Attributes Of A Good Service Writer By Mike Lee

There are many things that lead to a successful business. One of them is a good Service Writer. I have visited lots of shops where it was obvious that the Service Writer was not trained and was not motivated.

There are many important attributes of a good Service Writer.

1. They are alive.
2. They are motivated.
3. They like people.
4. People like them.
5. They enjoy their job.
6. They have good communication skills.
7. They have patience.
8. They know what they are doing.
9. They have stable lives.

There are others, but these are some of the more important ones. 

Are They Alive? 

It is amazing how many Service Writers are just going through the motions. They are not happy and this communicates to customer immediately. Customers react unfavorable to a Service Writer, who is acting like a walking zombie.

If they are not motivated, it greatly affects their sales. You can advertise like crazy, but the sales will be slow because the Service Writer is turning people off. This is especially true when they answer the phone.

In some shops, they have a mirror right beside the phone with the word “SMILE” above it. This way, when anyone answers the phone they will look at themselves in the mirror and remember to smile while talking to the customer.

Are They Focused?

I have seen in the past, Service Writers who are pretty good at their jobs, suddenly, start forgetting things and not following up or stay on top of their job. At the same time, the sales start to drop when it was busy. Later in talking to the Service Writer, you will find that he has some major problem going on.

Sometimes, you will find that they have a drinking or drug problem or they are going through a divorce or they have financial problems. When a Service Writer has personal problems, it will affect his ability to do his job.

Do They Like People?

When we do interviews with Service Writers, occasionally, we find that they actually don’t like sales. Mainly this comes from not knowing how to handle people in general or not knowing how to sell.

It is really apparent to customers when a Service Writer does not know how to deal with people or is not happy with life in general.

Often times, Service Writers get busy and are short with customers or they fail to take enough time with the customers to make sure they have handled all of the customers questions and considerations. Handling customers requires a person who likes people, who has patience with people that are confused and don’t fully understand what they are agreeing to have done with their car. Anytime a Service Writer loses his patience he generally loses the customers.

Do They Know What They Are Doing?

A high percentage of problems Service Writers have with customers come from their inability to handle problems thrown at them by customers. I have seen Service Writers start to lose their effectiveness when they start having problems that they don’t know how to handle.

They have problems with price shoppers, they don’t know how handle upset customers and what they or others at the shop did to help create the upsets.

Their lack of training causes them to lose sales, upset customers and not enjoy their job. Many do not fully understand their responsibilities and what is expected of them.

I can not tell how many times, I have seen Service Writers suddenly light up and take off once they understand what they are suppose to do and how to do it more effectively. Many times, you can turn a Service Writer who is not doing well into a happy, very effectively salesperson, who makes good money for themselves and you, by having them adequately trained on their job. Is your Service Writer producing at the levels you would like? It is only money…Yours!

Management Success! 

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The Adventures of MACH TWO – Chapter 2 By Mike Lee

Mike Lee
co-founder
Management Success!

Background

(MACH TWO gets his name from the fact that while at work, he is constantly going MACH TWO with his hair on fire).

In the continuing adventures of MACH TWO, a once mild mannered technician turned automotive shop owner, he now confronts the fact that while he seems to have developed a stable business with a bright future, he can't seem to find employees that will do the work on the car with the same thoroughness that he does.

Every time MACH TWO asks an employee to do a job, it is not up to the standard that he sets for the shop.  Also, he can't seem to find anyone that is willing to go get the training necessary to stay up to date on the new cars, even if he pays for them to do this.

Chapter Two:Handling Employee Problems

MACH TWO finds that when he tries to train his people they don't seem motivated enough to learn and don't seem to be able to do the jobs the way that he wants the jobs done.  Eventually, he ends up doing most of the complicated work himself.

It is very important to him that everything that is worked on in his shop be done to his standards.  He is unwilling to settle for less than perfection.

The Effect of Not Being Able To
Adequately Train Employees

Because MACH TWO cannot depend on his employees to complete a quality job he is sometimes forced into hitting Mach Three.  To his credit, MACH TWO is a super technician that insists that the jobs be done right in his shop.  But because he can't seem to get his guys to do the work the way that he wants, it is negatively affecting himself, his personal life and his ability to run his business successfully.

For example:

1.  It is a good thing MACH TWO is young or he would be a good candidate for:

A.  "I am forty-five and I have just had my first heart attack."  OR
B.  "I am getting married for the third time, gee!  I hope this works."

So how do you know if you are having these problems or if you meet the MACH TWO status?  Here are some of the major qualifications and/or symptoms.  These are all qualities that our MACH TWO hero in the story possesses.

1.  Your business has grown to about $10,000 to $25,000 a month.  You have two or three technicians working for you.  You have been at this level of sales for one or more years.

2.  You suffer from the DAD SYNDROME.  You, like our hero MACH TWO, are the only one that can really solve the tough problems in the shop.  You are so busy handling everybody else's problems that you don't have time to run the business.

3.  It used to be fun fixing cars, but lately it has become more and more frustrating because you never have time to do all of the things that you want to do.  So you have become MACH TWO with your hair on FIRE and with a SHORT FUSE.

