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Shop Talk Her Way is where former shop owner and coach JeanAnn Saint Grace opens up the books on what it really takes to run a profitable, sustainable, and well-balanced auto repair business.
With decades of experience in bookkeeping, operations, and leadership, JeanAnn brings an honest, no-fluff approach to shop management — all from a woman’s perspective. From financial systems and staffing to communication and culture, she shares insights that help shop owners (and especially women in the industry) take control, build better businesses, and enjoy the ride.
Whether you’re turning wrenches, balancing the books, or scaling to your next location, you’ll find encouragement, strategy, and a healthy dose of “you’ve got this” in every episode.
Shop Talk Her Way is an AutoFix Auto Shop Coaching production — helping shops thrive, her way.
Thanks to WorldPac and the WorldPac Training Institute (WTI) for sponsoring Shop Talk Her Way. Visit worldpac.com for the latest in auto parts distribution and wtitraining.com to explore training programs that can take your career to the next level.
JeanAnn SaintGrace [00:00:00]:
this level of transparency and open communication is something that we really need to work on. We shouldn't be coming in with secrets. We shouldn't be coming in with, oh, I don't want to say that because I'm afraid it's going to cause a problem. If it's going to cause a problem, let's cause the problem now before everybody's moved heaven and earth to make this happen. This is Shop Talk Her Way with Jean Ann St. Grace. Do you feel like you might have a better chance of winning the lottery than hiring the right person? You're not alone. I'm Jean Ann St.
JeanAnn SaintGrace [00:00:35]:
Grace. Welcome to this episode of Shop Talk Her Way, and I'm so excited to be here with you guys and bring this topic into discussion. Hiring is probably one of the top challenges that a shop owner has, and on the flip side of it, A lot of times technicians or advisors who are looking for jobs, they're taking a gamble too. So hopefully this episode isn't just from the owner's perspective, it can also be from the tech's or advisor's position as well. So one of the best ways we can talk about hiring is it's very much like dating, and we can all relate to that. So when we start dating, we might meet someone, we might be interested in them, we might need to spend some time with them to determine if they're really who we want to be with. And the same thing is true of your team members, whether you're an owner or an employee. You, you need to know the environment that you're walking into.
JeanAnn SaintGrace [00:01:46]:
So as the owners, as the people hiring, we are setting the tone for how this relationship is going to progress. And if we lay out our hiring process to a prospect and let them understand, we are wanting to get to know you, and at the same time, we want you to get to know us so that before you leave a job that you're at or before we fill this position, we know that we have a reasonable expectation of this being a successful relationship. So, just like if you meet someone new that you're interested in in a romantic way, you're going to maybe schedule a coffee date, then you're like, okay, this could go farther, so now I'm I'm willing to commit to an evening. And then we go to dinner and then we do dinner again for a couple times. And then we might spend the day together and then eventually it becomes a weekend and then it turns into whatever it turns into from there. And it, it might seem silly, but if you think about it this way, the next thing to having a romantic partner is having someone in your business that you're working with day in and day out. They have a direct effect on the the quality of your business and how it's run and how productive it is and how profitable. And you're going to spend a tremendous amount of time with this person, and they're going to be spending a tremendous amount of time with your team.
JeanAnn SaintGrace [00:03:16]:
So we need to make sure that everybody's on the same page and everyone is in. So what does this look like? This looks like a phone interview wherever they are sourced from, whether it's Indeed or whether it is an ad or a referral from someone else or somebody the tool guy recommended, wherever they might come from, this first step is a really light getting to know you. Tell me what you're looking for, this is what we have to offer, just purely in a position situation, just like you wouldn't go to on your first date and pull out your financial statement and show them all your accounts and all your assets and all your debts. You wouldn't do that on a first date, so you're not going to do that with your employee prospect. You're going to get a high-level idea of what they're looking for, see if it might be a fit, and decide if you want to take this to the next level. The next level of the hiring process is a good solid one-on-one face-to-face. Now, face-to-face could be in person or it could be on Zoom, I recommend that you have at least 2 people on your side, on the employer side. And that is because as humans, we often filter what we want to hear.
