April 11, 2025 • 55 mins
In this inspiring episode of HTM On The Line, host Bryant “B-Hawk” Hawkins Sr. welcomes Mark L. Taylor. Co-founder of Renew Biomedical and Master Medical Equipment, for a powerful conversation about purpose, innovation, and the impact of believing in something bigger than yourself.
Mark shares how he and his wife, Jill Taylor, built not just successful companies, but a movement within the Healthcare Technology Management (HTM) industry. From facing staffing challenges to launching a Department of Labor-certified Biomed apprenticeship program, the Taylors turned obstacles into opportunities, with Jill’s vision playing a key role in creating the Renew Biomedical Training Academy and establishing pre-apprenticeship programs for local high school students.
This episode gets into leadership, legacy and the importance of building a business that feels like family. If you’re looking to be inspired by how real people are transforming the future of HTM, this one’s for you.
We are immensely grateful to our partners: College of Biomedical Equipment Technology, A.M. BICKFORD, INC., UptimeServices, PM BIOMEDICAL and Talent Exclusive—for their support in making this podcast possible. Their dedication to advancing the Healthcare Technology Management industry is truly commendable. For more information about their contributions and services, please visit their websites.
For more podcast episodes, motivational videos, blogs, and newsletters, make sure to visit our website at www.elevatehtm.com. We look forward to connecting with you.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Bryant Hawkins (00:05):
Welcome back to HTM on the line.
I'm your host, bryant HawkinsSr.
And today we've got a specialguest, mark L Taylor.
He's the co-founder of RenewBiomedical and Master Medical
Equipment, a leader who turnedchallenges into opportunity and
helped shape the future of HTMthrough training, innovation and
(00:30):
passion.
If you're ready to be inspiredand reminded why this healthcare
technology management industrymatters, this one's for you.
Let's get to it.
We have a special guest with ustoday, mark L Taylor.
(01:05):
How are you doing today, mark?
Mark L. Taylor (01:07):
Good.
How are you doing Brian?
Be whole Everything good upthere in New.
Bryant Hawkins (01:10):
Orleans.
Everything's great up there,man, actually really kind of
chilly this morning.
I was shocked we got a few morecool days left in there for us.
All right things up there.
Y'all survived that tornado I'mabout to say hurricane yeah
tornado they hit.
Mark L. Taylor (01:27):
We're very fortunate.
Just a little damage and someflooding here in Jackson, but a
couple counties south ofMcMurray County got hit pretty
hard.
A lot of folks that were in thepath of a tornado that touched
down.
But I think they're digging out.
Our thoughts and prayers arewith those folks.
But good.
Here in West Tennessee today itwas actually a beautifully
sunny day, about 65 degrees.
(01:48):
A little cool this morning, butnice day here in West Tennessee
.
Bryant Hawkins (01:52):
Great, great.
Well, Mark, before we get deepinto this podcast, give us a
little background about yourself.
Tell us about you.
Mark L. Taylor (02:01):
Well, that's a loaded question asking a
salesperson to tell them aboutthemselves.
So my name is Mark Taylor.
I'm born and raised here inJackson, tennessee, went to high
school here, went to collegehere for a little while, played
football at Lambeth Universityhere in town before transferring
to Lipscomb University inNashville.
Finished up my degree there.
(02:23):
I had a degree in finance andeconomics.
I met my wife there SpringBreak 95.
She didn't like me to say that,but it was a long-term Spring
Break hookup.
Her name is Jill and she's,like I said, partners with me in
Renew Biomedical and MasterMedical Equipment and working in
(02:51):
the family business in therestaurant at the time and had
an opportunity to get intomedical equipment sales with a
friend of mine from high schooland took that opportunity and,
long story short, that's where Iam today.
I'm still in Jackson, tennessee.
We have Master MedicalEquipment, renewable Medical,
and me and my wife live here.
We got our sons a sophomore atUniversity of Tennessee and my
(03:15):
daughter is a sophomore in highschool, very fortunate to have
my parents live just down theroad from me.
My dad was a local smallbusiness owner and kind of got
my drive and entrepreneurialspirit and salesmanship from him
, and his name is LawrenceTaylor.
My mom normally lives rightdown the street, so I'm the only
(03:35):
child.
So everybody always asks me likewhy did you base your
businesses out of JacksonTennessee?
My first response is usuallywhy not out of Jackson Tennessee
?
My first response is usuallywhy not?
And then, further than that,jackson in West Tennessee is a
good place to have a business.
We've been here our entirebusiness career and it's a good
community.
We're pretty well situated inthe middle of the country, about
(03:58):
45 miles from Memphis.
So there's a little company inMemphis that does logistics
named FedEx.
So I tell everybody I say well,if FedEx decides Memphis is a
good place for logistics, thenwhy not Jackson Tennessee?
So that's a little bit about me, bron.
Bryant Hawkins (04:13):
Yeah, All that you said.
Mark L. Taylor (04:19):
one thing stuck out to me man, your dad is
Lawrence Taylor, that's right.
That's right Not the one thatplayed for the Giants.
Those of us who've been aroundfor a while it's back when I was
growing up.
People always said is your dadLawrence Taylor?
Like yeah, they said reallyyeah.
And then of course, they lookat me and oh, he's not the
football player.
I was like no, I got a goodpicture of my dad when the St
(04:41):
Louis Cardinals football teamwas still in St Louis, got a
picture of him and number 57,lawrence Taylor, with the Giants
.
It was a cool experience, it's56, by the way too, man 56.
You're a bigger LT fan than I am.
Bryant Hawkins (04:58):
Hey, man, just a sports fan.
When you said that, lawrenceTaylor, I said, wow, I know you
heard that a lot throughout yourlifetime.
Oh yeah, well, you mentionedyou and your wife are
co-founders.
How does that feel, workingwith the wife, man?
Well, I don't know.
Mark L. Taylor (05:12):
We work together daily or y'all work Anybody who
comes to visit our offices howclosely we work I have.
We're a true mom and pop.
We have a facility in Jacksonhere.
It's a pretty big facility, wehave about 62,000 square foot.
However, at the front of thefacility I have my office and
then we have a bathroom and inbetween, well, my office, jill's
(05:32):
office and the bathroom inbetween, so we share a bathroom.
So it doesn't get much more momand pop than that.
So we're fortunate we worktogether and we do have
different roles and she hascertain roles in Renew and me
and I've got other roles and weactually have a couple other
companies that we run out ofthat location.
But we are a true mom and pop.
Bryant Hawkins (05:52):
That's awesome.
That's awesome.
So, master medical equipment Iheard you mention that in Renew
Biomedical Services I'm familiarwith.
But before we get into Renew,tell me a little more about
Master Medical.
Mark L. Taylor (06:04):
Equipment, sure Master Medical Equipment.
We started in 2011.
I had been in another businessand split from my partner with
that and was looking forsomething to kind of start up
here in Jackson.
I actually started with acompany called Master Fit
Medical Supplies here in Jackson.
It was already in the physicianoffice supply space here in
Jackson was already in thephysician office supply space
(06:26):
and the idea was for me to helpthem with supplies and they were
going to help me sell equipment.
Long story short, after acouple of years the equipment
side was outpacing the supplyside.
So I bought those guys out andme and Jill started.
Master Medical Equipmentshortened it and so in 2013,
master Medical Equipment wasfocused mostly on selling
capital medical equipment tobasically either the
(06:49):
pre-hospital market orpost-acute market.
So we concentrated on EMS andambulance services as well as
long-term care, snfs, surgerycenters, anything outside the
hospital.
We sell defibrillators, vitalsigns monitors, anything outside
the hospital.
We sell defibrillators, vitalsigns monitors, ekgs, iv pumps,
(07:14):
ventilators, all types ofelectronic medical equipment.
We sell new and used medicalequipment.
We call it recertified.
So that was kind of the genesisof our business and so we used
to outsource our service.
So if we got a piece of usedequipment and we need it checked
out or tested or PMed, or weneed some repair work done.
We used to outsource it.
Well, after, from 2011 to 2014,.
We were doing so muchoutsourcing as our master
(07:36):
medical equipment sales grewthat we realized, oh well, you
know, it's time for us to starta service company.
Oh well, you know, it's timefor us to start a service
company.
So that was the genesis ofRenewable Medical really, just
to start and help us with ourexisting recertification, pm and
repair business that wasbasically selling master medical
(08:00):
equipment, wow.
Bryant Hawkins (08:02):
So let me ask you this question.
I always ask people in the HTMindustry when did you actually
hear about the service side ofmedical equipment when you
started selling it, or did youknow before you got into this
industry?
Mark L. Taylor (08:11):
No, I didn't.
So in 1999, when I first gotinto this business I mean it was
just selling equipment.
I'm a sales guy, I've been inthe restaurant business, didn't
know a whole lot about it, butvery, very quickly I realized
how indispensable biomass werebecause we were selling
defibrillators life pack 10s,life pack nines.
If you got one in and the, theold crt display wouldn't come on
(08:35):
or the output it wouldn't, itwouldn't shock or wouldn't paste
right.
Um, we had to send it somebodyand I like, who are these guys?
And I realized, oh, they're themechanics for medical equipment
.
So I got very familiar with theHTM Biomed field at an early
time in my career because itgoes hand in hand.
You can't sell used medicalequipment if you don't have
(08:58):
somebody that you know that canrepair or diagnose what's going
on.
So I had a lot of respect backthen I still do for the bio-med
field.
But back then it was, it wasreally, really you know,
soldering boards and and puttingstuff together.
You know some of the stuff,some of the the older equipment
was just, I mean it was I'm sureyou you remember B-Hawk.
(09:19):
I mean that stuff was was big,it was robust, it was not a lot
of diagnostics to it.
It was really open it up andfigure out what's going on yeah,
exactly, I mean it's.
Bryant Hawkins (09:33):
They had the wb allen's and the radio shacks
where you had to go get theresistors and capacitors.
Now it's a different world, butbut the need is still there.
Now you talked about the twocompanies where one feeds the
other and vice versa.
If you had to say I mean yourcompany, when you started out
(09:57):
staffing challenges that seemedto be a big issue right now in
our industry.
Have you come across anystaffing challenges and, if you
have, what's your secret tomaybe sustaining?
Mark L. Taylor (10:11):
That's a good question.
So so MME has always beenfairly easy.
We got warehouse workers, wegot salespeople, you know we got
account managers and you know alot of people know what medical
sales is and a lot of peoplewant to get into a company for
medical sales with their new.
The challenge was when westarted was not only hiring
(10:35):
somebody, hiring somebody whounderstood how independent
service organization works andwhat it means and how we're not
doing work for a facility, we'redoing work for a customer, and
our customer could be an EMS,could be a hospital, could be,
you know, a multitude ofdifferent types of health care
facilities.
So, that being said, in Jackson, tennessee, we have a hospital,
(10:58):
hospital Wires, bornJackson-Madison County General
Hospital.
They had a biomed department,but other than those few guys
that were in the basement thathave worked, you know I'm pretty
sure most everybody in the HTMworld knows how it works.
You know you get differentcontracts and these guys have
been contracted by Horizons orCSA or Crawford or currently,
(11:18):
agility.
But other than that, you know,we hired one guy, we moved him
here to Jackson and we kind ofstarted on a whim.
We didn't know what we'regetting into.
We knew we needed somebody whowas able to work on our
equipment.
But as we, as we grew, thechallenges of hiring more people
were real.
I mean, it was we tried to hirepeople in our community.
(11:41):
We tried to bring people herethat had a job with an OEM or
another independent serviceorganization and when we get
them here, either they wouldn'tlike our area or they wouldn't
understand how we work as anindependent versus maybe they
came from an OEM.
So all these challenges we hadwith human resources kind of hit
(12:06):
an inflection point in late2019 and early 2020.
We were really having a toughtime getting people to come to
our program, to want to workwith Renew, and one of the early
things we did is one of ourtechnicians realized that a lot
of people we were interviewing,even though they didn't
(12:27):
understand really what abiomedical technician or HTM
professional was, 2018, 2019,they would come in and say, oh
yeah, I can fix anything, I'mvery talented with my hands.
