Training That Pays Off

In-House Training

When it comes to in-house training at Thorson’s five shops in Minnesota and Wisconsin that specialize in European automobiles, such as Audi, BMW, and Mercedes, he has found the most success in offering paid training during the day.

“Every tech tells me they want training until you ask them to go to training on their own hours,” he explains. “They don't want to go on night and weekend training.”

Instead, Thorson brings in trainers once a quarter to address issues specific to the brands they service. Instructors typically remain on-site for two days to ensure all technicians receive training while guaranteeing the shop remains productive.

“So, they're teaching the same class generally two days in a row, which means my shops are operating at half capacity, but I'm getting half my guys one day and half my guys another day,” Thorson asserts. “Some instructors will teach an intermediate and an advanced class, depending on how we break our technicians up. But, with most classes that trainers have nowadays, everybody's going to get a little something out of it.”

Meanwhile, Thorson estimates six to eight hours are dedicated to Lunch-and-Learns that invite vendors to teach while staff members eat lunch provided by the shop. Coupled with a 5- to 10-minute training app on their phones and a brief Monday morning technical meeting with the shop foreman, Thorson says he allocates approximately 40 hours of training per technician per year.

He adds he is currently focused on hiring a full-time technical director to conduct in-house training and hone in on some of the topics where a need for training has been identified.   
Across the country in Colorado, tech to tech training at Pro Auto Care involves lead technicians and shop foremen discussing diagnostics, drivability, or other complicated subjects in which they’re well-versed and breaking them down to a room full of technicians quarterly for half-day or two-hour sessions.

The reason—President Al Oramas says—is because car care is constantly changing and shop owners must stay on top of the most recent innovations.

“Every year, the manufacturers make a change either because they have found an issue with a vehicle or they found a way to improve it. Being a dealership technician, we would get TSBs, or technical service bulletins, that would be fixed in the next model year. That car was changed. When you go to go test stuff, you've got to know what are the changes and what are the problems,” Oramas notes. “So, you have to familiarize yourself with a product that is evolving and changing, and you have to be aware of those changes.”

To stay on top of the ever-changing landscape, Tim Suggs of Turbo Tim’s Anything Automotive in Minneapolis, Minnesota, opts to gather as many of his 59 employees from his four stores on Saturdays for in-house training taught by one of the shop foremen. Topics focus mostly on diagnosing problems and making sure the sessions are fun and interactive.

In the same vein, ASE Trivia Night encourages technicians to showcase what they’ve learned utilizing their skill-building phone app that quizzes them for three to five minutes a day.

“It’s gamified and competitive and there’s teambuilding in that,” points out Suggs, whose shops service all makes and models from 2005 and newer. “But it’s making it fun and not feel like work. And it’s not set where the smartest person wins every week. It’s really like who’s consistently doing their classes and learning and getting better?”  

Breaking it down further, Suggs says, technicians are permitted to attend 40 hours of training locally in their first year of employment. After the first year, they are free to roam about the country to out-of-town training.

Conference and Trade-Show Training

“Conferences are a huge part of technicians’ learning. When you go to a class that's eight hours, you're going to get way more in depth than a class that's after work that’s two hours because you just can't really get into the nitty gritty in two hours,” Suggs explains. “I see the techs when they come back and they've been in a day class, and they're actually using the tools that they've learned.”

He adds that the classes are so effective that it doesn’t take any convincing on his behalf for technicians to want to go out of town for training.

“When a technician comes back from training and he's excited, and all the other technicians see that, it kind of sells itself,” he admits. “We have to have a lottery for who goes to training because some of these trainings, more people want to sign up than we're able to take, so they end up selling it to each other.”

Oramas says he not only encourages out-of-town training, but he also incentivizes it. As an ASE Blue Seal of Excellence shop, 75% of front and back staff members are required to be ASE certified to qualify for this distinction. And to be certified, one must commit their own time and resources to pass multiple tests.

“So, part of that is we incentivize our people. We pay for their test if they pass it and we give a pay raise,” Oramas explains. “So those people that are doing the testing and certifying themselves are always at the top of the list (to go out of town) because if you're willing to take time out of your schedule to study and then go test, you're likely to go to an event and learn.”

At EuroTech, Thorson says, conferences and trade shows are reserved for shop foremen for a variety of reasons, including the ability to send them to more advanced classes as well as their pay and leadership level.

“It's going to benefit them more to go to those events, and they have a much higher buy-in, and those people have shown the desire to really want to learn and grow,” Thorson notes. “So, those are the ones that generally are going to go to that type of event.”

