M&A means companies buying other companies (or combining with them). Here, it’s about how buyers decide what the shop is worth—especially whether the owner’s personal work is what’s making it successful.
Valuation is how much a buyer thinks the business is worth. If the owner is the key person doing the work, buyers may pay less when the owner leaves and the shop needs several new people to replace that role.
Concept
discipline
Discipline means sticking to the rules and routines the shop sets. It helps the business keep running even when the owner isn’t doing every task.
Culture here means the shop’s “way of doing things”—what people expect and how they behave at work. A good culture helps the shop run smoothly and grow.
“Systems-based” refers to running the shop using repeatable processes—documented workflows, checklists, and standardized procedures—rather than relying on one person’s knowledge. The speaker argues that this helps guide employees and makes performance more consistent as the business grows.
Concept
KKI's
KKI’s appears to be a shorthand for key performance indicators (KPIs) or similar measurable targets used to manage operations. The speaker says the goal is to set measurable goals that are manageable for the team.
They’re discussing how to set up a car repair shop so it still works well even when the main person isn’t there. The key is getting people to follow good habits, not just writing rules down.
They’re discussing the “rules” a shop writes down for how work should be done. The episode’s message is that having a written plan doesn’t mean everyone will follow it perfectly in real life.
They mean the step-by-step instructions a shop uses while repairing cars. The issue is getting those steps written down clearly without restricting technicians from handling real-world situations.
Concept
point A to point B
They’re describing a simple workflow goal: do the job in the most straightforward way first. If you need extra steps later, you add them after the basics are working.
A shortcut is when someone skips steps or finds an easier way to finish a job. The hosts are saying shortcuts can be tempting, but they can also undermine the quality of the work.
Concept
technical side of things
They’re saying the discussion is moving from “how the shop runs” to the actual technical work of fixing cars. The key point is that real technicians may have know-how that isn’t written into the shop’s steps.
They mean the tools or equipment used to do the repair. If the tool isn’t working right, the technician may need to use a different method to get the job done.
Process documentation is just the “how we do things” guide for a shop or team. The episode is saying that writing it down once isn’t enough—you also have to keep checking that people follow it and update it when reality changes.
Formalized follow-up means you don’t just make a plan—you check on it regularly. The idea is to make sure people keep doing the right steps, not just the first time.
Term
tech metrics
Tech metrics are measurable indicators used to track performance or progress in a technical workflow (often tied to software, service operations, or maintenance processes). The speaker references them as a way to review and manage how well the system is working.
UI experience refers to how a software interface looks and behaves—buttons, menus, and navigation. The speaker uses it to explain that frequent software changes can force process changes, because the “right way” to do a task may shift when the tools change.
A review/update cadence is a scheduled rhythm (monthly, quarterly, etc.) for checking whether procedures still match how work is actually performed. The speaker argues that without this regular cycle, even “correct” processes can become obsolete quickly.
They’re talking about double-checking that the customer’s phone number and address are correct. It’s a simple step, but if it’s wrong, everything that follows—calls and paperwork—can go to the wrong place.
Concept
desired outcome
They mean the specific end result they want, like “customer details are correct.” Then they build the steps to make that happen consistently.
Concept
keep a process fresh
They’re saying the shop shouldn’t set a process once and forget it. As things change—like software or how people work—you need to revisit the steps so they still work.
They’re saying the problem isn’t always that the “rules” are wrong—it’s that people aren’t following them the way the process expects. That mismatch can cause mistakes.
ASC Connects is a program that helps car repair shops find and keep good mechanics. It focuses on connecting with schools and giving shops resources to improve hiring.
Wrenchway is mentioned as a partner behind ASC Connects. The idea is that together they help shops recruit mechanics by linking them with training programs.
School Assist is a tool inside ASC Connects that helps shops work with local schools. It’s meant to support training programs so more future mechanics are available.
Accountability here means you set clear expectations and then follow up to make sure the job actually gets done on time. It’s different from micromanaging—more like checking that the plan is working.
Micromanaging is when a boss constantly checks and directs small details. The point here is that good leadership should set clear expectations and then verify results, not hover over every step.
This means running the shop in a way that keeps customers moving through the process without long waits. The goal is to communicate and schedule work so the customer gets their car back faster.
The episode highlights coordination between front-office staff (service advisors/administration) as a key operational factor. Good communication helps ensure accurate information, proper scheduling, and fewer handoff mistakes between intake, updates, and delivery.
They mean having clear, repeatable steps for how the shop works. That way, the work gets done the same way every day, not just depending on one person’s memory.
A checklist is a structured set of steps used to ensure key tasks happen in the right order. Here, it’s used to standardize opening and closing procedures so the shop can operate reliably without constant oversight.
“Ownership” here means assigning responsibility to specific people so they’re accountable for completing the checklist. It’s a management tactic to ensure procedures actually get used rather than ignored.
A dry erase marker is used to mark off checklist items on a laminated sheet. This is a practical “shop-floor” approach: it keeps the checklist reusable and easy to update without printing new pages.
Jasper Engines and Transmissions sells replacement engine and transmission parts. The idea is: if your car’s engine or transmission breaks, you can replace that part instead of buying a whole new car.
A drivetrain component is a major part that helps power get from the engine to the wheels. If one of these parts breaks, replacing just that part can sometimes be a better deal than replacing the entire car.
Jasper sells rebuilt car parts, like engines, that are put back together to work like new. The pitch here is that using a Jasper remanufactured part can cost less than replacing the whole vehicle.
A remanufactured part is an old part that gets taken apart, checked, repaired, and rebuilt so it works like new. It’s often cheaper than buying a brand-new part.
Muscle memory means your body learns a task through repetition. After enough practice, you can do it more automatically without thinking as hard about each step.
In this context, “accurate information” refers to having the correct vehicle-specific details (like what parts are required and what procedures to follow). The speaker argues that accurate checks prevent operational mistakes that can strand a customer and force rescheduling.
“One-and-done” means you do it right once and don’t have to come back. In a repair shop, it usually comes down to double-checking the correct parts and steps before work starts.
The Chevrolet Corvette is a sports car made by Chevrolet. It’s designed for fast driving and sporty handling, and many people talk about it because it’s a well-known performance model. In the podcast, it’s mentioned because the speaker is taking a new one to the dealer.
Filters are small parts that help keep fluids clean. This story is saying you can’t just grab “the usual” filter—some cars need a different one, and using the wrong assumption causes delays.