At this point you and our mild mannered MACH TWO shop owner are no longer mild mannered.  You become known as "A TICKING TIME BOMB ON THE MOVE".  Customers, employees, wives, children notice that you have become a "GRUMPY BEAR."

If you meet some or all of the qualifications of being MACH TWO, here is the PROBLEM:
MACH TWO knows how to fix cars.  He is the best at fixing cars, but he doesn't know how to fix his business and handle his employees.

1.  The only business school that he has attended is the school of HARDKNOCKS.  Of course, he graduated CUM SUMA HEADACHE and is now working on his MASTERS DEGREE in MIGRAINES.

2.  MACH TWO lacks management skill on how to train employees.  He gets frustrated because he cannot teach his employees what he knows. Mostly the problem is that he tries to teach his employees what took him ten years to learn in just two days and then wonders why his employees don't get it.

3.  He lacks the management skills necessary to get his employees OPERATIONAL.  OPERATIONAL means to work well without attention.  He doesn't know how to effectively deal with employees.

Here is the prognosis for our MACH TWO shop owner and for you if some of the above scenarios sound familiar:

A MACH TWO shop owner has got himself stuck in the Stage One of a business.  This is a common problem in the automotive industry.

In Stage One, the owner is doing every job in the shop.  He is the service writer, bookkeeper, legal department, advertising executive, employee director, quality control.  But he spends most of his time fixing cars.

As long as he continues to run his shop this way, he will never grow big and he will not make lots of money and will not have lots of time off.  He has 60 to 70 hour a week job.  He doesn't know it, but he is just an employee of all his customers.  They get great service and a super technician and he gets all the headaches.

SOLUTION:

MACH TWO needs to learn how to run an automotive business.  It is just like fixing cars.  If you know what you are doing, it doesn't take long to find and fix the problem.  If our mild mannered MACH TWO shop owner doesn't change his way of doing business, he will still be doing it the same way twenty years from  now.

Management Success!

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How Do I Get My People to Work as a Team? by Robert Spitz

Bob Spitz
Senior VP Business Dev
Management Success!

Recently this question came up while I was having lunch with a friend of mine who owns a nice shop but is struggling with some production problems.  We were talking about increasing production by improving how employees dealt with each other within the business.  One of the problems he was running into was a lack of communication between the front and the back in his shop.  “I don’t get it, it seems so obvious to me, and yet my guys seem to be on different pages sometimes.”

“Did you ever play any team sports?” I asked.  “What makes a good team good?  Is it simply a matter of recruiting superstars, or is there more too it than that?”  He had played team sports and was still a member of a softball team in a league in his town.  We started to examine what made great teams great and how that could relate to his current situation.

All the good teams he had ever been on had the following attributes in common:

1. They had a common goal.
2. Each person knew his position in the game.
3. Each person understood how his actions and performance affected everyone else.
4. Each person knew all the other players positions.
5. They drilled and practiced all the time.
6. They had a good manager who knew how to motivate.
7. They looked at key statistics in their game.
8. They reviewed good and bad plays.
9. They got along great.

We then took the list and compared these points with his shop.  And I asked him the following questions:

1. “Do you have a goal for the business?  Have you shared this vision with your people?” 

Just like sports teams, any group needs to have an agreed upon goal or objective to perform well.  In sports it is usually to win the division or something even higher like a state championship.  Then that big goal is broken down into smaller goals, then right down to individual players’ goals. I worked with a shop years ago up in Minnesota who had similar problems.  We got his people together and asked them what would they really like to have that would improve their working conditions?  They unanimously announced they wanted a better building. This answer surprised the owner.  He had heard grumbling about the lack of work space but never saw this as an opportunity to unite his people toward a common purpose.  We set about a plan to accomplish this goal and gave it a two-year target.  This was presented to the crew with the sales and production numbers it would take to attain this goal.  Monthly and weekly targets were set with smaller short team bonuses for the crew to earn and within a year they were in a new building! So I asked my friend again, “Do you have a goal for the business and have you broken that goal down into lesser goals with a shorter time interval where everyone involved could experience the joy of winning?”

2. “Does each of your people really understand their job, what’s expected of them and how to measure their own performance?” 

A team only performs as well as the individual players are proficient at their individual jobs. There has to be a way of measuring the production and performance of each position in a shop, a certain statistic to keep track of for that position.

3. “Do your people completely understand how their actions and how their performance affects the performance of the others in the group and the overall performance of the shop?” 

Nobody in a group lives on an island.  Each member has to understand how their actions and performance effects the actions and performance of the other members in the group.

4.  “Do your people completely understand everyone else’s job and what it is they do and how that affects them?”

When individuals in a group do not have a good understanding of the jobs others around them perform it greatly decreases that group’s ability to perform at peak levels. Complete job descriptions for every position in the business must be available and completely understood by each person for their own position. 

5. “Do you take the time to train your people in their positions and drill people on the shop’s procedures?” 

