Don Favors, an automotive technology teacher, lays out a five-step plan to train and retain new technicians, driven by what he’s seen: early attrition after schools and tool purchases, often caused by poor hiring fit and weak onboarding. He argues for better recruiting interviews and basic skills tests, stronger school-industry connections, a slower “first days” startup with job shadowing and front-office exposure, structured mentorship that protects culture, and financial education to prevent tool-truck debt and stress. The episode also highlights attracting more analytical, tech-curious students through tinkering and modern diagnostics.
Donald Favors, Auto Tech Instructor at Lowell High School, joins us to talk about the five steps he developed for technician retention in his “Pathway to Retention” program. In the episode, he walks through each step in detail—from connecting with local schools to providing technicians with financial education—and shares his journey from working in the automotive industry to transitioning into education.
ASE Connects brings shops, dealerships, and schools together in one structured network to strengthen the technician pipeline. By making it easier to connect, collaborate, and support students through job shadows, internships, and classroom engagement, ASE Connects helps schools build stronger programs and helps shops develop a more consistent, local source of future technicians. Learn more:
"Because he's so close to the next generation of technicians, Don has spent a lot of time thinking about what it takes not only to bring people into the industry but keep them here. In this conversation I'm going to dig into his perspective on technician retention, the ideas he's been developing around it and what shop leaders can take away as they think about keeping great people on their teams."
Retention just means keeping good workers from quitting. In auto shops, that can depend on things like training, support, and whether the job feels like a career.
Technician retention is the challenge of keeping trained automotive techs working at a shop rather than leaving for another employer or industry. It’s often tied to pay, training quality, mentorship, workload, and career growth.
"Yeah. The electronics training really helped me out and, you know, to think of back when we called it, General Motors called it, the second generation was C3, computer-controlled carburetor to the massive, you know, internet type systems that we have integrated with everything in the car."
General Motors is one of the big car companies. Here, they’re mentioned because they used a name for a stage of technology as cars started getting computers.
General Motors (GM) is referenced as the company that used the C3 “generation” label for evolving vehicle technology. GM is a major automaker whose history includes early adoption of electronic engine controls.
"Okay, so how I got to education, I spent 35 years
in GM dealerships and my wife came to work for the school system..."
“GM” is short for General Motors, a big car company. Working in GM dealerships usually means you’re dealing with their brand standards, tools, and training programs.
“GM” refers to General Motors, one of the largest automakers in the U.S. Mentioning GM dealerships signals the speaker’s background working within a major OEM’s dealer network and training ecosystem.
"Oh, sure. Yeah, sure did. I helped mentor quite a few of the young guys that we hired,"
Mentoring in a shop context means experienced technicians guiding newer hires—helping them learn procedures, avoid mistakes, and build confidence. In technician retention discussions, mentoring is often a key factor because it reduces early-career frustration and accelerates competence.
"trying to get them, you know, up to the the rank of journeyman, you know, from being just out of high school."
A “journeyman” is basically a more experienced, fully trained technician. It means they can do the job well on their own, not just follow instructions.
“Journeyman” is a trade credential meaning a technician has reached a higher level of skill and independence than an entry-level worker. In automotive shops, it’s often the goal of structured training and mentorship so new techs can perform repairs reliably without constant supervision.
"I have two shops that have a really good mentor program, and they don't have a retention problem. What they have is an expansion problem..."
Retention just means keeping employees. If a shop has a retention problem, people don’t stay long enough to build experience.
A retention problem means technicians leave the shop or industry faster than the shop can hire and train replacements. The segment contrasts shops with strong mentor programs (no retention issue) versus shops that churn through entry-level workers.
"...the longer you keep somebody, the better they get, and the better, you know, the higher customer satisfaction goes."
Customer satisfaction is how happy customers are with the service they got. The idea here is that better-trained, more experienced techs lead to better results for customers.
Customer satisfaction is the perceived quality of service from the customer’s perspective—often influenced by repair accuracy, communication, turnaround time, and professionalism. The speaker ties technician retention and skill growth to better customer satisfaction outcomes.
"...it really, it really has a lot to do with I think with customer satisfaction. And then in turn, with repeat sales after that."
Repeat sales means customers return for additional work after their first visit. The segment suggests that higher customer satisfaction leads to more repeat business, which reinforces the business case for investing in mentorship and retention.
"I think some of the issues we have with, and, you know, my buddy, George
Aaron, I'll give him a shout out from ASE, talks about eating our young and how we are really,
really guilty of that as an industry."
ASE is a well-known organization that certifies auto technicians. People bring it up because it represents recognized training and professional standards.
ASE (Automotive Service Excellence) is a major U.S. certification organization for automotive technicians. When someone references ASE, they’re usually talking about training standards, credentialing, and workforce development in the industry.
"So let's start with recruiting and hiring. What is different about what you're talking about with recruiting and hiring versus what you actually see being done in shops?"
Recruiting and hiring is how a shop finds new people and chooses who gets the job. The point here is that the interview should help you pick someone who can actually handle the work.
In this context, recruiting and hiring refers to how dealerships/shops find candidates and decide who to bring on. The speaker emphasizes that the hiring process needs to better predict whether someone can handle dealership-level work demands.
"Well, there were times where I saw the big need to get a lube tech. You know, we were shorthanded, you know, at the dealership and a kid would walk in and he had an interview that was maybe less than five minutes long."
A lube tech is usually the entry-level shop job that starts with quick maintenance work, like oil changes. It’s often the first step before someone can do bigger repairs.
A “lube tech” is an entry-level technician role focused on quick service tasks like oil changes and basic lubrication. In many dealerships, it’s often the first step before moving into more advanced diagnostic and repair work.
"And I think that has led to a lot of attrition in our industry. And I think a lot of it has come from the, the point of being desperate, right?"
Attrition means people quit or don’t stay. Here, it’s about new techs leaving the industry early, often before they’re fully trained.
Attrition is when people leave a job or industry over time. In this context, the hosts are talking about early drop-off of new technicians before they become established.
"But I've got kids who come in, and they can't identify a flat blade screwdriver from a pair of pliers literally."
A flat blade screwdriver is the common screwdriver with a straight tip. The host is saying some students can’t tell basic tools apart yet.
A flat blade screwdriver is a basic hand tool used to drive screws with a straight (flat) slot. The speaker uses it to show how some new trainees lack even fundamental tool identification.
"Building relationships with local shops takes time, and knowing who's willing to help isn't always clear. ASC Connects, in partnership with Wrenchway, brings schools and industry together on one easy online platform"
ASC Connects is a website that helps schools and local auto businesses work together. It makes it easier to set up things like tours, speakers, and even student job leads.
ASC Connects is an online platform aimed at connecting schools with automotive industry partners. It helps programs coordinate resources like guest speakers, shop tours, and student job opportunities in one place.
"At the heart of ASC Connects is School Assist, the online resource that lets you post exactly what your program needs. From guest speakers, shop tours, tools... shops can see your requests and respond directly"
School Assist is the part of the platform where schools can list what they need. Then local shops can see it and offer help.
School Assist is described as the core online resource within ASC Connects. It lets schools post specific needs—like tools, shop tours, and guest speakers—so industry partners can respond directly.
"maybe eighth grade do the RC cars because, you know, if you drive them like you're mad at them, they break and, you know, you got to fix them and everything else."
RC cars are toy cars you drive with a remote. They’re useful for learning because you can crash or wear them out, then practice fixing them and understanding how they work.