A transmission fluid change replaces the fluid that lubricates and helps control the transmission’s internal components. The correct fluid and related service items (like the right filters) are vehicle-specific, which is why accurate checks matter.
A “wasted trip” is when you go somewhere or move the car around but don’t actually get the job done. It costs time and can add extra handling of the vehicle.
Concept
customer profits
They’re talking about how the shop’s money situation changes when the process isn’t followed. Delays can reduce what the shop can make from the job.
Process writing means putting the shop’s “how we do it” steps into clear instructions. That way, different people don’t do the same job in totally different ways.
It’s a book about how business owners can avoid being the only person who can fix problems. Instead of always jumping in, the goal is to build a system where the team can handle things.
KPIs/metrics are numbers you track to see how well the shop is doing. Instead of guessing, you measure progress with clear targets.
LIVE
tipping point where the ownership moves from the leader to the team. And that's really what you
want. That's what makes a successful company and allows the company to scale. Once the team
owns the problem or owns the challenge, then the solution is going to come about.
Welcome back to Beyond the Wrench. My name is Jay Gannon and I am your host.
Dan Paulson returns to talk about his new book, Escape the Owner's Trap.
We're going to dig into what keeps shop owners stuck in how to build systems,
develop leaders, and create a business that doesn't rely on you for everything. If you've
ever felt like you can't step away, this one's for you. Dan, welcome back to the show. How are you?
Great. Jay, thanks for having me back. It's wonderful to be here.
So this book, I'm really, really excited about. I believe just came out called Escape the Owner's
Trap. Tell us a little bit about it. Well, let me give you a little bit of backstory because this
is a book that, so this is the second book I've written. The first book was many, many years ago
and there was always the idea of building a second book and building it more around
kind of the systems that I help companies implement. And as I tell people and as people tell me,
there's always tomorrow, right? You know, you're too busy doing the stuff today. We can wait till
tomorrow to get on that. It's no different for me than it is for anyone else. Well, as I tell people,
tomorrow came in a very hard way last year where, and you know this because of course we're connected
beyond this, but I actually had a medical incident that took me out of work for quite a while. I
spent a good chunk of May in and out of the hospital. I spent a good chunk of the months
following that, just trying to get back on my feet and recover from it. And, you know, even at that
point I realized that when the business completely revolves around me, things that happen then
prevent other things from being done. And now I was a living example of what I was
worrying other companies about. So while I had time to sit here and ponder, you know,
what I was going to do with my company going forward and how I was going to prevent this
situation from ever happening to me again, the idea came back to the book. And the book being,
you know, most owners, they start a company with this idea that's going to create freedom for them.
And lo and behold, they're successful. They start creating that, they start building that company,
building that income. Growth happens. Employees come along. In your case, you know,
the machine shop grows. There's more base. There's more text. There's more everything else.
But that owner still controls everything. Everything goes through the owner. They're
the freedom that they thought they were creating becomes the burden that holds them back.
And they might reach certain plateaus in the growth of the business where maybe, you know,
they reach a certain milestone in either financial or an operational that they just can't seem to
overcome that hurdle. Or the second part of that is now they're getting to the age where they can't
do the work anymore. They don't want to do the work anymore. Now they built some value in the
business. They want to sell it. But when they start talking to those M&A guys, they start realizing
that a lot of that value is tied up in them. They leave and they're getting replaced. You know,
they're going to have to replace themselves with three or four other people at a pretty significant
expense, which then lowers that valuation. Now it creates another problem that they've got to deal
with. So I realized this was a problem. And I realized this was becoming a bigger problem,
especially for those guys advancing in age who want to eventually get out of the company and retire,
that they really needed structure in place. They needed to build discipline and they needed to
utilize a culture that actually helped them grow the business. And I looked at other systems out
there. You know, I'm not going to mention all the different names, but there's a lot of other programs
out there that I know many companies use, but they're very systems based. And I will tell you,
systems are a wonderful thing. They allow you to control everything in your organization to a
certain extent and help guide others on how to do their job better and set KKI's that are manageable.
But here's the other problem I've run into, where you try to implement the systems and maybe the
employees haven't bought in yet, maybe the owner hasn't bought in yet. So they invest all this money
to get this better process going. And three, four months later, all of a sudden, they've revered
it back to doing mostly what they were doing before at a pretty significant expense. So my
approach has always been you start with culture first and build the systems after the culture is
set because you have to build the habits and you have to build the discipline before you can
implement the systems and make them successful. And that's really where the the impetus of the book
came about is the trap is you're stuck in doing what you do on a day to day basis. Everyone's
coming to you for answers. And you even when you try to implement the systems, it still falls back
on your plate. And you can never seem to get over that hurdle. The book is really the guideline of
how you build the culture first, build the discipline next and then implement the systems
following that. Yeah, and it's it's a great way of going about it. And for those of you that
probably don't know, most people probably don't know, we actually use Dan at our own independent
repair shop here in Wisconsin. And a lot of what he's talking about are some of the things that
we've had to go through with him in trying to get some of those habits changed, some of those
behaviors changed. And it's a lot harder than it sounds, right? So many of us are used to our day to
day life. And at our shop, our family shop, I'm, I'm not there all that often, I can't be there
very often. So we had to work around being able to get processes in place and and kind of just our
way of doing things. And when I talked to Dan initially, it was about some of the frustrations
that that I had with folks in our, in our organization, really, really good ones that were
struggling to follow processes. And so it probably I was guilty, like everybody else's Dan of wanting
to jump directly into the processes without really kind of looking at the behaviors that drive those
processes in the first place. And so it took some learning on my end to truly kind of understand that
there's more to it than just putting a process down on paper. And I think there are times in life
where we have a tendency to over complicate things. I feel like on on the process side, we and maybe
this is just me being guilty of this, but almost oversimplifying the process of making processes,
right? Where you think you're going to write it down. People are going to follow that process
time and time out, time in, time out, and then get frustrated when that doesn't happen. Is that
something that is just for for us at our shop in Mineral Point, Wisconsin? Or is that kind of
something similar to what you see with other businesses as well? Well, Jay, this should make
you feel much, much better is not unique to you by any stretch of the imagination. I almost every
company that I deal with goes through the exact same situation. They think if you implement these
processes, they're automatically going to be followed to the letter of the law. And you'll
never have to worry about them again. And right there is some of the issue that's going on. Because
even, you know, as you mentioned, I'm working with your shop, we've been talking about some of the
procedures that, you know, your team already does and how do we get those formalized to some degree.
