GA 165 | Lean in the Auto Collision Industry with Chris Norris

You're listening to episode 165 with Chris Norris.

Welcome to the Gemba Academy podcast, the show that's focused on helping individuals and companies achieve breakthrough results using the same continuous improvement principles leveraged by companies such as Toyota Del Monte and the U.S. department of Defense. And now, here's your host, Ron Pereira.

Hey, there. This is Ron Pereira with Gemba Academy, and I'd like to welcome you to another edition of the Gemba Academy podcast. As always, thank you so much for taking time out of your day to listen to the show and for watching our Lean and Six Sigma training videos over at Gembacademy.com, we definitely appreciate each and every one of you. Now, today, I'm excited to welcome Chris Norris to the show. Now, Chris works in the collision industry. So in other words, get in a car crash and you need to go get your car repaired. You might go visit a guy like Chris, and so he talks about how Lean is being used in that industry. In fact, he talks about how he applied it at a couple different companies. And then he even shares a where things didn't work out so well. So Chris actually shares kind of, you know, successes and challenges in this episode, and I really appreciate him for coming on and kind of opening up, you know, and sharing both sides of the. Of the coin, if you will. Not everything works out exactly as we want, but as you'll hear towards the end, the story ends well, and. And Chris is in a really good place now and doing some great work. So show notes for this particular episode can be found over@gembapodcast.com just look for episode 165. Again, gembapodcast.com and look for episode 165. Okay, enough from me. Let's get to the show. All right, Chris, well, thanks so much for coming onto the show. Where are you calling in from?

I'm calling in from Shawnee Mission, Kansas.

All right, very good, Very good. Well, hey, I'm really excited for the show. I know we've talked a few times before now, and I know you've been talking with Leslie and whatnot and got a pretty cool story to share and really excited to get going. So, as you know, I know you listen to the show. Let's go ahead and start with maybe a quote or two of something that possibly inspires you.

Absolutely. One of my favorite quotes here recently has been, reducing cost is reducing quality. Improving quality is reducing cost. And I'm not for sure of the quote who wrote the quote, but it seems to be relevant in what we do.

Why do you like it?

Because in the industry that we're in, so many people just want to cut costs, cut cost, cut cost. But all the things that we trip over during the day, we continue to do on a daily basis, and that seems to be okay. So, you know, the idea to improve each stage of the process, to me is where it's at fixing it. Right. The first time.

Got it, got it. All right, well, very good. So let's go ahead and kind of get started with you telling us a little bit about your background, Chris, and then. And then maybe tell us how you first got introduced to lean and then obviously what you're up to these days.

Absolutely. I've been in the collision industry since 1989. Pretty much straight out of high school, went to college. That didn't work out so hot. Got into a collision shop about five or six years. Seven years into the process, I got into restoring Shelby's and from there I kind of got burnt out. And, you know, the next step was to try to do something different. And I ended up taking a job as a manager, you know, in a body shop. And it all took off from there and then landed into a bigger dealership probably in 97. And then once we got to 2009, you know, we'd always done, you know, just the way that I had learned how to do collision work. PPG introduced us to the green belt, which was actually introduced through our paint provider. Right. So the paint provider was Color Vision. They would try to help us to improve so that we could fix more cars, so that they could sell more paint. Okay. I think that was the premise behind it, but it seemed to work well. Right, we help you. Yeah, win, Win. Yeah, exactly. So PPG and Color Vision brought basically a program called Greenbuilt to us that we could go as a three day course. And it introduced us to lean and throughput. So the idea was understanding. Basically they showed us 5s and they wanted to teach basically throughput. And they taught us how to go out and count cars. And without understanding the root of lean, they were trying to teach us to lower our inventory. And so we went through probably from 2000 to 2015, really just experimenting, trying stuff. And, you know, the collision center was a setup to where, you know, it's a commission based program. You know, the guys are paid for the hours that they produce. And so that was the old model. Right. A 40 or 50 year old model that, you know, you give a technician two or three stalls so that he could. And so, you Know, in those processes, we had to figure out ways to stop that. And it wasn't until about 2015 that we, we actually made some significant changes with Lean and. But it took us four or five years of really tripping over not understanding the basics first.

So. Okay, let me. So you kind of had that green belt, that three day kind of introduction. When was that?

