How A Hospitality Manager Became A Manufacturing Leader with Megan Weber

You don’t need a perfectly planned career to become a manufacturing leader. Megan, Director of Manufacturing at Sentry Equipment, started in hospitality and landed in manufacturing because she wanted a more predictable schedule for family life. What happened next is the part most people miss: she fell in love with the shop floor, learned continuous improvement tools like QRM, Lean, and Six Sigma, and kept choosing roles that expanded her skills until she was leading manufacturing operations.

We also get specific about what strong manufacturers do differently when hiring and developing people. Sentry runs a culture interview before a skills interview, betting on coachability, attitude, and learning speed. We talk about recruiting challenges, why marketing matters for hiring, and what companies can change right now to attract more women in manufacturing and a more diverse workforce without treating it like a checkbox.

Then we go deeper into the hard parts of scaling a shop: building teams with complementary strengths, using personality assessments to improve training, and capturing tribal knowledge before it walks out the door. Megan shares how they’re moving toward clearer work instructions and easier access to process knowledge, plus where AI can save time in everyday work when used responsibly.

If you want real-world manufacturing leadership insights and a clearer picture of how modern industrial companies grow talent, you’ll get a lot from this conversation. Subscribe to Automation Ladies, share the episode with a friend in manufacturing, and leave a review so more people can find the show.

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:00

Welcome to Automation Ladies, the only podcast we know of where girls talk about industrial automation. Good morning, Megan. And welcome to Automation Ladies. How are you? I'm good. How are you? Very good. Thank you. This has been a conversation that I've been trying to schedule for some time. So thank you for your patience.

SPEAKER_00 0:19

Absolutely.

Meet Megan And Why She’s Here

SPEAKER_01 0:21

I wanted to give a little, I try to sometimes give a little background to our listeners as to why a particular guest is on the show. And I will say, in this case, Megan came to me as a recommendation after I reached out, after I found her company, Sentry Equipment, on the Industrial Talk podcast with our friend Scott McKenzie. So I was recently on that podcast. I think the episode hasn't been released yet. But Scott and I just, he's he's a really great guy, great host, fun guy to talk to. And when I first got introduced to him, the latest episode that he had just recorded had been with the CEO of Sentry Equipment. And I thought it was a great episode. And I found also that, so I uh in my day job, I work for WinTech and HMI manufacturer. And it just so happened that I was able to find your account in our Hubspot. So I just thought, hey, what that I need to learn more about them. Um and then I came across, you know, that there are some great folks over there, including a director of manufacturing that is a woman, which is not that common in this industry. And I bet, you know, as you can imagine, I got pretty excited that if I was gonna get the opportunity to talk to Megan. And so having talked to a few more people at Sentry, they suggested that Megan might be a good guest for the Automation Ladies podcast. And I absolutely couldn't agree more because I got really excited to talk to her. So Megan and I have never met before. Um, and some people I talk to on the show after I've known them for years, and then other people, this is our first chance to get to know each other. So thank you so much for coming on our show, Megan. We really appreciate it.

SPEAKER_00 1:55

Yeah, thanks for having me.

SPEAKER_01 1:56

All right. So let's just start with our format is is pretty um free-flowing conversation. We'll find out in a few minutes whether we actually enjoy talking to each other or if this is gonna be a short 20 to 30 minute. Let's get her down the community. Uh but our first question is typically for those that don't know you, um, which is probably the majority of our audience, tell us your background. Tell us how you got to be in the position that you are. And the reason we ask this is because part of the the reason we do the show is to learn more about people in the industry and different types of jobs and how they got here. Because we find that most people didn't grow up wanting to be what you're doing. Um, because most people don't even know about our industry or that these jobs even exist. So we like to find out kind of what path got you here, uh, and then we can take it from there.

SPEAKER_00 2:44

Yeah, it's uh it was a windy path, to be honest with you. So I um I went to college for hotel, restaurant, and tourism management.

SPEAKER_01 2:54

Oh, cool. Yes, hotel at some point in time in the past as well.

A Windy Path Into Manufacturing

SPEAKER_00 2:58

So love it. Okay. Um yeah, so I wanted to, you know, prior to going to college, I had wanted to, you know, either own my own restaurant or do something along those lines, um, possibly be a chef because I love to cook and then um stumbled upon hotel restaurant tourism management. And so went to UW Stout for that. And um I started out, you know, in a resort uh here in Wisconsin and I loved it. I, you know, ended up at the front desk being a manager and lots of fun, right? You know, every day is different dealing with guests and employees and all that. Um, and so yeah, I was in the hospitality industry for about five years, went to a few different um different hotels. I got to uh start a hotel up. That was a really cool experience. Yeah, yeah, that was really fun. Um highly recommend to anybody if you get a chance to start something up, right? That's cool. So yeah, I did that. And then um my uh husband at the time and I um got pregnant with our daughter, and we decided that I needed a job that was more, you know, eight to five. So um, you know, the hospitality industry is not, and it's not Monday through Friday, right? It's weekends and holidays and and all that, especially weekends and holidays, right? Like yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 4:21

I worked Christmas a lot, so yeah, super family friendly, that's for sure.

SPEAKER_00 4:28

Yeah, so uh yeah, so I um honestly I fell into manufacturing. So I had I was pregnant when I was interviewing for jobs. Um so that's always interesting. And I was I was very pregnant when I was interviewing. Um, but there was a company that um I interviewed with a manufacturing company, and they took a chance on me when I was eight months pregnant.

SPEAKER_01 4:53

Yeah, I was about to say, I would love to, I'll ask you a follow-up question about that once we're done with the introduction. Uh, because I I would venture to guess maybe not all of them saw that as a positive point.

SPEAKER_00 5:04

You know, I I was very fortunate that everyone who had interviewed me and um on the leadership team there was okay with it. You know, they they kind of had the I talked to them afterwards, you know, and just like wow, you took a chance on me, right? Like and they just they were like, we just want to know you're gonna come back after maternity leave. And I was like, Yeah, I need a job. And so, you know, they they said, you know, life is about having a family um and doing a little bit of work. And so, you know, just a great company to to hire me at that point. So yeah. So honestly, started there in customer service, worked my way up, and I I just fell in love with manufacturing. Honestly, you know, I loved, you know, taking something that was, you know, just a piece of metal and you know, turning it into something else, and just watching um, you know, the shop floor hustle and bustle and just try to make the magic happen all the time. And it was just it was fun, right? Like to me, manufacturing is fun. Um, and I don't like the same thing every day. So, so yeah. So I think that's part of the reason I I like manufacturing as well. Every day is different. So, yeah, so um from there, you know, I I knew when I started there, I want to run the shop floor someday. That was my goal. Um, so when I was there, I tried to learn as much as possible and I had some awesome mentors. It was a it was a machine shop. So I learned, yeah, got to learn a ton there um in regards to machining and just you know leadership and manufacturing, which was awesome. Um, and then I left there and um took a little bit of a windy path because I did continuous improvement. So my next place, um, which was wonderful, like I they hired me and um I was like, you know, I've never done this before. And um they're like, yeah, we know, we'll train you, right? So again, another awesome company, like taking a chance on somebody who's never done this before. Um, I had a background in QRM um that I had learned at my first manufacturing job, which is called quick response manufacturing. Sorry.

