ChatGTP and AI Foundation Will Change Everything!
Guest writer John Anderson is tackling a topic that is the bane of school teachers everywhere: the advent of AI. In “ChatGTP and AI Foundation Will Change Everything,” John addresses the ways in which these technologies will change your business, your operations, and your future. He wants every reader to know this is no joke.
The Plot
Imagine you’re a heavy equipment dealer, running a dealership for one of the big brands like John Deere, Caterpillar, or Komatsu. You’ve got a lot on your plate – managing inventory, handling sales, handling customer service issues, and keeping the books in order. And then, you hear about something called ChatGPT.
At first, you might be wondering – what is ChatGPT? And more importantly, how is it going to affect my dealership? Well, let me break it down for you in simple terms.
First things first, let us talk about AI, or Artificial Intelligence. Essentially, AI is when a computer is able to do things that normally require human intelligence, like understanding natural language, recognizing images, or making decisions. And ChatGPT is a specific type of AI called a “language model.” Essentially, it’s a computer program that can understand and generate text, kind of like a super-smart autocomplete feature on your phone.
So, how could this be used in a heavy equipment dealership? Let me give you a few examples.
First, let us talk about sales. Imagine you’ve got a customer who’s interested in buying a new excavator. They have a lot of questions – what’s fuel efficiency? What kind of attachments does it come with? How does it compare to other models? Instead of having to answer all these questions yourself, you could have ChatGPT do it for you. It could understand the customers’ questions and provide them with accurate and detailed answers, leaving you free to handle other tasks.
Next, let’s talk about customer service. Imagine you’ve got a customer who’s having a problem with their excavator. They’re not sure what’s wrong with it, but they need it fixed as soon as possible. Instead of having to troubleshoot the problem yourself, you could have ChatGPT do it for you. It could understand the customer’s description of the problem, and provide them with a list of workable solutions, leaving you free to handle other tasks.
Lastly, let us talk about administrative tasks. Imagine you’ve got a customer who’s looking for a specific part for their excavator. Instead of having to search through the inventory yourself, you could have ChatGPT do it for you. It could understand the customer’s request and provide them with a list of parts that match their request, leaving you free to handle other tasks.
So, as you can see, ChatGPT has the potential to free up a lot of your time and resources, allowing you to focus on more important tasks. But how could this change the dealership in the future?
Well, for starters, it could make your dealership more efficient and productive. With ChatGPT handling all the routine tasks, you and your employees could focus on the more important things, like developing new business and building relationships with customers.
It could also make your dealership more accessible to customers. With ChatGPT, customers could get the information they need 24/7, without having to wait for a human to be available. This could be especially useful for customers in other time zones, or for customers who need information outside of regular business hours.
It could also make your dealership more cost-effective. With ChatGPT handling all the routine tasks, you wouldn’t have to hire as many employees to handle them, which could save you a lot of money in the long run.
Now, I know what you’re thinking – “But what about my employees? Are they going to lose their jobs?” And the answer is – probably not. While ChatGPT can manage a lot of routine tasks, it’s not going to replace human employees altogether. Instead, it is more likely that ChatGPT will change the responsibilities of your employees. Instead of handling routine tasks, they could focus on more important tasks, like developing new business and building relationships with customers. This could even lead to an increase in job satisfaction for your employees, as they’ll have the opportunity to do more meaningful work.
And, let’s be real here – ChatGPT is not going to be able to handle everything. It’s not going to be able to shake hands with customers, make a killer cup of coffee, or tell a dad joke to lighten the mood. It’s important to remember that while ChatGPT can handle a lot of routine tasks, it’s not a replacement for human interaction and relationship building.
So, in conclusion, ChatGPT is a type of AI that can understand and generate text. It has the potential to make your heavy equipment dealership more efficient, more accessible, and more cost-effective. But, it’s important to remember that it’s not going to replace human employees altogether. Instead, it’s going to change the responsibilities of your employees and open up new opportunities for them to focus on more important tasks. And let’s be real, who doesn’t want to focus on more important tasks?
So, embrace the power of ChatGPT, and watch as it takes your dealership to new heights. Just don’t let it start making dad jokes, okay? That is our job.
The Plot Twist
This blog post was written in one pass, entirely by ChatGPT, with simple instructions. It produced the examples, the ideas, the explanation and even the humor in under 30 seconds. The entire process from the instruction to the last word took under 1 minute.
The instruction was Compose a blog post of around 2000 words. The purpose is to explain what ChatGPT is in simple terms to readers and how it will affect the heavy equipment dealer in the future. Assume the reader has no idea what ChatGTP is and has technical education. Include a brief explanation of AI and what ChatGTP is. Then move on to how it would be used in a heavy equipment dealership like John Deere, Caterpillar or Komatsu dealer. Give several different examples ranging from sales, customer service to administrative tasks. Next present some ideas on how it could be used to change the dealership in the future. Lastly explain what impact this will have on the dealership in terms of process change and employee responsibilities.
This is the game changer, the apocalyptic change to the way business will be conducted and it’s already here. If you don’t embrace and adapt to this technology you will not be here, it is really that simple.
