Hire Like a Pro: The First 5 Seconds That Reveal A-Players
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About this episode
Joe Adams and Glenn Piccolo break down a no-nonsense interview playbook for auto shops: why first impressions and rapid rapport matter, how to use targeted…
Key takeaways
- —The first few seconds of an interview are crucial for establishing a connection with candidates.
- —Candidates should be made comfortable to reveal their true character beyond rehearsed answers.
- —Every interview is an opportunity to gather referrals, even if the candidate isn't a fit.
- —Asking about a candidate's last two years of earnings can indicate their value and skill level.
- —A-players are often found through networking and referrals rather than traditional resumes.
Frequently asked
- What should I look for in the first few seconds of an interview?
- You should assess how comfortable you feel with the candidate and their presence. This initial connection can indicate how they will interact with customers.
- How can I identify if a candidate is an A-player?
- Look for immediate impact on sales, how well they connect with the team, and their willingness to take initiative during the interview process.
- What is the importance of asking about a candidate's last two years of earnings?
- This question helps gauge their market value and can indicate their level of skill and experience in the industry.
▸Full transcript
Welcome to episode 16 of MasterTech to Millionaire. My name is Joe Adams with Adams Automotive and Auto Shop Answers. We are the biggest shop in the world and we love training former master technicians turned shop owners. We're trying to turn them into millionaires. So this is MasterTech to Millionaire. Today I'm here with Glenn Piccolo, who is pretty much in charge of all the training for our entire company., and the topic of conversation today is going to be, you know, the interview process.
A lot of people, you know, we know that people are very important to the concept and running the playbook, but how do you identify what a really good A-player looks like? And we're going to walk you guys through the interview process and kind of just have a great conversation on what we're looking for. So, Glenn, how are we doing this morning? Man, doing great.
Doing great. This is going to be a lot of fun. Interviewing, you know, recruiting is a big part of it. I think we'll touch on recruiting, uh, probably a little bit later, but to kind of kick us off to be able to start on the interview process. You know, I think, you know, one of the, the most important things in an interview is just really how comfortable I feel with somebody when they walk in the door and what that connection is like in that first 5 seconds.
So, um, we'll kind of get into it. How do you want to, how do you want to kick this off with the interview process? Well, let's just get right into it. So, you know, you said that, you said the comfortability. So something we talk about in training a lot is the first 3 seconds, you know, and the analogy we like to use is calling Verizon for support to get a person from a help desk to help you, or United Airlines, like, how long does it take you to understand if you have an A-player or somebody that's going to put you on hold for 30 minutes and you're going to have to talk to their manager?
And so when we're sitting in an interview, you know, the first 3 seconds is so important because like you like to say, that's what the customer is going to experience. So I'm trying to build that connection and then the rest, you You pretty much know in the first 5 minutes, really the first 5 seconds, if you can build a connection with them.
And then the rest of the interview is kind of to confirm what your initial reaction was. So do you want to walk me through kind of how you think about that process? Yeah, so that, that first 5 seconds is, is super important because like you said, so when a customer walks through the door, it's just like that Verizon example you give, right?
It's like, how is the customer going to feel in that first 5 seconds? Okay. And so we've even been in situations where like you have an interview and you know, you don't feel it right away. And then as you start talking, you start talking, you start warming up to somebody, but you always have to kind of circle back to what was that initial, uh, reaction, okay?
Like, how did I feel exactly when that person walked in the door, and what kind of presence did they have? And so, like, for me, I want to— I want them— I want to fall in love with somebody, like, almost immediately. And then my interview process is just, just way different because it's so, like, unstructured, I guess you could say. A lot of people have, like, the list, like, of all the questions, and obviously we have the questions that we're going to ask, but like, you know, where do you want to see yourself in 5 years?
And all the typical questions that people ask. My goal is to get somebody super comfortable, like very fast, because you're not interviewing them, you're interviewing their representative. It's a first date. It's a first date. So I'm interviewing their representative. And so in 90 days, is this going to be the same person? And the answer to that is typically not. Now, if I can get them super comfortable, like typically I look at a resume, I kind of glance at it, and then I get a good idea of just like little quick summary of it, and then I just put it off to the side.
Correct. And I literally don't even have it in front of me. I don't have a pen and a pad. I literally kind of sit back, relax, and I get them loose. And if you can get them loose, they will start feeling more comfortable. And then all of a sudden, you'll start getting things that you wouldn't get in a normal interview because people are trained to interview.
You can go, uh, you know, online, or you can watch videos, and you can be trained on how to answer. Everybody knows the right answers to the questions, but it's about you know, the actual comfortability with them once you start breaking things down, that I think reveals a lot. So you mentioned something, you said, I try to warm them up. It's like once they get warmed up, or what did you say?
You said the first 5 seconds, the first few moments, and then maybe you got, you know, once they get warmed up, you want to see what their actual character's like, if they connect, maybe they're nervous. But you made a great point as well that Elon actually talks about a lot. He says, I trust the interview way more than the conversation, way more than the resume.
Sure. Because you can get down to the root of whether or not they were the ones who were actually responsible for doing the work at their old company or if they just happened to work at a good company. So getting them as comfortable as possible, I think, is very, very important. If you just read the checklist, which we're going to go through the checklist as well, we have our pre-interview questions, which is you know, do you have a clean driving record, etc.?
But you are going to get the representative. And so I've literally watched you say, you know, what's up, buddy, how you doing? Like cracking jokes like it is the least formal process or that's the intention of it. Because what I've found and what I've watched you do is you get them so— you're selling, so you're on stage, it's a performance and you're getting them so comfortable and so like almost like they think it's a laydown that they're going to get the job.
And this guy loves me, right? He's like, we're connecting, but they don't know that you're like selling them. And what starts to happen is they literally just let their guard down. Like, F-bombs starts coming out. You know, the truth starts coming out. Man, yeah, man, dude, you wanna tell a story about the club? I heard there was a club that interviewee was a member of that I'd never heard of.
Oh yeah, yeah, so I was thinking that, I was like, club, what do you— Yeah, so I get this guy in and we're talking and, You know, like, like you said, I'm like super chill, super relaxed. Dude, what's up, man? Oh, man. You know, just like not formal at all. And so I'm like, like, what do you do? Like, even physically, you kind of— No, no, not physically.
No, I'm like, you're like this. Lean back. Exactly, man. Like I'm talking to a friend or whatever because like I said, it's like, hi, how are you today? You know, like a formal interview. It's like that just doesn't work. So I'm like, man, like, what do you do like on your spare time? Like, what do you, what do you like to do?
Pre-check question. Yeah. And he's like, well, I'm in a drinking club. Now, most people right there would say, like, disqualify, or okay, or write that down, or go to their piece of paper. And, you know, and that's going to give them a cue that you didn't like that answer. But me, I'm like, dude, really? Like, tell me, tell me about that. Like, tell me, you're in a drinking club?
Tell me about that. That's crazy. And he's like, yeah. So now he's, he's getting to express this to me, and he's like super excited because he sees I'm engaged. And he's like, yeah, so like me and this group of people basically go We go out, you know, like after work and we go and test out different drinks and we drink. And I'm like, that's crazy.
Like, you gotta be like, how do you even get up in the morning? Like, it's gotta be hard to do that. Like, that's wild. And he's like, no, it's not that bad. Like, basically I'm used to it. I do it all the time. Now in my mind, I have already like disqualified this person. Okay. But I also know that he knows people.
That's right. And so there's two parts of the interview. There's the part where I'm like trying to see if this person is gonna be a fit. And then there's the part where I will shift into This person's not going to make my team, but I know they probably know somebody that might. And then I'm going to shift to try and extract who's the best person they know.
And so every interview is very valuable, matter of fact. And the people that don't work out sometimes are the most valuable ones because they know somebody. And you got to remember, like, A players, which is what we're looking for, man, they're not just falling out of trees. They're not coming in off of ads. They're very hard to find. Matter of fact, you'll find a lot of A players through through resumes of people that didn't work out.
Yeah. So, so to reiterate, you're saying that every person that comes through the door is a resource as well as an opportunity. So yeah, like if it's not going good, why write them off? You're putting your time in to talk to them anyway. It takes 10 more minutes to make them comfortable and pretty much convince them that they're, they're a shoo-in for the job.
And then at the end of the interview, I'm going to talk to him and I'm going to say, hey, Billy, or whatever his name is, you know, this is the part of the interview where we're going to ask for some referrals. Like, do you have anybody that would vouch for you or anybody I can call that would be, you know, able to say something nice about you?
And don't give me your brother-in-law's number, you know, like, like, for example, who's the best manager you've ever worked underneath? Who's the best salesperson you've ever worked? Who's the best technician you've ever worked with? They don't know that I'm running a script. Todd trained us on the script, on running the play. I am trying to get the phone number out of their phone because, because, Glenn, you've been in the industry 28 years.
Have you ever had a resume? I have not. No. Glenn, when Todd recruited Glenn for our company 6 years ago, not only did he recruit Glenn, but he recruited Glenn's entire phone contact list. And actually, probably 20 or 25 people from Glenn's network ended up coming over to our business. Well, then guess what happens? Those 20 or 25 people know people. Yeah.
And so one person could literally change the future of your business. But I mean, at the end of the day, you have to run an A-player operation or you can't get Glenn Piccolos to come join the team, Mike Coins, Jose Garcia, etc. And we're going to get more into the recruiting process. But I think I'd like to get more into the actual structure of the interview process.
So most people don't really know what to talk about. And the pre-interview questions are a great— so that's a good theory, good philosophy, how to approach it. The pre-interview questions that Todd ensures that we ask every single time are a good framework if you kind of don't know what to say. So the first one that I always like to ask is, what do you do in your spare time?
I have plenty of thoughts on this, but do you have any thoughts on like what you're trying to look for when somebody answers that question? Yeah. Like the drinking club. Like the drinking club. What do you do in your spare time? What do you do in your spare time? Like we interviewed a guy one time and the third thing on his list was his family.
Correct. And so that was kind of, you know, obviously a red flag. It was like softball. I'm big into softball. I travel, do travel softball. And I think maybe some day trading or something, which is essentially like I go to the blackjack table just on my phone. And so that's, that's going to be a distraction for me. So, and then like the third thing is like, and if there's time left over, you hang out with your family.
Yeah, right. Okay. So we know that there's something going on there. So that you probably have a thought on that too. Yeah, so you cannot legally discriminate. So I can't ask you your marital status, I cannot ask you your orientation, sexual orientation, uh, if you have disabilities, I can't ask you your ethnicity, your race. These are the rules and they're there for a reason.
But what I can ask you is, what do you do in your spare time? And so what that means, one, people light up they light up. They've— they weren't expecting that question. And people love talking about what they're passionate about. So if you look at all the A-players in our business, if you look at myself, for example, what's the answer to that question?
Well, I work a lot. I love our business. I can't even stop talking about it. I get annoying at parties because I talk about it and people don't want to hear it. They want to talk about college football, right? And I'm like, I can talk about that, but what do I do in my spare time? I work, I think about working, and I spend all of my personal time with my family.
That's it. I don't drink. I don't go to the club. I don't— I play some golf, but that's pretty much my entire life. And that's the right answer. If somebody says, you know, because you have to learn how to translate it in your mind. And I tell this story of the softball guy because he's got a ring on his finger. And I said, what do you do in your spare time?
He goes, man, dude, I'm all over the country. I love travel. We've got a traveling softball team and man, we have a great time. And like, you know, we get down a little bit. I'm thinking to myself, like, this guy's cheating on his wife. That's literally the first thought that went through my head. Like, this guy's— this guy is cheating on his wife because he's thrilled to get out of town and go play softball with his buddies.
Like, that's just— so I'm really trying to get an idea of what drives and motivates the person in front of, in front of me. And if all the answers— and you might think this is work, hardcore work, grindcore culture, but it is. I mean, it is. This is the NFL. Like, if you really think about our business as the National Football League, Jerry Jones is interviewing Tom Brady to be a quarterback on the team.
Tom, what do you do in your spare time? Man, I got this softball team. I go around and play softball like Is that what he wants to hear? No, he wants to hear, I watch film 24/7 and I am obsessed with, with route trees. Like, that is the right answer. And so it might seem like a really simple answer, but it's, it's a secret way of getting an insight to what drives and motivates a person.
And there is a right answer. The right answer is I exercise, I'm with my family, I work, I love my career. And you can have hobbies, you can go fishing, you can play golf, but you're going to find out really quick if they have toxic hobbies, and you're going to find out really quick where they are in terms of how committed to their career they are.
Not every person needs to be all in, committed 100%, like a technician, for example. Um, superstar technicians, superstar service advisors. But man, it gives you an idea of where they're at on that spectrum. So any final thoughts on that question? I have more pre-interview ones that we can go through, but anything else? Well, to touch on that, like the technicians, you know, it's different.
You know, a lot of times when we're talking about this, we're talking about front of the house primarily, but it's two different things, right? So front of the house is a completely different, you know, interview than a technician, I guess you would say. And so I think that's another important part to point out, which we can kind of talk about here in a little bit.
Sweet. So here's one that's a non-negotiable you have to ask every time. Do you have a clean driving record? So, Glenn, why do we ask that question? Well, we had one guy, I guess what this was, I don't even know, this was 2 years ago. And do you have a clean driving record? And the guy's like, man, you're never going to believe this.
I got, I just got a DUI Friday. Friday. It was the first time I've ever, like, I don't even know if he said he, the first time he ever was drinking and driving or first time he got DUI or whatever. But he was making it like this is just not a normal thing. And look, You ever talk to somebody who has a DUI?
How many drinks did they have? Just 2. Just 2. It's always 2. Man, I just had 2, man. Just 2, man. Just, man, just barely, you know, just barely over the limit. It's like, come on, you drink and drive. You are lying to my face. You are lying to my face. Like, it is the first time that you got caught drinking and driving.
You don't just get into that. Like, sorry, the guy— this is why you ask the question first, because we did a Zoom, we talked to him, we had a whole interview, and then at the end of the interview, We were like, oh, by the way, do you have a clean driving record? And Todd taught us a valuable lesson. He's like, translate it in your mind.
He did not say, man, yeah, I had the first— first, I'm 45 years old. I've never had a DUI in my life. Friday I had 2 drinks and I just drove just, you know, half a mile down the road to my house. Got a DUI last Friday. Can you believe that? Like, you've been drinking and driving on Friday nights and you go, like for, for years.
And this just happens to be the first time you got caught. So translate in your mind and it just totally ruined the rest of the interview. We wasted our time. Whereas if I would have heard that on the phone, I would have gotten some referrals. I would have been out of there. But I wasted your time. I wasted my time. I wasted Todd's time because I didn't ask that question up front.
