Earn a Lot More Money this Year by Increasing Your Employee Satisfaction Levels

A study conducted by Harvard Business Review identified the growth of the service profit chain. They divided this chain into seven simple components that form a continuous circle.

These components have a domino effect on each other-and the cycle repeats, over and over.

In the automotive service industry, staff turnover, low job satisfaction, and poor staff morale are rarely measured and tracked. The amount of money these factors cost the average repair business annually is largely unknown-or disregarded.

All related research is clear. To consistently achieve high customer-loyalty and satisfaction levels, you must address the issue of Employee Satisfaction. It is nearly impossible to have a long-term, consistently high Customer Satisfaction Index (CSI)-which effects your customer loyalty and revenue growth-without the presence of a positive Employee Satisfaction Index (ESI).

Staff turnover is not a good measure of Employee Satisfaction levels. It is possible to have low staff turnover, yet still suffer from an unhealthy ESI score.

Our experience has revealed that even the most motivated service advisor misses over $500 of “unsold service potential” each day. What could that amount be with an unmotivated low-ESI service advisor-$1,000 or more per day? With 230 + working days annually, the economic impact is tremendous.

You can no longer ignore ESI; your long-term survival depends on it. A 1998 study, conducted by Thomas O. Jones, clearly proves the importance of keeping ESI levels high. They identified that loyalty and satisfaction ratios vary by industry.

Two businesses least effected by customer satisfaction and loyalty ratios are the airline and telephone industries. Unless a person is really dissatisfied with the service, he or she tends to stay with the same service provider.

That is not true for the Automotive service industry. Customers will be loyal only if they continually have an excellent or very satisfying experience with the service business; anything less can result in customer defection.

But you can’t achieve very satisfied customers without having very satisfied employees.

Because ESI is critical to your success, you must identify the factors and elements that are shaping your ESI level.

Our primary research on employee morale, job satisfaction, productivity, and quality of work done indicates that one single factor stands out above all others: the competence or incompetence of the supervisor or manager to whom people directly report.

In the majority of scenarios, where employee morale is continuously low, the manager to whom those staff members report is responsible for this low morale. Managers directly affect Employee Satisfaction.

The issue we must tackle here is the crippling belief it is not possible to have high Employee Satisfaction levels and quality staff. Managers who believe that are not surprised to see low ESI.

Those managers have fulfilled their own belief system-that leaders have no influence or control over the satisfaction level of their staff. Because they believe they have no control, they will make no attempt to reverse or remedy the situation.

The Good News is that it is possible to realize high ESI and employee loyalty. The impact that Employee Satisfaction has on the bottom line must be considered Job 1. If your goal is to build staff loyalty and customer satisfaction, start by addressing Employee Satisfaction.

1. Trust that it is achievable.

2. Make an unwavering commitment to see it through.

Take this opportunity to build your ESI. As a result of your efforts, your business may very well earn thousands of extra dollars this year!

About Results Consulting Group Inc.

Results is an international full-service business consulting company with special expertise and experience in the automotive industry. In the past five years alone, Results’ team of automotive professionals has trained more than 20,000 automotive personnel-and logged thousands of in-store consulting-project days, from independent operations to national and international chains. Senior Partners Ken Keis and Gordon Cameron have over 45 years of combined business-ownership experience and 15,000 hours of automotive consulting experience. The Results Performance Institute provides a full range of information products and services designed to increase your business and individual performance, including personal one-on-one coaching, in-store consulting, on- and off-site educational sessions, tele-conferences, videos, and audio solutions. Results also provides appointment-scheduling and dispatch software solutions-ServiceMate-specifically designed for the independent maintenance and repair sector. Shops wishing to start growing their service business immediately can now order ServiceMate software. Created for shops from 2 to 32 technicians, it almost pays for itself the first week you use it. Learn more about this easy-to-implement solution: Call 1-866-852-4347.

Results’ copyrighted service marketing and operational system, “0% Customer Defection & 100% Customer Retention,”

has a proven track record of increasing service gross by 10-20% and beyond-in less than six months. For further information about Results and its automotive and business solutions, call us Toll Free at 1-866-852-4347, email results@shaw.ca, or visit our Website at www.resultsconsultinggroup.com.