SPEAKER_01 7:16

Okay, I was about to ask what that what that stands for. Yeah, so I didn't find acronyms around here because I think we, yeah, it's too easy to forget that other people don't know.

SPEAKER_00 7:24

Yes, too many acronyms. Um so yeah, quick response manufacturing, which you know is a continuous improvement tool. So that's how I fell into this other company and um you know learned about all the other continuous improvement and lean tools and Six Sigma, and it was it was awesome getting to learn that. Um, because you know, if you want to run a shop floor someday, right, you can be in manufacturing, like those are some really good skills to to know and to have. So um looking back now, I I appreciate the fact that I learned all that for where I am today. So, yeah, so then after that, uh came to Century Equipment. And um, to be honest with you, when I was working at my first manufacturing company, Century Equipment was a customer of ours. And you know, when working there, it was like, oh, Century, that would be an awesome place to work. Like, you know, didn't know a ton about it, but you just you knew that it was a really good place. So when I um got my foot in the door here, it was just it was everything that people had said and more, right? So um, so yeah, I've been here for seven and a half years and I started I started in production control, um, scheduling, and then doing um lots of projects with my continuous improvement background, which has been awesome. Uh, did master scheduler and then moved up to production manager and then um now director of manufacturing. So yeah.

SPEAKER_01 8:52

So cool. But now that you're reached your dream or your your goal, right? Because that's been your goal now for a while, since you basically got into manufacturing, that this is the type where where you thought you wanted to end up. Um do you feel like now you've made it and like you're good, or or do you now have another like stretch goal for I don't know, five years from now?

SPEAKER_00 9:14

Or yeah, definitely. Um I would like to move up to a VP position, you know, add add more, right? Challenge myself to learn more, understand more, um, and become more. Yeah, absolutely.

SPEAKER_01 9:26

Definitely sounds like you're the type of continuous learner, you know, just the personality that like wouldn't sit still in the same thing. Um, I always find it fascinating too. I the way I think of jobs is not just what am I getting paid, but what am I learning? And how does that get me to potentially the next place that I want to go? Um, because I don't know about you. I mean, most people that I surround myself with, they always have some place they're striving to. Like you're not just like, oh, okay, I'm done now. Yeah. And and then you over time start to realize, like, yeah, you look at jobs in a totally different way when it's not just okay, how much am I getting paid for my hour? But instead, like, what else am I getting out of it? Um and there's lots of things to think about there. And I think they vary also based on where we are in our life and our career. So when your babies are small, you have certain things that you care about, and then when they're older, there's other things that you care about, you know, it kind of shifts, right? Like what really is important to you in addition to doing work that's interesting or that feels valuable, um, and all the other things that kind of come with employment. But wow, what I mean, how I don't like to attribute too much of people's success to luck. Um because I think also you need to usually be the type of person that's ready for luck, or like you allow it to happen if you're prepared and ready. Um, but a lot of it is also luck. Like, let's face it, it's both things. Like you can do everything right and still end up in like just not being in the right time or the right place. Yeah. But how lucky to with your first job in manufacturing is to work for someone that gets it that says, hey, you're here to have a family and to have a life, and you work to support that, not the other way around.

unknown 11:06

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 11:06

So I feel like there's a lot of companies out there that don't quite get that right in terms of how much people, right?

SPEAKER_00 11:13

100%. Yep.

SPEAKER_01 11:14

Yeah. And and so, yeah, I I know plenty of people that worked for manufacturing companies that they got, I mean, they were scared out of the entire industry because they were they were such bad companies. And I try to tell people, like, don't leave the industry because you had a bad experience, find a better employer. Because there are good and bad companies, I think, in any industry. Just like there are good and bad employees in every, you know, it's just like there's good and bad of everything, right? And especially in like the automation space and you know, kind of where I come from, there are, yeah, there's a lot of, you know, it's it's a whole spectrum of companies that get it right and get it wrong. And if you're at one of those that gets it wrong, there's plenty of other options out there for you. Um one of the other things that they really stuck out to me is like, yeah, you didn't have the exact experience for some of these jobs. It's not like, oh, I have this XYZ on my resume and I'm gonna come do XYZ for you. And again, I think those are people that are hiring for the right type of thing. They realize they want a learner, a person that keeps adding to their skills, and they're gonna get more from a person that they can teach the specific skills to, but have all this other stuff that they're looking for in a in a team member, right? Yep. Um and I wish that that was more common. I know it's hard now, you know, it's just like the volume of applications, and it's probably easier to match skills with people versus their potential. Yeah, do you do hiring now and stuff like that? So do you sit in that seat? Yep. What would you say about those challenges between like being efficient but also trying to actually look for that little like I don't know, the right people for your company? How do you guys approach that?

Culture Interviews Before Skills

SPEAKER_00 12:54

So one of the really cool things about Sentry is that you know, we are culture first here. Okay, 100%. So we actually do a culture interview prior to a skills interview. Nice. So it's really saying, you know, will you thrive at Sentry in the culture here? Like, are you a fit for us? As well as for that person, like, okay, we're showing you our culture, you know, do you feel this is a fit for you? But that really, you know, it sets the tone, right? That that that culture is more important to us than your skills. Because, like we just talked about, skills can be trained if the person is the right fit for the company. Like, are they a self-starter? Are they a learner? Do they, you know, do they have a good attitude? Can they take feedback, right? All those things. So having that culture interview is amazing, right? Um, so we start with that, and then you know, we go on to a skills interview. And uh definitely helps to have that culture piece taken care of on the front end. Um, but yeah, the it is harder to find, you know, applicants these days. We've we've definitely struggled with that. Um recently, though, the floodgates have opened here and we have hired a ton of awesome people over the last few months. Um, you know, we're growing as a company, and so we've hired a lot of awesome people, um, a lot of women on our shop floor too recently. That's great. I know, which is awesome. A lot of women and a woman welder as well. So very exciting. Um, but we were definitely struggling for a while to get, you know, people in, you know, just to just to apply, right? Sometimes it's just having people know about you and and apply for the positions. But yeah.

SPEAKER_01 14:36

Do you think it's have you guys done work to get your name out there and to get people to understand more about what you do? Or is it more just economics, like maybe a bunch of companies around your area had layoffs, or do you have any ideas what you think has caused that?

SPEAKER_00 14:51

So um, I definitely think that the company has done a really good job of trying to get our name out there more. You know, definitely the our marketing team um and our HR team has, you know, as well as our management team, has really made that effort to get us out there, right? So people understand and know more who who is sentry, right? And why would you want to work for them? So so yeah, I think it's been an effort on our part in order to get the applicants in.