So do you have a clean driving record? I'm allowed to ask that because we're in auto repair and we've got to be able to test drive vehicles and drive customer vehicles and drive to and from work. And so do you have a clean driving record is a great way to, to, to— because I know, I know, I know this podcast goes to people in multiple states.
I don't know the rules for every single state on if you're allowed to ask if they've had a DUI and stuff, but I just straight up ask them, do you have a clean driving record? Are you insurable? And so that's a good way to do it. All right. Next one. Last 2 years earnings. Oh, yeah. This is a good one. I'm sure you have thoughts on this one.
I do. I want someone that makes a lot of money. Yes. A lot of people are trying to get a deal on somebody and people that like, I'll tell you, like, and we can talk about the difference of an A player versus a B player. It's, it's night and day difference. You know, it's like pro tip, replace two, you know, two B players with one A player and just pay them double.
That's a huge pro tip because they will just generate you so much more and they just run so much harder. And so a lot of people are trying to get a deal on somebody like, man, I found this person and man, he's going to be, you know, it's going to be this great deal that I'm getting on this person. Like for me, I'm trying to find somebody that's high paid.
Yeah. Because if they're high paid, they're typically good. And if they're high paid and they're not good, they just won't make the team. But we'll find out like really quick. And that's a big part of our, you know, of our strategy when we hire somebody is like, we're going to move really fast. Now in the interview process, we set that up like very, very clear.
Okay. Like, this is what the expectation is, and we will pay you a lot of money, but this is the expectation. Just like the NFL. We, we— I talk a lot about the NFL in, in an interview. It's like, okay, we are the NFL, and, you know, there's only so many seats on the, on the bus, there's only so many players on the roster, and you have to execute at a very high level, and you have to earn, you know, earn that position every single day.
And so sometimes it's like interviewing them out. A lot of cases it is. And so there's two ways of looking at it. It's like, one, am I chasing somebody? Like, for instance, I found a superstar and I'm bringing them in to interview. It's a different interview than if somebody is coming to us to get the job. Two totally different interviews. I agree.
So they come to us, I'm trying to interview them out. I'm trying to show them all the reasons they shouldn't. Okay. Because man, are you sure you can execute at this level? Are you sure that you can play on this team? Because if not, you're not going to make the team. So look, I'll tell you this. If you have a job right now, my suggestion would be that you don't leave this job that you have because it sounds like you're doing okay.
And if you come here and you don't make it, you might only last a couple of days. It's that simple. Now, if, if I'm chasing them, I have to be able to sell them the dream, right? Because the dream for us is a reality. But they don't see that. They've heard all of these things 1,000 times, right? There's always the, the picture that's painted that just, man, everything looks great.
And then they get over there and the grass isn't greener. That's why you see a rap sheet resume. You know, people look at a resume and they go, man, this, this person's a job hopper, right? Like, all they do is just, just go from job to job to job. I don't want that person on my team. Why would I want that person on my team?
It's like, well, has that person ever found a home, right? Like, that— has that person ever been in a good environment? And we know in our industry, we call shops and we know a lot of shop owners, and like, we understand why people job hop. And so I think that's another key takeaway from that? So, so to reiterate, you need people that make a lot of money.
I think a lot of people listening to this would be scared to pay people what we pay our people. But the reality is you don't pay— Patrick Mahomes gets paid $60 million a year guaranteed for like 10 years, you know, or something. And if he tears his ACL, that's it. Like, you're, you're $60 million in the hole that year and you're hoping he's the same guy afterwards.
For us, You're paying a guy $100,000 or more, you know, $100,000 unloaded, of course, is what is it like $1,800 a week, you know. So we tell them in the interview, this is the NFL and we're going to fire you. Like, if you suck, you're telling me you're really good. You're telling me you made $130,000 in the last 2 years. I'm going to agree to pay you that.
But if you suck, you're done. Like, and that's not— you might think that that's ruthless, but at the end of the day, would you work for us if we sucked? You know, like, right? Like if I gambled your paycheck, if I showed up hungover to work, if payroll was late and the checks bounced, nobody would work for us. If there was no hours, technicians wouldn't work for us.
So it is a deal. It is a business. I am going to, you know, handle my end of the bargain. I am going to— Todd says it'll never be us. And what that means is I'm going to just give it my all day in and day out. And I will, you know, I will hold up my end of the bargain. If you don't, you're fired and that's it.
So you're not actually paying them $100K a year. You're paying them a couple grand a week. And the key is you have to let them know in the interview and you have to actually fire them if you know right away that they're not good, which we'll get into how you know right away. But I want to go back to why Todd says it the last— the way he says it.
He says, what are your last 2 years earnings? He doesn't say, how much money do you need? How much money would you like to make? Right. Because people will just say they want to make more than they're making now. How much money do you need? Like, what is your compensation? Right. What did you make in the last 2 years? And they will tell you, one, if they don't really know, Not good.
Yep. If they say, you know, they get paid hourly, probably not good. They're thinking about hourly, right? Like they're thinking, well, I get paid this much per week. No, I want to know. I want to hear a guy be like $140. That might make people nervous. Oh, I thought I was going to get this guy, but it's like, ooh, that means there's somebody in the market, right?
Exactly. Already knows that you have a lot of value and they, in our industry, usually doesn't pay that much, right? You know, and they know that you— they can't live without you, so they're paying you that much, I'll take a swing, you know, because one, for like, for, for that amount of money, you get to get an A-player potentially, and you get to put them in a team with other A-players.
That's going to elevate them. You get to give them our playbook. It's going to elevate them. And he, if they're— or she, if they're a stud, is going to elevate, you know, the other people that are already on the team. So speaking of how do you know, you know, Todd has his rules. How do you know, Glenn? Let's say you hire him.
You take that risk, you take that swing. How do you know, uh, and how long does it take you to know if they're truly an A-player? Uh, like 5 seconds. No, I mean, you know, very, very— no, for sure, day one, way, way early in day one. Uh, immediate impact on sales. I mean, that's the number one rule, right? Immediate impact on sales.
That actually goes both ways too, by the way, uh, with technicians. Um, you can tell if a technician has an immediate impact on sales, produce. Um, but mainly we're looking at front of the house, so immediate impact on sales. Customers love doing business with them, team loves working with them, and they make money. And so if you can hit all those 4 boxes, like, you're typically a superstar.
And you know very, very fast. I'll give you a perfect example. Um, I've got a guy now, now this is something I do, and it's after the interview process, but it's, um, kind of the onboarding process that I do, probably way different. And, and people probably look at me like I'm crazy until I explain the, the, the reason behind it, which is when they come in, I tell them to come to the speed rack, and basically you're just going to stay here for a week and just observe.
Now I I don't give a whole lot of instruction. It's really easy for people to say, okay, I want you to do this day 1, this day 2, this day 3, right? Like to have kind of a plan. And, you know, if you give people tasks to do, they'll typically get them done, especially like their first 3 days. So I do it a little bit differently.
I'm like, look, I want you to be here and I want you to just observe. And what I know is and notice is that the superstar A players can't do that. Okay? They want to— they want the ball. Like, give me the ball. So like Jason, you know, Stud, I remember this day one. I'm like, all right, I want you to stay here and you're going to basically just observe for a week.
I don't expect anything out of you. I just want you to observe and learn the process and just watch. And you'll be going to key to key, you know, on the next deal for our onboarding. And it's, I don't know, a couple hours in or whatever. And he's like, give me that ticket. I'm going to sell that ticket right now. Yeah. And I'm like, I'm like, you don't know the scripts.
You don't know. You haven't been through. He's like, you brought me here to sell. Like, give me the ball, right? Like, I'm going to go sell this this right now and then I'll learn the rest of how the scripts later, but I need to go sell. I need to just go sell this job. It needs to be sold right now. And I'm like, boom.
And then he literally just took off from there. That was it. As soon as he did that, I'm like, boom, that's my guy. But see, that salesmanship, that immediate impact, I think of Lewis Stud over at our Barker store, our Barker store, that interview. Think about that interview. And that's a rare That's a rare— good story. Yeah, it's a great story. That's a rare superstar that we get off of an ad.
Okay. I was trying to think this morning. I was like, man, how many people on my team did we get off of an ad? And I was going through the list of all the people and I was like, man, I don't like— there's like a couple like here at this store. Yeah. So Lewis, it's an ad and Todd's doing a phone interview with him.
With me. With you there. And he's like, look, I just don't think it's going to be the right fit. And Lewis is like, well, hang on, hang on. Look, man, look, before before you hang up, like, why don't I do this? Why don't I come down there, meet me in person, and then, you know, let's just kind of go from there. And it's like, whoa, Todd literally looked at me and he went, oh, he literally looked at me and he was like, he's got it.
Like, he kept me open. And he goes, Lewis, you kept me open, bud. When can you meet me? And he came in that day and we hired him on the spot because he overcame an objection. It is literally high agency. Like, you do not need to know anything about cars. It is a sale. It is a, you know, high agency. It means that when you run into a problem, do you just stop or do you look side to side and say, like, how do I get around this problem?
Like, the customer is giving me an objection. Todd is giving Lewis an objection, but that doesn't— that's not going to stop me. Like, that's not— that's all we needed to know. And then he comes here and obviously he's a stud. And then I end up meeting him and he's a stud. I felt like Like, and here's the great part about it. And we talk about that first 5 seconds, like, man, you fall in love with someone in the first 5 seconds, man.
I'll never forget that interview with him. I felt like I knew him my whole life. Like we were tight immediately. Like, like Mike Quinn, same thing. Like we were tight immediately. I was like, man, I could talk to you all day long. And so that overcoming that objection, that's another part of the interview that I'll do with somebody is I'll be like, look, man, like if this, if this isn't the right deal, like it might not be a fit, like, what's your next move?
I love that question. Yeah, because if the, you know, like, just think about when we talk all the time about like Todd, if somebody asked Todd that, like, Todd, if this wasn't like, if this wasn't the right fit for you, what would Todd say? He's like, me? You talk like, yeah, not the right— are you serious right now? I'm literally going to change your life.
Like, are you serious right now? But that question, like, what's your next move? I like to know where their mind is like, did they put all their eggs in this one basket? Are they actually talking to other people? Like, that gets them talking. The real, you know, like getting people talking is so valuable. And a lot of people that are interviewing just do a lot of talking and ask a lot of questions and don't really extract with follow-up questions to get the data that they need.
Yeah. I'm going to follow up on something you said. You said you connected with Mike Quinn, you connected with Lewis immediately. So there's something that Elon says. He says, A players do not like being around fuzzy thinkers. And what I think that means— well, one, I think that's true, but I think that, I think that some people who don't think about it that much or they don't try very hard, it's like annoying to an A-player.
And I think it's literally like, how do I say this respectfully? Like some people don't maybe have the snap to like understand quickly and they're not trying, they're not doing anything in their personal life to try and understand quickly. And so it gets— it's like the processing speed of their brain. It's like it's frustrating for a Glen Piccolo or a Todd to talk to somebody that they're not connecting with really quickly because it's like every time you say something, it doesn't land.
But then you find a Mike Quinn and you're like, oh, you're my guy. Like, you got— you get it. Like, he gets it right away. So an example of a question that we like to ask for technicians. So, you know, people always ask if technician interviews are the same is we actually do a diagnostic question. And I don't know anything about cars and I have my thoughts on this, but I want to hear your thoughts on what you're looking for.
We ask the question, Hey, walk me through your diagnostic process on a PO456. Yes. So what are you looking for in a technician interview and their response? Well, it tells you a lot about— okay, so one, if they don't know how to answer that question, it doesn't necessarily mean they're not going to be a fit. Okay, it just depends on what level of technician they are.
Okay, so if I ask them, hey, there's a code, uh, PO456, some, some people don't know what that is. So that shows you their level of— that shows me their level of experience. It doesn't say that they're not going to be a fit for a different level of technician. Now, if they're like, well, I go in with the scan tool and I command the purge valve to open, and then if that doesn't happen, I do a smoke test, it's something like that.
I don't know much about cars either, but I know it's pretty close to that. Yeah. Then I'm like, oh, wow, they know. Okay, they know what they're talking about. Like they know it's an EVAP code. Okay, so asking a couple of codes just gives you a little bit more feedback as far as what the technician really knows, you know, but technicians are different.
You know, it's— they're typically more introverted. They're, they're not, um, you know, they're not customer-facing. And so it's a, it's a totally different interview, right? I just want to know that, man, do they have a great attitude? Um, are they clean and organized? I can tell how— I can tell like a really, really good technician if I look at their box and their hands.
Yeah, clean. Okay, if you can look at their box and their hands, that tells a big story with the combo there. It's like, while that box is massive and this guy's hands are completely like clean. I can't tell they're a technician. The best technicians, I mean, I'm sorry, but like, you run into them in the grocery store, you don't know they're a technician.
Okay, they're more pro. And so, um, yeah, it's, it's a different set of questions. But for me, like, when we talk about A players, front of the house got to be an A player. Yeah, no B players. Technicians have to be an A player by way of like attitude, energy, reliability, knowing your skill set. One of the most dangerous technicians that's out there is the one that thinks he's an A but he's B.
A B technician is great if he knows he's a B. A C is great if they know they're a C. As soon as they think they're a higher level technician than they are, that's where they get in trouble. So I want to follow up on the question, how do I— what am I looking for in the PO456 one? Is I don't know anything about cars.
I am literally just diagnosing the person. I am seeing how their brain works and watching them walk through the process. So if they say, hey, you know, I would just go to AllData, and then I would like— okay, so I know that you don't have enough experience to just know that off the top of your head, but that's fine. Fine, but what I can still find out is, are you willing to admit that you don't know something, right?
You know, and that is a very valuable skill in a technician, is like, are they thoughtful? Are they thinking about like how to solve the problem, or are they just going to be a person that just throws the part at the car? Like, if you ask Josh G, you know, he's one of our top diagnostic technicians in the company, he one, knows exactly what to do.
He knows the exact workflow in his brain for how to diagnose that check engine light and where to start first. But then he is so granular, he would be able to walk you through his exact thought process on why he would try certain things based on certain scenarios. And so what that tells me is he has spent a lot of time thinking about solving problems and he enjoys solving problems, which to me is a good indicator of intelligence.
Like, right when it's, when it's satisfying to think, it's like a fun thing to do. It's fun to solve problems. Right. That is somebody who is going to continue doing that and they enjoy thinking. And I think it's a pretty good indicator of, of how much snap you have. So my technician interview is— I usually— we usually trust, honestly, the general managers to interview technicians and our recruiting team.