RC cars (radio-controlled cars) are small remote-controlled vehicles. In training, they’re often used to teach hands-on troubleshooting and basic vehicle dynamics because they break and need repair, just like real cars.
"some basic stuff with tools and everything and how suspension works and maybe a little bit of the electric drivetrain, how that works."
Suspension is what helps the wheels stay in contact with the road and smooths out bumps. If you understand it, you can better diagnose handling problems and worn tires.
Suspension is the system that connects a car’s wheels to its body and controls ride comfort and handling. Learning how suspension works helps technicians understand alignment, tire wear, and how bumps translate into vehicle behavior.
"getting getting a student like that exposed to some of the the service information or some of the, you know, I'm just thinking of ways that to stoke that brain in curiosity"
Service information is the official “how to fix it” documentation for a car. It helps technicians diagnose problems the right way instead of guessing.
Service information refers to manufacturer repair manuals, wiring diagrams, diagnostic procedures, and technical bulletins used to fix vehicles correctly. Exposing students to service information helps them learn the real workflow technicians follow during diagnosis and repair.
"Yeah, you know, back in the day, when I grew up, it was messing around, maybe putting a cam in, playing around with the carburetor, the ignition timing..."
A cam is part of the engine that controls when the valves open and close. Changing it can change where the engine makes power.
A cam (camshaft) swap changes valve timing and lift characteristics, which can significantly affect powerband and engine behavior. It’s a classic performance mod that changes how the engine breathes.
"...playing around with the carburetor, the ignition timing, you know, maybe a higher stall converter."
Ignition timing is when the spark happens in the engine cycle. Changing it can make the engine feel stronger, but too much can cause knocking.
Ignition timing is when the spark plug fires relative to engine position. Advancing or retarding timing can change power, efficiency, and knock risk, so it’s typically tuned carefully.
"They go and kind of earn their stripes in that lube rack... you almost have to prove yourself to get into that program. And it's got such a good reputation..."
The speakers describe a structured progression where technicians start with basic tasks and then “prove” themselves to enter a more advanced program. This is essentially a staged training pipeline designed to build competence and motivation.
"This week's episode of Beyond the Wrenches brought to us by Jasper Engines and Transmissions. Okay, your customer's engine or transmission has failed..."
Jasper is a company that rebuilds and sells replacement engine and transmission parts. In this ad, they’re saying customers can replace a failed drivetrain component without buying a whole new vehicle.
Jasper Engines and Transmissions is a remanufacturer that supplies rebuilt powertrain components such as engines and transmissions. The brand is central here because the episode sponsor is promoting remanufactured drivetrain replacements instead of vehicle trade-ins.
"there's a pretty good case to be made for replacing a drivetrain component that has failed or is delivering poor performance."
The drivetrain is what helps power get from the engine to the wheels. If a part of that system fails or doesn’t work well, the sponsor says it can be replaced instead of replacing the whole car.
A drivetrain component is part of the power delivery system—commonly the engine, transmission, and related assemblies. The segment uses this term to broaden the conversation beyond just “engine” to other failed or underperforming drivetrain parts.
"So, yes, I love, love, love that point. Yeah, there's definitely a gap in that. I tell them a lot of times when I visit, it's like,"
The “gap” is the difference between school training and what a shop needs. The goal is to close that gap so new techs can ramp up faster.
The “gap” refers to the mismatch between what schools teach and what shops need for day-one productivity. The speaker frames it as a common issue that can be reduced through mentorship, onboarding, and curriculum alignment.
"...they can do GM training, they can do Ford training, Hyundai has training available, Navistar has training available and every once in a while you get a kid that's really hot..."
Ford training means learning how to work on Ford cars the way Ford wants. It usually makes troubleshooting and repairs more consistent.
Ford training is manufacturer-specific education for working on Ford vehicles. It typically focuses on Ford’s diagnostic flow, service procedures, and how Ford expects repairs to be performed.
"...because we're ASC accredited, they can do GM training, they can do Ford training, Hyundai has training available, Navistar has training available and every once in a while you get a kid that's really hot..."
GM training is GM’s own instruction for working on their cars. It helps new techs learn the right way to diagnose and fix GM vehicles.
GM training refers to manufacturer-specific technician education for General Motors vehicles. These programs often cover brand systems, diagnostic procedures, and service standards that can speed up onboarding for new hires.
"...they can do GM training, they can do Ford training, Hyundai has training available, Navistar has training available and every once in a while you get a kid that's really hot..."
Hyundai training is Hyundai’s way of teaching technicians how to fix their cars. It helps new techs learn the correct steps instead of guessing.
Hyundai training available indicates access to Hyundai’s technician education resources. Manufacturer training can be especially valuable for newer techs because it standardizes how to handle Hyundai-specific systems and diagnostics.
"Now, the fifth thing that you've got here is one that I think is so important, which is financial education. And something I don't think we do much of in our industry at all."
They’re saying new techs need basic money skills, not just wrench skills. It helps them avoid buying expensive stuff too soon and getting stuck in debt.
The episode emphasizes financial education as a key part of training new technicians. The goal is to help techs understand budgeting and avoid overspending early in their career.
"...suggested, but whether they're going to check out a Dave Ramsey class or read a Dave Ramsey book..."
Dave Ramsey is a personal-finance educator whose programs and books focus on budgeting, debt payoff, and building savings. Mentioning him highlights the podcast’s theme of using structured financial education to support retention.
"So he says, all right, grandma's going to be done driving. So it was a 1970 Ford Maverick with a 170 straight six in it, and that car maxed out at 70 miles an hour."
A 1970 Ford Maverick is an older Ford compact car. The guest is saying this was the first car he owned and he remembers its engine and speed limits.
The 1970 Ford Maverick is a compact car from Ford’s late-60s/early-70s lineup. In this story, it’s notable because the speaker describes the specific engine and how it performed on the road.
"Speaking of Wrenchway, Beyond the Wrench is managed and produced by the Wrenchway team. Wrenchway is dedicated to promoting and improving careers in the automotive, diesel and collision industries."
Wrenchway is the group that runs this podcast. They focus on helping people build careers in car repair and related fields, and they also support shops and dealerships with useful information.
Wrenchway is the organization behind the podcast, focused on improving careers in the automotive, diesel, and collision industries. In this episode, they’re also described as managing and producing the show, and providing resources to help grow the technician workforce.
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I put stickers on my desk to remind me that I'm here to create an opportunity for both students
and local business owners and my job is try to get them connected.
Beyond the Wrench with Jay Gananan from Wrenchway.
Welcome back to Beyond the Wrench. My name is Jay Gananan and I am your host.
On today's episode we're joined by Don Favors. Don is an automotive technology teacher
who spends his days working with students that are preparing to enter the automotive industry.
Because he's so close to the next generation of technicians, Don has spent a lot of time
thinking about what it takes not only to bring people into the industry but keep them here.
In this conversation I'm going to dig into his perspective on technician retention,
the ideas he's been developing around it and what shop leaders can take away as they think
about keeping great people on their teams. Don, welcome to the show. How are you?
I'm doing great. Thanks Jay for having me.
Good. So where are you joining us from?
I'm joining you from Lowell, Indiana so I like to think of it as we're at the part where the
suburbs of Chicago in and the cornfields begin. So we're the first school that has an ag department
as you leave Chicago and Northwest Indiana heading south towards Indy.
Nice. Were you raised in that area?
Yeah, we're close enough to get to Chicago where if we need to go it's like 45 minutes away
with the expressway but we're just far enough away where we don't have to deal with that urban
problems that they have sometimes.
