I don’t do a lot of social media. I had to turn down the noise last year so I could focus. It was a very good decision for me personally. The one network where I do continue to participate is LinkedIn, where I keep in touch with people from my professional life. While browsing my feed for the latest news from my contacts, I came across a post about someone who had suddenly … [Read more...]

Years ago, I had a live podcast on Blog Talk Radio. I really enjoyed conducting live discussions and interacting not only with my guests, but also with the listening audience. One evening as I was going about my business, I suddenly realized I was more than an hour late for a LIVE episode on Blog Talk Radio! I was shocked at myself. This was the first time I can recall … [Read more...]

Welcome to the first edition of the Five-Minute Gemba, a bi-weekly newsletter designed to help you accelerate your Industry 4.0 Journey. The other morning, I woke up at 4 AM with my brain spinning, in full problem-solving mode. A technical issue I had encountered for one of my CIMCO Machine Data Collection customers evidently was prioritized in my slumbering brain. I had … [Read more...]

Recently, I experienced a real life episode of “The Old Woman Who Swallowed the Fly.” As the nursery rhyme goes, her story starts with a problem (swallowing a fly), and quickly escalates as she attempts to resolve it. Eventually, after swallowing a horse, she dies. Luckily for me, I didn’t actually swallow a fly and my story has a happy ending. Here’s how my nursery rhyme … [Read more...]

“Human workers in the future will need to be creative to fully realize the benefits of all the new things for the future—new products, ways of working and technologies. Robots currently can’t compete with humans on creativity. The future workplace is going to demand new ways of thinking, and human creativity is the key to it. “ - Bernard Marr, “The 10 Vital Skills You Will Need … [Read more...]

In 2014, my family relocated from Danville to El Dorado Hills, California, just one year after I decided to shift the focus of Managed Solutions to smart manufacturing endeavors (you can read the entire story starting with “The Adventure Begins”). During our new home search, much of my work supplies were in storage, which forced me to work more resourcefully. When we did find … [Read more...]