Managing Former Peers (A Cheat Sheet for Busy Managers)

Managing former peers is probably your most immediate challenge if you’ve just been promoted. Below we suggest five key steps to managing peers.”Congratulations… you’ve got that promotion you wanted so badly. Now go fire your best friend.”5 Steps to Managing Former Peers
Decide if you actually want the job of managing peers
Reach out to all stakeholders
Establish one on ones with your new direct reports
Strike the balance between over and under managing peers
Be a professional
Decide if You Actually Want the Job of Managing Former PeersJust because you are offered a promotion, doesn’t mean you necessarily have to take it. You need to think through whether you want the added burden of managing peers. Some things to keep in mind:
Your peer relationships will change whether you want them to or not. Don’t be naïve enough to think they won’t.
You can’t control others’ attitudes and/ behavior. Even if you are ready to make the new relationship work, that doesn’t mean others will be as willing.
If your personal relationships at work are really important to you, you may want to decline your new role of managing peers.
Reach Out to StakeholdersFor anyone in a new position of leadership, it is crucial to reach out to important stakeholders. It is especially important when managing former peers. You should speak with your new direct reports, your boss, and other people you interface with often. Here are some thoughts as to what to ask them:
What would you focus on if you were me?
What can be done better?
What would you suggest is the top priority?
Be systematic and thorough – even when it becomes onerous and time consumingEstablish One on One Meetings With New Direct ReportsWhen managing peers, it is important to establish structured and regular one on one meetings with these people. Well-executed one on one meetings will ultimately save you time, and make managing peers easier. These meetings provide an opportunity to:
Set expectations
Reinforce and reward desired behaviors and performance
Communicate and clarify roles and goals
Update status on action plans.
Best of all, regular one on one meetings significantly reduce the number of “drive-bys” or drop-in meetings when managing peers.Strike the Balance When Managing Former PeersDo not come on too strong and micromanage your new situation. BUT… you are no longer “one of the girls”, either. If you experience any significant challenge to your authority, you need to deal with it directly and quickly. Also make sure you delegate appropriate when managing peers. If you hoard all the work yourself, you will ultimately fail.Be ProfessionalProfessionalism is paramount when managing peers. In order to do so effectively, you need to detach yourself from your personality, and rather view yourself as the new manager of the group or department. Here are some guidelines for maintaining professionalism when managing peers.
Stay focused on facts
Maintain confidences
Tow the company line. You are management’s representative in your work group. You undermine your own credibility, and are not doing your job if you don’t properly represent management views.
You need to refrain from company gossip and going out for cocktails with you direct reports should be done with extreme caution.
Don’t play favorites
3 Things to Remember About Managing Former Peers:
Figure out if you really do want the opportunity. Most often you do have the opportunity to say “no”.
Your friendships will change. It won’t be the same once you are the boss.
Communicate several times. Everyone in a new leadership role should look to over-communicate by a factor of ten.

Building A New Body Shop

The purpose of this article, and the subsequent follow ups I will be writing, is to share with our customers what we hope will be valuable information in not only starting but running a successful collision repair facility.

When someone decides they are going to start a business, it usually comes from the thought that “Hey…not only can I do that…but I can do it better than the other guy….AND I can make some money doing it.” As such, the entrepreneurial spirit in us kicks in. We put together a business plan, we weigh the options of cost/loss versus profit and we decide to roll the dice, as it were, because we know we can build a better mouse trap. It is this spirit that drives us all in business.

In starting a collision repair facility, there are essentially two schools of thought. The first being the “corporate” path where one looks to build large scale, borrowing heavily either from banks or investors to finance the designing, building, staffing and managing of a larger facility. The second, and far more common is the “mom and pop” approach. Now arguments can be made as to which one is better for the ROI of the investment, but I tend to believe that the smaller shop is a better investment, long term for the ownership. I recently spoke with a long-time customer of mine about his thoughts on a start up body shop. He had successfully expanded and maintained a very large facility over the past 20 years. His annual gross numbers are well above 2 million. When I asked him his opinion on a best case scenario for starting a body shop, I was surprised to hear that his views are very much like mine considering he chose the “corporate” method and it has done extremely well for him.