JeanAnn SaintGrace [00:04:50]:
And something that happened when I was hiring in my shop and my husband and I were interviewing together was that I would pick pick up on certain cues that he wouldn't pick up on. And this can be true of, you know, if it's a male and a male interviewing, a female and a female interviewing, but especially male-female, they're going to pick up on different vibes. And this is so important that not only are we listening to the words that they're telling us, that we're not filling in any blanks that we want to be filled in, and then we're not making any assumptions. And this goes on both sides. We might be so desperate to hire, or as an employee, we might be so desperate for a change, we're not hearing the red flags or seeing the red flags. We might be only seeing what we want to see. And again, very much like dating, right? The cracks don't start to show until much deeper in the process. So I encourage a lot of question and answer type of conversation.
JeanAnn SaintGrace [00:05:57]:
Start off very kind of like you would a date. What do you like to do on the weekends? What, what's, what was your first car? Where did you go to school? What's your family like? You know, it seems counterintuitive because this is a business relationship, but the idea is to get the conversation flowing so that people kind of lose their best behavior that they're putting forward and really start to become themselves, to kind of loosen up the filters, see how things go. It's really a bad idea if you're meeting in person to meet outside of the shop environment, to meet somewhere neutral like a restaurant or a coffee shop. That's, you know, where you can still have a conversation, but, but be in a more relaxed environment where it doesn't feel so much like there's a, like this high coming together of two parties. And so if you've gone through that process and on both sides both of you feel like, hey, I could have this person over to my house for a barbecue and spend, you know, 5 to 6 hours and share my favorite beer or meat products with them, then we have the next interview. And this next interview is where we start talking about skills, tooling, training, all of those things. And from the team member side, we're going to ask about benefits, You know, culture, training. What's my map look like if I come to you guys? And we'll discuss some of these specifics a little bit later, but I just kind of want to lay this out for you guys.
JeanAnn SaintGrace [00:07:35]:
And at the point that that second interview rolls around, then you're deeper. Okay, this still feels like it's going to work, or it feels like it's not going to work. We might be on totally different levels. And please note here, I haven't said anything about compensation. We haven't talked about money yet. Because it's important that we kind of break all the ice and get to more who these people are, regardless of what side of the table you're on. Get to know them better. What are the pillars of the business? What are the values of the business? What is their guiding proposition? How long have they been in business? What's the future of the business look like? All of these things come to bear.
JeanAnn SaintGrace [00:08:18]:
And the next step that I would recommend, if we get through this step, the next step would be to have the team member come in for a working interview, is what I call it, or a shadow day, however you wanna, whatever you wanna call that. But the purpose of that would be for them to follow a person around who does their job and maybe multiple people. If you have multiple advisors, if you have multiple technicians, maybe they shadow a couple different people to see how their styles are different, what that might look like, and to see the personalities that are at play and to feel the energy and the culture. Doing this, then it's like our team members get to interview the prospect and the prospect gets to interview the team members. Ask deeper questions. What's it really like to work here? What happens on a slow day? What happens on a fast day? How's everybody's temperature as far as, does everybody get along? Are there any challenges within the culture or infighting or anything like that? This gives— it's everybody gets an opportunity to kind of, you know, see behind the curtains and see what's really going on. I also encourage that the shop buy lunch for the team and the prospect so that they can not only work together, but also kind of sit and talk together and break some of those filters, see what, you know, where the commonalities lie, see if there's anything that comes up that maybe is not a good fit. So that your team has a chance to give you their perspective and also so the prospect has a chance to see who their coworkers are and who they might be working with and is this a good fit for them as well.
JeanAnn SaintGrace [00:10:13]:
So, right now we're at very first date, quickie phone interview, second date, a meeting that's very personal, try to break through the filters, third date is a deep interview, fourth date is a shadow day where they can come and work with the team and see how things go. Now for the prospect, this should be paid time because they're either having to take off work, they might be burning a PTO day or holiday pay or sick day or however they, however it works out with their other employer to come and do this. It is an investment of their time. So something fair, something reasonable, something where you can just write them a check and not have to do payroll or anything like that. So basically under $600. $600 to give them time to fill everything out. And I think that's fair. And I'm not saying it should be $600, but under $600 is a threshold to either trigger a 1099 or where you have to put someone on a payroll.
