Ep 141: Why You Should Give a $#!+” with Frank Ziede
With Frank Ziede
Now playing — The Limitless Leadership Podcast
About this episode
In this episode, Josh Parnell is joined by Frank Ziede, professional facilitator and author. Frank shares insights from his 25 years of experience training leaders…
Key takeaways
- —Leadership requires courage and selflessness.
- —Connection before content is essential for effective learning.
- —Empathy and kindness can help transform disengaged participants into active learners.
- —Disengaged employees can lead to significant revenue loss for businesses.
- —Servant leadership focuses on supporting and uplifting team members to achieve their potential.
Frequently asked
- What is the importance of mindset in leadership?
- Mindset is crucial as it shapes how leaders approach challenges and engage with their teams. A positive mindset fosters connection and encourages team members to thrive.
- How can leaders effectively engage disengaged employees?
- Leaders can engage disengaged employees by showing empathy, creating a supportive environment, and fostering open communication to understand their challenges.
- What does servant leadership entail?
- Servant leadership involves prioritizing the needs of team members, supporting their growth, and creating an environment where they feel valued and empowered.
▸Full transcript
tip about here's what facilitation is, and the very first one was lecture is not learning. Yeah, leadership is exhausting, leadership is selfless, and leadership is lonely. You're listening to the Limitless Leadership Podcast, the podcast designed to help automotive repair shops learn how to lead, coach, train, and manage their team better by sharing proven techniques and thought-provoking interviews from industry leaders. Are you ready to transform your leadership skills by tapping into unrecognized potential to achieve limitless results?
Let's get ready for liftoff. It's time to go from great to greater. Here's today's episode. All right everyone, welcome back to another episode of the Limitless Leadership Podcast. As you know, before we get started, uh, like, click, comment, share, all do all the things you need to on social media to help this podcast impact people and build leaders. And I'm joined by another leader today, a friend of mine, new friend of mine.
Our guest today is a professional facilitator for a number of brands. He's going to share all those brands with us. Our guest is Mr. Frank Zitti. Frank, thanks for being here. It's an absolute pleasure to be here. Thank you to you and thank you for your audience to taking the time to listen to two dudes talk. Yeah, well, hey, man, we— that's, that's what we do on this show.
And so that's what we're going to be doing. For the majority of this episode. But first, you're gonna be the first dude to be talking because I'm gonna ask you to share who you are, what you do, and how you do it. So the floor is yours, my friend. This episode is brought to you by Limitless Leadership, because great teams don't happen by accident, they're led on purpose.
If you're tired of wearing all the hats, putting out fires, and wondering why your team won't step up, Limitless Leadership is for you. They help leaders transition from player to coach who develop people and multiply impact. Through in-person or online leadership training like the Limitless Leadership Blueprint or their Roots to Results coaching method, their services are designed to help you tap into unrecognized potential to achieve limitless results and help you create safety and trust in order to provide clarity and direction.
So if you're ready to stop managing chaos and start leading with purpose, head to limitlessleadership.co to book a complimentary discovery call today. Yeah, so my name is Frank Zitti. If my last name seems hard to pronounce, just think of the baked pasta, baked ziti. I've been a professional facilitator and trainer for almost the last, man, 25 years. And I've worked for brands like BMW, Mini, Jaguar, Land Rover, Honda, Kia, Acura, Nissan, Lexus, and Rivian, and Polestar, and Tesla.
And you name an automotive brand, I probably dealt with them in some capacity as a professional trainer. And that's training their sales and their service staff and technicians. On really how to, how to be nice people, how to, there's a, there's a skill set that we train on the sales process, service process, technicians diagnosing problems, all those things. But there's a mindset and the mindset stuff is what I've been graciously blessed to be able to work on.
I, I did some tech conversation like product knowledge and those types of things about how cars work and technology early on in my career. But most automotive manufacturers started to bring up the regional product trainer role. And so there wasn't a need for us to know every switch and dial. But the big need that we found, especially after COVID, was, is this workforce keeps coming in, and we need to work on soft skills, which are, you know, real— and they're anything but that, right?