And of course, as I'm talking to them, they're like, well, you can do it this way, but then you
can also do it this way, this way, and this way. Like, whoa, whoa, whoa. First of all,
now we're getting too far in the reach. Yes, you can probably do it a multitude of different ways.
But this is the problem we run into. We try to create every avenue without worrying about how
first do we get from point A to point B in the most simplest direction. And then as we go on,
if we want to go to a more, I'll call it advanced route, then we can do that. But that's a different
step along the way. And yeah, everyone thinks that, oh, if I just implement the system, or if I just
implement the process, it'll be followed. But you know what, guys on the floor, gals on the floor,
they figure out ways to cheat the system. And we're all guilty of this. So I'm guilty of this,
Jay, I can almost guarantee you probably done this sometimes. 100%. You look for the shortcut,
you look for the shortcut, or you know the shortcut. But sometimes the shortcut also
erodes the process. And the more shortcuts you create, and usually the shortcuts come in where
there's a problem. And the system that with design doesn't address the problem that came into play.
Now, I'm not a shop owner, so I can't speak to the technical side of things. But let's just say,
you know, you're doing a repair job on a car. And the technology that you're using for whatever
reason isn't working the way it should. Well, you know, the tech there has to figure out how to
make the fix happen. They might know of a technique that works that isn't written into your process.
So they then cheat the system. I tend to see that more on like manufacturing and even service
based in industry service space, especially, where there isn't anything formally documented,
or there isn't anything tangible that there is a lot easier to work around. So then they'll modify
the process to fix the problem. Well, okay, that's, that's fine, maybe for that one situation,
but then they never formalize that in a documentation setting, nor do they make anyone
else aware of it. And then what you see happen over time is, well, I got away with that fix,
I'm going to do the next one, the next one, and pretty soon within often in weeks or months,
the system that you put in place is no longer followed anymore. So as part of creating the
process, you have to create the process first and in the most simplest linear fashion that you can.
And then from there already set up a formalized follow up that you're going to hold people
accountable to. And that's the part that's often missing, because they think once you put that
system in place, and once you document that system, you're done. And nobody ever comes back to it
again. And I can pretty much say nobody because they're never usually arcade and set up where,
okay, we're going to review things at least do a touch base once every month, once every quarter,
it doesn't have to be that often, it doesn't have to be that long. But we should be looking back and
say, has anything changed? And Jay, you know this, and, you know, you guys use tech metrics have
mentioned that name just simply because we so we got a reference here. But like any software out
there, any software I use, in fact, we were trying to log in and get this done, you know,
new software, everything's laid out differently. Software almost always every month changes
something because they have to feel like they're advancing, you know, their UI experience user
interface experience. And so the button that's over here is now over there. Well, if there's too
many radical changes, now your process has to change. Nobody documents it within a matter of
months or a year. Any Texas situations could be completely obsolete if you aren't putting in a
regular cadence to review and update that over time. So it's funny, because I think
when you you've really dissected that really well, and throughout the book, you have really
done a nice job going through your process as well. And a lot of times I think people think
about the like the hard hitting stuff that we need a process for. And I'll kind of go back to
sometimes it's more of the simple stuff in that. For us, it was one of the major pain
points of frustrations was verifying customer information. So when a when a customer would
come in and being in a small town, you kind of know everybody. So you really assume that their
information is the same and hasn't changed. And, and so what would happen was kind of this cycle
where our office staff would just get really frustrated because maybe they had a wrong phone
number in or they are mailing something to the wrong mailing address. And, and so something
that is perceived as so simple. And we see it every day in a doctor's office and a dentist's
office. And, you know, anywhere the dentist specifically, I was just there being able to
they do it just so naturally and they have that process down. And so what seems really,
really simple to them is actually pretty hard for us, right? Because this is something that is a new
it's a new thing. It's something that I think we looked at what a desired outcome is. And that's
where I think when I brought you in, it was like, Okay, help us get to this desired outcome of getting
verified customer information, something simple, or we think is simple, not so simple. So, you
know, I think that's where when you came in and started looking at kind of the different behaviors,
really kind of getting to know the key players at the shop. And then, you know, you did a lot of
advanced stuff ahead of just making processes. And I'm imagining that's because
you want this to be a change that is, you know, implemented for a long time. And if it's something
that where technology does change the way that we go about that, or something else happens,
that we can adapt as we go, we just have to keep a process fresh and kind of top of mind
in hopes that it's actually going to take shape. Yeah, well, and, you know, if we just take a look
at your situation, for example, again, your situation is not unique. I'm talking with other
companies about this too, it all ties back to behavior. So it's not that the process is always
broken is that behavior doesn't align. You know, so let's take the example of, you know, when you
go to the dentistry, you go to the doctor, it is so routine that they will ask for your name,
your birth date, your social security, whatever information they're looking to collect. And,
you know, as I mentioned in my medical incident, I could go into the hospital,
and I would get asked my last name and my birthday routinely over the course of an hour, multiple
times, because every time somebody new came in, okay, what's your last name? What's your
birthday? Because they're confirming information. And, you know, keep in mind, they're doing that
because it's been embedded in them that if you give somebody the wrong medication, or if you
give them the wrong procedure, you could kill somebody. Now, in the world of automotive,
I would say there's probably some situations where that might be the case, but it's probably not
the same when somebody's getting oil change or tire rotation or whatever it might be.
So it's not necessarily a habit that they're used to doing. Also, I know your people and Jay,
you got a lot of good people there, and they want to do the right things by their customers coming
in the door. And especially when it's a small shop and people are in a hurry to get in and get out,
you see that line of people, I've worked in retail. When there's a line of people behind you, you want
to move that line along as quickly as possible because you see the people tapping their feet and
kind of getting that frustrated look because they want to get on to what they're doing.
That's where the shortcuts start coming in. If you don't have the discipline to follow through or
don't know how to handle a situation like that, that's where the shortcomings tend to pop up.