SPEAKER_01 15:18

I'm really glad to hear that because I think a lot of companies in our space don't really understand the role that marketing plays, not just in marketing towards new customers, but also marketing to every other stakeholder that you may need to be a successful business. And that includes your employees. Because if you don't get A, anybody applying for your jobs, but B, if you only get the people that are surfing all the job boards and applying indiscriminately to every job just based on, hey, it lists these qualifications or not, you know, then they probably less likely to be that culture fit. They're less likely to be a valuable long-term employee for you because they're just kind of going around spraying and praying their resume to anybody. Whereas people that actually look at your company and go, hey, I see something that I want to be a part of, just like you did, right? You knew more, you knew something about the company before you applied. You had seen something you liked, and that probably gave you you put in more effort to want to work for this company, right? Yep. And so you're gonna get a whole different applicant pool in addition to more applicants, if you actually put yourself out there and the things that like accurately representing yourself. So people that care about culture fit, they'll come apply at Sentry now because they've seen something, know something about the fact that A, you care about that, and B, they know a little bit about the culture, hopefully, from all the stuff that you guys have been putting out there, interviews with people. And I think that's what is so cool about stuff like this, too. It's like, yeah, you can, you know, getting your name out there and then just talking about what you do, how you do it. Um it can be so beneficial to so many different people that may want to know about your business. Um and then I have also gotten a lot of this question like over the years, how do we get more women applicants, right? Because we do want to hire, we want to have a more diverse workforce, but these people are just not applying. So what are we gonna do? It's not our fault that these people are not applying, right? Yeah. And the few things that I've always been able to say to people is just, well, you know, you want to go check your page, like your job page on your website. Does it have any pictures of what the environment is or who works there? And if so, are they diverse at all? Like, are you just think about the image that you're putting out there? And it can either be exactly what you have, or it could be aspirational. Like if you are a shop that has one woman and you want to have more, then show more of that one woman on your hiring page so that other women will be encouraged or think, hey, yeah, if I apply, look at that. There's a chance I'm gonna actually get this job because clearly they hire women, right? And sad to say, but in this day and age, it's still a lot of places, you know, in this type of job in the manufacturing space, there are still management teams that A, think that this isn't a job for women, or B, they they're completely blind to the fact that they're not really presenting anything attractive to women applicants or other diverse people, right? Yeah. So is that something that Century's always done right? Or uh have you guys kind of like looked at and evolved at as well to see who you're attracting with your job descriptions, the way that you present the company and so on?

SPEAKER_00 18:18

Yeah, I think um, especially over the past few years, done a really good job of representing the company and taking a new look at like, okay, let's look at our job descriptions. You know, are they truly understanding, not just like, okay, these are the skills um that are, you know, we're looking for or that you know are needed for this job, but you know, do they understand, like, you know, it's sunny and 70 here every day in our shop, right? Because it's temperature controlled. So that's important to some people. It is, yeah. Right? Like, so it's a really good environment. You know, we have a lot of flexibility on the shop floor. We started flexible scheduling, so let's put that out there, you know. Um, you know, all the different things that we have as a company, you know, our 401k match as long, as well as we're an employee-owned company. Okay, so let's let's you know, let's get that out there more. And do people understand what employee-owned is, right? So it's really trying to put out more of those benefits of working at Century and on the shop floor as well, to let people know, like, okay, this is a really cool place to work. Look at all these things that they have, right? It's not just another manufacturing shop, like a lot of a lot of really cool things that we do here. And we continue to invest back in our company, you know, get those things out there. So, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 19:38

Right. Well, speaking of, can you tell us uh what does Sentry equipment do? What do you guys manufacture?

What Sentry Equipment Manufactures

SPEAKER_00 19:44

Okay, good. Um, we make sampling equipment. So anything that needs inline sampling in order to make sure the product is, you know, safe, correct, you know, think about peanut butter. Okay. They need to make sure that it is what they say it is. So we make the equipment that they don't have to shut down their line in order to pull a sample out. Um, it safely extracts it without anybody having to do that. And then, you know, comes out, they can sample it, make sure it is what it is. Um, and we're in a ton of different industries, you know, obviously not just food and beverage, um, but we're in oil and gas, pharmaceuticals, um, as well as steam and water analysis. That's a really big one for us in power plants. We like to say we keep your lights on.

SPEAKER_01 20:26

So yeah, I feel like that's when I did, you know, my initial research on who the company was. That's kind of the image that I saw was kind of the steam and the water, and probably because it's one of your bigger, bigger industries that you guys are in, right?

SPEAKER_00 20:39

Correct, yes. And then we've really been trying to diversify over the last few years. And so we acquired um a company called Smart Skim, which is coolant recycling. So machine shops, you know, one of the larger expenses is their coolant. So instead of having to throw it out and put new coolant in, you know, we have the machines that that recycle it and they're able to take it out, you know, make it peer back and put it into the machine so that they're not always having to, machine shops are not always having to, you know, buy new coolant.

unknown 21:07

Wow.

SPEAKER_00 21:07

As well, uh yeah, which is awesome, right? Um, so we have you know CNC machines here too. So we have one up and running in our machine shop, which is awesome to show off when people come in. Um, and then we also acquired another company um in Salt Lake City, Utah, or West Jordan, Utah, um, called Rebuild It Services Group. And they make clarifier drives uh new and then rebuild old ones. So acquired them, both those companies about three and a half years ago now. So definitely diverse, diversify from what we've done.

SPEAKER_01 21:38

What do clarifier drives do? What are what's what is that?

SPEAKER_00 21:41

So um, like in a water treatment plant, uh the you know, you see the the big arm that goes around in the big circle. Wait, so we build the drive that goes in the middle that makes that arm around. Yeah. Okay, cool.

SPEAKER_01 21:55

Yeah, this is like I learned something so cool from everybody that I talked to. And this is how I got I got really lucky, and I'll say lucky because I didn't know what I was lucking into with my first job when I was a machine vision sales engineer. Um, and I had a territory in Northern California, and I got to go into manufacturing facilities of almost every kind from RD of solar cells in the Silicon Valley and semiconductor manufacturing, which is like the super high-tech of the high-tech, and then also blow-molding plastic bottles and chicken manufacturing out in the Central Valley. Like you name it, I I got to see most of it. If they were trying, if they had any kind of inline quality inspection or inline vision guidance, right? So vision systems have pretty you know diverse amount of applications now, especially nowadays, they've gotten so much better, they can do so many more things. Um, but just kind of like the inline sampling equipment, it's like it's not confined to a certain industry, it's whoever has a process that requires this step. And in sampling being one thing, visual inspection being another, it's doesn't really matter what you're making. Uh, and so I just the reason I say also lucky is because I worked for a company that was willing to train me. They said, we don't care what kind of degree you have, as long as you are a learner, you know, you take our engineering aptitude tests and you do demos, and we can see are you the type of person that can learn this kind of thing? And then I get to learn the technology, but then I got to learn from every single one of my customers a brand new like how this is made. Yeah, that's awesome. And I had no idea what I was signing up for. In that sense, I didn't, I was like, this was the very beginning of my career, and I didn't know what I wanted to do. At some point, at one point, I wanted to be in hospitality, but instead I went to business school, and then I realized that I like solving problems and kind of, you know, engineering things in a way without being an actual engineer. I was like, that's gonna be boring. I'm gonna have to sit behind a desk and never talk to anyone ever. But then I learned that there's this sweet spot in the middle, which is like sales engineering or applications engineering or pre-sale, like you get to do a little bit of both. You get to talk to people, you get a problem solve, you got to put together things to help people. Um, so the other thing that baffles me is really like, are we really expected to figure out when we're kids what we want to do and then learn that and then stick with that? It I mean, for some people, again, I think they probably luck out and they really do enjoy that one thing that they thought they were gonna do. Um, but then the practical realities of careers, I mean, they just life is complex and you end up having all kinds of family considerations and work-life balance questions, and sometimes you end up doing something totally different than you thought. Um but honestly, like every I don't see why every skill can't be considered as transferable. Because everything anything that you learn, aside from like maybe something, I don't know, operating one machine. And if you go into an industry where like nothing is ever gonna be like that again. But I think still, you learn how to like follow the instructions and get proficient with something, you can do that again with something else. I don't know. Do you think you'll stick around in manufacturing forever?