But if I'm interviewing a technician and I've interviewed plenty of technicians, it's pretty much the exact same as the pre-interview checklist. But I'm asking, what would you do to diagnose a simple check engine light? And the other one I'm asking is toolbox inventory. Yeah, like that tells the whole story, right? I mean, if you have, if you have a 15— it tells a part of the story.
Yeah. You know, I don't give a ton to the toolbox. Okay. Because I've seen some really, really nice toolboxes. No tool filled up with a lot of tools, even with bad technicians. Okay. Okay. And, and anybody listening to this definitely knows that that's out there. There are nice boxes with bad technicians. I've seen like stud technicians that I had. This is many, many years ago.
I had a dresser. Okay, this is many, many years ago. And this guy was a stud. No certifications, right? Like, literally had a, like, a chest and working out that. But he was a stud. I've seen a master technician that, you know, just can't fix anything. So I don't— you know, I don't give a ton to the box, but I like to know.
So Another great question for technicians would be like, look, I need someone that can produce massive hours. Like, are you that guy? Like, I need someone— like, I don't need a 40-hour-a-week guy. Like, I need somebody that can produce 60, 70. Is that something you can do? I like to hear that from them because that tells me a lot about their level too.
Like, how much money did you make last year? Another great question. Or the last 2 years earnings. I need somebody that made a lot of money. Okay. I mean, if they didn't, that means they're not probably a highly skilled technician. And in our industry, sometimes they don't know, like they don't know where they stack up, right, with, with other technicians, right? So there's guys that come in that think they're the top, you know, and maybe they are the top in the company they're at and they make, you know, half of what, you know, maybe some of our top guys make.
So I asked this technician a question one time. I said, how much money did you make last year? $140,000. Okay, nice. What's your toolbox inventory? $80,000. Okay. Yeah, check. And then I said, what's the most hours you've ever done in a week? 147 and a half. And a half. And he said, I've not— you know, that was obviously a bunch of stuff had to go right.
Yeah. But like, that's it. Like, I, I'm pretty sure this guy's a pro in 3 questions. Like, somebody who's capable of making money as a technician, producing. He's a top hourly paid guy. You know, I know his hourly rate. I know how much he can produce. Now I just got to figure out if it's— if he's somebody that we want on our team.
But honestly, if you check those 3 boxes, you just got to get them in the game, in my opinion, sign an offer, and, and then you find out pretty quickly if they're not going to be the right guy. Would you agree with that? Yeah, technicians, um, immediately too. I, I mean, you— there are some situations where you will have a technician that comes in and you might think they're better than they are, and then you may have some rechecks that, you know, that does happen.
Uh, but for the most part, you know, they will drive revenue. A lot of people don't really understand that a technician coming in can really drive your revenue majorly. Like, they make an immediate impact on sales also. And so, and, and why is that? Well, it's because, one, they just move super fast. They run to the car. They want to be efficient, and they hold the front of the house accountable to move faster and be efficient.
Because it's like, look, and they have a high expectation. So when somebody comes in, they have a high expectation. Like, I know this guy needs to make X amount of hours this week. Like, you work harder and push harder to make sure that they get there, because the last thing I want is that superstar leaving my shop. And so, um, it— and, you know, it, it makes the immediate impact on sales kind of like— trying to think of how I'm trying to say this, but like, when you're trying to make sure that somebody's getting top hours because they need that, it pushes you harder, which inevitably is going to have immediate impact on sales.
So I've got a follow-up question for you. What if you're in an interview with either a technician or the front of the house and it just goes really poorly? Not my guy, but one of your team members vouches for them. Does that influence your decision-making? Yes, 100%. So walk me through that. Okay, so I interview a guy, this is probably 2 years ago, and it's a technician, and I just didn't feel it.
Like, yeah, just like you're saying, like, I just didn't really like this person., and they had some good answers to some questions, but I wasn't feeling the energy. I was thinking maybe a little bit arrogant and like, I don't know, right? And so one of our team members, you know, knew this technician, I guess saw him walking up for the interview or whatever.
And it's like, oh, hey, I just saw you interviewed so-and-so. I'm like, yeah, do you know them? Oh yeah, he's a stud. Beast. Boom, that's it. That's all that matters. Done. Hire him because a superstar is telling me it's a superstar. And so I remember he did 90 hours that first week and, you know, he was a hammer. And so a superstar telling you this is a superstar, it's like it kind of trumps everything.
Yeah, I agree. So last question on interview and then we'll get into recruiting is, um, you've talked a lot about a working interview, you know, so it's kind of like like if they walk out of the door. So, so I want you to paint a picture in your mind. You've done 10 interviews today. What's the feeling you have when they walk out of the door?
You know, is it, I think he'd be good, I think he'd fit in, or she, or is it, man, I hope they take the job? Like, number one is you got to be like, man, I hope they freaking take the job. I really hope they come work with us. That's the person you're looking for. Yep. But if it's the second one, the first one, I mean, they could be a good fit.
You generally do a working interview, correct? So you might invite them in, do a half day or whatever, uh, to kind of continue moving the ball down the field to get a good idea. Because maybe they're nervous, man. People, people— we put it out there, we're on a freaking video podcast right now. Yep. Putting it out there that we're the NFL, man.
You're gonna get fired if you suck, you know. And so they might be nervous. I've had people tell me they were so nervous in the interview because they knew it was the opportunity of a lifetime for them in their career. And, uh, and so they're nervous. I totally get it. Well, I don't totally get it because superstars aren't nervous. They know, they know they're good, right?
Antonio Brown, you think he's freaking ner— you think Deion Sanders was nervous on draft day, right? No, the guy had a gold chain on, diamonds around his freaking neck, you know. He showed up in a— Deion Sanders for the Combine showed on a private jet, didn't stretch, ran the 40 in 4.3 seconds and left. Yeah. You think he was nervous? So he knows, you know, Pat Riley in the NBA, he says, bring your ego, bring your ego, don't leave it at the door.
He's like, bring your freaking ego, but just put it under the umbrella of the team. Yeah. Like, bring your ego at the door. I'm on a tangent a little bit here, so So maybe superstar people aren't nervous. Deion Sanders was not breaking out of his shell. Todd Hayes was born without a shell, you know, like he did not. He's never been nervous a day in his life.
So that's, that's a piece of context. But, you know, for technicians and for certain people in the company, maybe they were nervous and they, you know, they understand the situation. I know people that have had a lot of success with our company that were nervous. So I don't want it to be a blanket statement. But let's say the first interview doesn't go well, but you don't want the process to end.
You'll invite them in for a working interview. So what are you looking for? How does— how do you set that up? And just give me your thoughts on that. Yeah. So I actually don't set up like a working interview. Okay. This is another one of those things I do a little bit differently because it's going to tell me about the, you know, the potential candidate.
So it would be more like, hey, come into a Take Five, our morning meeting, and then just come and hang out at the speed rack for an hour and just see what you think. Now, here's what happens. There's two types of people. Okay, there's the type of person that comes in, they come to the speed rack, they come into the meeting, and they're like, wow, that was cool.
But right, we fist pump and high five after our meeting, and they're like, all right. They come out to the speed rack and they're there for 20, 30 minutes. They're like, yeah, this is cool, man. I think I could, I could see myself doing this. And they're like, yeah, all right, cool. We'll just get back in touch with me or whatever. I'm like, awesome.
Yeah, take care, man. Thanks so much. And then I'm like, that's not— they're not gonna make my team. Uh, I think of a guy one day, he comes in and he Yeah, man, let me, let me, uh, come and rack attack, you know, with you guys. Next thing you know, he's got gloves on and he's PMing cars. Yeah. Okay, now he was there.
I said just come hang out for an hour or two. So at the end of the night, it's— I mean, it's like 6:30 or something, and he's still there. He's washing a car. Okay, he's washing a car because the car needed to be washed, and there was people watching the car, and he's out there washing the car. He's not getting paid. He's not I'm like, he's just there, just coming to do an hour or two, kind of check the shop out.
And he's literally washing a car. At the end of it, he goes, all right, perfect. I'm putting in my notice and just let, like, let's go talk about the numbers. Like, let's see what I'm going to be getting paid. I'm going to put my notice in. Let's go. Let's go get this deal done. And I'm like, hammer closer, right? I had another guy.
He's rack attacking a car with us. And he breaks something and he's freaking out. Okay, we're rack attacking a car and there's like this like little coolant hose that's coming off of the like a reservoir. In the interview, in the working interview? Yeah. And he's freaked out. He's like, oh my God, he thinks I'm not gonna get this job. He's like, I broke it, I will pay for it, I'm so sorry, like whatever it takes, I'm gonna pay for it.
And I'm like, see, that's exactly what I needed to see. I don't care about the hose. It was like a $180 hose. But I said, look, don't worry about that. Has nothing to do with this. The fact that you broke that hose tells me all I need to know because you were in it. You were in the freaking car. You were PMIing the car.
And so that was a great indicator for me. So, um, and you care a lot about the hose. You're like, oh my gosh, this is— it's an important thing, you know. It's like, not to cut you off, but it's like you You're in it like you, you, you're nervous that you broke the hose. You care about the customer, right? You know, so it's the, it's the Patriots, man.
It's the Cowboys. It's the Chiefs. If you got invited to a working interview for the freaking Yankees. Yeah. Hey, man, this is cool. Mr. Steinbrenner, I'll see you. Let me know what the offer is, right? Or are you taking a lap around Yankee Stadium? You know, like you might think, whatever, it's a car repair company. Okay. You have not received the texts that I've received.
People literally come into our company and it changes their life. You get to watch people buy houses. You get to watch blue-collar people who have never made money, who've worked for owners who take advantage of them. They rip them off. They don't pay them what they're worth. They are ripping off their employees. And then they get to come into an environment where we are massively intense and we push people.
And it's amazing. You get to watch people I watched a guy get on a phone call in front of a group of grown men that work for our company this past week. He said, my family's noticed a difference. Yep. My family has noticed a difference in the way that I am at family functions, that I was a different person 3 years ago.
Yep. And that's a product of the quality of leadership of yourself, of Mike Quinn, of all the top people in our company, of Todd Hayes. And so I'm sorry to get passionate, but like, it's the pros. And if you take it seriously, it will literally change your life. And you can have a career based on this playbook and our company and our training.
Key to Key to Callbacks. Please come through Key to Key to Callbacks. That will literally change your life. It changed mine. My family's business was at $2.25 million a year, and it wasn't every year. 2011, it was $1.6. I bet we, I bet we lost big money that year. Dad's getting a loan against his house. You know, his kids are in private school.
Todd comes into our business 2020, for those that don't know, doubles the company in 4 months. 2021, $8 million. 2022, $10 million. 2023, with you and the amazing team, $12.25 million. You know, what's the difference? It's you started taking it seriously, you know? Todd Graves, Cane's Chicken, $10 billion company. On his business card, it says CEO and frontline fry cook. He calls it his chicken finger dream.
He's like, I am going to be the best in the world at chicken fingers. Charlie Munger, Warren Buffett, they say the secret to success is to take something very simple and just try harder to treat it more seriously than anybody else on the earth. And I truly believe that that is what we do in car repair. And I truly believe that it's the Patriots for some people.
You got a shot to play for the Patriots and you're walking around the state Gillette Stadium and Tom Brady's rings are on the wall and you're like, man, that's pretty cool. All right, see you, Mr. Kraft. Yeah, it doesn't work that way. If you're an ace, you are locking the place down at night because you get it. Or you don't get it yet.
You don't maybe understand that yet, but you have the qualities of somebody who takes something super seriously and they want to win. I know I'm long-winded here. Our general service technicians— I asked one guy last week, I said, what can we do better, man? And he's like, man, I really actually love working here. Maybe some better communication with the service advisors, which we could all work on.
But, but he said, you know what I like about working here? He says everybody takes it really seriously, like everybody's on it. It's not about the money. It is literally not about the money for our people. It is— they are winners. They are literally on a winning team for the first time in their life. And so I want to get into some recruiting, but do you have any thoughts on that, on watching some of these young guys literally transform in 6 months?
Like, we've got a GS here today, 6 months ago he was a different person. Now he's like like, why do— why does he care about the sales every day? It doesn't affect what he gets paid. He wants to be a winner. He gets to go home a winner because it's like, we killed it today. So do you have any, any thoughts on that?
Yeah, it goes back to remembering the difference between front of the house and back of the house. As far as like, front of the house, obviously just extroverted, you know, charismatic, typically, um, type of people, whereas technicians in the back are not like that. So when I interviewed him I mean, he is very introverted, right? I mean, he's been working at a job where he's kind of getting beat up.
Manager yells at you. You know, that's, that's pretty typical, especially coming in as a lube technician in our industry. Those are typically the guys that are just getting yelled at and not doing enough and getting low, you know, getting low pay. And so we bring him on board and it's like I could just slowly see this change in him because we tell him he's a superstar every day when he walks in.
And we're having our take 5 and he walks in the building and we just literally clap for him and we're like, superstar Lewis is in the building. Clap, clap, clap, clap, clap. And everybody claps. And so now it's like when we, when we, you know, have a sale, he's like, boom, let's go. I was a part of that. And he's like, what do we do today?
Like, how much do we do today, man? I was a part of that. And he loves it. And then appreciating them, you know, I think a lot of people just don't tell their people enough how much they appreciate them. Yeah. Like, man, we appreciate you. We couldn't do this without you. That is so important. Telling them they're superstars. We hug our team members.
We love each other. And so people might look at that and be like, oh, that's weird or whatever. But I can tell you it's not. Some people never have been hugged, which is crazy. I mean, I look at some of these guys and some of the people that have been through and come through and have grown in our company. And some people don't, you know, just people come from different backgrounds and sometimes that's what they need.
We're in a blue-collar industry, man. If you're listening to this in the car right now, go ahead and when you stop, pull out your phone and text the person who's running your business. Text the general manager how grateful you are for them and how thankful you are for them. Text the top technician. Be like, man, I am so proud of you. I'm so happy you're on the team.
You know what kind of influence that will have on their life? They probably haven't heard that in years. Maybe they have, maybe they haven't, but that's how seriously we take this. It is so serious, and I just don't have time. I will not allow an average person to get in the way of that. I'm not going to allow somebody— people are like, man, you're ruthless, how do you fire people?
Because I'm thinking about the other 10 people in the shop that their life will be affected by this person's poor performance who doesn't really care. Right. You know, and so it's— Todd understands this, you know, Todd Hayes, our CEO, he understands this, that the work is the most important thing. I love people. We love our people. We love our team members. I hope you can feel the passion that we deeply care about our team members, the people we work with, not the people that work for us, the people we work with.
But the work has to be the most important thing. And I need superstars to produce the work, the quality, the product, the service. Because if that's not good, you're going to get average people who just don't care. And the customers pay the price. They don't get good service. And then, you know who pays the price? The entire company. And I don't get to have an environment where people get hugs and they get to grow and they get to win.