A business that does not invest resources toward training is killing itself.  A shop has got to have a system and schedule for on-going training of each member of the group.  A shop also needs to hold training drills on the various administrative procedures in the shop.

6. “How do you compare with the good managers you have played under in those sports teams? Are you lacking any skills or knowledge to be a competent leader of your people?”

The owner of a business has many hats to wear but the primary ones are planning and the execution of plans.  This is easy to say but takes a very exact skill set to accomplish.  Top professional sports figures all have coaches.  An owner of a business would be wise to hire a competent business coach. 

7. “Like sports, a business must have Key Performance Indicators to gauge its effectiveness and progress toward a stated goal.  What stats or KPI’s are you managing with?” 

Understanding the sales-production-profit pipeline of a business and what the key statistics are to measure the success of an executive’s decisions and actions is vital to the achievement of the goals.

8. “It is a smart operator who videos their people in action and then review their performance with them. This gives management and staff a chance to reinforce positive actions and correct mistakes before incorrect actions become bad habits.” 

All pro sports players use video to enhance performance and it is something that should be done in the workplace.

9. “You had teams you were on where everyone got along great. That was because they were winning teams”. 

Keeping people winning on their jobs is an important part of managing and leadership.  Knowing how to set up bonus plans and quickly handling upsets with employees is all part of knowing how to win the game.

My friend sat back and looked at me and said, “I never looked at my business this way.  There is a lot of room for improvement, but now I have a direction to go in.” 

We hammered out a step-by-step plan to start implementing the changes that needed to be made to create a truly winning team, and I am happy to report the business now operates at a much higher level of sales and production and yes, they are getting along great!

If you would like to improve the performance of your business, give us a call, we would be happy to give you a free business analysis and get you pointed in the right direction.

Wishing you nothing but success!

Management Success!

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Business is Slow, and I Need More Leads! - by Mike Lee, Management Success!

Mike Lee
Co-founder
Management Success!

My service writer says, "Business is slow, and I need more leads!"

It is not unusual for some of our good clients to occasionally say they were doing okay, but it has slowed down. This is one of the areas which drives shop owners crazy. Just when they thought they were going to make some real money, the business slows down. 

There are several possible sources for this problem, but the one we are going to discuss in this article is: If business is slow, it is always the service writer. 

I can't tell you the number of times I have heard about shops having problems, and suddenly they change their service writer and - boom! - the business takes off.

Shops do not become busy by luck or accident. Oftentimes, successful businesses have a service writer who is good at selling, while the shops not doing well try to figure out where all the customers went. Let's look at some service writer basics which determine whether a shop will be busy or not.

Selling is a Necessary Evil!

A service writer needs people. It is amazing how many service writers really do not like to deal with or talk to customers. A good service writer likes people and enjoys talking to them. 

Oftentimes, when we interview service writers from shops around the country, they will indicate that selling is a necessary evil. This is a sure-fire indicator the service writer does not like dealing with people.

I Don't Want to Make Them Mad!

A service writer has to be willing to handle customers, even the tough ones. A good service writer is not afraid of the customer! 

A service writer has to have the ability to tell customers things they do not want to hear - upsetting things, such as it is going to cost more to get their car fixed. Unfortunately, some service writers are afraid to handle customers and tell them the truth - it costs money to fix cars! 

Some service writers are so afraid of upsetting customers and not willing to risk it, so they resort to not telling customers the full story on their car. They try to sell only what they think customers will pay for the job, instead of asking for the money on the full job. 

They suffer from the "Tricky Lower-Jaw Disease." This is the disease that afflicts service writers when they need to tell customers the repairs are going to cost $750.00. Their lower jaw goes into stutter mode, and $450.00 comes out of their mouth!

I Never Want to Rip a Customer Off!

Some service writers have high personal integrity and are careful to make sure they never rip customers off, especially by not overcharging for the work that needs to be done.

Again, this decision leads to service writers becoming rip-off artists. They end up ripping off the business, the employees, the employees' families, the owner, and the owner's family.

It is the responsibility of service writers to sell the work profitably, so all employees and the owner(s) of the business make enough money to live comfortably.

This comes from not knowing what is a fair price to both the customers and the business.  Most shops set their prices based on the "Grand Fake 'Em Method." Their prices are not based on their own costs, but on what their competition is charging. Of course, their competition is going broke, but they have to be competitive.

Can't You Give Me a Ballpark?

Price jobbers! This is the area which drives a lot of service writers nuts. Many service writers are not good at handling potential customers over the phone! Some shops quote prices for major work over the phone to new retail customers. 

This comes from not knowing how to handle price shoppers and, in some cases, the belief a shop must give prices over the phone for major work. 

The truth is that good service writers will normally be able to get 20-30% more business if they learn how to handle price shoppers and do not quote prices for major work over the phone. There is a technology to effectively selling. Most service writers have not had any professional training.

The result is a loss of income for the business and a lot of frustration.

I Need to Speak to a Technician!

A lot of women are involved in the automotive business and many let the lack of training stop them from becoming service writers. They are afraid that male customers will not be willing to listen to a woman because she is not a technician.  

