0:00 - Madeline
So how did this week's episode of the podcast go?

0:03 - Andy Richardson
I thought it was a very interesting and exciting episode. I had a guest on today, Tyler Campbell, and he just started a new company called FieldProof. Really, it was inspiring to me to hear about his And what I liked about it was a few things. And he started out in construction and He's been seeing problems from day one. And the construction industry does have a lot of problems. And so he was challenged about that from his brother. And we all know how that can be at times, I suppose. But he was challenged about that. Are you going to do something about it or are you going to just go on about your business? And he did something about it. So that was one of the big things that I liked his vision for the company. I like what he's trying to do. What it does is, it takes. I don't want to get into too much detail, but it takes some of the information we talked about: feedback loop. What does that mean? And so, it takes this idea of what's going on in one place versus what's going on in another, and connects the two. So, that's a bit of a primer on what it is. But the main takeaway for me, in terms of a high level, was the inspiration that I got—that he did. He took action. Yeah, so that. Was that really cool?

1:23 - Madeline
Like, basically, not just seeing a problem and glancing by and saying, "Someone will fix that," but taking the action to fix it—that's really an inspiring thought. Yeah, for sure.

1:33 - Andy Richardson
And we also got to listen to what his "pump-up music" is for—doing podcasts or work. So, that was always fun. We'll get to know about that too. Do you have any pump-up music you listen to before work, or...?

1:51 - Madeline
I mean, I've been listening to a lot of John Mayer recently, but that's not pump up.

1:56 - Andy Richardson
Yeah, quite the opposite. Well, hey, everybody. My name is Andy Richardson, and this is our producer, Madeline. We're with the Enhance AEC podcast, where we interview professionals in the AEC industry and find out what their why is so that you can learn yours. Let's jump to the intro.

2:22 - Madeline
Welcome to Enhance, an AEC podcast where we learn the why behind AEC professionals so that you can learn your why.

2:30 - Andy Richardson
Welcome to the Enhance podcast, Tyler. Yeah, having me. And you're no stranger to podcasting, right? Not really.

2:44 - Tyler Campbell
few times.

2:45 - Andy Richardson
So yeah, I'm still trying to get now that we had that tech thing. But yeah, so I wanted to start out with just an opener question because I know I've seen, you know, you playing music and it seems to be a big part of your life.

2:58 - Tyler Campbell
Okay, so recently it's been two So that's your opener question is Two artists. So one is Sleep Token, which is just like more hardcore. A little bit, not like crazy, but it's kind of like a, you know, they dress up in costumes sort of situation. It's one of those. Oh, wow.

3:30 - Andy Richardson
A kiss kind of Yeah, it's one of those.

3:32 - Tyler Campbell
But I've been really I into them just, lately. And then I Kendrick Lamar, Oh, wow. Oh, yeah. No, very, very broad interest in music. And then I play worship music on Sunday. So Kendrick on Tuesday, worship on Sunday.

3:54 - Andy Richardson
Yeah, that's cool. Well, and, you know, you got the acoustic guitar. I saw you playing that song. I guess that goes with your worship music, right?

4:04 - Tyler Campbell
So I play at church every week. And so this past this past Sunday, kind of putting a time stamp on when this episode was recorded. So this past Sunday was Easter, and so I had to play five services. So that was, dude, it was a lot. So, yeah, we did two services on Saturday and then three services on Sunday. So it was a good time.

4:27 - Andy Richardson
Wow, that's pretty intense. Yeah, so kind of continuing on the music, for a moment. I guess you play the guitar. Would that be your favorite instrument or do you have a favorite?

4:43 - Tyler Campbell
Read now, yeah. I went through phases. I started out with violin when I was like, golly, 12, 13, something like that. I had an amazing teacher growing up and then I got to 16 and I found rock and roll and it was all over, man. It was done. So I rock and roll and guitar. And I realized that was the thing that that would get girls attention more than more than violence. So, you know, I went with that. Yeah, that makes sense. I wish I wish it was less shallow than that. But my 16 year old brain, that's that's where it was at.

5:20 - Andy Richardson
I mean, I can relate. I can relate. I was 16 once as well. But and you're you did a lot of detailing work. Do you find and you were in the construction industry? You still are. Oh, gosh.

