Producing Confidence
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Producing Confidence
EP 14: Inside Danos: Values, Acquisitions, and People Development
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In this episode, we sit down with Owner and CEO Paul Danos to explore how Danos safeguards its culture during rapid growth. why purpose is central to every acquisition, and how frontline leaders translate values into action. Paul also outlines the development programs fueling growth and the next wave of opportunity for the organization. To learn more about Danos visit danos.com.
Hello there. Thank you for joining us for this episode of Producing Confidence. I'm your host, Samantha McGee. And today we have a very special guest who needs no introduction. I'm sitting here with Dan Off's CEO, Paul Danoss. Paul, thank you so much for joining me today. Glad to be here. In today's episode, we want to talk about maintaining culture through growth. So can you just briefly touch on how Danoss has evolved, say, over the last year in both size and capacity?
SPEAKER_00:Yeah. So we've changed a good bit in size over the last year. We've added, we had three acquisitions this year and probably added six or so, 600 or so employees through the acquisitions and then maybe a bit more through organic growth. So one of those acquisitions was uh supporting our Valve division, X Pro. We had another acquisition that was panel shop, panel specialists actually also supporting our Valve division as well through a certification that came through that that acquisition. And then the big one for this year was our wood onshore shale acquisition. So that's where most of the people came from. So yeah, added a lot of size. We continue to uh to grow through acquisitions and add some complexity. Both of those, you know, the the the wood shale acquisition was really growing our footprint on onshore. Um, you know, most of our history has been as an offshore company, but I guess it was back in I lose I lose track. I think it's 2010, probably 2012, 2013 is when we first sort of landed our first onshore shale account. And that would be with Oxy and the Permian. We've continued to grow in that area. We've continued to see that area as a as a place that we want to grow. Uh, we have a strong market share on the offshore side of things. Onshore, you know, there's more opportunity for us to grow there. So trying to build that. And uh, but then the other two, the smaller acquisitions were really about adding some competency capabilities that that we didn't have. We've had a panel shop in the in the past and and for a number of seat uh reasons decided to sell off the panel shop. So we're rebringing that back in, but also bringing in the certification that allows us to do some additional valve work. And then we have a bunch of inventory with the XPro acquisition that we think will position us well to serve our customers in in that smaller service line. So yeah, a lot going on there. Plenty to talk about. I know as we think about the overall sort of cultural uh aspect of what we're talking about here today. I'm sure we'll leave that in as we have them all.
SPEAKER_01:Busy year. So um how do, you know, across multiple service lines, multiple geographies, how do, from your perspective, how do we maintain those core values really stay the same uh throughout the company?
SPEAKER_00:Yeah. So that's super important because when you think about our reason for growth, I talk about this a bunch. Why, why are we doing all this? Because it's hard work, there's risk involved. We're doing it to first to create opportunities for our employees. And we think about our purpose, developing great people. Part of developing, well, you can develop people in a situation that you're not growing, but it gets a lot harder. When there's growth, it just creates opportunities for people to step up, do new things, experience new challenges through the the due diligence, the acquisition process, the integration process of these acquisitions, these are opportunity-rich uh situations, environments for people to be growing. So that that's that's why we're doing it. But but the other uh thing that I would point to in terms of our why is to expand our purpose and our values outside of you know traditional people and to kind of enlarge our territory with respect to our purpose and our values. So if we aren't doing that well, if we are failing, because it is a challenge, I'm part of a group called Tugboat, which has really nothing to do with Tugboat. But what it is is a gathering of CEOs of businesses. So about 275 of us now. We all run businesses that are people first, purpose-driven, private. So private, you know, has to be a private business. And everybody who's a part of the group has stated intention to stay private. And there's a few