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Equipment Dealer Technical School Advisory Board Support Plan
Equipment Dealer Technical School Advisory Board Support Plan
Our new guest writer, Ron Wilson has had the honor to work 41 years in the dealer equipment network in roles that included various parts and service management positions. He has spent time in the marketing department creating a data analytics team to utilize various data sources to improve existing and identify new revenue channels. Implemented pricing models that established market-based pricing models in the product support areas. He has expanded a training department’s capabilities to support technical and people skills development that included applying the Kirkpatrick training model and implementing virtual training relating to the technical and people skills development during the pandemic. Introduced dealer classes that qualified for college credit at the community college level and transferred toward a four-year degree program at the local university. His first blog post for Learning Without Scars is a valuable contribution to our Lifelong Learning series: “Equipment Dealer Technical School Advisory Board Support Plan.”
Equipment dealers, other donors, and the various technical schools spend a considerable amount of time, effort, and finances to support the ongoing efforts of education and training relating to our industry. Unfortunately, often the contributions are not properly aligned with providing the best educational environment for the students, and our future employees.
The following information is to provide a guide that will review, identify, and provide focus of the resources that are being provided to the various technical schools. This is only a guide, and does not include all the answers, but does provide directions that will improve the education and knowledge of our industry’s future employees.
Table of Contents for the Technical School Advisory Board Support Plan
Purpose and Roles of Dealer’s Technical School Advisory Board.
Purpose Statement:
The purpose of this guide is to help in the development and management of the relationships with the various schools based on their Career and Technical Education (CTE) programs that are related to the skill sets needed within equipment dealerships. The focus of the support provides a common approach for industry and education to work together to close the gap in skill sets and the number of vacancies in the technician job roles within the dealership.
Advisory Board Roles:
The dealer’s Technical Training Manager is responsible for maintaining a current list of the CTE schools, points of contact, and ongoing relationship with each school based on an individual plan for each school.
Advisory Board Members:
Recommendations of who should serve on the Advisory Board:
Relationship with Each School:
The relationship with each school may vary based on the:
Scheduled Meetings:
Structure of the Dealership’s Technical School Advisory Board.
Role of the equipment dealer’s members of the Technical School Advisory Board:
To define the dealer’s specific training needs and assist in the communication and development of training material that will link the specific schools to the skill level requirements of the equipment dealer’s service operations. The intent is to close the gap on the material being taught in the technical schools’ basic skills, as compared to the needs within the dealership’s shops.
Dealer members will at least include:
Technical School members will at least include:
The technical school’s participation will be critical to assist in the types of support needed for each school. The support provided can range from serving on the school’s advisory board, providing technical material that can be adapted to the school’s curriculum to meet the needs and obtaining classroom aids the schools can utilize within their programs.
Planning, Conducting, and Participating in Technical Schools Advisory Group Meetings/Events.
Planning, conducting, and participating in the technical schools’ advisory meetings/events will fall into three categories:
Assessing the Support to the Technical Schools
Limited Resources- We all have limited resources (time, talents, and dollars), therefore it is critical to focus on areas of positive impact with high results. In an effort to match the needs of the school and the support the dealership can provide a list of criteria, as a guide in defining the type and level of support to be provided to the technical schools.
The criteria will focus on:
An assessment form should be developed to assist in the review of each school. The assessment is only a guide to decisions being made to determine the level of support to a school.
Levels of Involvement With Various Technical Schools
Involvement with the various technical schools may occur through various avenues:
Equipment Dealer’s Industry Involvement in Technical Training
There are several opportunities for dealerships to participate in the development of industry wide skilled technicians by working with the various technical schools. The following are some examples of being involved at an industry level, which may still be combined with a technical school at some level.
Local Trade Associations
National Trade Associations-
SkillsUSA–
Is a partnership. students, teacher. and industries working together to ensure America has a skilled workforce. SkillsUSA empowers its members to become world-class workers, leaders and responsible American citizens. SkillsUSA improves the quality of America’s skilled work force through a structured program of citizenship, leadership, employability, technical and professional skills training. The program enhances the lives and careers of students, instructors and industry representatives as they strive to be champions at work.
SkillsUSA serves more than 300,000 students and instructors annually. The organization has 13,000 school chapters in 54 state and territorial associations. More than 14,500 instructors and administrators are professional members of SkillsUSA.
For information about the national level, visit skillsusa.org
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Friday Filosophy v.02.10.2023
Friday Filosophy v.02.10.2023
In Friday Filosophy v.02.10.2023, Ron Slee shares quotes and thoughts for your consideration from the French poet Charles Baudelaire.
Charles Pierre Baudelaire: (9 April 1821 – 31 August 1867) was a French poet who also produced notable work as an essayist, art critic and translator. His poems exhibit mastery in the handling of rhyme and rhythm, contain an exoticism inherited from Romantics, but are based on observations of real life.
