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From Technician to Filmmaker Spreading Positivity
From Technician to Filmmaker Spreading Positivity
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About this episode
Keith Smith shares his journey from a lifelong automotive technician to a filmmaker dedicated to positively portraying the trade. Drawing on nearly 20 years in the bays and inspired by his father's legacy, Keith created a heartfelt documentary highlighting the skilled, human side of the industry. The conversation explores the evolution of automotive technology, the importance of shop culture, and the need to counteract negativity with authentic storytelling. Keith emphasizes collaboration, mentorship, and the power of visual media to inspire future technicians and improve industry perception.
Topics:
technician career journey
automotive technology evolution
filmmaking and storytelling
industry positivity
shop culture and teamwork
technician shortage
mentorship and legacy
visual media impact
collaboration in the trade
overcoming negativity
Keith Smith, writer and visual storyteller of Straight Up Living, shares how he turned his ability to speak “technician” into spreading positivity in the automotive industry through his short film “From Bay Floors to Backroads.” In this episode, Keith walks us through his career as a technician, how he dove into filmmaking, and why he felt compelled to create uplifting visual content in an industry often surrounded by negativity.
Check out the full video version of the podcast on YouTube!
About the Episode
- Host: Jay Goninen, WrenchWay, [email protected]
- Guest: Keith Smith, Straight Up Living, [email protected]
Links & Resources
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- From Bay Floors to Backroads video
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- For Instructors: wrenchway.com/solutions/schools/
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Technical
Too Afraid to Ask
Car
Chevrolet Spark
"...you remember the size of those cars, what putting spark plugs in that was like. That's spoken like a true..."
Car
Ford Mustang
"...y Capri, which is always to people is basically a Mustang in disguise. Yeah. Only had a 200 straight six wi..."
Car
Ford Capri
"... a car payment like that now? With a 1982 Mercury Capri, which is always to people is basically a Mustang..."
Select text to request an explanation
I learned some fundamentals, took my technician mindset, like, well, I don't know how to use this
camera that's worth more than my car, but I'm going to figure it out enough to make this video,
and that's what I did.
Welcome back to Beyond the Wrench. My name is Jay Gannon, and I am your host. Today's guest is someone
who's lived the technician life and is now telling that story from a whole new perspective.
Keith Smith grew up in the trade, his dad spent 28 years as a Ford technician, and Keith followed
in his footsteps with nearly 20 years in the bays himself. After a major life transition,
he stepped into storytelling and filmmaking, returning to his roots with his first
documentary short, From Bay Floors to Backroads. Shot in his old Kentucky dealership and at a
local tech college, the film highlights the human side of the trade through the voices of
technicians, educators, and industry leaders. Keith, welcome to the Beyond the Wrench podcast.
How are you?
I'm very well, Jay. Thank you. I'm honored and happy to be here.
So I just met you. It's an interesting story. You had shot this video that we'll talk about
because it's a phenomenal video, and I hope that anybody listening will watch this video,
because I think it's really a nice reflection of our industry. But you had sent it to our team,
and a lot of times we'll get a lot of different types of emails that come in to us.
And for whatever reason, yours really piqued my interest. And as I opened it and started to
watch the video, it wasn't just the content itself, but the way that you did it. It was
unique in kind of that short film type of realm. Just wanted to start off by giving you
the highest praise for that video because I think it's something that our industry needs
more of and just your ability to do some storytelling. Pretty cool.
Well, I appreciate that very much. That means a lot coming from you. I mean,
you're a force in the industry, so I don't take your praise lightly, and I really appreciate that.
Thank you. Yeah. And I think as you and I started talking, I could tell there's a
lot of similarities between us. And I think I feel like a genuine love of the industry,
a genuine want to see the industry move in better directions in some ways.
And that came from your time in a shop. So let's talk about that. You grew up with your
father as a technician. Was it something that you kind of just figured you were going to do all
along? Yeah. I don't think I really even thought much about it. I was one of those people,
like many of us, who end up being technicians or people who work with your hands. School
was just not my favorite thing, just the learning style and the things that they were
teaching just didn't peak my interest. So I didn't necessarily excel there,
but I had areas that did interest me. And like you said, my father was a technician,
so I grew up, I was sleeping in a shop floor and I'm like 10 years old going to work with my dad.
And he wasn't the kind of person who would just let the kids sit there and watch him work
all day. He put me to work. So I had my first experience in the shop as a very young
person. So I just, it almost was just like automatic. I didn't even think of that. And
the next thing you know, I'm a senior in high school. I'm in the auto mechanics program
there. And I was already co-opping at the dealership at 17 years of age and spent more than 20 years
doing it. What year did you graduate high school? 1984. 1984. Okay. So you get in and you've
over that time, you saw some pretty drastic swings in technology and really the evolution
of a service department as a whole. You were able to kind of see our industry grow up a little bit.