That was in 2009. That was our first introduction. I actually, so I, it was me and Color Vision. One of the guys, Jay Elliott from Color Vision took me to, to this class and I was like, hey, this is pretty cool. I brought some stuff back and I had all this information, right. It was one of those deals where.

They, no one else in your, in your company had that, right? It was just you.

Yeah. Okay. And so, you know, you come back and you're like, hey, we're going to change up the way we've always done business. And that is not an easy way to go. So you have to work on your sales skills to make that happen. So we ended up, I ended up starting to send four or five guys at a time and each time they come back. So the next group would go to a three day course and come back and then they would bring ideas. Well, hey, let's do this. Well, the green belt class was evolving. They were making changes in their processes as well. But you know, in the old days with the body shops, it was just take the cars in, right? That was your sign of being busy, is that you had all these cars on the lot. As we learned, reducing the inventory really helped to take some of the chaos out of what we do on a daily basis. So it got progressively better. Everybody was still on commission. The paint shop was on their own commission side. The body shop, all the technicians were, you know, they're all they were at that point in time. They were all individual contractors, right. So you give a technician an estimate, they give you, they agree to do the job for what's on, you know, what the insurance company prescribed and then, you know, they go to town. And so we eventually evolved into where they, at that particular shop that they would actually, they teamed up and they split the hours. And so at that point we, we could get them to work together more. And that, that really solved a lot of problems because of, you know, just trying to change. Moving people's cheese is really hard when you're, when you're trying to get them to change and they don't have that protection and they're, you know, they need to know that, you know that they can generate a certain amount of hours to make their paycheck each week.

Yeah, no, I got. So I'm starting. I think I got the feel for it, but I just want to make sure I get it. Like, talk really just about the, I don't know, the problems you were trying to solve or really are maybe the need for lean, if you will, in this collision industry, because this is obviously not an industry I'm familiar with. Like, what were the main problems that you were trying to, you know, counter?

Okay, so this is perfect. So the main problems was that we would write the estimate on the drive, right. Customer would come in for an estimate, we'd write the estimate on the drive.

So I mean, I busted my car up in a car accident. Okay. I pull up. Hey, I'm Ron. Car's busted up, right?

Absolutely. So in those days, we would write your estimate, schedule the car in, if the car was drivable. And so the car would come in, say, you know, a week or two later, whatever the date was, once the vehicle showed up. And at that particular time, you know, we would let the customer or the technician would tear the car down, he would read the estimate, and then he would find a few things. So in those days, they would just plop everything on the floor. Right. Everything would just be in a big pile. And he would give it the best shot that he had. And so the car would go outside. So you'd have to move the car back outside until the parts showed, bring the car back in. Once they would start repairing, you would have to stop again because it would find more problems. The car would have to go back outside. And so the problem was you needed all this extra inventory to satisfy the mistakes that we were making in disassembly. Because there was no really strict process of, you know, everybody felt like the collision repair industry was special because each car was. No, no two wrecks were the same. Yeah, right. So what we, what we learned over those years was that the wrecks are always different. Right. There's lots of variability. However, the process that we need to get cars through, the shop needs to be the same. So the need for lean was more of a survival. Right. The insurance companies only pay one time to do things. They don't pay to redo stuff. And so the quicker we could get things through, the more that we can make the shops profitable, the more that we can make the technicians profitable. Right.

So, so, so when you mentioned that this, this commission based pay system, so that mean that I brought my car in, it's all Busted up. And then Joe is the technician assigned to my car. And so he tears it down or he, he starts to work on it. So as soon as he's. Joe's going to stick with my vehicle, I guess, until it's completely done. Is that correct?

That is. Well, no, not really.

So I'm just wondering, like, how do they get paid? That's what I want to try to understand.

All right, so there's maybe back then.

How did they get paid?

All right. Back in the day, a body technician would get paid for the body hours on the job. The paint technician would get paid for the paint hours. So the body technician would, if there was 10 hours on the job and he could get the job done in eight, you know, he would make an extra two hours on the job.

So kind of like that flag hour system, right? Like a mechanic, okay?

Yes, absolutely, absolutely. Mechanic system and body are identical.

Okay, okay.

So the paint shop's the same way, you know, so that's, that's how their pay system worked.