People that want to win want to be on a winning team. If you start— if the work is bad, you start to lose. If Tom Brady stops going to practice, if Tom Brady gets hurt and the backup comes in, what happens? The team starts to lose, right? The team starts to lose. And what happens then? Less tickets, less concessions, less TV deals, less, you know, superstars want to come get traded to Tom Brady's team, right?
The most important thing is winning the game, because if you don't win the game, you don't get to do all of the other things that allow you to influence the people in your business's life. And so that might sound like a ruthless thing, like we don't care about our people, but in fact it's quite the opposite. Todd has a reputation for being, as he says, not nice.
I'm not nice, but he's the nicest person I've ever met in my life. He just really has such a deep care for, for the people in the business. And that's been his strategy to, to, to really lift up the people that want to take it a step further. So we've only got a few minutes left in this podcast. I want to talk about recruiting.
Glenn, these A-players, these Tom Bradys, where— what are they doing with their lives? Are they just knocking on our door trying to work for us? How does that— No, I mean, they're out producing somewhere else. I mean, they're studs. They don't have resumes. They are literally making big money for somebody else. Correct. And so you have to go and chase those people down.
And, you know, like we were talking about earlier, I mean, how do you find somebody? Well, if I talk to anybody, I've gotten, I think, as many as 20 phone numbers off of just one resume. Yeah, I agree. Okay. And I think that's probably one of the most underrated, like, honey holes for people is the resume. And it's not the resume, like, look at the— okay, if you look at references on a resume, right?
What's a reference? I've always wondered this and somebody, I was listening to this on like a podcast not that long ago and I was like, okay, a reference on a resume. I always thought that was weird for like, as long as I've been looking at resumes, I always thought a resume reference was weird. Why? Who is going to put somebody on the reference that's not going to say something good about them?
Right. It's their mom or something. It's like, who would do that? Now, like as an example, You know, we were talking about that technician. That technician doesn't know what a PO456 is, man. If you were trying to diagnose that and you needed some assistance, like, think of all the technicians that you've worked with. Who would be the best one that would probably be able to help you diagnose that car?
You dog, that's sick. Is that bad? That's a good one. You're sneaky. I didn't even know what you were doing until halfway through the sentence. I'm like, oh, he's trying to get a fish. But wait, wait, wait, so Glenn, hold on, hold on. Hold up. Are you telling me that you poach other people's employees? Yes, we do. Really? Yes. How do you— how do you sleep at night, dude?
Man. Okay. Oh, man. Oh, come on, man. Hey, we love this, right? Look, at the end of the day, people are out there working for companies that are bad environments. They're taking advantage of their people. They don't have insurance. They don't have 401. They are being underpaid. They can't afford to put tires on their wife's car. They're struggling. Okay. And shops are out there competing with other shops that are struggling.
This is a common theme out there. Okay. And so there are superstars out there. They just haven't found the right shop. And so for us to give somebody an opportunity, I know we've got a bunch of stories in this, man, of just people we've recruited, whether it's been somebody we got in 24 hours that we literally changed their life. Or somebody that we worked on for 2, 3, 4, 5 years that they finally come over and they say, wow, you've absolutely changed my life.
So I feel like it is our obligation, our responsibility to be able to go and change people's lives. And so if I can take somebody from an environment and put them in an environment where they can thrive, if they're a superstar, then I'm going to do that all day long and sleep perfectly fine at night. Just as you know, and it goes both ways.
Like if somebody was to come over and try to recruit one of our people, which people do all the time, by the way, right? Literally try to come and recruit our team constantly because they know they're trained superstars. And if somebody was to find a better opportunity out there, why would I stop them? I wouldn't stop them. I wouldn't maybe be happy about it initially.
I'd be like, man, I dropped the ball here. Right, right. I dropped the ball. This is on me. But I would never feel bad about someone going to better themselves. And so we will go out and we will take people. I mean, look, how else are you going to get the good people? Not only do I sleep perfectly well at night poaching other people's team members, I feel obligated to do it because I have received so many texts.
Thank you for reaching out to me. I never would have made the jump. Yeah, thank you for changing my life. And that's not me. That's not Todd. That's not you. It's our ministry. And so how do I say this? I was born with certain privileges. I— my parents had wealth. I went to private school, no student loans, public school, college education, hook 'em, University of Texas.
You know, I grew up with technology. I had a job waiting for me after college. A lot of people in our life, in our world, they didn't grow up with those privileges, right? I've gotten a text from one of our guys, and it's a picture of his family. And they had a birthday party. And he said, Joe, nobody in the history of my family has ever thrown— had enough money to, to throw a party like this.
Yep. For his 2-year-old. That's what it's— dude, I sleep pretty good at night. He was poached. He was driving a truck. Yep. And we poached him from another company. He actually got fired. You talk about rap sheet resume. Yep. He fired from another auto repair company. And so is there a shortage of talent in the industry? No, but there is a shortage of A-player operators in the industry.
B— A-players, they don't work for B-players. They don't. They don't. Like I said, if I showed up late, had a tea time in the afternoon, didn't put in the work, same for Todd. Would you have followed Todd's, you know, reputation? Would you have followed Todd's lead if you knew that was his reputation? No. You followed him because you knew he had a track record of growing companies.
Yep. And the trenches guy that I could just, man, just latch on to. And he, and he will teach me everything he knows and he has. And, well, he teaches me in, in stages. You know, his mind works like so far ahead of ours, but he's, he's taught us so much. So, you know, the, the probably the most important thing that he's taught me He's taught me so many, which is, you know, there's a mentality that I can't afford this person.
Mm-hmm. And his mentality is I can't afford not to have this person. And a lot of people out there listening are like probably thinking the same thing, like, man, I can't go get this person. They make too much money. You have no idea the difference of what that type of person can make in your business. It takes you 3 people to produce what that one person could produce, and it costs you a to, you know, a lot less.
So, um, you can't afford not to have them. Very, very— for a superstar, if a superstar walks in the building, what do you do? You hire them, period. What if you don't have space? You hire them. See, LeBron— LeBron— Michael Jordan's walking in the front office. Hey, coach, you know, I want to join your team. Sorry, Michael, we're full. There's no space.
You see, we always like the sports analogies because it seems glaringly obvious, but well, though— well, that's the NBA, it's different. It's not. It's the same. It's running a team, it's running an organization, it's running a business. If Michael Jordan comes into your front office, you hire him. The NFL owners, they understand the arbitrage of paying people what they're worth. Overpay. Glenn says it great.
He says the most highly paid people in the industry are underpaid because they're producing 10 times what the people that are middle paid are. And the people that are averagely paid They are way overpaid because they're just coasting by. They're good. They're doing a good job. They're showing up to work, but they are not moving the needle. Look, why is Steph Curry getting paid $60 million a year?
He's made over $500 million in his career just from the Warriors. But guess what? Underpaid. Underpaid. The value of the Warriors was $417 million— $70 million in 2010. 2026, 16 years later, 4 championships. You know, Kevin Durant wants to come work with Steph Curry recruiting. 4 championships, literally changed the game, ruined pickup basketball for the rest of us. Everybody just jacks up threes now.
The value of that company is worth $10 billion today. So for $500 million, he got a return of $900— no, $9.5 billion tax-free, by the way, that growth, plus all the cash flow and all the deals and the momentum that they've shown along the way. It's like they were the 29th or something most valuable franchise in the league, and now they're number 1 or number 2 behind the Lakers.
And so you think you're getting a good deal, you're paying the price. Like, you— the ultimate arbitrage is to find an A+ player pay them double what you think you should, you know, and, and watch them change your life. Imagine, imagine LeBron comes in for a raise. No, no, no, sorry LeBron, we're actually gonna cut your pay. See, it doesn't work like that.
Well, you give 'em a financial stake and that's an, you know, another one of Todd's rules. It's find the, you know, find the right people, make it a great place to work. Give them a financial stake in the outcome of the business and train them. Mm-hmm. And so that financial stake is very important because look, somebody has to have incentive, right, to be able to— I mean, they're getting a piece of it, they take ownership in it.
So that's a very, very big part of it. So yeah, I mean, look, you can't— like, when you run the numbers on what a top producer, right, like brings to the table versus an average person, uh, I mean, it's, it's, it's crazy when you look at the numbers. Average people cost you money. They do. A-players make you money. So let's close with this.
I know we started with the interview process, but it's really turned into just a great conversation on people and the quality of people and how important it is to find the right people. So we do an exercise every month in training, and we honestly do it every day of our lives and every week of our lives with our general manager meetings and just the way we think about the business.
It's called checkmark, question mark, or X. Yep. Brad Jacobs, multibillionaire. He started $8 billion companies. Shout out Founders Podcast. We heard about him on there. He's currently the CEO, I think, of XPO. It's a logistics business. He says, I try to think about A players, B players, and C players, and here's what I do to know. So how do you know? I want to pay people a lot, but how do I know that they're actually an A player?
Well, immediate impact on sales, all of that. He says, I imagine them coming into my office and they say, Brad, I found another opportunity. You can't save me. Me and my wife, we've already packed the U-Haul. We're moving across the country to go run this other company or work at this other company. And he tries to envision the way he feels, the way he feels, the what he would be feeling if that person were to leave.
A C player, he says, is easy. He was going to fire them anyway. They show up late, they're drunk, they're hungover, they're not into it. He's like, well, whoo, thank God I don't have to fire. Nobody likes firing people, right? He says a B player, this is his reaction. Ah, that stinks., but we'll be okay. We're going to find a recruiter. We're going to replace him.
The business will be okay. An A-player, LeBron James, Kobe Bryant, Tom Brady. Tom Brady comes into the office. He says, Bill, Mr. Belichick, I'm done. What do you think his response is? I'm going to the Buccaneers. You know what Bill Belichick thinks about? He's like, oh my God, I'm going to lose my legacy. People are going to find out that it was Tom Brady the whole time, not Bill Belichick.
Think about the feeling that the CEO has when an A-player walks into the office and puts his keys on the desk. If you are panicking and rolling around on the ground, it's an A-player. Yep. And that's the difference. So I want you to— I want to hear your thoughts on— we do this exercise all the time. How long does it take you to know what somebody's perspective on somebody is based on their response?
How long does it take for me to— So if I ask you, how's so-and-so doing? What are you looking for? Oh yeah, yeah. So that's so funny. Um, immediate. So we know, we know immediately. So it's like, how's, how's this person doing? Stud. How's this person doing? Killing it. How's this person doing? Well, they're— boom, done. We know. That's it. Done. See, because it's Kobe.
See, it's Wilt Chamberlain. Shaq. Hey man, how's Shaq doing? 40 points last night, 10 blocks. Dude, he broke the glass on the backboard. Did you see that on Twitter? See, like, that's the, that's the answer, right? Shaquille O'Neal, Deion Sanders. Like, how'd Deion do last night? 2 picks, 100 yards. He played both sides of the ball, right? Like, did you not see SportsCenter top 10, right?
It's that clear. And you have to be in the business so much and so often and so long that you can clearly see the difference. It is a language. I, you know, Todd, I'm grateful for him. He's trained me on the language of business. And you speak it. He literally says you can't fake it till you make it. You can't. I know if you can speak it, right?
I know. In the same way, I know if somebody can speak English or if it's a language that they're learning, right? They say— I'm on a tangent here, but I just love this stuff. Do you know how you're truly natural-born fluent in a language? You can sit in a TED Talk for an hour, and if they make one mistake like in grammar, you notice it, right?
One mistake. If they say Netflix are coming out with a, with a new show, you would notice. You'd be like, what? Netflix is, right? Right. It's the same way in business. It's, it's the same way in any language. Like, I know, I know in the interview if you're faking it. I know if you don't— you can't fake it till you make it that you speak Spanish.
It doesn't work that way. And so an A-player will change your life. And if you ask me how Deion Sanders is doing, stud. Yep, he's a beast. How's Todd doing? Beast. How's Michael Floyd doing? Oh my God. Matt Keyes, stud, our CFO. How's Glenn Piccolo doing? Beast. That's it. How's Mike Quinn doing? Oh my God, dude, what would we do without— like, I can't— how's Sadie doing?
See, if your responses have to think about it, like, it only takes One second. One second. We had one the other day. We were talking about somebody and it was literally a half a second. You and I looked at each other and we were like, wow, we knew. And if you're listening to this and you're thinking, wow, I don't have any of those people, look in the mirror.
Like, I want to be in awe of the people that are on our team. Do you think Coach K, when he's doing— when he's coaching for Team USA, he is in awe LeBron is dunking from the free throw line. It's unbelievable what these people can do. He's in awe. I want to be in awe of the people on the team. But do you think they'd be on the team, you know, for a coach who didn't care about them?
No. Like, if you don't have any of those people, actually ask yourself, am I one of those people? Because if you're not, don't kid yourself. This is not an absentee. I hear a lot of people in the industry, absentee ownership, get to 10 stores, $10,000 a month to the bottom. Them. You can scale that to infinity. And it's like, but can you scale— can your people scale their own lives to infinity?
You know, no, you're the only person in your company that's making money. So I'll get off my soapbox, but man, A players will change your life. You know, a perfect business model with B players and horrible people, how are you going to do? The triangle offense with the Lakers with a bunch of 5-foot-10 16-year-olds against LeBron, like, you're gonna lose. You're gonna lose no matter what.
Really, really good players with no playbook at all, they're still going to get you most of the way there, man. Like, you put LeBron and Kobe on the same court with no playbook— give me the ball. Yeah, give me the ball. Like, you know, Deion Sanders, if he— if they go 3-and-out and they didn't throw it to Deion Sanders when he's on offense, he's slamming his helmet on the sideline.
You know, AJ Brown, throw me the ball, Jalen. Jalen Hurts, throw me the ball. What are you doing? So it's the same. It's a sport. It's a language. I could talk about this all day, but I think we're up on time. Do you have any final thoughts for the people, the people in our audience? Would you work for you? Yeah, I think that's the best question.
I love that question. Would you work for you? Um, you know, a lot of people out there, they'll cycle through people because they are not the leader they need to be.. And so would you work for you? Because you can't expect for anybody to continue to work for you if you wouldn't work for you. There is not a shortage of technicians. There is not a shortage of superstars.
There's a shortage of people who know how to lead. That's right. Well, dang, this was sick. This was our premiere episode of the video podcast. This has been Master Tech to Millionaire. I think this is our 16th or 18th episode now. We've been doing the Zoom calls. If you want more information, Please look us up on LinkedIn. We've got this podcast. We're going to be putting more content out there.
