"From Turnover to Tenure: Mastering Advisor Retention in Auto Dealerships" w/ Rick Ulin Education Team Lead/ Lead Instructor NCM Kansas City

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Well, welcome back to another episode of the Fuel podcast here. I've got Rick Ulan with me. How you doing, brother? Doing good.

Thanks for having me. I appreciate you coming on. So, Rick, for the listeners, if you don't mind, just kind of give a little bit of background about yourself. Well, currently, I'm the education team lead, lead instructor at the NCM Institute in Kansas City.

But that's coming off of 36 years in retail at the dealership level. Started in the parts department back in the early days on roller skates, back before the OSHA era, back in the book era, pre-microfish, all that. worked my way through fixed ops and then transitioned into variable about halfway through my career ended up running dealerships at the end but always ran them through a fixed ops brain so passionate about the business and just enjoy this part of my career just giving back to it in the classroom awesome brother man well you know i'm interested in depicting your brain about something that's kind of started to develop a little bit more and a lot of conversations i've been having you know um when you're doing these training sessions and when you're out there and you're kind of working with people, how do we start to address the issue of turnover?

And not so much technician turnover. That's been a big issue and a topic we've gone into. But I would say we would maybe redirect that to advisor turnover. So is there anything you can add to that?

Yeah, just a huge issue. Three years in a row, it keeps shaving a few months off, just under two and a half years now, average turn on an advisor. It's down at the level of, well, unfortunately, salespeople on the showroom floor, which that has been a notorious turnover area. We haven't had that at the advisor level.

So what we're dealing with is new people coming into the business that really aren't trained in the disciplines. And it's showing up. It's showing up in the proficiency of what they can do on the drive, obviously. So how would we make - first off, let's assess the issue.

Like what would be contributing to advisor turnover? Well, I do think a lot of it is just lack of training disciplines. I think as dealerships over the years, and let's be honest, and I've been involved in them in the past, there's no set business manual where you walk in and it's like, here's your service department operations manual. Here's your service department accounting manual.

There's manuals that exist to some degree, but not specific to your store. and so you know they're built by the people that operate them and it's that uh and over time you know they just they lose some foundational elements and so people come into the business they have high aspirations but without good training and disciplines to learn how to do the job eventually i think they get frustrated and the job is stressful you know it's a stressful job so if the income doesn't match the stress level at some point it starts to get to the point where it's not worth it.

And I think that's what we see a lot of early, early exits. Um, and maybe, you know, maybe we're failing them a little bit there. Yeah, I'd have to agree. I mean, I remember coming in, you know, broad eyed, bushy tailed, you know, here's a DMS and here's some customers get after it.

And so it's the meat grinder of, of, of kind of getting through the mix. And I think we're all kind of accustomed to it in the automotive industry of, you know, figure it out, you know, as you, as you kind of go along, but I like you, you know, you're saying that we're kind of lacking in the process. So if we were working with a store, if we were working with some people and we said, you know, Hey, if you're going to start instituting a process of retaining advisors, really retaining advisors, you know, where would be the first step that you could take, you know, uh, uh, a service manager, or I would say, how can you start getting the general managers and things of those nature involved in the process as well?

Well, I mean, I think the big thing is always show me the money. So I think you do have to show them how the math works and how everybody's supposed to make the money in the process. There's plenty to go around if we're making the right margin on the labor and if people are selling at the right hours per RO. And I think that deficiency on the drive, you know, if we're losing RO count coming through the drive, which is another thing we can get to, you know, that's one thing.

But when we start losing our hours per row, that's where it really starts to stack up. And usually with that turnover, that's an automatic. You're just, the person walking in day one is not going to be as proficient as the person who exited that's been there several years. So typically, so that loss of production, everybody feels it.

And the technician feels it in the hours that they get to turn. And then, you know, that's what pays for everything. So we really have to tie it out and They have to understand as an advisor, they're a salesperson. I know the title says advisor.

It sounds great. Consultant sounds great. Writer sounds very sterile, but they're a salesperson and we need them to produce at a certain level. They have a requirement.

So giving them a true education day one of what the expectation is and how to set the bar is something that's just kind of missing. We need to get back to the basics there, I think. No, I love that. You know, I mean, in relating GM general managers back into fixed ops, sometimes they're a little, I wouldn't say intimidated, but they're just, you know, kind of a little displaced.

You know, I'm over here. You're over there. I got a guy for that. You know, I got a, I got a FOD.