And as I was talking with your people, that was, you know, again, they're trying to do the right
thing, but they didn't know how to handle when there's two or three people in line. So we just
looked at a couple cues that they could do just to acknowledge the individuals that are behind them
and then get back on track. Another thing that we did to help them out, really simple. So,
you know, you were talking about simplicity versus complexity. I would say most processes
are simple, but they're not easy. And that's the differentiator because we can make a simple
process. But if nobody follows the process because of either past behaviors or because of other things
that get in the way, that's really where we start running into problems. So we put in place
just a basic checklist right by the iPad or the computer there and started coaching your people
to just, hey, before you let them go, look at the list. Can you mentally check off everything that
they did? Now, were they perfect out of the gate? No, but that's also where, again, we have to have
that routine. So now the leaders have to have the discipline to come back and say, hey, did you do
this? Or when we make that mistake, hey, what did we miss this time? How do we make sure we
correct that so that they know there's eyes on it, they know there's people watching it? Because I
will tell you from personal experience, the more you watch something or the more you hold people
accountable to it, the more likely that system's going to be followed. And that's often what's
missing. I know this because you, well, you and I grew up in a different time, you know, and probably
more me than you actually, because I think I got you by a couple years. But, you know, you were told
to do something once you were expected to do it. And I find a lot of people, especially in their
50s and 60s, that kind of grew up with that mindset. I told you what to do. I expect you to do it.
There shouldn't be this huge discussion on the end. And what I tell people is when you look at
our generations now, you go back to the millennials, generation X, generation, what is it, Z now? And I
think it's generation Alpha. So we've got, you know, beyond the the access that are now leaving
the marketplace, we've got three other generations that come in. And I tell people, when you look at
it, you know, if you had kids, and I know you have kids, and I often ask other people, you
have kids, okay, you have kids, what do you have them do pretty much from the time they can start
walking? Well, they're in soccer, or they're in basketball, or they're in karate, or they're in,
you know, they're in some form of activity where there's somebody always coaching them.
What happens though, when they get into the workforce? Well, they're expected to do the job
without any coaching. Well, what do they want? You talk to any of these generations, they want
coaching, they want feedback, they want to know that what they're doing matters and what they're
doing is a good job. They're not getting that anymore. So here's the breakdown. I know you've
talked about this, because I've listened to your podcast, if you're not giving that feedback back
to that individual, and then holding them accountable to that feedback and focusing on the
positive things, it's going to be very hard to keep that employee engaged and keep them employed
by you, because they'll go somewhere else where they can find that. And that's really what it is
about building in the systems, is you can have the best system in the world, but if you don't have
the behaviors behind it, doesn't matter how good that system is, because nobody's going to follow it.
I remember first starting off with you, and I had known you for many years prior to engaging in
this work with you, but I thought it was really interesting in that you were really intentional
about driving communication early, right, in making sure a daily huddle was a part of what you were
doing. And I think when we look at, like we just had our voice of technician survey come back, and
you still see a common thread with automotive and diesel shops in that there's still a
large gap in communication. And I think so many of us talk about communication
and think it's simpler than what it really is. It is hard to do. And I think having something
as simple as a structured daily huddle to touch base and make sure that things are being communicated
rather than maybe a leader getting frustrated because their people aren't doing what they are
supposed to be doing or the employee being frustrated because they're not being properly
communicated to. There's just a lot of this, not just our shop, but any business probably,
but shop specifically, where there are a large number of communication breakdowns. And I feel
like that drives angst. I think it drives miscommunication. I think it drives so many negatives
that it might seem at times for I've heard leaders talk about this in the past where
they want to cut down on meetings. They don't want meetings. They want as few meetings as possible.
But you almost do that to a detriment of your organization because things aren't getting clearly
communicated. And there's not maybe that feedback of understanding as well, right? Where if you're
doing a daily huddle real time and can really be able to understand that piece of it, that
there's confirmation that you understand what I'm telling you. And if there's not,
I want you to be able to ask that question back to me. I think there was a lot of power in that
part alone of really pushing that and not have it be like, oh, by the way, we're doing this,
but like an actual structured daily standup of these are the items that are important to us,
and this is what we're going to focus on. That communication strategy and style I think is so
important for any business, let alone shops. Yeah, I'm glad you brought that up because
I agree with you. I'm not a big fan of meetings, but it's not the meeting itself is having meaningful
meetings. And I think where most owners get frustrated and feel they have too many meetings
is the meetings aren't structured. We've talked about this. The meeting has to have an agenda,
has to have an outcome, and has to have a timeline. So for example, the daily huddles you brought
up. I've coached these guys and anyone else. A morning huddle is 10 to 15 minutes period.
You do not get off on tangents. You do not talk about things that are unrelated or bring up problems
that can't be solved in that meeting, because the whole point of that meeting is to really kind of
structure your day and maybe into tomorrow, depending upon, you know, the nature of your
shop and what you're doing. By doing that, that limits the amount of time that you can talk about,
which is also why it's important to follow an agenda. Most meetings do not have an agenda,
which is what allows them to go up in any particular direction and really frustrate people
immensely. Because now we're talking about everything from what the kids are doing this weekend to,
hey, Joe Bob had this problem over here, but it was something it's not anything again,
you can solve that day. It might be important, but it's not for that meeting. So that needs to be
tabled and then brought back at a later date when it does matter. And then it's that outcome. What's
the outcome of that daily huddle? Well, it's what's going on in the shop that day. Who's coming in?
What are we dealing with? Is there something on the rack, for example, that, hey, we thought this
was going to be a one hour fix. All of a sudden we found this other problem. We got permission from
the owner. Now it's going to be on the rack for eight hours. Well, that's a completely different
situation, what you're planning. And that's also backlogging other work that you might have that
you need to use that rack for. So there's a lot of things going on that that changes throughout
the course of the day or the week. And if that has never dealt with the techs out in the shop,
have no clue what's going on other than what's put in front of them, the people that are at the desk
trying to figure out how to play the shell game and move these vehicles around and take care of
the customers, that's not addressed. So there's a lot of confusion that goes on. I think that's
what leads to a lot of the issues. And then you factor that in, okay, now you're trying to have
me have another meeting, but now this meeting is going to stretch out to be an hour. That's where
people really don't want to deal with it anymore. So it's getting that displayed. It all goes back
to, again, culture and discipline. Start there, build that in first. Then you have meaningful
meetings. Well, how do you have meaningful meetings? Again, they're very structured. There's an
agenda. There's an outcome. And there's a timeline to it. And you figure out that cadence and you
work with that cadence to make sure that sticks. Once you do that, then you can start adding more
to it. But just having more meetings for the sake of having more meetings, I'd worked for large
companies. And I will tell you the main problem with a multi-billion dollar company is they are
not afraid to have more meetings and they will tie up hours, if not days, to discuss a problem that
they will never solve because they'll kick it to another meeting. And that's where I lived my life
in corporate America, which is also another reason why I got out of corporate America.
