Pandemic Perseverance by Pangolin with Wiliam Benner and Justin Perry

When things go south, the values-driven organization finds a new direction. Pangolin Laser Systems was faced with taking a bit hit during the shutdown caused by the COVID-19 Pandemic. Shows and product orders were being canceled. In this episode, Pangolin CEO William Benner and Chief Operating Officer Justin Perry talk with Paul Simkins about how they found ways to be resilient and productive while preparing themselves for the post-COVID economy.

Plus, Justin shares his recipe for a North Carolina-style BBQ Brisket on his Kamado Grill! You can find the recipes, and many more besides, on the Smoke and Ash Facebook group or by emailing paul@BoldlyLead.com.

You can get a copy of Paul's eBook 15 Innovative Ways to Show Employees You Care and Not Break the Bank by emailing him at paul@BoldlyLead.com.

Join the discussions at our Podcast Facebook group here.
Learn more about Paul Simkins on his website.

We happily work with Buzzsprout for our podcast. See how they can help you and get a $20 Amazon Gift Card after you pay your second invoice!

Transcript

Producer: 0:00

The tech leaders toolbox podcast is brought to you by Paul Simkins and the bully LEAD program, focusing on helping tech leaders like you, and the frustration of low performing teams, and losing excellent employees, so they can increase productivity by 50%. Go home on time, and sleep better at nights.

Paul Simkins: 0:23

Hello, and welcome to the tech leaders toolbox. I'm Paul Simkins. And we're here because how you lead today determines how your team succeeds tomorrow. This is Episode 51 of the podcast. And one of the things I wanted to do because we've been several months now with the pandemic and various levels have shut down. And it becomes so discouraging for leaders to wonder if there's an avenue of there's a chance to succeed here with all of this. So I wanted to share a story today that I think is going to help give you a little bit of hope there. We're revisiting someone who's been on the podcast before. So I'm gonna be revisiting with Bill Benner with pangolin laser systems, as well as his chief operating officer Justin Perry. And they're going to tell you how what they've been doing during the pandemic to keep on going. And I think it's going to give you some ideas and give you some hope.

Unknown: 1:21

Are you ready?

Paul Simkins: 1:22

Let's go. Well, my guests today are from pangolin laser Systems, Inc. I have with me William Benner, the President and Chief Technical Officer of pangolin laser systems, as well as the Chief Operating Officer Justin Perry. Bill bynner, Julian bynner. He's provide the company provides hardware, software and services for laser light shows all over the world. Chances are, have you seen an excellent laser light show somewhere? It's a good bet it was powered by pangalan. Now bill holds numerous US and international patents. He's had articles published in trade journals and other publications. And he's the co author of multiple books. Justin is the chief technical officer and partner in pangolin laser systems. Starting with him in 2008. He has a degree in business administration from the University of Central Florida, and of course lives in the Central Florida area. He is married, he has an he mentioned he has a daughter and another one on the way. Very soon. Justin has been featured in several trade journals. And again, has been working with Bill since 2008. Bill Justin, welcome to the show.

Unknown: 2:40

Thanks getting a two for one special today, Paul.

Paul Simkins: 2:42

There you go. Always like it. Great. conversate always makes for great conversations. So again, you know, I always like to start out because I love to hear stories, the journeys of how people got where they are. Now, Bill you've been on before. And so so again, recap for those who it's been a while recap for those how you got where you are?