These are the really engaging emotional skills that people need to be successful in business. So, but then I branched out probably in the last 10 years more to leadership, customer experience, employee experience, work for brands like Amtrak and Northrop Grumman and Coach and Sub-Zero Wolf Cove. So beyond the automotive industry, just into industry. And I love what I do every single day.
I didn't know what a facilitator was. My mentor found me like, I like I said, over 20 years ago in a hallway after 2 days of a facilitation boot camp. And he was like, "I have a job for you for the rest of your life. If you listen to me and follow my instructions, you'll have to turn down work." And I called him 2 days later and I was like, "Okay, what do I do?"
And yeah, it's been a pretty amazing journey. So I'm now an author. I have a book coming out this summer. I do a ton of work on LinkedIn, but my key thing is just trying to make the world a better place. For employees, for customers, for leaders. Why, why not? Why not work on that? Hey man, I feel like that's the way it should be.
You know, a lot of what you just shared falls in line with the connection side of things, but unfortunately, a lot of leaders are very focused on the content side of things. And I believe that it's connection before content. It's the name before the job title. It's people before process, people before profit. So being able to focus on the connection before the content and furthermore, dig into the leadership mindset.
I think that's important. Whether you're doing leadership coaching, whether you're doing cryptocurrency trading coaching, you're doing underwater basket weaving coaching, it starts with mindset. A lot of what we do, uh, you know, a lot of us, we're, we're operating under limiting beliefs. These are perceived limitations that we're operating under. So mindset is, is incredibly important. I'm curious, um, what does it look like from a, from a facilitator standpoint, for you to dig into mindset before you get into any of the content, any of the product knowledge, any of the car stuff, if you will?
Like, what does it look like for you, uh, from a facilitator standpoint to get into mindset and connection and all those good things that you and I both know and love? Oh, one of the big things is you have to make sure that your group of participants is actually participating. So people come into a training, they come into an event. I saw that you've done speaking things and, you know, if they get there, I've just launched this thing called Facilitation Fridays where every Friday I'm coming out with a 60-second tip about here's what facilitation is.
And the very first one was lecture is not learning. You know, telling is not teaching. It's, it's, it's useful for some people, but if you look at the overwhelming amount of scientific research and evidence, experiential learning is the best type of learning. You know, never do for a participant what they could and should do for themselves. So getting them in the sandbox, getting them engaged is at the heart of real learning.
It's what we do with children. I was thinking the exact same thing. Yeah. Yeah. My wife and I have 4 kids and as you're sharing that, I'm like, yeah, that's like, that's the way we try to teach our kids as well. Yeah. And people are like, well, they're adults now, you know, they're 40 years old. They should be able to sit there and, you know, listen to you for 8 hours.
No, they shouldn't. They can't. The human brain is not built that way. So I, Typically the courses I run are 3-day events and it's from, you know, 8:30 to 4 in the afternoon. So we've got a, we've got 6 shots, 6 opportunities, morning and, you know, AM, PM, AM, PM, AM, PM. And you typically around 3 hours in each one of those blocks.
That first 3 hours on that first day is really trying to put them into a ton of questions, a ton of research and data, and they analyze it, they unpack it, and we just ask a bunch of questions. Why does any of this matter? One of my first questions, one of my first modules is why are we even talking about emotion? We're in the car business.
What the hell does this matter? Why? Right. Just move the metal, sell the cars, fix the car. Your car broke. I fix. You, you take, you leave, you give money. I call it the caveman mentality. Yeah. Right. And, and it, what, what I'm, what I'm reassured by is there's always about half the group. It was like, oh no, no, no, no. The emotion matters.
And here, and I will tell me why. Yeah. And so instead of me coming at them, just saying, you know, this is why I'm really, really big on not being the expert. Because being the expert sort of makes people feel like they're not, and therefore they're not allowed to speak up or question your authority. So that's why you say facilitator. I'm just as a guide.