And what we didn't know iseverybody will say whatever they
want you to hear to get a job.
So you're like this.
So one of my techs we're asmall organization, two or three
(12:51):
techs at the time Somebodywould come in to interview and
we work in pretty fast pace.
Our biggest market is EMS andthey're always in high demand
for getting their equipment back.
So one day, unbeknownst to him,he was showing a guy how to do
a coin cell test, just kind ofshowing them how we worked on
equipment.
I think it was a coin cell andan ECG or defibrillator, and he
(13:13):
got called away from the phoneand he just kind of left this
guy there, you know, with a,with a unit opened up and, uh,
and and, and a coin cell halfway, halfway repaired.
So he gets back and the kid haddone it, the guy had done it
and he was like, wow, ok, and sohe came to us and told us about
it and I said, well, that's agreat way to test.
(13:34):
So one of our first tools forhiring is we call it the coin
cell test and what we do is webring somebody in and we would
make up a phone call.
Whoever, whichever one of ourtexts was doing the interview,
would say oh, I got to grab thisphone call See if you can
figure out that coin cell.
And if they can figure out thatcoin cell, which is a fairly
(13:55):
simple repair, then we knew theyweren't all phones.
So that was, that was our earlydays of of of getting people in
Cause.
We I'll tell you what we madesome bad hires.
We had had a guy I'm not I'mnot a mechanically minded guy at
all.
I can barely screw in a lightbulb.
But I have done my fair shareof printer roller repairs, you
know, changing out the LCDs andseveral things in in devices
(14:19):
when I had to.
But we found out not everybodycan even unscrew light bulb.
So so we kind of came up withthis coin cell test as a way to
kind of make sure we didn't hiresome of these guys we'd hired
that said they could fixanything and can't unscrew a
light bulb.
So that leads to 2019, 2020,late 2019, early 2020.
(14:40):
We were right at the precipiceof what's now known as the COVID
pandemic.
We were really struggling.
We got a couple of largecontracts, I think at the time
we had seven technicians and wewere just really, really
struggling with what to do toget more technicians that we
knew were going to be needed asour business grew with Renew.
(15:00):
So it was originally my wife'sidea.
Jill came up with the idea oflet's look into starting a Renew
Biomedical Training Academy andwe will train kids and people
in the community that want tolearn about Biomed and HTM, and
we're going to set out and we'regoing to have this venture that
will help us grow our talent.
(15:22):
And so the idea was great, jillhad this, we had our facility
redone, have a classroom put in.
We actually hired Richard Woods,which some of y'all may know.
Richard has a heart and apassion for HTM.
We call him our biomedprofessor at Renew.
We hired him.
(15:43):
He was retiring from at thattime I think it was right before
Julia took over our hospital.
Anyway, he was ready to retireand I said no, let's try this
and get you to teach some of ourguys.
So, long story short, after amonth of having them on board
and us just kind of scratchingour heads, how do we come up
with this curriculum?
How do we kind of create thisapprenticeship program that we
(16:05):
want to create it's good, we'renew by med training academy.
You know how do we get peopleinvolved?
And then, once we get them here, how do we?
How do we teach them?
So it was about about May of2020.
So pandemic had just startedreally having tough time getting
calls for a lot of service and,and the cool thing was is is is
.
We had this idea, but littledid we know that there were
(16:29):
people willing to help with it.
So what we did is first thing Idid was called Amy.
So I called actually Danielleand Amy and I said hey, danielle
, I know you're in education, Iknow you'll do a lot of Amy.
I said we're really struggling.
I said we have this idea of anapprenticeship program.
It's called Renewed BiomedicalTraining Academy.
(16:51):
How in the world are we supposedto get a curriculum?
Do you happen to know anybodythat could help us with any kind
of educational background?
Or do you all have anybody onstaff that would be able to help
us with this?
And the coolest thing ever,brian, she.
I remember like it wasyesterday.
She said mark, you gotta bekidding.
And I was like uh-oh, no, uh,you know, just, we're trying to
(17:13):
get some help to get our programstarted.
She said we have a curriculumthat's rubber stamped by the us
department of labor fora, biomedapprenticeship program.
I said you gotta be've got tobe kidding me, danielle.
She said no.
She said I said well, what doyou need?
She said we need an industrypartner.
And she said COVID's happened.
And no, we can't get anybodyinterested to be an industry
(17:34):
partner.
So I was like, hello, that'swhat I'm here about, so
everybody can look up online.
We're very proud of therelationship we had with Amy.
(18:00):
They helped us, they got us thecurriculum US Department of
Labor certified, tennesseeDepartment of Labor certified.
So once we got our curriculumwe were able to then go and
promote our Biomed TrainingAcademy.
And Brian this is during COVID alot of places were shut down.
You had some factories gettingshut down.
We were very, very, veryfortunate that we had a huge
(18:21):
first class eight folks thatshowed up.
A huge first class eight folksthat showed up.
So with our apprenticeshipprogram, not only do you come
and you learn about HTM, youlearn how to be a bomb at it.
It's two days a week, two halfdays a week in class.
The rest of the time you'reworking at a desk on job
training with another CBETjourneyman and the cool thing is
(18:43):
we're able to pay these folksto not only help us grow, renew,
but they are learning HTMindustry.
I mean, it is what RichardWoods does in his class on those
.
Tuesdays and Thursdays areamazing.
Every other week we have whatthey call the Renewed Knowledge
Bowl and where anybody who'sgone through the apprenticeship
class can come and actuallyRichard quizzes them on
(19:07):
questions that are going to beon the seabed exam.
So it's just a really coolthing.
So this whole genesis of theidea my wife came up with,
renewed Biomed Training Academyis now a full-fledged
apprenticeship program.
Thanks to Amy, we've beencertified for the last five
years and have produced over 40technicians man, that's amazing,
(19:31):
I mean, it's the perfectexample how COVID came in.
Bryant Hawkins (19:36):
A lot of people was looking at it as a downtime,
but you turned that around andmotivated you to do something
different.
I mean, you can reallyunderstand when somebody said
you build a movement literallybehind the scenes.
Biomed is behind the scenes andmost people are in the hospital
, but that's where the actionand that's where you doing
(19:58):
something.
That's amazing.
I've read about what you'redoing over there, but I never
heard the detailed story.
Mark L. Taylor (20:03):
So Story and I mean it just shows you.
I mean sometimes when peopledon't understand this,
especially small business owners, and I encourage all of them,
you know, no matter where andit's not just small business
owners, anybody in business orin an organization sometimes you
just got to reach out for helpand we were able to reach out
for help.
And then not only did Robertand Danielle and all the great
(20:26):
folks at Amy help us, we hadother people.
We had the US Department ofLabor come in, we had Tennessee
Department of Labor andWorkforce Development come in.
They helped us.
Actually, there was some grantmoney for during that time for
repurposing people who were laidoff from their jobs, and so we
got some money.
We're able to pass that on tosome of our apprentices.
We had a little bit of a grantto help us with restructuring
(20:51):
our facility for this classroomand it was amazing to see all
the people when you startedasking how can we help get the
word out about HTM, about theapprenticeship program, about
biomedical technicians and theincredible career opportunities
there are.
And, brian, we had so manypeople reach back out and want
to help.
(21:12):
It was amazing, absolutelyamazing.
Bryant Hawkins (21:14):
Oh man, that's the beauty of this industry, I
mean, everybody will helpeverybody.
And just listening to yourvoice, mark, I can hear the
passion is deep and better thanyou and your wife, for that
matter.
So this question here is notreally a HTM question, but Can
you share what is the why behindwhat you do every day?
(21:37):
I mean, you have to have a why,because you're not just doing
this off instinct.
There's something that drivesyou, and if you don't mind
sharing that, what is it that?
Mark L. Taylor (21:47):
makes you up.
That's pretty good, it's funny.
I send this video about JimRohn.
He's a motivational speakerfrom the 80s and early 90s that
I was, at the time, forced tolisten to.
But my why is why not, you know,why not me?
Why not us?
Why not biomedical technicians?
(22:09):
Why not, you know?
So somebody is going to be outthere doing it, and I have a
passion for connection.
I have a passion for anything Iwant to get into in life.
I just feel like, if somebodyis going to do it, why not me?
So my wife's a little bit ofthe same way.
So my why is why not?
(22:31):
You know, we're very, veryfortunate to live in a great
country like America that youcan have the opportunity to, you
know, do your own thing.
You can start your own business.
You can, you know, start abiomed organization.
You can become, you know, htmperson of the year.
You can get involved with Amy,you can get involved with, you
(22:51):
know, your local biomedassociation.
Why not me?
So I wake up every singlemorning, brian, and I'm very
grateful that not only do wehave these growing companies,
but I've got a lot of folksaround me that they're not
employees, they're family.
So my why is?
Why not us?
It's not just why not me, it'swhy not us.
(23:11):
Why not build us an amazingorganization that we can all be
proud of, that we can, you know,share with others, and that we
can do life together?
Why not?
Bryant Hawkins (23:21):
Yes, exactly Now .
I was going to say this forlater, but since we're talking
about it, just it just popped inmy head.
You talk about why not in hydrobusiness, business like a
family.
Now I go around speaking to alot of kids about HTM and it
seems like you're the same way.
You share with anybody who wantto know about HTM.
(23:41):
You share it with them what yousit in the classroom right now.
What would you tell somefreshmen in high school about
the HTM industry?
Mark L. Taylor (23:53):
That's a good question.
I would first off tell them Isay you know, are you a person
who enjoys working with yourhands and your mind?
I think I think what a lot ofpeople forget and when they
think about technicians isthey're only thinking about the
physical aspect and what.
What I get from a lot of myguys and and we do a lot of
(24:17):
interviews I like to talk to myteam.
I go around every singlemorning to the shop and I
literally try to talk to as manyof our technicians as we can.
Some of them are young, some ofthem are late teens, early 20s,
and some of them are my age orolder, their 50s and 60s.
And what was unique to me isthe younger ones are so
(24:38):
surprised that not only are theyturning wrenches and getting
knuckles deep in a device, butthey're having to use their
minds, they're having to thinkabout repairs, they're having to
approach customer service, andso what?
I think a lot of teenagers,especially ninth, tenth,
eleventh grade in high school,they don't understand.
(24:59):
You need to be challenged notonly physically but mentally in
your vocation.
If somebody is looking for thatand they said they are, then I
tell them HTM is the career foryou.
I mean there's upward mobility.
There's all different types ofmodalities of equipment you can
work on.
You can go in the private space, you can go in public space,
you can go work for an OEM.
(25:19):
I mean the opportunities areendless.
Bryant Hawkins (25:23):
That's it man.
See, now you ready to go talkto your first high school.
Mark L. Taylor (25:27):
We're very fortunate so.
So here in in in West Tennessee, we didn't even know this
existed, so we started ourapprenticeship program in 2020
to get some traction in 2021.
Well, in 2022, we had one ofour local high school teachers
vo-tech teachers come to us andhad worked with the same people
we'd worked in.
The girl's name has been veryhelpful.
(25:49):
Her name is Holly Wood, justlike the song you know, but her
name is Holly.
Last name Wood.
She's fantastic.
But he was talking to her andshe said you need to start a
pre-apprenticeship program foryour high school students with
Renew Biomedicals ApprenticeshipProgram.
So we are actually a state ofTennessee pre-apprenticeship
program and right now we havethree students two from South
(26:12):
Gibson High School and one fromMadison Academic here in our
town that come to us and inthree hours a week they are
doing work that will actually gotowards their apprenticeship.
So it's calledpre-apprenticeship.
So my wife has an extremepassion for letting younger kids
, specifically junior, high andhigh school kids, know about the
(26:34):
opportunities there are in theHTM field.
So we've been very fortunateAgain.
We reached out to some folks,they reached back out to us and
now we have a pre-apprenticeshipprogram for high school
students.
Bryant Hawkins (26:45):
Man, the more you talk about your wife.
