Speaker 0 00:00:00 <inaudible>
Speaker 1 00:00:09 Good morning, LinkedIn community. Welcome to this. Year's 2021 second episode of cocky of the gym and James, before we get started, I have to tell a quick story. During the holidays, you normally dream about sugar plums dancing in your head. Well, in our household with the wife being a mace coding inspector, our dreams are a little bit different. So James, I have to tell you last night, instead of dreaming about the normal stuff, I was so excited for this episode related. I was almost ready for this amped up for this episode. Come on guys.
Speaker 2 00:00:49 I don't make sense later. It will make sense later.
Speaker 1 00:00:54 Let me bring my partner in James to join the conversation, James, how are you? This fine and beautiful morning.
Speaker 2 00:01:01 Happy new year. I know we've made it now. Everything's supposed to change right? 2020 is over. That's what I think that's how it, everybody thought, right? We're seven days in man. It's not looking good after this week. Yeah, we won't get into that, Jimmy. I am. Well, I am, or we are not canceled. Apparently the rumors are not true, not true. Um, I think the co competitors might've put those up. Uh, it's a new year, but uh, coffee, Jim James is back and we are excited about our guest today.
Speaker 1 00:01:39 Absolutely. Let me, let me bring on our guest today. Joining us from the SSPC the man, the myth, the legend, Mr. Jim Kunkel. Jim, welcome to the show this morning,
Speaker 3 00:01:52 Jim and James. Thank you. I'm very appreciative that you have me on today.
Speaker 2 00:01:57 Jim konkle.com.
Speaker 3 00:02:00 Well, um, actually, uh, the website, uh, doesn't exist anymore, but, um, you can reach my, uh, email
[email protected]. Perfect. Perfect. Okay.
Speaker 1 00:02:12 If you give us a high level view of, uh, who you are, what you've been doing a little, uh, you know, a little elevator speech, if you would please.
Speaker 3 00:02:22 Yeah, my, uh, my background related to the, the coatings industry was I, I came from working in the, uh, the steel industry in the service center side and fabrication involved in powder coating. Uh, about eight years ago, the society for protective coatings or SSPC as it's known in the industry had hired me, uh, to do business development work related to the owners, specification firms, engineering firms, uh, to help incorporate, uh, contractor and blast and paint shop certifications that we offer to the industry globally. And, uh, primarily I did a lot of work initially, the oil and gas industry, some very familiar with the industry, you know, its ups and downs and its its pain points and things like that. Uh, currently, uh, actually yesterday was the launch of a brand new organization where NACE international, which is basically a corrosion society. That's been around since the thirties. And SSPC, we've been around since 1950, we've merged our organizations together and we're now called the association for materials protection, gen and performance or amp a M P P as it's going to be known moving forward.
Speaker 2 00:03:35 I see what you did there you were amped for. Yeah. And in full disclosure, uh, Jim, we are, you know, we're recording this on the seventh. So that announcement came out on the sixth. There's a good chance, you know, hold by mouth. But, uh, I saw that on LinkedIn actually yesterday saw the announcement come across about an app and uh, actually, uh, put two and two together. Right then. Cause I remember you mentioning that and, and kind of a pre-show, uh, work, uh, and I put two and two together and was like, Oh man, that's going to be perfect timing. So couldn't be happier with you being on today, talking a little bit about that. So, so you mentioned it, um, and you want to talk a little bit about the focus or the mission of amp itself and, and your continued involvement there.
Speaker 3 00:04:34 Yeah, no problem at all. So the industry, when you're looking at the global corrosion and protective coatings industry, when it comes to industrial coatings, both SSPC and NACE international are very well known now in looking at what both organizations do is we primarily think about it. We're protecting preserving, uh, steel substrates, other substrates related to the effects of corrosion and things that will wear and tear on, on substrates for the organization. Amp. We have to really think into the future and we talk about material protection and preservation because when you look at, for example, a coding, a coding could be in your cell phone, it's on a lot of different, um, uh, appliances. Um, even you have microbial coatings that go on to protect against, you know, bacterias and other types of, uh, you know, obviously, uh, pathogens and things like that. So coatings are, are so broad and across so many different industries, same thing when it comes to corrosion, there's different forms of corrosion.
