Repair Shop Advice

To better understand what automotive technicians feel the most important aspects of a job are, we worked with our partner WrenchWay to survey techs on the question. Here is what we found:

Put in order, they were ranked:

• 38.8% Pay
• 30.6% Work environment
• 22.5% Training and development opportunities
• 6.1% Paid time off
• 2.0% Benefits
• 0.0% Perks

Pay is the #1 factor for auto repair techs

As you can see, pay came in at the top as the most important aspect of a job. One of the participants probably summed up what many were thinking when they said, “All of those are extremely important but if the pay isn’t there then what’s the point?”

Pay is important but it’s impact on employee satisfaction isn’t as large as many employers may think. What the polling firm Gallup has found is that when people hate their job, they feel like they aren’t being paid fairly. However, people who love their job consider themselves “satisfied” even if they wish that they made more money.

Work Environment is also very important to technicians

That leads directly to the factor that came in second – work environment. It was a very close second. This is the factor that we find is greatly underestimated by auto repair shops. The shop of 30 or 40 years ago is not likely to have the type of work environment that many younger techs are attracted to.

Pay and work environment go hand in hand here. Maybe you’ve heard somebody say, “They don’t pay me enough to deal with this.” That’s a work environment problem. If you have a hard time attracting and/or keeping employees, you may want to take a hard look at your work environment.

Notably, the other point from Gallup is true too – a great work environment will in most cases prevent your people from leaving you for that one-to-two dollar per hour raise they may be able to get down the street. If you are providing a work environment where your employees feel like they are supported, cared for and appreciated they won’t even be tempted to look elsewhere.

Training and development opportunities should not be overlooked

Training and development opportunities follow in third place, but at 22.5% they should definitely not be overlooked. If you don’t currently have those opportunities built into the jobs at your shop you should consider how you can do so. That is also a good talking point when you are interviewing potential candidates. If you can tell them that you have a training plan for each of the roles at your shop, or at least for the one they are interviewing for, you can increase the likelihood that they will choose you. This is especially true if you are interviewing younger techs.

Paid time off, benefits and perks came in well behind the other three. That doesn’t mean that they aren’t a factor, but that for most techs they are less of a factor than the other three.

It’s important to remember that any one person’s happiness with a job usually factors in many elements. The same is true for a candidate’s evaluation of whether a job offer will be a good fit for them. This survey helps us better understand that in the mind of most techs pay, work environment, and training and development opportunities are the top three factors, by a large margin, in their decision to take a new job. If you haven’t made investments in those three areas, now is the time to do so to make sure you stay competitive in the hot labor market.

We can make your shop look great online to help you attract high quality technician candidates. If you’d like to learn more about our services, please call us at 855-294-6397 or schedule a meeting with us at a time that’s convenient for you!