Exactly. And I was forced to grow along with it. And that's one of the benefits I credit to
the trade because when I got into the industry, I mean, the industry, anyone who's been in it
and you are a shop owner yourself and spent time there as well. So you know,
it's a never ending state of evolution. It never stops. And when I got into the industry,
carburetors were already on their way out. So I had my hands on a few carburetors and I never
got good at rebuilding them because I didn't have to. By that time, we were just replacing them
as reman units. Fuel injection was coming out, electronic, the birth of electronic engine
control. It was in its infancy when I first got into the bays. And of course, you see
where it's at now, cars or the internal combustion engine is almost a side note now
because the rest of the car is just one big computer. It really is. And I think it's
so, so much of an evolution since the start of your career. And I'm curious, when you first
got into a shop in this, I'll go back to my experience a little bit here. I really struggled
early on in my career as a technician because I had watched a lot of these folks work like your
dad, right? And I just assumed that it was going to be easier than it was. How was your experience
coming into working as a full time technician? Well, I don't think I've necessarily thought it
would be easy because I was already having to turn the wrenches with my dad and our basement
whenever like one of our vehicles messed up or sometimes he would do his own little side
hustle jobs at home like every mechanic does. But it was still an eye-opening experience because
as tough as I thought it was going to be, it was even tougher. And that's not a negative statement.
It's just that it's much more challenging than I realized because it isn't just about
learning the basics of the way mechanical things work. And it is that you need that as a
foundation. But man, it just really opened my eyes in the technology side of it, the way
the engines were being, the changing and controlled was just mind blowing to me. And
it just seemed like once it started, it's just been like on rocket fuel ever since.
So Keith, when we're talking about the advancements in technology, was this something that
you embraced, would you say? Or was this something you kind of were scared of? It walked
me through the technology and the advancements behind it. How did you look at that?
Well, fortunately, my father, I had my father as a role model, and he actually was still working in
the shop when I first started in the shop. And he came from the old school from back in 1969 when
he first started. And he was one of the first people in our shop to be certified in electronic
engine control through Ford Motor Company. So I wasn't intimidated by it because I kind of
had someone there to mentor me through the process. So it was just like a matter of fact
type situation. We had these little Ford had these little things called stars to testers that
just beat that you and put out numbers. I'm sure you know what I'm talking about. I remember. Yep.
Very archaic compared to nowadays, but it was just a matter of fact. I didn't even question it. I
just rolled right into it because he'd already told me because look, underneath all this electronics
is still the same old dirty greasy engine. Don't let it scare you. Just do it. And that's
what I did. Oh, and that's good advice. I think a lot of our educators could learn
something from that too. And I think a lot of them are really good at this. But we've got to keep
in mind when we're training young people that there is that level of intimidation. And it's
this weird line that you have to walk because I think you don't want to you don't want to
intimidate them to the point to where they become paralyzed that they can't learn anything
or they're they're so afraid of touching anything that they're not actually going to
do anything. But then you also can't just make it seem so easy that anybody can do it
because not everybody can do it. Oftentimes in our industry, the electrical piece is what gets
people and I you know, it's one of those things where as an educator, I almost empathize with
them or sympathize for them a little bit because it can be challenging to get people to grasp
electricity. Absolutely. And it's no mystery why I think all manufacturers training paths and even
independent world starts with putting people through electronic courses first. In fact, with
my training path with Ford Motor Company, you couldn't even get certified in anything else
until you got certified in electronics because you can teach people the mechanical stuff mostly.
But the electronic stuff, you have to have a want to do it. And I mean, it's logical that that's
where you need to start. Yeah, it really is. And I like the way that your dad explained that,
right, where it is underneath all of this still the same engine. And it helps you maybe kind
of wrap your hands around that. So walk me through your technician career. You start off
in your dad's dealership, it sounds like. Yes, I started out on the co-op program, 17 years old.
I was already working in a shop. And I was hourly at first. And I was just, you know,
the gopher guy changing the oil with the floor jack and jackstand. So all you guys starting out
with racks, you've got it made. And so I was just that guy. And I just slowly worked my way up.
You know, dad didn't give me any special favorites, because he knew I had to learn
to trade if I was going to do it. But he was also there to support me. So I just spent years doing
that. There were a few times later in life where I left the trade a couple of times to try other
things that had gotten married. I was trying different things, went into construction for a
while, but always came back to the trade. It was always there. I knew that everything else
fell apart. Even today, I would have a little bit of a learning curve. Could I have been out
for a little bit? I could still go back and do something on cars. And that never leaves you.
So I spent years just, like I said, growing up in it, seeing all the changes.
Eventually, it's one point got into the management side for a while. And I actually
did like a tour of the dealership, you might say, because I was a service advisor,
assistant service manager. I even sold cars for a while, if you can believe that.
It's like a full experience. I think you had about a good car salesman as well,
just being able to adequately and properly talk about a vehicle. And I think that helps
build some customer trust. I've seen some former technicians turn into great salespeople because
they're able to talk about some of the stuff that maybe a normal salesperson wouldn't.
Exactly, exactly. It serves you well in almost all areas of life.
Did you learn anything when you went into the advisor role or into the assistant service
manager role that maybe you, I always think it's fun to have technicians come in and shadow
like a service manager, for example, because I think when you're on the other side of the
shop, right, you're in the back, a lot of times you'll look up front and say,
that service manager sits on his butt all the time or that, you know,
that advisor doesn't know what it's like out here. But when you go and experience the other end of it,
you start to see that, hey, this job isn't as easy as it looks.
I could not agree more. And I applaud you for having people do that to shadow the manager
because it is an, I think everyone in every position should shadow everyone else's position
at some point, because it's very easy as a technician. And I did it. I'm guilty. In my
early years, like, ah, the service advisor manager driving me nuts. They can't get approval on this.
They can't get approval on that. And you just don't know what they're doing up there. You just
assume that you're doing all the hard work and they've got the easy job. And in reality,
that's not true at all. They just have a different challenging job than you've got.
