Dealers struggle with hiring and retention strategies even though the automotive industry is booming and job creation doesn’t appear to be slowing down any time soon. Could it be that they simply need to tweak their methods?
Recruitment and retention remain a top-of-mind issue for dealerships in both Canada and the U.S., perhaps because many lack a proper process, one based on data and metrics, that could help boost their chances of a successful hire.
To be more specific, the problem is not about hiring people but finding, hiring and retaining good people — especially at a time when dealerships are looking to save money more wisely and drive efficiency in their operations, according to Adam Robinson, Co-founder and CEO of Hireology, a U.S.-based company that offers an all-in-one hiring and talent management platform for businesses.
“The people side of their business is really the last untouched area of most dealerships, where they can really leverage some cost advantage, get people selling cars faster, get people billing hours in fixed ops faster — faster hiring is faster time to revenue and that’s good for a dealer,” said Robinson in an interview with Canadian auto dealer.
But to do that, they will need to put more time and effort in their process, ditching the old “handshake” interview method (for those that still use it), and expand past simply posting on a job board and putting up a help wanted sign.
The experts advise creating a structure (and even introducing a screening process) that is based on some sort of data and measurement that will allow dealers to make more informed decisions. Otherwise, the dealership down the street that runs things more “digitally, intentionally and process-driven” will have the first bid on the best people.
Experts also advise against rushing, suggesting instead that dealerships take the time to find the right potential applicants to bring to their websites to apply for a job.
Take Mississauga Toyota for example: the company hired 25 year-old Justina Wilson who had little to no experience working in the automotive sector, having studied commerce at Queen’s University in Kingston, Ont. Wilson is currently the Branding & Communications Specialist at the dealership and has been working at Mississauga Toyota for about two years. To get the job, they put her through a three-step process.
The first interview involved meeting the direct manager and another manager from the dealership. The second round included the dealer principal, direct manager, and a general manager from another department to give them a different perspective. Wilson says they asked behavioural and situational questions relating to the position — similar to Hireology, who offers a quick and easy, true-or-false pre-screen, behavioural survey to weed out the people that are not a good fit for the job. In the final round, the general manager presented Wilson with the offer and went over all the details with her.
“They (the dealership) basically just hire for attitude and train the rest. It was all about a positive disposition at work and they really focused on hiring and fitting for the culture, and then of course training the rest,” says Wilson. “I feel like they look at a lot of transferable skills and what people bring from different positions, but not necessarily from the automotive background.”
Wilson is a good example of a young employee and “outsider” that seems to fit right into the auto retail environment. Her experience also goes to show that it is now more important than ever to target the right people to work for your business. Because even as the auto retail industry continues to evolve and boom, offering more variety and better paying jobs, many people — particularly millennials, still aren’t interested.
What do millennials want?
A study conducted by Hireology in partnership with Cox Automotive, on workforce attitude towards auto retail jobs, found that only one per cent of the people surveyed would consider a career in the industry, but 35 per cent would consider retail, finance or hospitality opportunities. Robinson says this information suggests that the problem itself is not about recruitment — it’s a marketing, communication and education issue.
“Dealers need to understand that their jobs are a product, and their labour pool is a market. Those are your customers for your jobs,” says Robinson. “You have to think about your jobs as products and ask the question: am I selling a product my market wants?” He adds that “the market wants a career path, stable pay, and they want a balanced life. They do not want highly variable pay plans, eighty-hour work weeks and a really murky career path.”
That is a sentiment that many millennials, including 26-year-old Coralie Gosselin, share. This young sales advisor at Cadillac Laval in Quebec and mother of a two-year-old toddler got her degree in International Studies and Modern Languages at Laval University in Quebec City in April 2017. She then moved to Laval Q.C. (near Montreal) to work for a dealership last August.
With no prior experience in the auto sector, Gosselin said she applied to a few places and was called in for an interview within a day of submitting her resume. She says the hiring process was fairly quick as the manager was mainly interested in knowing why she wanted to work in sales and with cars. But after being a part of the team for about nine months, Gosselin now finds it challenging — not just because she has a young child to care for, but also because of the competition that is involved.
“What’s hard in sales is that it’s very emotional. Up and down,” says Gosselin. “You never know how much you’re going to earn, if you’re going to sell. You can’t help but compare yourself with your colleagues, so it’s emotionally a bit challenging on that level. I think that is what makes people quit. Maybe they want more stability.”
She says that, regardless of her struggles, Cadillac Laval is a great place to work and that is why she is still around. However she advises, when hiring, to really stress the fact that the business moves fast and that it is very dynamic. Customers are demanding, profit margins are tight and competition is fierce. It takes a certain type of person to handle all of that.
Gosselin also wonders if a higher base salary would help retain more employees in provinces like Quebec, where the weather has been particularly bad during the winter months, resulting in fewer sales and less money in their pockets to pay expenses.
Hireology’s Robinson says he sees the industry moving away from highly variable draw or commission-based plans to the way the rest of the world works — and that is base pay.
Operating expenses
Whether you are finding new talent on job boards or in other unique places, Scott Brinkman, Vice President of Product at Hireology, also advises taking a moment to review your operating expenses to really see what the majority of your costs — which are your employees — really look like.
The market wants a career path, stable pay, and they want a balanced life. They do not want highly variable pay plans, eighty-hour work weeks and a really murky career path.
“This is a franchise business. You don’t control the marketing, you don’t control the branding, you don’t control the product — it’s the same model at different dealerships. But what you do control is your people,” says Brinkman. “That is your one lever that you can really pull on to make a differentiated customer experience in your dealership.”
In terms of front-end and recruitment costs, Brinkman says they are seeing on average $2,000 spent a month in the U.S. on job advertisements. He recommends making a budget and then tracking and centralizing the spending. “Don’t just let people go all over the place,” says Brinkman. “And when you do spend, ask a very reasonable question, which is: what did I get for it?”
In his experience, 99 per cent of the people asked this question are unable to tell him what they are spending today. Furthermore, he says no one is able to tell him what they got for the money they spend.
His best advice to dealers? Start measuring.
A Canadian solution
To attract more talent, young people may need a push to feel enticed by what the auto sector has to offer in terms of jobs. In Canada, that problem is being dealt with by the Canadian Automobile Dealers Association (CADA) and provincial dealer associations with their national campaign known as Auto Career Start. The initiative, officially set to launch in June 2018, seeks to reach out to potential employees through job boards and other venues in an effort to attract both more qualified and diverse people to the industry, while also promoting it as a rewarding place to be.
“We did a poll at the beginning of the year on millennials and the results were as expected, which is that nearly 70 per cent of them don’t consider the auto sector as a career choice that they aspire to — mostly because they just had not considered it,” says Barbara Barrett, a spokesperson for Auto Career Start. She says the campaign is addressing the need to fill the growing positions that are a result of a growing industry.
Their goal is to educate young people about the opportunities that are available in the auto sector — not just around sales and service, but also in IT and as marketing and social media specialists, among other options. They are looking to spread the word that there are tremendous opportunities in this domain. “Auto Career Start is a national campaign with a job portal for over 3,200 dealerships across the country to address this need,” says Barrett.