5:46 - Tyler Campbell
albeit we're I mean, I definitely think there is. I'll use detailing as an example because, I mean, when you're modeling stuff in 3D, a lot of times you're doing a lot of repetitive tasks. So it's almost like playing an actual keyboard. There's a lot of muscle memory in some of the different things that you would have to do and so that always sped me up a little bit. Music did kind of translate over into construction if you think about it from a muscle memory standpoint. So that was kind of nice. Thinking through other ways that it's potentially helped me, I don't know. I think music has kept me sane when trying to deal with the harsh environment that is the construction industry. I feel like, if anything, it's helped me to kind of work with my emotions a little bit more. So that's been a nice little bit of an add. To my professional career.

7:02 - Andy Richardson
Yeah, because I've been trying to learn the guitar, and I find it to be enjoyable in that way, because I'm an engineer, so I spend a lot of time in front of very detailed type things, not detailing, and so the cathartic music, and you're just doing something physical and musical, To me, it is calming. Even if I'm not very good, it can be calming.

7:34 - Tyler Campbell
It still counts. I think it's a good way to disconnect from the day. If you've had a rough day, it's good to just sit down and just strum for a little bit and just pick. For me, it part of my brain and just helps me activate sort of a rest mode. And so I'm just, I'm so thankful as I grow up. Like, you know, I didn't play as many sports growing up. Not as many. But I kind of opted for music. I played baseball when I was really And I'm really kind of thankful that I did that because I see a lot of people who spend time in sports and they're not able to play anymore, right? Or not as frequently. Whereas, you know, my thing, I've been able to just carry it with me, you know, as I age. And it's seen me through a lot. So it's a very important part of my life.

8:36 - Andy Richardson
Yeah, I can relate on the other end where I did spend a lot of time doing sports and those things don't necessarily carry over into your life later on.

8:46 - Tyler Campbell
Yeah, it's more an ACL, you know, little things like that.

8:52 - Andy Richardson
So you did a lot. You did a lot of construction detailing, steel detailing. Did you go straight into that originally or did you have a beginning elsewhere?

9:02 - Tyler Campbell
So, well, I started out working at mobile phone stores. So that was that was a lot of fun. Got to experience retail. And then soon after that, I joined the family business. And so the business is ABSI. That's my dad and my brother's company still to this day. And, you know, I grew up in there and was mentored by both of those guys. And so it was really cool to be able to experience that. And, you know, I skipped the college route. I just went straight into industry. And that was good for me. I know it's not the best relationship. Everybody, but it worked out all right for me. Probably would have killed a lot of my attention and learning stuff. I do better by just getting out there and getting my hands dirty and screwing up, right? So, yeah, I did detailing for years, though. I stayed there for a decade and, you know, kind of grew up through the team, got really good at it, and then decided to bail. You know, I was like, hey, I'm going to go start my own business. And, you know, that was storybook You know, I feel like it was And it felt like my passion was more towards solving those problems than actually the video component of my business. And so And you That's the reason why I was like, all right, buddy, are you going to keep harping on this? Are you going to put your money where your mouth is and try to actually help the problem versus just add to the noise? And so it has become just a big passion of mine, and it's something I just get geeked out over. It's something cool that I get to do. And again, I get to go out to the field now. I don't have to wield a camera, but I get to go out and play with robots and stuff like that, and that's the type of stuff that's just – It's just a good day, you know. It's a good day to get to play with new toys and software and stuff.

11:42 - Andy Richardson
Yeah, that sounds awesome. And that's really, I mean, you've like fast-forwarded because usually the purpose of our show is actually what you just described. What is it that you're doing that is making, and it sounds a little cheesy sometimes, like what are you doing to make the world a little better place, you know, to enhance the world around you? And, I mean, it sounds like you've hit on it. Like this is what you are doing to make construction better, which is – I mean the built-in world is – everything you see is – most of it is built by us, by people, except unless it's green. Read, right, right. So I mean that's what you're involved with, right?