Baudelaire was educated in Lyon, where he boarded. At 14, he was described by a classmate as “much more refined and distinguished than any of our fellow pupils…we are bound to one another…by shared tastes and sympathies, the precocious love of fine works of literature.” Baudelaire was erratic in his studies, at times diligent, at other times prone to “idleness”. Later, he attended the Lycée Louis-le-Grand in Paris, studying law, a popular course for those not yet decided on any particular career. He began to frequent prostitutes and may have contracted gonorrhea and syphilis during this period. He also began to run up debts, mostly for clothes. Upon gaining his degree in 1839, he told his brother “I don’t feel I have a vocation for anything.” His stepfather had in mind a career in law or diplomacy, but instead Baudelaire decided to embark upon a literary career. His mother later recalled: “Oh, what grief! If Charles had let himself be guided by his stepfather, his career would have been very different…He would not have left a name in literature, it is true, but we should have been happier, all three of us.”
His stepfather sent him on a voyage to Calcutta, India in 1841 in the hope of ending his dissolute habits. The trip provided strong impressions of the sea, sailing, and exotic ports, that he later employed in his poetry. (Baudelaire later exaggerated his aborted trip to create a legend about his youthful travels and experiences, including “riding on elephants”.) On returning to the taverns of Paris, he began to compose some of the poems of “Les Fleurs du Mal”. At 21, he received a sizable inheritance but squandered much of it within a few years. His family obtained a decree to place his property in trust, which he resented bitterly, at one point arguing that allowing him to fail financially would have been the one sure way of teaching him to keep his finances in order.
Baudelaire became known in artistic circles as a dandy and free-spender, going through much of his inheritance and allowance in a short period of time. During this time, Jeanne Duval became his mistress. She was rejected by his family. His mother thought Duval a “Black Venus” who “tortured him in every way” and drained him of money at every opportunity. Baudelaire made a suicide attempt during this period.
His most famous work, a book of lyric poetry titled Les Fleurs du mal (The Flowers of Evil), expresses the changing nature of beauty in the rapidly industrializing Paris during the mid-19th century. Baudelaire’s highly original style of prose-poetry influenced a whole generation of poets including Paul Verlaine, Arthur Rimbaud and Stéphane Mallarmé, among many others. He is credited with coining the term modernity (modernité) to designate the fleeting, ephemeral experience of life in an urban metropolis, and the responsibility of artistic expression to capture that experience. Marshall Berman has credited Baudelaire as being the first Modernist. Baudelaire is one of the major innovators in French literature. His poetry was influenced by the French romantic poets of the earlier 19th century, although its attention to the formal features of verse connects it more closely to the work of the contemporary “Parnassians”. As for theme and tone, in his works we see the rejection of the belief in the supremacy of nature and the fundamental goodness of man as typically espoused by the romantics and expressed by them in rhetorical, effusive and public voice in favor of a new urban sensibility, an awareness of individual moral complexity, an interest in vice (linked with decadence) and refined sensual and aesthetic pleasures, and the use of urban subject matter, such as the city, the crowd, individual passers-by, all expressed in highly ordered verse, sometimes through a cynical and ironic voice. Formally, the use of sound to create atmosphere, and of “symbols” (images that take on an expanded function within the poem), betray a move towards considering the poem as a self-referential object, an idea further developed by the Symbolists Verlaine and Mallarmé, who acknowledge Baudelaire as a pioneer in this regard.
Beyond his innovations in versification and the theories of symbolism and “correspondences”, an awareness of which is essential to any appreciation of the literary value of his work, aspects of his work that regularly receive much critical discussion include the role of women, the theological direction of his work and his alleged advocacy of “satanism”, his experience of drug-induced states of mind, the figure of the dandy, his stance regarding democracy and its implications for the individual, his response to the spiritual uncertainties of the time, his criticisms of the bourgeois, and his advocacy of modern music and painting (e.g., Wagner, Delacroix). He made Paris the subject of modern poetry. He brought the city’s details to life in the eyes and hearts of his readers.[
The Time is Now.
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The New Style of Leadership is a Developmental Process
The New Style of Leadership is a Developmental Process
After a brief hiatus, guest writer and coach Floyd Jerkins is back with a new blog for our Coaches Corner: The New Style of Leadership is a Developmental Process.
What’s the most important asset in your business? If your reply is about the facility or the brand of products you sell, hang on for a second. The reality is your people represent business’s greatest asset.
Leaders have much better success motivating their employees’ creativity and challenging work when they take the employees’ perspective and invite them to generate their own self-endorsed work goals.
The new style of leadership is a developmental process. When you replace giving directives and commands with working patiently and diligently to see the situation from the other person’s point of view, you have better success motivating others. Gathering input and suggestions to pull all that information together to offer some constructive goals and strategies creates sustainable changes. Although these approaches to motivating and engaging others are somewhat difficult, they are well worth the effort.
Leaders use certain behaviors to engage and motivate employees. They know they cannot control employee motivation.
Optimizing internal human resources is one of the quickest methods to add profit to the bottom line. To scale and leverage a business requires a strategy that makes sense. Learning how to maximize effective working relationships tends to improve with training and a company-wide developmental program.
Creating intentional strategies to maximize the return on your investment in your people just makes good common sense and is a good business decision. We get into business to make money. When you follow my dynamic living articles, you know having fun and enjoying life can be accomplished while you own or work in a thriving business. To think you work 100 hours a week but don’t have time to enjoy life is not a fulfilling lifestyle.
Leaders who recognize there is more potential to develop people than there are technical improvements or cost-cutting measures outperform those who don’t.