Speaker 3 00:05:37 It's not just primarily like steel and concrete, but a lot of other different types of substrates that are out there. So the organization is really looking at, okay, you know, we've got over 70, 75 years of history related to corrosion, protective coatings. What's the next evolution of these, this combined organization. And that's why the aspect of at materials, um, in, uh, engineering related to, uh, taking care of any type of corrosion issues, you know, stuff like that. Um, you know, looking at maintenance and planning and stuff like that in the oil and gas industry, if you have any type of downtime, it could cost millions and millions of dollars. So if we can work with the industry to help preserve and protect materials and substrates and things like that, boy, we could really be a very important partner globally with multiple different industries and a lot of different sectors when it comes to transportation or manufacturing or research or, you know, any type of industry. For sure.
Speaker 1 00:06:39 Yeah. I was just going to say on a note of that, I can't remember the last numbers like of natives, but I think there was like 39,000, 40,000 members worldwide, something astronomical like that you guys are, and I'm not sure about the SSPC and I apologize for that, that I don't, but probably combined you're well over into the 50 or 60,000 member range, is that correct?
Speaker 3 00:07:02 That's definitely correct. SSPC has roughly about 10,000 members. And the unique thing was when we were looking at the, you know, how, you know, when the mapping was going on to see how to both organizations kind of like overlay on top of each other, would there be a lot of, you know, would we be cannibalizing things and things like that? What we found was that there was not that much of a, of a, uh, it seemed like we had very unique memberships. So when we pull it together, it really added plus then take away. And it was just, it's absolutely a perfect merger of these two organizations that was attempted some years ago in the past, it didn't work this time. It made so much more sense. And the other thing too, is both organizations do have competition from other organizations. I mean, we're, we have a nonprofit, you know, we're, we're a five Oh one C six and a five Oh one C3. So, you know, we do have competition out there. You know, you've got big names like ISO that also offers standards and other types of, uh, programs and accreditation that, you know, can be competition for our new organization. So,
Speaker 1 00:08:10 Interesting. Interesting. Let me, I'm looking for your perspective on something because it is, you know, I joke around at the beginning of the, uh, episode being a little wacky, but being serious. So my wife has been in the coatings business for 20 years and I hear just day in and day out since we're in the same office space, quote unquote, I hear a lot of it, you know, in your world, dealing with, uh, corrosion, protective coatings items like that, especially during the COVID time, um, you know, engineers working with them projects needing to get done. Like you set up the project, there's a delay, we're talking millions of dollars. What has COVID done in that respect? Or what have you seen, um, how has it affected you all? And then what do you think 2021 is going to bring in regard to that? Have there been any, uh, uh, leaps or, you know, anything, any, any way that it's working easier on your side?
Speaker 3 00:09:07 Well, we all remember we went into March of 2020 and brakes hit hard and the brakes where we've got to make sure that we can address the spread of the, of the pandemic with a COVID 19 pandemic. And a lot of businesses really had to make quick adjustments. And that, that definitely impacted the contractors. Uh, when it related to the industrial coding side, where now all of a sudden they had to create new protocols and new safety programs related to testing of work crews. What happens if someone becomes infected? Um, the other thing is travel policies. And so for the first time in the coatings industry, you started to see that now you have a COVID specialists that would be part of the health and safety part of a contractors operation, but they also had to work that in conjunction with, for example, if they're doing projects at Exxon mobile or Chevron or whoever it might be, now they have a policy.