Nice. Is that where you were raised at? Was that area?
Pretty close. I grew up about 25 miles straight west of this so it's pretty much the same kind
of country where I was from. Yeah. Oh, really, really cool. So how did you get into this crazy
world that is automotive? Well, interesting story. When I was 15 my brother died in a
motorcycle accident and I inherited his automotive tool set. He had it in high school and he went
to auto shop and so I inherited this real small Mac tool box full of just the basics and my brother
in law worked for a lawn mower shop, big distribution center with the repair shop.
He says, you get your license, you're going to come to work there. So I started to work on
lawn mowers and I've worked on everything from weed whackers up to international trans stars
through my career. The craziest thing was a gas powered surfboard. I tell the kids about that.
They find that interesting. So I've had a little bit of everything when I was in high school. What
I did was computers were coming out. I took computer science. I learned about programming.
We had a year long electronics class in high school. So I started my college degree with
computer science at Southern Illinois and I found out that it wasn't quite for me. It just,
it wasn't a good fit. I didn't like working in the office, seeing so much. So I researched
what's going to be the best thing to combine my mechanical skills with my electronics knowledge
and with some research with some of the federal information that was out there. I learned that
cars were coming out with computerization and I happened to be at a school that has a great auto
program and it just, it just, you know, expanded from there. Wow. And who would have thought
from then to now, the advancements in technology and really even how you started off your education
is becoming pretty prevalent in everything that we do on a day-to-day basis.
Yeah. The electronics training really helped me out and, you know, to think of back when we called
it, General Motors called it, the second generation was C3, computer-controlled carburetor to the
massive, you know, internet type systems that we have integrated with everything in the car.
It has been quite a ride. You know, I've seen so much technology and I tell the kids, I said,
and you're a generation, even with everything that I've seen, I said, you were going to see some
crazy innovation with the cars over this next decade. Yeah. And it feels like on a day-to-day
basis right now, you're seeing some new level of technology introduced into our world and
you're absolutely right. It's going to just continue to get crazier and crazier and crazier.
Now, after you got into the industry, how did you kind of take that trip to end up in education?
Like, what was it that led you that direction? Okay, so how I got to education, I spent 35 years
in GM dealerships and my wife came to work for the school system and she worked in the central
office with the administrators and, of course, you attend events with, you know, the district
superintendent and director of curriculum and they were always like, when are we going to get
you to come to work for the school system? I'm like, hey, you can't afford me and I need the
money. I've got three kids. You know, my auto insurance payment is more than my house payment
right now. I can't afford to go down to a teacher's salary. Well, you know, 25 years goes by and then
pretty soon the job opens up again. And my wife, she didn't ask, she told me you're applying this
time. You know, so here I am at education. But there was always one thing that passed me out.
They kind of hinted around before I left college that, you know, maybe it's something you want to
stick around for and teach here at the university. But at that time, it just didn't work out. We
wanted to move back home to be with family. So I was always that one job that just kind of alluded
you that you always, you always wondered in the back of your mind, what would have been like if
I would, you know, maybe you applied for that job and got it. But you know, my road that path is,
is what it is. And it's been really interesting teaching high school kids. And I've created a
really good program. I put stickers on my desk to remind me that I'm here to create an opportunity
for both students and local business owners. And my job is trying to get them connected, you know,
to try to fill those empty slots. Oh, and we'll dive really deep into that over the course of the
show. But I do have to, I wonder, as I'm talking to you, you had 35 years in dealerships, that is
some patience to wait for that job that you kind of had really maybe that that interest in. And
you know, I in talking to you just get the sense that you would, you'd be great,
a great teacher in general. Did you feel that when you were in the shop? Like,
it was that something that maybe you were helping out with some of the younger techs in the shop?
Or did you use some of those, those qualities that make you a great teacher while you were in the
shop? Oh, sure. Yeah, sure did. I helped mentor quite a few of the young guys that we hired,
trying to get them, you know, up to the the rank of journeyman, you know, from being just out of
high school. And it's just, I'm just somebody who naturally just tries to help out. If I see
somebody struggling, and I've got the answer for it, I'm not going to just walk right on by. I mean,
there's there's no gain to be had by watching somebody struggle if you've got a quick easy
answer for it. I guess some people want to call it a team player or whatnot. But it's like it's
if I can see an avenue to help somebody, that's just what I try to do.
Well, and I think that's what we see from the best mentors and shops and we'll dive right into
this side of what you're talking about. Because I think, you know, we talk a lot in our industry
about how how important mentorship is and making sure that when we put a young person in our shop
that we don't just throw them to the wolves, which I think a lot of times our industry has done over
the years and it doesn't doesn't end up in that that young person succeeding in our industry. And,
you know, the power of a good mentor and somebody that wants to truly help you out is is invaluable.
It really, really is. And I feel like our industry maybe lacks that a little bit. There are some
great mentors in our industry do not get me wrong. But there are also a lot of shops that
just kind of miss that part, aren't there? I mean, it feels like there's there's a lack of mentors
across the industry. That's true. And as I go around and make connections throughout the year
with the different shops locally, I have two shops that have a really good mentor program,
and they don't have a retention problem. What they have is an expansion problem,
as they increase in the market share, because they're, you know, in part because of the service
department improvements, the longer you keep somebody, the better they get, and the better,
you know, the higher customer satisfaction goes. And then you have the flip side of that,
you have the dealerships that grind through entry level tax, and they're in and out and gone at no
time, you know, and they're calling for more. And I'm like, you just got a good kid, and you just
ground them out, you know, you just chew them up. So yeah, it really, it really has a lot to do with
I think with customer satisfaction. And then in turn, with repeat sales after that.
Yeah, I couldn't agree more. And that, you know, I think leads us really nicely into, and I don't
want to skip steps on your pathway to retention, because I think it's really important to kind
of talk through what you're building here. But as, as I'm looking at this, and I kind of view it as
almost like a white paper, and there's a lot of information in there, as I read through it.
What, what made you want to write out a plan for a path to retention? Because I read through it,
it's very detailed, very, very good information in it. But what was the driving factor to say,
hey, I'm going to spend all this time writing this out?
That's, that's, that's interesting. It's something that was more of a feeling at first. But I think
the feeling was, is I'm training these kids up, and putting them in jobs only to watch them get
ground up and spit out. So it's like, what can I do to get some information out there to increase
that, you know, that two year failure rate of approximately 50%. I think it's getting a little
bit better. I think we're down into the, maybe the lower 40s in the auto sector. But it's something
it's like, it, I felt like if I'm working so hard to try and train these kids up, if they're not
doing their side on the business side of it, if there's something that I can do to try to
help that situation out, then why not? You know, if not me, then who is kind of the question?
Yeah. And I think I'm going to lay out the five steps here. So then we can kind of go through
each one and talk a little bit about each one. Because I think it's really smart. I couldn't
agree more with you. I think some of the issues we have with, and, you know, my buddy, George
Aaron, I'll give him a shout out from ASE, talks about eating our young and how we are really,
really guilty of that as an industry. And in order for us to kind of change our luck, we need to
attack this a little better, right? We need to take this a little bit more seriously. And the
five steps you have laid out, the first one being recruiting and hiring, second connecting with local
secondary and post-secondary education. The third is an entry level new hire startup.
The fourth step is structured mentorship program. So I kind of skipped ahead there a little bit,
but we'll talk a little bit more about that. And then the fifth step and one that I think is really
underrated is that financial education piece. I do think this has a big weight on a young person
or carries a big weight on a young person that might force them to look in a different direction.