Numerous studies reveal every year that, without a doubt, the top 1 or 2 reasons talented people leave their place of employment are because of the culture and the way their supervisor treats them.
A leader always knows their own strengths and weaknesses. They want to maximize employees’ strengths and ensure their weaknesses do not weaken their strengths. They are self-learners and seek to learn new attitudes and skills to maximize their effectiveness. The goal is to be the leader that followers like to follow.
Don’t think you can apply a one-size solution to improve your leadership capacity in your business. Improving one’s leadership abilities requires more than the five-step approach that many suggest. Each person is different, so their strengths and weaknesses are different. The learning path they need is unique to them.
Reading my articles, you know then that being effective and efficient can easily make more money in less time. A business with culture and leadership issues doesn’t mean the company isn’t profitable. It’s just not as profitable or satisfying to operate as it could be. It could be subject to chronic issues that could cause a business to fail quickly. Measuring the cost of turnover can lead to a loss of sleep at night. The numbers are staggering to realize, but there is an even more significant issue with many relatively easy solutions when leaders use the appropriate leadership style.
People issues cost your business about 25% of its efficiency.
Your business improves when your people improve, and leaders and management lead that process to affect the culture positively. An employee who needs consistent attention and coaching can easily cost you more time than they’re worth. You want to see them growing into a role vs. being shoved because they don’t have the right skills or attitude. Moving people into different positions to find what they are best suited is easily an intentional strategy to improve overall performance. You just have to do this for the right reasons.
Middle management people are often overlooked and don’t get the respect they deserve. Their ability to get the job done is a duplicatable trait, and many I know enjoy coaching others. They typically have wonderful insight into what works and what doesn’t. When one quits or dies, you know first-hand how painful and costly they can be to replace.
Unleashing the creativity of your management staff unlocks the controls to your business’s growth. There is more power to solve business problems and grow the opportunities when you unleash this natural creative energy you already have at your fingertips.
Motivation is a complex process to explain and equally difficult to realize fully. Science tells us that motives are internal experiences that can be categorized into needs, cognitions, and emotions that are influenced by a business’s culture.
These internal and external forces highlight how we can intervene to increase motivation. Depending on the motivational situation we are dealing with, we can design interventions that target physiological or psychological needs and make adjustments to the environment to create the opportunity for increased motivation.
“Among all the prospects that man can have, the most comforting is, on the basis of his present moral condition, to look forward to something permanent and to further progress toward a still better prospect.” Immanuel Kant
Finding what is easy to do is rarely what is effective. You often have to go back to the drawing board to do the challenging work of designing effective interventions and motivational support.
Unleash Creativity in Your Most Valuable Asset — Your People
Creating a learning and teaching environment creates a progressive culture that employees like. Key leaders with specific knowledge of performing a particular task or set of functions can quickly become teachers. Documenting these processes is a wonderful best practice to implement while creating a clearer pathway to scaling the business.
Many times, a one-on-one is needed to foster an individual’s talents. Based on the assessment of a group of leaders, they may require classroom-style training so they all hear the same organizational message, and you can measure the anticipated outcomes.
Those you’ve identified as up-and-coming leaders may need more clearly defined learning pathways and resources. Other individuals may require a personalized approach utilizing inside or outside resources.
Various classroom, online learning, and one-to-one resources are available and cost-effective today; yes, even executive coaching services are available. My service fits nicely into this kind of developmental and implementation work.
Remember, in most businesses, there is more potential to develop people than technical improvements or cost-cutting measures. Create that learning pathway so your young and mature leaders can be far more effective at influencing and optimizing your most important asset. You are better together.
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Strategic Partners in Employee Development
Strategic Partners in Employee Development
Ron Slee makes an important announcement in his blog post, “Strategic Partners in Employee Development.”
An important step in the employee training world is taking place. Learning Without Scars is joining into a Strategic Partnership with four other businesses involved in employee development and training.
The McDonald Group, Inc.
Over the past four decades of collaborating with dealer management teams to help them improve profitability, market share, cash flow, and customer retention Walter McDonald has built a series of powerful learning tools. The focus of the McDonald Group is on working with and coaching dealer leadership teams worldwide to build their knowledge and skills on how to employ world-class best practices and achieve high-profit dealer benchmark performance levels The Group has recently published their 10-volume Master’s Program in Dealer Management book set. McDonaldGroupinc.com
Winsbyinc.com.
Winsby offers machinery dealer marketing services that work. They will build your customer email lists, create, and send effective emails, conduct customer satisfaction surveys, manage your website, and produce all the creative. The results of their work are phenomenal: customer retention is 30% higher, customer spending increases 2-3 times and customer purchase frequency increases 2-3 times. Contact Debbie Frakes, Managing Director, Winsby, Inc. 312-870-5678, df*****@*******nc.com.
HIVEQR.com.
HIVE Quick Response. First-trip service job completion is essential for improved customer satisfaction and technician productivity. The HIVE quick response system starts with placing encrypted decals with unique identifiers on each piece of equipment. These include model and serial numbers, GPS location, and other vital information. In 45 seconds, a service request can be submitted and your team will have all the vital information they need from the start. No more spending countless hours on the phone tracking down information and no more frustrated customers stuck waiting on hold. Results? 60% increase in first-time completion. 200% reduction on follow-up phone calls. Fifteen percent increase in technician utilization. 100% accurate equipment information. Contact: Steve Ross, President, HIVEQR, 407-234-4150. St********@****qr.com.