Unknown: 3:01

Sure, I'll give a very brief introduction, and then kind of maybe up to the point where we Justin joined the company, and then he can kind of take over from there. But yeah, basically, you know, it's a funny story. It started as I was in a rock band. In high school in college, I was a rock band. And what was neat was all the rock bands at the time, the biggest acts of the blues are called Pink Floyd. And others had lasers a part of their band, and I had already made a lighting system for our band. So lasers was just to kind of the next evolutionary step figured we'd need that. And it was very difficult to accomplish. But yet I accomplished it. And the lasers got lots of notoriety for the band and for the, and we had other bands come up to me and say, Hey, How'd you do that? Would you do that for us, too. And the band just kind of fizzled out, as normally happens with bands, especially high school and college bands. But my love for lasers and music continued. So I met another guy who had similar interests in music and lasers. And we said, hey, let's get together and make a business out of this. And we did. And basically built the business from an idea from, from, you know, kind of what sort of as a college project and when neither of us have business degrees, and we're just really passionate about the technology and about what it does to events, which is really spices events up and built the business. And so my story and I think I covered this last time to you was was kind of coming to a plateau right? I built the business as good as I could. But neither of us having me or my foreign partner Patrick having business degrees, we didn't really know what it was we did everything we knew how to do but it came to a plateau is about 1.2 million. And and Justin joined us in right around 2008 2008 Yep, yeah. And and of course, we just kind of gotten through is really the the epicenter of the great financial crisis, great time to join. But nevertheless, Justin who does have a business degree and lots of passion for business and A lot of drive, kind of took, participate in the business and really implemented many things that have taken us from the plateau where i, where i had accomplished too many bounds above that. So I'll just kind of that's where my story kind of doesn't really no, because I'm still here, but that's where Justin's joins. Uh, maybe this would be a good time for Justin to introduce himself and tell his story. Well, thanks. Thanks for the overview. Bill. It's a that was definitely a good one. And yeah, my story's it's pretty interesting. I, I had always had an appreciation for lasers. And when I was in college of blues, my sophomore year, Bill, you would put a an advertisement up for a position looking for somebody with some accounting and marketing related background. And I always had a curiosity for lasers played with them as a young kid and looked at the company. And it looked really, really interesting and fit in line with what I was studying. And then, as I came in, for my interview, I remember we were it was right around the time you guys were developing beyond. And so as a part of my interview process, I had to put together a marketing plan of how we would roll roll the product out. And we ended up scrapping that marketing plan. But it allowed me to learn a lot more about the laser industry as a whole. And what what fascinated me about the industry at that time as it was, it's a very niche industry that was poised for incredible growth. A laser as a technology in the lighting industry was still not as widely used as your classical le led moving head fixtures and things like that. But it was an emerging effect. So I kind of saw the the opportunity that it has had as something that really intrigued me, like we could really blow this thing out of the water, if we put the right pieces and tools in place. And another big passion of mine had always been international travel, I, as a young kid always had a desire to see the world experience different cultures and stuff like that. And, and pangolin at the time had being an international company. You know, I remember you told me one day, Jeff, you know, Justin, you're going to love the travel for the first couple of years. And so we we started doing a lot of trade shows around the world. And that kind of opened my eyes up as to what was happening in the lighting, industry, and then the laser industry as a whole, just getting to see how it worked in different in different parts of the world. So, you know, we started really growing the software enter the business by penetrating China, one of the first strategies we employed was was basically, you know, the vast majority of projectors are built in China, let's let's make sure that they're they're pairing our control and software together with that. And as a result of that, we built up just a monumental database, the product line really got into the hands of a just a really large amount of people and we built our internal marketing database up to you know, I'd be, yeah, we passed 70,000, we had, our database actually got so big that the software we were using couldn't handle it anymore. And we had to we had to migrate to another smoker. So you know, we're really, really proud to be able to get that many clients in the database. And then from there, we started looking at, well, how can we branch out a little bit more and, and so what we had realized from traveling, going to these trade shows and stuff was you know, we we as as a control company did a lot of the research and the development and Bill, I mean, you kind of pioneered a lot of that stuff. And then the people who manufacture the projectors sell this together with that, but they make they're making the lion's share, you know, they're making the lion's share of the money. So, you know, it was kind of like, we did a lot of the we did a lot of the research and development, you know, we're doing the support, but these guys are these guys are making the lion's share, you can kind of think of it. Um, you know, Intel sells the microprocessor, it's, it's inside of the computer, but Dell is really making a larger volume of that. And, you know, so we kind of had a brainstorming session, we were going to some masterminds, and we're like, why don't we flip the script? And, you know, we've got the database. You know, all the clients that perform laser shows are in our database, because they're using our software. Why don't we Why don't we try to consider selling the projector to them as well. And, and from there, we were at a trade show in, in Europe, and we met a guy named do Sean, who was the sales manager at a factory over there named kavon, in Slovakia, and they're based out of Slovakia. So they had really, really high quality engineering at an Eastern European price, but they didn't have a very big customer base. And you know, so we kind of explored the idea of giving them some designs and ideas for projectors that we would then distribute to our customer base and, and so that kind of eventually evolved into a division of pangalan that we call pangalan lasers and at That that division kind of exploded as well. And so, you know, kind of the combination of that is, is what's led us kind of where we are today. I mean, both divisions of the company are even in COVID times doing really strong that's because we're so well diversified. And then a lot of you know the additional developments that you came up with Bill with the the optical scanning technology and stuff like that this you know, we kind of are a one stop shop now we can provide you offer on the control hardware, the projectors, the OEM components that would go into a laser projector, and it's just, it's allowed us to really diversify out and and so that's just kind of that's kind of my story as how I evolved in the leisure industry. Kind of where my passion passion for it came from, I just always loved the idea of being able to take to be in an industry that was on the brink of growing and you know, kind of exploding and laser light shows have definitely exploded over the years and popularity and stuff. And, and being able to operate on an international scale and bring a product to an international marketplace. It was always fascinating to me and pangolins certainly provided a vehicle that allowed for that to happen. So

Paul Simkins: 11:14

great. So So basically, at this point, y'all manufacture the hardware you develop and produce the software and, and even program the systems, correct?