So let's start with recruiting and hiring. What is different about what you're talking about with
recruiting and hiring versus what you actually see being done in shops? Well, there were times
where I saw the big need to get a lube tech. You know, we were shorthanded, you know, at the
dealership and a kid would walk in and he had an interview that was maybe less than five minutes
long. And next thing you know, he's rolling in, you know, some set of tools and here you go,
train them up and it's like, okay. So you try to quickly assess the kid and help him out, you know,
and watch this and, you know, and then in a couple of days we'll have you start working on your own.
But so many of those kids just didn't make it. We didn't do a good enough
venting or interview process asking thorough enough questions to see if they were in fact even
capable of working at a high level, you know, at a dealership. So they weren't capable of handling
that stress or the accuracy that was required at a setting like that. So there was no amount of
help that was going to get them if they didn't want to train themselves as well. Also, it just
wasn't a good fit. And the old saying that I had, you know, read and heard several times was,
it's not enough to get somebody on the bus, you got to get the right person on the bus.
And even that's not good enough, you got to get the right person on the right bus and in the right
seat, you know. So that was one of the things that I thought if we could improve upon that initial
interview process with different style of questions, even going to the extent of maybe just
having them do a simple test to see what their basic skills are, you know, not all auto programs
are at a high level and not every student, you know, graduates with an A, you know,
I have some kids that are excellent, they go out and they just kill it, you know,
they just do a fantastic job. And I have some kids that, you know, they're high school kids,
they just kind of lazily go through and, you know, when they're done, if they can't find anything
else, they think, well, you know, there's an open job for a loop tech, I'll go give it a shot.
And it's like, well, okay, but not quite for sure if you're going to be able to handle that
or not, but good luck. I think you're spot on. And this is something I've talked a lot about where
we spend so little time in the process up front to understand if a student is
the right fit for our shop. And I think that has led to a lot of attrition in our industry. And
I think a lot of it has come from the, the point of being desperate, right? A lot of shops are
desperate to find people to come into their shops. And as soon as they, as soon as they hear from
somebody that's interested in the industry, they sign them up, let's bring them in and let's,
let's throw them on our path, which a lot of times that path is throw them out in the shop and say,
good luck. And that doesn't work out very well. And so I love the fact that you have taken the
time to think through that piece of it, because I think a lot of shops could learn from that. And
for you shops that are out there, this is an excellent opportunity to learn from an educator
that spent a lot of time in your shoes to be able to actually take it seriously. And I,
I always talk about how one of the more heartbreaking things that I see in our industry is that,
that early stage attrition, because it's not just the fact that they, they aren't going to stick
around in the industry. A lot of times they went and spent lots of money on education. They spent
lots of money on tools. They spent a lot of money on a lot of things that had they known that this
wasn't going to be a good fit for them, that they probably wouldn't have and now have put themselves
in a worse position starting off their lives. And I think we're doing a disservice to those folks,
right? That that really, we need to be a little bit more candid with them. We need to be a little
bit more diligent upfront. And just because somebody shows some level of interest in our shop,
doesn't necessarily mean they're a good fit. And sometimes I don't think we take it seriously
enough, right? If it's a young person coming in our shop doors, we treat it differently a lot of
times. And if we were to hire a more experienced technician. But if you think about the amount
of time, effort, money, everything, all the amount of effort in general that goes into a young person
and getting them to be a good technician for you, it's a lot. And if you don't take that seriously,
you're going to waste a lot of time, money, effort and end up even more frustrated at
the end if you don't take it a little bit more seriously. Yeah, the cost of training up the
tech is just incredibly high anymore. And it's just it's one of the things I would like to see
probably improve is the ability to get some part time experience for these kids before they make a
huge decision like that. So a lot of times I try to get the kids, you know, even if it's on a wash
rack, because that's normally open later in the evening, at least they get to see to see what's
going on in the shop and get a little bit of a view of some of that. And they get a little taste
of interacting with everybody. But yeah, it's definitely I sure like like to see it where they
before spending just an incredible amount of money on everything that they that they have
something to base that decision on. But what I get coming into the into my classroom is this,
if I get a kid who's whose dad works on stuff, maybe he's a farmer and they work on the equipment
and the tractors and everything else. Or if his dad's in some kind of a repair business or that,
they come in, it's like a breath of fresh air. They know what tools are. But I've got kids who
come in, and they can't identify a flat blade screwdriver from a pair of pliers literally.
And we're going to take them, we're going to get them a lot of knowledge. We can get them some
minor amount of experience with the amount of time that I have them. But that's the thing that
they really lack is they have this raw knowledge, but they don't, you know, they don't have that
hands on experience. It's not, you know, when I was like nine, nine or 10, my brother-in-law got me
a little mini bike, and I rode that thing like I was mad at it all the time. And of course,
you break it and dad says, fine, I'm tired of fixing it, you fix it, you know, if you want to
keep riding, then that's kind of like how it kind of like starts with a lot of kids that start early
on. But we've made the car so complicated, Dad's don't even pop the hood anymore. You know, so
they're not getting to see any repair done at home. I'm the kid that had to hold the flashlight
while dad was bleeding brakes, you know, and I'm pumping the pedal and stuff like that. You know,
I came up from that era. If you're an automotive diesel or collision instructor,
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Are there opportunities for a young person to be able to tear into things without,
you know, the threat of potentially ruining it and not being able to drive home
their own vehicle or something like that? I just feel like there is something missing there.
And maybe, you know, you look to like Legos. I know I've got a nine-year-old son who loves Legos,
loves tinkering with Legos, and then, you know, almost a stair-step approach to a little bit of
then you start to introduce some mechanical things and really trying to get them to understand
how things work. But there are times where even like modern-day lawnmowers aren't as basic as they
used to be, right, where you can just tear into them and try to learn some things. Where do you
see opportunities for a young person to kind of learn and discover and just be curious? Sure.
You know, I remember also, you know, as a kid, putting together the revel cars, you know,
classic cars. Yes, I thought about maybe doing something like that over at the middle school
as a club activity for however many weeks it takes to put one of those together anymore.
And then either that or see if I can get some contributions from some of the local businesses
to do maybe an RC car club or do both, you know, maybe have the kit cars for seventh grade and
maybe eighth grade do the RC cars because, you know, if you drive them like you're mad at them,
they break and, you know, you got to fix them and everything else. So they'll learn, you know,
some basic stuff with tools and everything and how suspension works and maybe a little bit of
the electric drivetrain, how that works. So that's something I've been kind of playing around with,
but I quite frankly don't have the money or the time currently to do that. So that's something
that, you know, whenever I do retire, maybe it's something I try to, you know, do some volunteer
work with with the school to try to help feed the program. They do have a complex club, but it's
those are more of the STEM students that are probably more gearing more towards an engineering
degree. Those are high level math science kids into middle school, and they normally get put on
track to go into, you know, the college track at the high school. Don't you get the sense that we're
going to need some of those kids in our industry? Like, you know, you think about it, and that's
how when I was raised in this industry, it was, you know, you're kind of a back of classroom kid
that maybe didn't have other paths to go. And I think as as technologically advanced as our
industry is heading, I think we do need to appeal to even more, right? We need more than just the
ones that are mechanically capable, just being able to reach one of those kids or one of those
students and say, Listen, I you want to go down this path. Well, here's a whole bunch of what
you're looking for in your backyard, right? Like this is a lot of a lot of very complicated stuff.
