I have been involved in this great industry for more than 30 years. In that time, I worked for a large group of consolidators,
dealer shop and a couple of small independent groups. All of these repairers fix cars very well. They also have faced many
issues on a daily basis that they really shouldn't have had to. These issues include poor repair quality, low morale, bad
CSI scores and poor cycle times.
The one underlying cause of all these issues is employee quality and performance. Universally, the one thing all of these
shops did was not hire the right people and/or put people in the wrong positions. Unfortunately, these mistakes are status
quo in much of the collision industry and have been for years. Do you have any idea what it costs to train employees only
to lose them to another shop or be forced to fire them yourself after investing time, money and effort into training? If not,
you should.
In the history of the industry, the pool of qualified candidates for all collision shop positions has been relatively small,
especially in the past 10 years or so. In the average collision market, many of the qualified, or unqualified employees for
that matter, have been "recycled" – going from one shop then back to another over and over.
In light of the recent economic conditions, more technicians and other qualified personnel have been finding their way into
the market due to layoffs or shop closings. This has produced, in some markets, a surplus of available, qualified candidates.
This is a situation most of us are not used to and may have some difficulty navigating.
Here are some tips on how to hire the right people, put them in the best possible situation for success and keep them as part
of your team for many years.
Change your thinking
JOB DESCRIPTION FOR Customer Service Representative
Your staff, your employees, are the most important asset you have. They are a reflection of your shop and your business principles.
In most cases, your staff ultimately is what makes a customer decide to use your shop instead of another one.
Consumers today have many choices when it comes to getting their cars fixed. Most DRPs offer several local options to a customer
when offering their programs. The customer may initially choose your shop based on its location in relation to their home
or work, but they will make the decision to use you for the repairs based on the performance of your people.
Benchmarking all of your positions allows you and your employees to know what is expected from them and helps you develop
"superstars."
Think about this. You choose to go to a restaurant that you heard through friends was fantastic. They raved on and on about
it during your last get together. You make reservations, get all dressed up and go. When you arrive, no one greets you, or
worse yet, the hostess greets you angrily (as if you are a distraction to her "important" cell phone call to her boyfriend).
You brush off her rudeness initially, only to wait for what seems forever to get seated, even though you had a reservation.
Once seated, you are graced by a waiter who is in a hurry, handling several tables more than he/she is capable of. You don't
get drinks for a half hour and by the time you order your food you have been in the place for two hours. In this scenario,
even if the food is fantastic, would you go back again? Probably not.
It's easy to see how not having the right staff, handling the right amount of volume, improperly or hastily trained, could
virtually ruin your business. How many times have you witnessed similar situations in your shop – customers not being greeted
properly by your customer service rep/estimator, waiting long periods for the service they had an appointment for, or just
not being treated as well as they should.
Kevin M Mehok is the CEO of Crashcosts.com and a current board member for several other companies. In his nearly 30 years of experience in the collision industry, he was Operations Director for CARCARE Collision Centers, and Collision Centers of America. He also served as Regional VP for Collision Team of America, and has worked in similar roles with several other Chicago area consolidators, Gerber, (Boyd) and Cars. He can be reached through e mail at: k.mehok@comcast.net.
Articles by Kevin Mehok