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So in talking about those meetings, one thing I'd like to ask you about is the accountability
piece. So you talk about holding people accountable. I think this is something that a lot of leaders
struggle with because a lot of us don't feel like we want to be babysitting. We don't feel
like we want to be micromanaging, if you will. Any advice in maybe those meetings or otherwise
on accountability? Yeah, and I agree with you. Nobody wants to be the micromanager. And that
when I talk to a business owner, it's usually their biggest frustration. And that's why they
often say, I told them what to do. I should not have to come back and remind them, nor should I
have to come back and check up on it. Well, then they're surprised when what they come back to
isn't what they wanted. So something's missing there. And that's why I think where people misunderstand
what accountability is. Accountability isn't micromanagement. It is simply making sure that
there's a complete understanding of what's expected, what jobs to be done, and ultimately
somebody to stand there and or not stand there. I don't want you're not boarding over anybody,
but you're coming back and you're making sure that what was agreed upon is getting done in the
timeline. Now, what does that do over a period of time? And one thing we haven't talked about
is values. And that's something that we've kind of worked on at a very high level in your shop.
But we set at least three main objectives. I wouldn't call these values, but we set some
guidelines. One was accurate information. One was expert, I called it expediting the customer
experience, making sure you're taking care of that customer and getting them in and out quickly
and efficiently as as possible. And there's a third one, Jay, help me out. Do you remember
what it is? We had some with communication between the front office staff. Yeah, that was the third
in the situation that I came into, there was two people in the front office, and they were kind
of communicating, but not really. And that's really where the morning puddles came in, because
we need to figure out how to kind of repair the communication between those two individuals
and get an understanding of it. And from what I'm aware of, that's improved greatly. And that's
called the lobby issues, which it really has. Yeah, that led to the whole go ahead. Oh, sorry.
Well, the weird thing with that, and I think these guys would say it as well, was it wasn't
even necessarily negative, like a negative relationship, it was just kind of, there was
some barrier there to where we were missing some of that communication. And one, just acknowledging
it and like kind of sharing, I think you did a really good job of just hitting that
between the eyes, right? Like this is the issue that we're having. We need to be able to address
this and do this differently. And it just was a, you know, it's a candid talk, a candid conversation
that I think was needed upfront to be able to really just talk about, right? And say,
what can we do better? Well, key part of that was who owns it. I was actually having this
discussion yesterday with the client, because there is this misunderstanding of who owns
the action. Most employees push the ownership up to the leadership team. So if that's the case,
for example, Jay, if you're the shop owner, and I'm the employee, and you tell me to do something,
I'm doing whatever I can to push that work back up to you. And this is a natural occurrence.
This is not a blame game on anybody, but we all work on the the easiest route or the path of
resistance. So for example, if I'm unsure about something, I will often go talk to the boss.
This is why C happened in companies, they go talk to the boss, the boss provides them with
an answer or solution, they go back and they implement the solution. What you need to understand
behaviorally is what what that creates is that creates a dependency of that owner to solve
the employee's problem. The problems never push back on the employee for them to solve it themselves.
This is where accountability is different. And if you're, instead of when that employee comes to
you, and it comes to you with a problem, if you're pushing it back on, asking them for a solution,
is forcing them to kind of solve their own issue. And over time, if you do that often enough,
they start to figure out that they have to, before they come to you, they have to have a
solution in place. And eventually it gets to the point where they understand what the solution
needs to be. And they can just act on that immediately. A lot of that, again, is tied to values.
Companies talk about mission vision values all the time. Strategic planning is all built around
that. And I will tell you the most important thing is the thing that is least done, which is really
dealing with the values. Because in my opinion, values target what you will do and what you won't
do to create the certain customer experience or the certain product that you're looking to push
out. And if people don't understand what the values are, what, and how those guide decision
making, it's very hard to get an employee to make the right choices, which then leads to
the micromanagement from the owner. And that's where it really is kind of crafting what are those
three no more than five core values. And those core values really turn into more value statements
that are then supported by stories that show where those values have been possibly enacted
in your organization. It's a longer step than just a quick snap of the fingers and implementing
systems. And this is, again, why I wrote the book and where I found the problem with most
other processes out there is they're so quick to go to the systems, and that's going to solve
everything. It doesn't. It really relies on building the right behaviors in place. If you
don't have those core values tied in, and people don't understand what those values mean and how
they work, and they aren't implemented in every conversation you have, it's going to be very
hard to get your employees to do the right things, even when you direct them to. Because
if there's an opportunity to take a shortcut, again, natural behavior, not blaming anyone,
it's going to naturally happen. It's just going to occur. It doesn't occur, though, when they know
there's a barrier on either side. And I describe it. So here's an automotive analogy,
and I'm a race car guy, so this is what I look at. You think of your company as a multi-lane
highway, and your people are going down this on a one-lane road, but there's multiple lanes.
And the reason there's multiple lanes is there's going to be obstacles in front of you. Problems
come up, fires pop up. You need to be able to maneuver around those situations. At the same
point, there needs to be guardrails, because the guardrails are what keep you on the road.
Those are your values. If you have no values, there's no guardrails. Well, what happens then?
Well, you're going to go off into the ditch because somebody's going to make a decision
or do something that is going to either damage your reputation, damage your equipment,
or damage your customer's equipment. In this case, maybe their car. So you've got to do things
to protect yourself, and that's really where a lot of the stuff comes into play, and it takes
longer to implement that. And we're in a have it now society, and that's probably the biggest
challenge I have, is you look at the systems that we've been working on. And it wasn't day one,
we were putting things in place. It was more like week four, before we even really started
implementing anything that I would say was seriously process related. There were some basic
stuff for doing. For example, starting the day, what do you do at the beginning of the day to
basically open up the shop? What do you do at the end of the day to close the shop?
Is there anywhere that's documented what procedures or what steps are going to follow?
Well, it wasn't. So we created a checklist. And then of course, the concern was, well,
nobody's going to follow the checklist. Well, the reason nobody follows the checklist is nobody
checks up to see if the checklist is being used. I put the ownership on them to say, okay, how
are we going to make sure this checklist is done? And they thought about it. And they said, well,
for one thing, we'll hang the checklist by the back door. So right when we come in,
that's the first thing we can grab. Good. Good decision. Let's go ahead and implement that.
They went, they got a way to hang it up. How else can we do this? Well, we'll keep the checklist,
we'll put it on a laminated sheet of paper, and we'll have a dry erase marker so that we can
check off so we can use that. We'll have the opening on one side, we'll have the closing on
the other. As we go through and we do our opening, we check it off, we then leave the checklist
between the desks, between the two office managers there. At the end of the day, somebody
grabs that checklist and they basically reverse the process going all the way back
off the door, checking off the closing procedures, hang it by the door, everything's done.