And getting getting a student like that exposed to some of the the service information or some of
the, you know, I'm just thinking of ways that to stoke that brain in curiosity to what we have
to offer, because I do think there's a lot of potential for for a student with that aptitude
to be able to come into our industry and really make some waves. Yeah, I mean, if we could if we
could attract some of the students that are maybe college bound, but maybe they they're going to have
a hard time with the high level math that might be required with something, this this would be a
perfect fit for for some of the kids that are going to go in that could go into this, make a
tremendous amount of money working on the high tech portion of the cars, they really could.
You know, that's kind of like the path that I was that was on is I was in computer science and I
was good at programming. But that that high level math just wasn't going to work out for me either.
But you don't have to do a lot of math working on the car. But that type of analytical thinking
is what gets you into that diagnostic process. And then also that type of memory
can get you the memory of the procedures that once you do a job two or three times, you're
getting to the point where you're going to beat that flat rate time. Yeah, we I just came back
from the vision high tech conference in Kansas City a couple weeks ago, and talking to some of the
technicians there that were going through training, they talked about the importance of, you know,
they're diving into programming, right, they're talking into, they're talking about
some very advanced level stuff. And they had a, we actually just had a teacher on
that will be on another episode of Beyond the Runchier soon, that was working with some software
and being able to program cars and doing some really cool stuff with it. And so, and that was he
ran an HP tuners class down there. And you talk about ways to attract a student that, you know,
really does have that, that ability to think through problems, being able to give them
an HP tuner and being able to tune a car and play with it and kind of see what that does to the
performance. And I just think there the opportunities are endless. And if you can start to stoke that
fire with something that is something they can tinker with, and tinkering looks a little different
now, right? It might look a little different than what it did when we were growing up, where if they
can hop on their computer and, and, you know, screw around with the parameters and be able to
really finely tune their automobile and see the performance results that, that it has almost
instantaneously. I think there's, there's a lot we've gotten this industry to offer that, that
could really get that, that young person thinking differently about a career path going into our
industry. Yeah, you know, back in the day, when I grew up, it was messing around, maybe putting a
cam in, playing around with the carburetor, the ignition timing, you know, maybe a higher stall
converter. And now it's, it's, the kid's going to be looking at, you know, improving the performance,
playing around with the laptop to getting a lot more out of the car. So yeah, the electronics is,
is, is definitely something that could attract some, some higher level thinkers, you know, the,
where they're capable of that analytical thinking and following the details of very precise diagnostic
flow charts, you know. Yeah, yeah, it gets very, very complicated. Now, going back to your, your
five steps, the one last piece I wanted to mention that I really liked about what you had written
out, excuse me, was when you have that initial question, which is ask yourself what position
are you looking for? And you broke it down between, are you actually looking for a lube tech or are
you looking for somebody that could maybe start as a lube tech, but then you want them to grow
through an apprenticeship program? Talk to me about that a little bit and the understanding of
just being able to ask that first question. Sure. I mean, it's, it's, it's something that, that
the interviewer is going to have to try to determine. I mean, what is it that he actually wants?
A lot of these big dealerships or even the smaller ones, they're looking for
to run a quick lube type rack. They have, you know, it's the number one job and most of the
dealerships is the oil chain still. So if they're looking for somebody that's going to be able to
stay on that lube rack permanently and be highly trained just for that, that process, and which
I had, I had some texts that I worked with that were really good on a lube rack. Louis was, you
know, 50 years old and he had two stalls and one was going up and one was coming down and that
would be between 35 and 50 hours a week just on the lube rack, you know. So I mean, if you're looking
for somebody who's going to be, you know, permanently on there, that's fine. You have to be honest
with the interview, but if you're actually looking for somebody who's going to turn into a journeyman,
that would be another story. You know, you could take a kid that maybe only passed a couple of the
entry level ASCs in my class and he's got a pretty good grasp on most everything. He could maybe
make an incredibly successful lube rack tech, but if you're looking for somebody who's passed
every entry level ASC test in class, you know, hammers out work in here, he plans on maybe
going to a local community college and work at the dealership at the same time,
he's got bigger aspirations than staying on the lube rack. He wants, he wants to be a journeyman.
So if you hire him for the lube rack without any thought as to what the next steps are going to
be for that kid, you're not going to keep him and he's going to go someplace who's going to recognize
that. Yeah, I couldn't agree more. And just being able to lay out that path, I do think there are
students that don't mind being on the lube rack as long as they have an idea of what their path is
leading to, right? And if it's the more, the better it's laid out, I always refer back to
Ed Roberts at Bozard four down in Florida, where he's got an excellent system with that where
he is putting them in a lube rack to start off with. And a lot of times they're not even coming
just directly out of school. It could be somebody that had some life experience already and they
wanted to change their path. They go and kind of earn their stripes in that lube rack with the
understanding that we've got a program that you're working your way into, but you almost have to
prove yourself to get into that program. And it's got such a good reputation that I think he's got
a line of people that are trying to constantly get into that program. So,
you know, I think it is just like anybody for young people, especially they want to know what
the path is, they want to know that there is room to grow. And when I say they, I shouldn't put them
all in that bucket, right? There's maybe some that are just happy to go in, put in their time and
leave at the end of the day. But I think for those high achieving students that are looking for that
career path, and even if it's something where they, they're just trying to justify it to their
parents, right? Like, hey, they've got this laid out for me, that might help them sell it to their
family as well. So I think there's a lot of value in what you have to say there.
Yeah, yeah, I remember when I changed from computer science through the auto program,
my mom was not happy with that. And my dad was questioning me, he says, all right, I trust you.
And then I finally one day I told my mom how much I made, she goes, excuse me.
Yeah, mom, I make more than programmers do by a lot, you know, I said, so I'm really good at my
job. But, you know, it was even funny, though, you know, I couldn't get over to take care of my mom's
basic maintenance. So she went to the local quick loot place. And they said, I need this and I need
that. And I said, mom, are you going to trust me? You're gonna trust the loot rack guy. Come on,
I've got two college degrees and in a lifetime in the business, your car's fine. You got 20,000
miles on it, you don't need anything yet. You know, so it's always funny, you know, the parental
pressure and I had a really talented young man that parent teacher conference night, I sent them
an email and said, I'd like to have a double slot for you guys and like to talk to you about, you
know, the potential that this young man has in this business. And they were all really impressed
with everything. But then they were like, but the statistics show that the income level is
capped at about 50. I said, yeah, but that also includes all the loot tax at the quick loot places
and everything else. I said, if you remove that out, I said, your son's within the first five years
is easily going to be a six figure tech. He's going to be able to do that. I said, you have to trust
me. I said, I had made $50,000 a year since I got into the business. I said, he's going to be fine.
So I got him into, you know, the place where I came from and he's just doing fantastic courses.
He's doing all the training. You know, he's got a mentor. He's on track with all the training.
He's part time with the local community college. So he's going to walk away with
his associates degree. So I mean, he's on track to be a highly successful tech.
That stats piece really drives me crazy. We put together a salary tool for Wrenchway where
and as part of this new ASE Connects program, because of that very reason, right? Because if
I were a parent and I was looking at this industry and maybe I didn't have familiarity with it,
and I looked at how low the start, not just the starting salary, but like what the Bureau of
Labor Statistics folks and they laid out the model for us. They were very open. They were very nice.