Going Down the Right Path

With shops in Denver and Littleton, Colorado, Oramas believes creating a culture where employees feel seen and heard should come long before the request for training.

“When you're asking technicians to do training, you're either going to tell them or you're going to ask them,” Oramas notes. “Asking goes a long way. And if you've got agreement because people feel very involved in the shop and understand that this is not just another chore, that is where you start. Start by connecting with people.”

Oramas adds informal huddles where technicians can ask questions and make suggestions is not only a morale booster, but a place where team members can have a voice—and sometimes even a say—in shop matters.

Once those connections take root, technicians are willing to put in the work to retain the skills needed to do a good job and to be rewarded for their efforts. In addition to giving travel priority to those who are willing to better themselves with ASE certification, those who complete apprenticeships are rewarded with a set of tools paid for by Pro Auto Care.

Oramas stresses the name of the game is creating buy-in and a place where employees feel there is value in furthering their knowledge.

“We've had multiple people come work for us that are friends with technicians in our shop because they told them this is one of the best places to work,” Oramas says.

What’s on the Horizon

When it comes to knowing what subjects to train for, shop owners have their own theories on where to focus their efforts.

At Turbo Tim’s, they’re just breaking into using data from technology, like a popular phone app, to tell them where their technicians would benefit most from training based on their score results to small tests.

“If you ask the technician what they want to learn, I think a lot of them are going to say ADAS and the truth is that's like maybe 1% of the work I get,” Suggs notes. “It's the most cutting-edge thing, but we're not there yet where it's like we're using it every day.”

And although computer skills will inevitably be needed to crack the code on maintaining vehicles, there is still something to be said for old-school skills that require a technician to dig in and get dirty.

“A technician might not know how to do a broken bolt,” Thorson says. “You have to teach them how to drill out a bolt. That's not going to be done in a class; that is a hands-on skill that has to be taught in the shop.”

To get ahead of the learning curve on electric vehicles, Oramas is not waiting around for manufacturers to hand them the keys to their learning toolbox. Instead, he bought a Tesla Model 3 for technicians to experiment with.

“We have a shop vehicle that we can connect to the computer, look at the diagnostics, look at how to take it apart, understand what's under the hood, if you will, which is a funny term for a Tesla, cause there is no under the hood, it's more under the car,” he quips. “But the challenges going forward with the new technology, we have to be exposed. You can read all you want, you can watch videos, but when you can do a hands-on, that's a game changer.”

Why Training Matters

Although the answers to why technicians need training may seem obvious, the costs associated with these sessions may be difficult to justify for those who are just starting out or shops that are struggling to turn a profit.

However, consider the hidden benefits not only for your shop, but also for your workforce in an industry where shortages abound, Thorson says.

“These cars are getting more and more complicated, and training is the only way you're going to get better. You either have to steal the most highly trained people from your competition, or you have to train your own,” he advises. “And the only way to get better is to be doing constant training. It's absolutely critical. Shop owners spend a ton of money with coaches and trainers and coaching and training at conferences and events, but they tend to spend very little on training their technicians in the technical aspects of fixing the car.”

He adds technicians need to learn to think on their feet and apply the theory behind training to properly diagnose a problem in a vehicle.

“The biggest thing we concentrate on is theory. You have to understand how a system works. If you don't understand how it works, we can't make diagnostic steps or diagnostic processes,” he asserts. “Generally, technicians are in the field because they're good at thinking, but if they don't know how it works, there's no way they can use their talents to figure out what the problem is.”

Meanwhile, Suggs points out that training pays for itself when it comes to continuity in production.

“You can grow you can grow B Tech to an A Tech,” he explains. “Because there's such a shortage of really highly skilled technicians in today's world, we have to grow them. We can't just hire them. They're not out there. They have to be grown.”

To encourage industry growth, Oramas is hoping to someday implement in-house training that invites trainers to lead sessions and other nearby shops’ employees to attend in a collaborative spirit.

“It’s been a vision of mine for a long time to bring in people from other shops. It breaks down barriers where people kind of look at each other and go, ‘We're competition’,” Oramas explains. “If we raise the bar for ourselves and we raise others at the same time, the industry is affected by it. So, essentially when the tide comes in, the little boats and the big boats all go up together. We need to work together to improve the industry and ourselves.”

Setting Technicians up for Success

No matter which route you choose for your technicians, your effort in giving them the best learning curve is noticed and appreciated. Whether in-house, independent learning, or out-of-town trade shows and conferences, each session puts them in touch with information that they can store in their educational toolbox.  

“Almost everything they bring back is going to have some kind of impact,” Thorson notes. “It’s going to trickle down and become the tribal knowledge for the rest of the team.”