How to Turn Quick Lube Techs into Master Techs | SDR #320 Clip

So how to get lube techs to become master text in. The thinking behind this was that we kind of hear that a lot, right?

Yeah. That there's. There's this gap between, like, the people that have been there 25 years, their master tax. They're great. Everything like that. And then there's, like, this.

Whatever you want to call it, a purgatory area where, like, there should be a lot more B and like, C plus text, but it's like master tech, loop tech, and then there's the. The ravine that's in between. And the. The thing that I keep getting asked, like, how do I fill that gap? Because I think people are feeling that pressure, and then they're trying to recruit, and all they're getting is people that are. What they would call it, you know, they would say are looptechs, but they're looking for that B, which I think. I don't know what you think, but in today's, like, the climate that we're in, I think B and C techs are super valuable. Yeah. Just because the way that the cars are built and everything like that, there's not as much brain surgery going on as there used to be. And B and C techs are worth their weight.

And I. I would say that it should take a year for a quick lube tech to become a ctech and not that, you know, two years for them to become a B.

Don't you think that even in that, like, that one statement is the. You're better off than.

70% of the other stores out there just coming up with, what's the time frame supposed to be like?

Yeah. And I. I would also say that, you know, when. When we come into a store to help turn it around, we're kind of forced to hire techs. We're really good at hiring techs, but that's a. That's a band aid, in a sense. If I was running a store, I would probably rarely hire text. I would be growing my own. And so the real fix, long term is to grow your own.

Yeah.

Like, you know, we can go in and hire a bunch of techs because nobody's done it for a while. But the truth is, really, you should be growing your own. And so by growing your own, it means that, you know, young kids are coming in and you're holding on to them. They're not leaving. And, you know, a lot of stats in our industry would say that 60% of those kids leave in the first two years because there isn't a plan in place. And Nobody quite understands how to move them from a quick loop tech to a master tech. And so we have some ideas here. The, the first one is to have a real career path.

This is something you made fun of me for at one point in time. Do you remember?

Well, well, yeah. And you know, credit to the way I think is I would rather win.

Than be right 100 because. Yes.

And so the, the thing that, you know, we learned out in the field is that giving these, these kids a career path. And so one of the things that would happen with, with them is they would see a shop foreman that had been there a long time. They would say, like, oh, this Guy's been here 25 years. It's. He's not going anywhere. There's no path for me. And so you have to, from day one, you have to show them a path and you have to paint a picture that they, they can grow. And then you have to develop a system that you're touching them along the way and then you manufacture bumps in the road that are the wins. Right. So it's like every in, in the system that was devised that I made fun of, it's like every two or three months, they're getting a raise and a promotion. And so like you're a quick lube. It's like karate and like you're a yellow belt with three stripes kind of a thing. Like you're. But it keeps them on a path and it gives them something to achieve and they're always seeing progress and, and if on the other side. And the thing that's lacking more than anything else is it forces the manager to be having these conversations. It forces the manager to pay attention and be involved with them. Where in most situations, like there's, you know, there's the stall, get to work, and there isn't this personal attention or involvement or focus on their career. And so more than anything is it's showing the, the younger, you know, quick lube tech a career path. But it's creating a system where the manager has to be involved and be active and intentional in that. And that's a win win. Right. When the, when the manager and the employee both share a common goal and a common interest. And so this kind of forces that.

Right. I love that.

What was it? I don't know. Last time I looked, was it 17 different stages we have in that?

Yeah, there might be more than that, but I want to say that there was. There was nine or 10 just within, like that express level, like that lube tech level. There was nine or ten, it might be 17.

And it works.

Yeah, no, it works. It's a complete 180 as far as turnover as far as, you know, loyalty. And the other thing too is they want to learn then. Yeah. Like they want to get better because they're vested in a career path. And when you're invested in a career path, you want to, you know, buy more tools, learn more stuff. It's, you know, it's a win, win on all sides.

Do you or would you, when you have like that focus on the, grow your own and like that this person, when you're kind of bringing them in, they're going to be someone in eight to 10 years that's still on your team. How would you interview for that? Like, is there anything that. Because I would guess you would ask questions different than our listeners. Like when you're thinking about bringing that person onto your team, that not just to change oil and do tires, but you're thinking that big long career thing. Would you interview any differently?

Yeah, well, I would say that the thing that you do different there is you're selling them on a career path from day one and seeing how they respond. But as the, as the leader, you have, you have to implant the future. Like you have to talk to their future self, right?

Yeah.

And so, you know, things that we've learned over the years in that too, and I think that's a great question is like if you hire somebody from out of town, most of the time they'll end up moving back home.

So you want to hire local, you want to be involved locally. Right. Because they usually end up going home. Boys usually end up going home to mom. In a sense we had that so.

Much in Chicago because we had that big UTI school right by where I worked and we interviewed a lot of those kids and I. You are so right. They went back to Montana, they went back to Wisconsin and it felt really good when they came in. But the homesickness is real. It's. That's a really good point. So, so hire the local talent and then man, hiring for the future self, that's such a big thing.

That'S really about you kind of seeing their full potential. Right. Even if they don't.