Speaker 3 00:10:08 When it comes to visitors who come into the plant, they have to be tested. If they tested positive, they have to have a, an isolation period. So the interesting thing with it, it was that it did impact early in the spring, companies started to adjust, but projects still had to be done. So the industry, when it comes to contractors, some contractors were hit with slowness. Some had slowed down, some were okay, depending on again, what their customer was, because a lot of times if you're working in a, you know, a hospital facility or, or you're doing, you know, floor coatings in a prisons prison system or institutional, you know, they have certain types of policies and regulations regarding health and safety that, you know, as a contractor, you're going to be in compliance with that type of a customer. But when it came, for example, the oil and gas or some of the other work related to an industries, they had to really make quick adjustments.
Speaker 3 00:11:03 Now the contractors have made adjustments, but that also caused extra costs. Insurance. There has to be extra insurance relating to business interruption and things like that. And then going into 2021, this stuff has all been kind of baked into a lot of what needs to be done. Corrosion continues to happen. Coding projects have to happen. It doesn't matter if the oil industry is in a boom and a bust, the coding projects still have to go on. Now. They might be prioritized differently because of obviously, uh, uh, issues related to capital availability and things like that for project money. Um, but it also gives an opportunity for a lot of companies to look at maybe some maintenance painting to delay the inevitable, you know, complete recoding of a particular section of pipeline or inside a facility, an operation. So the industry has adjusted to it. SSPC I can speak on the SSPC side.
Speaker 3 00:11:58 You know, we took a hit early regarding the training and the professional certifications, the class stuff that we would do, we had to quickly evolve into what we would call instructor and led virtual classes then do practical, where we actually have to sometimes go on site to do practical instrumentation testing, do that after when lockdowns and restrictions started to get, uh, eased up. We also move quickly to take what we could take from a classroom that doesn't require you really to be in a classroom, put it online. So SSPC, we made a quick adjustment, we got stuff online. We did virtual lead instructors. We ended the year relatively in great shape. We're before going into this, we, you know, if we didn't do anything, we would have been probably in a, an a little bit of, a little bit of a tight situation when it comes to revenues. Because again, as a, as a nonprofit organization, you know, we're relied a lot on revenues that we're bringing in to not only pay like my salary and sustain, but also to sustain the organization. So our members, our corporate members, the industry really, really came through for us. And I greatly appreciate the industry that I work in because of the support.
Speaker 2 00:13:16 Amen to that. I think we can all scream that from the rooftops Jim, you mentioned, I mean, you talked about how the contractors pivoted and, and during COVID-19, um, you know, I think us three on this, on the show today had to do something similar. And, uh, you know, what, I learned a little bit more about you and Jim came to me and said, you know, I've got a group, you know, possible guests. And, uh, I started to dig in a little bit. We saw obviously that you, uh, kind of started a YouTube channel this past year, uh, similar to our story. And, uh, you want to talk to people a little bit about, you know, what your focus is with the channel, what, you know, what your vision is and, uh, how, what launched you down this path, similar to how Jim and I, uh, find ourselves today.
Speaker 3 00:14:14 So really what launched everything. I'm, I'm a very, my biggest platform that I really love and cherish is LinkedIn. LinkedIn has been absolutely a godsend for me, both as a business development manager, but also too, as I don't want to say I'm an influencer, but people do reach out to me for questions and for, for assistance. And maybe I don't have the answer, but I can at least get them to the person or get that answer from somebody else to get to them. And through the process going into 2019, I started doing some little type of videos and people said, wow, I really like that. You're putting a lot of good content, a lot of great information. So then going into January, 2020, I decided to go ahead and launch a YouTube channel. And if you go back and watch like my initial videos, I mean, they're really poorly edited.
Speaker 3 00:15:06 They're, they're horrific. But my quality when it comes to editing and production skills got better over the year. Um, the biggest, um, lift for me was when I went to the world of concrete in Las Vegas, and I would do a daily, you know, I would take my breaks cause I was exhibiting there. I would take my breaks and use my breaks to go around and interview different companies regarding technologies for, you know, preparing concrete, working on coatings and things like that. And I would put those out there every day and tag in through LinkedIn to, uh, wrote a concrete and I'm getting 400, 500 800 hits that night. And it's a rush. You're like, Oh my God, I can't believe I've got like 20 subscribers to my YouTube channel. And I'm getting, you know, 800 whatever hits on this stuff. So what I decided to do is I got to go and keep doing this.