And so it was an outpour for me to see the other side of the fence, the other side of the
coin. Because that's why I noticed you noticed in my film, I included a service advisor because
a service advisor, independent shop, leadership, it doesn't matter whoever is in that role.
That relationship between them and the technician is absolutely crucial.
Because let's face it, most technicians probably don't need to be customer facing individuals.
They need to be doing what they're doing and has someone who's good at maybe more
what we call soft skills, people skills in that role. So doing that was a huge outpour for me.
It made me a better technician eventually, quite honestly.
Yeah, I totally agree. And I've heard that from others as well, that kind of make the shift and
then bounce back in that it gave them a different appreciation for the folks in the front. And
I think personally, that helps with some communication, right? Because maybe in the
past, if you're a technician without having that experience in the front,
you might not want to divulge information that you're supposed to be, or you might hold stuff
back. And when you see that other side, you're like, okay, yeah, now I get why maybe they're
walking the shop and asking for an update on where you're at with the car, because they're
going to get called in 20 minutes by the customer asking about an update on their vehicle. And if
you can't supply that, you don't look the best, right? So being able to kind of have your finger on
the pulse of the shop is important. And it's not like a manager is just trying to babysit
everybody. They're just trying to figure out where everybody's at so that when they get that
call, they have a good response. Like they look smart. The shop looks smart. The dealership looks
smart. Everybody looks smart when you have an adequate response. And I think when you're just
in that technician shoes, oftentimes you just think about, okay, why is this person over my
shoulder all the time? Are they micromanaging me? And you're like, no, it's not micromanaging,
they're just trying to communicate. Oh, I could agree more. And that's a huge part
of what builds trust in a shop. You know, the technician doing good quality work,
it's certainly a big part of the equation and the part that technicians typically focus on.
But that advisor who has the answers or who is transparent enough to say,
I don't have the answer yet, Mr. Customer, but I'm going to go get the answer for you
and I'll return that call. Then they're coming back into your bed or talking to you.
So that in and same goes for the manager. Those are crucial trust building roles that
it takes a team. It really does take the whole team working together to make this stuff happen.
No one role is more important than another. They all have their different
importance. That makes sense. It does. It makes total sense. And I think all of your
experience in a shop is what led you to eventually make this video that was the reason we had
the first conversation, right? And for those of you, and again, I would encourage you to
watch it if you haven't kind of that documentary type feel. And I did like the music in the
background, by the way, that was really, really nice. But it's a kind of a feel good
video that kind of in the face of a lot of negativity that we have in this industry
was just a good down to earth documentary type of video that when I watched it just felt better
after watching it. I give you that as a compliment because it was so, so fun for me to watch.
Well, that means a lot, you know, and that was very intentional to take that approach.
As you and I discussed a couple of days ago, when we first made our introductions to one
another on the phone, I took that approach very intentionally, because every industry,
doesn't matter what industry you pick, has its issues and challenges that need to overcome.
And it happens to be in our time in history, we have a skilled trades issue across all skilled
trade industries. So we're focusing on our industry, which is automotive technician. And
you hear the negative side all the time, oftentimes it's human nature to want to
magnify the negative, magnify the negative. But that's only one piece of the story.
There are some negative things going on that has got us to where we are now.
But it's not all negative. So I took that positive approach, that documentary type approach,
but I wanted to tell this, this is a real human story. There are real humans involved.
There are good people. Are there bad people in the industry? Absolutely. Just like there's
bad people in the medical industry and pharmaceutical industry, manufacturing, it don't
matter. But those are always, in my opinion, the exceptions. Most often industries are filled with
good people. And automotive is filled with a lot of good people. And I tell people oftentimes,
like you, who have spent time in those bays who like my film, I say, that's because I speak
technician. And because I'm not coming at it from the outside, trying to shine a light into a
space I don't know much about, I came out of that space. So it was important to me
to show that people, this kind of messaging, I mean, I didn't have this kind of messaging growing
up. I went there a period as a young teenager, I was sometimes slightly embarrassed about my
grease stain hands that I couldn't get all the dirt off of, because this is before the
days of nitrogluss. We just absorbed the chemicals back in the day. But
obviously, I'm way beyond that now. But so that approach was very intentional,
because this is a positive story. And I just really want to counteract that negative spin that has
been characterizing this industry, and especially this part of the industry for so long.
Yeah. And you hit on something there that I think is important to recognize, which is
not just our industry has bad days. And I think there's so many people
that make full, people in our industry that make wholesale assumptions or they really
base their level of satisfaction in their shop on the bad days. And they, at some level,
feel like thrive on the negativity. And you look at that, and you're like, okay,
so if this person is this negative on social media, how do you think they are in their
bay, right? Like, they're going out of their way to talk poorly about these folks. And
you know, we talk a lot about culture and shops and the importance of a good culture.
And that's one of those things where if you've got one or two of those people in your shop that
is just driving that negative narrative over and over and over again, I don't care how good
of a tech they are, they are costing you happiness, right? They're costing you so much
that might not show up in a P&L. I'd argue that it ultimately does. But when you look at those kind
of, I've got a book behind me called The Energy Bus and they talk about energy vampires. And if
you're working next to those energy vampires that just suck the fun out of the job or suck
just the enjoyment out, it's not fun to be around those people. And for those that are
out there and I think we all go through stages where maybe we're a little negative or maybe we're
in a rut. And that's okay. It's more of being able to look at yourself in the mirror and recognize
when something like that's happening to you and figure out how you pull yourself out of that.
