Weekly Impact by Lay of The Land

Hi, this is Jim Haviland Lay of the Land weekly impact.

And this conversation was once again part of the series we're doing for the Smart 50
Awards for 2025.

I spoke with a gentleman named Brian Wilson, who's second generation North American
Coating Labs Great conversation and really interesting technology, but probably most

important to me and also here at Impact Architects is he's running on EOS.

gives a shout out to his implementer, Dan Rose, as part of the conversation.

So uh lot of great stuff in here to learn that applies to many businesses and how to apply
the elements of a business operating system to reach success.

uh he's a great example of it, having gone from a reasonably successful business with his
father, but then really becoming super successful uh under his leadership and adding EOS,

which he gives a lot of credit to.

So please enjoy my conversation with Brian Wilson.

All right, welcome.

This is Lay of the Land Weekly Impact, the Smart 50 edition for 2025, where I'm talking to
this year's honorees, trying to find out what makes them a smart business.

And Brian, tell me a little bit about what are you doing here?

What's your business and why is it smart?

So I run North American Coating Laboratories, a business that does coatings for optics.

It was started in 1974 by my father doing coatings for eyeglasses and sunglasses.

I went to school to become an optical engineer and now we work on things like laser
optics, consumer electronics, augmented and virtual reality, military scopes and sites,

and a wide range of other devices in many, different industries.

I've had a very interesting career, but I actually had a paper published in optics.

Oh, really?

Yeah.

Well, I did a satellite thing back when I was in college.

OK.

I got to be on the paper.

We've done some coding for satellites.

It was a company in um Indianapolis that built these things.

They were supposed to measure, they're basically counting photons.

We could talk about it all day long.

That's my world.

That's awesome.

I know that there's a lot of polymer work that goes on here.

Is it similar and adjacent to that?

That's why it's in Northeast Ohio?

So it just happened that my father was the director of manufacturing for Cole National,
which was all the Sears Opticals.

Okay, I needed to bring coatings into that business and just ended up forming a
relationship with the uh manufacturer of the equipment and started this company doing

coatings, which were then back back then just eyeglasses and sunglasses where then they
were all made of glass lenses.

But it's funny that you bring up polymers because eyeglasses and sunglasses transition
from glass lenses to polymers way earlier than most precision optics have.

And that's our real key focus for us as a competitive advantage is the ability to put all
these coatings.

that are normally done at very high temperatures with processes that will melt plastic
lenses, we've been able to transition all those formulas to be able to be done on a

variety of polymers that are not being more widely used in the precision optics industry.

That's brilliant.

And there's glass everywhere.

like, lens glass.

mean, these are out there.

Exactly.

And it's crazy how much is going on with that.

So tell me, so you're

Your father started, did you always want to be in the business or did you rebel against
that at some point?

I never rebelled, but I was kind of raised to go into the business.

I have a sister and she's never been involved with the business.

So I'm not sure if it was just first born luck or what it was, but I pursued my career in
optical engineering, got my degree and literally two weeks after graduation, was, I've

been working ever back to work.

Yeah.

I always wanted that last summer vacation, but it didn't work out that way.

So it goes.

uh So how big is the business now?

So right now we have 30 people here in Cleveland, Ohio and mentor.

uh I also bought a company last year down in Austin, Texas, and we've got eight people
down there.

trying to just grow their capabilities, our footprint, our customer base, as well as they
do some ancillary technologies that are kind of add ons to the coatings that we do, right,

coatings as well.

So we find out who's the best use for either or the best choice for either one of the two
companies when a customer's inquiry comes in and we kind of put it there.

And target market fit, imagine, I this is such a specialized thing.

You've got people walking in the door willing to pay whatever it costs to get what you do.

So we have a very wide marketplace, but where we really do well is in some of the very
quick turnaround stuff.

we do partnerships with augmented and virtual reality companies, MetaFacebook, Apple,
Google, those guys.

They need to their things done quickly.

we actually, because we were in the eyeglass industry and we had people to turn things
around very quickly,

We've run three shifts since we opened 50 years ago.

So we are able to move our schedules around in order to accommodate expedited needs of our
customers.

have a very nimble staff that's able to adjust the production schedule.

And in some of these cases, as you mentioned, some of these companies are willing to pay
premiums to get to the front of the line.

And we're able to adjust those things and make it happen.

So we'll get inquiries from a customer who may ask today for saying that we'll have a
package tomorrow with some optics and then there'll be a special anti-reflective coating,

for instance.

how quickly can we turn them around?

And our response is, well, how quickly do you need them?

And they're like, well, same day if possible, ha ha.

And we're like, okay.

And here's what it's gonna cost.

Yeah, there's a price on it, that's all.

Yeah.

And so it's willing, know, what they're willing to pay.

And so we'll offer them options, you know, same day, next day, three days, turn around and
just decide what they're willing to pay for.

This is interesting.

your special sauce is not just the materials, but it's also the logistics.

part of the business.

is.

It's being able to work on the wide range of materials, the plastics, the glasses, even
some metal optics.