But when we heard kind of what the model looked like, it really made us question that all together,
right? And how they put that together. So we developed a tool and it's part of our kind of new
data exchange, industry data exchange that I think is really already, we already have school
using it on their site. So we give them the code to be able to put it on their website. And it's
for that very reason right there because we need to give them good information back. We also have
to be realistic in that. I think at times we don't want to overemphasize how much they can make
because we don't want them to come in in that first couple of years and be disappointed when
they're not making six figures right out of school. We want to be honest with them and say,
okay, this is what your potential is. But again, going back to the roadmap and being able to kind
of paint that picture to show them that you can make a really good living with this. And if you're
good, this will pay off tenfold. You'll be in really, really good shape. So I just think the more
we can provide that transparency, especially to parents and just making sure that we're giving them
all that information up front. Because if I looked at it from an outsider's view and in a
perspective where if the top earning folks are the very, I think the way the Bureau of Labor
Statistics says it, is that the top 10% of earners make like 80 grand a year or something. And we're
like, that's not right. Like that is not right at all. But if you're a parent and you see that
along with the tool investment needed, and then you see all the negativity online about our
industry, and that position specifically, I think most parents would be crazy to send their kids
into this industry. So we I think have to take that part really seriously. Yeah, yeah, we've got
that all across the trades. But we've got this fantastic trades building that includes precision
machining, welding and construction. We have other trades as well in the main school building.
But we're always fighting that misperception. And I always tell the parents, I said, look,
I can't guarantee your kid's going to be making six figures in five years. I said, it's going to be
all up to him. If he does the training, he does the work. And he puts in the time, I said, that's
what his potential will be in about five years, working in, you know, the more urban area of
our of our vicinity. And I said, so it's it really comes down to them. So and like,
going back to the the Lubrak tax, I have some kids that they don't think that they want the
stress of being a journeyman tax. So but they like the idea of maybe just being the loop tech.
And so, you know, those positions should be able to, you know, try to get them together and mash
them up. You know, like I said, you know, I had that guy that I worked with that his his two stalls
were, you know, in opposite directions on the constant basis. It can be done where you can
make good money on the Lubrak. I once had a dealer principal tell me he had a loop tech that was
really, really good. And he said that is one of the most key positions in our entire dealership,
because of their ability to do some inspections and their ability to just kind of
have everything kind of run through them in and just basically saying that person touches more
cars than anybody else in the dealership on any given day. And that's a it's a vital,
vital piece to what we do every day. So I there's definitely value in that position for sure.
Yeah, I've always always said that that's three positions that the dealership that
really have a lot of impact is going to be the service advisor, the loop tech and the cashier,
because they have more contact with the customer than anybody else.
Absolutely. Absolutely.
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Now, the second step in your five steps to retention connecting with local secondary and
post-secondary education, how does that lead to more retention?
Okay, so if recruiting the right person, it's going to kind of play into a little bit more
with the recruiting the right person as well, but if the dealer sends somebody down, whether it be
a tech or a service manager or a director to stop in and the kids can see their face, maybe they
do a presentation on new technology of a car or they help out with something in the lab or
like I just had a career day for all of the local auto programs for just the transportation trades,
you know, if they show up to that, the kids recognize their face to get to work with them,
talk with them, interact with them and everything and it just leads to drawing some of our higher
ability students because our competition anymore really isn't from independent to dealer or from
dealer to dealer. Our big competition is and I do this with the tour of our building all the time,
our competition is that whole side of the building with precision machining and welding
and construction and all these other organized unions that have these really polished recruiting
and mentorship programs and that's our competition and I've had some incredible students in the
auto program and they choose something like welding or construction, you know.
Yeah, I had somebody just recently tell me that that they're from an educator standpoint,
they don't view the four-year schools as the competition anymore, they view it as the other
trades, the other skilled trades and I think they're absolutely right that, you know, there are
people that are still obviously going to four-year schools and they should but when you look at that
young person that's got the talent and really going to be in the skilled trades,
you want to make sure it's our skilled trade, right? You want to make sure that they're going
into our world so I think that's a great perspective and one that's very, very real.
That and this generation seems to be for whatever reason, we could blame it on COVID
if you want or the electronics, it doesn't matter what the reason or the cause is,
they have a tendency to be a little bit more introverted but within their group they're very
outgoing with people that they know so if we could get some interaction in the schools
where they actually show up and see some face time then that comfort is raised where they can
approach them and speak to them in a more comfortable manner. I mean also it would be great
if they want a better prepared tech to hit the floor when they get there
to tell us what you actually want us to teach here at the high school or, you know,
college level, trade school, whatever it might be, you know, have some interaction,
show up to the advisory committee meetings and put in your two sounds and tell us what you
really want, otherwise, you know, we're following the ASC program, I got state standards to hit,
I have, you know, dual credit standards I have to hit, I'm trying to hit all that and if you've
got something that you really want us to teach, I need to know what it is. Yeah, and going into
those conversations from an industry perspective, this is something I've always taken pride in
being able to do and going into a school is just being able to give feedback of what a
current day shop looks like, right, and being able to help, I think, get on the same page as the
school because if you know what they're teaching and you are working toward our next point, which is
going to be some of that mentorship and that really, that onboarding from an early stage,
you haven't stated as entry level, new, higher startup, but if you're on the same page there
and you know, hey, the school is going to bring that student up to this point,
this is where the shop needs to take them and really start to kind of build on that and not,
I think at times, even out of high school programs, you'll get shops that just because a
student went through an automotive program thinks they're going to walk in their doors and light
the world on fire right off the bat and you're like, no, this tells me you have not spent any
time in a school because I don't know any educators that are saying, we're giving you
polished A level technicians out of school, and if they are, I'd probably question them, but I think
that's the impact of being involved in the schools. You understand what the school is teaching and
what level they're getting them to and then hopefully then the shop is taking them from
that stage and building them up from there. So, yes, I love, love, love that point.
Yeah, there's definitely a gap in that. I tell them a lot of times when I visit, it's like,
wait a second, I don't have kids eight hours a day. At best, there are days where I get them for
two, sometimes an hour and a half and sometimes just for 45 minutes. So the amount that I can
actually pack in on these days with this spotty schedule of trying to fit in hands on, you know,
some larger things on the two hour days and maybe cover a chapter on a 45 minute day,
it's really difficult trying to put it all together and trying to get a kid who's job ready.
You know, our kids even have the ability to do, because we're ASC accredited,
they can do GM training, they can do Ford training, Hyundai has training available,
Navistar has training available and every once in a while you get a kid that's
really hot and going into one particular brand and they'll take advantage of it,
but it's difficult to get the kid to jump into doing extra work on top of everything else because
you got to remember, they got to do language arts, they got a science class, they've got other classes
that they're doing and then on top of that, they're still high school kids. You know,
what are they going to do this weekend when they all get together? That's the thing, you know.
Couldn't agree more. Now, let's talk through that third step a little bit in a little bit
more detail because the onboarding piece and as I mentioned, the entry level new higher startup
as you have it phrased, I think is something a lot of shops just straight up miss on, right?
Like they just, they really, really struggle with this piece. What are your thoughts on that side?
Yeah, I always, I thought of this based on, you know, every time I moved up, you know, I did some
gas station work back when they still had stalls at the gas station whenever I was in college.
And then when I got out of college, I started out at a dealership and there was seven texts there.
So, I mean, it was kind of a small shop compared to some, but that was moving up such a big level
from working at a gas station was very intimidating. And once again, even though I was ASC master tech
and I'd been working on cars for a couple of years, I couldn't have felt more stupid if I had to.