Yeah, so if it. So. Oh, yeah, it's supposed to take you 10 hours and it takes me five. Then I just got, you know, five extra hours of pay so I could have it. Yeah, okay, Got it.

Yeah. So. And that was the hard part, right, is that how do you, you know, when these guys are paid in that fashion, how do you get them to change their mind? And that was, that was a really hard deal.

So what'd you do? How did you do that?

So we, in this particular shop that I was at, I was there 20 years, we. It was an evolution thing. So at one point we basically said, look, for the next 90 days, we'll guarantee your pay. And so we went back through the pay system over a six month period and said, you know, each technician averaged, you know, this many dollars. And we divided it out by the total hours produced each week. And so we said each technician was worth whatever they historically could have produced. And we said, look, we will guarantee these numbers just to do it our way. And it was actually a technician that had stepped up and said, hey, let's either forget about this or just do this. And really kind of catapulted us into making it happen because everybody was nervous. And, you know, even after we made that, you know, they were writing down everything they did and the hours that they should have had. And we studied this from two or three months before we actually pulled the trigger, me and the gm. And it worked within pennies of what, what they had been before. So that, that, that gave some Acceptance to the program. And then, you know, once that happened then things started to change rapidly. Once we got past that fear of how am I going to get paid.

I guess what I, what I still don't understand. Like my brother runs a. He's been a car technician all his life and now he's kind of running, running this huge service department in Houston at a big Toyota plant and he's been all over the place and Mercedes plants. He's really good, really good technician who you know, made tons of money over the years with, you know, because he was so fast but his body started breaking down kind of thing. And so now he kind of manages, he's a service director. Anyhow, like his gist was always, you know, the bright, the flag hours for this break job or whatever, I don't even know, eight hours or whatever. And, and he could do it in four, you know. So every week he'd get a, Instead of a 40 hour paycheck, he'd get a. He'd get paid for 80 hours or whatever. Right. Because he did so much work. Right. So I, I guess I, what I still don't kind of get is why, why wouldn't those folks want to go faster? Because they would make more money, wouldn't they?

They would, absolutely. And that's what we found, you know, over the years is that you know, if you. Alright, so you ever hear the expression I'm too busy to stop and go to training because I'm just too busy. I don't have time for that. Well, you know, I had, I had a close friend who had an independent shop that basically lost it and I would call him and say, hey, let's go to this class together. Oh, I'm too busy, I can't, I'm too busy, I can't. And then one day he had to close his doors and you know the same thing kind of gets trapped because of the way they're paid. You know, they don't want to stop and learn. So they, you know, this is the way we've always done it is the, is the mindset and that. So when you start to ask them to slow down and you know, hang every, you know, we actually hang everything onto carts, make it very visible and then that way the estimator can see everything he needs to replace all that stuff takes time up front is that at the end of the day when that car would get to actually come back in so they would disassemble the vehicle in a separate department. That car would go outside when the parts Showed that car would go through the shop in hours.

And now those technicians back at that other, your first dealership, did they make in the end, did they end up making more money than they did before?

Yes. And they don't work overtime, they don't work Saturdays. You know, those guys in the old days would work till 7, 8 o' clock at night trying to make their check. And now as a group, you know, they get the same hours done in, in less than 40 hours a week, probably 35 hours a week that they make, make everything happen. And they're still producing the same amount of work with, with a quarter less hours. So when you went operation.

So when you went to that, to the, when you left that first place and then you went to the second place and the one that didn't quite work out, did you actually use that like as kind of. I don't know. Hey, listen, these folks over here, they're making more money, right? And they're working less. Like, did you tell them that or.

No, they wouldn't believe it. They were, they were very, very hard headed guys. It was, it was a tough, tough road. Yeah, I made a lot of mistakes.

Yeah, like to me it's always, you know, sometimes especially early in that journey, it's like, what's in it for me? Like, you got to help those folks understand what's in it for them that, you know, you know, and yeah, so I don't know. That's interesting.