Unknown: 11:27

Yes, that's right. So we actually manufacture the guts of the projector right here in our offices in Sanford, the actual things that go into this, which is usable, not only a laser projector, but also other things like 3d printers and self driving cars. These are our other customers. And that's further diversification of our thing. The actual projectors themselves are still manufactured in Slovakia, but they use a lot of the components that we manufacture here in, in Sanford, and then they ship it back here to Sanford and we we go all around the world. So it's kind of a funny, funny thing. It's sometimes even Ilan says, you know, you take an atom out of the ground and how many times that Adam goes around the world before finally reaching and customer. It's funny. Yeah. Okay.

Paul Simkins: 12:15

So a couple of things that you talked about there that resonated me. Well, the first is just kind of an off note. You talked about the travel and getting the opportunity to travel and Bill saying, Yeah, you're gonna get sick of it real soon. I know, company. I

Unknown: 12:27

know. He didn't even say that. But you picked it up. Yeah, yeah. You're gonna be in the beginning as a company,

Paul Simkins: 12:34

I worked for MIT several years ago, I had the opportunity to travel a lot as a trainer doing because we had partners overseas. And it was that same thing. At first. It was like, exciting, great. I'm going to Hong Kong, I'm going to Singapore, I'm going to Kuala Lumpur and Australia and wow. And then, and then after a while, I'm going like, Oh, I'm going to Hong Kong again. And it just you know, especially going by yourself, it gets old.

Unknown: 12:58

And it's all the things that happen on a plane like screaming kids, your seat kickin, and sometimes you have a smelly person sits next to you. And you know, it's just us experience all kinds of stuff. So it's, it makes the trip not so fun.

Paul Simkins: 13:13

Yeah, that typically overseas trips are almost always packed plans are

Unknown: 13:17

Yeah, it's not where you're sitting. It's us sitting around you. That's my Yeah,

Paul Simkins: 13:22

I made the mistake my first trip overseas, where I took the window seat. Mm hmm. And the person's noses, you know, 747 and said, the people sitting in the middle seat and on the emcee, both basically slept the entire trip. So anytime I needed to get up, I had to wake everybody up so I could climb out. Yeah.

Unknown: 13:46

Yeah, yep.

Paul Simkins: 13:47

So now the other thing that that resonated me with Bill, you talked about how you hit that point where base with your background and knowledge. You and your partner took it as far as you could go? Sure. And and I like that, because you know, one of the things we talk about in leadership with john Maxwell calls the law of the lid. Yeah, which is that an organization can only grow as far as our leadership lid will take it.

Unknown: 14:13

Exactly.

Paul Simkins: 14:15

And the only way to take it further is we have to expand our lid and some and quite often that's by knowing who to bring in. Sure. That's part of what made Ray Kroc had success with McDonald's. Yes, absolutely. Knowing the people to bring in so that it's great that you recognize that and we're able to act upon that.

Unknown: 14:33

Yeah. together at the same time, one of them was meeting Justin and bringing him on and another was meeting Steven place and starting to his masterminds with Justin and then we we implemented the we implemented this is he either one of these wouldn't have gotten us where as wells but the combination of having somebody passionate and had a business background like Justin and and a lot of drawing To implement these things, because any of these mastermind guys will tell you it's nothing without implementation ideas without implementation is just dreams. I think you also to Phil, you always, you've always put a big emphasis on continued education, you know, kind of a Kaizen approach of constantly constant improvement, constant learning. And and so one of the things that bill always made a point was every year we were going to go to a mastermind for a while it was Steve places, we we went to my some Mike cleanings related stuff. Nick nanton, you went to the wakeup word? Yeah, we did. I did the wakeboard thing. But he, he's always really made that kind of a principle within the company that continued education, constant learning is a core value in the core principle here. And, and always, you've always done an amazing job of just providing the resources and capability to be able to do that. And I think, you know, we've always looked at continue education, education through the lens of we want to be the dumbest guys in the room, for sure. You know, if we're, we're the smartest guys in the room, we're in the wrong room, we want to be the dumbest guys in the room. And, and so we've always, you know, I think part of the success that we've had too, is just constantly seeking out new paths and new avenues to to continually educate ourselves and put ourselves into uncomfortable scenarios and uncomfortable situations where it kind of forces growth. So then definitely think that's been something very much instill a value you've instilled into the company. That's certainly contributed to the success as well. Yep.

Paul Simkins: 16:32

Excellent philosophy, you know, is that the old saying is if you know, if you're, if you're not uncomfortable, you're not growing? Yeah. All right. So I wanted to go back, because when Bill and I talked back in the spring, the COVID, was really just starting to hit hard. And we hadn't really felt the effects from it. But when we talked the other week, you did start feeling the effects of it, but you did some things. And I wanted you to talk about, again, how it impacted you and what are some of the things you've been doing to deal with that? Since the spring?