12:23 - Tyler Campbell
Yeah, and I think over time we recorded our own podcast and kind of backtracking just a bit just to kind of just again – to give some context is, you know, Eddie and I, my brother and I, we started up our podcast and we've been doing that over probably close to six years now. It's getting close to six years, which is wild. When we started up the podcast, we had this feeling and this intention of being like, we're going to go out and we're going to educate everybody and we're going to tell them how it should be done. And, you know, we thought we had it all figured out. Fast forward a little bit and then we realized, wow, we are really stupid and there are a lot of really smart people out there and we should probably shut up. Listen more, and you know Clifton Harness. I gotta give a shout-out to my buddy over at Test Fit. He was one that had mentioned "Feel the Feedback Loop" early on in our podcasting journey—like episode two, three, or four, something like that. It was really early, and that just kind of stuck. It's like, and so for me, facilitating a feedback loop is something that I feel like learned through the podcast but now I get to facilitate more hands-on by doing feel-proof it's we're trying to provide feedback up and down the chain all around in the construction industry why is that important context man we got to understand context of what other people go through in order to innovate more effectively and affect change across an entire industry. For me, it's not gonna be solved by one person coming in necessarily. I'm sure there's gonna be leaps here and there because some brilliant person comes along. It's certainly not gonna be me, but I'm looking for them, right? Find that brilliant person that comes along and changes the game and makes something incredible. But it's gonna be a collective effort overall the industry forward and, and make it better, you know, make it more exciting for, for our kids and, you know, make it a healthier environment as far as mental health is concerned. And it's just like, there's so many things in the tech space that I feel like can not fix, but assist in making our industry a better place. And so I, uh, I believe in tech, but I'm also a bit of a curmudgeon about it too, because I like to push back on it, um, just to make sure that I'm I'm providing a little bit of reality back to the people that develop technology tools. You don't have it all figured out. You don't. You need to continue to ask questions. You need to continue to grow and be willing to pivot and to, you know, helping out the people in the field. So, yeah, facilitating a feedback loop, man, that's the name of the game.

15:15 - Andy Richardson
So what do you mean by that, feedback loop? How does that work exactly?

15:19 - Tyler Campbell
Well, I mean, for us, it's, you know, feedback loop for me, has always been let's get outside of our normal day to day and let's talk to somebody who is above us or technically like below us. And then let's swirl that information around, right? Let's get in there. Let's stir the pot. Let's get everybody talking. And I think only through that can an owner understand what is caused when I started to develop a lot more empathy. And empathy is probably the biggest thing that Because it's like the world revolves around us and our model that we're building or our drawings that we're putting together. And it's so much more than that. The work as a detailer, what I They decide, "Hey, I want to change my brick color," or "I want to change this steel layout" decisions that were made by other people, you know, in the owner's seat, in the GC's seat, in the architect's seat, in the engineer's seat, like, it was a lot of decisions up until that point, and so who am I to complain without understanding what they're actually going through? So we have to have that feedback, we have to have that conversation as an industry at large, let the bottom talk to the top, and the top talk to the middle, and the middle talk to the, you know, kind of top, you know, like, we've got to be able to talk to everybody up and down the chain in to facilitate growth in the industry.

17:19 - Andy Richardson
Yeah, and have Yeah, that's awesome.

17:24 - Tyler Campbell
That name sounds familiar.

17:25 - Andy Richardson
He worked with Toyota, went to Toyota, and I'm just learning about him myself, but this is one of the things that he talks about is respect for the system. There's four, they call it the system of profound knowledge, and one of the aspects of it, it's like a Venn diagram with four bubbles, but one of the aspects is respect for the system. And it's what you're talking about, the idea of unintended consequences of like a brick color change and how that impacts, somehow in a weird way, it could impact the steel detail. Yeah, yeah, it could. You know, and it's like, how did that, you know.

18:05 - Tyler Campbell
It changes your lentils, you know, it like changes little things, like just little nuancy things that you just wouldn't expect that could come ramifications and expense back to the owner or frustration for the mason, right? The bricklayer, right? It's just that goes unnoticed a lot of times. So the decision maker up top, it's easy for us to say, It goes noticed, but it's noticed by the people that have to and say, oh, just change the brick. But you don't realize that on down the chain, so and so's already purchased pallets and pallets and pallets and pallets of brick, and it's just sitting out in the yard, and now there's this ramification, or maybe they just started laying it, and so now it's, we gotta tear it all out, we gotta put something new in. It's easy to get lost when you're that high level decision maker on the ripple effect that you have in a whole project. I think a lot of people do know that, but it's something that I think awareness will assist in. It's not gonna stop it, but it will definitely assist in making us stronger and a little less chaotic.