Speaker 3 00:15:57 So I started doing global topic and the global topic is basically a 15 to 20 minute interview. We talk about topics in corrosion, protective coatings, and I interviewed really industry experts on different topics and things like that. In addition to that, I decided to do, what's called two minute lessons. So I do two these two minute video lessons on technical topics. And I primarily focus on LinkedIn because LinkedIn has really, although I'm only have about 660 subscribers to my channel fluid is the first year LinkedIn, the views have been 17, 18 thousands. And I mean the amount of views through just even the LinkedIn viewer has been an outstanding and my network has grown the outreach for people coming to me, asking me for questions, you know, ask me questions or wanting to connect with me has been awesome. And I know it benefited me as a business development manager.
Speaker 3 00:16:55 I know it benefited the society for protective coatings, and I know what I'm doing is going to benefit amp. I know it will, because again, people want technical content. They want to understand, they want to be able to talk about these technical topics. So through the whole year I did 60 just global topic episodes. And I think with the two minute lessons, I think around 135 of those. And, um, so going into 2021, I stepped up my game when it came to, I, I took almost three weeks off at the end of the year. And I brushed up on editing skills, interviewing skills, recording skills, and now I'm making a leap into, um, IETV related to Instagram. And I'm looking obviously to really expand on what I do on LinkedIn. I do, um, a quiz question every day and people respond to those and just eat the amount of responses I get are absolutely outstanding.
Speaker 3 00:17:55 Now this morning I changed my profile for my, my job position to rep rep obviously reflect amp. And, um, I think I've got like a couple of hundred people congratulating me, but they're asking me, why did you change? Why did you leave? SSPC some literally posting that plus SSPC equals amp. So people understand that I have not left the society or for predictive codings. I've evolved with the organization into the new organization, which is amp. And, uh, uh, I appreciate, again, like I say, my network, if it wasn't for LinkedIn and my connections, I wouldn't be where I am today. And I'm so proud of, uh, the connections I'm proud of the platform and the abilities and the opportunities that it brings to anybody who uses LinkedIn.
Speaker 2 00:18:46 Um, there was two things I was going to bring up. One was you mentioned something about, go back and watch some of the first ones and how funny they are. Jim and I actually had a brainstorming session a few days ago. I think it was Monday. I got back from the holidays and we watched the first one together, uh, streamed it. And, um, it's very eyeopening to what, um, you know, this whole thing has become. So, uh, definitely can understand that. Uh, the other thing is, man, the LinkedIn community has been fantastic. Uh, what a great group coupled with our, our respective industries specifically, uh, and the overlap man, just, you could not ask for better people to be involved with for sure.
Speaker 3 00:19:39 You know, and the thing with it too, with LinkedIn, for example, uh, LinkedIn, um, you know, some time ago when oil field connections was started by Sarge summers. Now I know Sarge for years, um, from, for me, he's been an inspiration for me, both as a professional and spiritually as well. And the thing with it was when I started connecting with the members of oil fill connections and then some of the other, uh, uh, other, uh, industry related oil and gas industry related organizations, um, that professional networking has been amazing for me because you know what, as a business development person, if I am looking at a particular company to try and get a contact to the talk to them, I can reach out to these different network connections that I have and, and be able to get a better referral than I would if I was just cold calling by finding a name on LinkedIn.
Speaker 1 00:20:29 Yeah. And I'll say, I mean, just look at this, you and I met on LinkedIn because of your quiz. I thought your quiz was great. It was funny. And I gave some smart Alec response. Like if I have a question about a car, you asked the question, what do you do in this say, I said, well, I called my wife caught spring at our eye. And she tells me the answer, you know? And then you gave like a ha back. And then all of a sudden we just started having a conversation and boom away it goes. And, and it really is. Uh, I know James and I feel the same way you do it. It's absolutely wonderful. And the energy industry is riddled Laden with relationships. I mean, that's what it's based on. You know, you mentioned Sarge. I haven't seen Sarge in so many years. I've seen him on LinkedIn, but I remember he did a couple of meetings in Houston who three, four years ago. And he's a great guy.
