In this episode of UnfilteredFlowELSC, host Meghann Cook welcomes Willie Harbert, a seasoned expert in the fluid power industry. Willie shares his journey from being a Navy nuclear submarine officer to becoming the Vice President of Orbital Motors at Danfoss and Eaton. He discusses the importance of partnerships, the integration of smart technology and IoT in fluid power, and the challenges of attracting new talent to the industry. Willie emphasizes the need for adaptability and continuous learning in a rapidly evolving field, offering insights into the future of fluid power and the role of innovation in small businesses.
Keywords
fluid power, IoT, smart technology, partnerships, innovation, talent pipeline, adaptability, continuous learning, small businesses, industry trends
Takeaways
- Partnerships are crucial in the fluid power industry.
- Smart technology and IoT are transforming fluid power.
- Attracting new talent is a major challenge.
- Adaptability and continuous learning are essential.
- Small businesses play a key role in innovation.
- The industry is moving towards more automation.
- Generational shifts impact technology adoption.
- Data must be turned into actionable insights.
- The labor and talent pipeline needs strengthening.
- Fluid power is integral to many industries.
Transcript
Meghann Cook (00:00.927)
Hi everyone. Welcome to UnfilteredFlowELSC Flow ELSC, the podcast dedicated to the progression of the fluid power and automation industries. I’m Meghann Cook and today it is my pleasure to welcome Mr. Willie Harbert to the show.
Willie Harbert (00:17.036)
Thanks for having me. Great. Yes.
Meghann Cook (00:17.599)
Hi Willie, how are you? Yeah, absolutely. Thanks for taking the time. So Willie, why don’t you tell us about yourself and also how you got into the fluid power industry.
Willie Harbert (00:35.118)
Great. Well, I spent about 20 years in the fluid power industry, the first 17 being with Eaton and then obviously three years ago, four years ago, Danfoss Foss acquired Eaton, so I spent three years with Danfoss Foss. My last job being the vice president of orbital motors for Danfoss Foss and Eaton, which are probably the two places, it’s the place where both companies got started in hydraulics.
actually from the same person, Lynn Charleston, who licensed the technology to Danfoss and then eventually Eaton bought his company. it’s a pretty unique story and an exciting story. But I started out in my first introduction to fluid power was in the Navy. I was a Navy nuclear submarine officer.
And to earn your dolphins on a submarine, you have to learn every system on a submarine. And the planes and the rudder and the mast and everything are obviously high-power density applications. And they’re all hydraulically actuated. And I just remember when I was doing one of my interviews on the hydraulic systems, I was drawing everything, and they said, you forgot something.
pretty important. It was a accumulator on the system. I was like, oh, I forgot the accumulator. And I just remember that because I thought, oh, I should have known that. And then on the pneumatic side, obviously, submarines do what’s called emergency blows, which are like when if there’s flooding or anything, you get hit or something like that, there’s high pressure air that flows through the ballast tanks that pops up the submarine like a balloon.
Obviously, that’s all pneumatic valves and actuators. So that’s my first experience on a submarine. Pretty critical components as part of the submarine. then after I was in the Navy for six years, and then after I got out, I joined Eaton. And then that’s where I transitioned to more exposure, kind of slowly to fluid power. So my first main job in Eaton was
Willie Harbert (02:57.174)
actually in an industrial clutch and brake manufacturer called Airflex, and I was on the operations side. But they were all pneumatically actuated. they also had accessories like, we called them quick release valves, and what we called rotor seals, they’re rotor reunions that allowed the air to flow through to actuate the actual brakes and clutches. And then eventually I moved to the Twin Cities about 14 years ago where
I got into the heart of fluid power and with Eaton and a wide variety of roles.
Meghann Cook (03:30.795)
Yeah, you have an impressive career going there, really, certainly.
So over the years, and this can be going back to the Navy and then your time at Eaton, as far as projects go, what would you consider your most fun and or important project that you’ve worked?