I think I like Jill man.
We should have had Jill go hereand study you.
Mark L. Taylor (26:51):
Hey, she's just as passionate about it.
I give her all the credit forRenewed Biomed Training Academy.
Bryant Hawkins (26:58):
And I have no problem Part two and have Jill
come on here and talk about thisstuff.
She's got going on.
So wait a minute.
This pre-apprentice I meanlet's slow down, let's peel back
the layers a little bit.
Pre-apprentice means what?
Just to make it clear.
Mark L. Taylor (27:14):
So it's basically they get some school
credit and there's some thingsrequired by the local, by the
high school, but it is actuallyand it's our state does does
this program where they actuallycan get high school credit if
they sign up for apre-apprenticeship program and
they complete the terms of theprogram.
So basically the teachers comein they say hey, we're going to
(27:37):
send these three students to you.
My technicians kind of givethem some stuff to do and it's
literally like ourapprenticeship program, but in
smaller bites, because it'susually three, two, three hours
a day, a couple of days a week,and if they were put complete
those requirements they have,they have that but they can go
on their transcript and actuallygives them high school credit
for towards their grades.
Bryant Hawkins (27:59):
Wow, I wonder if that's something.
I guess if you can do it there,you can do it everywhere.
Mark L. Taylor (28:04):
I don't know.
Like I said, we're veryfortunate we had we had
Hollywood from our localworkforce development board,
that that she she's been a rockstar and that's I encourage
anybody who's looking at doinganything for education, either
high school, collegeapprenticeship program Reach out
to your local.
Every state has a workforce andlabor development folks.
(28:26):
We have another one, roderickWood, who actually spoke with us
last week.
He's out of Memphis but hecovers all of West Tennessee.
We just have been very, veryblessed to have some good people
that they want to help.
I mean, their entire job is tocreate more jobs in our states
and communities.
So I'm pretty sure everybodythat is interested in a program
(28:47):
like this, if you start askingaround your state has somebody
to help.
Bryant Hawkins (28:52):
You got to connect me with Hollywood after
this man so I can ask her somequestions.
She's great, she's fantastic.
That'll be a great initiative,because I know some schools
would love to start something.
You know, because when I gospeak to the kids, a lot of them
never heard of it, of course,and just think you can get some
high school credit for justletting them learn how to work
(29:14):
on some equipment is amazing.
Oh, it's fantastic.
Yeah, that's great, geez.
Now, man, you do a lot, dude.
You've covered so much.
Two companies working with thekids, working with your school.
You got it remodeled COVID.
Where do I want to go next withyou?
(29:34):
Renewal let's take a renewalbiomedical.
You mentioned how you have aculture that you built there and
it's a family culture andthat's amazing.
Now, I don't know if I'm justgoing to pick your mindset a
little.
When times get tough, you knowwhether it's business, and it
(29:55):
seems like you mentioned family,so y'all probably have a lot of
personal relationships.
What mindset, I guess principlekeeps you grounded?
You know, because when thingsget tough, sometimes things just
go haywire.
What keeps you focused, despitethe tough times might come
about.
Mark L. Taylor (30:14):
I think it's my faith and my gratitude.
I had to be honest with you.
We had a pretty tough day todayat work, had a lot of stuff
going on, a lot of externalstuff that we can't control.
You know, and it's going to be,everybody knows this it's going
to be a crazy year with aglobal economy and stock markets
crashing.
(30:35):
Stock market's crashing.
But I have had a talk todaywith somebody who's going
through a lot rougher time thanI could ever imagine, both with
family illness and some businessissues, and I think my faith in
God and my gratitude of thedaily gratitude of what we get
(30:56):
to get up and experience and dogets you through some tough
times.
You know perspective,understanding that, yes, it's
tough.
Anybody who's out there as anindependent biomed small
operators, you know it nevergets much easier.
No, life's easy.
But I think the way you frameit and the perspective you take,
(31:18):
take and if you have faith andunderstanding and gratitude, you
know you can.
You can face any obstacle.
Bryant Hawkins (31:24):
Absolutely.
Mark L. Taylor (31:25):
Great answer.
Bryant Hawkins (31:26):
Now, let's recall this the misconceptions
in our industry.
One misconception is they thinkthat HTM is just about fixing
equipment.
Now, yeah, see, a lot of peoplemay think that we just repair
equipment.
But what would you say tosomeone who doesn't understand
(31:50):
the full scope and the impact ofthis profession?
You know somebody, oh, you justfix equipment.
You know what could you tellhim and make him understand that
there's more to us than justfixing equipment?
Mark L. Taylor (32:02):
Well, people don't realize.
They really don't realize.
Like I said, our, our, ourmodel, one of our texts, came up
with years ago and we still useit today.
We're saving the lives of lifesaving equipment.
I can't tell you how many timeswe've gotten a call literally
at the last minute, for you knowwe're big in repair and in the
(32:24):
EMS field and we've literallyhad a helicopter land that was
having an ECG port failure on apatient flying over our facility
and us have to literally repairit on the fly.
And you know what?
People don't understand that atthe end of the day, healthcare
(32:47):
professionals, without theirtools, there's not much they can
do.
You know there's not much theycan do.
And who makes sure these toolsare working?
Who makes sure at the criticaltime when that baby's in an
incubator, when somebody'shaving a heart attack, when a
person is in surgery and isbleeding out, who makes sure
(33:08):
that those devices, thoselife-saving, life-sustaining
devices, are working not onlyproperly but effectively?
And I think a lot of peopledon't realize oh, they just sit
in the bottom of the hospital orthey sit in their shop
somewhere and somebody ships itin and they just tinker on it or
replace a cosmetic piece or apart.
(33:30):
I don't think they trulyrealize that most of the biomeds
that I know have spent a goodamount of time either in the
field or under the gun or both,and what's at stake is a piece
of equipment that could savesomebody's life or sustain
somebody's life, and I thinkpeople don't realize the gravity
of that.
I had a little State of theUnion address to my entire Renew
(33:53):
Biomedical staff.
So everybody from front of thehouse accounting to back of the
house, you know shipping andreceiving, and every technician,
every manager last week and Itold them I said I said I think
we've gotten.
We've gotten big.
We're very fortunate.
You know, we've got over ahundred folks that work for us
now and and I think I wasgetting frustrated because some
(34:17):
of what I was hearing wasinternal argument bickering.
You know your typical things inlarge organizations.
You get larger.
I said, guys, we've lost ourfocus.
I said we got to remember.
We got to always remember.
We're arguing and fighting.
We're talking about a piece ofequipment that could be saving
or sustaining somebody's life,and it's something I take very
(34:38):
seriously.
So we have a lot of fun in ourculture.
We make sure everybody'sincluded, but at the end of the
day, I told everybody.
I said we are not only takingcare of our customers.
Our customers are taking careof patients in their time of
most vulnerability, of moststress they probably ever had
and at a time in their lifewhere they need this device to
(35:02):
help, to help them, to keep themalive, to, you know, sustain
their life.
And again, it's something Itake very, very, very seriously.
I'm very passionate aboutmaking sure my team understands
that yeah, and that's perfect.
Bryant Hawkins (35:16):
And another thing I try to tell individuals
you live in this community, sothe equipment you're working on
could be the same exactequipment you could be on
tonight, or it could be me, itcould be my mom, it could be my
kids it could be my best friend.
Mark L. Taylor (35:32):
You don't know.
I tell people that all the timeI said you.
You just don't know.
Bryant Hawkins (35:38):
Another misconception there's no real
career path or growth.
You know some people believeHTM Rose.
You know we're just jobs, butI'm always saying it's not a job
, it's a career.
Now can you possibly share whatadvancements can look like in
this industry?
How can someone build along-term career?
Mark L. Taylor (36:02):
I'll give you a perfect example.
So Josh Weatherford.
Josh Weatherford came to usfive years ago.
It was when we were trying tohire a bunch of folks for our
growth post-COVID.
And Josh Weatherford previouslyhad been a nurse tech, been to
(36:22):
some nursing school, had been anautomotive tech, ASC certified
mechanic, had worked at afactory.
Him and his wife were expectingtheir first child and didn't
want to work at third shift in afactory.
Anyway, long story short, hegoes to our apprenticeship
program.
Right, and this is right whenwe were working with Amy.
(36:43):
So literally Josh Weatherfordis the very first biomed
apprentice in the country, sohe's the first one when the
Department of Labor we got thatstamp.
He's the very first one.
So pretty cool.
He's a great technician, greatwork.
Well, after two years ofworking for us he was just such
good work, ethic, such goodcommunication skills he got
(37:06):
promoted to assistant manager.
So he works as assistantmanager for a couple of years.
Again, such a good person as faras not only doing his work but
teaching others and mentoringand being a good manager.
After he became assistantmanager he is now our depot
manager for all of Jackson,everything that happens in our
(37:28):
30,000 square foot depot, andoversees all the technicians
there.
There's over 40 technicianshere in Jackson.
So that's just a small exampleof somebody who got into our
industry and has not only gottenin and gotten their
apprenticeship, got their C-bet,but has continued to take
opportunities for advancement inour business.
(37:50):
So I know of other examples too,of people who get in the
business.
Next thing you know, theyprogress through the ranks of a
large organization like Agilityor Traumatics.
I know of others that get inthe HTM field on a whim and they
go from, say, being a bedrepair tech to, next thing you
know, they're flying around andservicing high-end MRI equipment
(38:13):
.
People don't realize thatthere's so much opportunity in
the HTM field, whether it'sactually being a technician and
rising through the ranks ofspecialized technician or just
rising through the ranks of thebusiness you're in becoming a
manager or assistant manager,supervisor.
So much opportunity, yes, he'son the head there.
Bryant Hawkins (38:35):
Now soft skills.
You mentioned how yourtechnician had to become a.
He became a supervisor or aleader.
Now to become those things, howimportant are soft skills.
Mark L. Taylor (38:48):
That's a good question.
A little bit of a loadedquestion, so I'll be honest with
you.
So one of the things that welook for when we're hiring
technicians so we have we havesome technicians that are very,
very technical, very good withtheir hands, love the hands-on
work, they love being in thedepot.
They don't particularly loveinteraction with people, and
(39:09):
there's nothing wrong with thatNot as outgoing, not more
introverted, so there's nothingwrong with that.
And this is a great career forsomebody who wants to come in
and learn and not have to worryabout being a salesperson or
soft skills.
However, that being said,everybody has to have some type
of soft skills, no matter whereyou work.
As long as you're working withother people, you have to.
(39:31):
But what we look for is whenwe're interviewing candidates
for a new HTM biomed technician.
Technician position is if theydo have soft skills and they do
excel in communication and theyare good with understanding, you
know, and working with otherpeople.
Um, those are the people weusually put in a more customer
facing role like field service.
(39:51):
So not only do we have ourdepot in Jackson, we have a
depot in uh Louisville uhLouisville, kentucky.
A depot in Chicago, illinois,soon to be opening in Tampa,
florida, and we got a place inAtlanta, georgia.
The people that work in theseplaces are in the field a whole
lot, so we make sure that theyhave the soft skills needed to
talk to a nurse, to talk to adoctor, from time to time to
(40:14):
talk to somebody that's inlogistics and materials
maintenance.
When you go to a facility torepair on behalf of a
manufacturer, on behalf ofanother ISO, you have to have
these soft skills.
So one of the things that wetry to do is we try to make sure
when people come in forwhatever position that they're
interviewing for, if soft skillsare necessary, we make sure not
(40:35):
only do they have them butthey're comfortable using.
So very important, especiallyin customer facing roles.
Bryant Hawkins (40:43):
I got a question for you, mr Entrepreneur, now,
in this industry, that's also away you can go as far as owning
your own business, becausethere's a need for that also.
Mark L. Taylor (40:55):
Absolutely, and you definitely need soft skills
If you're going to open abusiness, because then you got
to hire people, you got to dealwith customers, you got to deal
with all kinds of communication.