Speaker 3 00:21:18 Definitely. And you know, the other thing, the other aspect of LinkedIn is that when you're a professional, it doesn't matter if you're an engineer. If you're a salesperson, if you're, you know what, it doesn't matter what your position is, but if you're a professional, you have to embrace LinkedIn for example, and you have to really be able to work at. And what I mean by that is you have to read the posts that people put, like share them, comment on them, make sure you're posting on there, you know, reach out to different contacts. If contacts reach out to you, connect with them because you never know where you, maybe you're in an industry like oil and gas, obviously there's, there are people looking for positions. And I tell people, listen, I might not be the person who can get you hired, but put your, put your resume out there on LinkedIn, post it. And I will support that. Now, what does that do? Well, you know, I've got a connections network and those people connected to me or connected to other people. And so it's a multiplying effect. Yeah, exactly. It's a multiplying effect.
Speaker 2 00:22:23 Uh, generally we teach a class usually once a year about how to, how to be better at LinkedIn. And everybody wants this cheat sheet or, you know, what do I do? What do I do? How do I gain? And, and honestly, what do we tell them? We're like, just go out there and it'd be real. It's social, there's no cheat sheet interact with people, engage with people and create content. I mean, that's, that's all it boils down to and be yourself. And, and it just, when you add in the element of business, people tend to freak out a little bit. Um, you know, and don't, don't want to say too much here, or don't want to bring this up, but man, it's been a phenomenal engine for so, so many folks. So I'm glad to see somebody else doing it. Mr. Schauer you want to hit on with the last one?
Speaker 1 00:23:15 I got one final question for you, Jim. This is a hard one. Okay. So prepare yourself. I can see the sweat forming on your brow right now. Do you love what you do? Absolutely.
Speaker 3 00:23:33 Every day I enjoy my life. I would never trade it for a trillion dollars or whatever, whatever numbers come out of Congress, but I would, uh, highly recommend people go out of your comfort zone. You know, people have said to me, Hey, you know, you're talking in front of crowds of sometimes 10 people, a hundred people, a thousand people, you put yourself out there on the internet. You're putting yourself on YouTube, LinkedIn, and everything like that. You got to get out of your comfort zone. And the reason why is you discover who you are and you do discover that you're braver than what you thought you were. And you're willing to take chances to make opportunities happen. So
Speaker 1 00:24:12 Brave be brave. That's where the magic happens. Man. Things get a little uncomfortable. Uh, James, I almost thought we had the first shortest answer to do you love what you do going into that?
Speaker 3 00:24:29 You gotta be, you gotta be careful with me because, um, as my wife will attest, I'd like to talk and I don't stop. So you have to be careful with me. Yeah. Sometimes you have to ask me those. Yes or no questions to keep me a little bit quieter than normal
Speaker 1 00:24:46 Today. You've been an awesome guest. Thank you so much for coming on, talking about amp. Um, we will link everything up. Hopefully listen, our networks need to be in Jim's networks and Jim's networks need to be in our networks. Um, it's a huge gift one weekend. Uh, have folks on that, get that part. So, um, thank you, sir. And, uh, Jim shower, I'm a for bringing home, so I will, I will get us out in a timely matter again. Thank you Jim. For joining us, it was very informative. It was great to have a new friend. Um, it's great to spend some time with you please. LinkedIn community, follow Jim follow amp, uh, follow coffee with Jim and James to please hit the follow button. Uh, I know that if you have any questions to hit Jim up, if you would like to be a guest of carpet, Jim and James hit James or I up and for the first time in the history of CARF with Jim and James, we have all Jim and James is on it today. So we made history today. So until next week we do appreciate you each and every time tuning in. We appreciate it so much. So thank you until next week, be safe, have a great week and we will, uh, see you very soon. Bye-bye
Speaker 0 00:26:10 <inaudible>.