Unknown: 17:04

Yeah, maybe I'll talk from a kind of a high level approach of the company and you could talk kind of specifically about the marketing and that sort of thing. So so what we did was it did impact us, you know, be basically the lockdowns, especially, which, you know, even the World Health Organization now says is a bad idea. You know, it's, it was a bad idea, right. So it everything stops, right. So now at the time, it was a lot of layoffs, Justin, and I know a lot of people got laid off right away, you know, we've been and I felt really bad about that. I felt like corporate america really let people down. And I didn't want to do that we had plenty of cash in the bank, we have the way we way we run the company is to have cash reserves, you know, we're not in debt. Right. So we it's another thing to whose credits kind of different about us from corporate America, right? So so I knew that basically, even if we had zero revenue coming in, we could survive for a period of time. And I was determined to do that. So we kept all of our full time staff, we, we didn't cut any hours, we didn't cut any people. And as soon as we could, as soon as the lockdowns were over, we brought everyone back, because I could tell that people were starting to get kind of stir crazy, you know, it's like people, they need to have social interaction. So we brought them all back. And so so that was one thing. And it was all done on principle, not because we had to have it not because we needed to produce this product, we kind of didn't, you know, in the meantime, when we were producing, we had everyone continuing to do the job, just like they always had. And with the purpose of now we're building up stock, right? So now it actually puts us in a better position. Because we can say, in an industry, which typically delivers in 11 to 16 weeks, we can say delivering from stock, which we could do now. Right? So So basically, we've used the opportunity to kind of make ourselves stronger in that way. Plus, it's made the community stronger and so much that you know, all the employees really appreciate still having jobs in not not having their hours cut, and appreciate it and they kind of appreciate that we kept everyone together kept everyone interacting weekly had a couple of outage outings and a team building exercise and stuff like that. So So basically, kind of from a from a company perspective, I just wanted to keep things going. And only keep things going from the business standpoint, but keep keep the internal machine going. Right just because it's it's important, you know, people, people, that the people who work here, our customers to the extent that we have been able to keep our customers lives, the same and we have to some extent, but to the extent that we can keep everything the same. We wanted to keep everything kind of just just to maintain the sanity. You know, there's been so much drug abuse and alcohol abuse and spousal abuse and all kinds of other things, you know, just because things are going crazy. And fortunately, we within our sphere of influence. We've been able to To keep, we've been able to really push all that stuff away because it's just Alexei it's all been on principle, it's all been on, we're going to do this, we this is what we're going to do, we're not going to, we're not going to participate in this in this violent basically that's it I said no virus will stop us that was the thing. That was kind of our foundational thing. So now that was that's kind of sets the business aside, that was kind of, like I said, just on principle, but but now I'll turn it over to Justin talk about kind of what we did from a business standpoint to keep money coming in and and to keep and, you know, some expenses were cutting, but I'll turn it over to him to talk about kind of the marketing the business and, and how it has all played out for us. So on the employee note to Bill, you, he definitely did I mean, he, Gary Vaynerchuk, made it made a comment and and we had talked about this earlier in the year, but you work for your employees. And he basically said, if you if you take the mindset work for you, you're going to lose your key players, you work for your employees, and you, you definitely did late lay that foundation of that principle across the company. And I think from a leader leadership point of view, when the team saw that saw you doing that, I think, I think they appreciated it. And it definitely was a bit inspirational and a time where you do talk to a lot of people and you hear your buddies are getting laid off and stuff like that, when people see that, hey, you know, the founder of our company is actually figuring out how we can organize a team building for us. I think that that that resonated a long way. Yeah, from a business standpoint, we, um, so it's funny, when the pandemic hit, I was in the middle of a podcast called think like a CEO. And it was from the founder of Keller Williams. And so we're listening to that podcast. And he said, in times of crisis, you want to revert back to your ABCs. And what he meant by that was, first things first, go through all your expenses, go through your credit card statements and start to label stuff in order have a BNC a meaning I have to bear this expense, this is a this cost is a cost of doing business that we cannot go without your bees are things that help the company operate better, but are not necessarily required. And C's are things that are a luxury to have, but certainly do not help the company required. And even goes down to DS where I don't know what this is, what is this expense? And why are