Bryant Hawkins (41:07):
Now let me ask you this question what are some
key lessons that you probablylearned opening up not one, but
two businesses that you canshare with a young person who's
trying to maybe start a businessin the HTM industry?
What are some key lessons youlearned you may be able to share
?
Mark L. Taylor (41:26):
If you're like me and you like to talk a lot,
you also have to have time tolisten, and I think some of the
most important lessons are whenyou're actually listening to
your customer.
Your customer will tell youwhat you want.
Sometimes you just got tolisten.
So me, being a talker and beinga sales guy, it's sometimes
hard for me to shut up, believeit or not, but I have found the
(41:47):
most valuable aspects ofcommunication, especially when
you're dealing with somebodythat you're trying to do
business with or hoping tobecome your customer.
You just have to listen, andit's a lost art.
I think in these days,everybody wants to be heard, but
not everybody wants to listen.
Bryant Hawkins (42:03):
Yeah, exactly Now.
I remember in the beginning youmentioned that you started out
in sales of medical equipment,Then you started doing service
Now in the HTM world sales andoperations.
They kind of sometimes pumpheads.
Yeah, yes, they kind ofsometimes pump heads.
Mark L. Taylor (42:19):
Yeah, yes, they do.
Bryant Hawkins (42:20):
Sales will make that promise that operations
can't handle.
Mark L. Taylor (42:23):
I have sales reps and operation people that I
come between every single dayin my organization.
Bryant Hawkins (42:28):
I was about to ask you how do you tell them
that, look, we fuel each other?
How do you, as a growingcompany?
How do you view therelationship between the two?
Mark L. Taylor (42:40):
Oh, it's symbiotic, they have to work
together.
But I hear both sides.
I hear operations say hey, thissales problem, this salesperson
just over-promised andunder-delivered.
They said we could get thisfixed and back to them today,
that's impossible, we don't havethe parts.
Then I also hear the sales guystelling me the operation guys,
hey, they're dragging their feet, they just don't want to get it
(43:00):
out today.
They don't really care.
So at the end of the day, backto what I said with my
complaints and what I had toldmy team last week is just in our
state of the union is hey, guys, at the end of the day, let's
don't talk about whether I'mright, you're right, she's right
, he's right.
Let's talk about what thecustomer thinks and at the end
(43:21):
of the day, if you let thatguide your communication between
each other, you get to asolution instead of dwelling on
each other's problems.
Bryant Hawkins (43:31):
Yeah, you touched on what you mentioned
about arts indirectly withservicing.
Today's healthcare environment,as you know, is changing.
It used to be yearly, it lookslike it's changing monthly.
That's cool.
How do you, at Renewal, respondto this rapidly changing need
of the hospitals, the clinics,service providers?
(43:52):
How do you continue to pivotand be able to be to respond to
these changes?
Mark L. Taylor (44:00):
And, to be honest with you, it's getting
more challenging.
Last year, the ventilatormarket, which we're heavily
involved with, there were threedifferent companies.
One went bankrupt by air andone pulled out of the market
Medtronic just totally pulledout of the market.
You got Philips, who had someissues and pulled out of the US
market.
You have to be nimble, you haveto be.
(44:20):
Also, you've got to read,you've got to go.
I suggest people you know lookat online, get on LinkedIn
following people like yourselfyou know, get information on
your industry.
Understand what's going onaround.
You.
Understand what's important forI mean tariffs, I mean I don't
know what this is going to do tomedical equipment parts.
(44:41):
You know, I'm, I'm, I'm tryingto read up.
What does this mean for mycustomers?
Bryant Hawkins (44:45):
So I think the biggest, the biggest challenge
is is just to, in order to stayahead of the game, you have to
be vigilant and and you have toreach out to others, you have to
communicate and you have toread.
That's it, man.
I tell people all the time justbecause you clocked out at work
doesn't mean you clock out.
You'll have to continuelearning, because some things
(45:05):
you can't learn at work, youhave to take a little time at
home to stay ahead, because it'schanging, just like AI is
coming into the industry at ahigh speed.
Matt Beck, what's your thoughtsabout AI?
Mark L. Taylor (45:18):
How you feeling about it.
Well, we have our own assetmanagement program, which is
really our own homegrown programfor CMMS, because we couldn't
find a limited serviceorganization.
And you know a lot of peopleknow the big players, nivolo and
whatnot but they're made foryou know more for hospital work
order management and hospitalasset management.
(45:40):
So us, as an independentservice organization, it does
field service, it does depotwork.
That also I wanted.
We've always had the desire forour customers to see what's
going on with their assets, tosee what's being repaired when
the next repair is.
So a few years ago, about threeyears ago, we started our own
CMMS literally from scratch,because we kept buying things
(46:02):
out of the box and trying totweak it.
So it's called RAMS Renew AssetManagement System.
The cool thing about RAMS we'restarting RAMS 3.0 right now and
it's funny, I had a talk withJeff Shaw from TriMedx about
this when he was down a fewweeks ago and I was showing him
our system and everybody'sintegrated.
Some way we're going to have apiece of AI integrated that, if
(46:25):
you use our RAM software andyour customer buyers, we're not
only going to show you whatwe've done to your equipment,
we're going to tell you what thetrue cost of ownership is of
your equipment when the next PMis due, what's the percentage
factors for this piece ofequipment breaking down the next
year, two years, three years?
And all of this is madepossible by AI.
(46:46):
And it's interesting, I read anarticle in 24-7 yesterday, the
day before just.
Is all AI in our industry goingto be good or bad?
I still think I'm a positiveguy, brian.
I'm really positive.
I think it's going to bepositive, but I think there
could be some things that AIdoes that we need to monitor.
So I'm cautiously optimisticthat AI is going to make
(47:11):
healthcare technology managementnot only jobs easier, but
hopefully more efficient andalso more precise.
So I'm hopeful, becauseeverybody knows this.
Everybody in our industry knowsthere's an issue where people
are aging out.
There's not enough peoplecoming into the field.
We need more technicians, andone way to get around the need
(47:32):
for more technicians ishopefully a good technology like
AI that can help us bettersolve the issues and repairs
that we're facing.
I'll give you a perfect example.
So one of the first things wedid with our AI and RAMS was to
take a service manuals of everydevice that we had service
manuals for in our entire shop,and we're talking hundreds of
(47:54):
devices.
So we fed all these servicemanuals in, scanned them in, put
them into the AI and now whenand this is about two months ago
now when one of our techsqueries in our RAM software a
repair, not only will it readthe service manual and tell what
is needed, it will also, basedon our service history, tell you
(48:17):
what parts and what toolsyou're going to need for the
repair.
I mean, how cool is that?
Wow, that's pretty cool.
So, rams, right now mytechnicians are typing in, you
know whatever repair it is, andthe AI will respond back for
this repair.
Estimated time 30 minutesYou're going to need two
(48:37):
wrenches and a you know whatevernut driver and you're going to
need, you know, this thermalprint head and this board and
that's it, isn't that?
Bryant Hawkins (48:47):
amazing.
Yeah, like I tell people, ai isGoogling on steroids.
It searches the internet to getthis information, whether it's
accurate or not.
That's where you come in.
Mark L. Taylor (48:59):
Exactly, and that's what we see in the mess
Garbage in garbage out, you knowso.
It is.
It is a hundred percent, butI'm very optimistic on the
future of AI and its positiveimpact on the HTM world Very
very confident.
Bryant Hawkins (49:13):
Oh, it will have to me.
I'm like you.
I'm always thinking positive.
I think it's going to be agreat, huge impact.
You're going to be able to workmore efficient.
They're even starting to hirechief AI officers to run
companies like GE has one, and afew other large companies have
a chief AI officer.
So it's not going anywhere.
(49:34):
It's changing.
I mean, every time you look upthere's a new app.
So they got like 30 of themright now, I think.
So it's not going anywhere.
It's incredible, isn't it?
Oh, my God, I love it.
I love it.
I love playing with it.
I got one question I'd like toask all of my folks that's on
the show the HTM world islistening to us what advice?
(49:59):
It's going to be a two-foldquestion.
What advice would you givefirst to a young person that's
new in this industry?
You went through that stagewhere almost all of your
employees sound like.
What advice would you give aB-man one first day on a job?
What advice would you give him?
Or?
Mark L. Taylor (50:19):
her.
I would say to this person, himor her, I would say listen,
this is an incredible field ifyou're willing to learn and put
the time in and listen to thosewho went before you.
So we're very fortunate.
We have a lot of young kidsthat come in, new to the field.
(50:39):
Be met ones.
Maybe they were successful asan auto mechanic, maybe they
weren't successful at tradeschool or whatever it was, and
you know, young folks areusually pretty bold and pretty
confident.
Htm is the type of field, though, that you have to be precise,
and I would encourage everyonecoming in the field, young or
(51:01):
old, to listen to those who,like yourself, have had
experience, who have been there,who have understood the
challenges of device repair, ofpreventative maintenance, of
dealing with field serviceactions and recalls.
There's so much to be learnedand, unfortunately, I think it
(51:21):
has to go both ways.
I think the young have tolisten to the old and the old
have to listen to the young.
So, overall, I'd tell whoever'scoming in and say, hey, this is
an incredible career, but yougot to look at what's been shown
to you by those who've been init for a minute, and they have
to understand that.
And I think.
(51:41):
With that attitude and youreyes open and willingness to
learn that you know a B-Met, onecould be the CEO of a TriMedx.
Bryant Hawkins (51:51):
You never know.
Oh, sir, now I'm not gonna askyou what advice would you give
to someone who's been in theindustry forever?
I want you to talk to thatmiddle, that sweet spot, that
five to 10 year old guy, becausethat's where it gets kind of
challenging for a B-Med.
You got past the B-Med one.
Now you're a B-Med two.
Getting to B-Med three is notas easy as getting to B-Man 2.
(52:15):
So what advice would you givethat B-Man 2 who wants to get to
that next level man, that's agood one.
Mark L. Taylor (52:24):
I'd say get involved with Amy.
Go to Amy Exchange, go to, youknow, md Expo, get involved.
I think there's so many peoplethat get so used to their
vocation to I mean you talkedabout this earlier B-Hawk.
You know they turn it off whenthey clock out.
You know they clocked out,they're done.
That's not their job, you know.
(52:44):
And I'm not saying you have tolive HTM, I'm just saying be
aware and be active.
If this is a career that youwant to advance in say you've
been in it five to 10 years youget a little burned out, get a
little challenged by theenvironment.
Seek out other opportunities,not just at your job or for
(53:05):
another job, but in this space.
I mean, there's such a goodcommunity and I see people all
the time that get fulfillmentfrom not only reaching out and
seeing what else there is tooffer for a job, but also what
other resources there are andhow you can learn from those in
other areas.
And a great way to do it AmyExchange, md Expo.
Go to your local BiomedAssociation meetings there's
(53:27):
just get involved.
And I think when people get ina rut they tend to want to draw
inwards and I want to encouragethem to go outwards, to go seek
those who who have, you know, alot to offer.
You know, at these places, atthese meetings, at these expos.
Bryant Hawkins (53:44):
I mean, that's some great advice.
You ever thought about being amotivational speaker, Mark?
Mark L. Taylor (53:50):
I can barely motivate my kids to do their own
laundry.
So I don't know, I don't knowhow effective I'd be, can barely
motivate my kids to do theirown laundry.
Bryant Hawkins (53:56):
So I don't know.
I don't know how effective I'dbe.
Well, mark, I really, reallyappreciate spending this time
with you, man.
I mean felt like I learned awhole lot, but I'm more than
sure there's much more insideyou.
So you're welcome to come backwhenever you feel like, and I'm
glad to have you back on and Iappreciate the great things
you're doing with your companies.
Y'all are much needed and youare very necessary.
Mark L. Taylor (54:18):
Well, b-hawk, let me tell you this One, I'd be
glad for you to have my wife onanytime she loves.
She's probably more passionateabout the industry than I am.
And two, I want to say I reallyappreciate what you're doing
the book for the kids, theinvolvement at a, you know, at
high school and elementaryschool, all the way up to what
you're doing with this podcast.