When my friend Robert went to the bank 8 years ago, he was asking to borrow about one million dollars to build his new shop. He was looking at increasing the size of his operation by over four times its current state. Expanding his operation from a 4200 square feet facility to a building well over 22,000 square feet was a mammoth undertaking. He rolled the dice, borrowed heavily and has since made a very good living for himself as well as his employees. Yet when asked if he would recommend doing the “corporate” start up, he said he would not and that the “mom & pop” approach was a much better decision for a new shop owner. As we discussed the issue over a few phone calls, these were some of the key points we agreed upon.

1. You should not start any business without a business plan and you will not borrow money from a bank for a new business without a business plan, period. My advice is to seek professional help on this. Look to the Small Business Administration to help you with establishing your plan. They have a large library of “how do I’s” for the small business starter. They can recommend advisors, give ideas about money management and in some case help you secure some funding sources to help in the startup process. Additionally, with the current economy having banks scared of lending money to anyone regardless of your credit score, borrowing history or cash flow, they can help you solidify your smaller business plan. Also getting a bank to lend you a smaller amount of money maybe a little easier if you have a well thought out and structured business plan as long as they feel comfortable with the amounts and the diligence you have put into the research of the plan. Be sure to include studies of the surrounding marketplace. How many other shops are in an immediate proximity to your proposed location? Is there sufficient egress to the property via main intersections or other businesses in the area that can generate potential “drive by” advertising for you? Do you plan to build or perhaps lease an existing building?

Have you made any contacts with potential clients such as rental companies, delivery companies, cab companies, or perhaps municipalities for bid work? Getting secured, contracted work will add bottom line receivables to your business that banks like to see. Be sure to approach suppliers and work out some soft numbers for discounts on parts and materials so you know your margins based on percentages. As you are looking for a location or perhaps looking to build, remember that you can always expand if the business calls for it. Avoid going into “building” debt and not being able to afford to install the necessary tools you need for opening day. Try not to over extend your business on Day 1 by over borrowing. Establish the track record with the lender by borrowing what you need to get your shop up and running and perhaps a small operating cushion. Sell them on the fact that you will be profitable quickly.

2. You will need to further decide how your business plan will be incorporated into a complete business model for your shop. A common misconception is that “bigger makes more money”. This can be true as we see in the larger consolidators. It means, however, as we are starting up more cost, higher risk and an inability, far too often, to survive. Start with what you know. Perhaps you are a good painter/body man. You have a good body man ready to come on board. Perhaps another fellow is a frame man. All you need is a small space, perhaps three bays, a small Chief rack and a paint booth to make it all happen. It is as simple as that. Start small and grow. Do not over commit unless you have something you can fall back on. In Robert’s case, he was maintaining his original shop while he expanded and built his new shop. As you establish your business, your customer base and your reputation, you will see opportunities to expand as your bottom line grows.

3. Pay “cash” as much as possible until you have established your cash flow patterns. Many shops I have talked to over the years get strangled in a cash flow net. It is easy to do regardless of the industry but in our collision repair industry, it happens more than most due to the nature of the business. Fronting repair costs of parts and labor, awaiting payment for past repairs, fleet accounts that pay on 30 or 60 notes or getting stuck with abandoned vehicles are only few of the problems shops face. These and many more lead to faster cash out and slower cash in. So do what you can to minimize credit exposure. Pay cash for parts when possible. Try not to give away profits by “financing” deductibles whenever you can. As you establish your profit margins, you could consider this as an alternate revenue source but I caution against it in a start up shop.

