Suggestion for Harley
Outstanding HDF Member
Joined: Feb 2012
Posts: 2,053
Likes: 39
From: San Diego
Often a new mechanic will be given the opportunity to work on a more challenging project, under the tutilage of a more experience employee. While this requires two people working on the same bike, it provides a new person to learn new skills, prove his talents and learn from someone who has been there before.
While this is not the most cost effective thing for a dealership, it does bring novices up to speed quickly, and also assures the customer that his bike is being watched over by an experienced technician but the bolts are being turned by a novice.
This is the same way that medical schools teach interns. Often described as see one...do one...teach one. The outcome is highly proficient individuals.
While this is not the most cost effective thing for a dealership, it does bring novices up to speed quickly, and also assures the customer that his bike is being watched over by an experienced technician but the bolts are being turned by a novice.
This is the same way that medical schools teach interns. Often described as see one...do one...teach one. The outcome is highly proficient individuals.
Tourer
Joined: Feb 2014
Posts: 328
Likes: 4
From: Arizona
So give the guy with lots of time under his belt only the tedious, time consuming jobs?
Experienced techs are usually paid by flag hours, not hours on the clock.
Say the book calls for 1hr, and he can do it in 48min, he can get paid for more than 8hrs working a normal shift. A green tech might take 1hour 15min for that same job.
If a job comes back, the flag time tech works on it for free. This helps to assure shortcuts are not taken. An hourly tech isn't as invested to fix it correctly the first time, since he still gets paid if he has to repeat the repair on the same bike.
When a tech never gets any easy, quick work, you get a grumpy tech. It's important for the shop to retain quality techs. Last thing you want to do is give him a reason to look for work elsewhere.
If he works at Shop A and they have him hourly working only on tough jobs, then across town Shop B offers to pay him what he flags with a mix of easy and hard jobs, Shop A risks loosing that quality tech.
Sometimes a variation of OP's original comment is done. An experienced flag tech will pay for an hourly paid helper. The helper will do the simpler parts of a job, flag tech the more complex. Flag tech is able to do more hours, and helper's hourly wage is deducted from flag tech's pay.
Experienced techs are usually paid by flag hours, not hours on the clock.
Say the book calls for 1hr, and he can do it in 48min, he can get paid for more than 8hrs working a normal shift. A green tech might take 1hour 15min for that same job.
If a job comes back, the flag time tech works on it for free. This helps to assure shortcuts are not taken. An hourly tech isn't as invested to fix it correctly the first time, since he still gets paid if he has to repeat the repair on the same bike.
When a tech never gets any easy, quick work, you get a grumpy tech. It's important for the shop to retain quality techs. Last thing you want to do is give him a reason to look for work elsewhere.
If he works at Shop A and they have him hourly working only on tough jobs, then across town Shop B offers to pay him what he flags with a mix of easy and hard jobs, Shop A risks loosing that quality tech.
Sometimes a variation of OP's original comment is done. An experienced flag tech will pay for an hourly paid helper. The helper will do the simpler parts of a job, flag tech the more complex. Flag tech is able to do more hours, and helper's hourly wage is deducted from flag tech's pay.
I'll add to my earlier comment. Even if working hourly, the experienced tech will do even simple jobs "like removing exhaust" quicker. He grabs the correct tool with muscle memory and has in grained habits where he put nuts and bolts. He knows the quirks and tricks of a job. He isn't using other techs time, asking questions how to do something. Even on simple jobs, having a lesser paid, not as experienced tech will take much longer so more money than the seasoned guy.
Seriously, when as ANY service provider ever passed on savings to the customer? I'm all for a lesser experienced guy working under a senior tech to gain experience, and having their work followed up on, an apprenticeship, if you will. But seriously, expecting to see a reduced labor rate because of it? There are too many people in a dealership environment that have non revenue producing jobs, i.e., financial liabilities, not an asset. Not that there is anything wrong with this, it's the nature of the beast. Overhead is overhead
Road Warrior
Joined: Jun 2006
Posts: 1,993
Likes: 20
From: Southeast GA
In my business, my policy is to delegate all work to the least paid COMPETENT employee. It does me no good to assign my floor sweeper to someone's vehicle if he isn't up to the task because if he breaks or screws up something, I am going to have to pay to make it right again.
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