Because if you just go down that path and you're just always miserable, it doesn't matter
if you're a technician. Like, if you were to go out and say, oh, this profession stinks,
I'm going to go be a carpenter. I can guarantee you're going to have bad days as a carpenter.
I can guarantee you're going to have bad days as a plumber or whatever other trade you feel like
treats their people so good. But if you look at some of the cool stuff we have,
and that's what I thought your video did such a nice job at was,
you talked about the nice people in the industry. We have a lot of great people in
this industry and a lot of great technicians that are taking young techs under their wing or
they're really kind of helping out with just wanting to pass it along to the next generation.
And even I was just talking to a young technician friend of mine the other day and
when I say young, he's probably mid 30s. And he just really had a really positive
viewpoint or stance on the industry. But he's also not the one that's going to go out to social
media and talk about it, right? Like he's not going to go blast how happy he is all the time.
And so that's why I feel like that negative narrative carries over. But all of that, just to say,
if you find yourself as a technician in that negative zone, figure out a way to get yourself
out of that. And if it's because you're working next to somebody that's super negative,
have a conversation with your supervisor, have a have a conversation with your service
manager or shop foreman about, Hey, maybe I need to move to a different bay or I need to
separate myself a little bit. But you know, I think, and I'm no different than anybody else,
you know, behind a microphone right now, where I'll have bad days, but I try to find
something to read or a good podcast to listen to or something to get my brain to snap out of
that negative pattern. And I think that's so essential to being happy, not only as a technician,
but in life and just knowing for our industry, bad days don't just happen to us. They happen to
everybody. It's just, you don't want that bad day to turn into a bad week and then a bad month
and a bad year and a bad decade and a bad life, right? Like you can do that because that
really is not the path you want to go down. Oh, I mean, you're, you're singing the song,
my song right now, because this whole, this really smacks of self-development and personal
accountability. And I love this stuff. And it put me in mind of two things. One is you had,
you've had Ed Roberts on your podcast a couple of times. I know, which those are forward as
shining examples of doing some things right, to say the very least. And he said something,
I've rewatched this recently, a couple of years ago, but he talked about how important
culture is in a shop. And you can amplify this, use this exact same example as for the industry as a
whole. But he talked about how the culture in a shop is so important because if you want happy
customers, you have to start with having happy employees. And like you were saying, if you have
somebody who's in the bay next to you and they've made a lifestyle, like you said,
anybody can have a bad day. Sometimes we all do. That's to see human experience.
But it's up to us whether we make that a lifestyle or not. And if we make it a lifestyle, well,
well then you've probably become a cancer to whatever business you're working in and you're
poisoning everyone around you. And you don't have to say that way. You know, many people do.
So I just want to emphasize, re-emphasize what you just said, that oftentimes people get that
backwards. You know, we need a happy CSI. What was the word to add? Use a happy CSI. But we need
to have a happy ESI first. Employee satisfaction. Yeah, have employee satisfaction first because
that's going to make you your happy customers. And like you said, but people want to gravitate
towards negativity. And in our industry, you hear that a lot and I see all kinds of social
media accounts out there. People who are miserable and upset like to, they want to be seen and
heard. So they usually do that through negative venting. What I wanted to do with my film was
offer an alternative like you can still be seen and heard without being negative. There are real
challenges and frustrations to the automotive trade. Like you said, like there is every other
industry. But that's the reason why I wanted to do it in a visual manner so people could see
with their own eyes that there is good things going on. There's good people in the industry.
And I came upon this idea from a woman named Sarah Urgrell. I don't know if you're familiar
with her. She's a producer, a two-time Emmy winner, founder of Common Ground Studios. She
has collaborated with Mike Rowe on a couple of his projects. In fact, the last two projects
you've seen, if you see a woman like people you should know in return of the favor,
there's a woman on screen with him who has co-hosts. That's Sarah Urgrell. Wow. And
this stuff that we're talking about, this type of storytelling is her jam. So it inspired me
thinking, okay, I saw a podcast interview with her and she said a phrase that stuck with me.
She said, we can't be what we don't see. And what she meant by that is we need that example.
We need to see the example out there because I thought we see the negative. It's easy to
believe that that's all that's available. So that stuck with me. And that's when I realized,
hey, there's nothing, no matter books or articles that I can write and Lord knows
I can write them and I've written bunches, but none of that's going to be as effective
as taking this to the visual medium. People need to see with their own eyes.
It's easier for anybody to write about it and you read a book, you say, well, yeah.
But when you're seeing the shop floor and on the screen that you saw like in my video,
who's my age mentoring the 19 year old kid who's got an engine tore down
and they're talking positively about the trade. It's a different narrative. And I think that's
kind of messaging that we need more of. I could not agree more. And I wrote down
that quote, we can't be what we don't see. Was that the correct? Yes. That is powerful. And we've
talked a lot about this as it relates to getting more female technicians in the industry,
right? Because a lot of times there isn't that visibility to a good female technician. But
when you do see one in a good female technician, there are a lot of them out there, believe it or
not. Yes. It's a thing. It is just awesome. And so I've told a lot of people, we need to share
that story more. We need to share the story of that young true apprentice tech that is doing
some great things and learning and just even chronicling through
things as they are working on them in the shop. If you can talk to a technician that,
you know what, I am struggling with electrical diagnostics and I'm struggling specifically
with maybe I'm new to using a scope. Just walking through maybe some of that mindset as
well. But what you did with your video and I said this in our first conversation as well was
I thought it was really important you used real people, like non-actors, not somebody that
as a technician, if I were watching it saying that, that's not a real technician. I can tell
them it's not a real technician. These are real people and they were well spoken.