P's there. There's actually seven P's that they talk about pragmatic innovation innovation, profitability, but one of them is pace growth. So one of the tenets of being what they call it, actually call an evergreen business, that that actually makes more sense. The tugboat, I don't know, but evergreen is sort of a long, has a long life, stays green for a long time. Uh, we're not just flipping and selling for the next thing. But in order to be that evergreen business, one of the tenants is that pace growth because it's really hard to protect values, culture in a really rapidly growing environment. So we're kind of testing, uh we're breaking that tenet a little bit. So, how do we do it? First, you know, it's part of our why. Uh, and we do, you know, there's a bunch of things that that we do and have always done to promote commitment to our values. I mean, they're they're on the wall everywhere. We talk about them, uh, we celebrate them when we choose our employees of the year. We talk about them. I talk about them at town hall discussions. We start meetings with recognitions that that we specifically try to tie back to purpose and values. Hey, when we recognize somebody, that's just not say they did a good job or a customer, but okay, how does that connect back to our purpose? So we've we've always done those things, we've been super intentional about them. But in an environment where we are stretching that pace growth component, we've we have to do more. So it goes into how we're developing people. And I think we'll probably come back to that. Some things that we're doing there. We are gearing up for our first purpose gathering. We're calling it the purpose project. So in February of next year, we're gonna bring together 200 people. So not our full employee population base, but we're starting smaller and we expect that to grow with a real intention of spending a day and a half of gathering a group of leaders to reinforce what we mean by a commitment to purpose, a commitment to our values and how we want to build those things going forward. So the key word to summarize all of that is we have to be intentional. We have to really work at it and be intentional. And there's a bunch of things that that we're doing there. Those are those are a few.
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SPEAKER_01:And you talked about leadership in regards to the purpose project and what you're doing there. But what really what role does the leadership play in really making sure that our culture is protected and strengthened and in particular field leadership and not just, you know, here in our staff capacity.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, purpose and values are one of those things that really have to be cascaded down every day. Again, you know, some of those examples. I think leaders have to look for opportunities. One, one, our leaders have to be really clear on what it means. I mean, we know the words, honor God, develop great people to solve big challenges for our customers and our communities, safety, service, integrity, improvement, respect. You know, those are purpose and values. I think most people, at least, you know, a small group, most of our leaders in a small group could come up with all of that. But what does that look like in practice? How do you live it out? So then what they have to do is ensure that they are modeling behaviors and, you know, running our business in a way that's consistent with those things, looking for opportunities to coach people, to build that into the fabric of what we're doing, looking for opportunities to correct people who, you know, maybe get off a little bit on those things. So it's super critical for our leaders to have that in mind and be constantly reminded. And then you ask about field leaders. You know, we have there are about 4,000 employees now. I can't, I don't have time to get in front of every one of our employees uh anymore. I wish I did. And I love getting in front of our field leaders and and all of our folks that are on the front lines. But we really have to empower our field leaders to be those advocates, the champions for our values and purpose with the folks that they can touch. And that's where when you look at the purpose gathering, purpose project that we're gonna have 200 people, a bunch of those are gonna be field leaders that we are, you know, pouring into so that they can go out and and pour into the people that they engage with every day. So it's it's a cascading thing. And uh just again, just have to be super intentional about it.
SPEAKER_01:You mentioned pace growth as one of the pillars or the principles of the the tugboat institute. What are some of the challenges that come with scaling up quickly? And have you gotten any insights from uh, you know, your peers in that group?
