Tracking Your Shop’s Performance, with Lauren Dunford—EP. 147

When we think about low lift, high return, reducing unplanned downtime through getting visibility into when your machines are running, when they're not and why? So you can roll that up into a Pareto attack. The top cause of loss. That's actually the place to start.

This is Swarfcast.

I'm Noah Graf.

Our guest on today's show is Lauren Dun, CEO and co founder of Guidewheel. Guidewheel produces a sensor that clips onto a machine tool's power supply to collect data about its performance. Manufacturers use the data to understand what variables on the shop floor need to be improved, such as change over time, manpower or quality of equipment.

Today's podcast is brought to you by Graff Pinkerton. Looking for a screw machine, rotary transfer.

Machine or CNC machine?

Grafbinkert's got you covered. When you're buying any used machine, you're taking a risk. So it's important to buy from someone who knows their stuff and who is going to give you straight information about what you're buying. Grafbinkert is a family owned firm that's been dedicated to selling great machine tools to the turn parts industry for 75 years. It specializes in the top multispindle brands including Index, Schutte, Gildemeister, Tornos, zps, Acme and Wickman. They also sell a variety of other types of used equipment such as cnc, Swiss cnc, turning centers and parts washers. Machine tools are complicated. If you're going to buy one, you should go to people who are knowledgeable and committed to the industry. Learn more at www.grafpinkert.com. that's www.graff P I N K E R T.

I am honored to be with Lauren Dunford, CEO and co founder of Guide Wheel in San Francisco, California. Welcome to the show, Lauren.

Thanks so much Noah. Great to be here.

Today we're going to talk about peak performance in a factory, how to achieve that. And first, just to start, I'd like just a very quick summary of Guide Wheel. Then we're gonna talk a little bit about you and we'll go back to Guide Wheel. So yeah, what do you guys do?

We have a platform we call a factory ops platform. So it allows any factory machines of any age, make or model to clip on sensors to the machine and get real time visibility and all of the tools that their teams need to achieve peak performance. So that starts with making sure their machines are running when they should be, increasing utilization and runtime and then has lots of areas where it can expand from there. We're big believers in starting with the lowest lift, highest return areas on the factory floor. Thinking about the full team. So empowering everyone from the operator through to the CEO with a shared source of the same visibility. And then we're also big believers in starting and accelerating impact over time. Not trying to have every bell and whistle on the planet all pushed on at once, but instead start with that low lift, high return and then accelerate over time.

Okay, now I want the three minute bio. You know, first of all, it's great to have a woman on the podcast. You could probably count on two fingers on two hands how many women we've had on the podcast, which is very sad. So that makes it already slightly more interesting. And second of all, we've had some people in the Bay Area, but not a lot. And so I think that adds an interesting aspect. We have customers at Graft Pinkert in the Bay Area that do machining, but it's not the first thing that comes to mind when you think of manufacturing. So first give me your story. You went to Stanford, you've done some various things before you did this. Give us a little background.

Yeah, definitely. So I've been in supply chain and ops now for a dozen plus years. First got hooked on the operations world while I was at Stanford, then actually got a Fulbright to study supply chain and realized I am not a person who can study. That's not where I thrive. I've got to be building.

Where was the Fulbright scholarship to?

It was actually to India.

Wow.

So I was looking at supply chains based in New Delhi and looking all over India, which was fascinating. Definitely full of adventures.

I'm sure that gave you a very interesting perspective on supply chain and just how productivity can vary.

Yeah. And after that I actually spent five years working out of a fresh food manufacturing plant in East Oakland. And it was there, sitting in the plant every day, that I saw firsthand some of the just amazing opportunities that exist to improve productivity. I was on the account management side, so I was in charge of 65 million of our west coast business. But I sat in the plant, reported into our VP of Ops and saw the Excel spreadsheets and the whiteboards we were using to track and also saw that the reason we were tracking things so manually wasn't because the operations team wasn't fantastic. They were. They were making great decisions about technology. There just weren't great tech options for manufacturers that weren't the world's most massive. So I headed from there back to Stanford and focused a two year MBA on how do we Apply technology in ways that are empowering and helpful and legitimately solve big problems within manufacturing. That's what kicked us off on this journey with Guidewheel.

I mean, did you have like a light bulb turn on your head where you were just like, what if we had this thing that could hook on to a machine that would do this? What I'm always interested in what inspires stuff. Did somebody else, your co founder perhaps, come up with it? What sort of serendipitous turn of events made you come up with this way of working on the performance in the factory?