Well, you want to tell some sort of story in there. And you know, we've kind of talked about this before, but in just a good example of this and I, I think anymore there's great examples of this and we have clients that do a great job with this. But Enterprise Rent a Car, like when, when they used to do job fairs is they would have these young kids come in and they would. They would say, like, hey, you know, this is. This is how we work. And just so you know, the CEO of the company started where you're going to start. And so anybody that comes in there is thinking, well, if I work hard, maybe I don't make CEO, but I could be a branch manager. I could be like, it's already embedded in their head because of the story that they've been told about the company at the very beginning. And so you gotta have a story about somebody who started it, you know, the ground level and moved up. And then along with that story, when you're interviewing them, you. You want to talk about the stuff that matters. Like, they, you know, they got married, they bought a house, they have kids. Like, whatever it is, like, that represents progress and freedom. You want to tell that as a part of that story, too, but you want to implant that as the roadmap, because people follow maps. Like, if you. If you implant a map, they will follow that map. And I don't mean to get too deep into psychology, but it's just a part of it. And then the map that is a story is twice as effective because we think in stories. So. And it's just what Enterprise did, right. They just talked about.

I thought it was so brilliant when you told that story. That was good. I also think that, like, there's a huge lesson here is that, like, the story starts at the interview. We think about, like, the, you know, bringing people into our family. Like, it starts on the hiring. It doesn't. It starts on the interview from that moment forward. That was a.

When you can tell in the interview, right. If you're telling that story, then you qualify. You're like, you know, tell me about your parents. And, you know, you know, if they're relating to the story, then that's a. That's a person that falls into the. The overall story you're trying to create for the business. And if they're like, you know, I just want to play video games and smoke weed. Probably not. Probably not. The kid.

Yeah, they might not have the ambition.

But if they get excited and, you know, they. They sit up a little straighter or they become more active in the conversation when you're telling those stories, that. That's something. I mean, it's not everything, but it's something.

It's a. I feel like there's a bunch of kids out there that are responsive to that stuff.

Oh, yeah, it's for sure.

Yeah.

But we're just not good at telling the story.

We're leaving it to them.

And then we sit around and we're like, well, these kids nowadays, and it's like, well, we're the ones in charge. Like, why don't, why don't we create a scenario where it's a win win?

Yeah, I agree with you. All we're doing is making it better for them.

Then the, the next one just goes along with form equals function, in a sense is if you, if you want to grow technicians, the environment and the system that they're functioning in has to breed to that. Right. And so, you know, in most dealerships, you hire a quick lube tech. They go to the quick lube and they're surrounded by quick lube techs. That is not an environment or a form that's going to progress function. It is almost, in a sense, you know, a dead end, really.

The worst is when it's the quick loop building.

Yeah. It's like, let them all fight it out and we'll see who makes it. Yeah. But meanwhile, they create their own culture, their own mindset, and none of it is about progress. And none of it has the influence of older, more qualified veteran techs. They're rarely interacting. And so, you know, the, the system that we put in place breeds this in a sense, that we put the quick lube techs in the shop, not isolated. They're next to and report to a team leader who's a veteran tech who helps them with their inspections. The, that lateral support group gets the work. And so you're teaching them, you know, that, hey, inspection sheets matter. And when you fill out an inspection sheet and the work gets okayed, our group benefits from that. You're just teaching them business. Like this is how capitalism and business works, in a sense is like the system has to be built or designed for the outcome that we want. And if the outcome that, that we want is, we want, you know, we want to capture whatever opportunity is there on the vehicles that we're working on and we want to grow our own technicians, then the, the system needs to do that. In the quick lube system, the way that most consultants or manufacturers do it is exactly the opposite of that. It doesn't. You don't grow your own. And it, you know, and then the other thing that will happen that, that I've seen, and you know, frankly, we've been guilty of this in environments that we have difficult customers that don't, you know, that are just locked into a way of doing things is then it's like, oh, well, we'll hire a tech to oversee the quick loop. But the efficiency drop, it's, you're.

It's just an expense.

Yeah. It's not, it's not a straight line. And they still don't see the benefit of the work in a sense too. It's, it's, it's more. When you design a quick lube the way that they're designed, it's all about speed and not about quality. And the thing that's rewarded is speed, not quality.

Yeah. Which. The faster you are, the worst you were, the worse it is at the.

End of the day.

I was just talking to somebody today about that and I was, like I said, the manufacturers, like, at the end of the day, I think that they had intent, they had good intentions. They thought they're listening to the customer. And I explained to him and he's like, well, I can get two people on the car. And I started to talk to him about, like that in itself, like, it's just a, It's a fallacy that two dudes do it faster than one guy. And then the end of the day, what we're missing is that the faster we do the oil change, the more it becomes a commodity. It's just something you're walking into Walmart and buying off a shelf. And like, the further we can get away from that, the better off we are.

Yeah. I would say too, is the faster we do it, the quicker we. We become the constraint. Because you get so busy doing this lost leader that you can't keep up with the volume anyways.

Yeah. And it's almost like, it's almost a punishment if you sell something because you're, you're, you're missing the dopamine hit of.

Getting like the, the form is designed around speed and not around quality and relationships.

Yeah. I never thought about lateral support as a life lesson, but is. Yeah. In the environment that you create and that, like, you would have people, you aspire. Yeah. That's. It's way more than just turning wrenches.

I mean, it too. Just for us as a company, like, we were running that system on our back end as far as growing our own coaches and all that. Like, it just works like, it works to throw people in the mix, to have them a part of the mix, not to have them isolated and specialized. When they specialize, they become specialized in that. So if you just specialize, then you're just a quick lube tech. And then you don't think there's a career path that's right. And you don't get the influence from the guys that are making really good money, that are making time, you know, because also, the other part of it is that quick lube, really, most of the time, isn't your. Your. Your margins are so thin, even if they're. Most quick lubes run at, like, 50% efficiency. But even at that.

Even if you got a quick lube to run at 100% efficiency, it still isn't profitable.

You're not collecting enough per hour for it to make sense.

Yeah. It has to be about maximizing the opportunity.

Yeah, I agree.

So form equals function. The system is what helps you get the quick lube. Text to Masters.