(54:39):
It's amazing for our industry.
Love seeing you at Amy Exchangeand all the places I love
seeing you post online.
I think it's very, very muchneeded and I just appreciate all
you do for our industry.
Bryant Hawkins (54:50):
I appreciate you too, brother.
What a powerful conversationwith Mark L Taylor.
He reminded us HTM is more thana job, it's a calling.
It's about purpose, growth andshowing up for the lives that
depend on us.
Whether you're just gettingstarted or decades in, remember
(55:13):
this field needs leaders likeyou.
Stay focused, stay motivatedand, as always, htm is on the
line.
Y'all be safe out there.
Welcome back to HTM on the line.
I'm your host, bryant HawkinsSr.
And today we've got a specialguest, mark L Taylor.
He's the co-founder of RenewBiomedical and Master Medical
Equipment, a leader who turnedchallenges into opportunity and
helped shape the future of HTMthrough training, innovation and
(00:30):
passion.
If you're ready to be inspiredand reminded why this healthcare
technology management industrymatters, this one's for you.
Let's get to it.
We have a special guest with ustoday, mark L Taylor.
(01:05):
How are you doing today, mark?
Mark L. Taylor (01:07):
Good.
How are you doing Brian?
Be whole Everything good upthere in New.
Bryant Hawkins (01:10):
Orleans.
Everything's great up there,man, actually really kind of
chilly this morning.
I was shocked we got a few morecool days left in there for us.
All right things up there.
Y'all survived that tornado I'mabout to say hurricane yeah
tornado they hit.
Mark L. Taylor (01:27):
We're very fortunate.
Just a little damage and someflooding here in Jackson, but a
couple counties south ofMcMurray County got hit pretty
hard.
A lot of folks that were in thepath of a tornado that touched
down.
But I think they're digging out.
Our thoughts and prayers arewith those folks.
But good.
Here in West Tennessee today itwas actually a beautifully
sunny day, about 65 degrees.
(01:48):
A little cool this morning, butnice day here in West Tennessee
.
Bryant Hawkins (01:52):
Great, great.
Well, Mark, before we get deepinto this podcast, give us a
little background about yourself.
Tell us about you.
Mark L. Taylor (02:01):
Well, that's a loaded question asking a
salesperson to tell them aboutthemselves.
So my name is Mark Taylor.
I'm born and raised here inJackson, tennessee, went to high
school here, went to collegehere for a little while, played
football at Lambeth Universityhere in town before transferring
to Lipscomb University inNashville.
Finished up my degree there.
(02:23):
I had a degree in finance andeconomics.
I met my wife there SpringBreak 95.
She didn't like me to say that,but it was a long-term Spring
Break hookup.
Her name is Jill and she's,like I said, partners with me in
Renew Biomedical and MasterMedical Equipment and working in
(02:51):
the family business in therestaurant at the time and had
an opportunity to get intomedical equipment sales with a
friend of mine from high schooland took that opportunity and,
long story short, that's where Iam today.
I'm still in Jackson, tennessee.
We have Master MedicalEquipment, renewable Medical,
and me and my wife live here.
We got our sons a sophomore atUniversity of Tennessee and my
(03:15):
daughter is a sophomore in highschool, very fortunate to have
my parents live just down theroad from me.
My dad was a local smallbusiness owner and kind of got
my drive and entrepreneurialspirit and salesmanship from him
, and his name is LawrenceTaylor.
My mom normally lives rightdown the street, so I'm the only
(03:35):
child.
So everybody always asks me likewhy did you base your
businesses out of JacksonTennessee?
My first response is usuallywhy not out of Jackson Tennessee
?
My first response is usuallywhy not?
And then, further than that,jackson in West Tennessee is a
good place to have a business.
We've been here our entirebusiness career and it's a good
community.
We're pretty well situated inthe middle of the country, about
(03:58):
45 miles from Memphis.
So there's a little company inMemphis that does logistics
named FedEx.
So I tell everybody I say well,if FedEx decides Memphis is a
good place for logistics, thenwhy not Jackson Tennessee?
So that's a little bit about me, bron.
Bryant Hawkins (04:13):
Yeah, All that you said.
Mark L. Taylor (04:19):
one thing stuck out to me man, your dad is
Lawrence Taylor, that's right.
That's right Not the one thatplayed for the Giants.
Those of us who've been aroundfor a while it's back when I was
growing up.
People always said is your dadLawrence Taylor?
Like yeah, they said reallyyeah.
And then of course, they lookat me and oh, he's not the
football player.
I was like no, I got a goodpicture of my dad when the St
(04:41):
Louis Cardinals football teamwas still in St Louis, got a
picture of him and number 57,lawrence Taylor, with the Giants
.
It was a cool experience, it's56, by the way too, man 56.
You're a bigger LT fan than I am.
Bryant Hawkins (04:58):
Hey, man, just a sports fan.
When you said that, lawrenceTaylor, I said, wow, I know you
heard that a lot throughout yourlifetime.
Oh yeah, well, you mentionedyou and your wife are
co-founders.
How does that feel, workingwith the wife, man?
Well, I don't know.
Mark L. Taylor (05:12):
We work together daily or y'all work Anybody who
comes to visit our offices howclosely we work I have.
We're a true mom and pop.
We have a facility in Jacksonhere.
It's a pretty big facility, wehave about 62,000 square foot.
However, at the front of thefacility I have my office and
then we have a bathroom and inbetween, well, my office, jill's
(05:32):
office and the bathroom inbetween, so we share a bathroom.
So it doesn't get much more momand pop than that.
So we're fortunate we worktogether and we do have
different roles and she hascertain roles in Renew and me
and I've got other roles and weactually have a couple other
companies that we run out ofthat location.
But we are a true mom and pop.
Bryant Hawkins (05:52):
That's awesome.
That's awesome.
So, master medical equipment Iheard you mention that in Renew
Biomedical Services I'm familiarwith.
But before we get into Renew,tell me a little more about
Master Medical.
Mark L. Taylor (06:04):
Equipment, sure Master Medical Equipment.
We started in 2011.
I had been in another businessand split from my partner with
that and was looking forsomething to kind of start up
here in Jackson.
I actually started with acompany called Master Fit
Medical Supplies here in Jackson.
It was already in the physicianoffice supply space here in
Jackson was already in thephysician office supply space
(06:26):
and the idea was for me to helpthem with supplies and they were
going to help me sell equipment.
Long story short, after acouple of years the equipment
side was outpacing the supplyside.
So I bought those guys out andme and Jill started.
Master Medical Equipmentshortened it and so in 2013,
master Medical Equipment wasfocused mostly on selling
capital medical equipment tobasically either the
(06:49):
pre-hospital market orpost-acute market.
So we concentrated on EMS andambulance services as well as
long-term care, snfs, surgerycenters, anything outside the
hospital.
We sell defibrillators, vitalsigns monitors, anything outside
the hospital.
We sell defibrillators, vitalsigns monitors, ekgs, iv pumps,
(07:14):
ventilators, all types ofelectronic medical equipment.
We sell new and used medicalequipment.
We call it recertified.
So that was kind of the genesisof our business and so we used
to outsource our service.
So if we got a piece of usedequipment and we need it checked
out or tested or PMed, or weneed some repair work done.
We used to outsource it.
Well, after, from 2011 to 2014,.
We were doing so muchoutsourcing as our master
(07:36):
medical equipment sales grewthat we realized, oh well, you
know, it's time for us to starta service company.
Oh well, you know, it's timefor us to start a service
company.
So that was the genesis ofRenewable Medical really, just
to start and help us with ourexisting recertification, pm and
repair business that wasbasically selling master medical
(08:00):
equipment, wow.
Bryant Hawkins (08:02):
So let me ask you this question.
I always ask people in the HTMindustry when did you actually
hear about the service side ofmedical equipment when you
started selling it, or did youknow before you got into this
industry?
Mark L. Taylor (08:11):
No, I didn't.
So in 1999, when I first gotinto this business I mean it was
just selling equipment.
I'm a sales guy, I've been inthe restaurant business, didn't
know a whole lot about it, butvery, very quickly I realized
how indispensable biomass werebecause we were selling
defibrillators life pack 10s,life pack nines.
If you got one in and the, theold crt display wouldn't come on
(08:35):
or the output it wouldn't, itwouldn't shock or wouldn't paste
right.
Um, we had to send it somebodyand I like, who are these guys?
And I realized, oh, they're themechanics for medical equipment
.
So I got very familiar with theHTM Biomed field at an early
time in my career because itgoes hand in hand.
You can't sell used medicalequipment if you don't have
(08:58):
somebody that you know that canrepair or diagnose what's going
on.
So I had a lot of respect backthen I still do for the bio-med
field.
But back then it was, it wasreally, really you know,
soldering boards and and puttingstuff together.
You know some of the stuff,some of the the older equipment
was just, I mean it was I'm sureyou you remember B-Hawk.
(09:19):
I mean that stuff was was big,it was robust, it was not a lot
of diagnostics to it.
It was really open it up andfigure out what's going on yeah,
exactly, I mean it's.
Bryant Hawkins (09:33):
They had the wb allen's and the radio shacks
where you had to go get theresistors and capacitors.
Now it's a different world, butbut the need is still there.
Now you talked about the twocompanies where one feeds the
other and vice versa.
If you had to say I mean yourcompany, when you started out
(09:57):
staffing challenges that seemedto be a big issue right now in
our industry.
Have you come across anystaffing challenges and, if you
have, what's your secret tomaybe sustaining?
Mark L. Taylor (10:11):
That's a good question.
So so MME has always beenfairly easy.
We got warehouse workers, wegot salespeople, you know we got
account managers and you know alot of people know what medical
sales is and a lot of peoplewant to get into a company for
medical sales with their new.
The challenge was when westarted was not only hiring
(10:35):
somebody, hiring somebody whounderstood how independent
service organization works andwhat it means and how we're not
doing work for a facility, we'redoing work for a customer, and
our customer could be an EMS,could be a hospital, could be,
you know, a multitude ofdifferent types of health care
facilities.
So, that being said, in Jackson, tennessee, we have a hospital,
(10:58):
hospital Wires, bornJackson-Madison County General
Hospital.
They had a biomed department,but other than those few guys
that were in the basement thathave worked, you know I'm pretty
sure most everybody in the HTMworld knows how it works.
You know you get differentcontracts and these guys have
been contracted by Horizons orCSA or Crawford or currently,
(11:18):
agility.
But other than that, you know,we hired one guy, we moved him
here to Jackson and we kind ofstarted on a whim.
We didn't know what we'regetting into.
We knew we needed somebody whowas able to work on our
equipment.
But as we, as we grew, thechallenges of hiring more people
were real.
I mean, it was we tried to hirepeople in our community.
(11:41):
We tried to bring people herethat had a job with an OEM or
another independent serviceorganization and when we get
them here, either they wouldn'tlike our area or they wouldn't
understand how we work as anindependent versus maybe they
came from an OEM.
So all these challenges we hadwith human resources kind of hit
(12:06):
an inflection point in late2019 and early 2020.
We were really having a toughtime getting people to come to
our program, to want to workwith Renew, and one of the early
things we did is one of ourtechnicians realized that a lot
of people we were interviewing,even though they didn't
(12:27):
understand really what abiomedical technician or HTM
professional was, 2018, 2019,they would come in and say, oh
yeah, I can fix anything, I'mvery talented with my hands.
And what we didn't know iseverybody will say whatever they
want you to hear to get a job.
So you're like this.
So one of my techs we're asmall organization, two or three
(12:51):
techs at the time Somebodywould come in to interview and
we work in pretty fast pace.
Our biggest market is EMS andthey're always in high demand
for getting their equipment back.
So one day, unbeknownst to him,he was showing a guy how to do
a coin cell test, just kind ofshowing them how we worked on
equipment.
I think it was a coin cell andan ECG or defibrillator, and he
(13:13):
got called away from the phoneand he just kind of left this
guy there, you know, with a,with a unit opened up and, uh,
and and, and a coin cell halfway, halfway repaired.