19:31 - Andy Richardson
How does FieldProof help with this feedback loop and improving that?

19:37 - Tyler Campbell
Our focus right now is connecting construction technology companies with construction companies and construction field guys, gals, whoever's out there that's actually putting the bricks and the sticks in the ground. We want tech to be able to hear the complaints, hear the gripes that the people using their technology that aren't necessarily their customers. To provide that feedback. And so, for instance, I'll give you an example. So a couple weeks ago, I had a company come to me and they said, hey, we wanna develop kind of a pilot program, somebody to test our product. Do you know of any engineers that do wood? I'm like, huh, interesting. Check out your profile, look at that. So that's one of those examples Hey, there's an opportunity for you to try out a tool and give them unbiased, unfiltered, complete, completely honest feedback from your perspective on what you actually think. And what that does is that makes their tool better; that makes them more informed, and it swirls around, and it helps everybody. So, that ripple effect that you're gonna have on that tool will then go out to a bunch of other engineers and lift the industry up. It's really hard for Startups to do that. A lot of times, it's difficult for companies that are entering the United States to do that too. You know, if they've got a great product but they're not familiar with the States, that's another thing that we can help with. So yeah, a lot of pilot programs, a lot of, you know, testing and beta testing, and it's—it's a lot of fun. And, like, you get to hear the unfiltered stuff, and it's—it's raw. You know the users—the end user, which engineers, contractors, superintendents. I saw your post about supers the other day, and just like they're not getting the; they're not—you’re giving them an ear to listen to for the first time in some cases, right?

21:44 - Andy Richardson
I mean, so tell me about that, because that seemed like a significant conversation that you were having. It was really cool. You know, we interviewed 10 superintendents and... And it's honest, and it just occasionally makes me fist pump. Read? Yes. All right. Thank you for finally saying they need to hear it. It doesn't have to be me bringing the bad news. Yeah, so it sounds like you've had some big wins already with what you're doing. Yeah, as far as you know, getting it launched and connecting some, I guess, these software companies or tech companies with the

22:24 - Tyler Campbell
And, you like, I'm just excited to hear what they have to say and like hear their pain points and dig in a little bit and kind of be a fly on the wall for some of these conversations that are happening between the parties. And I kept hearing from these supes like, hey, thank you. Thank you for asking. Nobody asks. Nobody asked me. And so what's funny is that I think what ends up happening is Decision gets made in the, in the top of the organization, from a different organization or whatever, and that decision ripples out to, like, a design change, right? Ripples out to the guys and the gals in the field, and that ends up providing just a lot of headaches back to them. And so, I just thought it was so cool to hear them say, "Thanks for listening. Thanks for hearing my opinion." in my, you know, my struggles because they know that like, Hey, it's, it's going to get better if I keep talking about this. Um, even better for them, they got paid to share all that stuff. So that's, that's even better. It's, there's an incentive to it of like, you know, you're not just gonna come in and test for free. Like I want to get the pros paid for what they provide. They're providing value. And so, um, and that was a whole part of our business model is Professionals paid for their opinions, um, so it's, yeah, I thought it was really cool that they said thanks. Uh, it was—it was kind of a thing that I didn't, I didn't expect. I didn't—I don't know why; I just didn't expect that. Yeah, yeah, that's cool.

24:05 - Andy Richardson
Um, now, what skill do you think? I mean, what is it that allows you to connect the users with the technology companies? Is there—is there a Then, we start up our podcast and build more relationships.

24:22 - Tyler Campbell
They're connected with more people, networked with more people, built up a following on social—small but mighty, you know, following on social, which is really cool. And then, you know, I lived the life of serving tech companies and the other company of Story Builder, and I saw the inside of, like, "Hey, there's a deeper pain Skill that you have; personality trait that gives you that ability. I don't know if talking is really the ability, but it certainly can be advantageous at times. But I think, I think my main, the main advantage that I can bring to the table is that I've lived kind of both sides of the coin. I started in the construction side; I built up relationships there. Able to solve that with video, but we can potentially solve it with other things. And so, it was really, it was a maturing in my own professional career that allowed for me to step out and, kind of, have faith and say, "All right, I'm gonna give this a shot. Let me see what happens here." And, you know, the initial response was incredible. I mean, in the first two weeks, we had like 90 people sign up for. For a testing network and saying, like, "Hey, I want to test new products like this," wild. That's not the expect—I had my expectations way lower than that. I was like, if I get five, I'm gonna feel great this week, right? And so, blew that out of the water. You know, just super, super thankful for that. And so, I don't know; I—I don't think I'm the only one that can pull this off, by any stretch, but I definitely am uniquely positioned to be able to—let's say, if we... Don't have somebody in the network already signed up? That at least have industry friends, connections, loved ones—even better if they are there and can help connect the worlds. Make sure that we can get the feedback back to the tech community initially, and then as it grows, the flywheel is going to spin a little faster. That's really what excites me: what's next? What are we going to keep pushing towards? And ultimately, it's just making better technology, and you know, making the industry a better place. Read? Make the industry a better place—that's the goal.

