team work on the service desk

[JOHNV44]

I have a dilemma. I have 3 advisors who are good people, like to sell, but sometimes throw each other under the bus just to see the other people fail. I pay them a base salary, commission on hours sold in the shop on a scale based on their indvidual CSI scores and then pay them a maint incentive spiff to increase maint sold in the shop. Our CSI is suffering right now and I am looking for a way to boost teamwork between the advisors without changing the pay plan if possible. I considered taking all 3 scores and averaging it out, but that hurts the top guy and helps the bottom guy. Any ideas????

[Old Irish]

This is a little disturbing.

Personlly, I would forget pay plans for the moment and examine the personality issues/conflicts at the desk. I think you should fix that first. Finding the right mix of players is important....even if it means "making some changes".

Easy for me to say, of course

Good luck
Doug

[paulmillar1]

I have a similar problem. 1 advisor that jumps out of his desk to get the attention of customers that walk through the door. Customers are starting to ask, "are you guys on comission or something?" It's starting to get out of hand. They are usually about the same hrs/ro and $lbr sales. I tried combining their sales for one month and then deviding it by 3, but that created its own problems. Any suggestions would be appreciated.

[This message has been edited by paulmillar1 (edited 04-25-2005).]

[3760Guru]

As much as you may not want to change the pay plan, if addressing it with them has not resulted in any changes, change may be necessary. Often times, advisors are influenced the most by the wrong reasons. If they perceive that their partners are "taking their customers", or they feel that they may take someone's customers by throwing them under the Greyhound, they will often do it. The key is to keep them on the same playing field. The best bet is to use a pay plan that pays the lions share on their individual performance, but has a rider that pays on the hours of the other advisors. This way, they all have a vested interest in others' success. I can try and dig a couple up if you would like.

[srvmanrick]

I am also having a similar problem. One of my advisors has the I am better than you attitude & only what I think matters. I have had several meetings with him & still has had little effect. I am trying to be as "PC" as possible. Any suggestions?

[Mike Vogel]

When we opened the dealer I am at a little over a year ago we tried something new that is working for us. First of all we are a team store. The advisors are paid on flat rate hours produced, no parts sales. They receive a certain dollar amount for all hours produced under their number and a smaller dollar amount for hours produced by other advisors. Second we use colored magnetic hats for tags and they are put in rotation so whatever color hat is on top, that advisor writes up that customer. If that advisor is at lunch or busy another advisor will assist since they will get paid a piece of that repair order. The result is much better teamwork.The customer does not feel the cut throat mentality that some commision plans show and for the teams more equal work distribution.

[pjpeery]

i worked for an old service director in a large dealership we had 5 advisors .. when problems of this nature arose .. i would ask him what he thought .. he said the to cure the bad habits i was to be at the write up area in the morning during the rush and as service manager i was to just stand there and possibley greet owners but mostly to just watch the advisors ... they knew why i was down there and i did this for 30 days and i was also there during the afternoon rush .. yes this was 2 or 3 hours out of my day but the problems started to go away .. the advisors knew that i ment business and wanted there cooperation ..

paul

we did not change any pay plans we just made sure that they knew we were interested in the way their day was going

[imfixed]

There are myriad ways to pay your advisors.

Just remember, that they need to be properly compensated for what they do: Sell hours, parts, and the dealership, by treating their customers right to gain their trust. Too many folks look at selling service like "closing a deal" but really the key is in following a proven process that treats the customer fairly, without high pressure tactics. Credibility goes a long way, and if you have it customers will pay you more than they would elsewhere.

Walk-arounds with a structured process are nothing new, but many dealers are starting to wake up to the benefits of doing this with some of the recent focus being put in this area by various consultants. Having write-up desks out in a properly situated enclosed service drive is the best case scenario. Not having this type of a set up where the desks are in the drive causes issues, but they too can be overcome with the right attitude.

Tell your advisors to remember to treat their customers like they would treat their own family, and if they are decent people (your advisors), it will eventually all fall in line. It's a trust thing! It will take a relatively long time to accomplish this, but it's worth it!

Traditionally advisors, or "Service Consultants" (Gotta Love today's "Titles"!) are paid a percentage of labor and parts sales, with spiffs on whatever's is the soup de jour. Some today think that paying strictly on Flat Rate Hours is the way to go, but if you really analyze this you will begin to realize that this very myopic view is basically flawed.

There are various ways to structure advisor pay plans, but what it all boils down to is having the right person for the job, paying them well (remember you get what you pay for!), and most importantly, having the right environment for your people. The environment is most important as viewed from the "people perspective" and not from the brick and mortar perspective. You can have a pretty poor facility and yet because of the support and team spirit fostered by management that truly cares, you'll have a great work environment, with great employees who perform at the top of their game.

In contrast, you can have a showplace for a facility, but if the man upstairs doesn't have his head screwed on straight there's nothing you can do about it, and unfortunately things will never change .......and, without going into a whole different topic (dealer ownership/management), need I say more?

Good Luck!


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Thanks,
IMFIXED.....OPS That Is!

[john]

The real problem occurs in the way the reservation is made. At the reservation call, If the advisor repeats his name and asks the customer to ask for him when he arrives, that should remove any competition for customers in the lane. The competition between advisors should happen for the phone call. Have the advisors hand out business cards and claim customers for their own clientel. If the customer is on the advisor's reservation sheet, he belongs to that advisor and no matter who does the write-up, the credit goes to that advisor. By doing it that way, the agressiveness of your advisors will be chanelled into answering the phone, not reading grills (Cherry picking customers in the lane).

I ran this system for 12 years with very aggressive advisors and we rarely had a problem. The key is to set up rules that focus the agression at the appropriate point.

By the way, service sales starts at the reservation time with a discussion of the service history of the car - the customer then does not see the effort in the lane as "selling" but merely an extenuation of the conversation started on the phone. Done correctly, the comment "are you guys on commission?" would never happen.

If done properly, each reservation customer will arrive prepared to discuss his needs with a particular advisor and will be documented on that advisors reservation sheet. That clears the air and makes everything reflect the advisors total effort(answering the phone), not just "lane skills."

I used a reservation sample script and reqired each advisor to develop his own script that covered all the points of the sample script. Once you get a handle on reservations and establish rules of conduct, this nonsense with fighting over customers in the lane will go away.

John

[Mike Vogel]

Another way to handle the reservation system that works well is to have a service reservation office. When calling in the customer is asked if they are calling to make an appointment and if so is routed to the reservation desk. If it is the customer's first visit they are assigned to an advisor by an up system therby being faif to all advisors.
If they have been in before they are assigned to the advisor that helped them the last time in.
The exceptions would be if either they do not want to work that advisor (bad experience) or the advisor is off the day the customer wants to come in.
If the advisor does a good job the customer will work with the same advisor/team every time in.
Customers feel more comfortable working with the same advisor and is fair to all advisors (assuming they are taking care of their customers ! )