At Management Success!, we have found a lot of women have the ability to be very effective service writers. Some of the most effective service writers in the industry are women who have learned to handle customers. One of the main reasons they are so effective is that most women do not have the technical knowledge for cars - and the less technical knowledge a person knows, the better they are able to sell the work.

In addition, women generally tend to be better at listening and have better communication skills. As a result, they do a better job of handling customers because they listen and do not overwhelm customers with a bunch of technical jargon that the customers do not understand.

I Want to Think it Over!

What the customers are saying with the famous "I want to think it over" statement is they are in confusion and are not sure that what their service writer is telling them is true. This is an indicator that the service writer is not in communication with the customer.  

Customers who are in confusion will not buy! They will go somewhere else. Trained service writers should know whether or not their customer is tracking with them and what they are thinking - this should happen before they get to the end of the sale only to find out the customer wants to think it over. 

When the customer says...

1. "I have to talk it over with my spouse."
2. "I want to think it over."
3. "I will have to wait."

...they are really saying, "The service writer hasn't sold me yet!" A lot of service writers spew out their sales procedure unaware of what the customer is really thinking. The service writer is not in good communication with the customer, but is really just talking to the customer.  The customer is wondering if the car really needs the work and the service writer is telling him or her how much. 

The customer is in confusion and the service writer does not know it. This is because the service writer has not been trained. Most service writers lack the technique of selling and are not in good communication with the customer. When this happens, the shop loses sales and customers.

The Phones Are Not Ringing!

"The phones are not ringing!" This is a favorite statement made by service writers when sales are down. It is normal for a shop to have one or two slow weeks; but overall, if one shop's sales are down, but other shops in town are doing well, then the problem lies in that one shop - and the problem is the service writer.

It takes a person who is motivated, likes people, and does not have his or her attention on other things to be good at sales. One problem of owners being service writers is they are splitting their attention among lots of things which need to be handled. If they have something pressing which needs to be handled, sales will drop. It does not take much for a shop to lose two or three jobs a week when the service writer is not focused. This is why it is best to have someone whose sole function is sales. When you have a service writer, the key point in sales is the rule: It is always the service writer.

I can recall numerous occasions when a client indicated the sales were down, and I gave them the rule. When they got in communication with their service writers, they found that he or she was having marital problems, had a sick child, or had another personal issue, which was diverting their attention from the job and affecting their customer service.

When a job has been growing, sales have been good, and suddenly it starts to go down, the first thing is to pull in the service writer and find out what is going on. Service writers will say it is slow and the phones are not ringing. That is a sure-fire indicator that they have something going on which is preventing them from doing their best.

Being a service writer requires a person's full attention. Service writers must like people and must be willing to tell customers things they do not want to hear. They must know how to do it and need to have good communication skills to know what the customer is thinking.

The Solution to the Above Problems

Just as you would not put someone with no training and knowledge on a tough computer diagnostic problem on a car, you would not allow an untrained person to be your service writer, correct? The sharp businessperson will make sure the service writer in his or her shop is knowledgeable in the technique of sales and has all the tools necessary to do a good job.

I recommend all of our clients who have started their training in business management to come to the five-day service writer course and bring their service writers to learn sales techniques and good communication skills. This is a challenging course that demands a lot out of the attendees. In the end, attendees leave the class with improved communication and sales skills. But, it is only money - yours!

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What About Helping Your Help? By Bob Spitz Management Success!

Bob Spitz
Snr VP Business Dev
Management Success

You might not like this article at all!  Then again, you might love it. 

Go ahead and read it anyway because I am going to lay it on the line right here, right now.

When repair shop owner say, “I can’t find good employees.”

Here is what they are REALLY saying. “I don’t know how to help employees.”

How’s that for a 180 degree shot right in the nose?

Ugly isn’t it?

But it’s fact.

When a business person is in the process of recruiting and hiring what they are really looking for is Potentially Great Employees.  Trying to hire Great Employees who are already top notch technicians who are trained in all the procedures of the business and never needs to be told what to do because they just magically know exactly what the owner wants all the time is very difficult, there is just not that many of them in the pool!

This is not just a fact a shop owner has to “deal with”.  This is about survival.  It is something a shop owner needs to know all about.  Otherwise that shop is going nowhere, and the owner finds him or herself stuck in the paint booth, or pounding on a fender from dusk till dawn.

If the shop owner knows how to take willing new employees and turn them into real help, well then the shop owner knows how to help a new employee.

It is as simple as that.

You have to know how to deliver the goods (real help) to the employee.

That is not backwards management.  You are there FOR THEM.  That is a head on, direct, “the-way-it-is” kind of truth.

Too many owners and managers get this in reverse then step on the accelerator and wonder why they are not moving forward.  They think the employee is there to serve the owner, which is backwards.  You want them there (A) serving the customer and (B) serving the business and then (C) the gold will flow to you.

There is a 500 pound gorilla in front of the treasure.  This is it: The employee needs help actually getting squarely ONTO THEIR JOB.

And just when it is looking nice and smooth and profitable a 1,000 pound gorilla shows up. Here it is: Often the employee needs help getting BACK ONTO THEIR JOB when they have slipped.