we paying for it. And basically, you eliminate your DS, you eliminate your C's, and you evaluate your B's and you keep your Ace and so we kind of started there. And it was an interesting exercise because it allowed us to see, you know, why do we have this subscription for this service, you know, are we are we actively using that is that active actively providing value to us, as well as to our clients. And so we were able to cut a lot of our overhead expenses down to just the core, the core things that we really, really did, did need for operational purposes. And that freed up a little bit of cash flow, to invest into things that do make a lot of money. So we, you know, we cut some operational expenses, but then we took some of those savings and invested them in a new CRM and an automation marketing software. We invested a lot a large amount of money into to online advertising. So Well, a lot of companies were cutting their ad budgets, we actually kind of doubled down on that. And, you know, the interesting thing is if people do their homework on on ad costs is there over the pandemic advertising costs have gone down, not up. You know, Facebook's and Google's realize that small businesses are a large, a large advertising block for them. And and they did reduce a lot of the advertising costs and provided some incentives for for people to advertise. So we've kind of doubled down on the advertising, and actually increased our budgets there. So we kind of pushed on to the throttle from that respect rather than held back. And, and then from an operational standpoint, we kind of looked at every process inside of the company from our administrative processes to our shipping and receiving processes to our repair processes. Where's Where are things broken? Where Where can they be fixed? Where can we automate, where can we improve it? So we spent a lot of time doing that, as well as cross training employees on different processes and procedures within the company. And kind of going forward from there, one of the it's something we've always wanted to do and and in all fairness, we're not done with this project yet. It's still an ongoing process project, but was internal company documentation. Right? So so one of the dreams is that one day, one day the company will operate like a McDonald's stuff, right? We will be that efficient and that that will documented that I could bring somebody in off of the street and have them trained and ready to go in a week. You know, Ready to go in a week. And with as complex as our business, our operating businesses operating internationally, it's tough to get new new staff trained and stuff like that. So we're investing a lot of time into create, using software like train Yule, to create video tutorials for company procedures. Instead of having a manual, we actually have video training tutorials on how to perform different functions across the company. So that's, that's been another big, big thing we did over throughout COVID. Just Just to make the business operate, operate a little bit better. And then finally, we actually increased our marketing and so much as re optimizing our websites, building new websites, improving improving the functionality of the websites, how they operate, how they integrate with the CRM, how they integrate with the accounting software. Just just really taken a bird's eye view to to how does our How does our machine work? There's a great book I'd recommend for anybody who listens, listens to the podcast. And it's from Ray Dalio, and it's called principles. So if you don't know who Ray Dalio is, he's the founder of Bridgewater associates is the world's largest privately held hedge fund. And he's an amazing, amazing businessman. And he says, you know, you really got to look at your, your business like a machine, and how do I oil the machine? And how, you know, if something breaks in a process, what broken my machine? And so we kind of looked at the business from from from that view? And how do we make this machine more efficient? You know, how, how do we how do we go from from driving a truck to driving a Tesla, you know, and, and that, that those exercises definitely did help. You know, they've improved processes here, they've improved productivity. And I think when when eventually things do get back to normal, we'll really be poised to, to tackle the market in a much, much more effective way. And in all the cases, he said, we even mean, just, I met all the employees, and I ended because the point was, is that although we kept our staff, the point wasn't, okay, we're gonna keep paying you for do nothing. It's what I said is all the pains in the butt that you've experienced all the lack of fixtures, all this, anything, it was a pain in the butt, now is the time to fix those main divots. Now that we don't know that we're not busy actually making product for the customers, let's fix anything, it was a pain in the butt. So that one, when it does turn out that now it's time to turn on that switch and start producing and we're going to be able to do it better. Because we did now Now we got time to deal with the pain. When we're cranking we don't have the time to deal with it. Now we got to deal with and and fortunately for us that time didn't last very long. It's like it for myself as a as a as a new product seller. I thought, Well, finally, now we're gonna get some time to really work on some new things. And, and that only lasts for about two weeks for me, and then I had to get back in back in motion yet. But yeah, everybody in the company participated in improving everything about the company.