Get in touch with Todd Westerlund, myself, Charlie Zlatkos, Glenn Piccolo, Mike Quinn, Brian Rhodes, any team members on our management team. We would love to invite you down to Houston, to Boston. We run the biggest shop in the world, $1 million a month led by this guy. We run the biggest small shop in the world, Charlie's Zlatkos, 2 bays, 4 lifts. $4 million a year, all-time record month, $427,000.
It's in— it's the NFL. If you want to learn how to, how to just drive your business to levels that you did not think were possible and influence the people that work for your family or your business's life, please give us a call. Reach out to us. We have monthly training programs in Houston. Come hang out with us in Houston. This has been Master Tech to Millionaire.
We'll see you guys next time.
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Click Here ________________________________________ Episode Transcript Disclaimer This transcript was generated using artificial intelligence and may contain errors. If you notice any inaccuracies, please contact us at marketing@wearetheinstitute.com. Episode Transcript: Jimmy Lea: Good morning, good afternoon, good evening, or good night. Thank you for joining. So excited for us to have this conversation today with some really good friends. Everyone, this is to be an interactive webinar. So you're sitting there, you've got questions, you've got concerns, type them into the chat. We wanna be able to ask those questions of our panel today as we are talking about a very interesting topic. And with us today, first, is our good friend, Mr. David Boyd of Inbound Communication. David, how the heck are you, brother? David Boyes: I'm great. I, I, uh, I fully intended to have my jacket on, Jimmy. Jimmy Lea: Man. David Boyes: So excited to be here. We Jimmy Lea: coordinated on this and everything. David Boyes: I know. I, uh- Next time ... I, I was, I was lucky as, as busy as we've been at Call Inbound to, uh, uh, get up and, and organize and dress today. So I really, uh, it's always great to see you and of course, um, uh, we got to visit a little bit out at, uh, Worldpac STX and, uh, man, I tell you what, your wardrobe is always top notch. Jimmy Lea: Hey, thank you. Thank you. We're glad you are dressed today, just don't stand up. Thank you very much. David Boyes: Great. Jimmy Lea: And joining for us in our conversation today, David, is Tanika, Tanika Hayes with, uh, Haynes with Browns Automotive. Tanika, how the heck are you, sister? Tonnika Haynes: I'm doing good, guys. What's going on? Jimmy Lea: Staying alive. Good to see you. Great to see you. Also at STX, what did you think of the, the conference there with Worldpac? Tonnika Haynes: It, it was really, really good. I was not prepared for the size of it. There was a lot of people. People were peopling. So, um, once I got adjusted to all of the crowds and everything, I enjoyed it. I hadn't sat in a class in a really long time, like at an expo. Ooh. I'm usually just walking around and being nosy, but I picked up some good nuggets, so it was great. Jimmy Lea: Beautiful. That's awesome. Well, if, if the STX was a large conference to you, I would suggest that you really prepare yourself months in advance if ever you come out to SEMA and Apex in Las Vegas. Tonnika Haynes: I will be there this year. Oh, good. I keep hear- hearing that, so I don't know what meds I need to be on to take, To take it all in. But Jimmy Lea: we'll- You- Tonnika Haynes: I'm excited about it ... Jimmy Lea: we, we will talk about that because there is more than you can see within a week, and you really only have three days at Apex, four days at SEMA. You want to map out where you're gonna go, who you're gonna talk to, who you're gonna see- And for you, Taneka, schedule some time to sit down and chill Tonnika Haynes: Yeah. I'm gonna have to definitely do that. You're talking about, um, scheduling times. I'm gonna schedule time to go sit in the corner and recoup. Uh-huh. So where's Taneka? She's in the corner. Jimmy Lea: Yep, and, and I- It's David Boyes: scheduled time ... Jimmy Lea: I, I'm gonna work with you on that because I know the corners, I know the places where you can go and, and find some solitude. Tonnika Haynes: All right. Jimmy Lea: I am. Well, our conversation today is in preparation for making your shop better David, I'm gonna kick it over to you, brother. Let's start this conversation with Taneka. David Boyes: Yeah. Let's, uh, let- let's kinda move into this. You know, we're, uh, talking about communication, and there are so many facets that impact the customer experience. I think that it's important to know that, you know, there are tools and there are, uh, from an owner or, and manager's perspective and from a service provider's perspective, there are ways that we rally around making communication better. Um, you know, one of the things that is common at all shops is, uh, the customer phone call. Tonnika Haynes: Oh, yeah. David Boyes: So you winced a little bit. Tonnika Haynes: Yeah. David Boyes: Uh, how many times do we, you know, talk about our phone skills, uh, getting better on the phone, understanding the customer, understanding their needs, addressing their needs? And there's so much, you know, revolves around, uh, the phone calls and, and the way that our advisors and our front office team handles these. Maybe you have a CSR, maybe you have, you know, a service manager. Um, but people are, are answering calls all day long, and this becomes important that we understand who's answering the phone- Mm-hmm ... how they're communicating, what, what's the message that's being shared. Every time that phone rings, uh, that, you know, we like to say that's money calling. So Taneka, let me just ask you, you know, what, what are some of the challenges that you see or the, uh, the successes that you have with your team when it comes to managing and, and, uh, getting better on our phones? Tonnika Haynes: I wanna start by saying, um, I think I listened to my first phone call at my meeting with Jen- Jennifer, with the Institute. I'm currently coaching with the Institute, and that is life-changing- Yeah ... to listen to your team answer the phone. So if anybody's out there and they have not done that, they have not listened in on a phone call, figure out a way to do it. I don't know if it's gonna be a little paper cup and a string, but figure out how to do it. Um, and then I, listening to my own phone calls, and I- I'm the boss, right? I still cringe. And so you never know what's missing from those phone calls, what, what, what is standing out. You know, my team, we would not even ask for the appointment. Like, "Would you like to bring this in today?" You know- Oh ... you ask all the questions, they go through the scripts, but then we found that they were not saying, "Hey, would you like to get that done? Would you like to bring that in today or tomorrow? What works for you?" They were leaving it all to the client to say- Jimmy Lea: Mm-hmm ... " Tonnika Haynes: What's next? What's next?" Hmm. So they were answering the phone, and they were s- being very polite, but they were not closing. They didn't have a lot of words with closing. And so with inbound, I've been able to coach- You know, when you listen to yourself and you're like, "Ooh, ooh." And you can say, "Do you see what you did there?" Or even, 'cause you know, the team can listen to their own phone calls. "Oh, I see what I did there. I see where I dropped the ball." So that was, opened up a whole bunch of eyeballs around here. Well- It's like, "Oh, it's Monday, it's time to listen to phone calls." Like, "Ah." But you just increasingly get better over time. Jimmy Lea: Oh, it's so true. And, and the ability, Taneka, the ability to have calls from today- Tonnika Haynes: Mm-hmm ... Jimmy Lea: or from yesterday or, or even the day before. Uh, there was a time a decade ago when we would have to listen, as coaches, we would listen to calls. Listen, listen, listen, listen, listen, listen, listen. We're trying to find a coaching call, a call that is coachable, and this might be a call from two weeks ago, three weeks ago. Mm. The advisors are going, "Dude, oh man, that's forever ago. No, man, I, I don't do that anymore. I'm not like that." But David, I, I think you kind of solved a bit of that problem with your phone services. David Boyes: Yeah, thanks. It, you know, it's, it's important to, to recognize. I think every owner I've ever talked with has a similar issue. It's... And a lot of it rev- revolves around time, right? Are, are we aware of what's actually happening- Jimmy Lea: Yeah ... David Boyes: on the front line? Mm-hmm. And, uh, some of it is, uh, I wanna keep this a little bit at arm's length because I, I can tell you as an owner, I will have an emotional response when I listen to that phone call. And Taniki, you brought up a great point. For owners and managers here that are on the phone, please listen to your own calls. Yeah. Do it at least one time. Tonnika Haynes: Yeah. David Boyes: Well, twice. Have to Tonnika Haynes: bite the bullet. Just do it. David Boyes: Yeah. Just do it. And, Tonnika Haynes: and, and be ready. Just like- ... just like, "Oh, that is me." Yeah, that is you. David Boyes: Do it- Yeah do it twice because the first time that you listen to a call, uh, it's gonna just be weird, right? So listening to myself on recordings is always weird, but there's this heavy lift of time, right? Am, am I aware of what's actually happening on the front line, and how are we interacting with customers? And then do I have, do I have a mechanism to understand what's my expectation? As an owner, um, you know, it, it's important to establish that expectation. Maybe you're working with a call coach, maybe you've been in trainings yourself. It's, it's ideal to have a method by which you're going to measure your call handlers. And, um, you know, we wanna be professional. We want to build confidence and, and build rapport with these customers. It doesn't have to be fast, but typically- Mm-hmm ... you know, an incoming call from a customer is likely an appointment setting call or a status call. We're gonna set that status call, uh, bucket aside for a second 'cause we wanna be in front of, uh, status calls instead of having customers call us. But if you're listening to these and you have that rhythm around it, uh, we understand how these small habits can build on one another. Am I, am I smiling when I answer the phone? There's something physically that hap- When I, when I physically smile, there's something that is noticeable in the way that I'm communicating. And, uh, am I, am I clear? So what are the expectations? You know, uh, if you watch your advisors, I have, uh, my little cordless handset here. If they tuck their phone in like this, and, and you know, they're, they're trying to multitask Listen to those calls because likely it's very, very difficult to hear on the other side of this. So listening to calls, uh, helps us understand how, you know, how we conduct ourselves, how we conduct business, how am I representing the business that I, you know, that I'm working at as a professional. But also, what is the customer hearing and what is the customer's experience? So, um, these are, uh, important points, and it starts by listening. Jimmy, you brought up a, um, an important aspect here. Historically, we would listen to call after call after call after call to try to find something I can use to coach. So Taneka, you might do this. You've got a call recording system. It doesn't do much but just record those calls, and now I have to go through this, this process to identify a coachable opportunity. And this is now I think where we can move effectively into technology, right? We all hear so much about AI today, and what's really nice about, uh, having, you know, a, a phone system that records is now you have an asset, and you can use that asset to do something more with it. And we can use AI to help that heavy lift of time and, you know, take 90% of the time requirement off. So instead of having to spend 30 minutes, I might have to spend two or three minutes to take that call, sit down with my service advisor, go through this, and have a meaningful, constructive conversation about the things that work well. Jimmy Lea: Yeah. I, I love, David, that your software makes it so easy to find these coachable calls so much faster. A- and Taneka, that's just gotta be a lifesaver for you as well, coaching your service advisors. Tonnika Haynes: It is. I remember, um, speaking with a friend, fellow shop owner, and he's like, "I need you to set aside a time." And so what I did is on my calendar, on Wednesday, that's the day that I sit down and we go over phone calls. And so, you know, you got the dashboard, and that dashboard will say, "This is a coachable call. This is a coachable call." And it is a habit for me as the owner/manager, um, to make sure that I'm staying on top of it all the time because we'll slip into old habits, right? So me listening to the calls and bringing the service advisor or, um, or bring Jay in and say, "Hey, let's listen to this. Let's see how we can get better." You know, you continuously improve on it, and you don't slide back into old habits. Because I'm not on the phone as much anymore. If I have to answer the phone, I know personally, and everything's at stake for me, I slide back into old habits. So we all are capable of it, and so having that dashboard in front of us and said, "Hey, this is a call you need to look at," the service advisor or the person answering the phone does not feel like they're being picked on, but they're being improved upon. So, "Look, I'm just lifting you up. This is what we can do. Do you see how we can make this better?" And it's a we, it's a us, it's coachable, it's there, it's real, and, um, I really enjoy th- that part of the dashboard. Jimmy Lea: Oh, I love that. How often, Taneka, do you send, "This is a really good call"? This is a really good call. I Tonnika Haynes: like a really good call How often do you send that to the team? You know what? Yeah. I probably should do that more. But when I see a good call, I, I, I like to share it. And when I get a good review, like I l- literally just got a good review based off of a bad situation that we were able to turn around with proper communication, and the customer l- literally said, he's like, "The communication... The problem was still there," he said, "but the way they handled it and the communication was key." So he was not satisfied when he left, but the way that we dealt with it afterwards, and that recording of how we guided him through the process, and how we, you know, we apologized, we came up with a plan, apologized again, and kept it moving, and that was a great coachable call. It's like, this is how you handle a bad situation. Look how we won here. So yeah, those are just as important as the, as the losses, as the bad calls. "Hey, this is a good call. G- this is a good call." That balance is super important. Yeah, it balances it. Yeah. And then, you know, it's like, okay, I did that right. Even when that client is a client that does not belong to you, and you can hear them tell the customer, it's like, "Hey, you know what? Appreciate your call, but this isn't the place for you." And that's not the word for word, but, "Hey, you handled that good. Thank you for saving us from a nightmare." Jimmy Lea: Yeah. Tonnika Haynes: Amen. Share it with your team. So you gotta share the wins and the, the misses. Jimmy Lea: Yeah. And, and, uh, for a lot of people, I think they struggle in the creative. So if they can hear it, that it's already been done, they can duplicate. Sure. They can mimic. They can do the same thing over and over and over again. So the more we send these beautiful calls, "Oh my gosh, you guys did so well on this phone call. I, I love this part, this part, and this part," they're able to duplicate that, and they'll do it over and over and over again. And then, then you're- The mistakes that are being made become much less because you're showing, you're, uh, mirroring to them these are the really good calls that we wanna hear. Tonnika Haynes: And, and sharing that when you're going over a call, you got the good call here, we can work on this call, but this is another good call. You know, we talk about giving that sandwich. Yeah. And so that's another opportunity you can give that good sandwich. So when it's time to come in on Wednesdays and listen to your phone calls, you're like, "Ooh, I know I got one coming and I think I know which one it is." And then you're like, "Yeah, but you got this one too, so you won here, and, uh, we missed on this one, but next time it's not happening." Right? Right. So it's, you know, it's all in coaching. Jimmy Lea: Oh, David Boyes: it's so true. You just said something that's super important, and, uh, ooh, I think I know which one this is. Tonnika Haynes: Yeah. David Boyes: Um, there, there's a lot to unpack there. I, I, I love the, the good with the bad. We'll talk about that more