I started in this industry, pumping gas to earn extra cash while I was going to university. At the time, gas was .45 cents a liter and the minimum wage was 7.50 or so. Also at that time, women were NOWHERE to be found in the Automotive World. However, fate put me in the best position possible it seems. The owner of the station I worked at also had 4 service bays and two daughters that he had planned to train to run the service counter at his shop. Neither took to the work at the time. But he had a great way of instructing and did not judge me for being a girl. Equally treated, I was put on a path of great success that would shape the rest of my life, my future husband’s life, and the lives of my sons. By the time I was 19, I had become a bit of a tinkerer with my car. My Dad showed me how to change the points and condenser (yes, I am THAT old) and my oil on my ’69 Beetle when I was little more than 16 years old. My Dad is very frugal and was always working in the backyard fixing his cars so he didn’t have to pay someone to do it, so I picked up a lot from him on the weekends that I was with him. He is also a strong speaker, negotiator, and salesman, I used to listen to him selling houses in the 80s boom and later cars. So, I am certainly a product of the “sales” culture. Many of my mannerisms, inflections, and persuasion skills I subconsciously learned from him. My Mom was an extremely dedicated employee. Up early, out the door on time, never late, and was dedicated to making a difference for the residents she was caring for. From my mom, I learned to have a passion for a job well done and to be dedicated to those I serve. She raised me on her own more or less so I learned to be independent very early on. I also was lucky enough to receive the best possible sales training from the one and only McDonald’s at my very first job when I was 14. Who knew that the phrase “Would you like an apple pie with that?” would impact my life forever. This should be part of the curriculum at every school. Sales skills are VITAL to survive in this world. McDonald’s should be everyone’s first job. They train everyone on everything AND THEN put the people in the positions that they are best at. I believe this is why I am a firm believer in cross-training. It is always wise to have a backup for a vital job that must be done. At McDonald's they teach everyone the art of “Suggestive Selling” which is the simplest, and most basic sales principle ever used. You are also imbued with the “Clean as you go” mindset and to always be busy. There is never a time that there is not something to do. It is the same in the service department and especially in the drive-thru. As I was being trained to pump gas, my boss showed me personally what to check under the hood when I was checking the oil. He wanted me to learn the right way to do things from the very beginning. He would say, “First, we remove that big wing nut thing and pull the cover off. Inside is the air filter, then check the brake fluid, power steering fluid, coolant, belts, tires, wipers, and so on”. Demonstrating the whole way. He was surprised that I did what he asked, and was suggesting things like air filters, belts, bulbs, wipers, brake fluid tops or exchanges when the fluid was black, alignments when I saw weird wear on tires, and so on at the pump. As green as I was, I honestly just thought people would rather know what was wrong and have an opportunity to fix it. I had no fear of losing a sale or having people think I was being pushy. The advice was genuine and sincere, based on a need that the customer did not even know they had. He started paying me $1.00 for everything I sold. At the end of every shift, I always earned 60 – 100 extra dollars compared to the boys I worked with who were earning 5 -15 dollars a night. I learned I had to hustle to get to the next car and pop the hood while the gas was pumping and show people what I was finding. Why did I do this? Not because I was greedy or wanted more money. I was honestly afraid the boys would not do a good enough check under the hood and something important could be missed and an opportunity would be lost. I noticed that most people were shocked that their “regular” mechanic didn’t see that and became loyal customers of my boss’s garage in turn. Not really knowing what I was doing, I would just look around, and when I saw black brake fluid, it didn’t seem right to me so I would send the customer to my boss for a chat about brake fluid and why it should be changed. Eventually, I was taking his lead and just selling them at the pump, saying what he said. I just explained it like he was telling it to the customers instead of wasting time and walking them inside. I was sending more people to his counter from the pump. It was clear to him that I had a sales skill that was part of my DNA. It was natural. Within a couple of months, he put me on the counter to help him as an Advisor and began to train me on everything. They say ignorance begets more confidence than does knowledge. I was a shining example of that. I was eager to learn, eager to make a difference and I was excited about the things I was doing. When an estimate came from the mechanic, my boss would explain how to present the required repairs, and what I could look for that the mechanic did not put, and I took that direction to the letter and did it. Big estimates did not scare me, because he was not scared of them. He was excited by them. He would like at it like a puzzle he had to unlock so he could present it in a way that made sense to the customer and they would hopefully see value in it and go ahead with the work. We went through the “what’s” and how much, when it was time to call the customer, I would say how much it was and I would just ask if they wanted to do it or not. Many people said no, but many people said yes! No words can describe how I felt when I sold a big job. Adrenalin and dopamine were suddenly pumping and I was addicted. More and more big jobs started going through the shop and the technicians were loving it. If I didn’t understand what they were fixing or what it did, I could take 5 steps out to the shop and see it, feel it, and thus explain that better to customers when they needed or wanted more information. Generally, though I kept it simple. Most people have no idea and or have no interest in the intricacies of the operation of the whosits and widgets on their vehicles. More or less, they want to know how much, and most importantly, HOW LONG the repair will take. For those that wanted super technical info, I had to learn how to prepare for them differently as the techs back then would not dare talk on the phone. I started to have the techs teach me about combustion and how fuel delivery worked. I used to help them with repairs when I was not busy on the counter. Slowly I started fixing tires, changing bulbs, and wipers and going on road tests to recreate issues customers were having. My car knowledge expanded a great deal in the first 5 years. Did I mess up? Yes, gloriously at times. But each time I learned a better way to say or present what I was trying to sell. My boss was always supportive and always showed me a better way when needed. He worked beside me for months until I was ready to handle it all on my own. Slowly, as time passed, I started to assist with repairs, hold this, pump the brakes, try to grab this my hand is too big, read me that pinout test. Or, a balance that tire, change that oil while I do the brakes and on and on. Fast forward a few years, I found myself at my first dealership. A very busy Dodge store. My manager and I worked together for 10 years, most of them amazing. I had to learn dispatching because for a few of those years there was virtually no one to hire. Most of the time we have to think out of the basic “dispatch box” and ram things in the shop to get it all done. We would book 90 cars a day and, in the drive, thru, there was me and usually 2 or 3 green Advisors. Honestly, I felt like an air traffic controller because my desk would have a lineup of customers that would only talk to me, mechanics that needed jobs dispatched, and other people asking where something was or how to do something that needed to be done and no one knew how. I was taking care of 60-70 work orders a day at the peak of it all because the other advisors could not handle more than 10-15 max. My sucess at that dealership knew no bounds. The records I set there still hold today decades later. Everywhere I go I set new ones that are way higher than anyone could have imagined. Through the years, I have been a Service Manager, a Fixed Ops Manager, and a Regional Fixed Ops Manager. With each position, I have learned more and more about myself and the entire world that makes up what we call service. But really, the most important thing I have come to understand is, that you need to learn “the people” as much as you learn the vehicles, the processes, the CRM, and the strategies.