I got a service manager that can handle that. But I think what you're hitting on is a good process. They can get more involved in to say how easy is the onboarding for new people? A lot of people have very complicated write processes of how they use documentation You got to seven different op codes to write up an engine concern and things of that nature So I mean from the from the service side I would say the easier you can make your process you know, as far as somebody who's never written service, you know, an easier process of writing up tickets and interpreting that.

But I would like to get your thoughts on, especially newer service writers, how much should they rely on what the technicians bring in them for recommendations? Well, they have an obligation. Let's put it that way. In other words, there's so much.

We look at it two ways. It's the advisor's responsibility during the write-up and the menu presentation, the walk-around process to get that mileage-based stuff, right? The 15K if it's due, the fuel induction service, a fuel transfer service, a brake fluid exchange, something to that nature. You know, if that stuff is due by time and mileage, that's the advisor's responsibility at write-up.

So we want technicians in the shop looking for repair opportunities, you know, looking at the strut leaks and the front timing cover reseals and the different opportunities that we find in the shop. And then we need to close 40% of that when it comes back. So if we get 40 hours of recommendation coming from my team, I need to close 16 hours of that as an advisor. That's what we say at the Institute, 40%.

So just tracking everybody, showing them what good is and what average is and what's benchmark and what's better than and what's world class and what do these numbers look like. and I think you know they don't even know these things and when you put it in that content and you show them like the number of opportunities on tires that roll through the drive you know what they should be selling with how many tires should be needed and how many you should be selling you can put the math together to prove that the job is very lucrative and all they need to learn is how to close those opportunities and how to seek those opportunities so you know it just goes back to educating the math and there's no book on it.

So each store's process on how they operate on the drive, right. Is going to like determine what their results are. Yeah. I mean, I think you hit it right on the head.

And I also think it kind of gets missed a little bit when we're, when we're putting goals out there and like, you know, again, and kind of putting the math behind it. A lot of times you'll say, Hey, we, you know, we got to sell a hundred alignments this month. Okay. So it seems like a pretty substantial number, but are we breaking it down for certain people?

You know, based on what you're doing, the opportunity that's being presented, I mean, we're really only looking at one more day. Can you find one more day? And I like the onboarding idea of the process when it's separated from what the technicians look at versus what the advisor looks at. So ease of being able to write up an RO, but also having a very easy process of training them.

Can you read history? You know, can you look at the history of the vehicle and just understand what they're due for based off of time and mileage? And again, you know, yeah, we're salespeople. We're going to sell features, benefits, and advantages of doing those services.

I would say you could go as far as pressing automotive maintenance for the vehicles because you got to drive on the same roads they do. So it's one of those things where I want your car, I'm advising you to be, you know, for this visit, you're here to be in top pristine, you know, but not also being afraid of hearing that word. No, I mean, as long as you're, you're asking for what they need that day and, um, and then kind of bring it to them. But I like what you're saying with the math, just break it down, you know, give, give it to them in realistic terms where they can kind of get their hands around it and kind of understand it, you know, at a, at an easier pace.

And so that substantial number we're looking at the high end. Yeah, I think sometimes advisors will, you know, I'm at 1.2 and this person next to me is at two hours per hour row. And I think it's because they can close the MPI hours coming out of the shop better.

That's my first thought is they're just better at closing those hours. but the reality is they're probably better at doing a walk around. They're probably better at doing a little pre-write work on the previous day for the work that they've got coming in. They're better at taking care of their special order business.

They're better at being a service consultant and doing all those tactical things that need to be done, all the status updates and all those things. And because of that, they sell more work. So it's more of really showing them that along the road to the sale and service, each part of that lends to your overall hours per hour. You know, good at this part, you're going to get a little bit of activity here.

You're going to get a little result here. And without those bits and pieces along the way, they just end up with an hour, 1.1 and they're just typical. And I think that that makes that job a stressful job.

They're never going to make the right money. You know, it's there to be made, but they never make it. And then that's the flash point, I think, when they give up. yeah they're not 100 um i think also something that's kind of misdirected is the tasks you have to do here's all the tasks you gotta do you gotta go get them right you gotta do your walk around you gotta do this you gotta do that you gotta follow up with this you gotta do the call in some cases during cashiering so i wouldn't say that it's so much looking at a task list as starting to allocate time you know understanding the allocation of time to do that one that one job and then move on to the next thing to kind of, you know, structure your day a little bit better.

So I'm glad you brought that up. I actually wrote this little note here and I, you know, it was like, you know, are we blaming the generation of learners, right? Are we, are we blaming the advisors for not being efficient, right? And and on top of their business uh or should we actually be blaming the generation of the trainers and leaders whose process it is that they functioning within Because ultimately you want to build a process that systemic right It's like someone leaves, someone plugs in.