too, but, um, creating the awareness. So consistency wins, and, um, I'll say it again, be consistent with the process because consistency wins. And when you have that rhythm where it's familiar and it's expected, we're gonna sit down and we're gonna listen to calls, we're gonna go through this, identify the opportunities, um, it's not good and bad calls, it's, you know, it, it, uh, we call them top calls or champion calls and coachable calls. So a coachable call isn't inherently bad. Maybe we even got an appointment. Tonnika Haynes: Mm. David Boyes: Right? But there's, there's opportunities. So, uh, when we have that rhythm and it's expected, what's really important about what you just said is the awareness. So when I go to pick up that phone, is this the call that Tanika's gonna be talking with me about tomorrow or, you know, Wednesday, whatever our rhythm is? It, it will begin to create that moment of pause that as an a- an advisor when I'm picking up that phone, I can take that breath. Yeah. I can, I can, uh, let that, uh, you know, that technician that just blew me up Tonnika Haynes: Let 'em David Boyes: go. I can let that slide off. I can shake that off. Yeah. And I can focus for a moment to make sure that that customer knows right at this moment they are absolutely the most important person to me right now. Tonnika Haynes: Mm-hmm. David Boyes: So that's an important message to convey over the phone, our, uh, the, you know, the way that we speak, the words that we use, my en- excitement and enthusiasm about being on that call all comes through. So as we get through this rhythm and we develop the consistency and it becomes normal, now I've got that awareness on my team that, hey, this next call I'm taking, I'm gonna have the moment of pause to focus because this might be the next one that, that we're reviewing. I want this to be a positive call that, that Tanika's coming to me and saying, "You did really well on this one. Let's continue to develop this," and, you know, replicate the things that are working well. Instead of, "Hey, there's some opportunity here. You know, you didn't ask for the appointment. You were, you know, pricing over the phone. You said 'no'." No comes out in a lot of ways, doesn't it, Tanika? Where- Tonnika Haynes: Oh, yeah ... we, David Boyes: we might be telling somebody, uh, "You know, I'm really busy right", or, or, or "W- we, we're really busy right now, I can't get you in until Friday." Tonnika Haynes: Yeah. David Boyes: That's, that's, we might as well just say, "No, I can't help you." Yeah. Tonnika Haynes: Yeah. You, that's, that's all they heard was the no. Um, even if you give... And, uh, everybody knows that I'm, I'm big on nos. Like, I can give you a no where there's some healthy nos, but then there's some nos and you have the customer saying, "Hey, um, m- my brakes are making the noise and it just started." And he's like, "Oh, no, I can't see you till Friday." He's like, "Yeah, but I'm gonna die before Friday. I wanna see somebody now." Um, so you don't, you have to learn how to coach them and say, "Yes, so bring that in. Let's take a look at what you've got, and then we'll come up with a plan." You didn't promise that it was gonna be today or tomorrow, but you said, "Bring it in. I'm worried about your safety. Let's see what you've got." Yeah. "Let's see if you should really be concerned about that check engine light. It might be a EVAP code." They don't know that, "But go ahead and bring them in." So and then you, like you said, the cadence in it. This, I'm not gonna make you any promises over the phone, and I would literally say that. "Hey, I don't wanna disappoint you by making a promise that I can't keep. So don't- Yeah ... don't make me, don't put me in that hole. But I need you to go ahead and bring that in to me as soon as you can. Um, and let's scan it. Let's see what you've got, and let's see if you should really be worried, if you can make that trip or we need to bring you in right away. We will help you come up with a plan." So just that solid no. "No, I'll see you Friday." Jimmy Lea: He, " Tonnika Haynes: Meh. No you won't." Yeah. Like, so that's support. That's Jimmy Lea: my- David Boyes: It, it becomes very collaborative in what you just said. Hey, let, let's make this about you, let's make this about your safety and your confidence to drive that vehicle. Maybe you gotta get across town and your commute is 30 minutes. Let's make sure that your vehicle is safe, and then once you're here and we make sure you're safe, let's talk about, uh, when we're gonna have that on the schedule. We'll get that vehicle in Tonnika Haynes: and prepared. Yeah. What are the next steps? Yeah. So let's go ahead and get- let's get your nerves calm- Mm-hmm ... and then let's come up with the next step. Let's come up with a plan. Us, us, us, we, we, we. So Jimmy Lea: yeah. Yeah. Oh, I love it. I love it. And, uh, you talk about s- building a solid foundation for this, the solid foundation for their skills so that the, the ongoing training you're doing really builds on that foundation. Uh, we've got a three-day service advisor with the institute. We're gonna give a shout-out to the institute here right now. So everybody grab out your smartphones, scan the QR code if your service advisor needs a solid foundation. Thank you, David. If you need a solid foundation- Registered now ... and you need to start with... Yeah, get registered. I know you've been to a couple of these, David, 'cause- I have you've talked about all the skills here just really, really well. If your service advisor needs that and you need to go from zero to hero very quickly, this is an intensive that you wanna send your service advisor to, and it will be at headquarters in Ogden, Utah. Fly right into Salt Lake, and, uh, and we got you set up there in Ogden. So, yes, David Boyes: scan that. It's a beautiful drive up from the airport. This class is, uh, it, it, it will help establish the, the fundamentals to build on. Yeah. So you come here, it's, you know, it's boot camp, right? We're, we're going to make sure that we're establishing the expectation and give you something to build on as the owner. Send your service advisors in here. Uh, they'll get those fundamentals, and then you'll have, you know, these, these mechanisms, uh, to improve them over time. I promise you it'll be a, a real game changer for your frontline. Tonnika Haynes: Well, you know what? Beautiful. I wanna piggyback on that. Um, and I wasn't coached to saying this. If they've already been, send them again. Jimmy Lea: There you go. Mm. Tonnika Haynes: Send them again, because here's the thing that I know, and I'm just gonna make it simple. I want you to think about your favorite movie. Like when, when I was in the 20s, for me it was Friday, the movie Friday. And then we watched that movie every Friday after work with the crew that I worked with, and it was just the most ignorant movie and the best movie for my generation. Each time I watched that movie, I would see a different thing. So I want you to think about your favorite movie and, or v- your favorite comedy. Each time you'd watch it, you would pick up something else. So it was like, "Oh, I didn't see that that last time." So even when it comes to training, "Hey, I did this three-day class and I did it a year ago. I grew." Jimmy Lea: Do it again. Yeah. Tonnika Haynes: Do it again. Do it again. You, you're never too mu- uh, there's never too much coaching. So just do it again and you'll see it from a different angle. I just wanted to say that. Yeah, 'cause, um, there's been some classes that I, I take, and not just this one, but other classes, like, let me take that class again. Yeah. And you're like, "Aha. I didn't remember that from last time." Yeah. I didn't implement that from last time, 'cause we, you guys tell us, and coaches will tell you, "Just go and implement one thing. One thing." I mean, watch those changes, and then the next time you take the class, let's do one more thing, maybe two, and get, get a little bit better. Right. Jimmy Lea: Yeah. So speaking of training, ASTA, A-S-T-A, is coming up here real soon, Taneka. Real Tonnika Haynes: soon. We're less than 30 Jimmy Lea: days out. Let's give them a shout-out. Tonnika Haynes: Shout out to ASTA. Those are the people, not the people that made me, but it's my just one, my just one thing that I took away from there each time has helped build me to where I am. And I am, I cannot say I would not be where I was without them. But I would not be where I was, where I am without them. From those, those people that I met, the village that I met, meeting you, meeting my first coach, just meeting my, my industry brothers and sisters that I can call on at any time when I'm about to flip out, or when I have a win. 'Cause you know as owners and when, when you're a little higher, you can't share your wins with everybody without some jealousy. True. Yeah. So when you have a win and you have that community to call on. Mm-hmm. So yeah, ASTA is the place to be, September 24th to 26th, right here in Raleigh, North Carolina. So I hope somebody shows up. And, uh, I wanna meet some... Well, I know Jim. I'll be there. Jimmy will be there. You will not miss him. David Boyes: He'll have the jacket. Tonnika Haynes: He will have plenty of jackets on. It is a fun atmosphere, lots of community, lots of learning and growing. Jimmy Lea: Yeah. Yeah. We're gonna have a jacket war, so anybody who wants to play. David, you're bringing your jacket, so David Boyes: who wore Jimmy Lea: it best? Yes. Yeah. David Boyes: Yeah. I, I wanted to make sure that we were gonna f- uh, be able to carve out some time to do the who wore it best. Tonnika Haynes: Oh, David Boyes: always. I think, so B- Benji will be involved. Brett will probably be involved, right? Mm-hmm. And, uh, you, you two- Mike Allen ... Mike, okay, Mike, yep. Tonnika Haynes: I, I, I feel like we should have a girls version of this, 'cause you know, if the women got involved- Jimmy Lea: We always lose Tonnika Haynes: I mean, we would just throw you guys under the bus. Jimmy Lea: It's true. We tried that, Tanika, and you swept it. Yeah. You swept it. There, there was no- Tonnika Haynes: I don't wanna do that to you guys ... competing with Jimmy Lea: Tanika. Tonnika Haynes: I don't wanna do... Yeah, I don't wanna do that to you, so we'll, we'll figure it out. Maybe I'll make a f- couple phone calls and text messages and see what's up. David Boyes: Yeah. Speaking of phone calls. Speaking of phone calls. Tonnika Haynes: Throw that back in. David Boyes: I have a question for you. Yeah. Yeah. That's, hey, I couldn't have asked for a better softball there, but that's great. Um- ... thinking, thinking about the coaching process, you know, I, I, I had mentioned before it can seem a little uncomfortable, even as an owner. You know, listen to two calls, because that first one, you're gonna be so- Mm-hmm ... consumed by how weird I sound on the phone, right? So, but when you, when you started this with your team, what, how was it received? What were some of the, the challenges, uh, do, you know, h- what feedback did you get about listening to calls and going through the analysis? Tonnika Haynes: So I wanna say that when I first did it in, in coaching, so in a group setting, and you're listening to your team, so they call in, they have to do a call and they'll record a call. And so it's like, "Oh, well this time she did this, and this is the excuse." You wanna come up with excuses. You wanna defend- Right yourself. I wanna defend my shop. And so that service advisor's gonna wanna defend him or herself. Like, "Oh, well, you know, that customer and this was that." I was like, "No." So you get past that, and it's like, okay, like I said, you give the sandwich. Okay, so this is a great call. You tell me what you could have done, could have done better in this call. Right. 'Cause I don't wanna be in... 'Cause if you go into attack mode and say, "Oh, you should do this better, and you didn't follow the script, and you, you, you, you, you," you're gonna get somebody that's gonna put up a guard and be like, "Whoa, whoa, whoa. I did my best." So I'll say, "I know you did your best on this, this one call, and you did a great job on this call. What happened, brother?" Balls in your court. Tell me how you can improve on this. Mm. What do you need from me to help you improve here? Was there a distraction? What was, what was the problem? So I kinda feel like I can teach them to self-coach. Jimmy Lea: Yep. Tonnika Haynes: I'm, I'ma give you a whole toolbox. You've got this toolbox. You know what a good call to- sounds like. Like, you also have a mirror. There's a mirror right there. Look at yourself. You've got reminders. I've got sticky note reminders on each, each person saying, "Don't forget to ask for the sale." What happened? "Oh, man, I was distracted, I sh- I should've..." Yep, you should've put the mouse down. You should've put the mouse down. So usually people will first get defensive, same. Mm-hmm. Um, then the defense mechanism starts to come down. Say, "All right, okay, so how do we fix this so next time I cannot find a bad phone call?" Jimmy Lea: Bingo. David Boyes: Yeah. Jimmy Lea: I love it. It, yeah. I love that you have a mirror there and you have sticky notes there helping as well, Taneka. Tonnika Haynes: Yeah. Jimmy Lea: Yeah. That's, that's so good. ' Tonnika Haynes: Cause we forget. And- And it's okay- Oh, we do ... 'cause we get busy. But the Jimmy Lea: more Tonnika Haynes: we work on it- And I, Jimmy Lea: I, you... I'm certain that you guys have heard this before, that a fake smile is better than a real frown. Tonnika Haynes: Yes. David Boyes: Yep. Tonnika Haynes: Yes. And I'm really good at that. And so I've learned that because I've been doing it a very long time, so people know that I can really make you... I could, like, really fuss you out, and I would sound so sweet 'cause I'm smiling at you the whole time. "Well, you know what, Jamie? I think that was the stupidest thing you've ever said." Jimmy Lea: And if you do it with a smile, you can Tonnika Haynes: get away with it. And you're doing it with a smile and, and when you're shaking your head. So that smile makes a difference. And when I'm- It does ... picking up the phone out of an emergency, if they are busy up front and I'll see that phone ringing, and I pick it up and I'm not ready personally, I'm not ready to answer that phone, and it's a client that knows me, and I'm not smiling, I will get a, "Hey, Taneka, what's wrong?" You Jimmy Lea: okay? 'Cause Tonnika Haynes: they, "You okay?" And I'll say, "Oh, I'm sorry. I was distracted." 