So he gets back and the kid haddone it, the guy had done it
and he was like, wow, ok, and sohe came to us and told us about
it and I said, well, that's agreat way to test.
(13:34):
So one of our first tools forhiring is we call it the coin
cell test and what we do is webring somebody in and we would
make up a phone call.
Whoever, whichever one of ourtexts was doing the interview,
would say oh, I got to grab thisphone call See if you can
figure out that coin cell.
And if they can figure out thatcoin cell, which is a fairly
(13:55):
simple repair, then we knew theyweren't all phones.
So that was, that was our earlydays of of of getting people in
Cause.
We I'll tell you what we madesome bad hires.
We had had a guy I'm not I'mnot a mechanically minded guy at
all.
I can barely screw in a lightbulb.
But I have done my fair shareof printer roller repairs, you
know, changing out the LCDs andseveral things in in devices
(14:19):
when I had to.
But we found out not everybodycan even unscrew light bulb.
So so we kind of came up withthis coin cell test as a way to
kind of make sure we didn't hiresome of these guys we'd hired
that said they could fixanything and can't unscrew a
light bulb.
So that leads to 2019, 2020,late 2019, early 2020.
(14:40):
We were right at the precipiceof what's now known as the COVID
pandemic.
We were really struggling.
We got a couple of largecontracts, I think at the time
we had seven technicians and wewere just really, really
struggling with what to do toget more technicians that we
knew were going to be needed asour business grew with Renew.
(15:00):
So it was originally my wife'sidea.
Jill came up with the idea oflet's look into starting a Renew
Biomedical Training Academy andwe will train kids and people
in the community that want tolearn about Biomed and HTM, and
we're going to set out and we'regoing to have this venture that
will help us grow our talent.
(15:22):
And so the idea was great, jillhad this, we had our facility
redone, have a classroom put in.
We actually hired Richard Woods,which some of y'all may know.
Richard has a heart and apassion for HTM.
We call him our biomedprofessor at Renew.
We hired him.
(15:43):
He was retiring from at thattime I think it was right before
Julia took over our hospital.
Anyway, he was ready to retireand I said no, let's try this
and get you to teach some of ourguys.
So, long story short, after amonth of having them on board
and us just kind of scratchingour heads, how do we come up
with this curriculum?
How do we kind of create thisapprenticeship program that we
(16:05):
want to create it's good, we'renew by med training academy.
You know how do we get peopleinvolved?
And then, once we get them here, how do we?
How do we teach them?
So it was about about May of2020.
So pandemic had just startedreally having tough time getting
calls for a lot of service and,and the cool thing was is is is
.
We had this idea, but littledid we know that there were
(16:29):
people willing to help with it.
So what we did is first thing Idid was called Amy.
So I called actually Danielleand Amy and I said hey, danielle
, I know you're in education, Iknow you'll do a lot of Amy.
I said we're really struggling.
I said we have this idea of anapprenticeship program.
It's called Renewed BiomedicalTraining Academy.
(16:51):
How in the world are we supposedto get a curriculum?
Do you happen to know anybodythat could help us with any kind
of educational background?
Or do you all have anybody onstaff that would be able to help
us with this?
And the coolest thing ever,brian, she.
I remember like it wasyesterday.
She said mark, you gotta bekidding.
And I was like uh-oh, no, uh,you know, just, we're trying to
(17:13):
get some help to get our programstarted.
She said we have a curriculumthat's rubber stamped by the us
department of labor fora, biomedapprenticeship program.
I said you gotta be've got tobe kidding me, danielle.
She said no.
She said I said well, what doyou need?
She said we need an industrypartner.
And she said COVID's happened.
And no, we can't get anybodyinterested to be an industry
(17:34):
partner.
So I was like, hello, that'swhat I'm here about, so
everybody can look up online.
We're very proud of therelationship we had with Amy.
(18:00):
They helped us, they got us thecurriculum US Department of
Labor certified, tennesseeDepartment of Labor certified.
So once we got our curriculumwe were able to then go and
promote our Biomed TrainingAcademy.
And Brian this is during COVID alot of places were shut down.
You had some factories gettingshut down.
We were very, very, veryfortunate that we had a huge
(18:21):
first class eight folks thatshowed up.
A huge first class eight folksthat showed up.
So with our apprenticeshipprogram, not only do you come
and you learn about HTM, youlearn how to be a bomb at it.
It's two days a week, two halfdays a week in class.
The rest of the time you'reworking at a desk on job
training with another CBETjourneyman and the cool thing is
(18:43):
we're able to pay these folksto not only help us grow, renew,
but they are learning HTMindustry.
I mean, it is what RichardWoods does in his class on those
.
Tuesdays and Thursdays areamazing.
Every other week we have whatthey call the Renewed Knowledge
Bowl and where anybody who'sgone through the apprenticeship
class can come and actuallyRichard quizzes them on
(19:07):
questions that are going to beon the seabed exam.
So it's just a really coolthing.
So this whole genesis of theidea my wife came up with,
renewed Biomed Training Academyis now a full-fledged
apprenticeship program.
Thanks to Amy, we've beencertified for the last five
years and have produced over 40technicians man, that's amazing,
(19:31):
I mean, it's the perfectexample how COVID came in.
Bryant Hawkins (19:36):
A lot of people was looking at it as a downtime,
but you turned that around andmotivated you to do something
different.
I mean, you can reallyunderstand when somebody said
you build a movement literallybehind the scenes.
Biomed is behind the scenes andmost people are in the hospital
, but that's where the actionand that's where you doing
(19:58):
something.
That's amazing.
I've read about what you'redoing over there, but I never
heard the detailed story.
Mark L. Taylor (20:03):
So Story and I mean it just shows you.
I mean sometimes when peopledon't understand this,
especially small business owners, and I encourage all of them,
you know, no matter where andit's not just small business
owners, anybody in business orin an organization sometimes you
just got to reach out for helpand we were able to reach out
for help.
And then not only did Robertand Danielle and all the great
(20:26):
folks at Amy help us, we hadother people.
We had the US Department ofLabor come in, we had Tennessee
Department of Labor andWorkforce Development come in.
They helped us.
Actually, there was some grantmoney for during that time for
repurposing people who were laidoff from their jobs, and so we
got some money.
We're able to pass that on tosome of our apprentices.
We had a little bit of a grantto help us with restructuring
(20:51):
our facility for this classroomand it was amazing to see all
the people when you startedasking how can we help get the
word out about HTM, about theapprenticeship program, about
biomedical technicians and theincredible career opportunities
there are.
And, brian, we had so manypeople reach back out and want
to help.
(21:12):
It was amazing, absolutelyamazing.
Bryant Hawkins (21:14):
Oh man, that's the beauty of this industry, I
mean, everybody will helpeverybody.
And just listening to yourvoice, mark, I can hear the
passion is deep and better thanyou and your wife, for that
matter.
So this question here is notreally a HTM question, but Can
you share what is the why behindwhat you do every day?
(21:37):
I mean, you have to have a why,because you're not just doing
this off instinct.
There's something that drivesyou, and if you don't mind
sharing that, what is it that?
Mark L. Taylor (21:47):
makes you up.
That's pretty good, it's funny.
I send this video about JimRohn.
He's a motivational speakerfrom the 80s and early 90s that
I was, at the time, forced tolisten to.
But my why is why not, you know,why not me?
Why not us?
Why not biomedical technicians?
(22:09):
Why not, you know?
So somebody is going to be outthere doing it, and I have a
passion for connection.
I have a passion for anything Iwant to get into in life.
I just feel like, if somebodyis going to do it, why not me?
So my wife's a little bit ofthe same way.
So my why is why not?
(22:31):
You know, we're very, veryfortunate to live in a great
country like America that youcan have the opportunity to, you
know, do your own thing.
You can start your own business.
You can, you know, start abiomed organization.
You can become, you know, htmperson of the year.
You can get involved with Amy,you can get involved with, you
(22:51):
know, your local biomedassociation.
Why not me?
So I wake up every singlemorning, brian, and I'm very
grateful that not only do wehave these growing companies,
but I've got a lot of folksaround me that they're not
employees, they're family.
So my why is?
Why not us?
It's not just why not me, it'swhy not us.
(23:11):
Why not build us an amazingorganization that we can all be
proud of, that we can, you know,share with others, and that we
can do life together?
Why not?
Bryant Hawkins (23:21):
Yes, exactly Now .
I was going to say this forlater, but since we're talking
about it, just it just popped inmy head.
You talk about why not in hydrobusiness, business like a
family.
Now I go around speaking to alot of kids about HTM and it
seems like you're the same way.
You share with anybody who wantto know about HTM.
(23:41):
You share it with them what yousit in the classroom right now.
What would you tell somefreshmen in high school about
the HTM industry?
Mark L. Taylor (23:53):
That's a good question.
I would first off tell them Isay you know, are you a person
who enjoys working with yourhands and your mind?
I think I think what a lot ofpeople forget and when they
think about technicians isthey're only thinking about the
physical aspect and what.
What I get from a lot of myguys and and we do a lot of
(24:17):
interviews I like to talk to myteam.
I go around every singlemorning to the shop and I
literally try to talk to as manyof our technicians as we can.
Some of them are young, some ofthem are late teens, early 20s,
and some of them are my age orolder, their 50s and 60s.
And what was unique to me isthe younger ones are so
(24:38):
surprised that not only are theyturning wrenches and getting
knuckles deep in a device, butthey're having to use their
minds, they're having to thinkabout repairs, they're having to
approach customer service, andso what?
I think a lot of teenagers,especially ninth, tenth,
eleventh grade in high school,they don't understand.
(24:59):
You need to be challenged notonly physically but mentally in
your vocation.
If somebody is looking for thatand they said they are, then I
tell them HTM is the career foryou.
I mean there's upward mobility.
There's all different types ofmodalities of equipment you can
work on.
You can go in the private space, you can go in public space,
you can go work for an OEM.
(25:19):
I mean the opportunities areendless.
Bryant Hawkins (25:23):
That's it man.
See, now you ready to go talkto your first high school.
Mark L. Taylor (25:27):
We're very fortunate so.
So here in in in West Tennessee, we didn't even know this
existed, so we started ourapprenticeship program in 2020
to get some traction in 2021.
Well, in 2022, we had one ofour local high school teachers
vo-tech teachers come to us andhad worked with the same people
we'd worked in.
The girl's name has been veryhelpful.
(25:49):
Her name is Holly Wood, justlike the song you know, but her
name is Holly.
Last name Wood.
She's fantastic.
But he was talking to her andshe said you need to start a
pre-apprenticeship program foryour high school students with
Renew Biomedicals ApprenticeshipProgram.
So we are actually a state ofTennessee pre-apprenticeship
program and right now we havethree students two from South
(26:12):
Gibson High School and one fromMadison Academic here in our
town that come to us and inthree hours a week they are
doing work that will actually gotowards their apprenticeship.
So it's calledpre-apprenticeship.
So my wife has an extremepassion for letting younger kids
, specifically junior, high andhigh school kids, know about the
(26:34):
opportunities there are in theHTM field.
So we've been very fortunateAgain.
We reached out to some folks,they reached back out to us and
now we have a pre-apprenticeshipprogram for high school
students.
Bryant Hawkins (26:45):
Man, the more you talk about your wife.
I think I like Jill man.
We should have had Jill go hereand study you.
Mark L. Taylor (26:51):
Hey, she's just as passionate about it.
I give her all the credit forRenewed Biomed Training Academy.
Bryant Hawkins (26:58):
And I have no problem Part two and have Jill
come on here and talk about thisstuff.
She's got going on.
So wait a minute.
This pre-apprentice I meanlet's slow down, let's peel back
the layers a little bit.
Pre-apprentice means what?
Just to make it clear.
Mark L. Taylor (27:14):
So it's basically they get some school
credit and there's some thingsrequired by the local, by the
high school, but it is actuallyand it's our state does does
this program where they actuallycan get high school credit if
they sign up for apre-apprenticeship program and
they complete the terms of theprogram.