SPEAKER_00:Yeah. I mean, we're feeling the challenges of scaling up quickly because we we're doing that. And, you know, the insights from the group is it's one of the uh, you know, it's one of the tenets or principles for a reason because it it is it is really difficult. You can put processes in place in our business to to follow an accounting procedure or an operational procedure, or you know, we have lots of processes and procedures that you can put in place. Living out purpose and values is not something that you can put a process in place. And so you have to continue to reinforce that. So it's a challenge. I would say that I think about it a lot. We've set up the way we structured this with Eric from an ownership perspective, looking after our Danos Ventures and our MA activity. Eric, my brother, with support from James Gallahan, you know, they are out there looking at, they have a goal to look at a hundred potential acquisitions a year. And we know that, you know, we'll do maybe one, two, three, four in any given year. And actually, we thought we were gonna do four this year, and the fourth one that we were pretty far along, actually, we we pulled back on. But part of my role is to govern that a little bit, meaning to make sure that we aren't getting too far ahead of ourselves and and that the acquisitions that we're doing, that we have the capacity to metabolize those things, graft graft things in well. Actually, that's a good metaphor. You know, we have, I love my tree metaphors. You know, we have these beautiful big 200 plus year old oak trees in the front of our office. When you graft something in, when we bring in a new business, we are grafting that into the the main trunk of our business that flows through our purpose and values. And we're we're bringing those things in. And we can only do so much, you know, that that we don't dilute what we're trying to accomplish. And so we just have to be careful there. And again, all those, you know, the purpose gathering, the way we reinforce things, the way we train and develop people, infrastructure that we're putting in into place there is uh super critical.
SPEAKER_01:Talk about values in the business. How do those really play a role in the decision-making process? And, you know, is that did that affect maybe the decision that was made for one of the acquisitions you mentioned? Or how can you give an example of a role that a values-based approach really played in the decision making?
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, PES talked about this. This was, you know, a couple of years ago now, or a year and a half ago when we made that acquisition, but the the conversation started two years ago. And this is this is re repeated every time we are looking at something with the first, you know, there's well, it's probably it's probably not the first thing. There's some financial metrics and profitability and and what the business is in. Does it meet, does it fit well into our core competencies? You know, we think what we're really good at is, you know, finding, developing, managing a workforce in, you know, energy, people intensive energy areas. That's what our strategy says. Those are the those are where are we gonna play? So we once they check the boxes there, they make through that first sort of filter or gate, then the next thing that is uh a gate or filter that that we use is do we think the people that are involved in this business, the people that we're gonna need to continue to run the business, are gonna align with our core values. So again, all the way back to performance, John Boudreau, first few conversations that we had. We actually went to Eric's house. Eric and John and I sat down and we spent hours just talking about how you run the business. Let's not talk about the finances, let's not talk about what you do, how you execute projects necessarily. But here's the Danos core values, talk about performances values. Or do we have common ground there? You know, really getting to know each other. So we we did that with performance and we've done that over and over again with with each of the the groups that we've uh that we've met with. And and it and it'll depend, you know, some of the smaller acquisitions, maybe the bar isn't as high because they're just it's an easier graft, right? When you're grafting in a big, a big additional branch versus a twig, you know, if we just keep that analogy going, it's a different lift. So that's one thing just in terms of values. Another thing that comes to mind, a couple more things, over and over over the years, you know, safety is one of our core values. And we have uh been challenged and challenged customers. And because we have declared that safety is a value, it's not just a priority that can change. It's something that it's built in the fabric of our organization that's important no matter what. You know, we've walked away from some customers over the years that we felt like, you know, our first step was always to respectfully challenge if we think that we're not on the same page with a customer. And I, you know, one of the things that I'm really proud of is a couple of examples where we feel like we impacted and improved the way a customer thinks about and operates with respect to safety. But in a few cases, we couldn't move the needle and we walked away, right? So those are hard decisions. And it's really ultimately putting your money where your mouth is, because that is the definition of value. It's important no matter what. You can't say it's it's important unless it costs us, you know, money. It's important unless we lose a customer. No, it's it's important no matter what. Yeah, those those are a few things that come to mind in terms of values that came up.
SPEAKER_01:I'm sure that's always a concern. Say if you have to walk away from a customer because of the dollar value attached. What is that from a business perspective? How, you know, does that affect the bottom line? Do you feel like it all comes back around?