At any point, Jay, you can come in and you should be able to look at that list during the day,
see what they check off at the end of the day, see what was done at the end of the day, and
hopefully, again, that checklist completed and hanging by the door. Was it perfect the first
go around? I think you and I would agree there were times that they were phoning it in and it
wasn't getting done, but what both you and I did was we would come back and say, hey,
where's that checklist? When I come in, one of the first things I look at is where that checklist
is supposed to be sitting and make sure it's been set. The first couple of times, I'd ask about it,
hey, is it getting done? One person would say, oh yeah, it's getting done and the other person
would kind of look at me and give me that sheet of paper and it's like, well, we didn't do it today.
Okay, well, instead of yelling at them, it was just, what are we going to do to make sure that
this is done? Do we understand why it's important? Because I think that's the other thing that's
often there. Why are we doing this? It's not to help you out per se, but we know that checklist
does help them out because you get busy, I get busy, we skip steps because, again, as you're
racing along, you're trying to get everything done, but you might miss that important step.
You might miss, for example, in this situation, they might miss walking the back door for
hours or they might miss turning off a light or turning off a compressor because we're in a hurry
and that's just the natural part of things. The whole point of the checklist is just,
did we go through, did we do everything? And that's what helps. But to me,
the more important thing, and you just recently hired a new individual, is now we have a training
tool. Now when that person comes in, we can show them and we can walk them through it because
the way we learn is through seeing, hearing, and doing. Now we have the tools that allow us to
do all three of those things because the checklist is part of the seeing and doing part. Now as you're
walking them through, okay, this is what this is. Now you're showing them, all that stuff is done.
The other thing we've also implemented or we're starting to implement now is video because all
of us are walking around with video cameras in our pockets and we can record these things. And now
we've got training tools that we can change on the fly at very low cost. Both you and IJ have
worked for large corporations where they'll bring in a, you know, they would bring in a video crew
or they would do all this stuff and then of course, you know, a couple months later it's all
updated. But now you can do the stuff on a camera on your phone so we can update it on the fly at
almost at any given point in time. So now it's just creating the routine where we're reviewing
that over time. But it's, technology has freed us up a lot more to make these changes happen. But
that's where you put in the discipline and where you put in the check. And then over time,
being the reinforcement, just saying, Hey, did you do that? No, you didn't do that. Okay,
what are we going to do to make sure it happens next time? I don't own it, you own it. So that
comes back to who owns what. And that's what what becomes so critical and gets you away from that
micromanagement phase. Yeah, and it's, it's been, it's so interesting. And as you were talking
through your values, I go back, I think I've got a book up here, as I'm turning away from the
microphone. I do it's a it's called Ray, it's principles by Ray Dalio. And he took that to
a whole different level where he had built this is 10 years ago had built a an algorithm
to help people understand how he made decisions so that they could he was he took it to that
extent to try and get people to to understand how what his thought process was to make decisions
in hopes that his people could start to make their own decisions. So I love that part of it.
And then, you know, I think the part that we talked about earlier that I think is really,
really important was the really deciding what was important to us as a shop, right as a business,
and identify clearly identifying, you know, for us, it was those top three things and then
having conversations with them over and over and over about those three things and asking them
what those three things were and kind of just really getting it ingrained in their brain. And
I'll never forget early on, you had said something about, you're, you're, you're going to get to
the point where you've talked about it so much that they're going to start rolling their eyes.
And it was very much the truth, right, where it does get to that point, but you're trying to,
you're trying to change the way they think about some of this and trying to rewire their brain
and really look at identifying those top priorities and making them top of mind so that
they don't get forgotten about it. And something as simple as verifying customer information,
it's easy to talk about hard to do. And unless we're talking about how much that means to us as
a company kind of over and over and over again, it's really hard. And we got to the point to where
you know, Matt on our team, Matt came up and said, I was down there late one afternoon and
and I said, how's this coming along? And again, I'm not there all the time. I'm not there very
often. And so I go down and was talking to him just asked, you know, how's this coming along? And
he said, you know, I finally come to the conclusion that we have to do this for every single customer
that comes in. Otherwise, we're not going to do it at all. And so he changed his mindset on
the frequency that they needed to do it. And he, I mean, it wasn't me kind of putting it on a platter
for him to tell me that what I wanted to hear, it was more of him kind of coming to that conclusion
on his own that, Hey, you know what, if we're going to truly make a change here, and we're
truly going to make this better, we have to be consistent. We have to do this with everybody.
And they'll still get tripped up from time to time, but it is far better than what it ever was
before. And it is top of mind for them, right? And we're talking about it every day. And even
if I'm not down there shooting slack messages back and forth to each other about making sure that
they're doing what they're supposed to be doing. So it is, I think, importance of understanding
what you want first and foremost, and then kind of reaffirming that every single day and making
sure that that's talked about that's been really powerful. Yeah. And what you just described
there is really the tipping point where the ownership moves from the leader to the team.
And that's really what you want. That's what makes a successful company and allows a company to
scale is once the team owns the problem or owns the challenge, then the solution is going to come
about. And I was, I'm glad to hear that Matt stated that because that, you know, for the first
couple weeks, couple months, you know, there was some pushback on that to some degree because
it's like, well, we know who these people are. You know, as you point out, you're in a small town,
everybody's related to everybody. I grew up in a small town myself. So it's like, yeah,
you don't date anyone because you're probably a cousin to them. But yeah, you know everybody.
So you assume again, emails don't change, phone numbers don't change, addresses don't change.
But the reality is, you know, even your third cousin once removed might move across town and
live in a different house or a different apartment. And you just don't, because you made that assumption,
now all of a sudden, all the information's wrong. And that's what often happens in organizations.
You know, we talk about from a, you know, we're talking about here from a customer standpoint,
but there's stuff that happens in companies that again, assumptions are made. And those assumptions,
you know, in some cases, they're not terrible. And they're benign. They're not going to take down
the organization. But other assumptions sometimes are much more costly and much more problematic
because the discipline hasn't been built in. And once you get to a point, again, where the employees
own it and the leadership doesn't, the leadership does test to follow up is no longer micromanagement.
It's just checking in to make sure we're still on target and still on task for what we need to do.
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It's been such a fun process to go through with you in trying to really get our hands around this.
