Chris Collins and Christian discuss how pay plans in automotive service often focus on expense rather than performance, causing turnover when plans change. They argue pay plans should be simple (one-page), used as recruiting tools, and primarily tie advisor pay to measurable performance (e.g., CSI) rather than metrics advisors cannot control (e.g., gross). They warn against micromanaging behaviors through convoluted pay-plan tripwires and recommend using minimum standards to manage behaviors. The clip closes with a CTA (subscribe and phone-in questions).
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October 25, 2022.
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We tried very hard to weed that out before we let somebody into the coaching group because that's. We.
We would have a hard time going along with that. We'd probably fire a client over that at this point.
I think. I think so too. Yeah. But at the end of the day, if we've got a slew of advisors making a bunch of money, everybody's winning.
Yeah. Because if we did the pay plan, it's relative. Everybody. Everybody wins. Right. There doesn't. Somebody doesn't have to lose for somebody to win. It can be a win win if you know how to do pay plans.
That's right. Which we know was that dealer group, one of the biggest ones in the nation.
Yeah. So.
Nation is definitely in their name.
Yeah. Just curious.
Really, really smart operators, those guys.
Okay. So they focused on the expense, not the return or the performance.
Advisors can't make that much. I've heard that a couple of times, and it just nails on a chalkboard for me.
One, it also creates tons of turnover.
But at the wrong spot at the top. You do turnover at the top, not the bottom, though.
No, no. One more thing about that is oftentimes we will. When we go into a market, we'll try to figure out who the top advisors are around.
The market. Right. And so we'll call those advisors and be like, hey, Christian, this is Chris over here at Bulldog, Volkswagen or whatever it is. And I hear you're a really good advisor and we can take you to lunch. And we go to lunch, and they're like, ah, I, you know, I like you, Chris, but I don't want to leave, blah, blah, blah. And then I'm working you, I'm working you. And then five months later or whatever you call me, you're like, you got a spot for me? And I'm like, yeah, what happened, Christian? You're like, they changed my pay plan.
Nothing opens the door more to steal top performers. If you're working them over time and you're networking and you're just touching them every once in a while, you eventually will get the call. And.
90% of the time, when you say, why, why, why? Now they change their pay plan.
You also are really crafty that you plant the seed at the lunch. Hey, if anything ever changes, they do something to your pay plan, just give me a call. Like, you. Literally, it's a magic trick.
Yeah. And here's the other thing that I love to do is I love to show them the pay plan they would be on when they come work for us. And let me Tell you a couple things about that pay plan fits on one piece of paper.
It's easy to read, really easy to.
Understand, and it's simple. And in the advisor, here's the thing, I would say.
This is totally a random number I'm going to make up. And it's probably low 60% of the pay plans out there for advisors and service managers. They can't figure out what they're tracking to make on a day to day basis.
That's right. So all of my pay plans were like that.
Yeah.
And the good advisors, what are they doing every day? Trying to figure out what they're trying to make.
What can I make? What can I make?
Yeah. And so they pay them on gross, which makes no sense because advisors don't control gross. It's just buffoonery. Okay, so that's the side note for that. Number two.
This is a good one. They try to manage behavior. So do. Do pay plans manage behavior? No, no, they do. Oh, I.
So.
Okay, go ahead.
Okay, let me ask you a question.
If I make CSI 30% of an.
Advisor'S pay plan, does CSI usually get fixed?
Yeah. So in that respect. Yes.
Does pay manage behavior?
It can.
I would say it does. My opinion is that it does manage behavior.
Okay.
But what happens is just like with the first one, that they're not paying attention to what the ROI is on the pay plan. Right. They figure out like, oh, hey, we changed the CSI bonus and CSI has been up, so now let's change if somebody shows up late or somebody has too many customers with a shuttle or what? And then they start micromanaging through the pay plan and then it has no effect because they're more confused than they were before.
Okay.
They try to micromanage things or manage through the pay plan instead of driving performance. There's a big difference between managing and driving performance through a pay plan.
Yeah. I feel about, I think about pay plans as recruiting tools for getting the best of the best of the best. And then I always think about behaviors being managed by minimum standards. But your CSI example is very solid and I've seen that work many times.
Yeah, but CSI is performance.
Exactly.
Everything else is buffoonery. Like the trip wires that I've seen people put into pay plans are just ridiculous.
Yeah, yeah. The thing about the shuttle drivers, you have to have so many open or closed ros by the end of the month. What are other things that I've seen in pay plans that are super interesting? Oh, like that you have to have so much usage of the videos being sent to make your money. And then another weird thing is, I don't know if you notice this, where instead of like a dollar bonus, like, it's, it's you, you can get more percents, which makes it really hard to calculate if you're an advisor.
Thanks so much for watching this clip.
Of Service Driver Revolution.
We're uploading new stuff every day, so make sure you subscribe and click the bell icon 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.