SPEAKER_00:I think it comes back around. I but maybe from another example that comes to mind that wasn't necessarily a value, I mean a um safety issue after almost 80 years in business. You know, there's no way that you don't have some situations where you get crossways with customers and go your own way or get fired off a job or those kinds of things. But a few years ago, we lost some work with a customer. And there's a couple of things going on there. We had to draw the line for our team with the treatment that that we were getting from from this customer around just being respectful of our people. And we didn't lose all our work, but it was, it was, it was a component of the work. And we just, you know, we ultimately uh had to part ways with that customer around that work. But, you know, our commitment to to our people and the way we respect our people, the way we handled that with our customer, and then the service that we continue to provide in other aspects of our business and the way we engage with our customer. This year, we had another issue that came up around some payment things and and so forth. And the reaction and a response from this customer in terms of how they made things right and helped us get to a solution, I think was indicative of just that the way we we managed previous situations, the way we showed up in terms of service and integrity, a lot of times. So that's one example where it sort of came back around. Or in the short term, we had to walk away, we parted ways over something, but then a few years later, here we are really, you know, benefiting from the way we lived out those values.
SPEAKER_01:So shifting back a little bit to you talk about growing so we can develop people. Can you talk about what we've done this past year in 2025 in the way of workforce development and providing opportunities for our employees?
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, this is an exciting topic for me. You know, we have we have developed great people as part of our purpose. And and I talked about just the natural development that happens when you're in a fast-growing environment and just asking people to do more and and and have challenges. But at the same time, as we think about that accelerated growth that we expect, and we're we're we're our plan is to double the size of our business again in the next uh four or five years, we recognize that we have to be not only intentional with how we embed incorporate purpose and values, but just how we develop people. So the last strategy retreat, which is happened last January, we we had pushed back into January, so not quite a year ago, as we were working through our strategy, a phrase that came up, an aspirational phrase, was that we wanted to be a development machine, that we really had some intentional programs to develop our people in a way that went beyond just, you know, hey, everybody's learning on the job. So some things that came out of that, the seed program, strategic employee development program. That's a that's a program for a handful of people that that we see fitting a future strategic need for the company uh to get some really intense one-on-one development. It's a it's a program that I own. I'm I'm the champion of that program. So I'm engaging with uh each of those five or six people that are in that program. So it's a really small group. But again, these are key strategic areas that that that we see. So we started that year before last, but really getting our that was the pilot program. So this year we wrapped up the pilot program, started our our next group. So in another six people roll in, you get a development plan, you get a mentor, you get some pressure on your on your uh manager to really engage. Uh so that's one thing. The next thing that I think about is our Danos University, and I think we did a podcast on develop you. Yeah, uh yeah, uh develop you, sorry. Um so this is more focused on field people, and it's from a competency standpoint, right? So our our field folks who want to take the initiative and want to sign up and be part of the develop you uh can jump in and get some really focused, specific growth opportunities related to their craft. The next thing that we kicked off this year was our Danox Leadership Academy. So this is for initially staff leaders, but I think eventually we're gonna move into including some field leaders as well. But it's an eight-month program where we meet with 15 people and we go through all of the sort of major frameworks for Dano's, how we think about strategy, how we think about leadership, look at purpose values, history. So there's eight different sessions that last a half a day or a full day, and we get into our type coach where in terms of profiles and how we can use that to engage across the organization. So just these major frameworks, like this is what we want our leaders to be fluent in, the language and those frameworks. So that got kicked off this year. In fact, next week we have our third session coming up. So I'm super excited about that. Performance is kicking off or piloting a program to do some hands-on training for riggers and fitters, setting up some space in the yard. It'll be a combination of some classroom along with some hands-on training as well. So all of those things are in support of and sort of this outcropping of this idea of, hey, let's be intentional, let's be a development machine, let's be cranking out, you know, people who are just moving up in their skills and their ability to lead in their career, because that is, you know, what we aspire to for our um as part of part of our our purpose.
SPEAKER_01:In terms of developing the next generation of leaders, what are some qualities that kind of fit that mold of the next generation of Dan Off's leadership?