I'm here. I'm your Sherpa through this conversation. And here's a bunch of questions. Tell me what you think. And great facilitation is when they start to teach you the content that you want taught. Yeah, man, Frank, you just shared a lot of amazing things that I 100% believe in. It's funny because just this week on two separate conversations I had, I, for whatever reason, this, the topic of expert came up and I shared with them, like, I don't, I don't view myself as a leadership expert even though I do leadership coaching, training, and speaking.
I don't do, I'm not a leadership expert because I always think like a rookie and I have a long way to go and a long way to grow and I'm committed to being a lifelong learner. But I like how you broke it down where it's like if I call myself the expert, that might subconsciously make them feel like they're not. And the reality is what you described in terms of facilitation is the same way coaching really could and should be, which is asking a lot of questions and helping potentially shift perspective if necessary.
Because with perspective, the way that we view things and drives the way we do things. Here's a perspective that I wanna share with you, and I, I know you'd appreciate this as a facilitator. As a facilitator myself, what I often say is that there are 3 different types of training attendees that I see. Which is the vacationer, the hostage, and the sponge.
And you already know, like, who these are. The vacationer is the one who— they're there, like, they were told to be there, but they're there. They're, you know, they're out of their environment. They might take notes, they may not take notes. They're just kind of, you know, like, they're okay, right? Yeah. The hostage are the ones who are sitting back, arms crossed.
They're there because they were forced to be there. They don't want to be there. I mean, just absolutely not gonna be taking notes. And of course, we all know what the sponge is. And I love, as a facilitator, I love nothing more than being able to convert the hostages and the, and the, the vacationers to the sponges. I, I'm sure, and, and just in the short time that you and I have, have been chatting, I know that you are really good at this.
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Now back to today's episode. Real quick, I did a podcast earlier this week with a guy named Jeff and it's gonna come out in a month or whatever, but he, He said the line, this is the best mandatory training I've ever been to. And that's like, that's kind of what you said you want to hear, right? That's the best, best thing you can get.
Yeah. I would say number one, I've come to realize now after doing this for so long, there are some hostages you cannot save. And those, those are people who it's got nothing to do with you. They are, they are steeped in, they're steeped in trauma. They, they don't know what that, you know, and I don't think they're intentionally trying to target you.
They just, their job sucks or their leader sucks or their marriage sucks and they got to be here for several days and their fear and uncertainty is just manifesting itself in your direction. So I, I, I try not to get focused in on that. I remember one time I had, I was in New York, Manhattan, doing a training for I think it was Acura.
And there was this big burly guy. I'm in New York and he's like straight out of, you know, Hoboken, like Brooklyn. And he is just hitting me with heckles as best he can. What about that? That's not the— I don't know about that. That one's not going to work. So one of the best pieces of advice I ever got from one of my— obviously the guy I was talking about earlier, Dave, my mentor who found me.
He said, remember, Nobody has an agenda that says when the breaks are. So take a break, right? There's onstage and offstage conversation. Yeah. So take a break, go to the sidelines. Don't ever do some confrontation about, you know, crucial confrontation or conversation about some sort of activity. So I did, I took a break and then I, it was like near lunch and I sort of got in this area and I was like, I came with empathy and I was like, hey, are you, are are you good?
And he was like, oh yeah, nothing to worry about. I'm just busting your chops. It's what we do here. And what I realized was it was just the region. It's just East Coast. And training in Texas is different. Training California is different. But I think this, this conversation back to when you talked about the hostage in those ways, uh, I've never ever found that empathy or kindness was not going to work with somebody when it was truly genuine.
Yeah, that's so good. I had some, I had a person in December, a class for BMW, and this guy was on his phone. 80% of the class, midst of modules, just on his phone. And I kind of let it go for the first day. And I came around middle of the second day because we're at the halfway point of the class. And I just took a knee right next to him at the table.
It's a flip chart activity. Everybody at his table's at the flip chart. He's still sitting at his table on his phone. And I said, hey, I'm just, I'm just checking in with you. It seems like you've got a lot going on. Is everything okay? Turns out the guy, besides selling cars, also has a carpet business and his entire shipping container of, you know, carpets or rugs was held up at the port in New York.