JeanAnn SaintGrace [00:11:17]:
So that's why I picked that number. And you might even give them some work to do, have them shadow, depending on the skill level that you're looking for, have them shadow the technician of that skill level and see, put them on a diag, put them on a troubleshoot, disable a vehicle and have them figure it out and see what their thought processes are. And you won't, because you won't really be able to know that until you hire them, but getting an idea of what is included is great. If you have some kind of a skills test, you can use things like if a DPFE is malfunctioning, what system is that related to? If you have, you know, a squeak coming out of a vehicle, 'With brakes applied, where would you start?' Just to get an idea of what they're thinking. You should be clear if there are things in your shop that you do that are non-negotiable. If you do digital vehicle inspections or courtesy inspections, that should be very clear. If you expect them to do, you know, 40 to 50 hours of continuing education a year, that should be a conversation. If you have a certain level of productivity that you expect, Or if there's team outings that you expect them to participate in.
JeanAnn SaintGrace [00:12:43]:
If you take 2 weeks off at Christmas every year, that's something that they should know about. The special things that you do in your shop that you just think are normal might be something totally new to them and it might come as a shock. Scarily enough, I heard an interview of a girl who was just freaking out because her employer expected her to show up at 8 o'clock in the morning and work till 5 o'clock every day that she was supposed to be at work. And this was torture to her. So talking about basic things like these are our hours, these are the hours we expect you to work, these are your breaks, these are your lunches, all that stuff really needs to be written out, especially when you get to the offer point. We should be talking about vacation pay, paid holidays, paid time off, and vice versa. If as a, as a new team member, you're coming on and you have a 2-week cruise planned in 3 weeks, The employer needs to know that. It's not fair to say, yeah, I'll take this job and I'm going to work for 3 weeks and I'm going to take 2 weeks off.
JeanAnn SaintGrace [00:13:47]:
Those are conversations that need to be had. And this is a much deeper subject, but this level of transparency and open communication is something that we really need to work on. We shouldn't be coming in with secrets. We shouldn't be coming in with, oh, I don't want to say that because I'm afraid it's going to cause a problem. If it's gonna cause a problem, let's cause the problem now before everybody's moved heaven and earth to make this happen. And that's from both sides. If you have a special pay plan or if you expect a certain level of customer service, are they willing to do training? Are they willing to joyfully do training? Are you gonna get paid for your training time? Another conversation for another day, but my advocation is yes, they need to be paid for their training time and we need to build that into our budget. So we as shop owners need to be totally transparent or as transparent as we possibly can be and vice versa.
JeanAnn SaintGrace [00:14:52]:
We would expect that somebody interviewing for a position will share things that might be challenges. Other things that might be challenges are their level of technical skill with like a computer or a tablet, especially if you're doing DBIs. If you're a paperless shop, shop? Can they do the computer? Can they find their work orders? Can they make notes? I've had some shop owners that have needed to find a way to do talk-to-text with translation because their team members speak— in this case, spoke Spanish but weren't great at English. And so their compromise was that they did talk-to-text into the tablet for the DVIs and the DVI did the translation. The talk-to-text did the translation for them. Them. So there's all kinds of cool solutions now that we didn't have years ago. But if we have certain demographics— and I'm not even talking about age, there's just certain people that are more technologically inclined than others.
JeanAnn SaintGrace [00:15:54]:
Some want nothing to do with it, others are deep into it, and, and those things can cause challenges. So it's better to say up front, hey, I'm not super comfortable with this, is there a workaround? Or vice versa. And so by the time we've hit this working interview, the shadow day, both the employer and the prospective employee should have a good feel for each other. At this point, we should feel very comfortable with this person that we've got a very reasonable expectation of what's going on. It's so important to ask the hard questions at this point. My shortcomings when I was interviewing for my shop were that I didn't want to hurt anybody's feelings. I didn't want to hear something I didn't want to hear. And I was kind of still in that, well, they have a pulse, they seem qualified.