They represented themselves in a very professional manner. And I guess the best way to put it is
polished. The whole thing was polished. And it to me, when we're looking for the respect that
we're looking for as technicians, when we're looking to get paid more as technicians,
when we're looking for all of this stuff that we're looking for, we hear in our voice of
technician report that you're looking for. This video kind of represented a lot of that.
You're showing this off in a way that if the general public were to watch this would be intrigued
and kind of see behind the scenes in terms of technology and the advancements and how hard it
is, but also like how skilled these people are that are working on your car when you take
it to the dealership, it just it kind of encompassed all of that.
Well, that means a lot and it sounds self-serving, but I agree insofar as the truth of showing the
real people called some of the most intelligent people I know working the automotive trade.
I mean, you can't be, I mean, for lack of a better word, just kind of humorous. You
can't be an idiot and be a successful automotive technician. You just can't.
You can.
Or a service advisor either for that matter, manager or so forth, but
again, and I don't believe anyone set out with bad intentions to create like the technician
shortage that we have and it didn't happen because of one person, one policy or one organization.
This is like, this is a cultural thing we're talking about and that includes the industry,
but also outside of the industry. So it's important for people to know
that all that bad stuff you're hearing, yeah, some of it, some of it, not all of it.
It's true. Right.
Yeah, some of it exists, but so much more good exists. And we, like you said, about women in
the trade, I was very happy to be able to have a female technician in my video.
That was cool.
Because we need sharp minds. I've told people all the time, we don't need specific genders.
We need sharp minds and people who are willing to learn, people who will step
up and embrace the challenge. And let's not forget, make some pretty good money at the same time.
And while not going into debt for your training, you actually can get paid to train.
And but to show this side of things, to me, it was just a no-brainer. It's like,
this has to be done. I didn't really see anybody doing it, at least not from the
perspective of having lived the life. And I just, I just, I went all in. Like I said,
I bought the gear, I learned some fundamentals, took my technician mindset. You know, I wasn't
scared of technology. Like, well, I don't know how to use this camera that's worth more than
my car, but I'm going to figure it out enough to make this video. And that's what I did.
What did you learn about there? Because as somebody that really stinks with
especially audio and video equipment like myself, what did you learn about filmography and just like
in general, how you do something like that? Because it was, again, very well done, very professional.
And for somebody to kind of, you know, you taught yourself, pretty cool.
Well, I appreciate it. I just went into it thinking, okay, how do you, I want to make this
documentary style. I want music. I want this to be like entertaining, educational. And real quickly,
before I forget this, you talked about people responding to this video. You'd be surprised
that many people watched this video and some of you commented on YouTube. You can go look at the
comments who were completely unaware that there's a technician shortage. Now it's mind-boggling
to us, but we're coming from the inside of the industry. We're in it. Yeah. We're in it. So
people didn't realize the storm is coming. The storm is actually already here.
But again, it emphasizes the importance of doing work like this. But I just went at it
thinking, okay, I want to make a really cool looking documentary type thing.
And I've already into this sort of thing anyway. I'm very creative. I like to explore new ways
of expression and telling stories and storytelling is the core. So I get to remember, start with a
good story and this is a good story that needs to be told and people want to hear it.
And after that, it's like, how do you learn what a good documentary is? Well,
watch a lot of documentaries. You know what I mean? What do you like about it? Look how they
set up the interview. You notice all my people are off to one side of the screen. That's called
the rule of thirds. You don't usually put someone right dead center of the screen. You
always have them off to one side talking towards the space. It's just things you learn
just by studying. I intentionally researched. Once again, I say kids nowadays are spoiled
because I watch a lot of YouTube videos to educate myself. Then I would just get my camera out
and start practicing and learn where all the settings were. And it's just like being a
technician that first in our shop, when modular style engines first started coming out like
Ford's 4.6 liter and 5.4 liter, I rebuilt the first one in the shop from the block up
because there was an oil consumption issue and I got sent a bare block and I had to build it.
And no one had done it. There was not even anybody to ask. And there wasn't YouTube.
There wasn't YouTube back then. So you just do it one step at a time. Don't let it overwhelm you.
Just what's the old saying? How do you eat an elephant? You know, one bite at a time.
That's just really how you could learn this just like I did.
It's just if it interests you and you want to do it. And if not, you find someone else
to do it. But it's just what makes a good technician is what makes anybody good at
anything. A willingness to learn, not be intimidated, but what you have to learn
and then just taking the lead. That's good advice as a whole right there.
And as you look to this, what was fascinating to me was that it wasn't like this was
commissioned or like you had a company that you were filming this for. And what I like about
that is that there wasn't like the undertone of some marketing behind you, right? This was true
raw video and for nothing other than to help promote the trade and to help make it better.
And in a lot of times when you see a video like that, there's going to be some undertone to
some other marketing reference of somebody that paid for it. Or you're clearly trying
to drive them into your program. Nothing wrong with that. We've done that before at our company,
right? And I think it was just the genuineness of it. Like there's so little of that anymore.