LearningWithoutScars.com.
For Dealers in need of job function-based online training classes, seminars, and webinars, LWS has developed an extensive catalog of relevant classes and job function training. LWS supports six distinct PartsDepartment employee categories with 36 individual courses and six Service Department positions with 36 individual courses. Overall LSW has eighteen job function skills assessments and 108 subject-specific classes available today. I highly recommend Ron Slee and his team for his highly popular dealer training resources. Contact: Ron Slee, 760-413-0708, ron@learningwithoutscars.com
BCAKC.com.
For manufacturers interested in customized support for dealer service and parts department training programs, Burgio, Cooney & Associates offers facilitator-led workshops, interactive web-based training, self-study workbooks, and video technologies. BCA designs gap assessments, curriculum development, training material production, and expert delivery. The BCA team members are experts in training—sales and customer service, technical skills, product knowledge, and supervisory skills. When your front-line employees are well-trained, they are better prepared to answer customers’ questions and offer solutions, making customers more likely to return and again. Contact: Michael Cooney, 816-979-1414, mi*********@***kc.com.
In 45 seconds, a service request can be submitted and your team will have all of the vital information they need from the start. No more spending countless hours on the phone tracking down information, and no more frustrated customers stuck waiting on hold. In 45 seconds, a service request can be submitted and your team will have all of the vital information they need from the start. No more spending countless hours on the phone tracking down information, and no more frustrated customers stuck waiting on hold.
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What Impacts Dealer Absorption Rate?
What Impacts Dealer Absorption Rate?
Our new guest writer, Walter McDonald, is President of The McDonald Group, Inc. Over the past 4 decades has developed and presented over 2,600 machinery dealer management workshops. He recently completed publication of his 10-volume Master’s Program in Dealer Management. “What Impacts Dealer Absorption Rate?” is his first blog post for Learning Without Scars.
The absolute number representing “Absorption Rate” is interesting but not a call to action. It only indicates your current position relative to the target score of 100%, a very desirable financial goal for your machinery dealership. Many dealer managers look at their current score and say “WOW!” with little insight into how to make any improvements.
This Absorption Rate formula is something that you can use when you review Absorption Rate and discuss it with your management team. I recommend your team review the components of Absorption Rate weekly. To support your discussions, produce a weekly flash report of your sales and gross profit by parts, service, and rentals plus departmental and overall dealer operating expenses.
The formula below illustrates inputs to Absorption Rate from Service, Parts, and Rentals.
Absorption Rate Formula
Gross Profit from Parts, Service Labor and Rentals
Absorption Rate = Parts, Service Labor and Rentals
Fixed Operating Expenses
Fixed Operating Expenses are those dealer expenses that do not change or vary with sales volume. Sales Commissions are variable and are not included in Absorption Rate calculation. There are other possible variable expenses, but for purposes of simplicity, we only use the big one, sales commissions, in this formula.
In your management review, ask what we can do to improve our position in each area.
Above line (numerator) items that can be controlled to improve Absorption Rate score include:
Below the line (denominator) items include expenses generated by each department.
If you and your management team review the components of Absorption Rate weekly and have your ultimate destination of 100% in focus, progress will be much easier.
I would welcome your comments: wa**@**************nc.com
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The Lazy Management Problem
The Lazy Management Problem
Guest writer Alex Kraft takes his cue for timing from Tom Brady’s retirement (again) in his blog post, “The Lazy Management Problem.”
I’ve wanted to write something on this topic for a while and Tom Brady’s retirement presented the perfect opportunity. I’m not surprised at many sports stats, but this graphic highlighting Brady’s excellence in his 40s compared to his 20s blew me away. More TD passes from the age of 40–46 than in his 20s? Ridiculous.
First Career – 21,564 Passing Yards – 147 Passing TD’s – Three Super Bowl Wins
Second Career – 40,018 Passing Yards – 309 Passing TD’s – Two Super Bowl Wins
Third Career – 27,632 Passing Yards – 193 Passing TD’s – Two Super Bowl Wins
Where am I going with this? We all see the same articles every day covering a labor shortage and others questioning the work ethic of the younger generation. There is some truth to both premises, but no one ever talks about the employer’s role. From my perspective, companies bear some responsibility for this problem by not having any structure to develop their employees.
There is a lazy management problem.
Everyone wants a Tom Brady in his 30s and 40s, they don’t want the 6th round pick Tom Brady that needs a ton of coaching and development. Those early Patriot teams relied on a strong defense and a conservative offensive game plan. Brady made some key plays at opportune times, but he was largely a ‘game manager’ early in his career. The Patriots developed Brady and gave him more responsibility as he improved. The offense evolved into a more aggressive pass-happy scheme that relied on Brady throwing 40+ passes per game, which was the exact opposite of those early Brady led Patriot teams.