And of course, the guys on the first day, they're busting my chops right off the get go in the first,
you know, two hours that I'm there. Of course, I'd been in shops since I was 16. So it was no big
deal. And I gave it back to them in the afternoon and they're like, all right, kid, you might just
make it, you know, even though I was 24, you know, you're the kid because you know, but it's, and then,
of course, when I went to the really big dealership, it was very intimidating going around, you meet
everybody. Of course, you can't remember anybody's names and then you go into the parts department.
It's the biggest parts department in, you know, Northwest Indiana, and there's, you know,
eight guys in there. And it's just like, you can't remember anybody's names. It's just so intimidating
getting into a situation like that. And if we could just simply get them through the first few days,
have an easier onboarding process, where they just basically job shadow, maybe a senior tech,
before they move on to doing a job shadow on the Lou Brack, just slow that process down
just a little bit, make them feel like they're part of the group before, you know, you say,
okay, it's time to start cranking out some work. Oh, I love that. And I would add there,
if you can get them a chance to sit with a service advisor, service writer, and maybe even the
service manager, and really try to build that relationship early, I think that you're going to
have even more familiarity with what the front office is doing in a comfort level. I think we
all remember when we were young and starting out, like how intimidating it was to maybe talk to a
manager and, and even just feel comfortable around them, right? A lot of times you're, you're almost
sweating from just having that conversation. And at least that was my experience. And I,
I think you could do a lot to kind of relax that a little bit, right, to where it is them
understanding, hey, this is just a person and you can have a good conversation with them and,
and probably learn some things from them. Right. My transportation trades day, you know, the,
the career fair just for transportation with the other schools, and had the different speakers
come up and interviewed them this year, a little bit of a different format for the round table.
And basically, I would tell them, look, this person was sitting in your shoes, albeit a long
time ago, but they get up in the morning and put their pants on one leg at a time, just like you
do. So, but the problem is they probably eat breakfast before they go to, you know, the work.
And I said, you guys roll out, put your pants on and come straight to school.
And I said, but they're just regular people. They're just regular people. And you just got
to talk to them. And I said, don't be intimidated. I said, they're more than happy to talk to you
and ask them questions. And I said, ask, ask them all this, how'd you get started? What was your
path? You know, tell me what it was like when you got going into business. And, and so that was
the theme this year was like the first, first two years, you know, what was it like when you got
going and what did you do to move up, you know? Yeah. And it's, I'm sure for anybody that gets
asked that in a shop atmosphere is probably feels pretty good that somebody wants to know how you
got to where you're going. And, you know, I think the, the, the one key element that I would mention
there is you have to make sure when they're going in and maybe this can lead really nicely into the
four step, which is the mentorship side is making sure you're getting with the right people in the
shop, right? Because there can be people in our shops that will tell that young person do not come
into this industry. We don't want you in this like, like you shouldn't come into this industry.
We hear that story all the time from young people, right? Like they'll go into a shop and, you know,
you've got that kind of old grumpy guy sitting in the corner that's just complaining about everything
and telling the young person like run as fast as you can. And, you know, I, there are reasons
some of those more experienced texts have that to say and some of them are, are, you know,
rightful in what they're saying. Maybe they haven't been treated the best over the course of their
career, but I've seen way too many good technicians over the years that love their job that just don't
speak, you know, on a public forum about it. And when you talk about mentorship, I just think
that part is really, really key is to make sure that they find the right mentor and somebody
that's going to encourage them and help them understand the industry and not just, not just
put down the industry because it's, that's just miserable to be around. Yeah, I worked with one
guy who was, who was excellent at teaching these young men who had some good quality skills on how
to get out the door. And it's just like, man, he is so good at just getting these kids to leave.
He just, he should just be put in a corner. He's a really good tech. He just shouldn't
interact with the young, with the young people that come in. But I, I really drill it into
these kids. I said, look, these guys are just professionals at complaining. They can really
fix cars. So there's a place for them in the business. I said, but their level to complain
about everything is like a 12 on a scale to 10. I said, what you need to ask them if they're
complaining so much is, is ask them, how's that house? How's that second house that you have that
maybe the one that's on the lake or your boat or your car that only comes out on shine, you know,
sunshine days. I said, these guys are doing really well. They're just good at complaining.
And you just have to look past that. I said, so that's, that comes into like the sarcasm training
that we try to give here in our trades building. One teacher calls it the building of truth and
sarcasm. So I call it my, my program as a three year program. So if, if when you're in the first
year, it's sarcasm 101. And then if you graduate to the second year, you get sarcasm, you know,
second 200 level. And then if you got me for three years, I tell them, if you got me for three years,
if your feelings can get hurt, I have not done my job. I said, you just, you know,
it's a different environment working in there. I said, nobody cares about your feelings. I said,
they're just, you know, it's just words. So you just go out, do your job and make your money.
I said, there's nothing wrong with it. I said, these guys are just really good at complaining.
I could not love that anymore. And the sarcasm piece, I think relates so much with
young people and anybody, like if you can get them to loosen up and kind of get that, that
sarcasm, it just makes everything way more fun. And, and yeah, I, I know my dad had a sign,
this tells you how I was raised, which was he had a sign out of his own shop, like he's,
he's got his own kind of hobby shop and that he has on the side. And he's got a
some cartoon from something way back when that said, I want you to know that someone cares.
And then it goes below and it says, it's not me, but somebody probably does.
It's something like that. So, yeah, that sarcasm runs deep in my bloodline for sure.
Yeah. So, I mean, we have to train them for the environment that they're going to go into.
And not everything is politically correct out there. And we just have to understand that.
And until the kids I said, look, one of these days, it's going to be you given the kid,
you know, a little bit of a hard time. You know, when I was 16, at the lawnmower shop,
probably one of the smartest mechanical minds I've ever worked with in all my years.
But anytime I would mess up, he goes kids these days, you give him books, you send him to school,
you teach him everything you know, and then he looks at you and goes, and this is what you get,
you know. Come on, I'm trying, I'm trying. You know, I probably heard that probably 50 times
that summer, but it was like, you know, sooner or later, you just, you just learned.
Well, I think there's value in understanding how to take that sarcasm too, right? Where if you're
that young person in a shop, don't take it too personally, like you'll hear some of that stuff
from time to time. And they say you've got to have thick skin. I think it's more so just like
understanding people's personalities. And when you're young, maybe you haven't seen all of those
different personalities yet. And, you know, people have different humor and different
ways of going about things. And if you understand that and kind of roll with the punches, I think
you're going to be a lot happier, you're going to let things go a lot easier. And I do think
that's really important. Now, the fifth thing that you've got here is one that I think is
so important, which is financial education. And something I don't think we do much of in our
industry at all. But walking through that, why is that important to you? Oh, man, I can't tell you
how many times I've seen a loop tech start, you know, and after 30 or 60, 90 days of being there,
he's got about enough tools that you could you could hold like this in your arms. And the next
thing you know, he's coming off, he's coming off the tool truck, and he's got this massive roll
cabinet, you know, he doesn't even have enough tools to fill one drawer of it, you know, and I'm
like, Oh, dude, why are you doing that? You're not going to have anything left. All your money's
going to go to pay for the toolbox. I said, How many times have I told you the toolbox doesn't
earn you any money? Which I kind of reformulated that because we had all of our tools ripped off
at the dealership on time. I'm like, All right, the toolbox has to keep tools in the box.