So many things in life are not. Unfortunately, one light bulb moment and this fits in that bucket. This was starting with initial prototype version of the platform that was informed by asking customers what they wanted. So talking with VPs of manufacturing, plant managers, maintenance supervisors, saying, where is the pain in your day? What are the frustrations you're feeling? What keeps you up at night? And then trying to solve that pain. That first version, I look back and I'm like, oh my gosh, you know, we clipped some sensors on. We were looking at the data at that point. We were focused on energy management within the plant. And it's been now two years initially of iterating and learning from, okay, we released this first platform. It met the first need that they had said. But then we watched how people used it. And what we saw was at first they had told us, oh, we need to manage cost, things like energy waste, we want to reduce waste. But what we saw was the people who were using the platform, that early version just to reduce waste used it once a week, kind of on a ad hoc basis. There was a whole group of other people though, who were using the same machine. Visibility. Those sensors we had clipped on showed what the machines were doing second by second. And what we saw was they were using that many times a day for a very different reason, which was to improve the utilization of their equipment, reduce that unplanned downtime, or that lost production time on their machines. And so we watched how they were using it and thought, oh my gosh, this is such a much higher ROI area to focus. When we think about low lift, high return, reducing unplanned downtime through getting visibility into when your machines are running, when they're not, and why, so you can roll that up into a Pareto attack, the top cause of loss, that's actually the place to start. So at that point we pivoted the design of the platform to focus in on that use case of reducing lost production time. And it's evolved and developed a bunch since there.

Very interesting. I want to know just a little bit, what does it look like? What is it physically doing when it's on these machines? It just hooks up to the power supply or does it hook up to the PLC control? I've interviewed a few other people, interviewed a company called Machinery Metrics or Machine Metrics and I just sort of visualize it. Tell me how I should visualize this product.

So what we're building towards is full factory ops visibility. So sensors that give you all the critical metrics you care about. Where we always start is a simple clip on sensor called a current transformer or a CT that's actually been used on many plant floors for decades. It clips around the first phase of the three phase electrical connections. These big pieces of equipment, any size, you know, any machine that uses electricity, it clips around that first phase, plugs into the cloud via whether it's WI Fi, Ethernet, lte, whatever, the easiest way for the plant to connect it is. And then that electricity draw of the machine is a beautiful second by second heartbeat of when it's running on, load idle or off. And we translate that into the web platform where it sends alerts if a machine is doing it something it isn't supposed to. Helps you identify the reasons for lost production time, bringing in context from the plant floor, layering in production and quality and speed and all of those other metrics on top of that real time heartbeat. But that sensor, so you can visualize it, is a simple like Fitbit for the machine that clips around that phase one of the power cord.

Okay. So my sense is, you know, I sell machines for a living and people ask, well, what are the hours? So they usually say on hours, run time and cutting time. So it's keeping track of all of those things. And that's based on how much power it's using.

Exactly. And the nice thing about that clip is you don't have to tunnel into the PLC or pull out or make sense of data in different formats. It's all a simple clip it on in minutes and you can be turning the lights on in terms of the visibility into all of those different machine activity metrics you might care about very quickly.

Okay. And then you're looking at the people that are operating that equipment, the type of equipment, and then just breaking all those aspects down compared to the data and patterns you've found.

Exactly. So it's benchmarking by machine, by plant, by process, type, by operator, being able to slice and dice and make use of the data. Because at the end of the day, no one wants data. What they want is action and results on the ground. So it's making that data useful that really is the key. Both through benchmarking from what it can collect automatically and from looking at the reasons for the lost production time. So bringing in the context from the plant floor around, if a machine wasn't running, why was it? Was it lack of material, was it setup time, changeover time? And giving the right visual tools for the team to be able to zero in on that top cause of loss so that their limited time can then be prioritized to attack the top problems that are holding back production.

I see. This is an interesting question. You probably know what's the perceived utilization versus the actual utilization of the machines?

The answer will depend a lot on the type of plants.

Right, Right.

And typically perceived as much higher than actual is the short answer there. As I'm sure you know, you've talked with others about and have heard. Definitely what we see is for a shop that's running a high volume.

So you're doing mainly plastics and packaging.

Exactly. We have, we have good success stories across lots of different industries. But right now we're focused on the plastics and packaging industry.

Okay.

So within that industry, a high volume shop might target an 85% utilization and be at closer to 60%. 65% is typically what we'll see. Sometimes lower, lower volume shops, then it might be okay, they're at 30% or 40% or even below that.

Right. Because the higher volume people have to really hit it. Right. Otherwise they're really screwed.

Exactly. If your machines are running, you are much more likely to hit your goals.