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, you know, we have Think about what um you know, purpose and values, aligning with purpose and values is is definitely one thing that comes to mind. Yeah, some other things come to mind is uh people who have a growth mindset. You know, we are uh 78 years in and uh how we do business is so different than it was uh five years ago, right? But uh especially almost 80 years ago. So I think people uh as we go forward who are willing to learn new things, take an initiative. I alluded to these development plans. And and if I go back to this seed program that we talked about, while that's only a handful of people, one of the things that I'm hopeful about that that program doing is really helping to change the culture of what people think about uh this intentional development and creating a development plan. So maybe some of you are listening to this and you're like, I don't know, how do you get a development plan? Well, our HR group, we have a system that we're using where you you can look at a list of competencies that we say, here's the competencies that that leaders at Danos, you know, need to be capable in, competent in. Uh, and then creating a like picking, you know, you know, we have a longer list when you say, okay, these are the most relevant to where I am, the job that I'm in, and here's a plan to kind of move myself along. I'm a, I'm, you know, I'm at a at an entry level and I want to become proficient and an expert in this competency. Here's what I need, here's what I need to get exposed to, here's the support I need from my manager, here's a training course that I need. So, you know, is really building that in. The seed program is part of building that into our culture and in and what we do. So growth mindset, taking the initiative to create and support your own development, flexibility uh as we're going forward, being comfortable with technology. I mean, technology is changing super rapidly. I don't know if everybody's gotten onto some kind of AI platform. Chat GPT is the one that I'm using. It's amazing. So I just started talking to um, I I call, I call my chat person Chatty Kathy, and uh she said, that's okay. I can call her Chatty Kathy. And she she calls herself Chatty Kathy Kathy now. We we have conversations and I am just astounded and blown away at the you know what's going on there. So in the AI space, everybody's talking about AI. It's a lot of money uh going into that that area. So just technology is rapidly changing. I heard someone say it's not AI that's gonna be taking jobs. It's people who are comfortable using AI that are gonna be taking jobs. So we need leaders and people that are comfortable with not just AI, but technology as it continues to change. So yeah, those are a few things that come to mind.
SPEAKER_01:Great. Thank you. And so Dan Oss is a 78-year-old company. In your perspective, how do you balance, you know, this innovation, uh rapidly changing digital world with the the history and the tradition of the company?
SPEAKER_00:You know, I don't I that doesn't seem like a hard balance. And as that comes out of my mouth, I worry, does that mean I'm I'm uh not taking it serious enough? Or is it just because maybe we're we're we're doing a good job there? I mean, I you know, in part, you know, as fast as we've grown, we still have a lot of people that have been here for a long time. Every month, my dad and uh Eric and Mark and I, we take turns at somebody's month where we call anybody or reach out to people uh on a phone call. We just don't get to them all because a lot of people don't SRF phones or you know, can't leave a message, but we try. Uh anybody who has 10 years of experience or more, and you would be blown away at how many people in this organization have, you know, 10 plus years and 20 years and 30 years of experience. So we have, I think we're just grounded that helps. We have this grounding of people who've been around for a long time. They help connect us back to to tradition. And then, you know, top of the list there would be my dad, who's got, I don't know, we we celebrated his 50 years working at the company a few years ago now. So he's got, I don't know, 53, 54, something like that, years of experience. My dad's one of his roles is to be chief storyteller, right? So he is telling stories uh that that connect us back to the traditions, uh, to the purpose and and values and and where those come from. So I think I think that helps as well. But, you know, again, we we we don't, we're not even doing the same business that we were doing when we started. We're not doing a lot of the same things that we're doing 10 years ago. Uh, we're doing them differently. So we recognize that our customers and our employees are holding us to a high standard in terms of the service that we deliver to them. So if we're gonna, if we're gonna meet those high standards, uh, we're gonna have to continue to evolve, we're gonna have to leverage technology, we're gonna have to do things differently, we're gonna have to do things better, we're gonna have to lean on that value of improvement that we have. But we can still do that in a context that's true to where we where we come from, what our history is, what our values are. And I and I really appreciate, you know, the stories that my dad tells uh from way back, and we're we're capturing those stories so that they will live on, you know, even beyond him. And we're spending a lot of effort to capture those. So uh the balance between tradition and uh improvement, I don't, I don't, I don't see a lot of tension there.