Willie Harbert (03:55.442)
That’s a great question. I’m going to bucket it into one big bucket and maybe go to some sub buckets. think the biggest thing about fluid power, and I wasn’t a fluid power engineer or anything, but it’s about partnerships. I think particularly in the United States, partnerships are critical, whether it be the distribution partnerships. I saw you interviewed Mike McVeigh from Cross, and I know Mike.
the collaborating with distribution and they do everyday innovation whether it’s big or small or whatever it is and just seeing all those projects, know, grinders and shredders, et cetera, attachment business, especially on the motor side, it’s always been very exciting. So I think partnerships have always been important. I had a chance to help acquire and then run a business where we acquired technology from a Scottish partner.
where we made these big large industrial motors. When I say large industrial motors, I’m talking about two-liter motors, large, maybe like three foot in diameter. We called them HydraMac at Eaton. They were to compete against the Haglunds motors from RexRoth. It didn’t really work out, but it was just incredible scale and learning experience for me.
I also got time to spend time in Edinburgh, Scotland, which is not a bad place to be. But finally, think the most important maybe impact was my role as the vice president of the Orbital Motors business. So obviously, as I said, we’re bringing together the legacy Eaton Charlynn motor, like the heart of what Eaton started as in terms of, and then also the heart of what Danfoss was.
Meghann Cook (05:24.821)
Not a bad spot to be, no.
Willie Harbert (05:49.598)
And we developed a great product roadmap. And those motors have been around for decades. And I look forward to there’s a product roadmap launching that next generation of motors. And I think you’ll see some come out probably at the next, probably next con expo in Las Vegas here coming up. So it’ll be excited to see.
Meghann Cook (06:12.778)
Yeah.
Willie Harbert (06:21.07)
probably the most important. I think you know, once you’ve launched some of these products, they last for 10, 20, 30, 40 years sometimes. So it’ll be exciting to see that.
Meghann Cook (06:30.987)
Yeah, me.
So in your time in the industry, and specifically, I would say, the past five years, the emphasis and the integration of smart technology and IoT, what have you seen as far as changes go?
and just the integration portion. You know, were mentioning earlier about your distribution partners, which, you know, is heavy on that integration side. So what have you seen in changes in that realm?
Willie Harbert (07:16.022)
Yes, no, mean, the industry is moving fast, right, with regards to IoT. Information and data is always important, right? You can embed nowadays sensors everywhere, whether it’s pressure, temperature, location, pretty easily now at fairly low cost. The question is then how do you use that information to take action, whether that’s…
predictive maintenance, whether that’s fuel savings, whether that’s energy optimization or a higher level control from the feedback systems. So that’s progressing, I would say. There’s two ends of the spectrum, as you mentioned. think the large, big OEMs, like a John Deere or somebody like that, they all want to control it themselves, right? Because they want it to be proprietary and differentiated.
So that’s one path that it’s going because they want to try to provide value that’s differentiated. And then the other path is through the distributions where we just want information. I think the distributors are doing a good job of providing some of those services. The challenge is not everybody knows exactly what they need. mean, think systems and information like the DanFoss Plus One system has provided some.
opportunity for that, but we’re still on that learning curve, I would say, of how we can better use this. think going forward, one of the challenges is this generational shift, right? And you need to have knowledge on the user side too, but you have maybe more of the experience.
operators, right, at the end users who what’s familiar to them is totally different to what’s familiar to a like 25 year old. And as more, you know, people who are more comfortable with the integration of sensors, analytics, control systems, that’s going to accelerate here, I think over the next decade. And I think we’re just going to have to adapt to what that looks like. You know, the reality is also the labor shortages.
Willie Harbert (09:31.896)
to where we’re going to have to automate more. And that’s going to be important with regards to the smart technology and IoT going forward.
Meghann Cook (09:41.462)
That’s a good point. And you mentioned, you know, the, let’s say engineers, they’re some of the younger folks as opposed to the machine operator. And I think that’s the key to that sometimes, you know, maybe isn’t understood by that 25 year old, as you say, you know, actually going and talking to that machine operator.
and seeing from their perspective what the issues are, what’s good, and then being able to take that information and understand to be able to apply it to the machine.