And he just, it was his, his next, you know, 6 months of income. Yeah. And I, I had to just have empathy in that moment and say, I get you. If you need to step out, you do what you need to do. I'm sorry that this is happening to you. Yeah. You know, and, and he, he did come around a little bit, but not as much as any of us would like.
But I think the sponge also can help the hostage. I think if you get the sponge to go participant-driven learning with other participants and engagement, They'll hear it better from them than, than, than from me. I could not agree more. The more the sponges drive the class in, in the way that we, that we want them to. Yeah. The more the vacationers become the sponges and the hostage slowly start turning into the vacationers and eventually they become the sponges.
And by the end of the 3 days, they're going to say, Frank, this is the best mandatory training I've ever been at. Shout out to Jeff. Yeah. Yeah. Um, well, so you mentioned, uh, Facilitator Fridays. Uh, you and I connected on LinkedIn. Uh, well, we're connected on LinkedIn, but we connected actually through a mutual friend, Chris Craig, uh, also in the, in the industry.
Um, so I'm gonna check out the Facilitator Fridays. Uh, I'll be, be sure to check that out. I'm encouraging all of our listening audience to check out Facilitator Fridays. If you are listening to this episode, you can also find this episode on YouTube at The Bearded Leader is where you can watch this episode. You'll see behind Frank, he's got a Lakers sign, so he's a, he's a Lakers fan.
I don't know whether or not to apologize or not, but hey, I will say, I mean, with Luka being there, they're, they're looking pretty good. I mean, LeBron's still playing at a high level and the Lakers might have a good shot in the West this year. I'm going to throw that out there to you. Every time I talk about the Lakers in class, some, you know, and somebody gives me a little bit of, you know, grief about them.
I was like, well, listen, if you don't like the Lakers, you just don't like winners. I don't know what to tell you. Yeah. You know, but unless the only person who gets to complain is a Boston Celtics fan. Okay. They're the only team that's better than them. Yeah. And I hate the Celtics to death. Yeah. But they have the most NBA championships in history, right?
For a reason. Yeah. It's because they're winners. They're full of leaders. And speaking of leaders, this is a leadership podcast. Yes. I'll ask you, Frank, that's my way of segueing. I'll ask you, what does leadership mean to you? Well, there was, I'll give you, I've been working incredibly, come, you know, a lot of complex detail, crunching the numbers, putting in the research and data, and I found this 3-step plan for what makes a great leader.
Step 1, build trust. Step 2, build trust. Step 3, build trust. Common theme here. I remember I learned that joke, per se, from the Steinway Piano Company. Okay. The head of their company was interviewed, and this is a video we showed at BMW a long time ago, training sales staff. And this guy had a very thick Austrian accent. He's like, here at Steinway, we're very good.
We're focused in, but we have 3 plans, 3 steps. Number 1, make friends. Number 2, make friends. Number 3, make friends. And it stuck with me that we don't have to overcomplicate this idea of what's it about. Because man, if I read another one of these leadership books and it gives me another model or another XY axis grid, It's just those 5 letters, T-R-U-S-T, it's trust.
But I think what, so the other thing I would add to that is courage. Okay. So leadership requires courage. And if you are courageous, you will earn trust. Yeah. That, I don't want to overcomplicate it. If I'm your, if I'm your leader, your manager, and there is something coming our way, I need to be courageous to step up and say, I've got people covered.
We can do this. We can handle this. Here comes a drought, or here comes tariffs, or here comes, you know, we're going to lose some people, right? There's, I can't think of the company name, but there was a story in Simon Sinek's Leaders Eat Last book where the company wanted to cut back, you know, money. They were just losing money and they had to do some cutbacks.
But the manager was like, no, we're not going to fire anybody. And they went to the team and there were people who had PTO days that they were not going to use and they gave them to employees as a gift. And, and everybody, everybody collectively took a little bit of a pay cut to keep the team together. Mm-hmm. Charlie Kim from Next Jump, he has a lifetime hiring policy where if you hire an employee, they have a job for life unless they do anything morally or legally or ethically wrong.