SPEAKER_00 25:08

You know, I'd like to say yes. But yeah, I would like to say yes because I just I love it, right? But um, I'm also of the mindset too, you never know where life's gonna take you, right? You know, we have a lot of young kids here um learning in manufacturing in high school, which I love, you know, being able to mentor them. Um, and I tell them, like, you don't have to have it all figured out right now because you know, sometimes graduation is approaching, and you know, oh, what am I gonna do? I don't know, you can start out doing one thing and then years later you're gonna do something totally different, and that's okay, right? Like that is okay. You just gotta be open to where life takes you, right? Work hard at what you're doing right now and be open to the possibilities of what can happen, right? Absolutely.

SPEAKER_01 25:56

And then I think if you're the type of person that embraces that and just is learning and becoming better at whatever you're doing at the time, right? Then the right types of people take notice of that. They see your your attitude, your aptitude, right? And then hopefully you find those right types of employers that will teach you those skills along the way, even if you decide to make a pivot or do something different, right? They kind of see the building blocks that you've got and are willing to give you a chance. I had the same thing. When I went from um doing automation sales to I I went and worked for a software company because a recruiter didn't know the difference between what I did and what this company did, and it was totally different. Electromechanical and electromagnetic is not the same word and it doesn't mean the same thing. But I said I was like, hey, this looks fascinating though, and I would be happy, like you're welcome to present me to these people as a candidate if you're up front and say, I want to say I don't, I know nothing about this, but I'm very interested to learn, right? And I think the other thing is like the more the more quickly you be can become self-assured of you just being you. Um I think that also speaks goes a long way. I try to encourage people to do interviews when they're not looking for jobs because it's so empowering to not need the job.

SPEAKER_02 27:14

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 27:15

Think of the interview as a learning experience.

SPEAKER_02 27:17

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 27:18

Um and uh, you know, not to just like waste people's times and and apply for jobs that are just you know, whatever. But at the same time, it's like we all need to keep our skills, and especially early on in people's careers, the interviews I think can seem so daunting and so scary, and like you gotta prove yourself on the spot, and somebody, you know, if you lose it, it's a big deal. So interviewing is a skill, just like anything else. And the more often you do it, the better you'll get at it. Um, but I think also you lose some of that like jitteriness and nervousness once you've been through it a few times, and especially if you realize the stakes aren't if I get the job, I win, if I don't get the job, I lose. And it's a you know zero-sum game, you either win or lose. Yeah. Whereas if you go in an interview and you know you don't need the job, you may be pleasantly surprised and you got it, and then maybe you would want it if it's a good fit. And if you didn't, you know, you learn something about yourself, you learn something about how other people interact. So I absolutely love that advice of like, you don't have to figure it out now. Just take a step, just keep moving forward, keep adding value to yourself, keep learning, and I'd say learn skills and learn about yourself as a person. The more you can be like self-actualized or understand how you learn and who you are, the more you can accurately represent yourself to employers and understand for yourself if something is a culture fit or not.

SPEAKER_00 28:38

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 28:39

I think early on in my career, anyway, I was just like, well, of course it's a fit. I'm gonna make it work. Of course I'm detail oriented because that's uh and you're like, yeah, I'm gonna be all the things that I need to be. And then later on, once you get a little bit more mature and you realize what where you really bring value and when you don't, you I can stop saying I'm detail oriented. My asterisk is if I really care, I'm detail oriented. If I don't, it's not my then somebody else's job, right?

SPEAKER_00 29:08

I'm the same way, so I love that, Nikki.

SPEAKER_01 29:10

Yeah, and then it's like as you get older too, as as you start working with higher qual like with professionals. Professionals understand that results come from a team, not from an individual being able to do absolutely everything all the time. Yeah, and that's kind of like why we build organizations, right? Um, so that I don't talk this whole episode. Do you do you have any thoughts on that as a manager, as a person that manages teams? How do you look at do you fit together a team, or do you think does everybody need to be their own unicorn with all the things?

Strength-Based Teams And Leadership

Personality Assessments For Better Training

SPEAKER_00 29:44

So I think that one person cannot be everything, and I wouldn't want one person to be everything. Um and I've learned that, you know, so much over the years. Like, I used to think I needed to be all the things, right? I I needed to be everything for every position. And it's like, no, you don't, you really don't. You need to like play to your strengths. What are your strengths? And then surround yourself with people who have, like, you know, whatever my weaknesses are, I need your strengths to be that, right? Um, I've worked really well with bosses that are completely opposite of me, and I've been lucky enough to have bosses that are opposite of me. I am not detail oriented. Um, and I get excited about things. Like, so, you know, I'll be like, okay, let's go do this. This is gonna be so awesome. And then it's like, oh, wait, we need to think about this, you know. So, so someone to bring me back to, okay, let's think about the details, right? Let's think about these things. Um, or somebody who is more of a visionary, and then, you know, I can gather the people together, you know, around the idea and get the project started, right? So somebody who's opposite of me, I I appreciate their skills because I don't have them, but I used to think that I had to be that person, yeah, right. And so one thing that um Sentry has is um an OAD survey, organizational analysis and design. So it's really, you know, the the personality assessment, and then there's you know, four different quadrants that you can fall within, and then there's multiple profiles within each quadrant. Um, and just introduced that actually to our shop floor about a year ago. So it started off that um with a train the trainer program. So we needed to be better at our training because everybody on the shop floor was super good at their skills and training that skill, but it was those soft skills that we really needed to work on, right? Like understanding the person that you're training and how they learn best and really how to work with them. And so we started a train the trainer program with using these organizational analysis and design assessments and leadership style matrixes, is what it's called. Um, so then in that training, the people who were taking that training learned about themselves first and foremost, right? I need to understand who I am, right? And that's so eye-opening to people. And you know, it was it was an eye-opening, like aha moment for a lot of people, like, oh my goodness, this is exactly who I am, right? Like when they read the and so same thing when I read mine, right? Wow, this is scary. This is me. Um, but you know, they went through that to understand who they are and then how we could use those assessments on new people coming in to help us better, you know, acclimate them and understand them so we can work better together, right? So we did that training, and everybody's like, this is awesome! Like everybody on the shop floor needs to go through this. And I was like, all right, let's do it. So um, yeah, we introduced this to the whole shop floor. We did a training, everybody took the assessment, we did the training, um, and it's been awesome for everybody to really understand themselves. Um, and then as new people come in, you know, we understand the new people more, we can train them better and just, you know, you can work better with people if you understand them, right? Yeah. Um, and I had some real aha moments when we went through this training too. Like I had been working with some supervisors who were directly underneath me, completely opposite of me. And I was frustrating them, and I was realizing why I was frustrating them. You know, they need details, right? They're more detailed people. So it's like I'm giving this big picture, and they're like, I need the details. And it's like, okay, now I understand more of like why you need this and who you are, and then I can tailor my, you know, my leadership more to what they need from me. So it has been awesome. Um, and people talk about it when, you know, on the shop floor all the time now, you know, oh, hey, what color are you? You know, when new people come in. And so it's fun. Um, just that people are excited about it, but also that they're they're utilizing it, right? So um, so I'm loving that. And we also use it like on my peer team, so like our operations manager team, you know, understanding where everybody falls on that leadership style matrix, and then it's awesome because we're spread out on the matrix, and it's like you can only get to a really good place with a project or with a team or with anything if people think differently. If everybody thinks the same, you're never gonna get to the best result. You're gonna you're gonna get a result, but if you don't have people that think differently and um feel comfortable to put out all their ideas, you're never gonna get to a good result. So I love that when you can have teams that all think differently and feel have that, you know, that safety to say what they want to say, right? Um, and everybody listen and be open-minded to everybody's ideas because like we talked about, you know, in the beginning of this conversation, everybody can't be everything. And we need to play to each other's strengths. So um I love that our you know, our operations management team does that, looks at our strengths like that.