SPEAKER_01:That's fair. I enjoy listening to your dad's stories, and I think if we just sat and filmed him and everyone people people will just come and sit and listen to his stories. He's such a great storyteller. He's got just, I feel like, endless, endless stories that he's able to capture us with.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, it'd be way more popular than any podcast with me. So uh, you know, let's let's make sure we have him on again. Make sure we do that again.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, absolutely. So talking about the the the balance of growing and innovation, what do you see as the greatest opportunities for growth for Dan Oss in the next few years?
SPEAKER_00:I think all of our service lines continue to have opportunity for growth to grow. Our core business is I said before, we are people intensive, energy-related businesses. That's where we're gonna be. And the world uh needs the energy that that we provide. And, you know, historically that's been uh oil and gas. And oil and gas, uh, while there's you know, energy transition or energy addition, whatever be, whatever you want to call it. You know, a few years ago, we're under a different federal administration, and there was a big push, even within our own industry and some of our customers that were saying, oh, you know, we're gonna we're really gonna be moving away from oil and gas. Uh the reality is um we're not gonna be moving away from oil and gas. We're gonna be adding other uh things to it. Uh so our our traditional historical businesses, even if you look at you know offshore Gulf of Mexico, right? It's a lot, there's a lot going on there in terms of just aging infrastructure and the shelf is is not a growth business, but we have opportunities to do new and different things in support of uh the shelf Gulf of Mexico, Gulf of America.
SPEAKER_02:Sorry, sorry, thanks.
SPEAKER_00:Uh the shelf Gulf of America as it changes, as it matures. So there's there's growth opportunities there. But then the broader energy mix, you know, we have a solar division and and and that that's exciting. We have opportunities with decommissioning. That's really kind of what I was talking about with uh supporting the shelf, but not only decommissioning, outsource operations. So we have a whole group that we put in place this year that is that we're we're calling our outsource operations group, where where instead of or in addition to historically, where we've just provided people working at the direction of our customers under several sort of layers of management in their systems where we could come in and really take over operations at a higher level and provide people, competent people that know and understand how to efficiently, effectively, safely operate facilities in the Gulf of America, where we could do that for our customers. There's growth opportunities there. Our INE uh division, our technical services division, there's a lot of uh going on in the world. So, you know, this demand for energy and the build-out of data centers and just the exponential growth in the requirement for electricity. I think that's an adjacent market that over the next few years that we're going to continue to look for opportunities in. Another adjacent market would be downstream, right? So some of our same customers uh who are employing service companies that have very similar capabilities to ours in these adjacent downstream industrial markets. That's an area that we're looking into and have had some organic growth, but uh uh, you know, we're really looking hard at acquisitions in in that space. Yeah, so those are those are some of the things that come to mind about in terms of growth over the next few years.
SPEAKER_01:A few opportunities there.
SPEAKER_00:There, they are endless. And good news is, you know, we have a strong balance sheet, we have um, which allows us to make acquisitions, to leverage our relationships with the banks in a way that in a very conservative way, you know, for anybody that that's out there, you know, are we taking too much risk? I can tell you that conservatism is built into our DNA. And even with the growth that we've had, even these acquisitions, uh, the way we're managing them, the, you know, in terms of how we're financing and and so forth, it's uh it's still quite conservative and and we're protective. Uh we understand that we're our core business is still in a very cyclical market and prices could go down. And we've seen that. We live, we've lived through it. My dad's lived through it, you know, 10 times, and Eric, Mark, and I have lived through it five times. And uh so we'll continue to be conservative in that way. But there's a lot of exciting growth opportunities.
SPEAKER_01:Amidst all the growth and um changes and exciting things happen at the company, from a personal perspective, what do you do to recharge, reconnect with your family, and kind of you know, find your own sense of purpose?