You know, the, the idea to take that position was to move. You know, when they, when this, when these two owners met me, they were like, I've never met a guy like you. This is, this is really cool. And, and so we, we went to dinner and talked and, and then the next time they brought plans to a brand new dealership and they're like, hey, how'd you like to run an entire dealership? And then when I got in there, you know, to take over this body shop, it was, I actually took the job kind of sight unseen and you know, went in and the place was a wreck and there was trash everywhere and all this stuff and I'm like, oh my gosh. And so we got most of that cleaned up and they fought me all the way. And then the other dealership went away. They were like, oh, you know, this is, this is really messed up over here. You need to stay here longer. And yeah, I couldn't get it to move and I didn't think it was ever going to move. So that's, you know, I was like, well, I Need to, I need to go somewhere where I can be constructive and help, help people grow, you know, because the, the people that I have touched and the people that have listened and bought into, I've helped them to advance in their careers. I've helped them to not work as many hours. Because in the, in the commission world, right, if, if you need to make a check and, and you've had a job to give you a hard time, Maybe it paid eight hours and it took you 16 hours to get it out to the next department, you might have to work another couple nights late or something to make up those hours. So it was a lot of pressure on them and we were able to take that stuff away and give them more time with their families. And I believe that's some of the respect for people is that we don't abuse. There's only so much human energy in this world and I think we're all given X amount of human energy. And if you burn that up, that's not fair to us. To take all that away and then send somebody home destroyed. We really tried to work away from that and we made big gains. It was really cool.

Awesome. Very good.

The tough part about all this and my feelings about all this is that these, these people all mean well. The dealers mean well. You know, they're trying to make it work, they're trying to make it profitable. But it's a, the commitment thing's hard because I had made the comment at one point that you're going to have to bleed a little bit before this gets better. And it really upset him. And I didn't, I wasn't trying to upset him. I was just trying to have him understand that, you know, these short pains will make long term gains. And you know, it still runs just like it, it did. It didn't miss a beat. You know, the, you know, you always hear people say, oh, you know, I left and that place just want to heck. And you know that that's not the intent, Right? The intent is to build it and culture.

Yeah, yeah. Build culture.

Yeah, yeah.

Cultures survive. Cultures are not people dependent. Like, you know. Yeah.

So that's awesome. One of the kids over there will, will call me from time to time. He's 26, but he'll call and say, hey, you know, this is what we did today. You know, I changed my toolbox around, I got a smaller toolbox. Or you know, we, we always had a big a problem with the, the giant toolboxes. Right. It was, it took up space. You could, you weren't mobile, all those things would happen and you know, they, they would call and tell me that, you know, hey, hey Chris, I made an improvement. So that's, that's great. That makes your heart sing.

Exactly. Okay, so, so, so folks went to these, to this training and was that just kind of how you guys learned? Is this going through this training or did you do, you know, I don't know, like read some books or how did you figure it out?

Well, that's. So after the, you know, I started craving. The knowledge for me is I needed to figure out ways to make this work. I didn't, I didn't, I wasn't an avid reader at that point in time. I was fascinated with, with the idea of getting the car through one time and not having to stop. And we kind of got into a spell where we had reduced the inventory. We found when that happened, the hours didn't change. Right. So we got a little tighter on our estimates. We started making cycle time and touch time. We were counting cars every day. And what was happening is that we were making deadlines with the customers, the quality was getting better, all these positive things were happening. And then after that I started researching on the Internet, going from just YouTube or Google and I run across Paul Akers 2 second lean. And then it was on. So we read it as a group, the entire shop read it as a group. And then I shared it with another body shop just west of us. And then he took off with it and he shared it with another body shop that we were friends with. And then, you know, it blew up here with us and then from there, you know, anything I could find, you know, the Toyota way, the 2 second lean, anything I could do to help him find ways to improve, we did.

So how did you share all this knowledge with? Was it just kind of calling them up and telling them or living it yourself or.

Well, they were all suffering the same thing. They'd experienced the green belt classes too, and they were all kind of fumbling around because in that three day period, you're trying to get as much knowledge as you can and they're trying to feed all this information to you with a fire hose. And so we ended up kind of building a mastermind of four or five shops. It was the core four and then the fabulous five and sharing this information to try to.

Now these were competitors technically or, well.

Not close enough to be. So within 35, 40 miles of each other. So no, not really an issue. But so we would get together, eat dinner once a month and trade books. And all that stuff. And that's. In fact, currently we have the one shop that's probably about 60 miles from us right now. We have a competition right now we're tracking hours and at the end of the month, whichever shop tracks the most hours per tech, we'll have to buy the other shop lunch. Cool, cool. So we do video conferences with them and trying to just make it fun.