JeanAnn SaintGrace [00:16:56]:
I don't want to hear any of the bad stuff. And I would kind of stick my fingers in my ears and go la la la because I didn't want to hear it or not ask the tough questions. And I'll tell that whole story here in a minute. I've got a couple of cautionary tales. Of course I do. I'm a storyteller. So, at this point, if you've reviewed their resume, if you've reviewed any other work, if you've checked their references, please check their references. Please don't skip that step because they could be very well underselling themselves rather than overselling, and their references might be the key to your hiring because because the person in front of you is not willing to show you their greatness or able to even communicate the level of their skill.
JeanAnn SaintGrace [00:17:46]:
So, definitely check their references. If there's holes in their resume, dig into those holes. If there's a month here or there, that's one thing, but if there's a year and a half, big solid chunk where you're pretty sure they weren't living without any income, definitely ask that question and be very aware of the answers, because if they left it off on purpose, it might have been a challenging situation, or they might not look very good from it. But I would rather somebody tell me, I left that off because it was a really bad experience, it ended really badly, or, um, you know, there was a big conflict and the person that you would be calling for my reference, we just had a big disagreement and it— they would not give a good reference. Um, I'd also want to know, do they take ownership for their part in the relationship or are they just blaming the other person? There's a lot of layering to, to all of this and, and things a lot of times I don't think we think about when we're interviewing. So I'm just kind of throwing out some possibilities. If you have access to a personality test, um, there's the DISC or the BIRD test. That one's something that you can find on the internet, download the paperwork, have them do it and get a feel for them that way.
JeanAnn SaintGrace [00:19:12]:
The Wonderlic is usually something that they give to the NFL players to establish their personality, their leadership skills, those kinds of things. There's another company called Genos, but they're very— it's something that you've got to like be a part of another organization to gain access to. But a personality test that will help you to understand the type of person they are. The DiSC test honestly is one of the least expensive inexpensive, easy to access, and easy to understand. And when they find out they're an eagle or an owl or a peacock or a dove, it will help you understand. And there are shops who have delved so deeply into the DiSC or bird test that they only hire a certain personality type because they know those people are going to fit the best into their organization. And I find that fascinating that they've dialed it down that deeply that they're like, yeah, if they're not this or that, we're not hiring. So there's all kinds of things to kind of get behind the wheels.
JeanAnn SaintGrace [00:20:25]:
And, you know, we're in the information age. Don't be afraid to look at their socials. Don't be afraid to Google them and see what comes up. The weight of it depends on what you find. And you have to remember both— and again, this goes both ways— if, if you're putting your uniform on someone or they're putting your uniform on, they need to be willing to what in, in the West we call ride the brand. Ride the brand would be these are the pillars of integrity, authenticity, transparency. Um, they have to be willing to to ride for the brand. They need to uphold the image that the shop wants to hold.
JeanAnn SaintGrace [00:21:18]:
And, you know, we want them to feel comfortable doing that, and we want to feel comfortable that when they walk out of the shop with our name on their shirt or their name on our— on their hat, our name on their hat, that they're a solid representative for our team. So there— this is, this is not it's not a— we always joke, right? It's not a, well, they have a breath and a heartbeat, so yeah, we'll put them in the position. And it's also not about how big is your toolbox. It's not about, for advisors, you know, how much experience do they have? Where did the experience come from? Who are their mentors? What kind of training do they have? It's all a matter of putting them through some kind of real-world experience to get where you need them to go. And just to back up just a hair, we talked about technicians and a shadow interview, but for an advisor, give them a DVI and ask them to write up the DVI, to create some estimates with the tools that you have. You can put them in front of a dummy invoice and have them work through your technology, create some invoices, and then have them sell you the jobs and see what's their selling style. How do they present? How do they speak? You know, what does this look like? So that you get a feel for not only their abilities, but also what coaching they might need or what help they might need and where their shortcomings might be. Um, or they might be awesome and you're like, put them on the counter, no, no questions asked.
JeanAnn SaintGrace [00:22:52]:
All of these things are important. We want to try to get as many of the skeletons out of the closet ahead of time than later, and it's so expensive from both sides to switch employers or to switch employees. For employers, there's startup costs, and for employees, they might be losing benefits. They might lose vacation or paid time off. There's risk on both sides. So if we can help both sides mitigate the risk by spending this time together ahead of time and really make sure this is the best move, then we can save a lot of heartbreak break and financial challenges long-term. So, that's kind of the process. Once we get to that point where we've done the shadow, we've talked to our team and gotten their feedback, now is the time to make the offer.
JeanAnn SaintGrace [00:23:47]:
Your offer should look like, obviously, pay. You might have a 90-day probationary period where they're on this kind of pay from here until the 90 days, and at that point, you'll reevaluate with the intention of putting them on a hybrid pay plan or a base plus commission, or whatever that looks like. It should be very clear and you should have their PTO, paid holidays, your employee in-house purchases if they need to purchase parts for their car and you let them do that at cost and then pay for them, how does that all work? All these places where there can be challenges, we want to clear that up. It should look like how much training do you expect and are you going to pay them for that? That time that they're training? Do you expect them to get certifications? Do they have to keep a certain level of ASEs? Are you willing to either pay for tests once they've passed them or research once they've passed them? Are you paying for uniforms? Are they paying for uniforms? You know, what does this look like? Another big one, just because I've lived this one, is whose car— whose cars can they work on in the shop if you offer them the ability to come in after hours and work on their vehicles? What's the pool of vehicles they can work on? Is it cars that are registered to them, cars that are registered to them and their spouse or partner, whatever that looks like? Is it their kids' cars? Do we draw a line that it's, you know, parents? Where do we draw that line so they understand? And, and that was a big one for us because My husband's family, when he was a technician, felt like they should get their vehicles worked on for free. And, you know, sometimes that's okay, but sometimes it's not. And so if that boundary needs to be created, it needs to be created at the beginning, not sometime in the middle and might cause hard feelings. So in the offer letter, I recommend that we explore as many of these things as we can and put it in the offer letter. Better.
JeanAnn SaintGrace [00:26:05]:
Um, these are— it's just, it's like any other contract. Let's have a clear, transparent contract so we can get there. So, and then present that, they sign it. If they accept, they sign it and go to work. If they don't, then we've learned something. It's not a waste of time to spend, you know, this could be 10, 15 hours of investment of your time, but what it might cost you to hire the wrong person, those— that time and hour situation is taken out. Like, you're gonna well pay for that if you take the time up front. And, um, it's just so important to do your due diligence.
JeanAnn SaintGrace [00:26:49]:
So I'll tell you a couple of my personal stories. And I'll tell you one that wasn't mine, but I witnessed. We were looking for an experienced technician, probably an AB technician. This guy showed up, he had all the chops, he had a lot of experience. He was coming from a Dodge dealership, a Jeep dealership, Mopar, Dodge, Chrysler, whatever. Was older than both my husband and I, and we'd had people older than us work for us, so I, that I wasn't honestly even concerned about that until we interviewed him. And we interviewed him together. Um, he would not look me in the eye.
JeanAnn SaintGrace [00:27:39]:
If I asked him a question, he would not answer me. And he was kind of smirky, I guess is the best way to put it. He kind of had a kind of, I think I'm smarter than you attitude. And I was like, there's something not right here. There's just something not right here. And, you know, he leaves. My husband and I sit down to talk about the interview. You.
JeanAnn SaintGrace [00:28:13]:
And I'm— full disclosure, our interview process was not this involved at the time. We were much more like, they have a pulse, they're breathing, they have a toolbox, they have the skills, let's pull them in and see what happens. Um, and my husband was like, oh, he's, you know, this and he's that and he's blah blah blah. And I'm like, yeah, but did you notice he won't answer me or he won't talk to me? He won't make eye contact with me. And my husband's like, yeah, yeah, whatever, like that, that doesn't matter. Like, okay, it mattered to me because my My feeling was that if he wouldn't— we're half of the equation. I am an equal partner. I have to give direction to the team.
JeanAnn SaintGrace [00:28:53]:
They need to answer me when I ask a direct question. They need to take direction. They need to take dispatches, whatever that looks like. And I felt like it was a big problem. He didn't. And so, I was very like, I don't want to hire this guy. I think he has a chip on his shoulder because we were younger than him. We were in the position that we were in and he wasn't.
JeanAnn SaintGrace [00:29:20]:
And this is not coming from a judgmental place. These are decisions we have to discern in order to hire a person. So, this is a legitimate place for there to be judgment and is more discernment of, I just don't think this is going to work. And so, I was adamant we should not hire this guy. Guy. And, um, bless my husband's heart, and you all know that he's passed, so I'm not speaking ill of him, and he would have told you she was right. But what happened was I was in the office when, you know, a couple days later, and this guy, the prospect, he pulled up on the— and parked on the street, and he caught my husband while he was moving a car, and they were standing on the sidewalk, and I watched all this happen, and they're talking, and the next thing I see is there's a handshake, and I'm like, uh-oh, Houston, we have a problem. And I was like, oh no.
JeanAnn SaintGrace [00:30:27]:
And so I was like, just maybe you're misinterpreting this, maybe this is not what you think it is, but my husband walks in and he, he was such a sweet soul. He had this big smile on his face and he was so proud of himself. And he's like, I just hired him. And I said, I know you did. And he goes, well, aren't you excited? And I said, no, I'm not excited. I already told you I have these huge— I have these huge feelings about this guy that are not good. Like, this is not going to work. And he goes, well, I hired him.
JeanAnn SaintGrace [00:31:00]:
And I was like, I was like, all right, heaven help us. Let's see how this works out. Maybe I'm wrong. And I don't know how long he lasted. I've probably blocked it out on purpose. But first, the first thing that besides the no eye contact before, you know, he still wouldn't make eye contact with me if I asked him to do something probably 50/50 if it would get done or not. Um, and I was sitting in my office and I had a door to the shop and I heard the strangest sound. And apparently this is the sound of a crescent wrench hitting a steel I-beam, and it makes a hell of a noise.
JeanAnn SaintGrace [00:31:52]:
Maybe you guys have had this before. I didn't know it was a thing. He was a wrench thrower. When he got frustrated, he literally threw wrenches. And I was like, okay, I don't know what this is. I don't know why he's doing this, but doesn't seem reasonable as expensive as tools are that you're throwing them in my shop, right? Like, this is not kindergarten. We're not doing this. So, and because he would not talk to me me.
JeanAnn SaintGrace [00:32:23]:
My husband handled it. I don't even know what he said to him, but it was the most hellacious noise I've ever heard. And, um, I talked to the parts guy at the dealership and he asked, oh well, how's so-and-so doing? And I said, well, he just threw a wrench across the shop. He goes, oh well, I could have told you that. And I was like, we didn't check his references. We didn't know how he would behave in a stressful situation. He was a wrench And, um, the culmination of this whole experience was one day we were just busy. We were just— we were packed.
JeanAnn SaintGrace [00:32:58]:
Cars were packed in everywhere. We had 17 parking spots in the lot. Every one of them was full. Some of them were double parked. We had 4 bays. Every bay was full. Our outside bay was full. We had some cars double stacked.
JeanAnn SaintGrace [00:33:12]:
I bet there were close to 30 cars on the lot day. It was all hands on deck, full scramble. And I was literally jumping in my truck to go get us lunch so I could come back and just— and we wouldn't, you know, we just eat on the go. You guys wouldn't know anything about that, right? And I go, I'm in my truck's in reverse and I'm backing out and I'm obviously watching where I'm backing. And I look up and I see this technician is sitting on his toolbox. And because of where my husband's command post was and where this guy's toolbox was, there was no line of sight because there was like an E-350 van on a lift. So he couldn't see him. And it probably would have been comical if we'd had a video camera catching this because I know I came to a stop, put the truck in gear, threw the door open, walked around the corner, and I'm like, what are you doing? Doing? And he said to me, I don't have anything to do.