SPEAKER_00:Spend time with family and spend time alone. Those are two different things. Two different things, yes. But both of them are important and both of them help me. Uh, we we just come in through Thanksgiving. So hope everybody had a a great Thanksgiving. We've got Christmas around the corner. My family, I've I have four daughters, and uh one of them got married this year, and one and she lives in Baton Rouge with her husband, one lives in Tennessee. My oldest daughter, another third daughter is in college. Um, we're down the one left. So the the preciousness of having everybody home and together is uh is something that once they leave, you get to be more fond of. Samantha, I know you got a little bunch concern. They're never gonna grow up, they're they're staying home forever. That's right. We'll see. Um, but yeah, just having everybody home and together. And I I I think of a moment I'm actually having a visual image of this. And I last year, my youngest daughter was her birthday, and it's around Christmas. So everybody was home, and a few of the girls had already left. And her birthday is December 20th. And she was sitting in the living room, and her three sisters were sitting around her. And I think one of the presents she got was, I don't know, some hair clips or something. And all three of them were standing around her, putting clips in her hair. And I'm just sitting there, and uh, and I just said, I'm gonna, I want to remember this forever, right? So just having intentional moments of just letting things kind of slow down and trying to drown out the noise and just focus on family and and soaking it in. And, you know, again, I had some more experiences trying to practice that uh last month during a wedding. So yeah, just being with family and then, you know, getting out on my own and recharging in the yard and on the tractor. I I've talked about that before. I really, I really enjoy, especially this time of year when it gets cool just to be outside and walking around in the quiet, watching the trees grow. I I planted a I planted a bunch of trees around my house and I go outside and uh I look at them every day. You know, get you get a little older, you start appreciation appreciating things like the trees growing. Love it. Yeah.
SPEAKER_01:What what if I know you um you've got a hobby of of beekeeping? Does that give you a recharging or is that more of a different aspect?
SPEAKER_00:Is this how much time do we have left in our uh we could go on for a while? I yeah, that's one of the things that that I enjoy doing. And it it probably it combines. I I am uh I get a recharge from being out on my own, but I'm I'm also an extrovert and enjoy really enjoy being around people. Uh I I like showing people how the bees work and operate. Bees are just amazingly fascinating. I it it's it's hard for me as a person who believes in a God that designed everything. And you know, it's hard to imagine when you look at the complexity with which these tiny little insects that have brains that I don't even know how big their brains are. It must be really small because a bee is pretty small. And yet they work together in a pretty amazing way to create something. Actually, well, I call my my my uh honey or my little bee label. It's a sweet word honey. Proverbs, I don't know, I'm forgetting the verse now. I mean Psalms 105 or 119, 105. How sweet is your word to my taste, sweet and honey to my mouth. Back a couple thousand years ago, you didn't have refined sugar. So the sweetest thing that anybody knew about was honey. And it's just a thing that these little insects create and that you're able to gather from them, and they make enough to have a little extra to share because that's how it works. So yeah, I started beekeeping in 2018, I think, and been making a bunch of mistakes and killing a bunch of my bees over the years. But uh year before last had a fantastic crop of honey, and I was able to share honey with a lot of people actually around the office. I don't know. Did you get any honey from me?
SPEAKER_01:Uh I don't know that I did. I think I saw some, but I don't know that. All right, well, next time I'll be on my look at it. You'll be on my list. I've noted. Sure.
SPEAKER_00:But yeah, we we made a lot of honey, and I enjoy doing it, enjoy telling people about it and just the fascination of or you know, of understanding how these little insects work together to create something so complex. Just again, it's it's hard, it's hard not to see a creation, uh, a designer in that process for sure.
SPEAKER_01:A great example. So going back to looking ahead, uh, Danos-wise, what excites you most? I mean, we may have touched on this a little bit because I know you talked about a lot of things, but you know, what excites you most about the future for Danos?