4. Try not to bog your shop down with “stall sitters” such as severe hits or restoration projects. If you have the physical space to store them or move them easily from the work areas, it isn’t a big deal but remember, we are looking at a small shop scenario. The longer a car sits on the frame rack or in a tear down stall waiting on another car to come out means higher turn time and less flow through your shop. Try to establish a quick fix mentality. “Hang and Paint” repairs, while considerably less dollar amounts, tend to be as high or higher profit percentage than heavy hits. The turn time for fender benders is obviously less and can lead to attracting clients such as rental companies or service companies that need their vehicles on the road. A faster turn time for repairs on a rental car equates to more money for the rental company. This can obviously lead to more work in volume from the rental company to your shop. So consider keeping a streamlined process to handle smaller hits more efficiently to be more profitable. I am not suggesting you turn work away but rather be a little selective on the scheduling if you can.

5. Work to make sure your customers are the top priority in your business. They are the reason you are here. Go the extra mile. Make them realize they came to your business for a reason. A business man I know is fond of saying “the difference in ordinary and extraordinary is the extra.” When you think about it, it is the extra things one does for the customer that offsets them from the competition. Taking care of your customer is the easiest way to secure another customer. Generations of family member continue to take their vehicles the same shop because they have an attachment to the repair facility by some means. If you can establish that type of relationship by taking care of the extras, you can grow your client base laterally without much cost. Remember, every job we do in a body shop is like a rolling billboard for the next potential customer. Friends know that “Joe Consumer” wrecked his car. When they ask, you clearly want “Joe” to tell them that every aspect of the repair process was handled professionally, quickly and without incident. Since on the average, drivers only come to need repairs done once every 7 years. That is a long stretch if you are not ambitiously going after more customers. You do this by taking care of the details, the extras.

While these steps might seem simplistically drawn out, they are the cornerstone to a thriving business. What needs to be understood is that there are a lot of moving parts to getting a shop open. These are more fundamental practices. In my next article, we are going to get more involved with the actual shop set up, discuss DRP relationship and how we go about marketing to the public for our new body shop.

Affiliate Marketing Tips to Help You Succeed

There are so many network marketers that are moving to the online world for connect and faster growth and a great way to make some extra money while growing your business and residual income is by affiliate marketing. Like most money earning opportunities, there are some strategies that work better than others. Here are 3 affiliate marketing tips to follow that will help you earn faster:

Plan Ahead

Most people who are online and doing marketing of any sort have some sort of blog or website set up. The problem is that is all they do and they assume that the affiliate programs they have in place will just automatically start working for them. This couldn’t be farther from the truth. While having a blog or website set up is a step in the right direction, you also need to make sure you have information that is valuable and relevant for the reader. The purpose f the website and blog is to create more traffic. The more traffic that stops on your page, the more people see your affiliate link and by giving the appropriate value to the links and a strong call to action to click the link, the more likely you will make more money and sooner.

Also with a blog or website it is very important to update and add content several times a week. Knowing a little bit about how keywords play into ranking is also a powerful affiliate marketing tip that can help your information to be seen quicker and on page 1 of Google.

Slow and Steady

Whoever told you that network marketing or affiliate marketing was a “get rich quick” type of income was wrong. For some individuals who have full time to work on it, very large lists of people to network with and actually go out and do all the work required are more likely to benefit for the “quick” part of that. For the other 97% of us out there, we have to plan and then build. This affiliate marketing tip may not resonate well with some, because most people want things NOW. Unfortunately, it really doesn’t matter what kind of business you start, it is rare you will see the return on investment for years. The benefit to network marketing and affiliate marketing, however, is that your investment is very low and your payment is usually residual income which is income that comes no matter if you continue to work hard or not. They key is that you still have to work to get it.

Stick to One Thing

It is easy to get distracted by other opportunities especially in affiliate marketing as you can get lost in the sea of them. Those who are greedy tend to jump from program to program and not allow enough time to make money in any of them. It is smart to stick to a program and give it time to start working for you. With affiliate marketing if you have planned correctly, and you stay true, you should start seeing the reward within a few months to a year. Again, thing is a very important affiliate marketing tip because no matter what business, that return on investment will usually take longer than that.

So make sure to plan out your affiliate marketing strategy, stay consistent and make sure to stick with your program for an appropriate amount of time before you jump ship and it is almost guaranteed you will find success and a return on your investment.