Paul Simkins: 28:06

Right? Well, what I like I hear about that, and is, you know, first of all, again, that from the beginning, it was your commitment of we don't want to get rid of anybody, we're gonna look for ways to keep everybody. But not only that, when you looked at Well, you know, obviously, somewhere we have to trim things. But your your focus was, was never really on trimming employees, it was always on what else can we trim to try and get us through this time. And so again, you very much kept that focus on boys. And not only did you did you not just Well, we're just not just we're not going to get rid of people. But we're going to kind of stagnate, you said no, let's double you double down on your people as well as on your processes and double down and said, Let's get people cross trained. Let's keep them engaged. Let's keep them going. Let's let's find creative ways to keep everybody working.

Unknown: 29:02

Yep. Yeah, absolutely.

Paul Simkins: 29:05

How has everybody responded to that? I mean,

Unknown: 29:09

Well, I'll tell you what, I think what we can do is talk about, you know, the proof of the pudding is in the eating. And, and the The bottom line is that our business is down by 30%. That that's amazing. Because we're, we're still debt free. You know, and I tell you why I'm looking at corporate America right now. And it is just debt out there. It's just amazing. So I think that we're doing amazingly well for having gotten through this pandemic, you know, to be down only by 30% from a record year. 2019 was a record year for us. Yeah. So and not only down by 30%. But if we look at the industry that we're in, we are in the entertainment industry. So our primary markets are touring, festivals, concerts, you know, I mean, those are the primary markets that we serve. And, and they got obliterated, I mean, let's be honest, you know, COVID COVID obliterated a lot of that stuff. So for us to only be down 30% I think a we need to be very thankful but be it's off, it's definitely, it's definitely a result of just the mindset that we've adopted as an organization that we, you know, like Bill Bill said earlier, we are not going to play by by this COVID playbook, we're going to write our own playbook and we're going to use the term often weather the storm, you know, we're going to weather the storm and, and we've really, really done a good job at that. And, you know, in our industry as well, we've helped other people become creative, you know, not only in our own company, but you know, driving laser shows Who would have ever thought driving laser shows is going to be a thing, right? You know, you're going to drive into a parking lot where you'd see a movie, and they're going to start putting on laser shows, this is actually emerging as, as an incredibly popular way of getting people out, you can do it safely it you know, if you if you're following that, that mindset, you can do these, you can do a drive and laser show very safely, everybody can maintain a social distance. And it brings joy and excitement into people's people's lives during a time when they probably need it. And this past weekend, Justin and a couple other people on the team put on this thing. Why don't you describe it? Because I don't even know how to describe this thing. It's like a it's a blizzard? It's a reverse. What do they call it? Yeah, it was, it's called a reverse parade. So So what so we just moved out to the very last kind of give you the, the full full picture, we moved on to the very, I'm an avid golf junkie. So I'm out playing golf at the local club, and the I get paired up with the city manager. You know, we're over 18 holes, we're talking and he's like, you know, you do laser lightshow stuff. And I was like, Yeah, well, we build the equipment and stuff. And he's like, man, we're racking our brains about what to do for our Christmas parade. Because, you know, we can't have people congregating because of the fear of COVID. And we're just trying to figure out what we can do with this. So he said, they were thinking about this concept called a reverse parade, where people will drive into a park, and instead of the parade going by you, and you're standing out on the street corner, you drive around the parade. So, you know, he showed me some photos and some ideas. And I'm like, you know, no offense city manager, but this is pretty boring on the image. I think after a year of isolation, if people are gonna wait in line to see this, they, they might not come to the Christmas parade next time you have one. And and so we as a team, we all talked about it. And we're like, Well, why don't we sponsor this thing as a way of showing the community what we do bringing some joy into the community and stuff. And, and so we set it up. So what they have is a big park, and it's got a, it's got a road that kind of goes around the park, and they set up these flows, you know, your traditional parade floats throughout that. And then at the end of the loop, there's a big laser light show kind of as as the finale. And, I mean, it was so successful, we're still getting the worst of the wait for the final count on the number of people that attended. But it's well in the mat, well, above about 30,000 people were sure of just based on the number of cars that we counted average number of people per cars. And I think I think the final tally will surely be more than that. And it was it's a backed up for miles, you know, just just miles and miles and miles and participants. So, um, you know, so if you had, again, just another example of using creative approaches to solve problems, and, and we, you know, we would have never imagined that, you know, driving laser shows or reverse parade with a laser show, that this would be an application for the technology, but you know, in times of crisis, innovation, innovation, you know, it's kind of key and thinking outside the box is is key. And so it's you know, it's working, it's becoming, it's definitely becoming a thing, it's definitely becoming a thing.

Paul Simkins: 34:04

So how did all these decisions that you made, again, the focus on keeping your people and not just keeping your people but doubling down cross training and everything? How did your personal or organizational core values drive those decisions?

Unknown: 34:22

And you know, that you know, what's funny is what you just said, is, Paul is is, is the is exactly what it is. In other words, the core values drove the decisions. I don't know how they did, but they just that's that's what happened. That is an explanation of what happened. What were you using? What happened? Well, our core values drove the decision. That's that is what happened. I don't know. I don't know how it happened. But that's I don't know how to explain how it happened. But that is what your question is what happened. You know, your question is an explanation of what happened is The core values it is an application, you know, so in when, when the crisis hit our core core values came out even more is became even more powerful or more more obvious, more evident. Yeah, I think, you know, in that respect, I think in times and times of crisis, what you, you know, what you truly stand for will become apparent. And, and so, this was a, you know, it's, it's been a tough year for everybody. And, and you've always told the people here at the company, you know, I want pangalan, to be a vehicle for growth for you, personally, I want you to, you know, the company is here to help you as an individual grow. And so 2020 was a year where a lot of the values that that as a company we profess to stand for, got tested. So, you know, it was kind of an opportunity for us to put our money where our mouth was where we where are we going to stand behind the core values that we profess, we stand for? Or are we going to make the easy decision and just start laying people off and doom and gloom and what was me, and, and we stood behind the laurels, and we stood behind the value system that that that exists within the company. And and it was a test of that. And I think I think that we've passed the test, I think that we've proven to our team and to the industry that we we stand behind the value system that we profess to believe in, it was interesting poll is that the I was in a kind of a it was one of these zoom meeting type things between a bunch of companies and that and basically our collective clients. And you know, I gave a presentation, and in my presentation I showed no virus will stop us. And then our competitor did a presentation and he said something like, Well, how do you expect us to do anything? There's a pandemic, right? I'd much rather be us than them right now. We're doing pretty well. I think that they I mean, they got it, they were amazed that they're in business just because of if that's your attitude, how am I supposed to do anything, there's a pandemic, how am I suppose it is a, always a victimhood, but it was like, it was it was self defeatist. Right? It was self defeatist. So it was, it was a big stark difference between our presentation and our attitude that we projected. And there's

Paul Simkins: 37:25

I love how you knew what your non negotiables were with all of this, and you stuck with it. Yeah. And committed to it. That's great. All right. So finally, so what's one tip or one thing a leader can do or apply today? To add value to their team?

