LWS: Parts Basic Management

There are some fundamental truths about people and their work: everyone wants to do a good job, everyone can do more than they think they can, and everyone is fundamentally lazy. In management and leadership we have to deal with people and processes. That is the job. You lead people and you manage the process.

The job of the manager or supervisor starts with the basic job function description and moves on to standards of performance. Everyone has to understand what is expected of them, as well as accepting that what is expected of them is both achievable and important. The various aspects of management as exposed in this powerful class.

In dealing with people, you also will need to be able to communicate with the employees.  In this program, we explore two of the main forms of communications: praise and criticism. This part of interpersonal relations can be improved. These are skills that can be learned by following a simple plan. We discuss this plan in detail, which has many common elements with both praise and criticism to provide you with better ability in working with your employees.

LWS: Parts Activity Based Management

The use of activity-based management as a management tool, has been relatively recent in our Industry. It was an unintended consequence of the work of Edward Deming, in Japan, and allows dealerships to review activities in a different manner. The use of the sales per employee implies a series of activities and relationships to our work that relies on historical approaches and does not take into account the opportunities to reinvent the operations of the department.

Our business is based on satisfying customer requirements. In order to be able to satisfy these needs we must better utilize technology and information in better and different manners. In many cases organizational transformation, has rarely been done without the attendant review on process effectiveness and market coverage methods.

This program will expose a series of thoughts that will allow the learner to be better able to evaluate the processes and methods in use today. The business world has been inundated with various “new” thinking approaches. This is Industrial Engineering at its’ root which morphed into the Continuous Improvement Movement, to Kaizen, then Six Sigma and finally the 5 S approach today. Each of these approaches is married to financial reporting which allows a more comprehensive review of all we do from an activity-based perspective. You will never regret taking this class.

LWS: Parts Leadership

The management and supervision in business is in many cases misunderstood. You manage process but you have to lead people. Often, we get consumed by our need to improve our processes. Since the 1980’s with the “Japanese” continuous improvement movement we have been obsessed with eliminating non-value added, tasks and processes. But what have we done to inspire management to improve their ability to lead their employees.?

Leadership is a complicated function. It involves compassion, courage, trust, integrity, commitment, loyalty, inspiration, and communication. A true leader will take people to places that they would not have gone to on their own. This program explores the true meaning of leadership and talks about differing leadership styles and their impact on performance.

Leadership has to ensure that the day to day operations are performing and at the same time they must focus on the future. They also have to understand and accept how important managing change is to improvement. They have to be able to look at their businesses with “fresh eyes” to ensure that they can identify and eliminate their “sacred cows.” This is a critical class for anyone in a leadership position.

LWS: Parts Balanced Scorecard

In the parts business we communicate with the marketplace in a variety of methods. We deal with various systems, manually and technologically. We have a responsibility to serve and retain customers while at the same time we have to make money for the business. This is a complicated business.

To assist us in managing the business and help us implement our company strategy we use a business tool that is called the “Balanced Scorecard.” The Balanced Scorecard was developed in the 1990s, designed for use in the planning and implementation of a company’s strategy. The scorecard looks at your business from four directions; finance, internal, innovation and customer. From this vantage point the company can develop a strategy as part of their operating plan.  These plans are meant to help a company achieve its goals.  If a plan cannot be agreed upon and effectively executed, a business cannot effectively reach its goals.

In this class, you will learn the ins and outs of this valuable tool, and the costs we pay in our business when we fail to execute our plans for success in our market.

LWS: Parts Basic Finance

Before we can be of any value to anyone else we have to be of value to ourselves. That is an old adage, but it still rings true. Ignorance is not knowing what to do. How can we know what to do if we don’t understand basic finance?

Here we will expose and explain all aspects of the operating statement, the balance sheet, and the cash flow forecast. These are the three major documents in the world of finance. We will define and describe all of the terms that accountants use. There will be no mystery to basic finance when we are finished. We will explain cost of sales and what it consists of, as well as all of the various expense elements. Personnel Expenses, Operating Expenses, and Fixed Expenses are discussed so that everyone will be able to understand and accept how and why money is spent and how we make it.

The fundamentals of basic finance have been a mystery for too many people for far too long. This class gets past mystery so that the employees, in a parts business will understand the financial impact of each of their decisions.