As we have gone through this, really talking about those behaviors, your book does a phenomenal
job at talking through all of this. One of the things that I think is funny in going back to
what I said earlier about how we assume it's so simple, or maybe we're, you know, in elements,
we think it's too simple. In other elements, we think it's too complex. But then when you look
at something that, I think when you talk about the actual making of processes and how you come
up with processes, that is where we over simplify how easy it is to make a process and how easy it
is to actually execute on a process consistently. Any advice to business leaders out there that
are trying to come up with processes? And, you know, I think the easy thing to do right now is to
type something in the chat GPT and have it try to spit out a process for you, right?
Half the time, Mr. Rowland.
And half the time, probably more than that, right? And then you can refine it and get it to where
you need it to, where you need it to be. But I do think in every business I've ever been in,
that is where it gets stale really fast. It's maybe not even accurate to start off with. This is
free chat GPT times where you would sit down and spend a little bit of time writing out processes
and then talk about it with your team maybe once. And then all of a sudden,
you know, you think you've got this process and a lot of business books make it sound like it's
really easy to just write up a process and have it executed. You better follow my process this way.
And then that goes back to what you were talking about with maybe even the generational gaps of
writing out a process and then becoming very, very frustrated when nobody follows that process.
And some of those processes I look at in a retail environment, it can be really
challenging to follow a process unless you know it like the back of your hand. Because
if you're answering the phone and the other two lines are ringing at the same time and you're
like, oh, no, I've got to follow this process and you're trying to fumble around and find the
process of what you're doing it. What happens then it just falls apart and you're not going to
follow the process and you're going to you're going to do whatever you need to do to get the
customers taken care of. Any advice for those business leaders out there as it relates to
developing processes and maybe trying to get them executed? Yeah, if I mean, there's a number of
things you can do. Workflow is key to a lot of this. So where does the work go? You know,
you've probably seen flow charts and maybe some of your listeners have seen flow charts or created
flow charts. It's often used in the IT world, but I've used it a lot in the management world.
We haven't really got into that with what you're doing because a lot of the processes that we're
we are working on right now are just the simple basic ones, the more the daily ones.
In my opinion, the daily ones because they're used so often can be very simplistic in a lot of ways
because you have that muscle memory that develops because you're doing this all the time.
The bigger issues come along are the processes that might be done once a month,
once every six months, once a year, once every five years. Those are the ones that don't get
talked about reviewed or documented and then people change, you know, somebody might quit
and then somebody new gets hired in, but they they're not hired in when that process needs to be
done. Now two years goes by and all of a sudden, again, this form needs to be filled out or
you know, this procedure needs to be done, this complying issue needs to be addressed.
Those are the things that typically aren't documented clearly or at all and then you're
expecting somebody to fumble through it. Well, now what should take them maybe minutes or hours now
takes them possibly days or weeks because they have to go through and they have to figure out,
but then it's never documented again. So now we're back in the same situation where another
five years are going to go by and that's never done. So from the standpoint of how you go about
documenting processes, simple is better whenever possible, linear path, don't come up with all
the ifs, ands, what's, you know, or therefore, that comes at a later date. Just how do I get
from where I'm at now to the result that I need in the quickest, most simplest way possible? And
as they develop the skills for that, we can add on more and that's really kind of where we're at
with your team in a lot of ways. So it's building that simplified process. Whenever you can visualize
that process as much as possible, like I talked about earlier, you need to see it here, do it.
We all learn differently. Some people can just observe something and they can immediately repeat
it afterwards because the way their brain works, they can see what's going on and their brain puts
together how that happens. Other people need to do it, they need to touch it, they need to feel it,
they need to walk through it, and then they built that muscle memory that way. Other people can just
you can just walk through the process verbally, and they can follow along because they can visualize
in their head what you're saying. If you incorporate all three of those concepts into
whatever you're teaching, training, or whatever process you're creating, more than likely you're
going to create a very sound process that's going to last for a long period of time. The next step
then as we talked about is there's got to be some semi-formal review of that process over a specific
period of time. Personally, I recommend at least looking once a quarter, once you have them firmly
established. In some processes though, especially when it's technology and it's technology you don't
own that somebody else is going to constantly be updating and changing, might be once a month.
And it's just a quick review to see, you know, did they move these buttons or did they now hide
this function that was right in front of you in a menu in its three layers deep now to go get that
same thing done. You just have to create that cadence and that review, and that means put it on
the calendar. Schedule the people that need to be there. You do not invite the whole team, you
invite the team that's going to be influential on making that process happen. Because if you invite
everyone in, there's going to be three quarters of people that are going to be standing around
twirling their comms going, I got better things to do, and you've just bored the crap out of me,
I'm not even paying attention anyway. So why bring them into the room?
We think it's better communication is really not. Bring the people that is going to matter.
Get those processes documented, get them recorded, get some video out there. As you're doing the
video, have somebody explaining what's actually going on in that video. We're using Zoom, for
example, using things like tech metrics where we can see on the screen where that cursor is going,
what they're clicking on, and then in this case, Matt is, you know, I'm clicking on this because
this does this function, and that opens up this menu, and then we enter this information here,
and this is the information we should have, and then we close it out on this menu, and then it
goes over here. And that's, you know, I'm sitting here explaining through this, if your people are
listening to this, they have no clue what I'm, and we're not looking at anything anyway, but that's
just as you're visualizing what's happening in front of you, somebody is telling you what's
actually going on, and the why behind it. Why are we doing this? So back to the example of,
you know, when we need that accurate information, why do we need that accurate information? Because
people move, people buy new cars, people change vehicles, people might have multiple vehicles,
you want to make sure you're doing everything right, so it's a one-and-done situation. You're
not caught with your hands tied behind your back because somebody didn't check things. I'll give
you an automotive example. So Jay, you know I'm a Corvette guy. I was taking my new Corvette into
the dealership, and my new Corvette requires some very specific parts for it. Well, even for an oil
change, and for a transmission fluid change, it needed some specific filters. Well, guess what?