Right. Okay, so let's go through the problems. It's different equipment than the stuff most of our listeners are doing. Their metal working. They're often pretty high volume stuff. It runs the gamut. What are some of the biggest points of waste? Is it equipment? Is it people? Is it poor maintenance? Give me the breakdown.

Yeah, definitely. What we see is changeovers and setup time almost always are the top areas where there's massive opportunity for improvement through simple changes. So changeovers where you can be able to spot the difference between the operator who's running a 10 minute changeover for the same type of product and one who might be running a 45 minute changeover. Or if your changeovers are longer, it might be the difference between three hours and eight hours. But there being a big opportunity to have the operators who are running those much more efficient changeovers share those best practices and yes.

So do you know why? What are the main reasons why some people have much better changeovers and setup times?

Yeah, it depends a lot on the process. So depending on the shop, what we typically see is kind of that smed. So a single minute exchange of dye, that process of. If we were nascar, how quickly would we be able to change everything? By preparing really well, having everything we need right next to us, by really dialing in that process to make sure we've thought about every piece that we're doing within that changeover, optimize that as well as thought about the process as a whole.

Trying to make sure people aren't getting up and going to the bathroom or getting up and going to talk to, not to get a tool from somewhere else in the room.

Exactly. All those little things. If the team can see how important it is that we not lose that runtime during the changeover and can together be sharing best practices. It might be the night shift sharing with the day shift or vice versa. People who wouldn't always overlap, but if they can have the data to look together at, where are the real bright spots? Who has figured out how to run an eight minute changeover and have that person share that amazing knowledge, creating that opportunity to let the bright spot shine and then find out what's going right and share that.

Is it mainly you guys interpreting the data and helping them figure out a solution or is it usually you give them the data and then they put their heads together and figure it out themselves?

It's always the team themselves. No one will know your business better than you. What we try to do is support by working with you to figure out where are the team meetings, whether it's a shift handoff or a scrum meeting or a weekly review and what is going to be the information that that in your existing meeting, no one wants longer meetings. So we don't want to be adding time. What we want to be doing is having you pull up the pieces of the platform that will give the right visibility and information for the meetings. You're already having to be able to drive that continuous improvement process. Those innovations and ideas always coming from our customers, but being enabled by the visibility that the platform provides. And then the other thing is bringing them into the platform so that it can systematize that process. So it's not just oh, we have a great idea, it's how do we build this in now to the escalating alerts within the system so those best practices can be shared as part of a systematic, dependable platform, rather than live in people's heads and only be accessible through a phone call or a text.

Listeners first. I gotta tell you, I'm so grateful for you guys tuning in. I know we have lots of competition out there. Freakonomics, this American Life, Joe Rogan. Also, I just want to let you know if you have guest ideas or questions for me or Lloyd, we'd love for you to reach out.

And if you want to talk about.

Future advertising opportunities, we're very happy to.

Talk to you anytime.

Feel free to email me at noahraphpinkert.com that's N O A H at G R A F-F P-I N K E R-T.com and now back to the episode.

What are the main problems you're finding? Okay, so we talked about setup. Is it that people don't maintain the machines? Is it the machines are, you know, outdated? Is it a labor problem? I'm sure it's some of all of these. But what are you finding?

Yeah, yeah. Always depends on what's happening in the market. Preventive maintenance, always super important, and making sure that machines aren't being just run to death but are being well maintained never goes away as a challenge. So we always see that. The other thing we're seeing right now is labor being a huge challenge for so many of our customers. And that feeling sometimes like something where there's nothing we can do, we just don't have the labor to run the machine. What we have seen is sometimes people will find interesting ways of actually with the right data about how much utilization they're losing because they don't have the right operators, having that data can actually inform very creative solutions to that challenge. So whether it's figuring out a way to do more with fewer people for those times when the no labor challenge is what's holding you back, or whether it's being able to make the case for changes that can access new labor pools and bring in people you might not otherwise. Without that data, whether it's wages or overtime or being able to have that ability to quantify the cost of the problem and the benefit of solving it in terms of those increases in runtime and production suddenly open up a lot of times new, very creative ideas from within our customers themselves.

Yeah, well, that's good because then you're a little bit more hands off on that part as well. Where do you see the product going and the future of the company? I mean, it sounds like you've got a pretty interesting product you're offering. Is it pretty much one Fits all. And how is it advancing? Where do you see the next thing?

It's advancing fast. So we're releasing 100 plus updates a year, focusing always on two ways of deciding what those updates are. The first is we're working backwards from this Factory Ops vision. What does a manufacturing team need to be fully empowered to reach sustainable peak performance. And doing that in a way that's empowering to every level of the team. That's the end goal and the vision towards that journey. We're always bringing in feedback from our customers who let us know this is the thing that would drive X results or X improvement in ROI for us. Or here's an area where we know the intent of this feature, but it's not quite doing it yet. You need to make xyz.

Can you give me a specific example?

Oh, yeah. So yesterday we had a customer who Our escalating alerts are a beloved feature. To be able to have an alert go to the right person, if something is happening with the machine, it shouldn't say it's drawing more current than it should for a given process, indicating it might have a mechanical problem. They always want to be alerted. But to have the right person alerted first and then that escalate if the problem hasn't been resolved. So I had a customer ask us yesterday. You know, we see the alert can escalate at 10 minutes and 60 minutes and then 2 hours. We actually want to have it escalate at 5 minutes, 10 minutes, 15 minutes and then 30 minutes. And we were able to make that small tweak there. And this morning I saw a couple of hours ago, they now have the option to get alerted at the cadence that works best for them. So those are very small things. But small things matter when you're getting people excited about technology. It's those moments of delight around here's something I thought would never be possible and suddenly it is. And also the speed at improving how we meet their needs, that helps them see where. Where technology can continue to solve those pains and reduce frustration rather than ad work. So it's listening to those kinds of very small things as well as the much bigger requests around. If the system could learn what's normal for my machines from a pattern basis, pull in what I'm running and when I usually run it and let me know if I'm on track to hit my goals. All of those big and small things funneled together into improving the system.

Is it still one size fits all for all the different machines?

Great question. It's configurable so we're big believers in the entire platform. We'll build in all the different ways that you can configure it. So for different machine sizes, user types, types of production, we've got so many different options.

Can the people in my metalworking industry expect this product to be introduced?

Definitely, yeah. We actually have folks in metal working using it right now. And as long as you're using machines to make things or stuff so discrete or process industry and you care about the runtime on those machines, we can deliver good value.

Okay.

If it's more of an assembly operation and you know, people are the heartbeat rather than machines are the heartbeat, we're not going to be as good for that.

See, that leads me to my thinking. You're hearing a lot lately about the four day work week and how people are realizing they can fit more in a smaller amount of time. Is this causing that or to do that, do you need more of a guide wheel to put onto a person?

We definitely don't measure people.

No, I know, you just said that. So what I'm asking is, is by doing the metrics on the machine, is that enabling people to shorten their work weeks?

We haven't seen shorter work weeks that I know of. Normally the customers we work with are actually looking to produce more with the time that they have. So in a given workweek, we've actually seen people find more capacity in the machines and be able to sell into that open capacity, which is more of a driving top line revenue rather than necessarily trying to shorten or cut work. I think talent is such a shortage right now that I have not yet heard the request to shorten.

Well, though the talent might request that they want the four day work week and then they might come and this could enable people to accomplish that. I don't know. That was what I was thinking.

Yeah. One thing I have heard which is kind of from users within the system. So whether it's plant manager or supervisor or maintenance teammates, one thing I've heard a lot of is how amazing it is for them to not have to be in the plant all the time. For example, to know that they'll get alerted if a critical machine is down, rather than feeling like they have to be there just to be listening and watching. And so that ability to accomplish the same results, intervening right away if there's a problem to make sure you deliver on time for a customer, but not have to physically be in the plant to be able to.

Right.

And now they're doing more interesting things, growing the company, you know, or being.

At home with their family or at a, you know, at a soccer game with their kids.

Right. Rather than just being a helicopter and watching it. So then perhaps it is having that result.

I've heard the examples of people being able to gain time back for the things that matter to them, whether it's kids or family or just even being able to rest or be outside of that environment, but I haven't heard yet examples of people changing their work schedules too dramatically.

Interesting. Okay. Because I've interviewed a few people that have told me by fixing their processes and changing their policies, they've been able to give people flexibility and even less hours, because people in a shop want that. I mean, most people don't want to work 60 hours a week.

So I would think that. That maybe it is having that effect and you just haven't talked to people about it.

Certainly might be. I think there's so much our customers do with the platform that they find ways to make it useful and solve that pain.

How much does it cost?

It depends on the size of the plant. So certainly, if anyone's interested in pricing, always happy to dive in. It'll depend on the number of the machines, the number of people using it.

You can't give me any ballpark at all. What's the highest and what's the lowest?