SPEAKER_01 35:02

That's very cool. I had not done one of those assessment personality assessments. Um, I've taken, I guess when you join a company, so my first job I mentioned, we did an end engineering like online aptitude test. And I've done a bunch of personality ones also. Like when I applied for a job at Target, you had got to answer all these multiple choice questions like a bajillion times. You're like, why are you answering asking me the same question three different ways, right? They have their own algorithm or something. But the thing was, none of those organizations ever shared any of those results with me. So they learned about me and whether or not they wanted to hire me. Yeah, and they did hire me, but I never knew what it was about those assessments that made them want to hire me and or what it told me about me, like because that was just for their HR or whoever.

SPEAKER_02 35:49

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 35:49

And and so I went, you know, 20 years in my career. Uh it was last year that I for for the very first time. And I probably had done like one of those ENTJ uh assessments or you know, some sort of personality thing in the past, but unrelated to work. I don't remember whether it was at school or or whatever, but like I never put much sock into it because I think it wasn't for any reason where I felt like understanding it for me personally was actually valuable. Yeah. And then last year I was helping um Allie, my co-host with the show. You haven't met her because we're kind of a new connection, but she's a controls engineer. Okay, and she runs uh her own systems integration firm, and her firm was growing, and she's an inexperienced leader. And so that you know, there's a lot of, especially from an engineering standpoint, you don't think about, or maybe just a less experienced right, like running a team. You it's a lot about people and people's interactions and people's feelings and people's backgrounds and their communication, and it's you know, a little bit of a babysitting job, and and uh, you know, I don't know, it's it's it's complex. And so we had uh a friend of ours who was in operations. She was like, hey, I do this personality assessment with my whole team. She's like, I manage, she manages a bunch of Gen Z people too. So she was like, it was really important for me. Like when we started to do this, I finally got a little bit more clued in on how I can effectively manage these young people who are different. They not only are they like different personalities, but they're just there's generational differences, there's things we learn, the technology, attitudes, all kinds of things. But she was like, it was really helpful for me to understand their personality types and then let them also understand, you know, how to work together as a team. And so we took one of these uh personality type assessments. Um, I'm trying to remember what it was called, but it's one that has like seven different types, including the visionary and like um, and there's a bunch of different flavors of this out there, yeah, depending on what company you subscribe to or whatever. But the cool thing is now, and I didn't know this, but like you can go and take one of these things yourself. It costs us like 10 bucks per person or something like that. And I'm sure there's different, all kinds of different packages, right? If you're an employer and you're really looking to do this on a professional level, I'm sure there's ones that are more tailored to that. They give you more stuff. But just for me, I mean, again, yeah, like you said, it was extremely eye-opening to have some sort of piece of paper like subscribe you to a T. How do you know me so well? And then part of you goes, Oh, I guess I'm not that special. But B, it's also good because then you're like, oh, okay, there are a lot of people like me, and I'm not some sort of weird anomaly that is just wrong, or I, you know, I've got my head in the clouds all the time, and I'm so excited about this new thing, and it's such a bad trait that I keep getting distracted. And it's like, no, because there are people that benefit from having someone like me on their team. And I in turn benefit a lot from having people that can rein me in or bring up the, hey, have you thought about this, or how exactly are you gonna do that? Um but yeah, it was a huge revelation to me. And I've now used that information for myself, not only that job or my position there helping as a board member. Um, but like it's helped me in every area of my life since then, now that I know more about myself. So if you guys are out there listening to this, if you A are well into your career and have never done one of these assessments, I highly encourage you to do so. Just if anything, for the aha moment of you reading stuff about yourself. Um also if you're early on in your career, if your employer has never offered you this, um, or you've done these and you haven't actually been the beneficiary of the results of what these, you can go take them online now. Um, I would like to try to uh, and this will be this episode will be aired sometime in January or February 2026. We're recording right now in December. Um, we're gonna have a new producer. So we're gonna put a link to some of these personality tests in the show notes. Um, and if Megan feels so inclined to share with us afterwards, maybe the specific one that her company is using, um, we can link to that as well. But I think it's not something you have to wait for your employer to do. No. No. Also think about it. If you're applying for a job and your employer is not looking at any of this, then they're not necessarily a company where they're really thinking about these team dynamics, and they may or may not be thinking very hard about the culture and you know the types of teams they're building. Because I will say this: look, I'm a huge advocate of diversity, and that is partially why we do the show, because we want to show more women and people that don't see themselves in manufacturing a lot. We want to bring out more voices of the people that are that are diverse so that A, you can see this is possible for you, right? And you don't even have to have gone to college for that thing. We have so many people that came into it from having learned all kinds of other stuff. The point I'm trying to make is that diversity isn't really important. It leads to better results, it leads to more innovation, but it's not easy. There's a reason also why a lot of these companies have kept it safe and played it safe by hiring the same types of people over and over because you kind of know what to expect. You can offer the same thing and it be okay, right? Whatever it is you've been offering for the last hundred years, if you keep hiring the same types of people, you may be getting away with it being okay to kind of stay the same. What diversity will do for you is start to expose a bunch of cracks, maybe, or just things like you will get more interpersonal conflict when you have lots of different types of people with different communication styles and different backgrounds. Um so it's not all, you know, unicorns and rainbows, once you hire a rainbow-looking team of people, right? It also means more complex, more complexity, more potential run-ins of communications, miscommunications, right? Um but if you the point is to kind of intentionally manage that and and realize that if you manage the some of the downsides of having more diversity, you get so much upside, right? From having those people, having them be there, feel included, feel like they matter, feel like they can bring something to the table. And then you get all kinds of, I think, yeah, innovation in particular, right? If you're in an industry that values innovation, you need good ideas, you need creative problem solving, you need to create new products or new processes or help your customers do things in a different way. It comes a lot of times. I mean, the ways that those things come about is those different like sparks of ideas or experiences that come together. And I think that's both like on the on the manufacturing and engineering side, we I think we like to default to the the hard skills a lot. And like, oh, you just need to know how to run these formulas or how to do this. And it's like, yeah, that's part of the that's part of the job. Um, but there's so much more to it. And I learned this from my background. If I was a sales engineer and I typically had to deal with a lot of applications engineers or back of the house engineers that didn't talk to the customers, but they were ultimately responsible for solving a lot of the problems. And they typically didn't love salespeople because salespeople would go talk to the customer and say, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, we'll do it all because I want to know, and then like go wrong, go, hey, do this or fix that. And engineers hated that. And I learned real quick when I walk in in the job, like, as the salesperson, you already got that stink guy of like, okay, what do you what are you gonna bring me now? Right. And I just had this instinct to try to learn what it is that drives people to want to help me. And so I would try to learn more about that person and how they communicate and how I can get them on my side rather than be like, oh, that person's so grumpy, they never want to help me. Um and I found I was just talking to my brother in law this morning, but like, don't give me a no. Give me your give me your no, and I will find you a way to get around it or something. There's a solution to everything. It just may not be as easy or as obvious. Or as simple as you would like. But in this world of manufacturing, we're so used to these like super complex systems and we come up with the coolest stuff that makes the world go around. So like, why would you not be able to solve people challenges in addition to technical challenges? Absolutely. Anyway, that yeah, sorry. This is my little soapbox on the show, but I just I learned so much from all my guests that this is oh, I'm so lucky. I'm so lucky to get to talk to you. Um, how much do you know about the stuff that you guys make and does it fascinate you, the technology?