Yeah, yeah. So now, are you still at the same company that where all this stuff was happening?

No, no, I've been through some changes. At the end of 15 or the beginning of 16, I left and took an opportunity to go to another company that was going to be in. Basically it was going to be an improvement. Right. Better pay, a chance for some bigger future part ownership, that type of stuff.

Still collision though, right?

Yeah, still collision with some chances for some other advancement. And it was a really tough deal and they wanted lean to work in a short amount of time, like a year. So we kind of had a plan to install this. And these are some of the trials and tribulations and that we have to be careful of because I didn't get the trust of the people first. And so, you know, I'd had at that job that I was at for 20 years. I had earned that trust through the 20 years. So making the changes, they knew that I had been good to them all those years. It was a lot easier sale. Going into a new market where nobody has been exposed to it is very, very difficult. And if I had a recommendation for anybody would be get the trust first because it imploded and I didn't have senior leadership support. And I ended up leaving a job because of that, because the senior management didn't support the efforts.

Now I guess the natural question is why did they hire you if they didn't support it? Or was it just kind of flavor of the month or what do you think?

I am not for sure. I still trying to unwrap that one. But, you know, it was, I think, too big of an organization. Right. So not enough people to help make that change. You know, for one person to make the change through the entire dealership, incredibly, incredibly hard. So, you know, I guess outside looking in, you know, you know, the last year you would have to have 100% support from. From the top people. And sure.

Now I guess my question to you then is, you know, obviously it's easy to kind of say, well, it didn't work because of.

Of.

Of other folks. But if you had to go back to that first day on that job, and do anything different, would you? Or do you think that you did everything correctly?

No, no, no. Heck no. I would absolutely have worked on the trust.

What do you mean by that though? I mean, what do you mean? Like how do you get people to trust you?

That's a good question. You have to earn it. And I didn't, I thought that bringing that knowledge, you know, that I would just show them this knowledge and they would be amazed and want to do it. You know, they had been very successful doing it the old way for many years and the struggle with that is that the insurance companies, we're in a instant gratification society and people think that when they crash their car, you just get it back the next day. So there's a lot of demands to meet, cycle times and quality. So it was a conflict of interest and I'm not for sure how I would go back. And if I had to go back into that shop today and revisit that, I would. You know, the hard part, you think back to where it was successful the first time, you know, that was over a six year period and this was over a year period. That and it, yeah, it was too much, too fast.

Yeah, I always say that, you know, this is. No, even with folks that come to Gemba Academy wanting to learn more, my saying is always that this isn't get rich quick, right? We can't just, you can't just watch a couple videos or you know, bring a consultant in for a day or two and think that that's it, you know, so yeah, you got to put the work in and you know, I think a year, you can do a lot in a year. But, but yeah, you're not going to become, you know, totally transformed. Right.

So I would agree it's a, it is a work in progress and that's, that's the hard part. You know, I thought I, I had done the work and so I would just plug this information in and everybody would be happy. And that's, that's not the case. You have to, everybody has to come along with, with you or it won't work.

So what are you doing now?

Well, in the, in the meantime, one of the guys that was in our core four or fabulous five, soon to be significant six, we had, had, had, we had talked a few times about getting together. He was a very forward thinking guy and so we ended up connecting and, and being able to make it work. His culture is insane. They do a morning meeting every single day of the week. We have one piece flow. We are a continuous Improvement facility. And so it was a very good fit for me because he was one of the people that we had introduced the 2 second lean to. And he took off running. So he was. So their top leadership was 100% on board. And as they developed this thing over and it's same scenario that took them a few years to get it off the ground and go on. But it's still a work in process. I mean we have to continually make improvements and make changes. One of the cool things that happened here a couple of months ago, one of the paint technicians actually went and grabbed a copy of the blueprint of the building and rerouted how they wanted to make cars go through. And they took some Hot Wheels and laid it out on a blueprint and then cleaned everything out of the shop, re taped up the floors and they have a new process. And you know, we, the hard part that we have in this is that when we were kids we were told we can do anything we want. And as we get older, we don't think that we can make changes in what we're doing. Right. So running these experiments and trying different things and I think is hard for people.