And if you decide to leave the company, they'll help you find your next job. Okay. Uh, Zappos offers, I think it's something like $2,000 to someone to quit the job after one year of being there. Yeah. All of that is courage. You know, you're going to have so many people be like, you're an idiot. Everybody's going to do the job and then take the 2 grand.
But if you look at the cost of turnover, it is exponentially 10 times as much if you're going to lose it, that person stays and they're terrible, or if they leave at a crucial point in time. That's right. So I don't, I don't know how else to say it. I need you to be courageous. You're the person. With the shield out in front slaying the dragon.
And that's because you're the leader. You don't want that job? Give it to somebody else. I've met many people who don't want to be the leader, and I'm okay with that. They're like, it's not that I don't want to be the manager. That's not the position I want. I want to just be frontline. I want to be a tech or I want to be a salesperson.
Just, and, and that's, I think that's actually great self-awareness. So courage is the, is the road to trust. That's my, that's my definition. What about you? Great question. I mean, ultimately I believe in, in the opportunity that we get to tap into unrecognized potential to achieve limitless results. And as leaders, we are pulling that out of somebody. So if I'm leading you, Frank, you may not see what I see in you in terms of potential.
Um, I believe that you are capable, competent, and confident, but maybe you're not always confident in your abilities like I am, or you're not confident about where you could be going. Where, where I see you being able to, to, to end up. And so my job as a leader is to serve you. It's a servant leadership style approach where I'm asking a lot of questions.
I'm supporting, serving, coaching, training, managing you, leading you in a way where I'm pulling something out of you that you never saw in yourself. It truly is this Believe sign behind me from Ted Lasso. You and I were talking about it right before we went live, and the four words that, uh, unfortunately some people have never heard in their life is, I believe in you.
Man, all it takes is one. And if I can be that one leader to believe in that person so they can believe in themselves, incredible things can happen. I mean, there's so many people that have been in trainings that I can see have zero confidence. Yeah. They, I did an activity one time having people trying to figure out their purpose in life.
And this guy was almost in tears saying, I think I've just realized my father never told me he loved me. Wow. You know, so it's— Give me goosebumps just now. Well, I mean, it's like, and you just said what I'm big about, servant leadership. And then I try to talk to all these staff and I say, the best definition you can have as an employee is a servant's heart with attention to detail.
I think that's the combo. But I have so many specifically young men who are like, I don't serve anyone. And I've often said to them, I said, hey, instead of saying, hey, welcome, how can I help you? Maybe we could say, hey, how can we serve you today? Page right out of the Chick-fil-A book. They, they are viscerally against saying that. They feel like they're less than the customer if they're saying that word, just one word.
And I was like, well, and I don't know, I was going to ask you this. Are you a veteran? I'm a veteran. Yep. Yeah. You just got the look. I'm just going to put it out there. You've got the tats and the, you know, you're fit, but is it, why is it not? Why is it negative? But then when we say to a veteran, thank you for your service.
Mm. Right. Great point. Why, why is that? Oh, great. Cause it is, but why can't you say I can be of service? Yeah. And so I think there's a question. I think there's ego. I think ego is just there and there's a lot of people who've been hurt. They're at the natural defense mechanism, all that stuff, but we gotta let that go to start even as an employee to be serving others.
So that when we get to leadership, we're ready to do it. I think you just said a key word too. It's ego, which might be the opposite of humility. I mean, when I'm thinking about how we connect with people, we connect, in my opinion, through authenticity, humility, and vulnerability. And there's a famous quote from, I believe, C.S. Lewis. He said, humility is not thinking less of yourself, it's thinking of yourself less.
So it doesn't mean that I'm gonna think less of myself if I'm serving others. This is a privilege. This is an opportunity. This is, um, a, a, a gift to be able to serve others. And you and I both know, Frank, the more you serve, like, like we don't, we don't get to give. Sorry, sorry. We don't, we don't give to get, but we get to give.