Unknown: 37:42

What would you say? Just, you know, I'm gonna go back to the, to the discussion that, that I think that the whole conversation has evolved around, it's your value system, I think one of one of the best things a leader can do is know what their own principles and value system is, you know, and, and it sounds kind of corny. But But every mastermind that we go to the real leaders in the group, I always hear them say the same thing. You need to, you need to have a value system, you need to have principles, and you need to be working for something bigger than yourself. Because if you're just working for yourself, eventually you're going to lose motivation. But if you have a larger purpose and and a larger value system and a larger set of principles, it's bigger than just you as one person is and communicate that to the team. Yeah. team have that. Yeah, that the whole thing is bigger than the team. Exactly. Yeah. And and so i think i think it's a it's a great exercise for anybody who's in a leadership based position to take take some time, you know, we're going into a new year, take some time on a quiet evening and write down what your values are as a human being and what your principles as a human being are, and try to live live by those laurels. Make sure to communicate. Yeah.

Paul Simkins: 39:01

Excellent. Great. Thank you both William better, Justin Perry. Thanks for being on the show.

Unknown: 39:06

Thank you, Paul.

Producer: 39:09

While you're here, take a moment right now to subscribe to the tech leaders toolbox podcast, and leave a review. That way, you will always be up to date on the bold and innovative leadership principles we are sharing here. And come join the tech leaders toolbox Facebook group as well, where you and other leaders discuss these concepts in more detail. And we answer your questions. Subscribe today and share this with your friends.

Paul Simkins: 39:38

All right, and we're back and of course this part of the show one of my favorite things to do because I love outdoor cooking. I do all kinds of outdoor cooking. I've got a smoker I've got a grill. Dutch ovens and being involved in the scouting program, do a lot of camping and cooking outdoors over open fire and with coals and Dutch ovens and all and so I love doing this so much. I've actually created a few Facebook group called smokin dash, and on the smoking dash Facebook group me and all of my friends who are other also fans of outdoor cooking. We share recipes we share what we're doing this weekend, what we're working on, our everybody likes to show off pictures of their cookers and all that and talk about all the wonderful things they can do. And so I like to share a outdoor cooking recipe in every episode of the show. And I also make that recipe available out on the smoke and ash Facebook group. And when I have guests, I like to invite them if they have a favorite recipe to share, to share that recipe with the group as well. And Justin, you said you had a great recipe that you wanted to share with us today.