Yeah, change is hard. The order we get. Change is hard.

Yes.

Talk about some of your daily habits as it relates to continuous improvement. What do you do?

Well, we, we, we do a morning meeting every single day. We are, we do videos. So right now with the shop that's in Warrensburg, we have a 22 video challenge for the month. Trying to get 22 videos onto YouTube just in the improvements so that we can share ideas and contribute to helping each other. Right. So and then we're always try to identify ways we'll actually stop the shop, pull the andon cord if we have something going south and try to.

Do you really have an andon cord?

No. No. Okay.

Virtually speaking. Okay.

Yeah. Well, we'll pull it. The cool part about it is, you know, one of the disassembly or reassembly technicians had issues with how some stuff was coming to him. Right. It was, it was coming to be reassembled and some stuff wasn't labeled correctly and they stopped and solved the problem together as a group.

Let me, let me throw a challenge out to you. Why don't you have a physical, I mean really in certain parts of your shop that, where you can pull it and you know, it, it signals that this person needs assistance. What do you, what do you think? Would that not work?

I think that would be great. Some of the other stuff that we've Done. We've. We've built a chart of all the technicians in the shop and of each area of the process. You know, so disassembly, reassembly, paint shop, and detail, and all the different things that need to be done through the shop. And what we. What we've done is we let the guys rank themselves. So we made a board and put what people were proficient at. So we kind of had a red, a yellow, and then a Ninja Turtle, which means you were proficient. And so if the more people that we could get proficient in all the areas, then we could help move to the, you know, the bottlenecks. And so that's a. A program that we're working on right now. Yeah.

Awesome. Well, sounds like a. Sounds like a pretty cool culture you got there. And excited to see. See how that progresses. Well, let's go ahead and transition into the reflection section. Chris and I know you listen to the show, so this. You know, this first one already, but I'm curious, what does respect for people mean to you?

This. This is actually a very hard one for me, and it's something that I'm trying to work on because I'm a helicopter. You know, all the years of fixing cars and going through the problems, I was a good problem solver, so I would take over the problem. Right. And solve it for people. And so sometimes I wouldn't listen as well as I should. So the. What respect for people means to me is truly listening with the intent to understand and not the intent to reply.

That's hard.

Yeah.

Yeah. Especially when you had tons of experience.

Right? Yeah, well. And we fix cars. Right. So we're fixers. And, you know, we think that we need to fix problems, too. So we're. We. And you. You come to mind a lot because one of the girls that you said, well, what do you think? And so we use that comment a lot around here. And so sometimes when you go to ask questions for somebody, you have to be careful, because the reply that you're going to get is, well, what do you think? And so we have to be careful.

Got it, Got it. What's the best advice you've ever received?

Inspect what you expect.

What's that mean?

Well, in regards to going to the Gemba and actually going out and seeing what's going on, or if you're going out to look at the quality of the repair or the quality of the paintwork or the quality of the process, you have to inspect what you expect. You can't just expect for it to be right. And not go see what's going on.

Yeah. So over the last year or so, as you guys have been experimenting and trying different things, has there been any something that didn't quite turn out like you planned? And if so, what did you learn?

The last position that I was at, that was a huge experiment, you know, trying to get a shop that was 35 people turned around to understand Lean. That was a big experiment and, you know, they had never been exposed to it. So that was, that was the one that didn't go well.

Okay.

Okay.

Well, I guess on the flip side, what are you most proud of as it relates to your Lean journey?

The shop that we spent the six years, you know, I was there for 20 years, but the shop that I, you know, that we did the journey together over that six year period and I left a year and a half ago and they're continuing to make improvements and do it. So it wasn't like I had left and then that this all stopped. They kept it going because we're working. The pay plan that we decided as a group is still in play. They're still making improvements, they're still constantly improving to try to do a better job. And that's what makes me the most proud, is that it didn't just fail. Right. You think, well, you know, that business won't survive if I leave. Well, that's not the idea of what we're supposed to do. We're supposed to help build it and make it strong and help grow people.

Do you stay in touch with those folks?