I feel like where there's not that marketing undertone or somebody's recording a video
for something that's really selfless. So when I look at what you did, that was selfless. And
I hope it does lead to more opportunities where you're able to create more of this type of video
just because it is the right way to do it. And I think it's okay if there's marketing
undertones, but really just this one didn't have that feel at all. It just felt like from
the heart, you really wanted to do something that you'd be proud of and that the industry
would be proud of. And I think you accomplished that.
Well, listen, that means more than I can convey in words, seriously. And it really was a work of
the heart, a work of passion. One of my core philosophies in life and the things I've been
doing since I've been living the nomad life is it's amazing to me how sometimes people are
surprised when you show up to help and you don't have any other motivation behind it.
And because we're all conditioned to so much of our relationships being transactional.
And there's a time and place, like you said, for transactional stuff, marketing stuff.
I love that stuff. I think it's very interesting and there's a place for that too.
But we're so conditioned to everything being transactional that we sometimes
mistakenly believe that everything is. And again, this is my legacy. I think of my father.
I want to honor him. I want to honor the people you saw in the video,
the guys I worked beside, sweated beside, sometimes custom bled beside.
It really was a work of the heart. And to see the industry constantly trashed,
even by people who are currently mechanics, they're obviously dissatisfied. And
I just want them to know, like, you can be seen and heard. You don't have to take this route
and you're not going to accomplish anything but taking this route. Take my word for it.
I've tried the negative path myself a few times and every once did it really accomplish
anything good for me. So it was just important to take this route and let people know that
there are people out there who really care in my motivation. I mean, could this lead to
other opportunities for me? That would be great. But clearly I didn't sit out that way
because no one hired me to do this. I don't know if anybody even wanted me to do this.
But I wanted to do it. And once I got to talking to real technicians
on the front lines, they were happy to be part of it.
I think so. And I think that opens the door for so many other opportunities for content in
our industry. And I think as you look at this and your video was probably more
macro level looking at it kind of broadly as far as the career itself.
And I'm just curious as to how many other types of videos do you think you can make
about our industry? Because I feel like there's an endless amount of content out there to create
if you're able to do it. Oh, 100%. There's no shortage of ideas at all.
Again, astute eye on your part where you notice I did take a full bird's eye view.
I got a little bit closer than that but still kind of a macro view.
But there are so many stories that we could go into. And I think need to be gotten into
everything from the independent pathway shops. And I spent some time in an independent shop too.
And it's a whole different, it's a different world, similar, but also a different world.
I spent time in this dealership. We got the service advisor angle.
We got and just thought let's just include the entire fixed ops area. I mean,
we can't leave out parts department because without parts technicians kind of screwed.
So there are just so many stories. There are so many pieces of the industry that we need to drill
down in and talk about. We could talk about the technician pipeline from tech schools to dealership
level training programs. Like we mentioned Bozard's four down in Florida who's got their own
thing. And from what I understand, most of the people who graduate through a program stay there.
And that's in itself is phenomenal. But again, I get all excited to talk about this because
there are so many stories waiting to be told. If I had unlimited funds and could start tomorrow,
I wouldn't live long enough to tell all the stories. So there are a lot of stories to tell
from the day to day people experience from.
Oh, yeah. Oh, sorry. Go ahead. I don't want to just create my my goal.
I'll apologize. My goal wasn't to create just technician content. I want to
facilitate. I want to be a facilitator of conversations because the problems that we
talked about that face our industry and the technician shortage.
I think there are many different stories being told. You have like leadership and
manufacturer level leadership saying this one story, you have your frontline technicians
saying their lived experience story. You've got perspective technicians hearing stories or
spending their own story, what to believe about the trade. In my experience, like for example,
if you ever work in a business to where you get a lot of he said, she said, you don't know
who said what my way around that was always get OK, I will pull all the managers in the
same room and say, OK, what is it that we need to do here? And then stuff actually got done.
And what I would like to do is help facilitate those type of conversations
and get everybody in the same room, sometimes literally, sometimes figuratively,
and have these conversations because it's not that we're starting to say, oh,
you're wrong. They're wrong. He's wrong. She's wrong. It's just that in order to
resolve any of these real issues that much like you said, the shadowing earlier of
understanding the different perspectives, manufacturers have some legitimate perspectives
as much as the guy on the front lines may say, may, you know, kind of grit their teeth at that.
And that would have been me at one point. But the front line tech has some,
has some valid viewpoints, too. And we need to be having these conversations
solution oriented conversation, not just sessions to scream at each other.
And that's the whole point of creating this type of content. And I kind of went off
on a tangent there and away, but I love it. The point being, there's no limit to the stories
and how deep we can go. You know, I agree. And the point you made there about having
conversations without having to get upset with each other or angry, even with varying
viewpoints, I think if you're one of those technicians that's out there, like we talked
about before, where you are finding yourself in that rut or in that negative rut.
And I think one simple shift you can make in your mindset is to
approach this as, am I trying to help solve the problem, the grander problem of the industry? Or
am I just trying to fight people? Because if I'm just going out to like social media is a prime
example of that. People just going back and forth in comment sections and trying to win
an argument in a comment section, you're like, okay, you're completely missing the point.