The parts manager just assumed that it was going to be the same as the base car. It was not. So
transmission filter change, only to find out that he comes out 10 minutes later. Yeah, I didn't
order the parts because I just assumed everything was right. I now had an hour drive back home,
and now had to reschedule appointment while I was busy traveling, so now I put an extra
couple thousand miles on the car that I didn't want to do because they didn't have the right parts
in place. That's what making that mistake happens. You tell that story to somebody who's handling
that problem, and now they're going, oh, I get it. Now I understand why I need to do the checks
and balances, and need to make sure things are done correctly. That's just what we got to get to,
is where people understand the impact as not only on them internally, because now you've tied up a
text time. You've wasted a text time that you're not going to be able to bill for, because they
can't bill until I come back and get the service work done. You wait to buy time as a client,
which is now upset me greatly because now I have to waste two trips, and plus time that could damage
my vehicle. You waste the shop money with customer profits, so there's a lot of different things
impacted. It's just getting to the point where you're communicating that to people, and they start
understanding it from their perspective on how it impacts not only the shop, but the customers as a
whole. What happens when maybe there's not agreement on the process itself? You talked about
how we want that linear path, but oftentimes you'll have, if you've got a team, multiple people doing
the same thing differently, and they might have arguments as to why they're doing it a certain
way, and so might the other parties, and so trying to get consensus on this is the way we're going
to do this moving forward. Any advice on that piece of process writing? Well, I think it's real
easy as the owners say it's my way or the highway. In my case, even if I don't necessarily agree with
their process, I will ask questions, and I will get their feedback because, as I mentioned earlier,
people want to be heard. They want to feel like they have purpose, and they want to know what
they do matters. Well, if they have an idea or they think there's a better way to do it,
shouldn't we at least take a little bit of time and hear them out? Because who knows? Maybe what
we've got in our head isn't the best way to do it. Maybe they do have a better solution for it,
and maybe we should listen to that. So we've got to at least give them the time of day and listen
thoughtfully to what they're saying, and then if we're still not in agreement, we still have
reasons why we need to do things a certain way versus what they do, and we even went through
this with your team. It's just asking them questions and saying, well, tell me more about
that. Well, what if this happens? I tell people, I'm like Jeopardy. Everything's answered in the
form of a question with me. I'm not always going to give you the statement. I'm going to use your
brain matter to help solve the problem. So, okay, you're so interested in this. Well, what if X
is the outcome of that? How are you going to deal with that when Y is actually a better solution
for that? Or tell me why Y is not going to be the solution or why Y is not going to work?
And then let's get an understanding of what you're seeing through your lens, and maybe then I can
help reshape your lens to see why your solution is flawed. So it's that back and forth discussion
that often doesn't happen. And again, I see this with a lot of people who are in their 50s and 60s,
who are very used to saying, nope, this is the way you're going to do it, and just do it. Well,
guess what? They go out and they'll tell you, they'll nod their head in agreement, and then
they'll still go back and do whatever they feel is the right way to do it, and it's probably not
the way you want them to. Oh, my goodness. You and I could talk about this for a long time, I think,
and we do talk about this a lot. And I think for those that are interested, where do they get your
book at? Well, the easiest way right now, I would send them to Amazon because you can get it in hard
cover, you can get it in paperback, and you can also get the Kindle version if you want it.
Haven't got to audio yet? We'll work on that in the near future. You're going to read it?
I am not going to read it. So no. Oh, man. Part of the whole medical thing that I had happened was
it makes it concentrating on print and then reading it like we're talking here,
that ain't going to happen. We'll just we'll just leave it at that. But yeah, we'll get somebody
to read it or maybe here's where we use AI to fill in some gaps. But the book is called
Escape the Owner's Trap. It is really targeted not only towards owners, but really kind of any
leader that's in that situation where it feels like everything's kind of falling in their lap
and not getting done. It is built around what I call the MAX system, and MAX is spelled M-A-A-X.
And, you know, we're business people, we love our acronyms. So MAX is management, accounting,
but accounting is defined not only the traditional accounting numbers, but what KPIs or metrics are
you using to measure your success. Then there's accountability, as we've talked about a lot here.
Accountability is the big factor this often missing. MAX stands for excellence. Most companies want
to create a level of excellence because that's what gets our customers to come back. That's what
allows us to grow and allows us to scale. So utilizing those three elements is really where
we create the system. And again, it comes to values and behaviors first, and then the systems
next. And what I did with it, I basically created two avatars in the book going through different
situations because it's very difficult to talk about clients in first person and talking about
the good, the bad, and the ugly. So I created two scenarios that I think are pretty realistic for
people. You might agree with that as well. There's almost something, all something there that
can be relatable to the situation that you're in. And we walk through the process of what MAX does
in an organization and where we start and the fact that it isn't a system-centric process. It is
really a people-centric process. And we are still in the world where I don't think the robots have
taken over quite yet and I don't care what other people say, we're still going to need people
fixing our cars, we're still going to need people building our houses. People are going to be around
for a while. And we also deal with the situation where, and this is why it works well for shops
and contractors and things like that, is we have the field, we have the office, or we have different
divisions. So there's cross communication that needs to take place, which most systems assume
everyone's under the same roof. And often that even if you're under the same roof, you're in two
completely different areas. So I deal with that where a lot of other books don't really address
the difference between what the office needs are versus what the shop needs are, the field needs are,
and try to communicate that in a clear way to understand where those breakdowns happen and how
to overcome them. I had the great fortune to be asked by you to write the forward to the book.
I was able to pre-read the book and it is a phenomenal book, very easy read and so much
good advice in the book. So I hope that those of you that are out there and maybe struggling with
some of this process type stuff and just in general, any business owner or leader out there that
wants to make their systems better and make their business better, this is a fantastic book for that.
So I'd encourage you to all go out, find that book, get it in your hands, read it. Dan gave me
the hardcover. That was very, very nice of you. It's really, really cool and we'll maybe try to get
the artwork of the book, picture of the book on the show notes when we release this, but it really,
really well done, Dan. You do phenomenal work as always. This book was a reflection of that.
So thank you for coming on the show. Best of luck with the book and with your travels that
are probably going to come as a result of that. But appreciate all of your help and coming on
the podcast and your friendship. It's always a pleasure talking with you. Well, thank you, Jay.
And as always, I've enjoyed working with you and enjoy everything that you're doing here with
Wrenchway and wish you much success as well. Thank you, buddy. All right, take it.
Thank you so much for listening. We'll see you next week.
About this episode
Dan Paulson lays out why shop owners get stuck doing everything themselves and how to break that cycle by building culture before systems. He emphasizes simple, repeatable processes, regular review, and accountability that feels like coaching rather than micromanagement. Morning huddles, checklists, and clear communication between office and shop teams all show up as practical tools. The larger message is that ownership has to move from the leader to the team if the business is going to scale.
Dan Paulson, Author of “Escape the Owner’s Trap,” joins us to tackle one of the biggest challenges shop owners face—being stuck in the middle of everything. We break down how to build accountability without micromanaging, fix communication gaps, and create processes your team will actually use. If your shop depends on you to function, this episode shows you how to change that.
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:
