Andrew returns from Japan with 15 lessons that challenged the way he thinks about leadership, training, standards, and continuous improvement. These include thoughts on how leaders accidentally become bottlenecks, why standards drift over time, and what it means to build a culture that surfaces problems instead of burying them.

What happens when an iconic brand starts fighting its own fans?

This week, Andrew and Jay discuss Fender’s controversial cease-and-desist campaign against Strat-style guitar builders and discuss the difference between protecting intellectual property and damaging brand loyalty. What can businesses learn from the backlash?

The conversation then shifts to Andrew’s recent trip to Japan, where he spent six days immersed in lean manufacturing, visiting world-class companies, schools, and cultural landmarks. He shares early observations on Japanese efficiency, intentional design, continuous improvement, and why blindly copying another company’s systems is often a mistake.  

Along the way, the hosts unpack lessons from Rick Rubin’s The Creative Act, discussing creativity, constraints, improvisation, and why some of our biggest limitations are self-imposed. They wrestle with the relationship between process and innovation, lean thinking versus rigid systems, and how business leaders can create environments where people and ideas can flourish.

Jay welcomes John Grimsmo of Grimsmo Knives for a wide-ranging conversation on leadership, manufacturing culture, lean systems, and the Six Types of Working Genius assessment. Fresh off implementing the framework with his family and team, John shares how understanding “working genius” helped relieve pressure, clarify leadership frustrations, and reshape the way he thinks about people, meetings, and workflow inside his company.

The conversation includes: why some people thrive in tenacity while others burn out, the surprising emotional impact of understanding your frustrations, how working genius creates a shared language across teams, the danger of over-optimization, and more.

Is a good leader a dictator? In this episode, Jay and Andrew wrestle with the tension between decisive leadership and collaborative growth. What starts as a customer support question turns into a deep conversation about lean manufacturing, parenting, company culture, value stream mapping, and the hidden danger of “at some point” processes.

They unpack why servant leadership is often misunderstood, how leaders can avoid micromanagement without abandoning standards, why some mistakes are worth letting happen for the sake of growth, binary decision-making, lean waste, product simplification, and more.

Andrew also shares why he finally committed to a once-in-a-lifetime lean trip to Japan with Paul Akers, and the mindset shift that convinced him to go.

Andrew and Jay explore the tension between confidence and delusion in entrepreneurship, the challenge of scaling a company without losing yourself, and the reality that what got you here might not get you there. They also dig into Vistage vs. hands-on consulting, the value of networking in real life, productive failure, family business dynamics, and why some people seem to operate in an entirely different league.

Is anybody too big to fail? (Answer: no.) What actually keeps a business alive when everything around it starts shifting?

In this ep, Andrew and Jay talk the quiet reality behind “too big to fail,” looking at why companies collapse, how bad assumptions creep in, and what it takes to stay standing when conditions change fast. From supply chain headaches and rising material costs to vendor missteps and risky investments, they look at the everyday decisions that shape whether a shop survives or struggles.

Along the way, they dig into why you can’t afford to coast, how small operational choices add up, and what it really means to adapt in a changing market. The conversation even takes a turn into brain performance and decision-making, exploring how the way you’re wired affects how you lead.

Jay and Andrew start by talking about getting back into work after time away, which leads into a broader discussion about applying work systems and efficiency principles in both the shop and at home. They cover a range of topics including garage organization, equipment decisions, troubleshooting production issues, trade shows, business growth, tools, taxes, and the use of AI, and more.

Fresh off the Machining Summit on the Summit in Mammoth Lakes, Andrew and Jay sit down to unpack what actually made the experience worth it...and it wasn’t just the sessions. From gondola rides to small, living-room-style conversations, they talk about how being in the right environment with the right people leads to better conversations, clearer thinking, and relationships that actually matter.

Along the way, they share some of the bigger takeaways that stuck with them, including why collaboration tends to win over competition, where they see the industry heading, real-world lessons on finances, building redundancy into your operations, and more.

What happens when your factory catches fire without warning? In this episode, Brian Meyers (president of Fat American Mfg and host of Lean by Doing podcast) sits down with Jay and Andrew to share the story of a fire that broke out in his brand-new facility, and what it revealed about leadership, preparation, and the power of lean manufacturing.

In short: what could have been a total loss wasn't at all. Because of the systems already in place due to a culture shaped by lean thinking, his team didn’t panic. They acted. And their decisions prevented far greater damage.

But the story doesn’t end with the fire. Brian walks through the long aftermath: the disruption, the emotional weight on the team, the insurance process, and the slow return to normal operations. Along the way, he reflects on what he would and wouldn’t change, and how the experience reshaped his thinking on safety, culture, and resilience.

Learn more from Brian:

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Jay begins by talking about selling a machine, and when it's better to go direct versus using a dealer, with broader implications regarding alignment, control, and the hidden costs of outsourcing parts of your business.  

From there, the discussion shifts into shop operations: flow vs. batching, tool changes, and where efficiency actually comes from in real production environments. Jay and Andrew challenge common assumptions, showing how context matters: sometimes batching wins, sometimes ergonomics matter more than cycle time, and often the biggest gains come from reducing friction for the operator, not chasing theoretical efficiency. Plus: the perfect keyboard, how to get that most out of a conference or summit, and more.