The process is strong and holds. You have to plug in and adapt and run within the process. You know, we'll talk about like, you know, a Big Mac is two LB patties, special sauce, lettuce, cheese, pickles, and all that stuff. If you decide you want to make it another way, you don't last long.

Right. But in our business, somehow we get people that get out there on the service drive and start to do things their own way. And they actually do last long. And so, you know, that process starts to melt down.

And then if they're not held accountable, then I don't have to do it, you know, and things come apart. And then you don't have that systemic process that's easy to hold on to. So it's a discipline thing and working, you know, your team through that. They have to buy into want that.

You know, nobody wants to be the word discipline scares people. You know, we're talking more from if you can get through the daily grind, eventually you start to see the result. Right. Just with anything.

So the same thing in getting your service drive process tied down and built out to where it functions efficient. Absolutely. Absolutely. I mean, the biggest struggle is getting out of the, when you get in that groove, that black cloud groove, when, you know, the phones ring in, you got to get this together, you got to call that person, this person standing in front of you, you know, a salesman's coming back asking you for something, a technician's barking at you.

It's, it's, again, it's, it's being able to control your environment a little bit better and allocation of, of what am I focusing on right now to get that done? And so I think it's, it's really misguided in some cases, you know, to give people structure. I like what you said. It starts off as a base foundation, but then you start to understand what you can do with your skills.

You know, you're really, really good at a walk around, you know, so what are we identifying and what are you not really, really good at? And then reallocating some of that time over here to get better at that, to understand where we need to put at it. But I think the ease of onboarding, you know, is going to be the easiest way to, like you said, you have a systemic process that allows you to plug people in and let's roll. And it's going to make it much easier for people to get more comfortable.

So that, in my view, would be kind of that rolls into retention. It's easier to get comfortable. It's easier to get in the groove and it's easier to retain your advisors. Or is that kind of long lines you're thinking?

Yeah. And I think you've got to be realistic. I don't think it's a 30 day job. I don't think you're, I don't, I don't think you're, you got to ask the dealer, do you want to put this person in front of your client base before they're ready?

Right. When, when every client's precious, uh, you know, retention is, is, is, is, is tough. And so having a true process when they're onboarded that where they build confidence and they kind of graduate to the floor process is what we should have. And because, you know, we have the turnover pressure we have, we put them in there too quick and that doesn't help them.

Right. And or, you know, we give them a sponsor. You know, you work with Bill or Jane today and, you know, they're going to show you what to do. Well, no, you're going to learn what Bill or Jane does.

You're not going to learn the store's process if you don't have a good discipline process that's documented. So onboarding, you know, when I came to NCM, it was the best onboarding experience I ever had because I had two full weeks of daily agenda, exactly what's going to happen down to the hours for two full weeks. And then before those two weeks were up, I was given two more. And so, you know, it's like focus on the things in front of you, right in front of you.

Don't worry about the big picture. Let's just get you through each step along the way. And I think, you know, if we could do that with our staff, I think we'd have a lot more success out there. And then if they walk into the arena, understanding like what each of their actions, how it pertains to the role they're in, by the true understanding of the role, I think they'll be better at it.

Yeah. Like I used to walk into the arena, mine was welcome to the Thunderdome. Get after it. Have some fun with it, you know.

But I mean, kind of going back to something you said earlier, that is it the, is it the people that are doing the job or the people that are training them to do the job? And I think that's, that's one of the biggest aspects as far as people that I talk to coaching calls I'm involved in and things like that. Before we start to point the finger at anybody else, let's look in the mirror. Or they set it for success.

Did we give them what they need to be successful? And then we can start looking at pointing the finger saying, okay, here's some things we got to identify and work on. but but i like you know it's really sitting down and having that hard conversation you know with your training team or with yourself you know are we doing it the right way to get the best success from it you know and so i think that's a huge takeaway especially from a general manager standpoint you know you're over it you brother you got a guy you know you and you maybe don't have a whole lot of fixed outs background you know sales of service like you said so what do you bring into the table in that aspect of it so where do you stand on guys that are um i'm sorry go ahead.

No, I was just going to say, you know, it's an accountability test. You know, you have to look in the mirror first and be just be honest about it. Did you give them a job description? Did you give them a pay plan that matches it?

Did you give them goals that align to where you're trying to get to, right? Did you, did you line everything up to like, here's your piece? Here's our puzzle. Here's where you fit into our puzzle.

