Last spring representatives from the National Auto Body Council (NABC) were invited to make presentations as part of the curriculum for Arizona State University’s Certificate for Automotive Entrepreneurs and Leaders program (CAEL).

The engagement was so successful, that the speakers, Bob Schubert of Impact Auto Body, Mesa, Arizona and Mike Quinn, 911 Collision Centers, Tucson, Arizona, and Las Vegas, Nevada, have been asked to participate in a special offering of the CAEL program, the Leadership Education for Automotive Dealerships program (LEAD). NABC Secretary and Autobody News columnist Janet Chaney will also participate.

The CAEL program is an accredited program offered by the W. P. Carey School of Business at Arizona State, one of the largest business schools in the United States. CAEL provides Arizona State students with the opportunity to apply business acumen to the automotive industry and build leadership skills to help instigate changes in dealership management. LEAD provides a conduit through which those at other universities can enroll in CAEL. A prerequisite for any student in the program is a business degree or enrollment in a business major.

CAEL was initiated in part by Ford Motor Company’s Dealer Development Office, which wanted to develop a program at a leading university that focused on the automotive industry. Retired Ford executive, John Whelan, is an Arizona State faculty associate for the CAEL program. In addition to teaching, he works with the school to develop relevant curriculum for CAEL and LEAD.

From Whelan’s perspective, NABC’s participation is a key to the success of CAEL and LEAD. “The collision repair element of a dealership operation is not only growing in importance as a profit center, it is getting increasingly sophisticated to manage,” he said. “We knew that if we wanted to provide a well-rounded course of study, body shop management needed to be a significant part of the mix.”