This is not a pitch about “oh you poor, helpless, victimized technician let me help you get to work on time at least once this week”, or “I am so sorry I looked at you crosswise last Thursday when you completely botched those four procedures in a row and blew all the monthly profits but will you please be my best friend forever.”  No, that is not the point here at all.

If you can bring a person UP TO THE LEVEL of doing consistent quality work then you have really helped that person.  And all the while THEY are helping you.  And they know it.  And they are proud of it.  And that helps them more than anyone may ever know.  That is world-class help.  There is not much better actually.

You think teaching is a saintly job?  You’re right it is. It requires a high ability to tolerate stupidity!  But what about taking all that teaching and focusing it on the real world so the person does something useful, valuable and beneficial with it?  I think you would agree that would be real teaching.  It is an even tougher job to do right - the job of bringing out the very best in a person so they routinely get exceptional results with whatever they set their mind to.  And that would be a greater gift to the person than just textbook teaching.

Far too few shop owners know how to offer it.

Most shop owners sincerely want to help their team.  But they do not know how.

It is tough to fess up that the real problem is not having the ability and know-how to help an employee – real help – getting them actually ON THE JOB and KEEPING THEM FOCUSED AND PRODUCTIVE ON THE JOB.

Some owners (not the most responsible ones) might spit out some tough sounding drivel like “Well the technician works for me”.  Or “That estimator ought to know who butters their bread.”  Maybe they will say something like “Don’t they know who cuts the checks around here?  If they cross me I’ll send them packing.”  It can be any such foolishness, and those comments are all pretty much the same shade of black and blue.

Here’s the straight scoop:

First you hire potential help and then you have to help them help you.

It really is not any more complicated than that.

But wow, does it get flipped-flopped upside down and around.

Technicians work with cars.  Managers work with people.

Cars are cars and people are people.  Not the same thing.  But some of the concepts are a bit similar.

For example, take care of a car and it takes care of you.  Do not properly maintain a car and it will eat you alive.

You get an employee to take care of you by showing them how to do their job and by getting them to do it!

That’s helping them.

Show them, teach them, push them, make demands, don’t accept “no”, teach them more, but all the time you are actually HELPING them. 

They will be stronger for it.  And so will you.

So the next time you hear a shop owner say “There isn’t any good help out there anymore…”

What can you say to s person who says that?

“Get some help.  Get trained in employee management and learn how to recruit and hire the right potential employees and how to turn them into a winning team that can really get the work done!”

Then your team will get you your pot of gold, and they will get theirs.  Wishing you nothing but success! 

Management Success!  The Employee Management Specialists

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In Search of a Good Technician By Bob Spitz Management Success!



Bob Spitz
Snr VP Business Dev
Management Success 

Let me tell you a story about a shop in Anytown, USA.  Anytown is an expanding upcoming prosperous suburb of a major city.  The town has four dealerships and twenty independent service facilities.  Pat’s Family Service Center is one of them.  Nice shop, good customer base, plenty of work.  In fact too much work as far as Pat (the owner) was concerned.  Pat was frustrated and worn out from the long hours that come with not having qualified help.  He fired one of his three techs that day and ended up back turning wrenches to get the cars done.  He knew tomorrow was already stacked up and he would be turning away new work, which he knew was a really bad idea. So that night sitting in his office with his hand on his head he was thinking,

“Where do you find good help?
There are no good techs in my town.
I ran an ad for a month, but the only guy who showed up was the one I fired two years ago!”

Pat was disgusted and thinking maybe he should close the doors and do something else. He tried everything he knew how to do and it was not working.  His kids were growing up without him and he and his wife had not had a vacation in years.

Although this is just a story this is one of the most common problems in any industry that requires skilled labor.  It is not just the automotive repair industry.  If you are suffering from this problem let us take a look at some things before you throw in the towel, hop in your truck and head off into the sunset.

Do You Really Need Another Technician?

In some shops, the solution will turn out to be getting more production out of the technicians you already have. In other shops the problem can actually be too many people on board. There is a guideline you can use to sort this out. Take your gross sales (minus sales tax) and divide by the number of production people you have. The resulting figure should be at least $17,500 per production person per month. Most shops should be in the $17,500-$20,000 range. If you are a specialist, your numbers should be in the $20,000-plus range. If your number is a lot lower, you’re not getting enough production out of the guys you already have.

All too often, an owner’s solution to low production is to hire more people. However, if the shop is not properly organized for production, more employees will only add to the confusion and adversely affect your income.

You Really Do Need Some Techs!

But sometimes you really do need additional help or a replacement. While you may have had some frustrating “adventures” trying to find a new technician, rest assured that there are good employees out there. You just have to maintain a good attitude and persist in your search. If you believe that “there are no good techs”, or “nobody wants to work,” you probably will prove yourself right and you won’t find anyone! So that is the first step; decide that it is possible to find someone. Once you’ve done that, you’re ready for the next step.

