Parts 1-3 of this blog series outlined technician retention through providing individualized training paths, growing students and apprentices, and offering creative compensation. Now, it comes full circle to fostering a shop environment conducive to loyalty through technician and manager relationships.

All employees want to feel appreciated and respected. This is especially true for technicians who also want their direct supervisor to understand what they go through every day. Yet, problem customers, mounting overhead pressures, and OEM demands fill most managers’ capacity to the brink. How can a manager find time to nurture technicians and create an atmosphere of encouragement, care, and respect?

Done correctly, crafting this type of environment doesn’t require a tremendous amount of your time. But it does require two things: making it a priority and getting out in the shop. The payoff is a sizeable impact on the technicians’ engagement and performance.

1. Master the Impromptu 1-on-1
   • Annual performance reviews are extremely important but cannot be the only form of individual communication. Take a walk. Randomly stop and chat with a technician. Don’t center the conversation on work. Let them know you value them as a person, not just as an employee.
   • Always conclude a conversation with, “Is there anything I can do for you today?” Be prepared for the “white whale” requests, but you will find that there may be simple suggestions that can have a huge impact when addressed. Sometimes, just knowing you are interested in helping is all they need to feel appreciated.
   • Take to heart the findings of Gallup’s Employee Engagement Study, “The State of the American Manager.” It reminds us that “Employees are people first, and they have an intrinsic need for bonding that does not automatically turn itself off between the hours of 8 and 5. The best managers can understand and relate to their team members’ inherently human motivations.”*
2. Hold Shop Meetings
   • Formal shop meetings keep employees in the loop. Distributing an annual calendar listing the monthly date and time along with advance copies of the basic agenda each month lets everyone be prepared.
     • Leave time at the end of the meeting for roundtable discussions. Some technicians only feel comfortable discussing an issue in a group.
     • Spot early signs that a meeting may be getting off topic or turning negative. Keep the focus at all times so the meetings stay productive and generate engagement.
   • Stay positive and use these meetings to tell the shop as a whole what is not being done correctly. Every issue can be viewed as an opportunity if addressed correctly.
   • Keep it short and don’t reschedule meetings.
   • Pay your flat-rate technicians for this time; it is definitely worth the investment. They will be more engaged knowing the meeting isn’t costing them time and money.
   • This is a great venue for acknowledging technicians in front of their peers for tenure, birthdays, training completions, or general praise.
3. Maintain the Equipment and Facility
   • A technician’s bay is their office. Broken, unavailable, or outdated shop equipment is the equivalent of working without a computer or phone. You wouldn’t want to work that way in your office, and neither do they.
   • Shop equipment that is maintained and working not only increases efficiency but boosts morale. Keeping a clean, organized, and well-lit facility will also reduce accidents and show your technicians that you value them and the space they work in every day.
4. Feed Them!
   • Nothing makes technicians happier than free food in the shop. Most technicians work very hard and do not get many breaks to eat. When the pizza boxes come out, it gives them the chance to take a well-deserved break and shows your appreciation.
   • Hold a technician appreciation barbeque. Grill massive amounts of hamburgers and hotdogs. Provide chips and drinks along with tables and chairs so the technicians can hang out in between jobs. Block your schedule for that one day and make them your priority!
   • If your shop is not air conditioned or has less than stellar air circulation, provide ice cold water and Gatorade on hot days. Technicians have an extremely physical job and the heat can make it tougher. Small gestures can pay big dividends in morale and your relationship with the technicians.

It may be true that employees leave managers, not jobs. Get creative and be the kind of manager that no one wants to leave. Engaging and fostering genuine relationships with technicians is an extremely effective part of any dealership’s retention plan.

With a shortage of quality technicians available, a well-crafted retention plan helps you keep the technicians you have and make them even more valuable than you thought they could be. It’s time to do what it takes to make long tenures in your shop the new normal.

*”WHAT MANAGERS MUST KNOW FROM THE GALLUP EMPLOYEE ENGAGEMENT SURVEY,” WWW.GETLIGHTHOUSE.COM/BLOG/GALLUP-EMPLOYEE-ENGAGEMENT-SURVEY-MANAGERS/.

In Parts I and II of this blog, we looked at setting individual training paths for technicians, as well as growing technicians internally from students to top employees as part of a technician retention plan. In Part III we will discuss varying ideas for pay plans to motivate your technicians and improve overall morale.

Let us not forget, solid fixed operations absorption moves to the front burner again as a looming front-end plateau becomes a reality. Creatively designed compensation to retain and motivate technicians also goes a long way in getting the biggest return on your back end’s most valuable investment.