LWS: Parts Time Management

Time is one of the many elements of our lives that we deal with every day. It is one of those elements, however, that does not change.  We do not have the ability to add more time to a day. As a result of that fact it is important that we use all of the time that we have as effectively and as efficiently as possible.

Rarely do we accomplish that. We do things over and over again, we defer conclusions and decisions, we get interrupted with unrelated issues, we have to deal with meetings and the internet and the telephone. There is a lot to the use of your time.

From your desk, to your email and telephone you will find thirty powerful methods to better use your time. This is not about “efficiently” it is about being more “effective.”

This program will introduce you to different styles of work and a series of steps that you can consider to more effectively manage your time. At the conclusion of the course you will have been exposed to a wide range of options for you to consider that will assist you in managing your time more effectively and efficiently.  Don’t miss out on this powerful class.

LWS: Parts Customer Retention

All of the training and tooling in service, and the inventories and systems in parts, and all the good work by professional salesmen will be wasted if you cannot keep your customer for life. The Japanese taught us that in the 1970’s, and Harvard Business School did the definitive research in the 1980’s. This class deals with the facts of customer retention and “how to” minimize the number of customers that “defect” from your dealership.

The statistical impact of defection on profitability across differing Industry groups is exposed. It is shocking. In the Industrial Distribution business, if you can increase your customer retention 5%, then you can increase your profitability as a Company by 45%. There is no single element of what we do that has the impact on dealership profitability like customer retention. The tools you should use to minimize customer defection are discussed in detail in this impactful class. Everything that we do in the performance of our jobs is at risk if our responsiveness and convenience are not to the customers’ liking. Don’t miss out on this powerful program.

LWS: Parts Delivery Systems

In the parts business we communicate with the marketplace in a variety of methods. With the telephone, with people walking into your store, some customers will send orders by mail, or via a fax, and some use the internet. But the variations of the work don’t stop there: we also have to contend with a variety of “delivery” systems as well. These are not transportation systems. This is a customer service delivery system.

We process sales orders for our customers and we all know that not all customers are created equal. Some customers spend a lot of money with you and deserve to get special treatment. Well, we also have some processes that are cost intensive but also some that are very efficient. These are the customer service delivery systems.

From the customer who does not know the part numbers that they need, to the customer that can order parts from an electronic catalogue on the internet, there are wide ranges of differences. Each of the delivery systems has a different cost component, and that can lead us to provide differentiated services dependent on the delivery system that is chosen by the customer. We explore all aspects of the delivery systems we offer to the market in this important class.

LWS: Parts Make It Matter

Everything that we do in the parts business has a profound impact on our customers, suppliers, coworkers and other stakeholders. There has to be a difference in what and how you do your work that is visible and obvious to everyone that you touch in the performance of your work.

You have to be able to answer two very simple questions. But, they are not that easy to answer. What do you do and what do you provide? Most of us will look at these questions and think it is obvious, it is self-evident. We supply parts. Pretty simple, isn’t it? The trouble with that is that anyone can do that. We have to make a difference. We have to make what we do “matter.”

In this class, we will explore who you are and what you bring to the organization and to the customer. We will explore how and why you make a difference. Each of us has to create our own brand. That is how we will differentiate ourselves and what we do from the crowd. We will explore serving people in the parts business, all that our work means to the market, and how we make a difference. These define how we make it matter.

LWS: Parts Marketing

In this Basic Marketing class, we explore a broadly misunderstood sector of business. It is much more than mailings, promotions, and tradeshows. It is all of the aspects involved in influencing the customer to purchase your products or services.

Marketing is the science of choosing target markets through the use of market analysis and segmentation. This class exposes all aspects of marketing: Relationship Marketing, Business Marketing, Social Marketing and Internal Marketing. In Relationship Marketing, we focus on suppliers and customers, and the goal is to build loyalty. The Business Marketing is all aspects of the traditional marketing functions: advertising, promotion and communications. Social Marketing looks at everything that impacts society. For instance, the impact on the environment from the use of clean engine technology. Internal Marketing, is the broad communications to all employees of everything that we are doing in the business.

This program covers all the basics of marketing: from the four P’s to the more current addition of SIVA. We expose you to everything involved in basic marketing theory today. Without creating the environment where your product or service is understood, you make the job of selling much more difficult. This program aims to provide you with the tools to use to make selling more successful.