now I gotta know what's your best Sunday? My best Sunday. Yeah.

00;28;06;03 - 00;28;24;12
James Butler
My best Sunday would be waking up at 5 a.m., going out, and it'd be November, the first week of November. It's the whitetail deer. You go out there, you shoot a nice big buck. You had a great experience out there. The sun came up, you're in the woods, woke up, and you got a real nice one. And then you come home.

00;28;24;16 - 00;28;41;14
James Butler
You got your wife and kids there. You have a good breakfast with them, and and you spend the rest of the day, you know, going outside, hanging out, and maybe shoot some booze with the family, but spending it outside with family and getting a little bit of hunting. I could take fishing too. I'd be okay with that as well.

00;28;41;17 - 00;28;44;00
Travis Miller
I hope you don't have a bow for your one year old yet.

00;28;44;03 - 00;28;50;09
James Butler
Yeah, I don't know. I've been talking about it, but the wife isn't thrilled.

00;28;50;12 - 00;29;09;00
Travis Miller
So as as we, As we're finishing up here, James, and my last and last big question for you is, you know, as you look into your your crystal ball, what do you see as the, landscape for hiring and for our industry over the next couple of years?

00;29;09;02 - 00;29;35;10
James Butler
So one thing that I think in our industry is that specifically controls engineers, and this is my crystal ball, this is what I think could happen, I think controls engineers are underpaid. You go look at software guys and software guys. They're making, you know, 200, $300,000 like insane dollar amounts at some of these companies that they're working at.

00;29;35;10 - 00;30;08;06
James Butler
Now, granted, they're doing a lot of crazy stuff, but if you told me, hey, I want you to go find a software developer that I can deploy into my company that can do software for warehouse automation, and you have one week to do it. And I also need you to find a controls engineer that can come in, and he can, you know, he can come in and he can program an entire conveyor system, shoes, orders, high speed merging, scanning, printing, apply and do all the communications back to the WGS.

00;30;08;09 - 00;30;28;00
James Butler
I could go find you a couple hundred software developers that I could deploy into helping you out. I would be hard pressed in that week to find one controls engineer that I could say, hey, he can go in there and do that job. And that's just kind of what I've seen happening over the years. You know, I've, I've worked with software guys.

00;30;28;00 - 00;30;50;00
James Butler
I've worked with a lot of controls guys. And I think the controls guys are hard to find. And I think there's a lot of a lot of pressure on finding good ones. And I think with all this, I you might see some software guys coming over. I don't know. But I think that the controls guys might be getting a pay boost, but that would be my crystal ball and I might have a soft spot for controls guys as well.

00;30;50;02 - 00;30;50;12
Travis Miller
In the.

00;30;50;12 - 00;31;17;03
James Butler
Industry itself, for where we might be headed in the in the next, you know, 5 to 10 years. I think we're going to see a lot less of these, like massive $50 million conveyor systems. And there's going to be more of the smaller, I would call them handy conveyor systems, where, hey, you can get, you know, maybe a companies getting their first conveyor and, you know, they're looking to spend, you know, below 100,000.

00;31;17;03 - 00;31;35;10
James Butler
And we're putting in a small sorter where they can roll it around on wheels and, and they can sort boxes to one of three lanes and it has a UPS, Fedex and, you know, USPS. And I think that is where the industry will be in ten years. Is is I mean my buddy we call it micro fulfillment. I think that's going to be a really big thing.

00;31;35;16 - 00;31;39;12
Travis Miller
More automation at companies that aren't currently utilizing it.

00;31;39;15 - 00;31;59;03
James Butler
Correct? Yep. Yeah. Like I think how big can you know? I say how big can Amazon get? I buy Amazon stuff every day just because of the convenience of it. But I think there's going to be, a window for some of these smaller companies to get in, get their first conveyor system. And, and obviously they're not going to be spending 50 million, $10 million.

00;31;59;03 - 00;32;02;19
James Butler
They're going to be looking for a cost effective solution that gets them going.

00;32;02;22 - 00;32;28;27
Travis Miller
Yeah. And oh, last question. Back to the controls. Engineers are what can what can the industry do as a whole to support the next generation in the generation after that of controls engineers? Because there's not as many controls engineers as there are software engineers coming out of school. And we know we've got a big demand for it. How do we help make more of them?

00;32;28;29 - 00;32;49;15
James Butler
I mean, I think this one would be beyond anything I could do. This would be a, nation wide effort. But like, nobody goes to school and they can't, and they come out and they're like, hey, I have a controls engineering degree, right? A lot of people do computer science, software engineering, right? Controls engineering. A lot of people don't even know what it is when they're in school.

00;32;49;22 - 00;33;09;24
James Butler
And so I think, you know, maybe opening up and creating some type of degree that specialized on, you know, PLC programing and robotics programing, motion controls and things like that would be definitely beneficial. And I think that that would be probably the number one thing, but that's a nationwide effort. Like how do you make something like that happen?

00;33;10;01 - 00;33;12;24
James Butler
I don't know that I could be the one to do it, that's for sure.

00;33;12;27 - 00;33;29;16
Travis Miller
Yeah. Well, we'll have to go talk to Jeff Bernstein at E3 and see what he's got to say. Yeah, right. James, it's been great. Really appreciate it. Who are the, people that should be reaching out to you? And what's the best way for them to find you?

00;33;29;18 - 00;33;52;06
James Butler
Yeah. So, I mean, people that should be reaching out to me would be really anybody that's a controls engineer working in warehouse automation doesn't have to be. Maybe you want to make the jump to warehouse automation project managers that you know have experience working in the warehouse automation space. Electricians, and those are going to be people that would come on to the team at Bridge or Automation.

00;33;52;06 - 00;34;13;00
James Butler
But then, you know, integrators who are, you know, selling conveyor projects and are looking for, controls House that can be there for them every step of the way and, and deliver a good product for their end user. It's you should be reaching out to us and anybody can find me on LinkedIn, James Butler, you'll see me and com commands cross the same hat on.

00;34;13;00 - 00;34;23;23
James Butler
And you know, you can also reach out to me at the letter J. Butler Butler at bridge or automation.com or even give me a call at (443) 903-6101.

00;34;23;25 - 00;34;26;24
Travis Miller
All right. As the owner, did you design the logo yourself?

00;34;26;26 - 00;34;27;27
James Butler
I did, yes, sir.

00;34;27;29 - 00;34;36;29
Travis Miller
All right of it, James. It's been a pleasure. Big thank you. To know Acuff, our producer, as always, has been hired. The podcast. Talk to you all soon.

00;34;37;04 - 00;34;38;29
James Butler
I appreciate it. Have a good one, fellas.