What's Working with Cam Marston

It's simple. To do anything you must begin. Joe Calloway understands that one of the many barriers to success for an entrepreneur or any business leader is simply to get started. To begin. We can create lists of reasons to delay, to wait, to push off till tomorrow. Success, however, starts no other way than to begin. Meet Joe Calloway. Hear his enthusiasm. Let it take hold. And lets all...begin. S...

AI is changing everything it touches. Why not supply chains and logistics, too? Shashank Rao leads teams of students working with companies to combine the two in unique ways. Shashank gives me some insights into the projects they're working on and what the results have been and how AI will continue to impact logistics. It's fascinating stuff to an outsider like me. To Shashank and his team, though...

Not being beholden to tradition or industry norms has helped Joey Mason make Mason Hills Farms a premium provider of beef for the discerning consumer. His cattle are grass fed and grain finished on his own farm near Grand Bay, Alabama. Never farming before, Joey has learned the business from the ground up, from how to prepare the cattle to how to process and package them to retain the best flavor...

A circuitous route delivered Hastings Read from England to Mobile, Alabama where he learned custom woodworking after a successful career in management consulting. Today he leads the team at Oakleigh Custom Woodworks as they build beautiful doors, windows, and shutters, employing a team a craftsmen who take great pride in their work. Deadlines matter but the work of a craftsman should not be rushed...

If you buy commercial insurance you've certainly noticed the rate increases. Brian Tanner is Managing Principal at EPIC Insurance's Birmingham, Alabama office and is our monthly Business Alabama magazine deep dive interview. He explains why rates are up, how AI is making creative crooks more clever, and why the art of cold calling is not dead. Brian is high energy and this interview is a thrill.  ...

Foodservice is typically full of high turnover. Unless you work for PP Hospitality Group . Panini Pete and his sister, Cheryl Blohme , have created a rapidly growing organizaiton due, in part, by their ability to find and keep good people in jobs typified by high turnover. Pete and Cheryl and their leadership team have figured something out. It begins with Pete, Cheryl, and the leadership team liv...

There is a big difference between a skills shortage and a labor shortage. Employers used to worry about lack of applicable skills. Today employers just need people with some of the skills demanded. Elizabeth Crofoot is an economist with Lightcast . Based in DC, Elizabeth knows how to mine the data our Federal Government provides and "read the tea leaves." She and I talk about the tops skills emplo...

There are basics to marketing your business. Before business owners get into the weeds of fancy marketing tactics, they need to make sure the basics are covered. Gayle Rogers of The Atomic Agency works with owners of new businesses as well as business veterans to make sure the fundamentals are well taken care of before anything sophiticated can begin. Hear Gayle's advice for what bases you need to...

Sports Tourism draws athletes and their families from hundreds of miles to destinations where they can compete. Joel Lamp is the Sports Manager for the Huntsville Convention and Visitors Bureau and is responsible for filling the statiums, stands, fields, rinks, pools, and courts around Huntsville with these athelets. The opportunities continue to grow. Turf a field (artificial turf) and it's a foo...

Started by a retired sheriff hired to protect construction on a nuclear power plant near Dothan, Alabama, DSI Security Services now has operations in thirty-three states and 5400 employees. Alan Clark is chairman of the board. His father was the retired sherrif and his two sons are now involved in the company. Alan cites solid customer relationships who wanted DSI's services in their new locations...

The proposals are worth millions of dollars each. The clients are major global companies trying to impress cllients, thank teams, generate sales. The proposal has to be right. It has to be good. It has to be as perfect as it can be. Jason Cohen is the Execitive Director of Global Sales at Accor Hotels . With 5500 properties across the globe, Accor can handle the work IF they get it. How do they ge...

This month's Business Alabama Magazine interview features Stephanie Bryan , the Chairwoman of the Poarch Band of the Creek Indians . In her tenure as chair she's diversified the tribe's holdings far beyond gaming into government services, hotels and resort hotels, even processing cattle and many more. She's active across the state of Alabama as she checks on the tribe's businesses and even holds a...