Yeah, we definitely. So I can't give exact numbers. What I can say is we'll always work with you to make sure that the ROI makes sense. We would never want to deploy the platform where there wasn't clear benefit that outweighed the cost of it. So while I can't share specific numbers, I can't share that. We always want to make sure.

You can't tell me, you know, like, is it $100,000 for one sensor or not? You can't even tell me that. You know what?

I'm really not. I'm not supposed to, so sorry.

It's okay.

I've talked to a lot of people that couldn't give me that, but I.

Can tell you that it will be surprisingly affordable. So if. Yeah, if anyone wants to get in touch and we can, you know, prepare a custom quote, you'll probably be pleasantly surprised by how affordable Guide Wheel is compared to systems you might see or have seen in the past.

Okay. Okay. Just a couple more questions. I noticed in your LinkedIn that you did a lot of environment work before this. Can you just give me a little bit of information about that?

Yeah, definitely. Very related. So thinking a lot about climate change and Sustainability. I think where my work has always tried to land is in the win win for the business side and the sustainability or the planet side. So Guidewheel is actually a public benefit corporation. We have a mission and responsibility to do broader good work and have a positive impact on more than just profit. And we build that in not through trying to sell directly on sustainability related outcomes, but through trying to make sure that we provide for customers the thing they most need. The lowest lift, highest return area, focusing first on lost production time and then in the system there's actually included an energy management system.

That makes sense then. Yeah.

So while you're working to drive those outcomes that drive that immediate roi, we also give your team the tools to be able to increase energy efficiency and drive those sustainability outcomes as well. We don't talk a lot about it because what we find is if you try to do five things, you end up doing none and it's boiling the ocean. So we always try to focus first on that area of highest ROI and then have a conversation around if there are sustainability outcomes that you want to be achieving. We've got all the tools actually built in and ready for your team to take advantage of already being used across your team.

Well, I'm sure people prefer a lower energy bill.

Yes, always. Yeah. So there are some really good win wins there from a financial perspective too. We just want to make sure that we always start with the low lift, high return, that lost production time piece because typically the benefits of that in terms of bringing in more revenue from your existing machines will be something where it's such a clear recurring benefit that gets the entire team engaged. Because it's at the end of the day, what keeps the lights on for everyone in the business.

Excellent. What's something that you learned last week about anything? It doesn't have to do with Guide Wheel necessarily. So many things could be like a TV show or a podcast or whatever.

Yeah, definitely. So right now I'm reading a lot about the topic of customer success. So how, you know. Yes, we've got a platform that customers get great value from. How do we as an organization get better at structuring the journey for them so that they can pick and choose the training areas and ways that they want to get supported. So I think one of the things that is a learning area that I'm digging into a ton right now is how do we structure the trainings in modules that customers can more easily choose from. So digging into what what other companies do, they're trying to learn from the best and also trying to learn from our customers because they've often deployed training and onboarding for other things in very successful ways. So learning what's the regimen that when you're deploying a behavior change or new technology you tend to apply is what I'm digging into at the moment.

If you weren't doing Guidewheel and you were starting another company or doing some other job, what's one thing that you might do?

Oh man, that's so hard because I really feel so privileged to this is my dream job.

That really is privileged. You're supremely lucky. But I mean, say somebody said no more guide wheel. Is there something else that you always had your eye on, fantasized about, or a different company you'd want to start?

You know, I'm not trying to dodge the question, but there just isn't this ability to provide something that's so valued by our customers and where the impact from a broader planetary perspective is super clear and to get to work with the team that we have who are talented and growth mindset and all of that. I honestly not trying to dodge the question. There, there is nothing else I do right now.

When you hear the word happiness, what does it make you think of?

I've been thinking about this a lot lately. Building something that matters and enjoying doing it with people you respect and care about and being able to look back and say, oh my gosh, we started there, now we're here. Look what we did together is happiness for me.

Well, I really appreciate you being on the show and is there anything else you'd like to say to the people of the world?

Oh, just thank you. I have such a thank you, Noah, for doing this, for having me.

You're welcome.

Thank you to your listeners. I just have tremendous respect for everyone who's building things.

From today's machining world. This is swarfcast. If you like this podcast, please subscribe to the show on your favorite app and give us a five star rating and a review. And don't forget to tell your friends about it. Follow us on Facebook, Instagram and todaysmachiningworld.com to join our mailing list, read episode summaries and watch extended interview videos. I'm Noah Graf. My occasional co host is Lloyd Graf. Our managing editor is Ridgely Dunn. Our audio engineer is Patricio Garcia. For information on advertising or to submit an idea for a future podcast, follow the contact information@todaysmachiningworld.com.

Sam.