Like, we're not, we're not serving in order to receive. We're not giving to, to, to get something. But hey, man, it, it, it's gonna come back around in different ways. Yeah. You know, forms or fashion. But ultimately, Like, if I'm ever describing servant leadership to someone, I'm first starting with this concept of like what I was used to as a veteran in the Air Force.
I'm a veteran of the Air Force, and it was a— it was positional leadership. So you have, you have boss at the top and you have employee beneath boss. Well, let's change boss to leader, and we're gonna change employee to team member, and now we're gonna completely reverse the, uh, reverse them. So now, uh, uh, team member is on top and leader becomes servant leader because now as a servant leader, I am serving, supporting, guiding, influencing, investing in, pouring into this person.
Like, my job is to lead people because the people are now leading the processes. So that's why I, I like to say leadership is truly a full-time job. But I know that you know this, Frank. Like, there are people who you, who you work with and who you serve who are, uh, who are formal leaders, but they also have responsibilities, uh, of folks who they are leading.
So they could be selling, they could be doing workflow, they could be dispatching, they could be doing all kinds of things. Oh yeah. And they're formal leaders of all these team members as well. That's a tough spot to be in to be an effective leader. Yeah. Leadership is exhausting. Leadership is selfless and leadership is lonely. So sign up today. Are you excited?
Right? But the thing you have behind you there, the word legacy is, I think, the payoff. And legacy is a little bit of an illusion, right? This is, this little statue right here is Marcus Aurelius. You know, in a thousand years, none of anything we're talking about will matter. But we're in the present moment. And your legacy can be something that actually I think can be seen.
You can see an employee that you lift up, like you said, you raise them, that person can get married and have great kids and become a great leader to them, or they can start their own business. These are things that we, it's a bigger, higher goal. I think it's the best kept secret that if I'm selfless, so much comes back to me and it's authentically given to me instead of me trying to sell anything to anyone or, or, you know, gain anything from anyone.
Little side note, the 48 Laws of Power by Robert Greene. I hate the book. Hate the book. And, uh, I argue with people all the time. They're like, yeah, because there's one, I got to like law, I don't even know what it was, 37 or whatever. And it was take credit for other people's work. And I was like, no, no, that's not a law of power.
Now, if somebody was like, well, maybe it's what you should be aware of. Maybe you should be fearful that there are people who work like this. And I was like, well, then let's call it the 48 Cautionary Tales of Power. Okay. Because I'm not going to do that thing. I'm a selfless leader and I'm just focused on what ethically is right. But a quick story for you.
I was doing a big keynote for Amtrak, 300 people. I'm looking at the audience. I'm 80% through my time, maybe 90%. And I'm trying to come with the hard leadership pieces at the end, right? That, you know, fearless leadership is not a real thing. All leaders are afraid. That's why it requires courage. And there's a, I say this line that I learned from Gary Vee a long time ago, which was, you don't work for your employees.
I mean, sorry, your employees don't work for you. You work for them. Yeah. Right. They're on the front, they're on the front lines, not you. You're in the watchtower. Yeah. But that, that's your job is to serve them every single day, not the other way around. Left side of the, the, the ballroom, 3 tables in out of 6 table rows. I could still see him today.
Bunch of gray hair. Is that, that's always an indicator. That person right there, when I said that line, gave me this look. They said, and I'll, for your podcast listeners that don't have visual, guy's just shaking his head. Got a big old no, no, no, no look on his face. And it stuck with me. I was, I was frustrated. And then I realized he was a hostage.
And then I was like, I have to just keep moving because the other 99% of the people were with me at that point. Yeah. Yeah. But I think it's, you don't have to be just young to have ego to be about these things. You can be more mature and have a lot more life experience, but still be stuck in your ways. Like you said, of this is, you know, where we're going to be and that's how things are going to be.
You have to invert it. Yeah. I mean, I think, I think for a lot of people who believe that leadership equates to power and control, then they may not get the message that you and I are trying to convey. You mentioned the word legacy behind me. So this is a copy of my first book called Leading a Legacy. I'm, I'm about to release my second book called Blue to Black, which is, which dives into the concept that the sky is not actually the limit.