26:44 - Tyler Campbell
Yeah, yeah.

26:46 - Andy Richardson
And, um, now, is this field proof? Is this something that's just you, or is this part of your work with other partners?

26:54 - Tyler Campbell
Oh, we're bootstrapping it, baby. So it's just me, and, uh, you know, that's the way I like to do it. So, okay, that's just me. So it's a lot more, uh, you know, a lot more legwork, but, uh, dude, I'm... What it is we're selling back to tech to help them with. Read? Yeah, yeah. We're working through that right now. You know, we're two and a half months in. It's really early, really early. But initial signs are good, and it makes me excited. So, yeah, it seems like it. And I'm really excited to have you today just to talk about it. Sounds like things are going really well for you, so. Had so many people, even come out of the woodwork, saying that they wanted to partner up with this. And so I may even, hadn't—I'm having to pump the brakes on partnerships a bit, you know, specifically because I want it to mature a little bit more.

27:52 - Andy Richardson
I want to take it one step at a time and really feel out, okay, where is this pain point at? Because, you know, it does me no I'm really happy. And it's interesting how you've gone from the early stages of, you know, you mentioned the podcast and you wanted to change the world through education and knowledge. And there was a realization that, I mean, yeah, that could help. But to be this catalyst seems to be the way you're going about it now. I guess you're still probably doing the podcast, right?

28:24 - Tyler Campbell
Oh, yeah, we're still doing the podcast. I'm in the podcast booth right now.

28:27 - Andy Richardson
I know, like yeah, you're gonna do both. You're gonna educate the world and Catalyst. But there was a point at which you did the Catalyst thing, and you decided that you wanted to do this. What was the trigger for that?

28:39 - Tyler Campbell
A couple of things, and one of them was, you know, meeting between friends, but also Eddie. Eddie kind of thumping me in the nose, saying, "Hey, man, you're gonna keep talking about this, or are you gonna do something about it?" Yeah, so of got. Comfort is Milledgeville, Georgia, in our small little town here. I can fly out occasionally, but it's not something that I'm all over the United States if I'm shooting videos. Yeah, I didn't realize you were quite that close, because Yeah, really not far. Next time you're down Yeah, let's do it. Me, that got my Let's see here.

29:54 - Andy Richardson
So I want I mean, and obviously you probably don't want to give away too much, but what trends are you seeing right now that we should be aware of I'll say here's a pain.

30:17 - Tyler Campbell
Here's a common pain. And it is, there Let's do it. Through multiple project management apps. We know which one you're talking about. I'm not going to say it. I'm not going to blaspheme Searching through or many anything. Project there. It leave to going management just I'm apps to try to find information. His GF was spending anywhere from 4 10 a week just trying to find information. The problem is that it's really well set up for GC, great setup for the GC. Gets it and it uses it, but when the subcontractor has to interact with it and the superintendent of subcontractor has with it, disconnect appears, right? Because they have their own systems. They have their own processes. This isn't geared for them. And so, then, you end up with this data silo yet again. Like, what was the thing that everybody was preaching a couple of years ago? That it's a big issue. And it's not groundbreaking information. I feel like if you're But what's funny is a lot of these tech companies, they don't realize it because they're going They got their blinders and they're just doing this the whole time thinking about their thing. But you have to be able to map the entire workflow to understand like, okay, yes, Go eliminate data silos. Guess what? We created a crapload of data. These data silos are a result of system here, but how are these other people interacting with it? Is that user experience good? Guess what? If the GC is using something and they love it, but then they pass it down to the subs and all the subs hate it, what happens? The rumblings, right? All the subs start trash talking it. You start losing market share immediately. There's like, you're not going to be able to recover from that, or it's going to take a very long time to recover. For me, I think the tech companies are just unaware that some of the things that they've created are actually causing pains. And so it's hard. It's a hard thing to fix. But for me, I think there needs to be this underground plumbing happening between the apps to get information to flow. Because it's fine. If I like using one thing and you And so they don't want to give that API up or that ability to somehow connect these two apps, because if it did, then that would make it way easier to do what you're talking about, right?