Willie Harbert (10:25.452)
Yes, data is only so good as you can turn it into information and feedback to make better decisions or to get better control. yes, so that is extremely important. think sometimes you get paralysis by analysis, and that happens too. we’re all still learning how to better use data, even in my day to day.
Meghann Cook (10:49.737)
Okay.
Meghann Cook (10:53.803)
Absolutely.
Willie Harbert (10:54.69)
just living because there’s just so much information out in the world now that’s accessible information that’s out there.
Meghann Cook (10:59.867)
There is there is that’s true almost too much Honestly, it makes my ADHD pick up sometimes really like just like a squirrel with shiny things I can’t concentrate on one thing with everything that’s out there. What would you tell Professionals in the industry whether it’s you know, somebody younger that’s cutting their teeth and coming up in the industry or somebody that’s
been in the industry for a minute here, Willie. What skills or areas of knowledge would you tell them to concentrate on to be successful in the industry going forward?
Willie Harbert (11:43.438)
Yeah, no, mean, we were just talking about, mean, things are moving so fast now. I think I heard somewhere that 25 or even more percent of the jobs that will exist when a kindergartener graduates doesn’t even exist yet, right? There are jobs that are being developed. And so how do you tell a kid what they should be when they grow up?
So I think the answer is just to continue to stay curious and adaptable, be lifelong learners. We do have resources like YouTube now and on-demand training and all this stuff where you can learn something, right? When I go out and need to, you know, fix my toilet, I’m going to Google and look at YouTube and find out, okay, how to do it, right? So, you know, those, at least those…
Meghann Cook (12:34.801)
Mm-hmm.
Willie Harbert (12:39.017)
avenues for learning now exist in a lot of different places. I think, know, I listened to Mike McVeigh’s messages. You still have to have a level of technical, you know, he grew up as a salesperson, have a level of technical and analytical skills. So continue to learn about, you know, anything you can, whether it be, you know, tools like, you know, AI, you know, just continue to learn.
I recently read a book, or I like the book, it was called Range, and it talks about specialists versus generalists. And the first example they gave was Tiger Woods and Roger Federer. many of you know, for those of who know, Tiger Woods is a great golfer, Roger Federer is a great tennis player. But Tiger Woods grew up and he just golfed since he was like two, whatever, two years old, and he learned golfing.
And he was a specialist in golfing, which is a one way to go and been, you know, obviously very successful. Roger Federer didn’t really take up tennis until he was a teenager. He played, you know, soccer or football in Europe, right? He played all these different sports and eventually he, you know, took up tennis. He was more of a generalist, but he could use all of the skills that he used in many of these other sports for tennis. And he was able to be successful there. And, you know, you can be successful in both, but, you know, with
just directly with AI and automation doing very specific tasks. AI is going to be in automation and computers are going to be very skilled at doing a single task, like lifting something up and down over and over again. So the specialization is going to be more easily replaced. The ability to learn and be a generalist is going to be harder to replace. So my recommendation is to be able to adapt to whatever happens out there.
Meghann Cook (14:22.965)
it.
Willie Harbert (14:37.631)
is probably the primary recommendation.
Meghann Cook (14:40.681)
Yeah, and you hit the nail on the head with both of those. Curiosity, that comes up a lot actually, and adaptability, absolutely. And continuous learning, obviously. So what would you say the biggest current challenge is in fluid power?
Willie Harbert (15:00.703)
Yeah, I would say two. The first one is actually just the labor and the talent pipeline. Everybody wants to, the thought says, I want to work in software. I want to work in computers. So really, how do we attract talent to fluid power? I always say, it’s not fluid power. We have to think about what we’re doing. mean, we’re building.
construction equipment, we’re building agriculture equipment, we’re doing, that’s what we’re doing, you know, we’re building airplanes, right? mean, submarines, right? All of this stuff has, you know, fluid power in it, right? Makes the world run. So I think that’s, you know, we don’t do a great job of marketing, I think, and then in terms of what we really do. So I think that’s the biggest challenge is going to be our labor and talent pipeline and attracting talent. And that starts early, as early as possible.