Working the Grapevine

In every community there is an informal communication system called the grapevine. Good technicians don't usually have to look in the paper for a job; they just use the grapevine to find out which shops in town are good to work for. Here are some people who can help you get your message out on the grapevine.

Tool-man
Tell him what you need and want in a tech; give him your business card. Keep mentioning it to him WEEKLY.

Parts Vendors
Talk to the salesmen you deal with, and even the parts delivery people that go into most of the shops in your area. Again, give them a business card or two that they can pass on to prospects. Some parts houses have a bulletin board on which you can post a small ad.

Customers
This is probably the most ignored communication line available to you, your loyal customer base. Put up signs in your sales and waiting areas. If your zoning codes allow it, put a similar message on your marquee or on a signboard in front of the shop. Your customers might have a friend, a relative or a neighbor who is a technician looking for a job.

Local Trade Association
Many local trade association chapters actively help members find technicians. They run ads in the paper (paid for with membership fees), they contact tech schools, interview applicants and sometimes will even build a pool of prospects and resumes that their members can utilize. Usually the pool includes guys with all levels of skill and experience. 

Churches and Synagogues
Talk to your minister, your priest or your rabbi. Let him know you want someone to join your family of employees. Give him a business card, a 3x5 ad for a bulletin board, or run an ad in the Church Bulletin. Or do all three.

Local Business People
Spread the word via everyone you do business with in town, from the person you see every week at the grocery store, to the guy at the printing shop. Give them all business cards and let them know what you need and want.

Vo-tech Schools
Contact anyone you know at the local Vo-Tech, or call one of the teachers and ask for the names of the best graduating students. You might even end up hiring one of the teachers! One note of caution: some Vo-Tech schools are magnets for addicts and criminals who choose tech training to stay out of jail or the army. Make sure the school has high standards for its applicants.

Military Placement Agencies
A local military base will sometimes have a placement service for guys leaving the service. Call and see if they have one of these offices.

 If so, mail or fax them a description of what you need and want in an employee. Guys with motor-pool experience and military discipline usually make good employees.
By now you’ve gotten the idea that you cannot ignore any possible avenue of communication for your search. The more you tell people what you need and want, the better your chances are that you will find what you need and want.

Place an Advertisement

If, in spite of your efforts, the grapevine does not provide enough prospects, do some advertising. There are some very good web-sites for placing help wanted ads. Not only are they less expensive, but you are likely to get higher quality prospects responding to your ads in them.

Your ads should be worded so that they will attract people with good attitudes and some experience. It is better to hire someone with less experience who wants to be part of the team and is willing to work, than to hire some “Super-Tech” with a giant chip on his shoulder. An employee with a bad attitude will affect everyone’s production and drive you crazy.  I have personally heard from many clients how well the  ads they got from Management Success work.

It is also better to hire two or three guys at the same time because one might not show up for work, one might not be able to produce and only one might be a “keeper.”  Rarely will you run into the problem of having too many good technicians on board.

Your positive attitude can create a good, secure atmosphere that will attract and keep good employees. On the other hand, a negative disposition can repel the best guys. Good people don't want to work for a grouch, and sane people don't want to work in a chaotic, insane environment.  Similarly, employees that have a lot of baggage, such as drug or alcohol abuse problems they bring into the workplace, will contribute to an “unsafe atmosphere” that will drive the good prospects away.

Sloppily run, unprofessional shops that have no basic systems or policies in place will attract non-productive, unmotivated technicians who cost you more money than they make you. On the bright side, a tightly run, efficient shop in which everyone is making decent money and which has policies that limit personal baggage will be most likely to attract good technician prospects.

The bottom line is that, in spite of any difficulties you might encounter in the adventure of finding technicians, over 80% of the people out there are decent and willing to help you achieve your goals. Positively decide you are going to find the right one of them for your team. And good luck in the hunt!

“Hi Honey, I leaving the shop early, things are under control.  Why don’t I pick up the kids from school?”

Management Success! "How to Increase Your Profits" Seminar

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Help! Help! I Work At A Madhouse! By Mike Lee Management Success!

Mike Lee
Co-founder
Management Success!

When I used to do on-site consulting, one of the first things that stuck out in a real busy shop was how insane everyone was. The first time I saw this was in a very busy shop in Maryland. They had two Service Writers and they both needed space-age phone talker helmets. They had cars and customers all over the place and the phone was ringing off the hook. The owner was so busy helping out that he just waved to me because he just didn't have time to talk.

I watched them for a while and concluded that the two Service Writers had to be crazy to work under that much stress and the owner definitely shouldn't have been involved in the process.

Later, I noticed that time after time, I would go into a busy shop and would see everyone was running around like crazy. Occasionally, I would hear heated discussions or very upset people muttering to themselves. It was very obvious that nobody knew how to organize the place and they were killing themselves and not being very efficient at anything. The biggest problem was that they weren't even aware of how much money it was costing them to do things this way.

The Owner Promised Me It Would Be Done Today!

Nothing drives a Service Writer crazier than to find out from the customer that the owner had promised the customer that his car would be done today and not told the Service Writer.

