Strategic Staffing
(Continued)

To this point you may have concluded that “adjusting staff” simply means increasing the number of service personnel on the floor at a given time. This is not true. In addition to increased labor costs, having too many staff can be just as unproductive as having too few. The number of personnel needed, at a given time, should be driven by two extremely important factors: (1) the number of customers projected for a specified time frame, based on historical data, and (2) the skill level of the personnel scheduled.

Even if you have scheduled a sufficient number of staff in the service bay, if the personnel are inexperienced or they have little ability to work together as a team, then your results won’t improve and the number of staff is not the issue. The skills of those staff, or more accurately, the lack of skill is the issue.

When you plan your schedules, it’s helpful to have three important tools available:
• The number of vehicles projected for each service hour (based on recent historical data compared to the year ago time frame).
• The number of personnel needed, based on skill level, to service the projected hourly volume.
• A skill level chart that organizes your staff into skill levels by position.

The skill level chart should be a simple at-a-glance form that organizes your personnel in order of proficiency in each service area. You may be thinking, “I don’t need a chart to tell me where to put my staff.” And in the case where your customer demand is easily predictable, that is probably true. But there are two good reasons why you should consider using a tool like this.

First, it’s an easy tool to manage training. Now a comprehensive training program is a topic for another day, but in this scenario you can staff people who have skills with those who need them. In a simple example, if Jimmy’s really good with ATF flushes, staff him with other techs who are not. This allows them to learn from Jimmy.

Secondly, on those days when you’re unexpectedly caught short, lack of staff planning may be the difference in those few cars that don’t get serviced. If that means you lose only three cars per day, at the average ticket reported in NOLN’s 2009 Fast Lube Operators Survey ($52.04), you’re missing almost $50,000 in revenue annually. Planning your staffing strategy, when you’re not under pressure, will help save lost efficiency when you need it most.

Avoiding Summertime Volume Frustration
Neither your employees nor your customers like being put in a situation where pressure builds and tempers flair. But hot summer days, when customers are in a hurry and a center is undermanned or under-skilled, can lead to exactly that.

We opened this discussion with two potential scenarios, which occur in fast lubes across the industry: Scenario one of employee/customer frustration, irritability and exasperation, and scenario two of customer/employee satisfaction, enjoyment and appreciation.

Since both scenarios can occur under the roof of the very same fast lube operation, perhaps even yours, there is a question to be asked: Which scenario occurs in your service bays? If you find that the answer is too often scenario one, remember this: Attempting to service peak volumes without the proper mix, and number, of people and skills is setting the stage for lost customers. That’s what strategic staffing is all about.

DAN KAUS is workshops brand manager for BP Lubricants USA, Inc. He may be reached at daniel.kaus@bp.com. To learn more about Castrol products and programs in general please call 888.CASTROL or visit: www.castrol.com/installers

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