Meghann Cook (15:35.813)
It makes the world run. That’s what I always say.
Willie Harbert (15:56.302)
to get people engaged. How many people like the more hands-on? I grew up as an electrical engineer. My buddy, said, I’m entering this whole fluid power industry. And he said, you know what? In electrical, you have Ohm’s law, voltage equals current times resistance. said, fluid power is the same way. It’s pressure equals force over area. It’s just
It’s just that a macroscopic and not a microscopic scale and you can actually see it and then how many people, know, they’re, you know, Legos are much more popular than, you know, you know, circuitry systems because kids can build Legos, they can feel it and see it. So it should be an easier sell. You know, I actually have a lot of construction going on in.
And you can’t imagine how many kids are lining the streets, sitting on the steps of their house, watching the vehicles, the construction. That’s a love. And then how do you harness that to transition to a labor market? That’s what we have to figure out.
Meghann Cook (17:02.391)
Maybe we should put the simulators in every school. Really? That would get all kinds of people excited if they could hop up in there. You know, some sort of virtual thing where they’re running a backhoe or a dozer or something like that. mean…
Willie Harbert (17:04.269)
Yeah.
Willie Harbert (17:17.837)
Yes.
And I think related to that, just I don’t want to, you I want to add to that is I think it’s not a challenge, it’s an interesting thing to look out for is as the industry consolidates, right, Eaton and Danfoss Foss or Rexroth Roth and Hydraforce instance, you know, Parker’s bought a lot. I mean, it really, they focus on these big home runs, right? And this, you know, these huge markets, where can I get my
biggest return on investment. And that leaves a gap. And also from a labor perspective, attraction, right? If I want to be more innovative, I don’t want to try out these ideals. Some ideals are killed for big companies because you don’t get the ROI. So there’s an opportunity for at least smaller product-oriented businesses to maybe innovate these niche, but maybe higher value solutions. So I’m reading a book.
actually by a friend of mine called Unconvention. And it talks about a lot of innovation that can often happen in small areas and these very niche high value where a lot of people have passion too, right? Because that’s the one thing I love about the industry. There’s so much passion in the industry. And I’m afraid that going back to the labor is…
as people are retiring and moving on, are we going to lose that passion and that pipeline? But I do see it in pockets of several colleagues, too. So I think that one of the advantages of the US is the way we’re structured is we have an ability for small businesses and incubation and small inventive companies to really thrive and experiment and grow. So I’m hoping that we can continue to leverage that in the fluid power industry.
Meghann Cook (19:07.947)
Yeah, that’s an excellent point you make and actually that, you know, leads into my question with your thoughts about the acquisitions that are going on and the impact on the industry, which, you know, is pretty much asked and answered. But it’s such an interesting time on both sides, the manufacturing side and the distribution side, Willie.
Willie Harbert (19:30.551)
Yes.
Yes, yes. Yes, I think the distribution side is the same way, right? Because they also want to have the buyer power, right? They see all the manufacturers consolidating, the distributors are also consolidating. It changes the game. But again, I think that there’s going to be bigger companies move slowly. It’s just going to be a fact. And there’s a reason for it.
there’s gonna be opportunities out there and for smaller companies to spring up, to thrive and survive. think they’re just gonna have to, the smaller companies are gonna have to find their niche. Just going back to that book I just started reading, so I’m not done. They talked about bookstores, right? The example of bookstores when like the Barnes and Nobles and the borders popped up and then you had all these independent bookstores out there.
And then actually, then Amazon popped up and actually ate the lunch of the Barnes and Nobles and Borders. Borders, I don’t know even how many Borders exist anymore, if they even exist. But the independent bookstores still survived because they were able to find what they did special, how do they service their customers better than some of these big players because they were much more intimate with their customers.