The sky is our launchpad. So we get to go from blue to like the blue skies to black, like rare air, deep space. You mentioned that you're writing a book. I'd love for you to share with our audience the title of your book, when it can be released, and where we can find it. So it's called The Lost Art of Giving a Shit, Why Caring About Customers Actually Pays Off.
It is not long. It's, you know, it's a sort of a training manual on how to care about what you do. And in the preface of the book, it says, I thought about calling this book The Lost Art of Caring or The Lost Art of Giving a Crap, but I don't think that has the gravity of what we're talking about here. There's a thing on the very first page in the book called The Big Idea in 3 Parts.
Part 1, according to Gallup, in 2024, there was $7.8 trillion with the T lost revenue due to, due to disengaged employees. About, about half a billion of that was in the United States alone. Point number 2, some of you don't give a shit. Some of you, what I just said, you don't give a shit. And point number 3, some of you are more upset than I said the word shit than the first thing I said.
And it's like, where are our priorities? We all want an employee who is engaged and motivated. And, you know, some leaders are like, if they could just be a better employee, I could be a better leader. It doesn't work that way. It doesn't work that way. And so it comes in 5 chapters, either you do or you don't give a shit, right?
You need to be honest with yourself. The second one, if you don't, figure out why. There's probably in my 20+ years of doing this, uh, you have some unresolved trauma. You have something like you said in the very beginning of this, you have a limiting belief that makes you feel like you're not good enough or nobody gave a shit about you. So as a result, why would you give a shit about anybody else?
And section 3 is how, uh, why to give a shit. So it's a whole bunch of empirical evidence and data, decades of research. The, the fourth section is how to give a shit with a thing called the Give a Shit Kit. And section 5 is, uh, people who do. So it's real life examples. I think about 9 or 10 stories, either from multi-million dollar companies or just one is my story about my wife, uh, examples of, of what this can look like.
And so it's a call to action. It, it's just many people I've read, uh, all these books by me. Well, not all, there's 2 or 3 that haven't, very small ones. But a couple of these I've really read back to like Start with Why from Simon Sinek, New York Times bestselling book, right? Let's figure out your cause and effect, your why. What I've experienced now after doing trainings with probably over 10,000 people, I can't get you to dive into those deep psychological concepts until you can either admit to me that you do or you don't give a shit about the job you do.
And that's it. Let's start there. Yeah. Because I found there are many, there are some people who are hostages, not in even a classroom setting, just in their own life. They're just like, no, I don't. I was like, okay, that, that, thank you for admitting that to me. Now let's talk about why, why don't you? Because you should. There are holistic, you know, psychological, financial, spiritual benefits to actually caring about what you do every single day.
Living a life with purpose. I know it sounds corny, but just because something's corny doesn't mean it isn't true. Right? So why, what is holding you back? Yeah. And so that's, that's what it's about. Um, I, when's it coming out? Prop, right around summer. I'm sometime probably in May. Okay. Excellent. So, yeah. Um, well, great. So, um, you know, you, you mentioned something that's really important.
So $7.8 trillion in lost revenue because of disengagement. And I love that you touched on this and here's why. What we know is that, and in fact, according to Gallup as well, 77% of team members are disengaged at work. And, and they're disengaged 'cause they don't feel seen, they don't feel heard, they don't feel valued, understood, respected, cared for, loved, all the above, right?
So what we know, and you and I, I think we, hopefully you agree with this, Frank, like connection creates engagement and engagement increases performance. So if we wanna increase performance, let's shift our focus from the KPIs and the sales, which by the way are important. I don't wanna make it sound like they're not important. We're, We're, we're gonna, we're gonna study and, and train on the sales processes, but let's shift our focus from the KPIs and the numbers to the people and make the connection with the people to create engagement.
Because conversely speaking, 80% of people will tell you they're fully engaged when they receive meaningful feedback at least once per week. And that can be in the form of a quick 5-minute conversation. So I, I love that you're releasing this book. I'm absolutely gonna be on the lookout for it. I can't wait to get a copy in my Uh, I will send you a copy.
