No Excuse to Miss Out on Training

I recently received a very pleasant letter from Mike Duguay about our Banner Program article in May, focusing on something Rob Hutchison said to J.D. Ney about technicians having to invest the time to attend training. Duguay, who is an instructor himself as our readers know from his columns here in SSGM, was in full agreement with this sentiment and he made some interesting points that I believe are important to this issue. Duguay pointed out several objections technicians and owners of independent shops often give for not attending training programs. The most common reason given for not attending training programs is that it costs too much to have a technician out of a shop for three or four hours to take a training course. It is better to keep that technician on the shop floor working and making money than sitting in a classroom, the argument goes.

But Duguay and I agree that this sentiment is the wrong one.

Why, I often wonder, can a shop show no hesitation to spend thousands of dollars on new diagnostic equipment, or for a technician to spend some of his or her salary on new tools, but cannot spend a few hours out of a day or a few hundred dollars to sign-up and attend a training course? On a recent trip to visit a shop an hour outside of Toronto, I found a training program taking place with an instructor speaking to a total of two technicians! What amazed me was this training program was taking place in a location that had over half-a-dozen independent service shops less than two blocks away and a major car dealership with a service centre. And this poor instructor was lecturing to two fellows in a room that could hold some 30 people comfortably. I have to ask: could not one of those shops have spared even one employee to take the training offered in their backyards?

The problem, at least to me, is too many times we tend to think of training not as an investment, but as a cost; a cost that needs to be controlled. But this is the wrong approach. Training is an investment, the same as investing in a new diagnostic tool that helps in generating revenue. Technicians whose skills are up-to-date will have a greater return on investment (the cost of the training and time away from the shop floor) than one who is not getting that training. So let’s stop thinking of training as a cost.

Now, the other big objection is time: one can’t spare that technician to take a four-hour course because that means a loss of potential business. But I’m not so sure even that holds water.

Today, the Internet is becoming a phenomenal means of getting training directly to technicians, and I know several major aftermarket suppliers are moving to providing training programs online or are in the process of making even more advanced training and programs available over the Internet. These programs are offered 24/7 and with high-speed Internet now common and computers being so cheap, there is no reason not to use these online resources. A technician can easily use their lunch hour or even a slow period during the day to go online and get the training; or the shop manager can book some time for technicians to go online without disrupting the workflow.

Rob Hutchison is right: it is up to the technicians and the shop owners to make that investment in training and using the tools available. There is no excuse not to make that investment.