JeanAnn SaintGrace [00:34:11]:
If you know about me and the Genghis Khan School of Management, I lost it. I fully lost every ounce of composure I had. And I said, can you see Tim, my husband? Can you see him? And he goes, no. Then can he see you? And he said, no. Then how does he know that you don't have anything to do right now? Why don't you get off behind and go ask him what he needs you to do next. With all of these cars here, do you not think that we don't have something for you to do? Lost it. Not my finest moment, but had it. And so I watched him jump off his toolbox and pitter-patter over there to get his next project.
JeanAnn SaintGrace [00:34:57]:
And I got in my truck and went and got lunch and took a few deep breaths. The guy actually, he quit the next day. He showed up with his trailer and his truck and he was just quietly loading his stuff as we were opening the shop. Never said, "I quit." Never said anything, just packed his stuff and left. And I think I mailed him his last checkbook, his last check. Like, it was, it was bad. But this is why I recommend having at least 2 people in the room when you're interviewing so you don't have this happen, and why having somebody of the opposite sex there too so they can get a different read. And men, I am not taking anything away from you, but you sense people's energy differently than women do.
JeanAnn SaintGrace [00:35:41]:
Women can often sense danger, creepiness, whatever that might look like. And, and you don't have that experience because you're bigger, stronger, more able to defend yourself, where women's instincts are a little more like on alert for or, hey, this person might be dangerous. So please don't discount that. And if you feel something like that, then maybe dig a little deeper. But if it's a no-go, it's a no-go. And it's okay for anybody in the party, whether it's the prospect or the employer, to stop and say, I'm out. Thank you for the opportunity, but we gotta let this one go. And it's no harm, no foul.
JeanAnn SaintGrace [00:36:24]:
It's just so important that if we see any red flags to address them. They might turn out to be nothing. The prospect might be having a day, a bad day. You might be having a bad day. You just don't know what it looks like until you get there. But don't, don't commit until you've seen all of, all of the, the bad side, all of the dark side. Ask them, what are your weaknesses? What are your strengths? You know, most people will tell you the truth if you ask them that in a genuine, authentic way. If you get some response that's like, I don't have any weaknesses, most of us have enough life experience to know that that statement's probably not true.
JeanAnn SaintGrace [00:37:13]:
So just be mindful, be intentional, be aware, listen for the little words that make your little antenna go up., and don't discount that. My other hiring story was an advisor. Again, he supposedly had 10 years of experience. He worked for a big national chain. He gave me references. I didn't check them. Bad on me. Me.
JeanAnn SaintGrace [00:37:47]:
I take 100% responsibility for that. Um, he was charming. He seemed, when he talked to us, like he was reasonable. Um, he answered all the questions correctly. The lack of references should have— he gave me the references, I called them, I couldn't get a hold of anyone. So I did try, um, but I also think there was a part of me that was so desperate that I didn't check far hard enough or give that the weight I should have. Have because it would have saved me from hiring him, him working for 2 weeks. And then we had the moment when, um, we had a, a very special circumstance.
JeanAnn SaintGrace [00:38:30]:
In, in any normal situation, I would not have done this, but we had an elderly gentleman whose wife had been in a car accident that day. He was literally going to pick her up from the car accident and and his brake pads on his F-150 went metal to metal. So not only did they have a car that was being towed off to the collision shop, they also had an F-150 that was their only other car that was metal to metal. And I told the gentleman, it was a Friday, and I said, "Sir, I understand totally your situation. My feeling is we just need to get you on the road for the weekend." We'll get you back in. I know some of these parts aren't available. We're going to get you back in on Monday when they have the parts, have the vehicle down for as short a time as possible and get you back on the road. And that'll give you the weekend to get a rental car, to do everything you need to do to make sure you guys have transport.
JeanAnn SaintGrace [00:39:28]:
But I don't want to tie up your vehicle over the weekend. And the new service advisor knew this. He knew all of this. And when I set him up to sell the job, I told him, you know the situation, we're going to slap pads on it. And I know probably everybody's cringing when I say that, we were going to slap pads on it, let him drive it for the weekend, get it back in and get rotors, get— it needed the calipers rebuilt or it might've even needed new calipers. I don't remember, but the parts were not available.. And so, um, I told him all of this. We're giving the car back to him, or the truck.
