My partner, Gene, and I had attended the seminars and read the books that preached ‘you need to hold your staff accountable to your company standards.’ But, they never could show us how to actually do that without causing a revolt. You know how hard it is to find Techs, so if we actually enforced what few rules and standards we had, we were afraid they’d quit and we’d be back in the trucks doing the work again, like the old days.
Finally, we hired Al Levi and he showed us that the way out of this cycle of fear was to learn how to recruit, hire, train and retain people the right way. And, to hold people accountable. He created a Customized Operations Manual, which became the backbone of all our company standards and training.
Next, we built our own Training Center, just like the one Al had when he was a contractor. The manuals got converted into a complete training curriculum and the Training Center allowed us to make training to come alive. Al taught us how to teach people without putting them to sleep. Now, we’re improving the skills of our existing Techs and we’re better able to hire new Techs because we train them the Winters Way.
Today, everyone at my shop loves training, and loves feeling they have a career and not just a job. They know how great our company is because we’ve invested the time and energy in making them better. And finally, we can hold our staff accountable to company standards which make life better for us, for them and for our customers.
By the way, it feels great to no longer be a hostage!