I have seen the lazy management problem in heavy equipment my entire career. Every sales manager wants to “manage” the A+ sales rep who kills it every year. Conversely, they want to fire the low performer immediately. I’m not suggesting that every low performer can become an A+ contributor, but how many managers do you see devoting considerable time and effort into helping those low performers improve? It almost never happens. Everyone wants to go on sales calls with the A+ sales rep to their biggest accounts. Rarely do they collaborate with the young struggling rep as they try and build their territory. The younger inexperienced employees become a nuisance to the managerial layer. We get easily frustrated by the basic mistakes they make, by the “stupid” questions they ask, and how they just don’t seem to get it.
The same climate exists with younger technicians. How many companies have a formal plan to develop inexperienced technicians? Sending technicians to a product training school every 6 months doesn’t count. There doesn’t seem to be much thought put into what jobs these younger techs should focus on. Instead, managers are in reactionary mode dispatching an available technician to the next repair job without any real understanding of their capability. If that technician screws up the job, he or she isn’t any good. It is sink or swim. Companies are expecting everyone to hit grand slams right out the gate. We are setting people up to fail and blaming them when things go wrong.
The excuses are all the same. Managers will complain about how they are a lean company and don’t have the resources available to provide ongoing training. Blah Blah Blah. Why are the excuses always pointing to what other people need to provide? What then is the role of a manager? What are managers paid to do? Their collective laziness is making the job an unnecessary layer. This reality is devastating for organizations. It creates employee burnout, frustration, and leads to more turnover. I have seen this firsthand. I remember jotting down names of former coworkers in different positions over the years. The numbers were staggering. With some self-reflection, I realized that it was unlikely that we hired incorrectly those 50+ times, maybe the problem was our company not supporting/developing those 50+ people?
My intent is not to place blame solely on employers. I wanted to point out that the discussion around labor mostly seems to blame workers for not choosing a certain path or for a lack of work ethic. There is a joint responsibility between employees and companies. Not everyone works as hard and is devoted like Tom Brady. His desire, work ethic, and selflessness are huge parts of his unparalleled success. But the Patriots organization deserves a lot of recognition for helping him grow into the player he became. Maybe instead of hoping that more people decide to become technicians or younger people work harder, we ask ourselves ‘how do we help our existing employees become the best version of themselves?’ Control what you can control. I bet anyone reading this can think of a few managers they have worked with over time who would’ve said, ‘this kid Tom Brady sucks…he’s a 6th round pick for a reason!”
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ChatGPT and the Dealer Network
ChatGPT and the Dealer Network
Managing Director Ron Slee writes this week about the positives of all of the easily accessible artificial intelligence programs available today with “ChatGPT and the Dealer Network.”
The advent of advanced language models like OpenAI’s ChatGPT has brought about a change in basic assumptions in the way businesses operate. In the capital goods industry, ChatGPT is expected to have a profound impact on dealer networks and the behavior of those involved.
One of the ways in which ChatGPT is expected to impact the capital goods industry is by improving the efficiency of dealer networks. By providing quick and accurate answers to customer queries, ChatGPT can reduce the response time of dealers, thereby improving the customer experience. Additionally, ChatGPT’s ability to understand and interpret complex technical queries means that dealers can offer better solutions and services to their customers.
Another way in which ChatGPT will impact the capital goods industry is by enabling personalized experiences for customers. ChatGPT’s ability to understand the context and intent behind customer queries means that it can tailor its responses to the specific needs and preferences of each customer. This will allow dealers to offer more personalized and relevant solutions, leading to increased customer satisfaction and loyalty.
ChatGPT will also have a significant impact on the training and development of dealer networks. By providing real-time, accurate answers to technical queries, ChatGPT can serve as a valuable resource for dealers to expand their knowledge and skills. This will lead to better-informed and more confident dealers, who can offer more value to their customers.
Furthermore, ChatGPT has the potential to transform the way capital goods dealers manage their inventory. By analyzing customer data and predicting demand, ChatGPT can help dealers optimize their inventory levels, reducing waste and improving profitability.
In conclusion, the advent of ChatGPT is set to have a profound impact on the capital goods industry and its dealer networks. By improving efficiency, enabling personalized experiences, supporting training and development, and optimizing inventory management, ChatGPT has the potential to revolutionize the way dealers do business and serve their customers.
The time is now.
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Friday Filosophy v.02.03.2023
Friday Filosophy v.02.03.2023
Our Managing Director, Ron Slee, shares quotes and words of wisdom from Robert Frost in Friday Filosophy v.02.03.2023.
Robert Lee Frost (March 26, 1874 – January 29, 1963) was an American poet. His work was initially published in England before it was published in the United States. Known for his realistic depictions of rural life and his command of American colloquial speech,[ Frost frequently wrote about settings from rural life in New England in the early 20th century, using them to examine complex social and philosophical themes. Frequently honored during his lifetime, Frost is the only poet to receive four Pulitzer Prizes for Poetry. He became one of America’s rare “public literary figures, almost an artistic institution”. He was awarded the Congressional Gold Medal in 1960 for his poetic works. On July 22, 1961, Frost was named poet laureate of Vermont.