Meghann Cook (20:36.747)
Yeah.
Willie Harbert (20:54.829)
So there’s going to be small businesses out there that may invent the next great thing, and they’re going to need partners, a distributor, an integrated partner to help them with the automation, integration, fluid power solutions. there’s just not going to be as many. The big players may not want to partner with that small company down the street, but maybe some of the smaller companies will. So I think there’s still an opportunity. So we just go through these cycles and waves, and I do think a lot of these smaller companies will start to pop up.
Meghann Cook (21:25.001)
I think you’re right and agility is a key word there and as you also said.
you know, the customer, it’s agility, the way you treat your customer base, how you go to market that way will set you apart because it is the larger you get, the slower moving you are. It’s just back that way. So I think you’re right. And I think there’s going to be an opportunity for, you know, some of these smaller companies to really make, make headway in the current.
Willie Harbert (21:49.453)
Yeah.
Meghann Cook (22:00.427)
situation and in the next 10 to 15 years certainly.
Willie Harbert (22:04.302)
Yeah, definitely.
Meghann Cook (22:06.419)
So this is off the books, Willie. If you could go back to Willie, and this could be pre-Navy or pre-Eaton or both, what piece or pieces of advice would you give yourself?
Willie Harbert (22:26.924)
Yes, no, I think for me, was a, I mentioned earlier that I was, know, I went to school and decided to major in electrical engineering. you know, just going back to what we said, we were talking about, I think, you know, engineering and, you know, how many systems these days are purely mechanical, purely electrical, purely X, Y, Z, nothing.
I wish I had spent more time at least looking at kind of the entire, more of a systems engineering approach. Because the reality is I didn’t end up ever designing systems, but I utilized them and it’s about how everything goes together at the end of the day. So if it were me, I would have spent less time doing the very theoretical classes and more time.
working on more hands-on projects and learning how systems work. even as we talk about integrators and distributors, I’m not sure if you will be successful even classifying yourself as a fluid power distributor. I think, for instance, I think you’re going to need to understand how to be an automation distributor or something.
more than that as an integrator to combine a lot of different partners and systems. So I think that’s something that’s going to transition over time. So I would tell myself to learn a broader spectrum of technical knowledge and resources.
Meghann Cook (24:12.139)
Yeah, that’s excellent advice. Again, considering the current climate, I call them hybrid engineers, but there’s such a blur in systems anymore. know, the pure, nothing’s pure hydraulic or pure electric or anything like that. And then having an understanding of motion control and that sort of thing. You really need to have that.
Willie Harbert (24:29.496)
Yeah.
Meghann Cook (24:38.389)
hybrid look at things and So in that respect too, it’s a very interesting time and will be
Willie Harbert (24:47.02)
Yes, yes, and we’ll continue to be. And the great thing about it is, least in most industries, that things are tangible. You can feel and see the results of machines and look at it. In the fluid power industry, I have a bias towards things I can see.
So when I walk around conferences like ConExpo, I could always see the motors. That’s one of our motors, oftentimes they’re outside of machines. I used to run actually a cylinder and actuation business within Eaton. The cylinders you can often see and then the fluid conveyance you can often see. Those are the three things you can see. Sometimes the valves or the pumps are embedded so you can’t even see it. I always have a bias towards the…
the parts that I can see.
Meghann Cook (25:37.033)
I’m 100 % with you there. It’s always fun and Con-X is an animal of its own, but I always loved walking around and, you know, looking for product and the different applications. It’s just neat. I don’t know. It’s a cool industry, right? That’s all you can say. Well, Willie, I so much appreciate your time. I know you’re busy. I’m glad you took the time out to have a chat here.
Willie Harbert (25:55.128)
Yeah, definitely, yes.
Meghann Cook (26:06.753)
and thank you very much.
Willie Harbert (26:10.168)
Thanks, Meghann It was a pleasure.
Meghann Cook (26:13.45)
Alright, have a good day, Willie. Bye.
Willie Harbert (26:15.407)
All right, take care.