So basically the teachers comein they say hey, we're going to
(27:37):
send these three students to you.
My technicians kind of givethem some stuff to do and it's
literally like ourapprenticeship program, but in
smaller bites, because it'susually three, two, three hours
a day, a couple of days a week,and if they were put complete
those requirements they have,they have that but they can go
on their transcript and actuallygives them high school credit
for towards their grades.
Bryant Hawkins (27:59):
Wow, I wonder if that's something.
I guess if you can do it there,you can do it everywhere.
Mark L. Taylor (28:04):
I don't know.
Like I said, we're veryfortunate we had we had
Hollywood from our localworkforce development board,
that that she she's been a rockstar and that's I encourage
anybody who's looking at doinganything for education, either
high school, collegeapprenticeship program Reach out
to your local.
Every state has a workforce andlabor development folks.
(28:26):
We have another one, roderickWood, who actually spoke with us
last week.
He's out of Memphis but hecovers all of West Tennessee.
We just have been very, veryblessed to have some good people
that they want to help.
I mean, their entire job is tocreate more jobs in our states
and communities.
So I'm pretty sure everybodythat is interested in a program
(28:47):
like this, if you start askingaround your state has somebody
to help.
Bryant Hawkins (28:52):
You got to connect me with Hollywood after
this man so I can ask her somequestions.
She's great, she's fantastic.
That'll be a great initiative,because I know some schools
would love to start something.
You know, because when I gospeak to the kids, a lot of them
never heard of it, of course,and just think you can get some
high school credit for justletting them learn how to work
(29:14):
on some equipment is amazing.
Oh, it's fantastic.
Yeah, that's great, geez.
Now, man, you do a lot, dude.
You've covered so much.
Two companies working with thekids, working with your school.
You got it remodeled COVID.
Where do I want to go next withyou?
(29:34):
Renewal let's take a renewalbiomedical.
You mentioned how you have aculture that you built there and
it's a family culture andthat's amazing.
Now, I don't know if I'm justgoing to pick your mindset a
little.
When times get tough, you knowwhether it's business, and it
(29:55):
seems like you mentioned family,so y'all probably have a lot of
personal relationships.
What mindset, I guess principlekeeps you grounded?
You know, because when thingsget tough, sometimes things just
go haywire.
What keeps you focused, despitethe tough times might come
about.
Mark L. Taylor (30:14):
I think it's my faith and my gratitude.
I had to be honest with you.
We had a pretty tough day todayat work, had a lot of stuff
going on, a lot of externalstuff that we can't control.
You know, and it's going to be,everybody knows this it's going
to be a crazy year with aglobal economy and stock markets
crashing.
(30:35):
Stock market's crashing.
But I have had a talk todaywith somebody who's going
through a lot rougher time thanI could ever imagine, both with
family illness and some businessissues, and I think my faith in
God and my gratitude of thedaily gratitude of what we get
(30:56):
to get up and experience and dogets you through some tough
times.
You know perspective,understanding that, yes, it's
tough.
Anybody who's out there as anindependent biomed small
operators, you know it nevergets much easier.
No, life's easy.
But I think the way you frameit and the perspective you take,
(31:18):
take and if you have faith andunderstanding and gratitude, you
know you can.
You can face any obstacle.
Bryant Hawkins (31:24):
Absolutely.
Mark L. Taylor (31:25):
Great answer.
Bryant Hawkins (31:26):
Now, let's recall this the misconceptions
in our industry.
One misconception is they thinkthat HTM is just about fixing
equipment.
Now, yeah, see, a lot of peoplemay think that we just repair
equipment.
But what would you say tosomeone who doesn't understand
(31:50):
the full scope and the impact ofthis profession?
You know somebody, oh, you justfix equipment.
You know what could you tellhim and make him understand that
there's more to us than justfixing equipment?
Mark L. Taylor (32:02):
Well, people don't realize.
They really don't realize.
Like I said, our, our, ourmodel, one of our texts, came up
with years ago and we still useit today.
We're saving the lives of lifesaving equipment.
I can't tell you how many timeswe've gotten a call literally
at the last minute, for you knowwe're big in repair and in the
(32:24):
EMS field and we've literallyhad a helicopter land that was
having an ECG port failure on apatient flying over our facility
and us have to literally repairit on the fly.
And you know what?
People don't understand that atthe end of the day, healthcare
(32:47):
professionals, without theirtools, there's not much they can
do.
You know there's not much theycan do.
And who makes sure these toolsare working?
Who makes sure at the criticaltime when that baby's in an
incubator, when somebody'shaving a heart attack, when a
person is in surgery and isbleeding out, who makes sure
(33:08):
that those devices, thoselife-saving, life-sustaining
devices, are working not onlyproperly but effectively?
And I think a lot of peopledon't realize oh, they just sit
in the bottom of the hospital orthey sit in their shop
somewhere and somebody ships itin and they just tinker on it or
replace a cosmetic piece or apart.
(33:30):
I don't think they trulyrealize that most of the biomeds
that I know have spent a goodamount of time either in the
field or under the gun or both,and what's at stake is a piece
of equipment that could savesomebody's life or sustain
somebody's life, and I thinkpeople don't realize the gravity
of that.
I had a little State of theUnion address to my entire Renew
(33:53):
Biomedical staff.
So everybody from front of thehouse accounting to back of the
house, you know shipping andreceiving, and every technician,
every manager last week and Itold them I said I said I think
we've gotten.
We've gotten big.
We're very fortunate.
You know, we've got over ahundred folks that work for us
now and and I think I wasgetting frustrated because some
(34:17):
of what I was hearing wasinternal argument bickering.
You know your typical things inlarge organizations.
You get larger.
I said, guys, we've lost ourfocus.
I said we got to remember.
We got to always remember.
We're arguing and fighting.
We're talking about a piece ofequipment that could be saving
or sustaining somebody's life,and it's something I take very
(34:38):
seriously.
So we have a lot of fun in ourculture.
We make sure everybody'sincluded, but at the end of the
day, I told everybody.
I said we are not only takingcare of our customers.
Our customers are taking careof patients in their time of
most vulnerability, of moststress they probably ever had
and at a time in their lifewhere they need this device to
(35:02):
help, to help them, to keep themalive, to, you know, sustain
their life.
And again, it's something Itake very, very, very seriously.
I'm very passionate aboutmaking sure my team understands
that yeah, and that's perfect.
Bryant Hawkins (35:16):
And another thing I try to tell individuals
you live in this community, sothe equipment you're working on
could be the same exactequipment you could be on
tonight, or it could be me, itcould be my mom, it could be my
kids it could be my best friend.
Mark L. Taylor (35:32):
You don't know.
I tell people that all the timeI said you.
You just don't know.
Bryant Hawkins (35:38):
Another misconception there's no real
career path or growth.
You know some people believeHTM Rose.
You know we're just jobs, butI'm always saying it's not a job
, it's a career.
Now can you possibly share whatadvancements can look like in
this industry?
How can someone build along-term career?
Mark L. Taylor (36:02):
I'll give you a perfect example.
So Josh Weatherford.
Josh Weatherford came to usfive years ago.
It was when we were trying tohire a bunch of folks for our
growth post-COVID.
And Josh Weatherford previouslyhad been a nurse tech, been to
(36:22):
some nursing school, had been anautomotive tech, ASC certified
mechanic, had worked at afactory.
Him and his wife were expectingtheir first child and didn't
want to work at third shift in afactory.
Anyway, long story short, hegoes to our apprenticeship
program.
Right, and this is right whenwe were working with Amy.
(36:43):
So literally Josh Weatherfordis the very first biomed
apprentice in the country, sohe's the first one when the
Department of Labor we got thatstamp.
He's the very first one.
So pretty cool.
He's a great technician, greatwork.
Well, after two years ofworking for us he was just such
good work, ethic, such goodcommunication skills he got
(37:06):
promoted to assistant manager.
So he works as assistantmanager for a couple of years.
Again, such a good person as faras not only doing his work but
teaching others and mentoringand being a good manager.
After he became assistantmanager he is now our depot
manager for all of Jackson,everything that happens in our
(37:28):
30,000 square foot depot, andoversees all the technicians
there.
There's over 40 technicianshere in Jackson.
So that's just a small exampleof somebody who got into our
industry and has not only gottenin and gotten their
apprenticeship, got their C-bet,but has continued to take
opportunities for advancement inour business.
(37:50):
So I know of other examples too,of people who get in the
business.
Next thing you know, theyprogress through the ranks of a
large organization like Agilityor Traumatics.
I know of others that get inthe HTM field on a whim and they
go from, say, being a bedrepair tech to, next thing you
know, they're flying around andservicing high-end MRI equipment
(38:13):
.
People don't realize thatthere's so much opportunity in
the HTM field, whether it'sactually being a technician and
rising through the ranks ofspecialized technician or just
rising through the ranks of thebusiness you're in becoming a
manager or assistant manager,supervisor.
So much opportunity, yes, he'son the head there.
Bryant Hawkins (38:35):
Now soft skills.
You mentioned how yourtechnician had to become a.
He became a supervisor or aleader.
Now to become those things, howimportant are soft skills.
Mark L. Taylor (38:48):
That's a good question.
A little bit of a loadedquestion, so I'll be honest with
you.
So one of the things that welook for when we're hiring
technicians so we have we havesome technicians that are very,
very technical, very good withtheir hands, love the hands-on
work, they love being in thedepot.
They don't particularly loveinteraction with people, and
(39:09):
there's nothing wrong with thatNot as outgoing, not more
introverted, so there's nothingwrong with that.
And this is a great career forsomebody who wants to come in
and learn and not have to worryabout being a salesperson or
soft skills.
However, that being said,everybody has to have some type
of soft skills, no matter whereyou work.
As long as you're working withother people, you have to.
(39:31):
But what we look for is whenwe're interviewing candidates
for a new HTM biomed technician.
Technician position is if theydo have soft skills and they do
excel in communication and theyare good with understanding, you
know, and working with otherpeople.
Um, those are the people weusually put in a more customer
facing role like field service.
(39:51):
So not only do we have ourdepot in Jackson, we have a
depot in uh Louisville uhLouisville, kentucky.
A depot in Chicago, illinois,soon to be opening in Tampa,
florida, and we got a place inAtlanta, georgia.
The people that work in theseplaces are in the field a whole
lot, so we make sure that theyhave the soft skills needed to
talk to a nurse, to talk to adoctor, from time to time to
(40:14):
talk to somebody that's inlogistics and materials
maintenance.
When you go to a facility torepair on behalf of a
manufacturer, on behalf ofanother ISO, you have to have
these soft skills.
So one of the things that wetry to do is we try to make sure
when people come in forwhatever position that they're
interviewing for, if soft skillsare necessary, we make sure not
(40:35):
only do they have them butthey're comfortable using.
So very important, especiallyin customer facing roles.
Bryant Hawkins (40:43):
I got a question for you, mr Entrepreneur, now,
in this industry, that's also away you can go as far as owning
your own business, becausethere's a need for that also.
Mark L. Taylor (40:55):
Absolutely, and you definitely need soft skills
If you're going to open abusiness, because then you got
to hire people, you got to dealwith customers, you got to deal
with all kinds of communication.
Bryant Hawkins (41:07):
Now let me ask you this question what are some
key lessons that you probablylearned opening up not one, but
two businesses that you canshare with a young person who's
trying to maybe start a businessin the HTM industry?
What are some key lessons youlearned you may be able to share
?
Mark L. Taylor (41:26):
If you're like me and you like to talk a lot,
you also have to have time tolisten, and I think some of the
most important lessons are whenyou're actually listening to
your customer.
Your customer will tell youwhat you want.
Sometimes you just got tolisten.
So me, being a talker and beinga sales guy, it's sometimes
hard for me to shut up, believeit or not, but I have found the
(41:47):
most valuable aspects ofcommunication, especially when
you're dealing with somebodythat you're trying to do
business with or hoping tobecome your customer.
