Overcoming complex challenges can be tough. You'll have moments when you feel your only option is to give up. Doubt, stress, and obstacles can come in intense waves. Challenges, especially as a shop owner, are a journey with many steep mountains.  

But if you want to run a successful shop it requires looking at challenges as opportunities. Because the best shop owners know challenges are opportunities wrapped in ugly wrapping paper.  

The best shop owners know challenges are opportunities wrapped in ugly wrapping paper.  

To take this idea even a step further, approach challenges not as something you have to deal with, not even as something you get to deal with, but as something you choose to solve.  

In working with hundreds of independent auto shop owners, Motor Supply Co has found that there are a set of common challenges that owners and shop managers face regardless of location. 

So what are these opportunities wrapped up as challenges in ugly wrapping paper? 

1.Price Volatility 

Inflation, supply shortages, and product backorders has created price volatility the auto industry has never seen. While many shop supplies are pass-through to customers others are a direct hit to the bottom line.  

 2. Supply Constraints 

Two to three years ago it wasn’t a question if you could get a particular product, it was who could you get the best deal from. Today’s environment is much different. Products like oil, filters, tires, and more have seen unprecedented shortages causing some shop owners to head to their local Walmart to stock products to keep their shop running. 

3. Acquiring New Customers 

The internet has leveled the playing field and put the power of choosing an auto shop squarely in the hands of the consumer. Finding and discovering new ways of acquiring the right kinds of customers for your shop to keep weekly car numbers consistent is an ongoing opportunity. 

4. Meeting the Needs of Team Members 

The challenge of consistently trying to meet every team member's needs and expectations is wildly complicated. If that weren't enough, the number of employees in most shops has grown to 10-14. This means devoting adequate time to more people is hard.  

5. Enabling Change 

The challenge of opening people's hearts and minds to different ways of thinking and behaving than they are previously accustomed to is difficult because we are wired to resist change. However, every industry including the aftermarket auto market is in a state of transformation, so change is required to stay ahead or advance past the competition.  

6. Developing Skills 

Creating pathways to help team members continue to grow and develop is hard in a small shop. As Keith Huggins, an ATI (AUTOMOTIVE TRAINING INSTITUTE) Member and owner of Brown Motor Works told us, “we think of Brown Motor Works as a training center. If you work here, you will learn.”  

“If more shop owners thought of their business as a training center for their employees, they would have more fulfilled, engaged, and productive team members.” 

7. Recruiting Talent 

The challenge of recruiting talented people is evergreen. However, there isn't a shop owner we have worked within the last twelve months that isn't concerned with recruiting talented people more than they used to be. The labor shortage has hit nearly every industry including auto. 

8. Creating an Excellent Team  

A challenge for any shop owner is to bond people together to accomplish more than they can on their own. A team, by definition, is a group of people that come together to achieve a common goal. While it might sound simple, it's anything but, especially in a busy garage. 

9. Unlocking Elite Execution  

A significant opportunity for any shop owner is improving daily execution. In some ways, any shop can increase their car count simply by running ads or lowering their price. However, turning over cars efficiently and with a high level of communication is a different story. Constantly improving the execution in the office and in the garage is a challenge for any owner. 

10. Avoiding Burnout  

The most emerging challenge facing shop owners today is avoiding burnout in themselves and their team. There is immense pressure to increase results faster. While speed is essential, it also causes burnout.  

When leaders solve these ten challenges they will have a higher-performing shop and have more fulfilled, engaged, and productive team members.  

How to Begin to Solve These Shop Challenges 

Solving some or all of these will require ongoing effort, strategy, and modifications. Here are a few solid ideas to help you in the short term.  

Empower Team Members to Solve Problems 

You will solve more problems and overcome challenges faster and more effectively if you empower others to make decisions. The word empower means "to give control over another's life and the authority to do something." So often, shop owners do the opposite of empowering. They micromanage when challenges arise.  

Suppose you want to get better at empowering your people and inviting them into the problem-solving process. In that case, it starts with making them aware that solving problems is a part of their job responsibility regardless of their title.  

Make team members aware that solving problems is a part of their job responsibility regardless of their title.  

Come up with a Maximizing Mantra for the Year 

There will always be priorities and changes that grasp your people's attention. With as fast as the aftermarket auto market is moving, we are past the point of being able to have a one-item execution list.  

However, you can create a maximizing mantra to create consistent energy on a team or company. A Maximizing Manta is a short and simple phrase that provides clarity, is action-oriented, and is fun. A few of my favorite examples include: 

• Let's Go 
• Move the Needle 
• Keep Engines Running 

When you or your team come up with a Mantra for the rest of this year, please put it on shop walls, or get T-shirts made. Use it to keep it in the forefront of your people's eyes and hearts.  

Reward and Recognize Effort 

One of the biggest reasons teams consistently face the same challenges is because shop owners are too critical of their team. Instead of encouraging them to persevere and looking for new and better ways to solve problems, they judge. 

When this happens employees tend to shut down and give less than their maximum effort. While there are places for critical feedback and tough conversations, shop owners must start rewarding and recognizing the positive effort team members demonstrate daily.  

Shop owners must start rewarding and recognizing the positive effort team members demonstrate daily.  

A great trick for this is to give at least three positive comments to every critical one.  

Closing 

If there has ever been a time to turn challenges into opportunities, it's right now.  

It's MotorSupplyCo’s hope these strategies will help your shop run toward these opportunities because that's precisely what the best do.