It's also the service.

We're highly focused on relationship building and we build these relationships with these
huge companies that I mentioned.

knowing that we're never going to get the millions and millions of pieces of volume, we're
just not set up to do that.

But we are set up to be their best R &D partners because we're quick to respond.

have all the technical capabilities.

And our philosophy is, I'd to get a piece of the pie and no pie at all.

And for that, we were able to establish these relationships I was talking about with these
companies.

And every time they have a new idea, they come knocking on our door as soon as it
originates.

And we're working with them at the very early stages of the best way to try to get to what
their end goals are.

That's brilliant.

Love that.

So what lessons have you learned?

You've got out of college, you're back in the business.

How long have you been running the joint?

I've been running the place fully as the CEO now for about 15 years.

All right.

So you've had a chance to do some things.

Less than the best way.

Yes.

And you've learned a long way.

What have you learned?

What do you take as your most important leadership lessons?

So some of the best lessons I have are to understand the approach to a situation.

And by that, mean everybody's got a unique character.

And if you can best understand your employees, your customers, your vendors, and how they
like to be interacted with, especially employees, you can really get the best out of them.

There's no one size fits all when it comes to addressing people.

found that out.

That was one of the best lessons learned and one of the best things I try to pass down to
the other leaders in our company is understand your audience.

Knowing that I can say the same thing in four different ways to four different people and
get the best out of each of them.

But if I use the same thing for all four of them, two might think it's great and two might
think I'm an idiot.

So it's really understanding your audience, catering your conversation, looking for the
best qualities in people and trying to grow that.

know, my father used to, and it's a

an overall business situation from the 80s and 90s, it's like, hey, we've got a great
manager that's running this division, but now we've got an opening in this new division.

So I'm just going to take this person and slide them over there.

That doesn't work.

You got to use, we follow EOS, the entrepreneurial operating system.

So we use the RPRS or right person, right seat format.

And we really are careful to say, here's the unique talents, abilities and creative
abilities that these people have.

How can we best use their unique skill sets?

to help complement the company and also provide them an opportunity to have fun and enjoy
what they're doing for work.

Yeah.

You we, part of what we do at Impact Architects is we help with operating systems,
including EOS.

And, uh, you know, we, we talk all the time about, Hey, you want all of your team to be A
players.

Well, that means everyone's doing something they're great at and love to do.

In the top left quadrant.

Right.

Yeah.

Exactly.

Unless you get them there, they're not, they're not going to be A players.

Yeah.

People say, I don't want to get rid of this guy.

He's been with me a long time.

Yeah, but is he ever going to be an A player?

Right.

Then you're doing a disservice by keeping him around.

Yes.

If he's not going to be an A player, that's the meanest thing you possibly do.

Let him go be an A player somewhere.

Exactly.

Well, this is great.

So um what do you have problems?

You because you're you run an EOS shop, you're pretty good at hiring the right people.

don't.

We're very careful on the hiring process.

Good.

We go through a very diligent.

Evaluation if they're going to our core values, we're very focused on culture at the
company.

um We took the time to really develop our core values through the EOS implementation
process and landed on three core values that we hire, fire and live by on a daily basis.

I love it.

And those are embodies here to help positive energy and driven.

And when annual performance reviews comes up, quarterly conversations, we're always
looking at those core values and seeing how do our employees from top to bottom fit those

particular core values.

And we discuss ways we can improve or what they're excelling at or how we can get better.

We're always looking to get better across the board.

Every day, just get a little better.

You either growing or you're dying.

Those are the two options in this world.

When clients start on their implementation, I tell them, well, you're going to be hiring
by your core values.

What do you mean?

How am I going do that?

I guess I can try to figure out whether they say, no, no, you're going to ask them
directly.

Tell me an example.

of when in your work career you've exemplified this core value.

If you don't have an answer, then probably you haven't.

It might be there, but you know.

you think too long about it, then it's not the top of your It's probably not there.

It's not there.

I'm going to do you favor.

Keep moving.

That's right.

So do you have an implementer that you work with that you want to shout out to?

Sure.

We use Dan Rose here locally.

Oh yeah, Dan's great.

Yeah.

And he helped us get through it and we've been running now for about two years on our own.

And Tim, we need something.

We reach out to Dan, but we've got it done pretty well.

That's great.

That's great.

So what, is there any other earned wisdom you want to share about, you so you're running
on EOS.

Is EOS good for anybody?

For a small business up to a certain size, I think EOS is a great platform.

I mean, one of the greatest things that it provided to us is streamlined meetings.

Meetings in every company can be really terrible if they're not done right.

Almost always are.

everybody's been into a meeting where you go in, people call a meeting for a specific
topic, you start talking about that topic and then Betty over in the corner two minutes

later is now veered you off a little bit.

And 10 minutes into the meeting, we're like, why did we even come in the room?

I don't even remember what the topic of this meeting was.

So keeping the format of the meetings is really key.

Having everybody have accountability goals that you can measure, key measurables.

It's all just a really great way of running a small business.