Did the Part For the Buick Come In Yet?
Don't you just love it when you are busy trying to sell a job to a customer and a technician wants to interrupt you to handle some problem?

Is My Car Going To Be Done Today? I have seen Service Writers actually throw phones against the wall because one of their customers calls every five minutes to see if their car is going to be ready.

When Is My Car Going To Be Done? You Told Me the Same Thing Yesterday!
This is another version of the customer who calls constantly wanting updates on his vehicle. It is amazing how much time is wasted answering the phone and then checking on the status of the customer's cars.

Did You Get the Authorization To Work On the Ford Truck?
How many times a day does someone in your organization ask the Service Writer or you questions about the status of a car or when is a part going to arrive?

There Is No Change. It Is Still Doing the Same Thing It Was BEFORE You Worked on It.
Just Ducky! Just Marvelous! This is just what the Service Writer wanted to hear at the end of a super busy and crazy day. Sometimes, they want to kill the technician who did the work on the car.

I Thought You Ordered It.
This is another lovely piece of news to a Service Writer trying to handle a customer on the phone about when his car will be done. It turns out the part the car needed was never ordered and of course, it will take a week from today to get it. You're thinking, "Do I have to do everything myself?"

I Am Sorry, We Are All Booked Up! I Can Get To It In About a Week!
When I hear owners and Service Writers saying that to customers, I go NUTS! I want to grab the owner and the Service Writer and explain to them how much money they are costing themselves by not having the shop and the front organized.

I remember visiting a shop where the Service Writer told me that he was in overwhelm and it was a madhouse and he didn't know how he was going to get it all done. I looked at the parking lot and the bays and asked "Is this all of it?" He indicated that it was. I told him that it didn't look that busy and that he probably would be over the hump by 2:30, if he did it right.
He handed me the clipboard and said, "You do it then!" I took the clipboard and got all the data on every job and where it stood and when it was promised and who had what. By about 2:00 o'clock it was pretty much a piece of cake from there and he indicated he could handle it. After closing, I sat down with him and showed him how I did it.

Some Basics

If you ever want to watch a really organized operation, be on an aircraft carrier doing flight operations during wartime. It is an amazing thing to watch. They have lots of people doing dangerous activities at a breakneck speed and have occasional unplanned disasters happen, but they handle it all with incredible speed and efficiency. The key is they are trained. They are organized. They have procedures. They all know how to do their jobs.
Of course, if you don't want to join the Navy to learn how to speed up your organization and handle a lot more cars with half of the effort and stress, you and your Service Writer should come to our three-day Controlling The Front Workshop.

At the workshop you will learn how to handle the basics of organizing and controlling the front part of your operation. You will learn how to handle more work in less time and under less stress. You will gain new insight on how to turn your front operation into a lean, mean, money-making machine. It's only money! Yours!

MANAGEMENT SUCCESS! Training and Consulting

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I am Too Busy to do the Controlling the Front Workshop By Mike Lee Management Success!

Mike Lee
Co-founder
Management Success!

There are 3 ways to increase the bottom line in a shop.

1. Increase your prices.
2. Cut your expenses.
3. Increase the volume of work being done by the shop.

One of the fastest ways to make money, when a shop tends to be very busy, is to organize the front of the operation so it can handle more work effectively.

Boom and Bust!

Without organization and training, one of the things that can happen to a really busy shop is the Boom or Bust phenomenon.

This is especially true with clients who have entered a period where the shop is really busy. Just like a race car, a shop will peak out at a certain level of efficiency. When they go beyond that level of work that they can handle effectively, a lot of negative things start to happen.

The Service Writer starts to become overwhelmed. He starts to make little mistakes and then sometimes bigger mistakes due to the lack of control and organization. When this happens, the shop starts to become less efficient.

He then starts to spread his overwhelm to the production people. Technicians start making silly and costly mistakes. Things are forgotten. The small mistakes creates comebacks and this adds to the confusion and the overwhelm and spreads back to the already overwhelmed Service Writer.

How to Lose Customers

When a Service Writer gets into overwhelm and things start to get chaotic, most Service Writers will begin to stop the flow of business. They begin to not push to get customers into the shop as soon as possible. They start pushing work away. They tell the customer that they are super busy and can't handle it for a couple of days or next week or occasionally for a week or two.

When this happens, they don't realize that they are killing their future and losing good customers. The difference between being super busy and slow is not that much on a per day basis. It only takes about 2 or 3 more cars a day to make a shop super busy. So it doesn't take much of pushing work into the future to start to slow a shop down.

The other missing piece on this is when you put a good customer off for 3 or 4 days or a week. Occasionally, they will decide to take it somewhere else to get it fixed because your shop is too busy. Sometimes, those customers will like the new shop better and you have lost a good customer and you don't even know it.

Normally, within about 2 to 3 weeks, things have slowed down. The shop doesn't realize that it is partly responsible for creating this problem. They are not aware of what is happening, so they continue to let things slide until the shop is dead slow. At that point, the owner now is screaming for more business.

So the shop starts another cycle of boom or bust.

Too Busy or Too Slow!