SPEAKER_00 44:35

Yeah, so um the stuff that we make, like I had no idea any of this stuff existed before I worked here at all. So, but I am constantly learning. Like, I'll be honest with you, like, you know, I'm out there with the manufacturing processes and all that, but you know, really understanding the products, like I am I'm still learning. Um, and we've got some awesome people who have been here for a long time that like I'm constantly amazed at you know how they talk about our products and you know, all the stuff that they know. And I'm just like, yeah, so constantly learning, constantly, but I love it, right? So just gotta keep soaking it all in. The people that have been here, I mean, there's a lot of people that have been here a long time, which says a lot about the company, right?

SPEAKER_01 45:18

Yeah, and and ideally, you want that, you want those really tenured team members that can keep passing what they know and what they've learned over to the new team members. So, how are you guys handling that sort of stuff? Like, obviously, the whole manufacturing industry has this huge personnel issue and this issue with institutional knowledge because a lot of them operate with there is one guy that knows everything, or you know, something like that. And everything just exists in his head, and it's usually a he, occasionally a she, but most of the time it's it's an older gentleman that kind of knows everything, and they I think the way that work used to work is they feel very valued being the person that knows everything. Um, it can sometimes be a challenge to let all of that go and not think you're losing your worth as you share all of that knowledge. Do you guys have systems in place to kind of help that institutional knowledge, you know, spread through the organization, or is that something you guys are thinking about or tackling?

Turning Tribal Knowledge Into Process

SPEAKER_00 46:12

So we have some of that. Um, you know, there is so much tribal knowledge, but that's something that, you know, we constantly are talking about like, okay, we need we can't have all this tribal knowledge, right? Like we have to figure out a way to get it, you know, down on paper, down in a process, or you know, something to get it out of this person's head and get more people to know, right? Like it's it's important to do that. Um, we have you know, a sales guy who's been here for a very, very long time. I mean, he he has an amazing knowledge, and so, you know, as he comes upon that retirement age, you know, it's it's how do we get all that knowledge from him? And so, you know, he used to take around all of our new employees around the shop, and he would talk about all the products to help them understand. And, you know, we've now transitioned that to um another sales guy and then myself. So he talks about the products and I talk about um the manufacturing side of things for new employees or whatever, and so you know, that's one way like trying to transfer that knowledge a little bit more in that way, you know, also just trying to um more processes that are written down, right? So a lot of times when doing things or understanding things, it's again that tribal knowledge. So working on getting systems in place where you know you can maybe a QR code, right? Um, in order to we're we're using something called Dizuki. We haven't started it yet, but in order to get our processes so that we can have a tablet, you can you know hit the QR code or search for whatever process it is that you need that you're doing right now, and you can pull up the work instruction, right? Um because we can't we can't continue to go down the path that you know everybody is going to, you know, just pass down that knowledge by showing somebody, right? We need to have that reference of this is you know how you do it. So working on things like that um is really important. I like to say, I like to have things so that if anybody off the street could walk in and do this by looking at this, right? Like is it whether it's a work instruction or a video or whatever it is, um, we need to have it so that anybody walking off the street could look at this and understand and do this process. So it's obviously a challenge to get there. It takes a lot of time, but I think we are at a really good place now that we're gonna start, you know, doing more and more of that here at Century. So yeah, I'm very excited.

SPEAKER_01 48:46

A lot of organizations have that as like they know that it's a thing that they need to do, but it may or may not be on their roadmap like now. Um, and it just depends where people are at, right? With everything is kind of, you know, you got to take it one step at a time. Um, I feel like there's a lot of hype right now about like, oh, AI is gonna take care of all that for you. Uh, is that something that you guys are buying into? Or are you, you know, more so looking at practical tools that have been around for a while, or like what's your uh any thoughts about how AI is gonna help us with all of that going forward?

Using AI To Save Time

SPEAKER_00 49:16

Yeah, I am loving AI, I'm gonna be honest with you. Um, so I was super skeptical about it. I was like, well, AI is just cheating. I'm cheating at my job if I'm using AI, right? Um, and so at first I was just like, I was very skeptical about it. And then I started getting into it and understanding more of what it could do for me in in my everyday job. And honestly, it saves me a ton of time. Like I love it. And um, you know, I've tried to transition that to the shop floor as well. Like we were doing um, we celebrate welding month, and so we like to put the bios out of all of our welders then and showcase them, and we weren't getting anybody's bios in. And I was like, it scares them to write this down, right?

SPEAKER_01 49:59

Yeah, nobody wants to write about themselves, right?