JeanAnn SaintGrace [00:40:09]:
We're putting pads on it. We're going to get him back in to do the rest. He's on board with all of it. We just need to tell him how much. So the new service advisor gets on the phone and says, well, we've got it up on the rack and it's taken apart and we can't have parts until Monday. So it's going to cost X amount of dollars and we're going to need it till then. And, and I was like, I was, I was making eye contact with him while he was on the phone, and I was doing one of these, stop talking, put him on hold. I was like, you know, like giving him all the pantomime that I could.
JeanAnn SaintGrace [00:40:45]:
Put him on hold, stop talking. And he just kept on. I reached over and I put the, the, I put, I put the call on hold, and I looked at him, I go, what are you doing? And he said, I'm selling the job. And I said, you're doing everything I told you not to. And he goes, so? Needless to say, I took the phone away from him, I sent him to lunch, I wrote his final check, and when he came back from lunch, I sent him on his merry way. I don't, I don't have an explanation for that one. I don't. But that is one of my giant failings in hiring, was I couldn't get references for him and I hired him anyway.
JeanAnn SaintGrace [00:41:25]:
Totally on me. So you can see from my stories, there's times when I was totally naive or just put my blinders on and hoped for the best. There were times when we did our due diligence when I had, you know, challenges with the person and my husband overrode me because it was still early in our business relationship and he didn't trust my intuition, if you want to call it that. Over time, his opinion of that changed and he started to respect it. And I'll give him credit, all credit due, when that technician walked out that day, he walked back in and goes, "Well, you were right." And I've got to give him a lot of credit for saying that. And he said, "You nailed it from the beginning and I didn't see it." And that's not to say— I'm not telling you guys that because I'm great or anything like that, but that was my experience. And so, I always keep that in mind that different people will see strengths and weaknesses differently. And, you know, my husband was 6'1", he was 210.
JeanAnn SaintGrace [00:42:34]:
He could handle just about anything that came his way. You know, I'm much smaller than him. I, I need tools and implements to defend myself. Um, and he just didn't get the same vibe. So, um, and he wouldn't necessarily, so I'm not even holding that against him. It was just not on his radar to see that. So all of that said, to be very intentional and clear with your hiring. And to also be very clear and intentional with your partners.
JeanAnn SaintGrace [00:43:08]:
So that will segue into— thank you to WorldPak for being our partner on the podcast Shop Talk Her Way. I'm so grateful to them for not only their commitment to the podcast, for their commitment to our industry, WorldPak Training Institute for bringing classes and training to all levels of the shop. They are a tremendously good industry partner for not only for me, but for our industry. And I hope that you guys can find your WorldPak distributor close by and do business with them and that you have a great experience. So thank you to WorldPak and WorldPak Training Institute for being a sponsor and being on our team. So, you know, I'll wrap up with be intentional, have a plan. Clue your team in on what's going on. Let them know you're hiring.
JeanAnn SaintGrace [00:44:03]:
That is key also because you don't want any kind of challenges around, oh, the boss is talking to somebody, who's on the chopping block? We want to be very transparent with our team to let them know when we're hiring. I also recommend that you have a bench. So even if you're not hiring and you have someone come in who might be a good prospect, expect, let them know, hey, we don't have a position for you right now, but if something opens up, we'll be in touch. Because as you know, and I will always tell you, life changes on a dime and you never know when you might need to replace that next person. So have a bench, have a group of people that, you know, if a technician quits or, you know, has a life change and they all of a sudden have to give you 2 weeks' notice and leave, you've got somebody that you can pull in and replace them. If you've got an advisor, same thing. But have a bench, have some depth to your to your team chart so that if something happens and you need to replace a key player, you've got that behind you. So with all of that being said, happy hiring.
JeanAnn SaintGrace [00:45:10]:
Hopefully we've taken some of the luck out of it and added some skill. I wish you all the best in hiring, and it's definitely part of you having your shop your way. Take good care and we'll see you next time.