Gina would tell you this, he didn't invent this stuff, the thing is, there is a way of
doing this that you don't know yet, but there is a path.

You can be very, very good at this.

And meetings, I hear about a meeting called Time Board where there's the book report part
where I'm gonna tell you everything I did this last week.

Nah, that's not helping, because now everyone else is tuned out.

Exactly.

You've lost everyone's attention.

the audience.

Yeah.

Well, so about mentors, have you had some mentors along the path?

Anyone you want to recognize?

Well, I'm going to talk about two mentors, actually.

One of them is my father and not in the traditional sense.

OK, my father, you know, I give him full credit for taking the steps to start his own
business.

I took a lot of gumption to be able to do that.

But uh I also watched a lot of mistakes made along.

Yeah.

And.

uh

rather than just following the footsteps of my father exactly.

kind of watched what was done incorrectly and learned from that.

Right.

My parents went through a very nasty divorce that almost like shuttered the company.

I watched how that happened.

They both took their hands off the wheel.

The company was running itself.

It was headed for the dumpster.

That was right when I graduated.

So I was able to come in and luckily you get to do a turnaround.

Yeah.

To be a turnaround guy at 21 years old.

But no, so that's the one thing.

And then actually another gentleman, our name is cool to use.

Yeah.

Okay.

Greg Skoda.

yeah.

yeah, great.

Yeah, obviously I was at a luncheon with my father years and years ago This is before I
was running the company was invited this lunch and I ended up sitting next to Greg.

We ended up chatting Just hit it off and Greg's been a mentor It's given me some sound
advice over the years become a personal friend and just a great guy to bounce ideas off of

and he's wisdom and his knowledge and it's

His track record is solid.

So I like to ask this question because there are some people that come up on a regular
basis who just constantly reckon all of I tell my clients all my biggest mistakes in

business were all because I didn't have enough mentors to get me out of it to keep me from
making mistakes.

Exactly.

And you got it.

You you check in with people, you know, you're not building relationships, like I said,
you got to have as many as you can.

Yeah, I used to be a kind of an introvert.

But now these days I really take every opportunity to network and to know people.

Yeah, because getting to know people and getting to know who they know.

that can help you solve a lot of problems in this world.

Everybody's seen something at some point.

So you don't have to figure it all out yourself.

There's other people that can help you along the way.

The model that I share with all my clients, because it's hard to know when you know enough
to make good decisions.

It's with the Dunning-Kruger curve, you know about this.

At the beginning, you're the top of Mount Stupid.

You know a little bit and you think you're above average on it.

It's like, no, no, no, you don't know anywhere.

You know less than half of what you think you know.

Which means you're almost guaranteed to make the wrong choice.

Exactly.

Both averages.

Yeah, you've got to keep asking.

So when you're coming in a new situation, you've got to keep collecting information until
you've got, okay, I started to hear some themes now.

I'm starting to pick it out.

So I think it's great stuff.

Anything you'd want to go back and tell young Brian Wilson at 21 years old that you didn't
know then and that you know now?

So think one thing that's super key is

building yourself a world class leadership team that you trust.

um My wife and I have a huge passion for travel.

We want to see as much of this world as we can while we're still on this planet.

And up until recently, I was struggling to try to find the right group of people in the
right role, the right person, the right seat, right?

And now we've done that.

So the fact is I can take a three week vacation and the company runs perfectly on its own.

Now some of the high level projects, acquisition looks and things like that, those go on
hold.

But day-to-day operations, if you've got the right people that you trust, can be handled
appropriately without you having to be on the phone every five minutes.

I remember growing up and going to Disney as a kid, and every 20 minutes my father was at
a payphone calling and checking on how things were going.

And I'm like, I never want to have to do that.

Yeah.

Well, that's not leadership, right?

That's right.

It's micromanaging.

It becomes something where you're not actually building a transferable asset.

Something happens to you, this business isn't worth anything, right?

No.

wonderful team that I really am proud of.

That's great.

They've given me this opportunity.

Have you had to change some people out along the way?

mean, yeah.

So either change out a couple, couple retired, we have like a crazy retention policy.

Like just a couple of weeks ago, we had somebody, our accounting person left after 47
years.

All right.

so company is 50 years old.

So that tells you something.

I mean, she used to babysit me if you want to.

All right.

Family business, man.

I love it.

change people out along the way and really just always look to get people that are in tune
with the core values and see the vision and see the goal and see the finish line that

we're always gonna strive for.

That's brilliant.

Well, great.

Thanks for talking today.

think congratulations on all the good work.

Thank you very much.

And hopefully we'll see you back again.

You'll be at the big party.

I am, fortunately, I'm not gonna be, because I'll be traveling.

My wife and I already have plans, but I'm setting my business development manager and
my...

Operations manager my place.

They're the ones.

Okay, you fired this whole thing and actually wrote the part to get me into this Oh, there
you go.

That's a great way to kind of get feedback to them.

Perfect.

Let them go to the party exactly.

All right.

Thanks so much