SPEAKER_00:I just continue to see create opportunities for people to be developed in their careers and and hopefully sometimes, you know, experience a place where they're able to accomplish more than they than they would have even imagined, right? I think for me, the motivation really has become you know, it evolves over time. Come back and for me personally, you know, spend some time trying to prove yourself. And of course, you know, everybody's trying to feed their families and make some money and all those kind of things. And those are important and continue to be important, but the opportunity to create a, you know, that purpose-driven, people-first, values-based place to work where people can come and yet it's professional and it's growing and that they can grow. I mean, that's what excites me. So when I look at our five-year plan that we've just laid out where we're gonna, you know, double the size of our business again, and then we know why we're doing that. We're not doing that to increase our bottom line. Our focus and our real why is to create opportunities for people to be part of what we're doing here in terms of the values and to really learn and grow in a way that they are not just applying that at work, but what I I mean, what I get super excited about is hearing a story of how somebody who has taken leadership skills that they've learned at work and not only applied them to make Danos a better place to serve our customers, to serve our people, to serve our communities well, but then they are, you know, going back and taking those leadership skills and applying them to an organization that they're a part of, you know, a church or bitty basketball or, you know, coaching or some nonprofit that they're connected to. That's what gets me really excited. And I know that in order to accomplish the business objectives in terms of the growth that we're planning, we're gonna have to really back to that word, intentionally develop a lot of people to get ready to do more and to step up. And that's just gonna, that's just gonna create fantastic opportunities for people. It's it's gonna be awesome for the community. And, you know, we could talk about the foundation and uh everything that we're doing there through Seeds of Giving as well. I'm super proud of that. And uh but it's it's all connected, you know, the skills and the environment that we have created here and that we continue to to shepherd is putting people in a position to be able to do the kind of things through the foundation that that we're doing. That's uh that's been really fun.
SPEAKER_01:It's been exciting to be a part of, I can tell you that. And as we head into 2026, what message of encouragement do you have to share with the Danos team?
SPEAKER_00:It doesn't take very long to figure out that life and work and everything around it comes with a lot of challenges. And we, you know, we have challenges that we're gonna come up against as we go forward and we endeavor to pursue our goals and to have that growth and develop great people and and solve challenges for our customers and our community. But when I think about, you know, the industry we're in, and we talked about that. We are such a critical component of providing uh reliable, affordable energy that solves so many problems in the world. You know, we're in a great industry that is needed and will be greatly needed going forward. We have a purpose that I think is, you know, is beyond just ourselves and and the individual for anyone, the good for any one individual, but it's a collective good. It's a it's a focus on a higher calling. We have a great purpose, we have values that guide our decisions. We have a vision about where we, what kind of company we want to be. We want to set the standard, you know, we want to be the best for operational excellence, customer service and care for people. We have a strategy in place or a plan to get to that vision. And we have amazing people that are supporting that. You know, that's that's the message of encouragement. I mean, it's encouraging to me, really, to when I step back and say, yeah, I know it's gonna be hard. It's gonna be hard work, a lot of challenges along the way. But when you bring all those things together, it's great industry, purpose, values, vision, strategy, and the people that we have, that sort of ecosystem is gonna continue to attract. They're gonna want to be a part of what we're doing. We're gonna accomplish great things. So excited about that.
SPEAKER_01:Thank you very much. Any any final things that we didn't touch on?
SPEAKER_00:Um, I'm just you have to ask me questions.
SPEAKER_01:You have learned a lot. Well, I think this is really helpful, informative. Thank you so much. It's been a true pleasure, and I appreciate you joining me today. Thank you.
SPEAKER_00:You know, I'll we'll do a few more. This is the first time, you know. I I don't know, there's gonna be some most people are just gonna be listening to this, and we got headphones on, it's a mic in your face, and it's something new. So uh I'll have to do a few more so I can get comfortable with it. But this is really fun. Yeah, thanks for uh thanks for the questions. Fantastic. Thank you. All right.