Hourly and flat-rate industry-standard pay plans are well and good, though not without their pros and cons. It’s time to look into some outside-the-box compensation to get technicians to stay, turn more hours, increase the bottom line, and secure the dealership’s financial stability through fixed operations absorption.

• Performance Levels
  • Track technician’s efficiency, productivity, and proficiency. Make sure your technicians know what the dealership’s benchmarks are for each and their individual expected contribution. Align compensation to these goals and set no limits when a technician exceeds the dealership standard. It is a great way to show your technicians their expertise and performance is recognized and rewarded.  They perform at a higher level producing more hours in a day and make the bottom line a lot healthier. A definite win-win.
• CSE/CSI
  • Make sure technicians understand their direct impact beyond “Fixed Right First Visit” on survey results and the correlation between the customer voice and retention. Technicians need to be responsible for their part in the dealership’s processes that are intended to boost customer satisfaction. The best spent CSE/CSI budget isn’t expended on compensating customers after a less than stellar experience, but instead ahead of time on technicians and the parts and service team to ensure scores attain and stay at the top.
  • Share the dealership’s goals and satisfaction reports so technicians can monitor their individual performance. And like advisors and managers, bonus technicians for above target CSE/CSI performance.
• Spiffs/Bonuses
  • Let technicians earn a little extra money while the dealership benefits from the additional sales. Looking to boost inspections or sales on a particular part? Just purchased a truck load of tires from your OEM’s promotion? Perhaps that $55,000 new alignment machine needs to start paying for itself? Spiff your technicians to get them to focus on checking and recommending appropriate upsells.
  • Cash is king! If paying spiffs in money pay the winners in cash – it will mean more since it can be instantly spent as opposed to having to run to the bank. However, the spiff does not always need to be monetary. Paid time off, lunch off-site with management, OEM apparel, gift cards for tools, etc. are all great motivators.
  • Change it up. Running the same spiff program with the same rewards will eventually get stale and loose its luster. Come up with a new program each month with different types of rewards. One month, spiff anyone who upsells the special. The next, spiff only the top performers. Use pull boards and other visual incentive props to engage employees. Get creative!

So don’t be crippled by the idea that “I can’t pay more money for employees that already make top dollar.” Do the calculation. Adding some incentives will motivate your technicians to work harder, produce more sales, and best of all improve overall morale and technician retention.

In Part IV of this blog, we will discuss the ways to improve the technician/manager relationship. Stay tuned!

Growing Your Best Technicians From Apprentice to Longest-Tenured, Top Employee

Finding and hiring qualified new technicians is getting more difficult. There just aren’t that many out there. As we discussed in Part I of this blog, creating an individual training path for your technicians is one way to keep the good ones you already have. It shows them you’re investing in their growth and helps develop an even more talented team. In Part II, we’ll examine the idea of growing your technicians from the ground up, from students and interns to top technicians.

New hires nurtured from the beginning of their careers can evolve into more loyal, high-producing employees than those in advanced career stages. They can be groomed, tend to have fewer bad habits, and adapt easier to dealership processes. The best place to find these moldable new hires is in the automotive programs at secondary and post-secondary technical schools.

Choose Secondary and Post-Secondary Students

Community vocational schools and post-secondary automotive programs require students to intern. Whether generic or OEM-specific, these programs also utilize local employer advisory boards to contribute to the curriculum based on current industry needs. Dealerships with service managers on these boards get first crack at the best apprentices. To find local opportunities, check with your state’s automotive advocacy organization, your franchise’s representative, or these online resources:

• TradeSchools.net
• AYES.org (Automotive Youth Educational Systems)

Assign Mentors

A suitable mentor has to have the demeanor, skill level, and experience to properly guide the intern. To best fill the role, the mentor must understand and support your dealership’s commitment to utilizing apprentices. They need to help bring those student apprentices up through ranks and not be threatened by the concept.

What’s in it for the mentor? Compensate them for taking on the responsibility with a pay rate increase or assigning the apprentice’s billed hours to them. As the student’s knowledge and skills grow, they will require less guidance and can work more independently. The student can then start to retain a portion of their produced hours.

Offer Tuition Reimbursement

The cost of post-secondary school is growing. The soaring cost has had an unfortunate effect on student enrollment. Tuition reimbursement is a mutually beneficial investment and a rewarding way to secure a competent student.