'Cause that's usually what happens, you're distracted, or that service, that, um, technician just rubbed you the wrong way or something's happened at home. So but once you put that smile on- You just fake it till you make it. And now you, I usually don't like to say that, but sometimes you do have to fake it till you make it. Like, yeah, absolutely. And use those words of, those positive words. Absolutely. Let's look into that for you. Yeah. Yeah. Jimmy Lea: Sure. I love it. Love it. We talk about the phone call and how much it's worth. Uh, Bimmer PhD Motorsports is saying, "Can we dig into that a little bit?" How much does it cost to get that phone to ring? How much does it cost to acquire a new customer? You talk about the mindset and you talk about the service advisor- Mm-hmm ... and the smile that's needed to be there, fake or real. How much is that phone call worth, Tanika? Have you analyzed any of that in your shop? Tonnika Haynes: So that was actually a, um, something we did in the 20 group with my coach Jen. We went through that and we calculated how much it costs to sh- get that phone to ring. And I really wish I was prepared and I had that number for you. But once you realize that number, share it with your team. Jimmy Lea: Yeah. Tonnika Haynes: And then, uh, the institute probably has, um, a blueprint on how to figure that out. So you're looking at how much your website is, your Go- Google ads, any form of marketing that you have out there, down to the phone bill. Jimmy Lea: Yeah. Tonnika Haynes: How much does it cost to make that phone ring? And once you see it as the owner, you're gonna be like, "Whoa." And you share that with the team. Like, every time that phone rings, it costs me this. And then also think about your ARO. Jimmy Lea: Mm-hmm. Bingo. Tonnika Haynes: And every time- Yep, yep ... we do not get a y- yes, and we don't get that client through the door, we lost $850. Potential $850, potential $1,100. Jimmy Lea: Yep. Tonnika Haynes: So once we start thinking about, you know, everything, everything's not about money. It is That Jimmy Lea: we keep score. Tonnika Haynes: It is how we keep score. Yeah. Like, you know, we, we talk about we've got the metrics on the dashboard. Numbers don't lie. People do. Your emotions will. David Boyes: Yeah. Tonnika Haynes: It costs me $75 every time that phone rings. Mm-hmm. And when you ring it, and when you land that deal, that's a potential 850, or whatever your ARO is, or whatever- Yeah ... that's what it is. And that's, and how long does it take to get that one client to get through the door? Yeah. And also think about how long you can hold onto them as a client. How many years Jimmy Lea: are you gonna- Tonnika Haynes: What's the lifetime value of the client? What's the lifetime of that client? Jimmy Lea: Yeah. Tonnika Haynes: So that smile when you answer the phone, yeah, that's worth a lot of money. Jimmy Lea: Tens of thousands of dollars. Tonnika Haynes: Tens of thousands. So go ahead and put your Vaseline on your teeth- Jimmy Lea: Mm-hmm ... Tonnika Haynes: and, and start a- smiling. Jimmy Lea: Yeah. That's an old theater trick. Yes. Are you a, are you a musical theater person? Tonnika Haynes: No, but I just know about- Where are you pulling that from? ... Vaseline on your teeth and, 'cause you get tired of smiling. You, you know, at the conference, you have this whole muscle thing. You're like... Jimmy Lea: Uh, yeah. Tonnika Haynes: Keep s- keep, just keep smiling, smiling, smiling. Jimmy Lea: That's right, David Boyes: Dorothy. Those are important numbers, uh, to know how much does it cost to get that phone to ring. Tonnika Haynes: Mm-hmm. David Boyes: Uh, in some cases it can be, uh, you know, several hundred dollars depending on really all of those factors around generating those phone calls, and then what that ties into when the phone does ring, um, and we don't ask for the appointment. Has that $850 or $1,100 just walked over to my competitor across town? Yeah. But it also sets the stage when we're talking about coaching and development to bring it back to what's in it for me. As a service advisor, you know, most high performing shops are incentivizing their advisors on these, you know, these GP numbers and, you know, there might be other metrics on Google reviews, maybe have spiffs for these different things. It all requires us to generate the appointments and get those vehicles in so that we can have an inspection and we can, you know, generate the, the estimate and ultimately have a sale, and then make this an amazing experience for the customer so they're gonna come back next time. Tonnika Haynes: Mm-hmm. David Boyes: Uh, at the very front end of the phone call, you know, it, it takes X number of dollars to make the phone ring. When that phone rings, the customer, if they're a first time caller- Uh, they're likely y- we as, as a business are likely setting the stage within that first 15 to 20 seconds for the length of our relationship. So based on those initial interactions, we're going to begin setting the stage of how well this customer visit is going to go, uh, how much that we're developing trust with this customer. Do they trust me as an advisor? Do they trust this business, that we're experts and we're gonna help them, and we're gonna do so in a, in a fair and meaningful way? And then also, uh, we're going to set that basis for a repeat customer. Jimmy Lea: Mm-hmm. David Boyes: So that, that's where we get into the, the longevity of our relationship. Interestingly enough, so much of this happens at the very first moments of that very first phone call. And when we acknowledge that as a service advisor, I'm like, "Oh, that does tie back to the paycheck I get." As a business owner, "Wow, that ties back into the stickiness of my customers." I love, you know, repeat customers. I love repeat business. So we wanna drive these skills up front. Uh, Taneka, you talked about, you know, sitting down and going through, um, some of these calls and the, the service advisor reaction. Have you really developed and, you know, share your expectations on how you'd like the, the phone answered? I'm not asking about a script. Tonnika Haynes: Mm-hmm. David Boyes: But like that flow, right? We don't wanna create robots. Right. What have you done at, when you, you know, train and develop your team on here's what I would like to hear from you? Tonnika Haynes: So I haven't honed that in 100%, but I, I do know that we wanna thank them for calling. David Boyes: Mm-hmm. Tonnika Haynes: We wanna know how did you find out about us? Great. Is this your first time calling? How'd you hear about us? So, so we can track that, right? Yeah. Was it a repeat? Was it a neighbor? Was it a Google? How did you... Was it a postcard? How did you hear about me? Um, what can I help you with, and how soon can I get to it? Can you bring that in today or tomorrow? And, um, and smile. So I have these little things that I want them to say that's on the side- Yeah ... of their computer, and I don't want you to sit there and read and just say, "Oh, well, yes, sir, how can I help you today?" I want it to flow naturally because that's who we are as a shop. We- we're not a scripted shop. We're, we're a bunch of goofy people, actually. People. We just happen to fix cars. Um, and that's who we are. Yeah. And I want that to come through. I want you to be friendly. I want you to re- when they come in with the cat or the dog or whatever, please not a cat, but the dog. I want you to put in the notes, this is, this is that customer's name and this is what their dog's name. If they refer to their, their car, "My car's name is Pearline." If you called my car by his name, I'm not taking it nowhere else So I want you to build that relationship. And so I don't have a script and I don't have a formula yet, and maybe I should work on that. And, um, we do have like a SOP. Yeah. Probably should do a better job at that. But then what you just said made me raise my eyebrow, like, I should do better with that. But we do have some things that I'm, that are non-negotiables. David Boyes: You've got your flow there, which is great. Mm-hmm. And I think you're, you're doing better in that than, than- Yeah ... uh, some owners that, that we talk with. I encourage, I encourage everybody to have a flow, right? Yeah. We, we wanna kind of go through the conversation. I'll tell you the number one, um, deficit that I hear within the first probably 10 seconds of a phone call is asking for the customer name, right? So- Right ... "Thank you for calling ABC Automotive. How may I help you? Um, yeah, I can help you with that. My name's David. What's your name?" Jimmy Lea: Mm. David Boyes: It's so simple. Yeah. And, uh, I listen to call after call after call. I mean, these, they, they pop out because of our AI call analysis, but where we go through this whole process and we've had a 90-second call or a two-minute-long phone call, and at no point ask the customer name. Tonnika Haynes: Right. And then you assume that the name on a caller ID is their name. David Boyes: Mm-hmm. Right. Tonnika Haynes: That, that's a problem, too. I know that we were doing... I was doing it as well. Yeah. I would do it as well. David Boyes: Yeah. Tonnika Haynes: But, um, and, and with that, I had a little challenge saying, "Hey, I want to see you guys' name on the, the review." Yeah. And it really bothers me when a client calls to check on their car, and I have to, have to answer the phone, "Hey, who was your service advisor?" "Uh, I don't know." What? David Boyes: Mm. Tonnika Haynes: They need to know your name. David Boyes: Mm. Tonnika Haynes: So I had to make sure that everybody had their own business cards when the car was dropped off. "Hey, my name is Stuart. This is who you should call to check on your car. Everybody here can help you, but I'm the main person." So I think a lot of people just don't do that, and say, "Hey, well, my name's Tanika. Who am I speaking with?" Great. "Have you been here with us before?" David Boyes: Mm-hmm. Tonnika Haynes: You know, if it doesn't pop up on the caller ID, "Have you been here with us before?" Yeah. But the caller ID pop up, that's a game changer. Am I skipping ahead? Should we not go that far yet? David Boyes: No, you're fine. Yeah. Tonnika Haynes: Thank you, David. Yeah, just be ready. Yeah, be ready when, when David Voigts calls Brown's Automotive, and you call and say, "Brown's Automotive. This is Tanika. Hey, David, how can I help you today?" What is that? What are you doing? You knew I was calling. You know, like- Yeah ... yeah, caller ID exists. People forget about that. David Boyes: Yeah. Tonnika Haynes: But- They do. They do. But it, it's just extra special. Yeah. And that's what the caller ID... I know one thing I do when the customer's walking in, and if I know I have a blue Toyota Coro- Corolla coming in at 9:00. "Who is this coming in?" Yeah. "Hey, Mrs. Such-and-such. Good morning. Oh, hey." Instead of saying, "Can I help you?" Yes, you can help me. That's why I walked through the door. David Boyes: Mm-hmm. " Tonnika Haynes: Hey, M- hey, Mary David Boyes: Jane." Or, "Hang on a second. I'll be with you in a second." Tonnika Haynes: Yeah. No. David Boyes: Don't do that. Tonnika Haynes: Don't do that. David Boyes: Yeah. Tonnika Haynes: So, um, there's a lot to be said about customer service, and there's a lot to be said about s- calling people by their name. Jimmy Lea: Amen. Tonnika Haynes: Yeah. David Boyes: It creates familiarity. Yes. And, uh, when, when we have familiarity, we have a relationship. Mm-hmm. It's in- it's potentially implied. But people love to do business with, with the, the folks that they have a relationship with. Mm-hmm. And they're inclined... You know, this is the fun thing about consumer behavior and human behavior, is when I have a great experience, I wanna rally my friends around that too. I want to include them in the joy that I get to experience when I come see Tanika and her team. Yeah. So I'm gonna- I, I'm gonna be much more likely to tell folks about it. If I have a meh- Meh ... average experience, it's probably not gonna come up in conversation. I'm not gonna stick my neck out there. But, um, how do we do that? Well, we address people by their name. We know when they're calling, right? I might even be pulling that up in my shop management system or my CRM. Just the s- the second the phone rings, it's gonna pop and present that information. "Yeah, I saw you were in three, three months ago, and we had looked at, you know, X, Y, Z on your vehicle. Should we add, add some additional time to take care of that this time?" Right? It, we have an awareness. They have confidence in us. We know them as a person. We know their vehicles. And now we're, we're joining together with our customers. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Uh, at, at a common goal, right? And it comes back to their safety. Well, Tonnika Haynes: so what'll happen is you'll get a client, and, um... Sorry about the background noise. That's all right. You'll get a client, and they're not thinking about their car. They, they, they've grown to love you. They've grown to know you. They know you by your name. And then you made the recommendations last time. They trust you enough that they are just gonna be like, "Okay, whatever. I'll talk to you about it next time. Tanika's gonna remember that for me." Say, "Hey, Miss Mary Jane, you remember we talked about..." "I don't remember we talking about." "Well, here's a copy. I'm gonna send that over to you. We're gonna look at it, these things again." Yeah. It's just like having a whole system, and then you become that person. It's like I don't have to remember what my car needs 'cause Tanika and her team have the history, and they know me by my name. David Boyes: Mm-hmm. Tonnika Haynes: Right. And they're gonna take care of me. David Boyes: The paradigm shift there is I, you know, as a service advisor, I'm the expert. Tonnika Haynes: Mm-hmm. David Boyes: As the service manager, I'm the expert, right? You've come to me because of our and my expertise, and I'm sharing the belief that you wanna be safe and you wanna care for your vehicle. So allow me to make these recommendations. Allow me to, to keep that, those notes about our previous interactions so that when we meet to, when we meet again, we can make sure that w- you know, we're, we're not starting from zero- Tonnika Haynes: Mm-hmm David Boyes: that we already have this information available, and we're going to improve that experience. Tonnika Haynes: Yeah. David Boyes: Um, on the, on the call coaching side of it, um, you know, I, I think at some level you've kinda normalized it in your shop, and I'd love to learn more about how, you know, how did you do that? It's, it's not typical, I would say, that people are just, like, rallying around, "Let's listen to calls," right? 'Cause part of it is, you know, the exposure or this kind of fear of judgment. But once you normalize that and make it consistent, um, I'd love to know how you've done that and, and keep the, uh, the Big Brother mentality out the door. Tonnika Haynes: Well, I don't, well, we've got cameras, and we've got these things recording the calls. And, and first of all, these calls are not being recorded to get you. These calls are recor- Yeah ... recorded to cover your butts from that crazy person that swear they didn't say it. Mm-hmm. These calls are recorded to make you better. Um, I remember Chad say, "Hey, just put it on the calendar. Just put it on the calendar." It's like ha- having that one-on-one for the first time. Nobody knows what to say or to do. I'm not trying to attack you. I'm just trying to make you better. So let's just... I listened to my call. Be vulnerable. Me. Hey, Jimmy Lea: Yeah ... Tonnika Haynes: you don't wanna listen to your call. I didn't wanna listen to my own call. But let's, let's do this. It's just on the calendar. And like I said, the defense will just break down a little bit at a time, and I found that with my one-on-ones again. Like, we do a first Monday one-on-one. If I was late or if I skipped the one-on-one, they're like, "Well, why did, I didn't get my one-on-one. Am I in trouble?" They look forward to it. Everybody wants positive reinforcement. Amen. So if you keep it positive, and then some- like, "Hey, I looked at 10 of your calls, and out of the 10, only 3 of them were coachable." Or, "Hey, you remember when we started out, how you would have, like, a 11 bad calls out of 20? Dude, you only got two this time." So make sure we measure it, okay? Schedule it, measure it, keep it going. Know you're uncomfortable, they're uncomfortable, and just say- I don't wanna do this. Nobody wants to do it. Nobody wants to lift that... Well, a lot of people don't wanna lift the heaviest weight for the muscle gain. Mm-hmm. It's gonna be painful, but it's gonna get easier. It's gonna be easier for me and you as the coach and the coachee, or is it a coachee? Whatever. So, I mean, it, it's... I don't know if there's an easy way to put it, but I just know that you just keep doing it, you be consistent, and you let them know if you're uncomfortable. Like I hear shop owners say, "How do you start this one-on-one stuff? How do you start this coaching stuff?" You just start it. And you're just like, "Ooh, hey, I don't know what I'm doing either. Let's do this together." Yeah. "Let's, let's get better together." Like, I'm listening to my calls too. We're all getting better together. So I would just say start it, put it on a schedule, make it, make it pop up, show up. Yeah. Wednesday, coaching calls. Jimmy, one of the- Schedule it. It's ready to go. David Boyes: Yeah. That, that's perfect. I, I, I love the perspective too. And Jimmy, one of the, you know, the things that I share with owners consistently is be consistent. Mm-hmm. So I think the, the technology drives that, right? We're delivering an email with, you know, here, here's a, a top call, here's a coachable call. Here's some additional information. So delivering that is important, and the technology really helps us drive that consistency in this case. So, um, when that, that email comes out, here's a call example, you don't have to do anything with that today, or you can. If you don't, there's another one tomorrow, right? Mm-hmm. And we wanna create that normalcy. And th- this is the part that drives change, is one, you know, we're, we're making this normal. Yep. And Tanika, you were just talking about that, right? We're gonna put this on the calendar. People begin to expect it, right? It becomes normal for them, and that's a super important milestone in the coaching, training, and development process, is that sense of normalcy in the shop. And then, um, u- understanding the expectations and, you know, where do we have the opportunities. Um, Tanika, you know, one, one thought that comes to mind here is, you know, you'd mentioned at the beginning, like ask for the appointment. As you began doing this, you know, what, what did you begin to understand and, and see happening across, you know, the phone calls and across your organization? What patterns began to emerge? And really, what's that aha moment you had where you're like, "This is bringing value to me while I'm bringing value to my team"? Tonnika Haynes: Ooh, that's a good question. So when we start asking for the appointment, you know what? The calendar filled up. David Boyes: Yeah. Tonnika Haynes: Yeah. So the marketing was