And here's what we expect of you. And if you do these things, this is what you get. And if you do these things at this level, get even more right and if you want to aspire to go to the next level here's how you do it so if we give those basic fundamentals and then hold true to that you know people don't people don't quit their job right they quit their leadership so without that when they get lost um and then somebody dangles something that looks a little better And because you haven shown them much you know next thing you know you getting a notice on your desk So, yeah.

But what is that term that's going around now? A quiet quitting? People start to quiet quitting and stuff like that. So, you know, just to kind of, you know, change directions just a touch.

I wouldn't mind picking your brain on this concept. A lot of times you will start to see seasoned advisors. You have been in the business. They start to see things.

They almost start to diagnose a little bit on the lane. So how do you, how do you kind of talk to about you standing in your lane to an extent? Like you're the advisor, but the technician do his job just because you've seen that this is probably a TPMS sensor. This is probably a wheel speed control module or something like that.

hey, you know, look, you may have an idea, but let's verify it. You know, what do you say to that? Well, I kind of give that the freedom and flexibility of what are their results, right? So if this is a high level advisor that has great CSI, loyal clientele, runs a good hours per RO, I think you got to give that person a little freedom and flexibility that they've earned that ability.

in other words they're not they're not really outside of their lane uh they know the lane i think it's when you get the younger advisor who starts making that call is where the problem is so i i think it's like if you uh if you you have to give some grace to that i believe when you get to that level um because you want to keep that advisors um being sharp and i think their experience is what makes them sharp so i don't know i'm a little mixed there but i do believe like i don't want diagnosing on the drive you know we're going to teach that don't do it um but i do understand just like you would if you after you've been in the chair long enough you know you've seen it you want to go there and it's just kind of a natural tendency to do it so i don't i don't hold them to to account for it yeah i think it's a perfect answer i mean i think it depends on the rider and where they're at and what they do and you know what kind of rapport they have with their customers and what their success rate you know but they're misdiagnosing stuff all the time so I would stop talking, you know, kind of stuff.

So I think that's pretty good. So is there any markers, you know, kind of as we start to wrap up, you know, we talked about the onboarding process. You know, we talked about retaining them with a solid foundation and keeping that foundation easy to plug in and play with and then letting them grow, letting them establish that. Is there any key things or key identifiers that you can start to see that an advisor starting to go down the downslope of holding that position?

Yeah, I think we look at just their true output. 500 hours of production in a month is basically supporting about three technicians, not even three. Three at maybe 100% proficiency. so it's it's not like you're blowing the cover off the ball so 500 you should do to pay for you know these other three people to be here to make this all work unfortunately right now benchmark is 407 now some of that is going to be the cdk numbers are filtering through and that's going to clean up in time by the end by the time we get through august numbers that'll be purified everywhere but but to some degree it was it's it's definitely off it's been off hours per tech per day or only are under eight um and that's a number that you know just shows that you know we are we say we need more technicians but we're not as efficient and proficient as we used to be so our our youth in our drive and i say youth by not age but by experience on the drive is showing up in their ability to sell the hours.

And then the technician in the shop, your boomers are retiring out, you know, and the models are changing so fast, you know, the propensity of having knowledge of, you know, it's just, it shows up. Their diagnosis times are being hammered, you know, and stores are behind, you know, that's where they're struggling is in just the diag type work and keeping up with that type of stuff so it's affecting the the industry that's why rates are going up because we got to afford it somehow people still need to make money so we're in we're just in that flux where everything is tightening but i do think it'll come around but there is a shift that's happening so we're just in the middle of it yeah brother i think yeah like like again it's just it's something we got to adapt to it's all it's always been that way.

I like how people think that this is something, no, we've always had to adapt to shifts in the market and shifts in the culture and things like that. So just kind of overcoming it. So, well, Rick, this is going to wrap up our episode today. What I love to do as we wrap up the episode is give my guests the final say.

So anything you, the last thing you can want to wrap things up with put out there, you know, just remember the three P's, you know, the people ask yourself, how good are they? How good is your roster? You're as good as the depth of your roster. Process, how well do you document things and stay disciplined in your processes?

And then, you know, production is what it's all about. How well does your shop produce? And I think that if you can focus on those three things, you know, you'll be successful in this business. Awesome, brother.

Well, thank you again. This will wrap up another episode of the Field Podcast. We'll see you next time. Thank you for joining another episode of the Field Podcast.

Always be sure to like, follow, or subscribe to be notified when new episodes are being dropped. And click the link below to review any of the show notes for additional information. Or you can email the Fuel Podcast with the link as we encourage any feedback or any questions or comments from our listeners. Until next time, I'm your host, Alex Keyes, with the Fuel Podcast for fixing underperformance and evolving leadership.