DealersEdge Professional Forums

If their was a book that detailed all the of the things that would make a new parts manager effective and efficient at their job (setting up sources, inventory management, profitability, customer satisfaction) and also be a good read for experienced managers to fine-tune their departments would you be interested in it?

PartsPlant81 wrote:If their was a book that detailed all the of the things that would make a new parts manager effective and efficient at their job (setting up sources, inventory management, profitability, customer satisfaction) and also be a good read for experienced managers to fine-tune their departments would you be interested in it?

If you're a "GM Parts Manager" (insert sarcasm here), My question is WHY?

partsguy99 wrote:

PartsPlant81 wrote:If their was a book that detailed all the of the things that would make a new parts manager effective and efficient at their job (setting up sources, inventory management, profitability, customer satisfaction) and also be a good read for experienced managers to fine-tune their departments would you be interested in it?

If you're a "GM Parts Manager" (insert sarcasm here), My question is WHY?

Could end up being a best seller, either under "comedy" or "drama"!!!!!!!!!!!
But if you are a "GM Parts Manager" it could end up under "Murder Mystery", ya just never know!

Yes I am a GM Manager but it would be able to be applied to all carlines.

I'd read it.... heck, I'd help write it. But the more GM comes in with RIM, and Sad Day Service, ect, the less control the Parts Manager has....the next logical step would be for GM to insist on 2 way controls between them and your DMS provider.

Remember, you read that here 1st.

It's funny you all bring this up. The shop foreman and I joke about putting a book together about the behind the scenes shenanigans of the Car Dealer ship. It would be a best seller. It's called the "You are not going to believe this Sh!t..what really goes on at your local car dealership." We are on chapter 37 at the moment.

Prologue: overview of the personnel and the drug proliferation throughout the dealership...from the tweaking car salesman to the Lortab dealing technician

Chapter 1: Wheel of excuses. Its like the wheel of fortune but used by the SM to take time off. Like 2 Feet of snow at his house when everyone else got 2 inches. Or, a friend of a friend of an aunt had a dog die and there is a funeral

Chapter 2: How did you get hired? or rehired? You took a mans polaris in on trade, didnt mark it in paperwork, sold the car. Problem is he got home and realized that he got nothing for his polaris while you sold it for cash on the side!
uh-oh.

i could go on. feel free to add your experiences. we could have a hit!

LOL. I considered writing all of the whacky shit that I have seen throughout the years and trying to sell it as a sitcom or a movie. It would be the funniest thing since The Hangover but it would have to be listed as a fictional comedy because nobody would think the stuff really happened.

Don't forget owners throwing money out the car window to watch employees pick it up, salesmen stealing cars after hours and totalling them, guys arrested for DUI in demos, customers pulling guns over ink stains that didn't come out, counter guys writing crdit memeos to take money out of the drawer then charging themselves back for the part plus interest, and used condoms upsatirs on top of parts shelves.

.....and the interdepartmental relationships, some affairs caught on tape, people licking other people's lunches in the fridge....
I always thought I'd call my soap opera "As the Dealership Turns". Sounds like we all have had this thought at some point, but I must agree, no one would believe the sh!t we put up with from GM or our coworkers!
I am totally in!

THIS is why "The Office" is so popular... it is real life "stuff" that happens on the job, what we all experience day in and day out. I met my wife at a car dealership back in 1979, just like Jim and Pam on the show meet at their workplace. We all know people that match-up with the various personalities and such. I think a book/sitcom on life at a dealership would be hysterical, but The Office has already run that race.

As far as a "How To Book"... I dunno. The idiot book has been written, it is the GM RIM Dealer User Manual.

~ gt