Robert Frost was born in San Francisco to journalist William Prescott Frost Jr. and Isabelle Moodie. His father was a descendent of Nicholas Frost of Tiverton, Devon, England, who had sailed to New Hampshire in 1634 on the Wolfrana, and his mother was a Scottish immigrant. Frost’s father was a teacher and later an editor of the San Francisco Evening Bulletin (which later merged with the San Francisco Examiner), and an unsuccessful candidate for city tax collector. After his death on May 5, 1885, the family moved across the country to Lawrence, Massachusetts, under the patronage of Robert’s grandfather William Frost Sr., who was an overseer at a New England mill. Frost graduated from Lawrence High School in 1892. Frost’s mother joined the Swedenborgian church and had him baptized in it, but he left it as an adult.
For forty-two years – from 1921 to 1962 – Frost spent almost every summer and fall teaching at the Bread Loaf School of English of Middlebury College, at its mountain campus at Ripton, Vermont. He is credited with being a major influence upon the development of the school and its writing programs. The college now owns and maintains his former Ripton farmstead, a National Historic Landmark, near the Bread Loaf campus. In 1921, Frost accepted a fellowship teaching post at the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, where he resided until 1927, when he returned to teach at Amherst. While teaching at the University of Michigan, he was awarded a lifetime appointment at the university as a Fellow in Letters. The Robert Frost Ann Arbor home was purchased by The Henry Ford Museum in Dearborn, Michigan, and relocated to the museum’s Greenfield Village site for public tours. Throughout the 1920s, Frost also lived in his colonial-era house in Shaftsbury, Vermont. In 2002, the house was opened to the public as the Robert Frost Stone House Museum in 2002 and was given to Bennington College in 2017.
Frost died in Boston on January 29, 1963, of complications from prostate surgery. He was buried in the Old Bennington Cemetery in Bennington, Vermont. His epitaph, from the last line of his poem, “The Lesson for Today” (1942), is: “I had a lover’s quarrel with the world.”
Frost’s personal life was plagued by grief and loss. In 1885, when he was 11, his father died of tuberculosis, leaving the family with just eight dollars. Frost’s mother died of cancer in 1900. In 1920, he had to commit his younger sister Jeanie to a mental hospital, where she died nine years later. Mental illness apparently ran in Frost’s family, as both he and his mother suffered from depression, and his daughter Irma was committed to a mental hospital in 1947. Frost’s wife, Elinor, also experienced bouts of depression. Elinor and Robert Frost had six children: son Elliott (1896–1900, died of cholera); daughter Lesley Frost Ballantine (1899–1983); son Carol (1902–1940); daughter Irma (1903–1967); daughter Marjorie (1905–1934, died as a result of puerperal fever after childbirth); and daughter Elinor Bettina (died just one day after her birth in 1907). Only Lesley and Irma outlived their father. Frost’s wife, who had heart problems throughout her life, developed breast cancer in 1937, and died of heart failure in 1938.
The Time is Now
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ChatGTP and AI Foundation Will Change Everything!
ChatGTP and AI Foundation Will Change Everything!
Guest writer John Anderson is tackling a topic that is the bane of school teachers everywhere: the advent of AI. In “ChatGTP and AI Foundation Will Change Everything,” John addresses the ways in which these technologies will change your business, your operations, and your future. He wants every reader to know this is no joke.
The Plot
Imagine you’re a heavy equipment dealer, running a dealership for one of the big brands like John Deere, Caterpillar, or Komatsu. You’ve got a lot on your plate – managing inventory, handling sales, handling customer service issues, and keeping the books in order. And then, you hear about something called ChatGPT.
At first, you might be wondering – what is ChatGPT? And more importantly, how is it going to affect my dealership? Well, let me break it down for you in simple terms.
First things first, let us talk about AI, or Artificial Intelligence. Essentially, AI is when a computer is able to do things that normally require human intelligence, like understanding natural language, recognizing images, or making decisions. And ChatGPT is a specific type of AI called a “language model.” Essentially, it’s a computer program that can understand and generate text, kind of like a super-smart autocomplete feature on your phone.
So, how could this be used in a heavy equipment dealership? Let me give you a few examples.
First, let us talk about sales. Imagine you’ve got a customer who’s interested in buying a new excavator. They have a lot of questions – what’s fuel efficiency? What kind of attachments does it come with? How does it compare to other models? Instead of having to answer all these questions yourself, you could have ChatGPT do it for you. It could understand the customers’ questions and provide them with accurate and detailed answers, leaving you free to handle other tasks.
Next, let’s talk about customer service. Imagine you’ve got a customer who’s having a problem with their excavator. They’re not sure what’s wrong with it, but they need it fixed as soon as possible. Instead of having to troubleshoot the problem yourself, you could have ChatGPT do it for you. It could understand the customer’s description of the problem, and provide them with a list of workable solutions, leaving you free to handle other tasks.
Lastly, let us talk about administrative tasks. Imagine you’ve got a customer who’s looking for a specific part for their excavator. Instead of having to search through the inventory yourself, you could have ChatGPT do it for you. It could understand the customer’s request and provide them with a list of parts that match their request, leaving you free to handle other tasks.
So, as you can see, ChatGPT has the potential to free up a lot of your time and resources, allowing you to focus on more important tasks. But how could this change the dealership in the future?
Well, for starters, it could make your dealership more efficient and productive. With ChatGPT handling all the routine tasks, you and your employees could focus on the more important things, like developing new business and building relationships with customers.