34:00 - Andy Richardson
There's a big interoperability aspect of this that is just flaming apparent to me.

34:11 - Tyler Campbell
The big boys, we'll say, of the AEC tech space, yeah, they want to Using another, I feel like that shouldn't—that shouldn't stop us, but we should be able to connect the tools together so that I can work Put a moat up around their castle, so to speak, right? And it's understandable from a perspective that you would want to do something like that and maintain your space in the market. But also, you've got to realize that what you're doing there is actually hurting the industry as a whole because preventing information from flowing back and forth, right? You can't be all things to all people. We have to a little bit more of an open source kind of mindset with our tech. And there are a lot of people pursuing that. Are, but they're not as big. And so you've got these 1,000-pound gorillas in the room that are throwing their weight around and acquiring people nonstop or acquiring companies nonstop to squash And so there's another side of this with the big boys that are all right, well, it's fine that you're big, but you got to realize too, you control the health of the industry and you need to take that responsibly. Like you need to think through the ramifications of this. And again, that's where stuff like FieldProof can come in and assist where it's, okay, let's do some focus groups here. Let's understand like, really, what, what, Doing, doing to you in the field that truth bubbles to the surface. And for me, I think this is the stuff that the, you know, the VPS, the CEOs, these people at the top of those technology companies, they need to understand that. Because I think if they are a lot more open and a lot more transparent, that it is going to result in a ton of wins for them. They're gonna be the preferred person or company. Rather, by being open and sharing. I know Elon gave away his engine ideas or something like that, right? So like, come on, let's follow suit.

36:31 - Andy Richardson
Well, I went to a conference a few years ago and they were talking about that. They were like, what if we, you know, it was mass timber, you know, but not, it doesn't have to be mass timber. It could be any type of construction because they were talking about what if we had open source design, you know, where, you know, these designs were open source and people could just build from that. And these were, you know, there are architects in the room, there are engineers in the room. I mean, we're a design industry. So, but how could we all benefit from that? I mean, obviously the end user would benefit from that. But now that's my world because that's what we get paid for is the design. So I got to protect that too, right? But maybe there's a way, you know, Elon Musk, he gave it away, and he's still doing fine. So sometimes you can give it away and do okay, right?

37:22 - Tyler Campbell
Well, I don't know. Then he gets involved in politics, and that's where it gets fuzzy, but we'll see what happens. Yeah, we might be digressing some. We might be digressing just a little

37:32 - Andy Richardson
So, yeah, so those are a few trends. I mean, we have a lot of architects. Is there anything for the design side? I mean, you mentioned a wood design app. Is there anything like that that you've seen come through on the design side?

37:48 - Tyler Campbell
Yeah, no. I think there are a couple things out there. There's one that actually is really interesting to me, and it's a modeling platform. God, the name escapes me. I'm so sorry. And I can send it to you later, but put it in the show notes or something like that. It is actually ex-CEO of Autodesk. He's building up a new modeling platform, which I am crazy excited about. It's about time. We need to get away from, well, we need to get better tools in the modeling side of things, I'll say. I think that's a very important app that needs to be developed. And then there are a few others out there that are playing with that as well. And I'm kind of cheerleading from the sidelines, just excited to see that. Also, seeing as how robots in the field, they are gonna be enabled by our ability to model things accurately. And that's something I don't think people, I don't think everybody has really been able to connect to yet. I think people know robots are starting to come, but the reality is And you need data points to I think for me, in order to enable better robotic practices, more things to And so it all comes back to modeling platforms. Me, that's the biggest thing that I'm keeping my that the model drives the robot. Party up and down the chain, that's the thing. That's the game changer. We'll see what happens. That's a big ask. That's a big ask. But it needs to happen. And I think it's going to take an Elon sort of character to come along and be like, I'm not selling it. I'm just going to do the thing. I think it's going to take that sort of personality to make it happen and make Read, make it stick. That's the big thing. Um, it puts the feet to the fire for the other big guys out there developing modeling applications, and that makes them improve their products a lot more rapidly, makes them get a little more serious because right now they're fat and happy collecting the subscription fees. I think somebody needs to come in and thump them in the nose.

