Chris Collins and a co-speaker argue that service managers must stop hiring just for availability, spend time in the shop with technicians, and teach staff financial literacy. Managers often avoid risk and define wins too narrowly, missing chances to build profitable behavior and real leadership.
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Most service managers hire for pulse.
That's, that's a great description. I love it.
So, I mean, how many times have you heard like, oh well, they know.
Adp, like that's the lead in for their, for an ad in some cases.
Yeah. Or they're Chrysler certified.
Yeah, that's great.
They, they've, they've been indicted for embezzlement, but they're Chrysler certified.
Right.
You know what I mean? Like that isn't the, that isn't the only reason to hire somebody.
Yeah. Felons accepted with DMS experience.
Yeah. So you know, you want, you want to hire for the right fit, you want to hire for past performance. But just hiring because that pulse is going to kill your culture in your, in your department. They don't understand that technicians drive everything. The most important part of our business is technicians. They are their production. Without technicians, we have nothing to sell. Yes.
You work in an empty factory if you have no technicians.
So they spend very little time recruiting technicians, hanging out with technicians, understanding technicians.
They just basically kind of complain that the technicians aren't productive or aren't, you know, but you, to be a good service manager, you need to spend a portion of your time understanding what's going on in your shop personally knowing your technicians, you know, taking interest in their goals and where they, where they're headed. But you have to be active in the shop more than anywhere else.
Right, I agree with that.
Most managers don't even go in the shop. Well, they're afraid of it because especially.
Ones that came from the advisor world, they don't know the shop.
But what you are selling is time and that time can only be produced by a technician.
That's right.
They don't have boundaries. And so I would go back to earlier where we, we want to stay off the radar. We want to be liked. And so what happens is, hey, the toilet is plugged in the showroom. Hey, you know, I got a friend in from town I need like we're the, we're the catch all for everything. And we feel like if we're the catch all for everything, then we won't get in trouble for the fact that we don't understand financials and we're not actually profitable. And so we gotta have some boundaries and understand why we're there. Which understanding the financials helps you with that. But we were there to collect customers and create profit. And we want a customer experience that customers want to come back over and over again. And if this is in a dealership, they're going to buy their next vehicle from us. Right. So the retention aspect and then make a profit, those two things. And we spend time doing all kinds of other things. And we don't have boundaries because we don't have the self esteem or the understanding of what it really is to be successful. Our self image is that we're the afterthought that were not important. And the industry does that to us. I don't think that, I don't think that managers do that on their own most of the time. I think the industry says that sales is more important. All the, you know, all the spiffs, the games, the cigar smoking, the trips, all that come from the front end. And so then we buy into the idea that we're supporting were the after effect. Yeah.
The interior manager and all that other stuff. Like the thing that always has amazed me is the difference in training for management on the front end versus the back end. It is insane how much access you have to training on the variable side.
And just understanding as an industry. Here's one thing that nada doesn't understand but would be incredibly valuable is that we have to raise the self esteem of a lot of people in service in order for them to then feel good about learning. In order for them to want to learn. Right. Because if you, you know, if you, if you don't think you're important, then you're not gonna, you're not gonna invest in yourself, you're not gonna want to get better. And that's lost in our industry completely. It's just the afterthought. Most managers are stubborn.
They want to be right versus winning.
And so that we go back to the first one where I said they want to be safe. Right. They don't want to take a chance, they don't want to, they don't want risk. They want to move away from pain towards security. And that creates an element of stubbornness where you just don't want to try anything. And so even when nothing is working, you'd rather double down than try something new.
With the idea that if you keep doing things the same way, you're gonna keep getting the same results. But that somehow is lost on us often.
Well, I think another thing too is service managers don't have the right definition of what a win is all the time either.
Yeah. And partially that's because they don't, they don't see the financial, they don't understand it. And so they're, they're in a no win situation.
Yeah. So they try to hold on to what makes them feel the best, which is their win.
Yeah.
What makes them feel?
The general manager goes by and he's like, get me more gross and Got it. Yeah. Well, let's send out coupons. Or, you know, it's just, it's a vicious cycle.
Thanks so much for watching this clip of Service Driver Revolution. We're uploading new stuff every day, so. So make sure you subscribe and click the bell icon so you don't miss out. If you have a question you'd like us to answer on the show, call 8333-ASK SDR and we'll answer your question on the show. That's 8333-ASK SDR. For special deals on our books and training, head over to offers.chriscollinsinc.com now that's offers.chriscollinsInc.com I'm Chris Collins, and I'll see you in the next video.
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