Richard, a shop foreman, asks Chris Collins, Chris Stone, and James Ballmer how to become a service manager. They say spend 90 days to six months in the front office learning service writing, read The Irreplaceable Service Manager and How to Win Friends and Influence People, master the numbers, and find a mentor.
Foreign.
Welcome, everybody, to your Friday drive by where we take your questions and try to give you an answer. I'm Chris Collins. This is Chris Stone. Hello, everyone. We have a very special guest who you've met already, but Mr. James Ballmer, better known as Captain.
Hello. How are you?
Sort of Captain. If people are like, Captain, no problem. Probably preferred, right?
No.
People call you Captain.
No. You know, and Captain, I'm so glad to hear because I had a story for you. So yesterday, I'm out walking around and I come across these two blind people, and they're fighting, and I'm like, well, this isn't really interesting. Like, they're flailing about because they can't see each other. And so I yell out. And it got really good after this, I'm like, my money's on the one with the knife.
How would you grade his segue?
The joke?
It was pretty smooth, right?
It was awesome.
Yeah. You didn't know it was a joke.
Okay, so remember, if you call in and we play your question on the air, we're gonna send you some swag. Swag that you can't buy anywhere. So, like a service drive revolution hat, T shirt, mug, notepad, I think is in there, all kinds of fun stuff. So get a pen, pencil. People still write with a pencil. Open the notes on your phone and write this number down. It's 8,000, 333 ask SDR. That's 8, 3, 3, 3, ask SDR. Okay, let's go to this week's question.
Hey, Chris. My name is Richard. I'm a working shop foreman for a domestic store. Place has only been open for just over a year and a half now, and we're growing a good, steady customer base. My question is, I'd like to eventually leave the bench for a management position within my industry. I enjoy the industry very much. I'm just wondering what steps or reading could I take or would you suggest to help prepare me or any shop foreman for that matter, for that possible transition? I'm just wondering if there's any steps I could take, if there's any further reading I could do. Great podcast. Thanks every. Thanks for all the information. Hope to hear your answer on the show. Thanks.
Awesome. Thanks, Richard. So a couple things come to mind right away. First is I would honestly start with the book the Irreplaceable Service Manager, written by me.
So I'll make sure that we get your info and we'll send you one and check it out. It's an easy read, but I think that'll Give you a general foundation. The thing that I would hope you would walk away from that book understanding is that there's really two things that are the outcome of being a good service manager and that's profit and the customer experience. And remember I didn't say gross profit, actual net profit and the customer experience because even if that isn't what your, you know, general manager, dealer are talking about, it is on their mind. So you don't want to get caught in a trick bag. So keep, you know, keep that, that in mind. The other thing that I would say, and we've worked with a lot of great service managers that have come from being shop foreman.
Yeah.
Historically what I've done in that process is I've made them Write service for 90 days to six months. Because you kind of have two things. There is one, you, you want that experience because it's different. It's different than working in the shop.
And you're going to be more effective coaching advisors if you know kind of where they came from. What are some. Can you guys think of any other downfalls for a shop foreman coming out besides the financials, being an advisor?
Well, I was going to mention the financials and I think if a shop foreman went to their service manager and asked them to be mentored as a favor and asked them to please explain the financials, I think that would help them a lot because most foremen don't deal with that part of it.
Yeah. And maybe dealer general manager too because sometimes the service manager they're working for might not understand it.
Right, right.
One big advantage is you're going to be better at recruiting techs. You're going to know how to interview techs. You're going to kind of understand where techs come from, what they're looking for. So you have an advantage coming from the shop in that sense.
I think you might even have a pool of tech so you know, in the community that you could try to recruit.
Yeah. It's really good. Yeah. I think the other, I've got two pieces of advice. The first is a follow up to your replaceable service manager would be how to win friends and influence people. Is a second thing just understanding. Yeah. So the human emotion part of it. Because I think that in the shop you get really, really comfortable and used to working with cars and as you move into the leadership role, it's about your interaction with humans and understanding how their behavior works. And then the second thing I would do is let's say that you're at a Ford store. I would find the best Ford store in the area and I would go and just kind of watch how you do it at your one store is probably not how everybody else does it. So I think trying to make your world a little bit bigger would be another good piece of advice. Yeah.
And if you, you know, if you do make manager or somebody wants to mentor you, probably the quickest shortcut to that is getting in our coaching group and let us, you know, let us hands on mentor you and kind of guide you because that will set you up for success, probably better than anything out there. But thanks so much for the question, Richard. And thanks everybody for tuning in and we will see you next time on Service Drive revolution. Thanks for watching this week's Drive By. I hope we gave you something to think about over the weekend. We're uploading new stuff every 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 8, 8333 Ask SDR. For special deals on our books and training, head over to Offers Chris Collins Inc.com that's Offers.Chris Collins Inc.com I'm Chris Collins and I'll see you in the next video.