SPEAKER_00 50:01

And they don't know how to start. So, you know, I sat them all down and I was like, okay, I was like, here's how you can do this, like using AI. And so, you know, all of a sudden, you know, the bios are flowing in and they look amazing. Um, so absolutely, there is definitely a place for it. And I think Century is really embracing it, right? Like trying to find the places where we can use it. Is it the end all be all? No, but it can definitely help us. Um, and I know there's a projects that are being looked at. I'm not a part of them right now. Um, but you know, what can it really do for Sentry and how can it help us? We want to get ahead of it so that we're not behind the game. Um, our IT department and our CIO, he is, you know, a huge proponent of it and just trying to help us understand it as well. Like, because if people don't understand it, then they become fearful of it, right? So he's just trying to get that knowledge out there in regards to AI, which has been super helpful. So I love talking to him about it and getting his advice. But yeah, I am I I use it person for personal stuff too. I mean, we were redoing our house this um this past summer we bought a project house. Um, but you know, it's like have a whole nother episode talking about that. So it's like it's hard to visualize what you you know want it to look like. So, you know, I take a picture of it as is, and I say, okay, you know, show me what it would look like with this or whatever. And what and then I show my husband, and he's like, Oh, yeah, yeah. So it's like, you know, can be all uses, right? Personal, work, very helpful.

Upskilling To Stay Valuable

SPEAKER_01 51:37

I also just recently had to get prepare my house for selling, and I had to change the front door, and front doors are I had no idea how expensive front doors are. Yeah, I really don't want to make the wrong choice here and spend thousands of dollars on something that's not gonna look great. Um, and then I have a weird size door, so it was like I can only choose between, you know, and yeah, I I took a picture and then just started like going online and being like, show me my house with this door on it. Yeah, and just that was like super helpful. But yeah, I also use it now constantly for all kinds of things. I'm trying to be just cognizant of not offloading things that I like if I can't sit down and draft an email without AI doing it for me in the future, like I've lost something, right? But I think that there's so much complimentary stuff that we can have it do with us or for us without losing the ability to do it on our own. Yeah. Um, and then the other thing I think is really important is yes, understanding it because you don't want to be the person that doesn't understand that a a chat GPT will make something that sounds really good but can be completely wrong, and then pass that off as your work product. Also, I think it's really important to be just just be realistic, be honest and realistic about what how AI is helping your work. Don't pass AI generated stuff off as your own work. If it's a if it's a deadline project and you're handing it in, do the work. If you're like, hey, I created this draft with AI, do you want to review it with me? Like, say that, right? There's there's a place, there's a time and a place for all of that. And I think if you're honest about what you're doing and you're learning and you're testing those limits with your team within like approved bounds of like if you're using it at work, of course, don't put company information in a public uh AI tool, for instance. Like make sure that you're working within your organization's guidelines and things. And I'd say experiment at home with non-sensitive information if you're trying to learn how to use it. Um, but yeah, I think I I this is just my personal opinion, but I don't care, I don't think it matters what job you do. You need to be learning how to use AI for your job right now. And if your company is allowing you to, great, utilize that. If your company is like, we don't know, we're not doing it, it's not, it's not our thing, then go learn it at home. Like, go find a project, go find there's something in your personal life. Whether you're renovating your house or you need to put together a grocery budget, whatever it is, like learn how to use these tools to help you so that you can understand what their limitations are. Um, because your job may not require it now, but your next job or that same one either will require it or you will lose out to a candidate that knows how to use these things to help them create better work product faster. Right. Yep. So I was actually talking to um my brother-in-law this morning. He unfortunately recently got laid off from a manufacturing job. Um, they just have less capacity now. He had joined recently, they kind of have some seniority, you know, rules, and though even though he was doing really well, they don't have a capacity for work right now, and he just got laid off after a 10-hour shift. Like it sucks. Um, and we're looking at, okay, well, how can we make sure that you're not in that type of situation where you're the commodity, you know, worker where it's just your labor that's important. And if there's no, you know, labor needed today, then you are no longer needed on the team, right? That's a different type of job, and that unfortunately doesn't give a lot of stability or upward trajectory to anyone to work those types of jobs, right? So thinking about upskilling and stuff, we were talking about using AI, and I was like, yeah, I mean, I I'd say there may be like two camps, and this may be wrong, but I'm overgeneralizing. But there's types of people that will learn how to use AI to do their job faster. And if I can turn an eight-hour job into a two-hour job, now I have six more hours in the day to do more things for my company, right? I can now be a more productive team member, I can get probably promoted faster, I can become more valuable in my organization by now saying, hey, guess what? This eight-hour job now takes me two hours because I figured out how to do it better and faster. What else can we do? And or even better, here are six ideas I have for other things I can use my time on that need to be done, right? Or I think there are people, and I don't want to be naive about this, that would figure out how to do an eight-hour job in two hours and then just sit on their ass for six hours and not do anything because they've figured a hack and they want to just do less, right? And and I think I've been guilty of ignoring that those people exist and thinking the best of everyone all the time. And I'm like, why would a per why wouldn't a person do this? And I've learned over the years that not everyone is like me. Um, and there, I think the reality of work and business ownership and stuff is that there are people out there that are kind of they do the bare minimum and they may not be as interested in learning and contributing, right? They want to clock in and clock out and get paid.

SPEAKER_02 56:38

Yep.

SPEAKER_01 56:38

And some of that I think is not gonna change. And that's why, like, in, and I think in a lot of engineering terms or whatever, but like there's a Gaussian distribution to almost everything in the world. If you think about like the 80-20 principle or the Pareto principle, you spend 20% of your, you know, 20% of your anything is gonna produce the most amount of, whether that's effort or or whatever. Um, so there's always gonna be those people that like are not gonna take full advantage of things, they're not gonna do that sort of discovery, self-learning. They're not gonna be motivated to just do more for you your company. Um But I think, and that's the that's the baseline that we all operate on in terms of businesses are hiring, right? Especially if you're hiring like entry level or what you would consider to be more manual labor type jobs, you're probably mostly getting people from that pool that are happy to come in, clock in, clock out, do the job, right? But if you present yourself as an organization where it's not a clock in, clock out type of job, it's a come here, grow here, you know, there's extra benefits, there's things you can learn, you can grow yourself, right? Then you're more likely to attract the first type of person that if they found an extra six hours in the day, they would give it to you for something, right? Um, am I insane? I'm not in like I'm not a people manager. So I think so. I have all kinds of ideas that once like if I was really in that position, I'd be like, Nikki, what the what are you talking about? Am I crazy or do you see like, have you worked with a spectrum of people? Am I is this something that you notice at all?

