Don Romano
Though he is a year away from turning 65, Hyundai Canada President and CEO Don Romano says he isn’t ready for retirement or to back away from a challenge.
After taking the helm and turning around Hyundai Canada as a struggling brand, introducing Genesis to the marketplace, and putting his personal stamp on diversity, equity and inclusion, Romano is moving to Australia in a similar role and also as a chief advisor to the Hyundai Asia Pacific Region. He will be replaced by Steve Flamand, who worked with him as Executive Director of Sales and Digital Strategy.
“Canada is the top-performing country globally (for Hyundai), so where else can you go from there?” Romano said with a laugh in an interview with Canadian auto dealer. “We exceeded everything we set out to do and I thought, ‘do I just drift off into the sunset?’ I’m not ready for that.”
He added that José Muñoz, Hyundai President and CEO, indicated to him that he could “use me in some of these challenged countries if I don’t retire, and I gave him the thumbs up. I told him I could do another two to three years.”
Romano led Hyundai and sister company Genesis to many accomplishments for retail sales and growth.
Romano had an inauspicious debut with Hyundai when he attended his first national dealers meeting and announced the company’s new image and certification programs. Over the course of time he received buy-in from the dealers, who saw their franchises rise in value as consumers embraced Hyundai, which expanded its product line and later went big into electrification.
Steve Flamand
“We just kind of stuck with our game plan and our belief stream and said, ‘Hey, this is what we’re going to stand for,’” said Romano. “That was it. We’ve just got some good people behind me, too. What I’m going to miss is my employees and my dealers. I would say I’ve got the best team I’ve ever worked with in 40 years. I absolutely love my dealers and my employees.”
He said Hyundai’s introduction of Genesis to Canada with a program to purchase the cars online via an agency model and concierge service for delivery of new cars and pickup for service also met with dealer skepticism. But it did well and subsequently developed into standalone franchise distributors.
“We’re actually the top-performing country in the world for the way we did it,” said Romano. “That was probably the most fun thing I’ve ever done in my career, launching that brand and having the dealers really get into it. They got behind it emotionally. It launched globally about the same time, but the difference was our dealers are cool. They’re good business partners and they’re good friends. That’s tough to leave.”
Diversity, Equity and Inclusion (DEI) became a major platform for him. He said it’s because of the way he was raised growing up in southern California.
“Everybody deserves an opportunity, everybody deserves a chance and it shouldn’t be based on privilege,” said Romano. “It should be based on capabilities given the opportunity to prove those capabilities, which a lot of people don’t get because of glass ceilings and racial tensions. It’s a belief stream and you don’t abandon what you believe in. And it’s good business and good altruism.”
“Look at our demographics of who comes into our showrooms. They are not a bunch of old white guys. They’re not a bunch of Koreans. They are from all over the world. We’re just not an all-white country. Why should we have an all-male, white old team?” he said.
“We did a lot of things to build employee engagement. I wanted people to love coming to work. I think we achieved that. I don’t know if I can replicate that in two to three years. That took a long time to build, but it’s still going to be my goal down there. I’m still going to go down with the thought of building an infrastructure that would support diversity and equity and give people who are bright and capable a chance.”
Rein Knol, Chairman of the Hyundai Canada National Dealer Council, said beyond building the manufacturer’s sales and key performance indicators, Romano’s legacy will be his communicative skills and desire to be transparent and respectful with the dealers.
“The trust he built with his team allowed us to get ahead of all kinds of technologies that no other manufacturer is doing,” said Knol. “That particular part of his legacy is real and there’s no other executive I’ve ever seen or heard of that can do what Don did. He’s just a very special dude.”