working. And, um, but the big aha moment... Ooh, that's a good question, Dave. You got me on that one. Should have text me that before you asked me that one. I'd been ready. David Boyes: My Tonnika Haynes: apologies. Phone with you. Aha moments with phone calls. I don't know. I, I really, I can't answer that one for you, but what I do wanna say before I forget the chance, don't get the chance to say it, when they're sitting beside each other up front and they're lis- 'cause they're, everybody can hear everybody's phone calls. Mm-hmm. I can hear them say, "That was a good one. What was that one about?" Or like Stuart would tell Hailey, he's like, "She's, she's had a lot of good phone calls here lately. I can hear the change in the way she's handling the phone calls." So again, um, may have got a little bit off subject, but them helping each other and encouraging each other. Maybe they can only hear one end of the phone call, but there's some key words like, "Oh, you killed that one." Jimmy Lea: Yeah. " Tonnika Haynes: You killed that one." Or making that sale on the phone call. Yeah. "I heard how you delivered that BVI. I heard that delivery. You gave them the good sandwich," and they said yes. Like this morning, she was like, "She said yes to everything." It's like, "God, it's working." Imagine that. Love it. Imagine doing a training, following the instructions, and it actually working. Jimmy Lea: Yeah. Gotta David Boyes: love that. It really is the aha moment too, right? Tonnika Haynes: Yeah. David Boyes: You're, you're going through, you're driving consistency. You have, you know, some form of flow and expectations, and you're learning from one another. I love the fact that- Mm-hmm ... they're listening at least to one side of each other's conversations- Right ... in real time. Tonnika Haynes: I David Boyes: think I'm lucky Tonnika Haynes: with that- And then getting to populate from that ... with my team. David Boyes: Yeah. Tonnika Haynes: I think I'm lucky with my, 'cause they're, they're not in competition, and, um, it's like how do you keep them... I don't know. God blessed me with that, but I'm just lucky that way. But encouraging each other- So. Jimmy Lea: It's good. That's good, Tanika. You, you've set up a solid culture there, solid people. They've got great results. You're listening to the phone calls. Consistency, like David's talking about. You know, um, hearing one side of the conversation helps a little bit, but if you, if you, as an owner, if you're only listening to half the conversation and you are not booked up three, four, five, six, seven, eight days in advance, chances are you're missing the other half of the conversation, and you need to listen to it. So you do need a device, a program, a, a hardware. You need a, a phone system that allows you to listen to all sides- Mm-hmm ... of the conversation. You've g- just gotta be able to do that. You gotta be able to do that. Now I'm gonna give another shout-out here as we work in our marketing. So a lot of times I hear shops talking about their marketing. "Well, my marketing's not working. I'm not... It's not working. It's not working." A lot of times it comes back to the phone call. Mm-hmm. How well is the phone call being handled or treated from an advisor? But speaking to the marketing part, we've got a shout-out here for the institute is holding a marketing intensive this October 26, 27, 28. Tanika, I just got off the phone with Brett Faidley. He is signed up. He is coming out for Mars Conference, so if you wanna get signed up as well, sister, we'd love to have you out here. Tonnika Haynes: I gotta get a real flashy jacket for that one. Jimmy Lea: Uh-huh. Tonnika Haynes: Pull out my Jimmy Lea: rhinestones. Right behind that Mars Conference. So if you got your smartphone there in front of you, grab out your smartphone, turn on your camera. There's the QR code right there. Oh, man. Flash the QR code and get registered. The, the, uh, the Mars Conference is going to be awesome. It is a conference where when you are done with the workshops, it's a three-day conference. When you're done with that three-day conference, you have 2027 mapped out, ready to go, and you know what you're gonna be doing month to month throughout that whole next year. It's super awesome. I, I love the Mars Conference. David Boyes: I do too. So Jimmy Lea: come- David Boyes: I was at the last one. Excited to be there. I'm, let me just say I was there as a participant at the last Mars Conference. Tonnika Haynes: Mm-hmm. David Boyes: And, uh, one, getting to, you know, to interact with so many, uh, friends across the industry was great, but also, uh, you know, I, I, I don't own a shop. I own a, uh, communication business. I took so much away from that that I immediately applied. I can speak from my own experience. Uh, and I know, uh, you know, many of the participants there that took those components right back to their shop and made immediate changes. So it is, uh, it's not just a, um, it's not just a workshop where you're gonna come away with a flashy workbook and put that in a dusty cabinet somewhere and never do anything with it. I promise you, you attend the Mars Conference, and, uh, you will come away energized and ready to make a real difference in your shop Jimmy Lea: Yep, for sure. For sure. Tonnika Haynes: All right. Like I s- I'm never gonna be at work if I keep coming, following you around, Jimmy. David Boyes: Just imagine your wardrobe, though. Tonnika Haynes: Oh, I know. It'd be so good. Jimmy Lea: It'd be so good. Tonnika Haynes: But no, we'll see. I, I'm thinking about that. I thought about what we talked about the other day, but we're not gonna get off subject 'cause I do that a lot. David Boyes: It can happen. Jimmy Lea: Yeah. David, what else? What else can we talk about with phones, phone systems, programs? Um, can we track our marketing using your phone system? David Boyes: Yeah. Uh, just on that very note, you know, the, uh, uh, we'll talk about this a little bit this year at Mars as well, but, you know, market tracking is important, right? We, we spend a lot of money, and understanding the performance, uh, is important. So with our phone system, you know, we can provide, uh, market tracking numbers if you have different campaigns, mailers, text messaging, website, uh, related, uh, leads that you're generating. Um, we can certainly provide unique numbers. The customer experience is the same, and the, um, you know, the shop experience is the same, except you have all of this additional data about, you know, how many calls were generated. So that's important to know, and, uh, it's also important to, uh, use that as a, you know, a good baseline of information about your capacity to manage phone calls in your shop. So when we look at some of the, uh, the other performance metrics, how long does it take us to answer the phone? Are we answering the phone, right? Jimmy Lea: Mm. David Boyes: In order to ask somebody for the appointment, we have to first answer the phone. Uh, and if you're spending this money on marketing campaigns, there are a variety of reasons, and I'll just tell you one example that I hear often from owners is, you know, they put out a marketing number and they, you know, advisors, uh, might believe that it's, you know, it's generating bad leads, something like that, so they won't answer that phone. Um, but we wanna, we wanna understand, uh, the behavior of what's going on. Is it something that we can control? Um, are, are we effective in the marketing campaign? What information do I have around that? And then additionally, uh, running that into the call analysis, uh, so that we understand are we, are we converting these, right? If we're generating the leads, are we actually generating appointments? And then, uh, from that point, if you know you have the appointment, you can measure your performance, uh, go forward. So there's a lot of data that we can capture, um, other than just sending in all of these phone calls to the main number. Jimmy Lea: I love it. David Boyes: Mm-hmm. Jimmy Lea: I love it. I love the, the phone is such a powerful tool. I love when we can multitask that tool and do multiple things with the, the same tool. Very cool. Very cool. But i- if there a- any questions, comments, concerns from our audience, we would love for you to type those in. If there's questions for David or questions for Tamika, go ahead and type those into the comments section. While they're doing that, I will say if you are trying to keep up with me, good luck. But you can find it on our website. The website page is, uh, wearetheinstitute.com/events. That's all of the events that are coming up here in the very near future where you will see the institute participating and locking arms with the industry to help elevate the industry. Our motto, our mantra is, better business, better life, better industry. We're gonna lock arms with you as a shop owner so that you have a better business. The net result of you having a better business is that you have a better life. Tonnika Haynes: Mm-hmm. Jimmy Lea: And not just you have a better life, your advisors have a better life, your technicians have a better life. Your, uh, your partners have a better life. Your spouse Your advisors' significant others, their spouses, uh, their, their technicians and their spouses, the, and their children. Everyone elevates, everyone breathes better, everyone sees a bluer sky and greener grass when we have a better business, a better life, and our commitment is that we will help this become a better industry. Looks like there's a couple of comments that did come through. Oh, no, that's Raleigh posting out the webpage for the events. Yeah. Uh, super awesome. Super awesome. Uh, last final thoughts, final ideas. David, we'll start with you. Tanika, then to you. Yeah. That we can help this industry grow. David Boyes: Tanika, thank you for joining today and, and sharing your experience. It's super valuable for, for me as a provider to our industry that, uh, we understand how we're driving impact. So thank you again for that. Thank you for your trust and support. For the, uh, the audience, uh, Call Inbound is our company, callinbound.com. Uh, we provide communication services, uh, call tracking information, uh, advisor call handling performance metrics, and AI call analysis. But above all, we're part of the industry, right? So, uh, I got my start with, uh, with the institute in a 20 group. Got, you know, very ingrained in the industry, uh, while I was building my company. And, um, you know, I'm proud to say that I'm part of the, uh, not just the automotive aftermarket, but the, the service repair industry. Thank you, Tonnika Haynes: gentlemen. I wanna make, make sure you know that I appreciate your company. Um, I don't know how many employees you have, but it seems like they're all just sitting in the same room waiting to help. I can send an email and I get a response so quickly, and it's always been consistent great service, so I do appreciate that. And, uh, anybody that's on the fence, whether you, you know, I'm like, "I don't wanna listen to phone calls, that's just another thing for me to need to..." Do it. Listen to the phone calls. Start with yourself. Start with yourself as the owner. I always say start, start with yourself. I always assume that I'm the problem, then I can work from there. Listen to your phone calls, and if you think you're good and then you listen to them, you realize how bad you are, think about how bad your team is if you're not coaching them. So get them in coaching call services or what- whatever. Listen to the phone calls. Get everything in order. And not only will you make better sales and better connections, more appointments, but I really truly believe that it could save you a lot of heartache. Yeah, they record bad calls, too. Bad calls from the other end that you're, you know, that you need, I hate to say for court, but anything. It's like, "Hey, sir, we've got that call recorded and that didn't go quite the way you're saying it's gonna go." So that's another part to it that could, that could be very important in your shop. We call that David Boyes: the replay booth. Tonnika Haynes: Yeah. Jimmy Lea: Yeah. Yeah. David Boyes: We'll take that to the replay booth. Tonnika Haynes: Yeah. Jimmy Lea: It, it, it's an important to CYA. Exactly. You gotta cover your own behind. Tonnika Haynes: There's a great... That's a great tool for that. Jimmy Lea: Yep. Yep. Yep, for sure. Well, with that, thank you very much. David, thank you for being here. Taneka, thank you very much for being here. Tonnika Haynes: Any Jimmy Lea: time. Look forward to seeing both of you very soon at our next conference, and to give you a big hug and say hello. Uh, bring your best jackets, David. Say Tonnika Haynes: less. Gotcha. Say less. Back in the David Boyes: studio. Jimmy Lea: Yes, yes. Very much looking forward to working with all of you in the very near future. And for everyone that is listening, thank you so much for joining us today as we talk about building a better business, a better life, and a better industry. My name is Jimmie Lee. I'm with the Institute for Automotive Business Excellence, and we're here to lock arms with you and make a difference. Click on it. Come find us. We're here to help. How can we help you? Let's make a difference. Talk to you soon.
Ep 173: How to Upskill Leadership Skills in the AI Era with Jacki Lutz
Are You Running Your Shop… Or Is It Running You? | Darin Johnson - Ep 37
You shouldn't have to play detective just to figure out what's happening in your own shop. 😂 If you're ready for all your shop's information in one place, check out Tekmetric HEREConsistency is key - heard that! But, consistency is HARD. That's why I gave up on trying and let the experts handle it. Detect Auto. Let them clean up your estimating process and raise your ARO - like they did for me! CLICK HERE TO BOOK A DEMORunning an auto repair shop is one thing—but what happens when the shop starts running you? In this episode, Tonnika Haynes sits down with Darin Johnson, a one-man shop owner from Great Bend, Kansas, who admits he's working seven days a week, struggles to tell customers no, and hasn't taken a real vacation since 2018. They get into the difficult transition from technician to business owner, why coaching and industry connections have changed Darin's approach, and how raising his labor rate didn't create the customer revolt he feared. Tonnika also gets fired up about boundaries, last-minute customers, “free” tire pressure checks, and why serving your community doesn't mean allowing customers to control your schedule. Darin is heading to ASTA with a mission: build his network, learn how to step away from the shop, find help, and finally create a business that gives him a life outside the bays.Timestamps:00:00 Cold open: “It’s gonna be on one more day”00:19 Downshift intro00:38 Darin still has a FLIP PHONE?!02:10 Meet Darin: Running a one-man repair shop in Kansas02:44 How he accidentally became a shop owner04:27 From hot rods to 25 years in automotive05:39 Does Darin really want to stay a one-man operation?07:06 Heading to ASTA for the first time07:40 Why Darin LEFT his first training event early08:39 Coaching struggles: Knowing what to do vs. actually doing it09:55 The real reason Darin is coming to ASTA10:16 Shop ownership can feel like you’re on an island13:08 Working seven days a week & being married to the shop14:20 The people-pleasing problem15:03 Customers asking about cars at dinner and the grocery store16:27 What happens when the shop becomes your only hobby?20:26 Feeling guilty for taking time away20:57 “Schedule your hats”—including downtime22:59 Darin’s five-year plan: Train someone to replace him23:38 His last REAL vacation was in 201824:34 Open-heart surgery changed how Darin viewed the business25:21 Becoming an owner instead of just a technician28:06 Why 15–20 cars are constantly sitting at the shop28:34 The work Darin has finally started saying NO to30:49 Bringing an accountability partner to training32:42 Why a few unhappy customers can ruin your mindset33:58 Should you just FIRE the worst 5% of your customers?38:02 Tonnika gives Darin his official ASTA assignment40:40 Finding your automotive family42:39 Why Tonnika recommends coaching43:57 Coaching’s impact on Darin’s mindset and mental health45:01 “I wish I would’ve done this 10 years ago”46:04 Why shops that don’t train get left behind46:58 Darin now has the highest labor rate in town47:34 Tonnika’s $12 lawnmower tire era 😂49:00 Learning how to say NO without losing customers49:12 Scheduling your different “hats” as an owner51:10 Customers don’t control your schedule51:44 “It’s been on for two weeks? It can wait another day.”53:05 Your six-month-old check engine light isn’t suddenly my emergency53:50 How “real quick” jobs steal HOURS from your day54:52 Why Tonnika refuses to just throw air in a tire55:32 “My air isn’t free!”56:23 The right way to say no: Give customers another option57:45 Darin’s ASTA challenge & what’s coming in Part 2