Unknown: 40:41

Yeah, so I've recently joined the the smoker brotherhood and I bought myself a kamado grill. And I've been fascinated with it ever since since I purchased it. And many moons ago before I was a married man, I dated a girl up in North Carolina and I had also fallen in love in that period of my life with that North Carolina vinegar based barbecue sauce. And so when I got the tomato, I started reading, reading up on briskets, and how difficult they are to cook and you know, you kind of have to break the meat down and all these different things. And so I read a lot of different strategies and ideas about how to cook a brisket and then kind of played on my own experience having gone up to North Carolina and having a real passion for that North Carolina style vinegar based barbecue and I kind of melded all the things together. And so so the recipe kind of goes like this is um, go get it you know, you go and get a good sized brisket. If you can find the USDA prime version of the brisket, it will make an exponential difference in the quality of the final cook. And so I highly recommend Sam's Club they have USDA prime beef over there. Many times it's going to be cheaper than your local supermarkets choice based beef. So prime beef obviously being a much higher grade a much higher quality. So try to find a prime brisket if you can. Once you get it home, you're you're gonna want to trim trim the fat off of it, but leave about a quarter inch of that fat cap on the top of it. But save those other fat trimmings they will come in useful they will come and useful down the road. But you're going to want to trim the brisket after that. And then the next stage is making your rub. So different people have different flavor flavor palates. I've used a simple mix of garlic powder, paprika, salt, pepper, a little bit of cumin in there, a little bit of cayenne pepper, because I like the spice. And then sometimes I'll use a little bit of nutmeg in there to kind of add another layer of complexity, get your rug going and then really rub that into your brisket. And before you put the rub on a little trick that I learned was to if you can get peanut oil and rub the brisket with peanut oil, and then put the and then put the rub on after that the rub is going to stick to the meat a lot better. And that peanut oil kind of helps just kind of helps tenderize the beef a little bit it gives it a little bit of a nutty flavor. And that definitely tends to shine through in the final cook. So once you've got your peanut oil on and you've rubbed, you rub your brisket down, you put it in the oven or not in the oven in the fridge, wrap it in saran wrap and you want to let it sit for about 24 hours. But after that you're going to fire your smoker up you want to get around to 25 to 250 put your brisket in there and you're pretty much setting it and forgetting it. And then the next stage after that is making your your sauce and so with the sauce, I like to go get a good tomato puree, something that has organic if you can find it and you don't want to have any preservatives, no, you know No, none of those ones that have olive oil and salt and other stuff just real raw tomato paste are to make a tomato puree. And then you're going to put some tomato paste in there. Then after that, you're going to get some apple cider vinegar and you're going to add that apple cider vinegar to that and the rate the rations and the the portions that you're going to you're going to use here depend on how many people you're making it for. So it kind of varies depending on how many people you're making it for but apple cider vinegar, then after that a little bit of honey and if you can get it molasses, a little bit of mustard in there, salt, pepper, and then you're going to whisk that all together. And then you've got you've got the base of your sauce and you can kind of add add seasonings as you like but that's really your base. And then once you have that based on then you want to get a block of brown sugar and crumble that in there and begin to whisk that in and sweet sweeten it up to your desired sweetness level and you kind of have your base and then by at that stage, probably about four hours, four hours after you've had your brisket on the smoker then you just give it a light little mop and then close it back up and keep smoking and then About about every hour after that, I give it a little mop. Another trick that I've learned is when you when you make that brisket, if you take some chunks of hickory wood or mesquite wood, and you soak those in apple cider vinegar overnight and put them into the smoker, when you put the brisket in, that just kind of adds another level of complexity to the brisket as well. So not required, but kind of an extra step that that really sweetens things up. And then after that every hour, you're just mopping your brisket mopping your brisket, mopping your brisket. And I've kind of found, so I'm normally doing about anywhere between an eight to 10 pound brisket. And I'll smoke that for about 16 hours. Sometimes even more, you know, to the point where on the outside it is charred, I mean it is almost black. And then when I bring it inside it is you will try to cut it and it should just crumble. It's almost just melting together so it gets so tender inside. And when you use that Prime beef that that fat, that fat just melts. And so you can't even really slice it at that point. It just becomes this crumbled beef brisket with a lot of good fat in there. And then you lather on some sauce, then make maybe a little homemade coleslaw and some big beans and you have added and that's that is my brisket recipe.

Paul Simkins: 46:27

That sounds terrific too. So again, you mop it with that sauce. You said as you're cooking it.

Unknown: 46:33

Yeah, yeah, that adds a good flavor to it. And that that salt kind of tends to caramelize you know, as you're smoking it over time. And the big things that kind of differentiate it is rubbing it with that peanut oil that that definitely adds a great layer of complexity. And then really given the brisket the time. So after you rub it, just putting it in the fridge for 24 hours. That really lets the so what happens is the meats actually sucking in some of the flavors from the world. And it really penetrates the meat and it goes a long way in kind of getting a good barbecue.

Paul Simkins: 47:09

Exactly. Sounds great. All right. Justin Perry's brisket. Barbecue brisket. All right. All right. So my gift. Thanks, Justin. So thank you so much. Thanks. So tell us right now, what is it you're working on right now that you're excited about?

Unknown: 47:25

Yeah. So the big thing right now that we're seeing is companies are trying to fight in states in states that are still open and not locked down, that people are trying to find unique ways of getting people into their businesses or getting a message of hope out there or getting an advertising message out there. And, and lasers are really a phenomenal tool to do that. Because we could project a corporate logo or text, or a slogan, we can project this miles away. And we can make a projection hundreds of feet wide and hundreds of feet tall, using using a number of lasers in combination. So lasers for projected digital advertising is been a segment of our business that has just exploded. You think about how many times in a day you're getting an advertisement fed to you, probably so often, you don't even recognize him anymore. I mean, I mean, you got ads being thrown at you every which way. But I tell you what you will, you will recognize and what will catch your catch your eye is seeing a giant laser projection, I mean, it's impossible to miss. And so it's it's a great vehicle for companies to really shoot, you know, get a message out there or display their corporate logo on a very massive scale for in many cases cheaper than you'd be able to do with with traditional forms of advertising. And then the other one is really these driving laser shows that those, it's become a great way of allowing people to safely get together in the comfort of their own vehicle. So everything safe, but you can enjoy an outdoor event and a beautiful laser light show. So those become very, very popular use of our technology as well.

Paul Simkins: 49:11

Great. So if someone's interested in hearing more about that, how do they get ahold of you?

Unknown: 49:15

Yeah, they can check us out. go directly to the website, www dot get a laser.com. Terrific.

Paul Simkins: 49:24

Well, again, William better. And Justin Perry, thanks for being on the show today. And again, everybody reach out to that because they do some terrific stuff there. And they've really have a great focus on how to take care of their people, which makes all the difference in the world. Thanks. Thank you. Well, that's about all we have time for this week, folks. Until next time, go out and be the leader. You were meant to be.