The Surgical Approach

I consider surgeons to be the utmost professionals in our society. The title of surgeon carries with it an immediate respectability. When we’re talking about taking a surgical approach in our dealerships it only makes sense if we desire to reach the respectability of a surgeon.

Professional Processes
Could you imagine if your surgeon met you at the door and reviewed your medical records? Then would they proceed to take your blood pressure, weight, and heart rate? You will never see this happen and the reason is simple. The surgeon’s time is too valuable to perform these basic tasks. The reality is all of our time should be considered precious and any process that will maximize the availability of it should be a mandate. I am always amazed to watch fixed operation employees run around in circles trying to put out fires they created with poor work processes.

The most common reason they don’t consider improved processes is they don’t have the time. The sad reality is poor processes always lose time, profit, and customer satisfaction. Then on top of this we add smoke breaks, Facebook, and cell phone use during working hours and the time losses really add up. I have seen dealership employees playing candy crush in between customers.

What if your surgeon team was playing candy crush during your surgery whenever they had the chance to? As ridiculous as that sounds is it any better that we allow our people to constantly waste time that would be better spent providing customer care?

Professional Training
One can only imagine the results if surgeons were not required to meet the highest professional training standards possible. As ridiculous as that sounds I believe the same should apply to our dealership employees. The days of hiring people from a different industry and putting them directly on the line without any professional training has to be behind us.

 We need to have training standards that outline professional development in every position of our dealerships operations. We can’t expect high performance in customer care to be an automatic result. It is those dealerships that understand investments in their people are critical that prosper in the long term. 

The Best Equipment
Our Surgeon is expected to use the latest state-of-the-art equipment. I would assume that professional surgeons faced with using equipment that didn’t meet that standard would not stay long at that hospital. They would seek employment at a hospital that met the professional standards that they hold dear and have becomes accustomed to.

They would accept nothing less than excellent equipment. Yet in our dealerships, we accept old antiquated equipment that requires twice the time to use. Why tolerate computers that are outdated and slow and are very low cost to replace and modernize?

If we want to improve dealership operations substantially we must adapt to the “Surgical Standards” of today’s medical profession. I challenge all of you to adapt your own set of professional standards into your daily operations. Those who do I am confident will prosper.

Sincerely,
Rob Gehring, President
Fixed Performance Inc.
Margin Plus
1-888-205-8718
Cell: (419) 282-1351
rgehring@fixedperformance.com
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