Tuition reimbursement also serves as a retention tool. By dispersing the payments incrementally after graduation, you motivate them to stay in your shop longer. The longer they stay, the more likely they will become long-term team members.

Provide Tool Scholarships

As you know, a technician’s tools are an extremely large investment. Too many students are deterred from even beginning this career due to the impending cost to get started. Snap-on and AYES have student tool and tool box plans to help get students over this hurdle with quality tools that can be used throughout their career. A scholarship does involve investment from the dealership; however, the student pays this investment back with tenure after graduation. You can visit www.ayes.org/Students-Parents/Scholarships/AYES-SnapOn-Tools.aspx for more information.

In Conclusion

Growing your technicians from the student level is definitely a long-term investment. But, the promise of a long-term, loyal, and proficient technician is well worth it.

In Part III of this blog, we will discuss different pay structures that encourage your technicians to produce while boosting morale. Stay tuned!

With the shortage of qualified technicians in the workforce, not only is it daunting to find good candidates for hire, but your competitors, who are facing the same issue, are working harder to recruit your qualified technicians.

While the lack of capable new hires is discouraging, the technician turnover rate is simply alarming. The annualized turnover rate for service technicians last year was a whopping 24%, according to the NADA 2015 Workforce Study*. That means a dealership with 8 technicians can expect to lose 2 this year. Where will that leave your dealership?

The revolving door in your fixed operations is costly and frustrating. It’s time to “stop the bleeding” and keep the technicians you have. Here is part 1 of a few retention plan best practices to help you do just that.

Training Paths As a Retention Plan

Having spent years as a service manager myself, and later as an OEM District Manager, I can fully relate to the factory telling you all about your technicians’ under-benchmark training numbers. Sure, technicians need to properly diagnose and repair, and keep warranty ratios in line, but how do they see their training? Is it just something they have to do or an investment in helping them build their career? You know your intentions. Make sure your technicians do too.

1. Define Individual Training Paths:
   • Make training personal. Tailor each technician’s training path to his/her skill level and growth potential. Some can complete training modules and retain the knowledge at a quicker pace than others. Individualized paths make training a push, not a pull.
   • Follow your OEM’s path, being sure to give expected completion dates that are realistic for the workload. Create a contingency plan for overdue classes that may include blocking off the technician’s schedule if necessary.
   • Inspect what you expect. Put monthly or quarterly training path reviews on your calendar. Sit down and have a two-way conversation with each technician so they know they have a voice.
   • Post-training, give them the opportunity to put the knowledge to work and retain the information. A technician that has just completed HVAC training should be given the opportunity to diagnose an A/C concern.
   • A technician with a higher percentage of completed training and more skill is simply worth more money. Why? More efficient diagnosis and repair has a real impact on the bottom line. Make rate increases a component of the training path. Lay out the levels that must be reached and the pay increase associated with each level. Make it a big deal when a technician hits his or her goal!
2. Promote ASE Certifications:
   • ASE certifications are a great way to validate your technicians’ knowledge, ability, and experience. They also build tremendous trust with your customers who know their vehicles are being repaired by ASE certified technicians.
   • Some OEMs make ASE certifications part of their requirements. If yours doesn’t, be sure youInclude ASE tests in your technicians’ training paths, placed in line with the OEM courses.
   • Making it easy for your technicians to complete these certification tests will produce less push back. Keep track of recertification dates, schedule the tests, and pay for the fee to take tests (passing grade only). Sweeten the pot with a bonus for each test passed.
   • Display each technician’s certifications proudly where your customers can see them. This display sends a message to your customers about the quality of your service and, more importantly, reinforces to your technicians the value, respect, and pride you have in their achievements.
   • Get started at ase.com/home.aspx.
3. Encourage State Inspection Licenses:
   • Motivate your technicians to obtain their licenses by including them in the training paths. Keep track of their license renewal dates and help them get recertified.
   • Most states with inspections will offer to send a trainer to you for a minimum headcount. Get all of your technicians on the same schedule and offer to hold an in-house recertification class to save them the time and trouble of traveling off site.
   • Consider covering all or part of the cost to obtain inspection licenses and renewals. Remember, these inspections are beneficial not only to the technician, but also to your store.

Are you catching the vision and seeing the value in retention? Stay tuned for my next blog. In it, I will discuss “growing” your best technicians from students still in training.

* “NADA Study Reveals 71 Percent Turnover for Dealership Sales Positions,” October 27, 2015, www.drivingsales.com/news/nada-study-reveals-71-percent-turnover-for-dealership-sales-positions/