KYLE BETO ON LIFE SKILLS AND GETTING IT RIGHT THE FIRST TIME

Growing up in Helena as the son of a lineman and grandson of a railroader, Kyle Beto knew he wanted a career that rewarded a hard day’s work.

“I came from a very blue-collar hardworking family that, if you worked hard, you could do the things you wanted to do, and they instilled that into me very, very early,” Beto said.

He also knew he liked math. And he recalls his fifth-grade teacher at Jim Darcy Elementary, Jenine Johnson, encouraging him. “That was who probably helped me start focusing,” said Beto. “I was always a pretty good student, but she was the one who pushed a little bit more in all sorts of things, from school plays to school work in general.”

That focus paid off both inside the classroom and outside on the playing field. Beto went on to become a high school track athlete and middle linebacker for the Bruins, who won the state football championship his junior and senior years in 2006 and 2007.

But the most formative moment of Beto’s K-12 career – and the foundation of his successful career today at The Boeing Company  –  was the moment he decided to enroll in Jim Weber’s welding class at Capital High as a sophomore.

Beto was hooked. Using his mind and hands to transform a block of raw material into something beautiful or useful or both was magic. He enjoyed the methodical and meticulous process of taking a project from start to finish, be it a knife, a belt buckle or a trailer hitch.

Beto credits his K-12 education at Helena Public Schools – where he progressed from Jim Darcy Elementary to CR Anderson Middle School to Capital High – with building the life skills he needed for success. Chief among those skills is the ability to work as part of a team.

“What it teaches you is discipline and also, ‘If I mess up, everyone messes up,’” said Beto. “Whether it’s sports or a play or whatever, it’s just the discipline to do a good job.”

Getting it right the first time is more important now than ever for Beto. As an “NC” (numerical code) programmer for Boeing, it’s his job to program multi-axis milling machines. Beto writes the computer code that will direct the cutting motion of the mills to transform forgings of titanium into structural parts of an airplane wing or other plane component in the most precise, expedient, cost-effective and replicable manner possible.

Beto’s upstream customers are the engineers who design the airplane parts and need them produced to their high-precision specs. His downstream customers are the machinists on the shop floor who will actually produce the parts.

“I’ve got to make (the computer code) the best it can be for all those guys out there on the floor,” Beto said.

Beto says he developed much of the tenacity and discipline that are required for a career in the precision machining industry in Mr. Weber’s class.

“What Jim instilled in me more than anything was a work ethic and I think that’s something that’s tougher to build than a lot of things,” said Beto. “Knowledge is one thing to build, but work ethic is probably one of the hardest.”

The opportunity to work on usable projects like hunting knives made the lessons stick, he said.

“It was more connected to me when it was something I was graded on that had to be finished in time, finished to specs, and something I could use every fall to cut up my deer or elk or have my brother use it or my dad,” said Beto, who, even as he spoke, was preparing for his next hunting trip. He still uses the trusty knife he made in Mr. Weber’s class, engraved with the words “Elk Slayer.”

Beto knew early on in high school that he wanted to stay in Montana, he didn’t want to pursue a four-year degree and he wanted to make good money.

“I wanted a good wage. I like things. I wanted to have a home,” he said. “I wanted to have my extracurricular activities and toys and stuff like that, and that’s what really drove me.”

Beto’s hard work at CHS paid off. He earned a scholarship at the Montana Skills USA statewide competition that paid for his first year of tuition at Helena College, where he earned a two-year associate’s degree in machine tool technology/computer-aided manufacturing. His student loan debt was all of $3,000.

“I graduated on a Friday and I started work on Monday,” said Beto, who began his career as a manual quality assurance inspector at Summit Aeronautics in Helena.

Summit was purchased that fall by Boeing, where Beto progressed from manual inspector to machinist to his current position as NC programmer.

Beto considers himself fortunate to have found a rewarding career in a lucrative trade in his hometown. He and his wife, an RN at St. Peter’s Healthcare, are raising their two young children three houses down from his folks and a quarter mile from his grandparents.

While machining work is often unseen, it’s essential to everything from automotive work to aerospace to firearms. “Everything starts with machining at some point,” said Beto. “The mold for a plastic XBox controller was machined. The mold for a plastic water bottle was machined.”

He expects his learning journey to continue as the industry expands from “subtractive manufacturing,” in which bulk is removed from a piece of material to form a product, to “additive manufacturing,” in which a product is built up from raw material by a 3-D printer or similar process.

The industry might not look exactly the same in the future,” Beto said. “But it’s always going to be around and evolving.”

His advice for today’s students: “Be disciplined and have a good work ethic and the knowledge will come. Just be willing to learn.”