40:45 - Andy Richardson
So, right, disruption's gonna happen soon.

40:49 - Tyler Campbell
Yeah, it will. It's just a matter of when and who.

40:53 - Andy Richardson
Yeah, I mean, what you mentioned about. The modeling and the connection to the field, I mean, that makes sense because I just saw a Starbucks 3D printed. Yeah, I saw that too. Really? That's amazing. I mean, and it looks pretty good, in my opinion. Yeah. Um, I mean, I like how they— the texture of it and everything. I mean, some people may— I'm not an architect, so they may say, "Oh, that's they just leaned in," but I could respect that too.

41:17 - Tyler Campbell
Read? They just leaned into the fact that it's 3D printed. Yeah, it's 3D printed, whatever.

41:21 - Andy Richardson
They didn't code it or anything. They just went with it. So, yeah, there's a lot of cool technology out there. It sounds like a really good time to be in what you're doing and facilitating. Mean, and it also seems like your career, it's really cool to see how your career brought you to this place. And now you're able to use all that knowledge of the detailing, all that knowledge of, you know, like your podcast and everything. Was there anything else that helped you? Is this helping? You with your current role?

41:58 - Tyler Campbell
I've had to get a lot better at it, a lot more proficient. Because right now, if it's just me, it's lean and mean, I got to get a lot done. And so how can I use AI in a smart way, not in a, let me just hand this off and be brainless way, right? How can I do this in a way that can speak that can make me more accurate, do all of the, you know, do the trifecta, all right, that we're all looking for, faster, better, cheaper. I tend to, like, that is honestly, that's the thing right now. That's me more than anything. And I can't understate the impact that I think this is going to have. I think everybody kind of knows that it's going to be a massively impactful thing. But, I mean, the thing that I, The things that I'm seeing right now, just on my own side, and doing what I am doing, I'm like, kind of like, this is, this is insane. Like, the genie's out of the bottle. What the crap is going to happen now, level? So, um, yeah, that's a—I won't say AI is the game changer, because it's already here; the game has already changed. But I think modeling platforms will be the next game changer, right? There's an order—well, and they need.

43:14 - Andy Richardson
I mean, and not to, you know, put you too much on a platform, but I mean really, these companies—they need something like what you're doing to connect the dots. Yeah, so I think that's why it makes sense. About what you're doing, has, has perplexity or ChatGPT, have come knocking yet to fulfill proof to say they need me?

43:33 - Tyler Campbell
I think they've found their product-market fit, so I think they're...

43:42 - Andy Richardson
All right, um, at least for this part, um, but yeah, I mean, if there are AI companies that are coming out, AI first is what I'm seeing. Um, that's where I think using the AI-first construction technology is what we're going to see more of Would you agree with that?

44:01 - Tyler Campbell
Yes, and I mean, that's— I mean, that's honestly a challenge that I've set for myself: to be AI first as a business and field proof. Is, you know, before I go out and hire people, let me see if I can actually do this with AI, just to see if it's possible. Just because I want that challenge for myself. I love interacting with people, don't get me wrong. I want to have more people come on board and help, but also if it can be at the foundation level of everything that we do, that's the thing that I think is going to be really interesting, is new businesses coming online with that mindset of, okay, we're no longer... The companies that have been around for a long time, the ones that are the massive aircraft carriers, we'll say, of businesses, it's going to take a long time for them to turn around and integrate AI into their systems and do that in a way that's responsible. Whereas with smaller businesses, these tiny ones that are just getting started, now if they are AI first from the start the the ability to advance and innovate and stay ahead of those massive massive companies right from the shoot is gonna be really interesting to see yeah so yeah AI first construction companies that's the thing that I'm kind of looking at going man when when is that going to happen? I think, I think it already is, but they just haven't bubbled up to the surface yet. I think they're going to bubble up to the surface and you're going to go, Oh crap, that thing's they're huge. And they only have 50 people or whatever it is. And they're, you know, $6 billion a year.