Why aren't we hearing other people out and then offering suggestions on maybe,
maybe they are just flat out wrong, but you proving a point to them in a comment section
isn't going to do you any good. But if those same two people that are arguing back and forth
start to brainstorm about ways to make the industry better, even though they have varying
viewpoints on this, you could find yourself in a much better position,
not even like position, but just like mentally in a better position if you reframe your thinking
just a little bit. Oh, I couldn't agree more. This is the basis of human conversation, right,
of actual genuine communication. Because like you said, we're not going to solve anything.
And so much of our in social media is a good example of this, even though I've been seeing
a trend lately, even on radio stations, I was driving across the country,
coming across to make this film, I've been hearing these radio stations
having these little segments that was just good news. I've been seeing more of this trend on
social media costs so much. I think people are getting burned out with the divisiveness.
Everything is divisive. Name the topic. I've seen videos of 11 year old
kid playing drums and someone dissing the kid in the comments. I mean, he's like,
people are just like, you know what I mean? It's just like, oh, look at that Lord jerk, man.
How miserable of a person do you have to be to put a 11 year old down?
Exactly. But that same spirit is like he said, is permeate or society in too many ways.
And my work in this world, I fully believe, and automotive trade is one area in which
I'm pouring myself into, is to try to bridge these divides. Because that is the only way
forward as I mean, you could macro all the way out for us as human beings and our life on this
planet all the way down to day to day life and whatever your chosen profession may be.
We have to be able to bridge these divides. We have to be able to disagree and still move
forward because guess what? We can. If you've ever been in a romantic relationship of any kind,
married or not, people know that you don't agree on everything, but you can still live
life together. Well, this is no different. I mean, you and I, Jay probably would not agree
on everything in life exactly the same. And that would be quite boring if it was that way.
But I bet you and I are going to be friends and I bet we already know we have a lot of common
ground and we know that we can move forward from there with that and make positive changes
for everyone or influence those changes. That's a great message. Now,
I do have one film request from you at some point in your career that I'd love to see.
I'd be curious if you'd be interested in learning what my request is because I think
it would be a cool film. I'm ready to hear. I'm going to write it down just to see.
So you talked about your dad's legacy and kind of the legacy that he left behind in a shop.
I would love to see more awareness and just kind of highlighting some of the people that came before
us or some of the folks that are that alpha mentor in the shop that took a lot of people
under their wing over the time that they had in the shop, maybe didn't get the recognition
because they largely were in the shop and not upfront at a dealership or even at an independent.
And I would love to get to the point to where we do highlight some of those people and give them
the recognition that I feel they deserve in a lot of ways. And I talk a lot about it, but
I've still got one of my mentors business cards that sits right behind me on the podcast.
And so I think over the years, I've come across so many technicians that have gone
unrecognized for work that wasn't on a car, right? Where it was somebody that really took people
under their wing and really showed them the way because those are the people we need more of
in our industry are those people that do have that genuine heart that want to take people
under their wing that want to do things the right way. And unfortunately, a lot of times,
they're not the ones that get the attention. And so that's my one video idea that I would
love to see is maybe finding that person that has been in the shop for 40 years and has taken
a lot of people under their wing. And I almost look at it like if you watch sports at all,
you see some of these coaching trees of a Bill Parcells or a Mike Holmgren or Bill Walsh,
like all these coaches that had all these protégés underneath them that ended up
spreading their wings and flying to different levels. I think we have a lot of that in our
own shops and we don't pay enough attention to those folks.
I told you, you are natural at this. That is a brilliant freaking idea. I got goosebumps,
no exaggeration. I'll show you if you could see them. But that could be either a whole deep dive
video or even a series of videos of the mentors because these are the guys who are now,
speaking of the shortage, who are aging out. And maybe we could be, some of them
may just want to retire and they've earned it. But if they didn't, they don't really
weren't interested in retiring, but maybe they've gotten too old, their body's kind of like mine,
who's like, I really can't do that work anymore. There's still a role for them if they want it.
This, that could be a, that's a fantastic idea. That's a fantastic idea. And how needed,
it not only does it honor those people, like you said, who paved the way for people like
me, you and now even the younger people, they publicly didn't get the recognition that they
deserve almost guaranteed from the rest of society as we have the technicians. I mean,
I became a technician because of someone who is already a technician and your story is very
similar. And how many people out there are the same way? And I could talk about this rest
of the day, the storyteller of me just got so excited when you were sharing that. That's a
fantastic idea. Yeah. And I just look at it as almost giving people credit that they've rightfully
earned, but never received. And, you know, I look back over the course of my career, I was a rep,
a factory rep, and there was a dealership that I worked with early on in my career,
Lee Case Modell, he ended up working directly for me. I went to go work for the dealership
and he was working for me. And it's so funny because he was working for me. I was the one
learning everything from him. And, you know, I would sit down and have so many good conversations
with him. A lot of them were technically focused. He was trying to teach me something
that I didn't know or didn't have a good understanding of, but he was so patient and he
was so willing to go out of his way to explain something where a lot of people weren't. And
the guy could care less if he got recognition for it, right? Like he did not want the recognition.
That's the funny part about a lot of these people and maybe the difficulty in creating a
film around it would be a lot of them don't want the recognition. A lot of them don't want
they don't want to be given credit for the stuff that they've done. But I look at
like an example like that where he was hugely impactful on my life and Lee's since passed away,
which is still a, you know, it's still heartbreaking to me because I had conversations
with him about retiring and he never did actually make it to retirement. And that was like
one of those where it to this day still eats at me because here's this guy that went out of his
way to help me and expected nothing in return. So I just, I know there's a lot of Lee's out
there that we should be sharing the story of and hopefully we can. I couldn't agree more.
