Manufacturing Without Borders: Technology, Culture, and the Future of the Industry with Tony Gunn

In this energetic and information-packed episode, Lisa Ryan welcomes Tony Gunn, who leads global operations at his new venture TGM Global Services after a successful five-year run with MTD CNC. Tony has spent two decades on shop floors and in boardrooms around the world, traveling approximately 300 days a year to over 60 countries, giving him an unparalleled front-row seat to the technologies, trends, and people shaping modern manufacturing.

Tony shares his remarkable journey from mopping floors on weekends for minimum wage and learning to use basic presses, to mastering CNC machining through the mentorship of industry veterans who taught him line-by-line programming. His story exemplifies the power of workplace mentorship and the importance of taking skilled workers under your wing—lessons that continue to guide his mission today.

The Smartest Person in the Room

Tony lives by a powerful principle: "If you're the smartest person in the room, you're in the wrong room." He thrives on being the "dumbest person in the room," learning from experts across the manufacturing spectrum—from garage shops with three or four machines to CEOs of the world's largest manufacturing companies. This humility and hunger for knowledge informs everything he does in media and content creation.

His approach to sharing stories and technology stems from remembering his own starting point—when he was just learning to turn raw material into something of value. He's passionate about explaining concepts at a level that empowers everyone, avoiding the industry jargon and acronyms that can leave people behind. He never forgets the experts who gave their time to an amateur, and now pays that forward by putting others under his wing.

The Technology Challenge: Keeping Up When It's Your Job

Tony candidly admits that even though it's his full-time job to know as much about the manufacturing industry as possible and share it with as many people as he can, he still can't keep up with how fast everything is moving. He can only imagine how difficult it must be for shop owners and operators whose day-to-day activities involve actually running their businesses.

From a global perspective, Tony sees shops still running machines that are 15, 20, 30, even 40 years old—machines that run good parts but can't complete a part on one machine, requiring five machines and much longer cycle times compared to modern technology. He draws a powerful contrast from his visit to the American Precision Museum in Vermont: 200 years ago, they were making micron parts, but it took two weeks. Today, it takes two minutes.

The Labor Shortage and Automation Imperative

The conversation centers on what manufacturers are most hungry to understand and solve right now. Tony identifies the labor shortage as a critical issue that companies are trying to address through multiple strategies:

Inspiring the next generation through STEM - While crucial, this is years in the making and can't be the only solution

Adapting technology in the midterm - Companies must figure out which technologies are most affordable and provide the best ROI to minimize labor shortages while competing globally

Various forms of automation - From traditional robots and cobots to pallet systems and bar feeds, companies are finding ways to have one machinist run 10 machines instead of one, with processes running 24/7

Digital transformation - Tools like Datanomics and Fulcrum that take traditionally tribal knowledge and display it on screens, giving operators and management real-time visibility into what's actually happening on the shop floor—eliminating the need for all-day meetings filled with 80% truths and 20% fabrication

Tony emphasizes that knowing actual uptime, real capabilities, bottlenecks, and opportunities for improvement allows companies to create better...