Hayes: Inside the Trenches

There’s no shortage of training in our industry. Seminars, breakout rooms, slide decks, binders—most of it well-intentioned. But there’s a hard truth shop owners eventually learn: you don’t build world-class service in a classroom. You build it in the bays. With real cars. And real customers. And real pressure.

Inside Adams Automotive of The Woodlands, one of the top-performing Goodyear service locations in the country, opened its doors in January and let leaders step directly into the operation. Not to observe from the sidelines but to execute, lead, and perform live.

No selling. No theory without reps. Just execution.

From Daily Discipline to Live Customer Experience

The weekend didn’t start with a keynote. It started the way every strong operation should with a Take 5. This focused, 15-minute huddle is held daily before "tip off" (the store opening) to align the team on both the brand concept and operational goals.

Attendees didn’t just watch; they stood up, led sessions, and received real-time feedback. The lesson was immediate: when leadership shows up prepared, aligned, and present at the start of the day, execution follows everywhere else.

From there, attendees moved into staffing and structure not from a textbook, but by mapping real stores against real production needs. Titles didn’t matter. Output did. Leaders saw firsthand how misaligned roles, overstaffing, or unclear accountability quietly erode profit and culture long before they show up on a P&L.

Data integrity came next to show systems don’t fail; discipline does. Participants walked through live examples inside shop management software, focusing on warranties, deleted tickets, inventory controls, and cash adjustments. The takeaway was clear: clean data isn’t an accounting function; it’s a leadership responsibility.

Then came board and bag audits, live repair orders, real invoices, and real conversations. Attendees reviewed tickets exactly the way strong operators do—daily, weekly, relentlessly. Estimate integrity, documentation, parts flow, and time management weren’t discussed in theory; they were evaluated in practice.

Before lunch, we addressed tech stacks and standardization. The focus wasn’t on “what software should you buy,” but how simplicity and consistency create speed. And how fewer tools and clear ownership amount to cleaner execution.

Applying the Principles

Consistently applying these start-of-the-day principles establishes a professional tone for the entire shop, maximizing operational efficiency and ensuring meticulous accounting practices. By executing the concept at its highest level, it creates a standard of excellence that inevitably drives significant daily revenue and long-term success.

Auto Hospitality in Motion

After lunch, everything moved onto the shop floor.

Attendees rotated through four live customer experience stations:

• Shop tours and first impressions
• Rack attack and rapid inspections
• Diagnostic and strategy conversations
• Invoice review and closing

These weren’t role plays. They were real interactions, happening in real time, with real outcomes. Leaders felt the pressure of explaining value clearly, managing time, and maintaining hospitality while protecting margin.

When the group reconvened, the learning accelerated. What worked was obvious. What didn’t was impossible to hide. And that’s the point.

Applying the Principles

From start to finish, the “key-to-key” concept turns a standard transaction into a relationship built on trust. By incorporating personalized education within the four main processes, shop owners can clearly communicate the benefits of their expertise to the customer. This transparency is the backbone of auto hospitality—it ensures the client leaves not just with a working vehicle, but with the confidence that they are in the best possible hands.

Profit Awareness, Missed Sales, and Choosing the Right Work

Late Saturday afternoon shifted to the conversations most shops avoid:

• Missed sales.
• Unrecovered opportunities.
• “Gravy jobs” that quietly drain capacity.

We broke down how chasing the wrong work caps growth just as effectively as low car count. Leaders examined profit per hour, technician efficiency, and the long-term cost of saying yes to everything.

The day closed with a scatter plot exercise that forced clarity around talent as far as who elevates the business, who requires intentional leadership, and who may be holding the operation back.

Applying the Principles

Real growth happens when you stop acting like a mechanic and start acting like a hospitality mogul. If your team is constantly buried under "nightmare" repairs that drain money and kill morale, your ladder is against the wrong wall. Instead, focus on auto hospitality and the "gravy"—those high-margin, high-flow services that maximize bay efficiency and keep the business humming. By avoiding the efficiency-killers and focusing on the metrics that actually drive revenue, you ensure the shop isn't just "busy," but is operating at its absolute peak financial potential.

Leadership, Accountability, and the Hard Conversations

On Sunday, attendees focused on leadership under pressure.

A panel of top performers, “The Hammers” from Adams Automotive, The Woodlands, spoke plainly about expectations:

• What A players need.
• What they won’t tolerate.
• Why leadership consistency matters more than motivational speeches.

From there, leaders revisited their team evaluations and tackled the hardest responsibilities of ownership: defining a true “10,” handling performance issues, and executing terminations correctly and respectfully. These weren’t lectures. They were live role play reps designed to remove hesitation and replace it with confidence.

One session in particular turned the spotlight inward: Are you a true hammer?
Because standards only work when the leader is willing to live them first.

Recruiting followed not as a reactive task, but as a daily discipline. Attendees practiced real outreach conversations and saw how strong culture attracts talent long before positions open.

The weekend closed the same way it started: with reps, Take 5 execution. leadership presence, and accountability.

Applying the Principles

The secret to "auto hospitality" lies in the caliber of your staff, which is why constant evaluation is non-negotiable. Using tools like scatter plot rankings and weekly performance checks, shop owners can pinpoint exactly where their team stands at any given moment. This constant feedback loop allows you to reward your "A" players and provide targeted training for those with potential, while simultaneously recruiting for those who don't fit the vision. In our shop, we operate with the mindset that every day is a tryout; this ensures that our performance-based culture remains sharp, profitable, and attractive to the industry's best talent.

Why This Approach Matters

What separated this experience from traditional training wasn’t intensity; it was immersion:

• Discuss
• Execute
• Review
• Repeat

Every concept lived inside a real shop. Every idea was tested against real customers. Every leader left knowing exactly where their execution is strong and where it needs work.

World class service isn’t a slogan and auto hospitality isn’t a script. They’re built in the trenches, one disciplined rep at a time.