But it doesn't earn you any money other than the fact that it's going to organize and keep them in
your box. You need tools first, you know, and and and so now they're buried and they're like, I'm not
making any money. You're making money, but you're spending too much money. And I can't tell you how
you earn, you know, flat rate times and and everything else. But I didn't have a savings
account. And once I to speak of to compensate for those bad weeks. And so, you know, when something
happens and you get a couple of bad jobs in a row, it's a crisis. And so if we can teach them,
you just get this small little savings account. It's not I'm going to buy parts for my car account.
It's not that I'm going to, you know, go out and you don't have a good weekend or it's not a
vacation account. It's for bad weeks or a bad month for credit out loud. They happen. If you
have that money, then the stress is just gone. But if we can get them going in this business
without getting buried with tool purchases, at least for maybe like the first six months maybe
to see, is this something that you really want to do? So I tell my kids, I said,
harbor freight or anything like that, it's not a bad idea. And I said, worst case scenario,
you stay in the business, you take you end up replacing all of these, but you take those tools
home to use whenever you're around the house. And I said, so you're they're not going to go to waste.
They're definitely not something you can use on a professional level day in and day out,
if you're going to really beat, you know, beat them up pretty hard, you're going to need some
top level tools eventually. But let's get into it in a smart way. So you still have money along
your path and then help teach them, you know, about saving for retirement, saving for your big
purchases like a car or, you know, anything else and having those different accounts as you do.
But I tell them as soon as you you can get into taking advantage of some type of a retirement
plan where they might match funds, you got to spend that money and allocate that to do that
because your body's taking clock. And you know, once you're going to get to your mid 50s, you
know, you might just find yourself where an opportunity comes up and you can go and teach
at a high school, you know, it could happen. It's really good advice. And I've, I've put people
on to and just suggested, but whether they're going to check out a Dave Ramsey class or read a
Dave Ramsey book, some type of financial planning book, or, you know, a lot of times maybe a church
will put on a class or, you know, just look out there are so many resources now where you can
educate yourself financially. And I think for young people, that's really, really important. But
then for the shops that are out there, I've heard more and more that are bringing in financial
advisors to talk to their, to talk to their teams or they're, they're bringing in folks that can
train them on that very topic. And I think as it relates to a young person, my goodness, I love
that. I really, really wish more and more shops would, would take the time to help educate their
people. I think what they'd find is less people leaving for a dollar or two, right? Like, I think
there are people that make those moves out of necessity. Whereas if you could help educate
them a little bit better, maybe that would help to, to keep your people around.
Yeah, the dealership where I spent 30 years at, it was a fantastic place to work still is.
And we could have easily have gone to some other local dealerships and made that extra dollar or
two per book dollar, but you didn't do it because it was such a great place to work. It was,
I think what we need to do in some aspect is, is we need to take management training and we
need to incorporate leadership training with that. It's not enough to just dot the i's and
cross the t's. We got to, we got to get some, some leadership type training for, you know,
service management, dispatchers, anybody in those positions to where they can,
that interact with the techs, other than, you know, just a service advisor capacity.
If you're more than just a service advisor, there should be some type of leadership activity,
whether it be something simple like a Maxwell program or, or even like,
plus Brown videos or anything, anything like that. There's so much of that out there.
And it just, it's like putting dessert on the end of a good meal. And it starts to create that
team and type feeling or family type feeling. And people are going to leave you at that point
for a buck or two, because this is a good place to work. And you know, that it's going to be
long sustaining. I could talk on this topic for days. I think this has been just reading
through all the thought that you've put into this is really cool. And I hope you keep building on
this because I think what you're putting together is really important for industry to understand
and just absolutely love, love, love what you're putting together here. So before we end, I do
have a few quick hitting questions for you that are just kind of fun questions that we like to
like to ask our guests. So the first is, what was your first car?
Oh, my first car. The one that I owned. My dad let me drive his pickup truck at first,
but then the oil embargo hit and I couldn't afford my part time job wasn't enough to pay
for the gas to get there and back. So he says, all right, grandma's going to be done driving. So
it was a 1970 Ford Maverick with a 170 straight six in it, and that car maxed out at 70 miles an
hour. It would not go 71. That was hammered to the floor, man. And I had a friend with a Griblin
and he was chasing me on this bad country road. So I floored it. I was on my way home and he only
lived a couple of miles from me. So he's trying to catch me and I can't pull away and he can't
catch up. I pull into the driveway and he comes in, you know, like 10 seconds later,
and I get out, walk to him. I said, we never tell anybody about this race.
And here we are talking about it publicly.
What's your favorite type of food?
Oh, favorite type of food. Wow. Well, my son makes a really mean barbecue. He's got one of those
fancy smokers and he's always trying something different with that. So, you know, just good
home barbecue is probably the best. But then other than that, something that I cook for myself,
and if you're an outdoorsman, you're going to like this. And that's shore lunch at a lake in
Minnesota for something that you just caught maybe just a few minutes beforehand. Very cool.
Like both of those answers, that's really cool. Last question. Do you have a particular time
that you wake up in the morning? Oh, yeah. Five o'clock. And if I miss it, my dog didn't make
sure that I don't. The best alarm clock you can get? Yeah. Yeah. On the weekends, there ain't no
sleeping in. He's like, so sometimes he's a pretty smart dog. So sometimes I go to him,
look, Nitro, we're going to sleep in tomorrow. And he might let me get to six o'clock. But then
he's like, you know, he's got that nose poking in you. It's like, come on, old man, you know, we
both have to go pee. Oh, what a fun conversation. How do we follow along with what you're doing
with your work here? Like what is a good way? Maybe we'll have you back on the podcast at
some point in the future. That'd be really cool. But what is your hope with this? How do you kind
of educate your shops and and trying to make sure that they're following along with your program?
This is this is pretty new. I came out with a short version of this. It was just a two page doc
document. I called it pathway to retention. And I happen to have somebody on my board that advisory
board that has already he had this on here before he came to my board. And he's just has, you know,
really good results with it. But I don't know where I'm going to go with this. I'm going to
keep working on it. But I I'm not quite for sure how to present it out to anybody just yet. So,
you know, I'm open to new ideas. But other than emailing me here at the school, I'm, I'm so busy
just trying to keep my head afloat teaching the kids. I I keep working on this, you know, it's
got to be like 50 pages or something like that. But it's great to get it out to other other people
other than printing it out to them and talking to, you know, some of the, you know, local, you
know, service directors and managers. I hope we're able to kind of spread the word about this a
little bit more just because it is great work. And I think there are so many things that you've
learned between your 35 years in a shop, and then your time in education, that there's value in
seeing both sides of the equation, right? And you've been able to do that and really kind of
point out some key things that I truly think are important to to getting this next generation
up and running the right way. So I applaud you for putting the thought into it. And thank you so
much for coming on the podcast. This has been a really, really fun conversation. Well, thanks for
having me, Jay. It's been a blast. That wraps up another episode of Beyond the Wrench. If you
liked this episode, please show your support by rating and following the podcast. You can also
watch the video interviews on Wrenchway's YouTube channel. Speaking of Wrenchway, Beyond the Wrench
is managed and produced by the Wrenchway team. Wrenchway is dedicated to promoting and improving
careers in the automotive, diesel and collision industries. In partnership with ASC, we run the
ASC Connects community, which empowers shops and dealerships with reliable data, school connections
and industry insights, while helping grow the future technician workforce. You can learn more
by visiting wrenchway.com. Thank you so much for listening. We'll see you next week.
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