At Management Success! we have watched this happen repeatedly to our clients. One of our Service Advisors will call a shop about doing the Controlling The Front Workshop and the owner of the shop will say "Man, we are swamped and can't do it now. Call me in a month."

The Service Advisor will call again in about a month and the owner of the shop will say, "It has quieted down and I want to think about it. Call me in another month." The Service Advisor calls in another month and the owner says that they have no business and they want our help with marketing, because they need customers.

Organizing the Front Office Improves the Bottom Line

The owner of the shop doesn't realize that one of the fastest ways to improve the bottom line is by organizing the front part of the operation. When the owner and the Service Writer are trained on the basics of controlling the front operation, it means big numbers on the bottom line.

Example: Shop A: The owner and the Service Writer are not trained and the shop tends to max out at about $10,000 a week in volume. After doing the Controlling the Front Workshop, Shop A can easily handle $15,000 week and seem slow. Also, Shop A will not tend to have this constant pattern of boom or bust.

Time to Change!

So are you tired of this boom or bust pattern? Are you tired of chasing the business? Are you tired of going through periods of craziness followed by periods of boredom? If you get into a condition where the shop is so busy that you can't handle it, that shop needs to have both the owner and the Service Writer do the Controlling the Front Workshop. But it is only money, yours!

MANAGEMENT SUCCESS! Controlling the Front Workshop

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How Much PROFIT are You Leaving On the Front Counter? By Bob Spitz Management Success!

Bob Spitz
VP Production
Management Success!

I was talking with a distressed shop owner the other day, who was worried sick about his car count.   He told me all the money he had spent recently on marketing efforts, trying to resolve the problem.  “I’ve got mailers going out, my website is new, I don’t know what else I could be doing!” he lamented. 

After asking him some basic questions regarding his marketing and advertising efforts, I asked him the following:  “Do you track how many calls or walk-ins you get per week?”  This made him pause, so I continued.  “When someone calls your shop or comes in asking about your services, that is called a reach.   What happens with that reach can mean the difference between eating well and starving.  Marketing materials get the phone to ring, get customers and potential customers to visit your website or to stop by the shop.  Once that person reaches it is up to sales to close the deal.  These are two distinctly different areas of a business and they must be watched and kept track of carefully. 

“Who is answering the phone in your shop and do they like sales or do they think of sales as a necessary evil?”  That got his attention, because he did not know.   “Can you help me with this?” he asked.  I offered to set up some “mystery shoppers” to call and come in to his business to test the waters.  I would get back with him once I had the results.

I set up a team to do a series of mystery shopper phone calls and had a friend of mine drop by the shop and pose as a potential customer.  The end result was very revealing.  This is what we found:

• The phone was not answered promptly and sometimes went to voice mail.
• One three different occasions when the phone was answered the person answering did not announce who they were and sounded rushed and impatient.
• When asked for a price on a repair we were put on hold and waited longer than a customer would normally wait.  When the person came back on they quoted a price and then were not asked to set an appointment to bring the car in for an inspection.  The person on the phone seemed bored with the whole process.
• On one occasion when calling to ask for a price on a repair we were immediately given a discount.
• We were left on hold and forgotten about.
• On one call we were asked to bring the car in, and when we politely declined the person on the phone called our caller a jerk as he hung up.
• The on-site mystery shopper stood at the front counter and was not acknowledged by anyone in the shop until he begged for help from someone walking by the front desk.

We then surveyed the people working on the front and found neither of the two had any professional training in the area of sales, and one of them did not like selling or having to deal with customers!

I went over the findings with the shop owner. He was shocked and a bit embarrassed.  I told him to stop beating himself up, this wasn’t uncommon.   Often a shop owner can be the last to know the true condition of the front once he stops actively running the day-to-day operation of the business.

Then I told him this key concept.  “A shop can have a great advertising campaign, a very good looking, professional website and it will be all for naught and waste a ton of money if the shop has the wrong or untrained people on the front counter.  THE PEOPLE ON THE FRONT WILL EITHER MAKE OR BREAK A BUSINESS!”

We went over a list of attributes that his front people needed to be successful and checked to see how they stacked up.

Attributes of a Good Front Person

• They have to like people
• They have to enjoy the game of sales
• They have to be highly skilled at communication
• They have to know how to sell and close the deal
• They have to really care about the customers and the shop
• They have to enjoy responsibility
• The have to be organized
• They need to have good computer skills

Measuring his front people against this list, we came up with a solid plan to get his ship righted and went to work. We started monitoring his reaches and sales on a weekly basis, and started getting his guys grooved in on the “Good Attributes” and got them really selling!

The turn-around for this shop was not something that happened overnight, but is also did not take forever either, and the results where nothing short of miraculous.

I called the shop the other day and was greeted promptly and professionally by a cheerful individual who was a joy to speak with.  The results of a follow-up round of mystery shopping showed a 180 degree turn in the front, and the statistics prove it.   Sales were up 26% and the owner is breathing a lot easier these days!

MANAGEMENT SUCCESS! Training and Consulting

FIND THE BLACK HOLE IN YOUR SHOP! TAKE THE TEST!