You just have to listen, andit's a lost art.
I think in these days,everybody wants to be heard, but
not everybody wants to listen.
Bryant Hawkins (42:03):
Yeah, exactly Now.
I remember in the beginning youmentioned that you started out
in sales of medical equipment,Then you started doing service
Now in the HTM world sales andoperations.
They kind of sometimes pumpheads.
Yeah, yes, they kind ofsometimes pump heads.
Mark L. Taylor (42:19):
Yeah, yes, they do.
Bryant Hawkins (42:20):
Sales will make that promise that operations
can't handle.
Mark L. Taylor (42:23):
I have sales reps and operation people that I
come between every single dayin my organization.
Bryant Hawkins (42:28):
I was about to ask you how do you tell them
that, look, we fuel each other?
How do you, as a growingcompany?
How do you view therelationship between the two?
Mark L. Taylor (42:40):
Oh, it's symbiotic, they have to work
together.
But I hear both sides.
I hear operations say hey, thissales problem, this salesperson
just over-promised andunder-delivered.
They said we could get thisfixed and back to them today,
that's impossible, we don't havethe parts.
Then I also hear the sales guystelling me the operation guys,
hey, they're dragging their feet, they just don't want to get it
(43:00):
out today.
They don't really care.
So at the end of the day, backto what I said with my
complaints and what I had toldmy team last week is just in our
state of the union is hey, guys, at the end of the day, let's
don't talk about whether I'mright, you're right, she's right
, he's right.
Let's talk about what thecustomer thinks and at the end
(43:21):
of the day, if you let thatguide your communication between
each other, you get to asolution instead of dwelling on
each other's problems.
Bryant Hawkins (43:31):
Yeah, you touched on what you mentioned
about arts indirectly withservicing.
Today's healthcare environment,as you know, is changing.
It used to be yearly, it lookslike it's changing monthly.
That's cool.
How do you, at Renewal, respondto this rapidly changing need
of the hospitals, the clinics,service providers?
(43:52):
How do you continue to pivotand be able to be to respond to
these changes?
Mark L. Taylor (44:00):
And, to be honest with you, it's getting
more challenging.
Last year, the ventilatormarket, which we're heavily
involved with, there were threedifferent companies.
One went bankrupt by air andone pulled out of the market
Medtronic just totally pulledout of the market.
You got Philips, who had someissues and pulled out of the US
market.
You have to be nimble, you haveto be.
(44:20):
Also, you've got to read,you've got to go.
I suggest people you know lookat online, get on LinkedIn
following people like yourselfyou know, get information on
your industry.
Understand what's going onaround.
You.
Understand what's important forI mean tariffs, I mean I don't
know what this is going to do tomedical equipment parts.
(44:41):
You know, I'm, I'm, I'm tryingto read up.
What does this mean for mycustomers?
Bryant Hawkins (44:45):
So I think the biggest, the biggest challenge
is is just to, in order to stayahead of the game, you have to
be vigilant and and you have toreach out to others, you have to
communicate and you have toread.
That's it, man.
I tell people all the time justbecause you clocked out at work
doesn't mean you clock out.
You'll have to continuelearning, because some things
(45:05):
you can't learn at work, youhave to take a little time at
home to stay ahead, because it'schanging, just like AI is
coming into the industry at ahigh speed.
Matt Beck, what's your thoughtsabout AI?
Mark L. Taylor (45:18):
How you feeling about it.
Well, we have our own assetmanagement program, which is
really our own homegrown programfor CMMS, because we couldn't
find a limited serviceorganization.
And you know a lot of peopleknow the big players, nivolo and
whatnot but they're made foryou know more for hospital work
order management and hospitalasset management.
(45:40):
So us, as an independentservice organization, it does
field service, it does depotwork.
That also I wanted.
We've always had the desire forour customers to see what's
going on with their assets, tosee what's being repaired when
the next repair is.
So a few years ago, about threeyears ago, we started our own
CMMS literally from scratch,because we kept buying things
(46:02):
out of the box and trying totweak it.
So it's called RAMS Renew AssetManagement System.
The cool thing about RAMS we'restarting RAMS 3.0 right now and
it's funny, I had a talk withJeff Shaw from TriMedx about
this when he was down a fewweeks ago and I was showing him
our system and everybody'sintegrated.
Some way we're going to have apiece of AI integrated that, if
(46:25):
you use our RAM software andyour customer buyers, we're not
only going to show you whatwe've done to your equipment,
we're going to tell you what thetrue cost of ownership is of
your equipment when the next PMis due, what's the percentage
factors for this piece ofequipment breaking down the next
year, two years, three years?
And all of this is madepossible by AI.
(46:46):
And it's interesting, I read anarticle in 24-7 yesterday, the
day before just.
Is all AI in our industry goingto be good or bad?
I still think I'm a positiveguy, brian.
I'm really positive.
I think it's going to bepositive, but I think there
could be some things that AIdoes that we need to monitor.
So I'm cautiously optimisticthat AI is going to make
(47:11):
healthcare technology managementnot only jobs easier, but
hopefully more efficient andalso more precise.
So I'm hopeful, becauseeverybody knows this.
Everybody in our industry knowsthere's an issue where people
are aging out.
There's not enough peoplecoming into the field.
We need more technicians, andone way to get around the need
(47:32):
for more technicians ishopefully a good technology like
AI that can help us bettersolve the issues and repairs
that we're facing.
I'll give you a perfect example.
So one of the first things wedid with our AI and RAMS was to
take a service manuals of everydevice that we had service
manuals for in our entire shop,and we're talking hundreds of
(47:54):
devices.
So we fed all these servicemanuals in, scanned them in, put
them into the AI and now whenand this is about two months ago
now when one of our techsqueries in our RAM software a
repair, not only will it readthe service manual and tell what
is needed, it will also, basedon our service history, tell you
(48:17):
what parts and what toolsyou're going to need for the
repair.
I mean, how cool is that?
Wow, that's pretty cool.
So, rams, right now mytechnicians are typing in, you
know whatever repair it is, andthe AI will respond back for
this repair.
Estimated time 30 minutesYou're going to need two
(48:37):
wrenches and a you know whatevernut driver and you're going to
need, you know, this thermalprint head and this board and
that's it, isn't that?
Bryant Hawkins (48:47):
amazing.
Yeah, like I tell people, ai isGoogling on steroids.
It searches the internet to getthis information, whether it's
accurate or not.
That's where you come in.
Mark L. Taylor (48:59):
Exactly, and that's what we see in the mess
Garbage in garbage out, you knowso.
It is.
It is a hundred percent, butI'm very optimistic on the
future of AI and its positiveimpact on the HTM world Very
very confident.
Bryant Hawkins (49:13):
Oh, it will have to me.
I'm like you.
I'm always thinking positive.
I think it's going to be agreat, huge impact.
You're going to be able to workmore efficient.
They're even starting to hirechief AI officers to run
companies like GE has one, and afew other large companies have
a chief AI officer.
So it's not going anywhere.
(49:34):
It's changing.
I mean, every time you look upthere's a new app.
So they got like 30 of themright now, I think.
So it's not going anywhere.
It's incredible, isn't it?
Oh, my God, I love it.
I love it.
I love playing with it.
I got one question I'd like toask all of my folks that's on
the show the HTM world islistening to us what advice?
(49:59):
It's going to be a two-foldquestion.
What advice would you givefirst to a young person that's
new in this industry?
You went through that stagewhere almost all of your
employees sound like.
What advice would you give aB-man one first day on a job?
What advice would you give him?
Or?
Mark L. Taylor (50:19):
her.
I would say to this person, himor her, I would say listen,
this is an incredible field ifyou're willing to learn and put
the time in and listen to thosewho went before you.
So we're very fortunate.
We have a lot of young kidsthat come in, new to the field.
(50:39):
Be met ones.
Maybe they were successful asan auto mechanic, maybe they
weren't successful at tradeschool or whatever it was, and
you know, young folks areusually pretty bold and pretty
confident.
Htm is the type of field, though, that you have to be precise,
and I would encourage everyonecoming in the field, young or
(51:01):
old, to listen to those who,like yourself, have had
experience, who have been there,who have understood the
challenges of device repair, ofpreventative maintenance, of
dealing with field serviceactions and recalls.
There's so much to be learnedand, unfortunately, I think it
(51:21):
has to go both ways.
I think the young have tolisten to the old and the old
have to listen to the young.
So, overall, I'd tell whoever'scoming in and say, hey, this is
an incredible career, but yougot to look at what's been shown
to you by those who've been init for a minute, and they have
to understand that.
And I think.
(51:41):
With that attitude and youreyes open and willingness to
learn that you know a B-Met, onecould be the CEO of a TriMedx.
Bryant Hawkins (51:51):
You never know.
Oh, sir, now I'm not gonna askyou what advice would you give
to someone who's been in theindustry forever?
I want you to talk to thatmiddle, that sweet spot, that
five to 10 year old guy, becausethat's where it gets kind of
challenging for a B-Med.
You got past the B-Med one.
Now you're a B-Med two.
Getting to B-Med three is notas easy as getting to B-Man 2.
(52:15):
So what advice would you givethat B-Man 2 who wants to get to
that next level man, that's agood one.
Mark L. Taylor (52:24):
I'd say get involved with Amy.
Go to Amy Exchange, go to, youknow, md Expo, get involved.
I think there's so many peoplethat get so used to their
vocation to I mean you talkedabout this earlier B-Hawk.
You know they turn it off whenthey clock out.
You know they clocked out,they're done.
That's not their job, you know.
(52:44):
And I'm not saying you have tolive HTM, I'm just saying be
aware and be active.
If this is a career that youwant to advance in say you've
been in it five to 10 years youget a little burned out, get a
little challenged by theenvironment.
Seek out other opportunities,not just at your job or for
(53:05):
another job, but in this space.
I mean, there's such a goodcommunity and I see people all
the time that get fulfillmentfrom not only reaching out and
seeing what else there is tooffer for a job, but also what
other resources there are andhow you can learn from those in
other areas.
And a great way to do it AmyExchange, md Expo.
Go to your local BiomedAssociation meetings there's
(53:27):
just get involved.
And I think when people get ina rut they tend to want to draw
inwards and I want to encouragethem to go outwards, to go seek
those who who have, you know, alot to offer.
You know, at these places, atthese meetings, at these expos.
Bryant Hawkins (53:44):
I mean, that's some great advice.
You ever thought about being amotivational speaker, Mark?
Mark L. Taylor (53:50):
I can barely motivate my kids to do their own
laundry.
So I don't know, I don't knowhow effective I'd be, can barely
motivate my kids to do theirown laundry.
Bryant Hawkins (53:56):
So I don't know.
I don't know how effective I'dbe.
Well, mark, I really, reallyappreciate spending this time
with you, man.
I mean felt like I learned awhole lot, but I'm more than
sure there's much more insideyou.
So you're welcome to come backwhenever you feel like, and I'm
glad to have you back on and Iappreciate the great things
you're doing with your companies.
Y'all are much needed and youare very necessary.
Mark L. Taylor (54:18):
Well, b-hawk, let me tell you this One, I'd be
glad for you to have my wife onanytime she loves.
She's probably more passionateabout the industry than I am.
And two, I want to say I reallyappreciate what you're doing
the book for the kids, theinvolvement at a, you know, at
high school and elementaryschool, all the way up to what
you're doing with this podcast.
(54:39):
It's amazing for our industry.
Love seeing you at Amy Exchangeand all the places I love
seeing you post online.
I think it's very, very muchneeded and I just appreciate all
you do for our industry.
Bryant Hawkins (54:50):
I appreciate you too, brother.
What a powerful conversationwith Mark L Taylor.
He reminded us HTM is more thana job, it's a calling.
It's about purpose, growth andshowing up for the lives that
depend on us.
Whether you're just gettingstarted or decades in, remember
(55:13):
this field needs leaders likeyou.
Stay focused, stay motivatedand, as always, htm is on the
line.
Y'all be safe out there.
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