I could name several people myself just like you who don't want to be in the spotlight.
I think I, and again, because we hadn't been a technician, I think at least some of them,
not all of them, I could probably talk into, look, let me tell you why we need you on camera, man,
because I mean, we need this part of the story. You know what I mean?
You have to use your storytelling to be able to get them on the story. Yeah. Yeah. Exactly.
Exactly. Yeah. Yeah. And I even look at it. I've had some over the course of my career
too that were kind of rough around the edges and they at first were super cold to me. And then
over time warmed up and then they became a great mentor to me. And there's just so many
different ways you could look at this and go about this and really just so many good stories
to be had. But I think there's a lot of value in being able to tell a lot of those stories.
I couldn't agree more. And I think it's what we really need right now and getting circling back
to what we're just, you know, how we started the conversation. That's why I did this project in the
first place, because it's a story that deserves to be told. And there are a lot of people's
stories who need to be, who deserve to be told. And that's, we need more of that messaging.
And someone has to take the leap. And maybe there are others doing that I'm not aware of,
but I don't know about it yet. So, you know, sometimes people will thought though,
maybe there'll be others who do similar things, but it needs to be done. So I'm just
going to try to do my part. You're doing a great job at it. And as we get close to the
end of this, we do have some kind of fun questions for you to run through and just
learn a little bit more about you. First question is what was your first car?
My first car that I owned, myself. Yeah, the first car that you, like when you got your driver's
license and took off, what was your first vehicle? Well, the first car I drove belonged to my parents,
but I kind of took it over with a 1973 Ford Maverick. All right. Not the pickup truck kids
that you see today. This was a car and it had a 302 V8. So you can imagine if you remember
the size of those cars, what putting spark plugs in that was like.
That's spoken like a true technician. That's the first thing that comes to mind,
those spark plugs really suck to do. Oh, yeah. The first car that I paid for after graduating
in high school, my dad put a $500 down payment, but I took over the payment. I still remember,
there's 176.50 a month. Would you kill to have a car payment like that now?
With a 1982 Mercury Capri, which is always to people is basically a Mustang in disguise.
Yeah. Only had a 200 straight six with a one barrel carburetor.
A one barrel carburetor. Zero to 60 in three minutes.
Just choking self out. Yeah. That is great. I had some gems growing up myself and growing
up in a shop. I think the assumption would be that you'd have a nice reliable vehicle and
that couldn't have been further from the truth from my experience. I empathize with some of that.
Now, what time do you wake up in the morning? Are you an early riser or late riser? What are
you like? I'm an early riser. It's not uncommon for me to be up at four in the morning,
but I'm always before five or at five. All right. That's something we've learned
over the years, I think is a common theme amongst some of the high performers we've
had on. I think it's just a good best practice in general.
Even going back to some of the better technicians that I've seen over the years,
they were a lot of times the early risers that were in the shop, organized to the shop a half
hour, 15 minutes before the shop actually opened or their shift started and were just
prepared and ready to go at start time. It was game time when the clock rolled to
eight o'clock or seven thirty or whatever it was, but I think that's a good thing.
Last question, what's your favorite food? Oh, my gosh. That's really hard to say.
If you say drink, I would easily answer coffee.
But food, I don't know. I like food, so it's hard to say. I like burgers and
pizza like anybody else, but also like nice soups and black and salmon.
That's probably a top contender. Black and salmon. I love black and salmon.
All right. That's a good one. I'm kind of like you. I'm all over the place. I like all
kinds of food. Probably like food too much in a lot of ways. But yeah, no. This is,
I've always loved the fun part of the conversation, but for the serious part
of the conversation, I genuinely appreciate what you're doing for our industry and the fact that
you had the heart to go create this on your own is really telling. I think there'll be a lot of
people that once they watch this video will be hopeful that you're coming up with some more,
because they are really, really good. That video is really, really good. It just feels
like there's so many other stories to tell and you being able to use not only your industry
background, but your storytelling ability is awesome. I really look forward to hopefully seeing
some more of your videos. That's definitely my intention. Like I said, I'm funding this all
myself and that's really the only contender. I'll find some way to do it because my heart
is sold on this. This needs to be done. If we're going to turn the industry around,
we have to be collaborative in our mindset. This is my way of doing that.
Yeah. I love that. And then lastly, how can somebody get in touch with you?
I'm on social media, obviously, Instagram, YouTube, Facebook, it's all Keith E. Smith
is an Edward, K-E-I-T-H Smith. But you can also email me at thekeithesmith at gmail.com.
It goes to great lengths with the name like Smith because all the gmail accounts were taken.
We didn't have that problem with getting in. Yeah. I bet. I envy you a little bit.
If you found my video on YouTube, obviously, you can leave comments there and say,
hey, I want to reach out to you. I can't find you. I do have a website. I haven't put some of this
automotive content on there yet. It's straightupliving.com. You can go there and click any links also
to get more like social media links or email. We'll make sure to include the links in the
show notes as well. Thank you. I can't tell you how much I've enjoyed this conversation
and getting to know you, Keith, and just want you to keep up the great work. You're doing
some phenomenal things. Well, I appreciate it. I consider this the beginning of a good friendship.
If I appreciate you responding to my email and for allowing me to be on your podcast,
I really have enjoyed it. The pleasure is all ours. Thank you, Keith. Thank you.
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