Come on. Of course. Thank you, my friend. And I'll send you a copy of Brutal Black as well. And, uh, before we go, I do want to ask you the second question I ask every guest on every episode, which is, Frank, what is the best advice you've ever received from a coach or a mentor? I thought you just told me. I, I mean, the best advice.
Uh, I'm sorry to hesitate, but it's a really good question. And I've heard so many different things for so long. I think it's an amalgamation of 2 or 3 different mentors kind of saying the same thing in different ways, which was, it's not about you. And I have suffered from imposter syndrome, like many people. I will probably today at 3 in the afternoon, my typical regular imposter syndrome appointment..
And I've had, you know, people get frustrated with me or something goes wrong, or I feel like I've made a mistake and this and that. And wise people who I trust very much and I know love me have come to me and said, hey, this is not about you. Yeah, you, you're fine. Keep doing what you're doing. Be your authentic and genuine self.
This is something else. And because man, even the littlest sort of thing, the little bit of destructive feedback or a little bit of what I felt was, you know, somebody thinking less of me, I would ponder on it for weeks. It would still come back in flashbacks. You know why? Because you give a shit. That's why. And there's, there's, there's a section in the book about not giving a shit, uh, not giving too much of a shit about the wrong thing.
Uh, you know, you, you like, you need to focus it in. But yeah, I think that was the best piece of advice. Like now when something happens around me or near me, not to me, I look at it and go, what evidence points to the fact that this has anything to actually do with me? None? Okay, then, then why are you thinking that?
And that is, it's been very, very helpful for me. Love that. Hey, we're about 150 episodes in and I just gave the audience an Easter egg because I never cuss on my podcast. And so, oh, I've realized that any, I'm going to, I'm going, I mean, I'm going to say that word a lot in my career now. Uh, but it's also, it's also letters and it's not letters.
It's a dollar sign. A hashtag, an exclamation mark, and a plus sign. And each one of those is a symbol that represents sort of the mindset of what we're doing. That's cool. Well, you know, what's interesting is I— so I was facilitating a training years ago, almost a decade ago, and had an attendee come in. He was a franchisee for an incredible organization.
And he was like, you know what, I just— I want my team members to have some gas. Yes, yes. I want them to give a shit. That's what he said. Right. Okay. I can get on board with that. So anyway, Frank, man, I really appreciate you being here. Really pumped for your book. Pumped for you. And Hey, Facilitator Fridays. If you're listening or watching this episode, be sure to tune in and check out Facilitator Fridays and Frank Zieti on LinkedIn, on Facebook, on Instagram.
Help the audience know where, where can we get in touch with you, Frank? Uh, I have a website for the first time in 22 years. I realized I need one of those. Uh, it's ftzinc.com. So it's me incorporated, ftzinc.com. Uh, you can find contact information there, but LinkedIn is where a lot of my con— I, I decided 3 years ago that that's where I was gonna pour my heart and soul into.
Yeah, and I do every day. I have an Instagram page, but that's only for filmmaking. And then I have a Facebook page, but that's really only for family stuff. So I don't put those things on there. But, you know, I'll share, I'll share this thing everywhere. But yeah, LinkedIn and my website are the two main areas of focus. Excellent. And you're killing it on LinkedIn, man.
I really appreciate what you do on LinkedIn and how you do it. And, and I enjoy watching and, you know, watching your videos that I have seen and then checking out the posts that you make. And I'll be sure to make sure that I'm I'll be sure to make sure I'll be tuning in on every Friday. I'll be sure to make sure.
Make sure. There you go. That's a lot of sure, sure, sure-ing happening. That's a t-shirt right there, man. Be sure to make sure, uh, otherwise you're not gonna be sure. That's right. All right. Hey man. Well, thanks again and thank you everyone for tuning into another episode of the Limitless Leadership Podcast. As you know, we look to tap into unrecognized potential to achieve limitless results.
So thanks again. Have a great day everyone. Don't forget to smile today. Tell your loved ones how much they mean to you. I'm Josh Parnell reminding you to keep leading well.
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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.
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