It could also make your dealership more accessible to customers. With ChatGPT, customers could get the information they need 24/7, without having to wait for a human to be available. This could be especially useful for customers in other time zones, or for customers who need information outside of regular business hours.
It could also make your dealership more cost-effective. With ChatGPT handling all the routine tasks, you wouldn’t have to hire as many employees to handle them, which could save you a lot of money in the long run.
Now, I know what you’re thinking – “But what about my employees? Are they going to lose their jobs?” And the answer is – probably not. While ChatGPT can manage a lot of routine tasks, it’s not going to replace human employees altogether. Instead, it is more likely that ChatGPT will change the responsibilities of your employees. Instead of handling routine tasks, they could focus on more important tasks, like developing new business and building relationships with customers. This could even lead to an increase in job satisfaction for your employees, as they’ll have the opportunity to do more meaningful work.
And, let’s be real here – ChatGPT is not going to be able to handle everything. It’s not going to be able to shake hands with customers, make a killer cup of coffee, or tell a dad joke to lighten the mood. It’s important to remember that while ChatGPT can handle a lot of routine tasks, it’s not a replacement for human interaction and relationship building.
So, in conclusion, ChatGPT is a type of AI that can understand and generate text. It has the potential to make your heavy equipment dealership more efficient, more accessible, and more cost-effective. But, it’s important to remember that it’s not going to replace human employees altogether. Instead, it’s going to change the responsibilities of your employees and open up new opportunities for them to focus on more important tasks. And let’s be real, who doesn’t want to focus on more important tasks?
So, embrace the power of ChatGPT, and watch as it takes your dealership to new heights. Just don’t let it start making dad jokes, okay? That is our job.
The Plot Twist
This blog post was written in one pass, entirely by ChatGPT, with simple instructions. It produced the examples, the ideas, the explanation and even the humor in under 30 seconds. The entire process from the instruction to the last word took under 1 minute.
The instruction was Compose a blog post of around 2000 words. The purpose is to explain what ChatGPT is in simple terms to readers and how it will affect the heavy equipment dealer in the future. Assume the reader has no idea what ChatGTP is and has technical education. Include a brief explanation of AI and what ChatGTP is. Then move on to how it would be used in a heavy equipment dealership like John Deere, Caterpillar or Komatsu dealer. Give several different examples ranging from sales, customer service to administrative tasks. Next present some ideas on how it could be used to change the dealership in the future. Lastly explain what impact this will have on the dealership in terms of process change and employee responsibilities.
This is the game changer, the apocalyptic change to the way business will be conducted and it’s already here. If you don’t embrace and adapt to this technology you will not be here, it is really that simple.
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Change Management – Not Just Another Business Cliche
Change Management – Not Just Another Business Cliche
Guest Writer Steve Johnson, one of our educational specialists here at Learning Without Scars, writes today’s post about Change Management, and why it is not just another business cliche.
Entering the year 2023, I have been in a reflective mood. In my years in business, I have walked the critical path, pushed the envelopes, been right-sized, undergone knowledge transfers, sat directly on the cutting edge, jumped out of the box, been taken offline, launched trial balloons, delivered deliverables, lost traction, gone viral, drilled down to the granular level, hunted the BHAG, arrived “just in time,” and sometimes painfully, have had my paradigm shifted on multiple occasions. There’s always a new book and the following wave of new buzzwords. A person doesn’t have to have been in the business world too long before business jargon starts going from meaningful to meaningless.
The thriving art of business clichés may evolve into business comedy, however, that does not mean that some of the underlying ideas aren’t important. For example, consider the topic of “change management.” A cliché in itself, it has a number of accompanying sub-clichés: company agility, resistance management, the only constant is change, alternative futures, continuous improvement, etc. There is humor in business clichés, yet successful companies understand that there are serious business implications inherent in many of them, particularly when they cannot navigate change.
The list of big companies that could not successfully navigate change is long: Washington Mutual, Blockbuster, American Motors, Lord & Taylor, Prime Computer, Bethlehem Steel, PanAm, TWA, Digital Equipment Corporation, Montgomery Ward, Sears, Sports Authority and Faberge to name a few. Over the last few years in the industries that Learning Without Scars works with, OEM profit margins have decreased, the profitability of service departments have become critical to business success, transforming new technologies are becoming dominant, and industry restructuring and consolidation continues in the pursuit of economies of scale and assortment. Businesses are affected by e-commerce, growing rental markets, more small equipment market competition, alternative energy costs, EPA legislation, Tier 4+, and the list goes on.
Do you have a company plan to address change in the industries you participate in and products you sell? What about the marketplaces you serve? Do your business structures and processes facilitate optimal performance, customer satisfaction and profitability? Are your employees well-trained and up to the task? Are you able to recognize and capitalize on change, and even perhaps gain market share? At this time in 2023, we may or may not go into a recession, but certainly the time will come when we emerge into the growth stage of the business cycle? Now is the time to develop solid product/market plans, focus on employee excellence and strategically position your company for the next “industry wave.”
As you pursue employee excellence in your company, we encourage you to explore educational opportunities at Learning Without Scars for high quality industry- and position-specific education.
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