Yes. Yeah, they're probably a couple times a month, I'll talk to them and see what they're doing. And we throw out challenges to them too, to try to see who's making it work. Right. Because a lot of these shops have about the same amount of technicians. And so we'll throw out challenges to see what hours they're producing and if somebody's producing more hours, what are you doing to make that happen so that we can collaborate?

Do you ever regret leaving?

Oh, yeah, absolutely. It was a success story and a half and, you know, going through some of those trials and tribulations and trying to get, you know, because there is struggles that go along with it. You know, you get tired of fighting that some days. But looking back at what they've done and where they're at today, they've done a great job. Yeah.

That's awesome. So I know you mentioned you've read some books and watched some videos. I know you're checking out Gemba Academy. These days as well. But is there any good book or resource that's touched you over the last year or so that you'd like to recommend?

My favorite book that I did last year. There's actually probably two. Everybody Matters by Barry Wehmiller was probably my favorite. The other book was Turning on the Light Switch by Jack Schaefer, I believe is his name. Yeah, Jack Schaefer. He was an ex FBI guy that talked a lot about relationships and how to work with people. And that was a very good book.

Nice, nice. So, last question. So I know you're constantly learning. Is there a knowledge or skill area that you want to really hone in on here over the next few months?

Leadership. Leadership skills is what I'm working on first and foremost right now. Just trying to get as strong as I can with that and so that I don't make those type of mistakes like I did last year.

I tell you not to over promote Gimba Academy, but we're working on a job relations course right now. It's part of the TWI series.

I've been following that and man, let.

Me tell you, I think it might be one of the most Transformers transformative courses that we've, we've ever produced. It's, it's really simple and elegant stuff, but it's so, so powerful and so many people, myself included, fail at so many points within the JR process that I'm so excited to get this thing out in the next month or so.

So.

So keep your eyes out for that one.

We are definitely too, you know, we, you know, in this industry, there's, there's always been, and I think this happens in all industries is that, you know, we take a new person, we throw them into the pool and see if they can swim or not. And you know, if they swim, this guy's a good guy. And if not, then we need to get rid of him. But, you know, I think TWI is more important than ever. You know, in a lot of industries, so many people are looking for, you know, technicians and mechanics and, you know, they're hard to find. And what we're finding is that we want to work on ways to grow our own people so that we don't have to try to go pull from a pool that we can develop, that it needs to be a continuously growing deal, that we're constantly raising the next generation of paint techs and body techs and going through that process as almost a farm. Right. Because the only thing worse than training somebody and having them leave is not training them and having them stay.

Oh, yeah, there you go. That might be the quote of the episode right there. That was good stuff.

It's true. It's very true. Yeah. And you know, our market, you know, there with the collision avoidance and all the different things that are on the cars nowadays, there's a lot of training that has to be done for these technicians to do what they need to do.

And so we'll check out the JI stuff, man, if you haven't already, the job instruction stuff that we've got up because it's, it's also powerful.

So, yeah, we are currently working on that right now.

Awesome. Awesome. All right, Chris. Well, hey, I've really enjoyed talking with you. I knew it would be a good one and you definitely delivered, so thank you. Well, let's go ahead, just wrap this show up with maybe sharing some, maybe just final words of wisdom for the folks listening and then. And then tell people how they can connect with you.

Final words of wisdom is to be patient. Right. That's probably the most important thing. And don't be afraid to run the experiments. That's how we learn.

Yeah, yeah. How can people connect with you?

There's a couple of different ways. I am c. Norris@weaversautocenter.com Norris is two Rs, just like Chuck.

Yeah.

And then you can reach me on LinkedIn at Chris Norris. And then it's connected to Weavers Auto Center.

Got it, Got it. And we'll, we'll have everything linked up on our show notes which people can find@gembapodcast.com and this, I believe, will be episode 165, so.

Oh, wow.

Yeah. 165. Yeah, we're getting there, man. We're getting there. 200 is coming around the corner, so pretty cool.

Thank you. Thank you for having me on today.

All right, Chris, you take care.

You too.

Thanks for listening to the Gemba Academy podcast. Now it's time to take a free, free, no strings attached, fully functional test drive of Gemba Academy's School of Lean and Six Sigma over at Gembaacademy.com gain immediate access to more than 500 Lean and Six Sigma training videos free of charge at Gembaacademy.Com.