Chris Collins talks with Matt Thoraldson about hiring a high school student who no-showed at first. Instead of firing him, Thoraldson found out the kid wanted to learn welding, gave him practice time after shifts, and watched attendance improve and a real connection form.
We saw a post that you hired a high school kid to help him out a little bit, and then the kid was kind of no showing. And so instead of kicking the kid to the road, you thought, why don't I try something a little different? So tell everybody kind of what you tried and what the outcome was.
Yeah, well, Kurt, of course I was upset. My first emotion was, was a little upset and frustration, but kind of sat back and like, what's the pros and cons to firing them? Who's it really going to hurt? It's just going to put more of a workload on me. And what's the issue, you know, what's the issue of not showing up and, you know, trying to find the source of the problem and find a solution that works for both of us. Seemed to kind of motivate him a little bit. It's, you know, back in my day, you want to get away with that no call, no show stuff. So, you know, I don't know if there's a sense of entitlement a little bit with the younger generation or not, but, you know, it's. Instead of just taking the easy road, I found something. I know he was into welding. He wanted to be a welder, and that's what he's gonna go to school for once he graduates this year. So there's plenty of welding projects around the shop to do. So I'm like, well, why don't you show up? Why don't you show up a little early and show up on time and we'll get you into welding the last 45 minutes of the hour of the day and get you some hood time and get your practice and, you know, to move on to what you eventually want to do as a career.
And it worked, right? So then he started showing up.
It did, it did. You know, now he's. Now he's back to school. So, you know, I only have him a couple days a week, so. But yeah, it really did seem to help him out, you know, and it made me feel better, you know, because fire them and find someone else and it's just more stress and. But if you can try to, you know, figure out the younger generation, figure out a different path, you know, I was taught the hard way where, you know, you got yelled at and you changed your. Changed your weight pretty quick, but not ever, you know, everyone's different. So it's a kind of a case by case situation. And like I said, there's always an issue to why, why there's why there's a Problem, you know, there's something at home. Is it something I'm doing wrong? Is there something I can improve on and, you know, teach you better? You know, nobody wants to come in and stay in the car, you know, eight hours a day. That's not fun. But, hey, you gotta start at the bottom and work your way to the top. And gave him a little bit of incentive, you know, to. To do that.
Now, when you. When you propose that and he accepted and started showing up, did you notice any change in your personal relationship with him at all?
No. That's a great question. Absolutely. You know, he was. I don't talk much. It's, you know, it's kind of work here when you hear we work. And now it kind of opened up a little bit. And every day you're learning more. I'm learning about him. He's into trucks. He bought himself a truck, so he wants to start putting suspension, exhaust. You know, the typical stuff as a teenager you want to do and. And show off. So, you know, learning more about him can help me kind of know more about him and help kind of go in the right direction and see what, you know, see what kind of, you know, positivity seems to work for him. And. And going that route is. Is something that works for both of us. No one wants to be negative or be in a negative situation. So it helped us both at the end of the day, you know, gave me a little bit of patience.
Is the kid a natural welder?
He wasn't bad. Absolutely. Absolutely. And he just, you know, we just put him on the mix, you know, on the. On the gun, on the MiG. So it was. Yeah, he didn't do too bad. So if that's what he wants to do, let's keep him practicing. Practice makes perfect. No one's perfect, no matter how long you've been doing this. So get him the basics to move along to the next step in life, you know, when he goes on to college, already has those basic tools and kind of can kind of excel, you know, once he starts moving forward.
Well, your. Your post inspired us here in the office to stop and, you know, just look at ourselves a little bit different. And I think it was. It was a great, you know, experiment into human behavior. Thanks so much for watching this clip of Service Driver Revolution. We're uploading new stuff day, 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.