Finding and keeping good employees today is very hard. The shortages driven by the Baby Boomer retirement have begun making their mark in the workplace. And even as populous as the Millennials are, there aren't enough of them to replace the Boomers. Employers are pulling their hair out. Employees have their pick.  Dr. Josh Duplantis is the Dean of Workforce Development for Coastal Alabama Communit...

Casey Biehl is the VP of Operations for Fat Boy's Pizza based in Metairie, Louisiana. This pizza chain is growing rapidly due to the quality of ingredients and the ambience of the restaurants. I got word they were looking to head further east and became curious of their recipe for selecting new locations for expansion - what do they look for in a community? How far do people travel for to come to...

The intersection of I-10 and I-65, the Port of Mobile, several rail lines, and the reinvigoration of Brookley Field has the potential to futher transform Mobile into one of the nation's largest logistics hubs. Philip Burton knew this but one piece was missing - the logistics parks where the product is brought after unloading, sorted, and shipped again. Philip found the land and got started and tod...

Matt Peat is a Gen X'er that has never job hopped. He's been with Transhield many years and has remained with the company through the many times its been bought and sold. He tells the story of the remarkable product they manufacture, and how he has managed to thrive in each transaction where others may have been dismissed or asked to leave. Matt was on his way through Mobile with his wife and thre...

Roy Lewis Construction has a reputation for quality building and adding value for customers. It's this reputation that has kept them going when times got tough. For years the phone rang from customers eager to benefit from their quality and reputation. Then there was the Great Recession. Then Covid and supply chain challenges. Paul Lewis , company president, kept going with the firm belief that de...

What are the details - the nitty-gritty - of finding a business to buy, valuing it, and finding a buyer? Trey Langus works for Transworld Business Advisors and that's what he does. His customer from a recent transaction was Trey Galloway - now owner of The Health Hut . Hear how Trey Langus found the business and Trey Galloway found an opportunity for entrepreneurship and all the steps in between....

Water, walks, and sleep. Those were the three biggest points that stood out when I heard Brad Davidson speak at a recent corporate event. He's trained athletes ranging from high school football teams to NFL left tackles. His recipe for busy executives eaten up with stress is more water, longer walks, and better sleep. It's a foundationally different approach to exercise for people in middle age th...

Meet my son Spencer. A tradition of What's Working is to interview my children upon their high school graduation. He's off to the University of Alabama in the fall. We discuss what skills he predicts will be needed in the job market, his prediction of the impact of AI on tomorrow's workplace and where he hopes to land in the work world. You might hear me choke up a bit when telling him how proud h...

April McClung's sons had a chance to travel abroad as high school students. April needed money to make it happen. A decison was made to use a family member's old pound cake recipe to sell them at farmer's markets. Today those cakes are sold at Sams and have been shipped across the country. Meet April, hear her amazing story, and become inspired by a woman who thought she had it all figured out unt...

ESG is not something "out there" or only discussed in political environments. ESG (environmental, social, governance) is here and is shaping the way businesses interact with each other and with customers.  Kai Gray and his parters run Motive ESG. They work with businesses to improve their ESG scores, thereby enabling them to compete for business with some of the nation's defense contractors, major...

I met Heikki Malinen at a conference in Point Clear, Alabama for his company, Outokumpu . His presentation showed a grasp of world events like none I'd seen before. He travels nearly non-stop, visiting the company's stainless steel plants across the world. The war in Ukraine has impacted his company's ability to get the affordable electricity he needs to power his plants in Europe. Workforce issue...

I've long been suspcious that social media can do anything for me. For kids today, yes. For me, a middle aged guy? Hardly. Domenick D'Andrea and I met at a conference and he assured me that if I learn how and when to post and what subject matters people want to see, it will generate profitable business leads. I commit to try it, postng primarily to LinkedIn, to see what will happen. And Domenick s...

Dr Matt Barber loves his work as a orthopedic surgeon. It's a combination of of skills that hits his sweet spot, including the advances in technology which peak his intersts. In the studio with me, Dr Barber has a sample of a knee made from a 3D printer of a patient's scan including the slight imperfections caused by the patient's age and wear and tear. Dr Barber and I discuss how technology conti...