45:49 - Andy Richardson
You had one on your podcast recently, right? First engineering.

45:55 - Tyler Campbell
Ahmed, Ahmed. That was dude. That was wild. He really, He really brought some insight and made us think. Ahmed is, actually, he was a steel guy too, man. That was really cool. I think he worked at a large steel company, manufacturing facility or company. And he just went full-bore into AI. And honestly, after talking to him, Eddie and I both, we both were like, hmm, maybe we should start playing with that more. Out by it, you could go, "Oh my gosh, it's the end of the world. I'm gonna lose my job," or you can get really excited, like I am, and be like, "Listen, what are the opportunities here? How can I leverage this to make my work better or make my business better?" And the people that think like that, those are the ones that are gonna win long term. So it's been a mindset shift for me. At first I was like, "Yeah, And so we did, and that's really the thing that spurred us on, and said, "Like, hey, let's try testing some of this stuff." And man, the stuff that we have been able to do—just our dumb butts here in the office—being able to code stuff and create things for ourselves. Man, it's—he was right. Like, it's AIs coming for at least a lot of different roles now. It's you could get for. This is something Read, right.

47:37 - Andy Richardson
Well, that's I mean, just, and it's becoming cliche I mean, it's here. We have to. Use it. We Like, oh, junk.

48:21 - Tyler Campbell
For documents, for 10 hours a week—I mean, like, can you not have an AI agent to go find that? You know, shop drawings or whatever he's looking for. They exist, they exist. But you know, they're still being trained, and it's still something that's—you know—being worked on. Um, so I will say they do exist.

48:43 - Andy Richardson
Um, so again, it's, it's even kind of an education part, too. Um, but like, for the contractors to Kind of reckon with yet, and or we have, but not to this degree.

48:54 - Tyler Campbell
The fact that we can train an AI model to replace an entire human is insane to me, but here we are, you know, and it's only getting better every day, which is again mind-numbingly crazy, a little freaky, but you know, which I mean. It seems like they should be able to have AI solve that gentleman's problem of search. Else, which is fair, which is fair. I mean, you don't want Humpty Dumpty It's up there looking happy right now. Don't look at him too hard, right? And sometimes implementing a new tool can So for a minute, for a minute. So you got to be bold to Which that's another model, but that's not your model is to help those Hey, here's what's available.

50:09 - Andy Richardson
But I think they're a little bit confused and stunned right now because, Maybe eventually.

50:16 - Tyler Campbell
We'll see what happens here. It might have been a thought.

50:21 - Andy Richardson
I saw your note app that you put on LinkedIn. I do follow you, by the way. That's cool to see how you... I've gone through that process, too, with different things where...

50:36 - Tyler Campbell
I saw your different brainstorming things where you thought through, okay, these are the things I No, it's like, for me, like, oh my gosh, dude, I, yeah, brainstorming buddy with AI has been huge for me. I, cause I feel like a broken record a lot of times when I'm talking to people, cause I just, the mind's just always spinning. There's a, there's a rodent up there that's just always running on the, on the wheel and I can't stop it, but you know, here we are. And it's awesome. Drives my wife insane. So it has been nice. Now it has a few, But anyway, I thought it was hilarious. Well, I haven't done that part where I've done the transcription. You haven't done the With AI, like ChatGPT or Perplexity or something.

51:24 - Andy Richardson
I guess you just haven't. Oh, Andy.

51:29 - Tyler Campbell
Oh, Andy. I'm going I'll check it out.

51:34 - Andy Richardson
It's pretty wild.

51:36 - Tyler Campbell
I'm not going All right.

51:38 - Andy Richardson
We'll check So she was a little jealous at first.

52:08 - Tyler Campbell
It's completely free.

52:09 - Andy Richardson
We're not gonna If we need you, we'll let you And so you go to fieldproof.io and join Yeah, and then other, I guess, big technology companies that might be listening to Enhanced Podcast.

52:23 - Andy Richardson
Yeah, yeah, yeah.

52:28 - Andy Richardson
They can sign As far as the other...

52:30 - Tyler Campbell
Well, Issues and kind of understand how we might be able to help.

52:34 - Tyler Campbell
Um, you know, if we can't just go join the network.

53:05 - Madeline
Hey everybody, thanks for listening to today's episode of Enhance, and please leave a like, a subscribe, or a follow, and we'll see you next time.