Job Ladders And Growing Leaders

SPEAKER_00 58:13

Yeah, there are. There are some people who just want to clock in, clock out, right? Who just want their, you know, and maybe it's where they're at in their life, though, right? Like, so they have they have things going on, you know, outside their life that, okay, I'm gonna give you, you know, this amount of time or whatever. Um, probably not gonna be anymore because of where I am in my life. Totally fine. Um, you know, we do tend to attract here um people who are looking for that growth and you know, want to know that there is growth. We do a lot of promoting from within. So we um we actually created this last year, year, year and a half, two years ago, um, job ladders so people can understand like, okay, this is my my entry level position. Here are the you know the next levels of this area, and this is how I get there, right? So it's attached to a training matrix, um, and it tells you specifically how you get from here to here. Wow, you know, so and of course it's attached to you know to pay as well. And then, you know, we also we like to be able to move people in and out of departments, so you know what other cross-training matrixes are you on that you can ebb and flow in and out, you know, because again, that just makes you more valuable, right? So, you know, having people be able to, you know, grow within their area, but also grow by learning other things. Um, and then we also, you know, people on the shop floor who aspire to be leaders, which is awesome. Um, and so we have a program here at Century, um, a leadership development program, um, and also um lots material, oh, a high potential employee program, um, which our shop floor was not originally a part of. And it felt like we just didn't have a bench on the shop floor because of some of these things, right? We weren't really preparing people uh for leadership, but they were striving for it. So um, over the last few years, I brought that out to the manufacturing floor where we've added them into our leadership development program. So people who aspire to be leaders, um, and we see potential in them, right? So we see something in you that you could be a leader someday. So they, you know, go into that program, as well as then our high potential employee program. Again, you aspire to be a leader or you know, we see something in you. And so they get into this program where they have, you know, a mentor here within the company, and then they come up with their individual development plan of like, you know, how I'm gonna continue to grow. It's not so much a succession plan for a specific role, but just when Century is looking for new leaders, um, you know, this is the pool that we're probably gonna look at because they're in this program and they've been doing work to better themselves and to continue to grow. Um, and so it's been awesome having the shop floor be a part of these programs and to watch people grow within this. Um, and so continuing to um, you know, again, promote from within of our leadership on the shop floor because we have those skills now, we have that bench because they're actively being um, you know, trained, if you will, to be leaders. So it's been very exciting. Um, and love the response on the shop floor with those that have have been added to that.

SPEAKER_01 1:01:25

So yeah, that's incredible. Because I think oftentimes, yeah, it's kind of taken for granted that some of those people that are on the floor, whether they're at entry level or they just have that period in their life where they're just working a more traditional job, right? Some of them may want to keep that, right? They don't have capacity for any extra. But a lot, I think a lot of people in those positions would love to grow in their careers, but they're not exactly given in most other places, many other places. They're not really given that path. Um, I can think of one particular business where it created a lot of problems after some time that people were kind of, they had a ceiling in the position that they were in, and there wasn't really a way to step up. You either like that job is just kind of how it pays that much. And you know, you go anywhere and you do the same job and it's not going to pay more, but there isn't really like a step up either. You either do that or you and it and it, yeah, it created a place where people felt kind of, I think, trapped, right? They've been with the company a really long time, they feel like they're contributing, they're doing their job well, but there's really not anywhere else for them to go because that company didn't have that kind of thinking about cross-training. And if there isn't an immediate, you know, supervisor position within that line, then how do you continue to develop these people so that they don't just become resentful of the fact that they've given so much and they're kind of getting nowhere? Well, we are out of time. We've talked for over an hour. It went by so fast because, yes, I obviously subjects we care about, um, and you guys have are doing things right, it seems. Um, and that is joy to my ears to hear. Now I want to know what locations are your businesses in if people want to work there. And I'll say if if our listeners happen to be anywhere near your facilities, they should kind of plug in to get to know who you are.

SPEAKER_00 1:03:10

Um yeah, so um our headquarters and largest manufacturing facility is in Okanemak, Wisconsin. Um, and then we have um another manufacturing facility in Houston, Texas, and then in West Jordan, Utah as well.

Locations, Open Roles, And Follow-Up

SPEAKER_01 1:03:27

Okay. So that's three different potential locations that you guys can draw on. Um, if you are in any of those areas and know someone or you yourself are, you know, looking for a new opportunity. This sounds like a fantastic place to work. Um, and then with that, I'll have to wrap it up with our last question and we can kind of build a little bit of that into there or talk about you know, you as well as a person, Megan, depending on what you got going on. But where should people follow you andor your company? So whatever you want to include. Um, if people want to either learn more, stay in touch, just make sure that they kind of are in your orbit of either yourself or Sentry, where should they go so that they can follow up? And we'll try to put links to all the things you mentioned in the show notes so people can just go ahead and click. But let us know where people should follow. And then if there's any particular jobs or shout-outs or things that you want to tell people to watch out for that's coming up from Sentry, trade shows there should meet you, or jobs you guys have open. This is your chance to tell us all the things that we should do to follow up on if we found this conversation with you and particularly what we learned about Sentry to be of real interest today.

SPEAKER_00 1:04:32

Yeah, so um, I am on LinkedIn as well as Sentry. Um, Sentry is on the social media platforms, obviously Facebook as well, as well as I am. Um but yeah, you know, follow us on Facebook and LinkedIn. We had we had our hundredth year anniversary list last year, so we have a lot of good content out there. Um, but we are looking, you know, we're all I shouldn't say we're always, but we have um machinist openings right now. So if you're looking to be a CNC machinist, um, we are looking for machinists right now. So yeah, very good.

SPEAKER_01 1:05:08

Well, thank you so much, Megan. I really appreciate this. I'm sorry that I probably talked more than I should have during this episode, but uh as you can see, uh we really tickled some subjects that really are near and dear to my heart. Yeah. And it's been wonderful to meet you. I I hope that I get a chance to see your equipment out there someday. I was really I was gonna ask you all kinds of stuff about the automation and you know, because this is automation ladies after all. Uh but you know, I think I'm I'm passionate about the tech, but the reason we do the show is the people. So we can follow up on the tech stuff later. Or if people want to know more about the inline, you know, testing equipment, um sampling, then I'm sure there's plenty of technical information or demos or videos of your equipment that people can find on your website, right?

SPEAKER_00 1:05:54

Absolutely. Yes.

SPEAKER_01 1:05:55

Yeah. So I have I have spoken, and actually the reason I reached out to Sentry in the first. Place was actually not to interview Megan, but I wanted to get some more information and footage about their machines because I want to start putting out more technical content. Because I think just more people should know what technology makes the things that we use. Right. And and machine building and building, you know, uh manufacturing things that make other things. Uh I don't see a whole lot of that kind. You know, like I don't know. I grew up loving to see how it's made, but it's showing you how the end product is made. So I'm I'm a geek about automation and machinery. So now I want to see how the machines are made. So hopefully we will have a follow-up segment of some sort um on a new series on automation ladies in 2026, where you guys will get to learn more about the technical ins and outs of uh the sentry equipment. You guys are on my short list of when I start that kind of content. So looking forward to hopefully keeping up again, maybe with someone else on your team. Um, but really appreciate you joining us, Megan. And thank you guys, everybody that's listening. Hope you got a few nuggets out of this, and then send that Sentry uh careers page to your friends and family that may be looking for a good place to learn more.

SPEAKER_00 1:07:12

Yes, please. Thank you so much, Nikki. This was great.

SPEAKER_01 1:07:15

Absolutely. You have a great rest of your day. Bye. Me too. Thank you for listening to Automation Ladies. If you like our content and you want to stay in touch, please connect with us on LinkedIn, follow the show page, subscribe to our YouTube channel, and you can send us a message or a copy on our website, automationladies.io. We look forward to getting to know you. Our producer is Veronica Espinosa, and our music is composed by Samuel J.