WrenchWay, in partnership with the National Institute for Automotive Service Excellence (ASE), is introducing a new initiative to recognize particularly strong partnerships between schools and industry members. The School Assist All-Star Awards, using the School Assist platform, which WrenchWay and ASE collaborate to manage, are designed to highlight efforts to work together to promote the future of the collision industry.
WrenchWay co-founders Mark Wilson and Jay Goninen, along with Dave Johnson, president and CEO of ASE, addressed a WrenchWay webinar audience recently. The awards, Wilson explained, are intended to be an annual occurrence recognizing shops and dealerships and the schools they work with to educate up and coming technicians. The partnerships help in addressing the industrywide shortage of techs.
“We all know it's occurring. We all know we have to help schools and create that next generation of technicians, and this is a way to reward and recognize shops and schools that do a good job working together,” he said.
How the Awards Work
Winners get a physical certificate to hang up and a digital version they can share on social media.
Schools looking to earn the recognition are required to do several things to show how they are working with the industry. They must post one update each year on School Assist, describing the program, how many students are enrolled and any major program updates, along with three requests for industry help.
The latter step, Wilson said, allows schools to use the program to make requests for speakers, job shadow situations, donated tools and other needs. Schools should also log completions of those requests recognizing which shop filled them.
Mark Wilson.
School instructors and shop owners stay busy on a daily basis, so incentivizing the certificate prompts them to do “something that you know is good for you to do anyway,” Wilson said, and their usage of the platform in this way raises the effectiveness of the awards program. There are currently more than 3,000 schools participating on School Assist.
“It's so much about being able to, as a school, reward behavior that is helping you outright,” he said. “We talk to schools all the time that are struggling to get that industry involvement and struggling to get people to really pay attention to their program if you can reward people with recognition, or shine a light on them and what they're doing for your program, you are really stoking the fire of that program or that business that's actually involved with your school.”
Jay Goninen.
Shops can qualify for the School Assist All-Star Awards by helping schools three times during a 12-month awards cycle. Shops may locate schools in need of help by scrolling through the platform listings.
“It doesn't need to be grand gestures of donating vehicles or things like that,” Wilson said. “It might be speaking to a class, attending an advisory committee meeting or having a kid come out for a job shadow — anything school-related that you can think of.”
Shop representatives will find a button that allows them access to log their contributions. It’s a quick process, Wilson said, and the School Assist team will review them before issuing awards.
Taking the time to document participation will help shops keep track of their own contributions over time, and it will also help shops manage their relationships with schools. And tracking, Wilson pointed out, can help shops navigate next steps in participation with schools.
Shops Supporting Schools
School/shop interaction via the platform is designed to ultimately develop new technicians so they can join the industry and foster a “continual pipeline of labor and skilled resource” so shops can continue to run smoothly, Johnson said. As technicians age out of jobs they’ve held for years, the industry is “scrambling” for new talent, and the platform seeks to help alleviate that need.
Dave Johnson.
“It's about having that community that enables and encourages that interaction that ultimately gets you to having more work-ready technicians that can be certified that are professionals that keep you in the supply of personnel that you're going to need for years to come,” he said.
Goninen called the need for shops to be involved with educational programs “critical” as they look beyond filling individual positions to helping create more of a steady flow of qualified people into the industry.
“That is the program rather than the person,” he said. “ I think it is it is essential to be able to focus on the health of your local schools and the programs that they're putting out for you because if you are only focused on that one person, and the program is struggling, you might get that one person, but you're cutting yourself off at the legs for the future.”
Looking toward needs for programs is also a way to connect with instructors who need validation in their educational efforts, Goninen added. Putting together programs only to have minimal industry participation can be discouraging for these individuals.
“I think that's what ultimately ends up in a program struggling to stay alive is if they just can't get the support they need,” he said.
Shops of All Sizes
In connecting with schools, Johnson pointed out, shops are creating a symbiotic relationship, but interactions are important in creating those relationships. It’s crucial to take time to figure out whether to connect with an instructor or administrator first, and it’s also essential to build those relationships before asking to connect with students so schools know shops are invested.
Example of the certificate of recognition winners will receive.
Most relationships do begin with instructors, Wilson said. School officials, Johnson said, also have differing levels of comfort working with shops.
“I think a lot of times that starting point is the hard part of ‘Who do I talk to, how do I reach out to the,” Goninen said.
School Assist can help build these relationships. The platform has a team that can reach out to schools on shops’ behalf and keeps a record of personnel changes at these institutions, Goninen said.
“It's a lot to keep your arms around if you're doing that and running a shop, and that's why we can kind of put it on a platter for you through the school assist program,” he said.
In recognition of the fact that employers come in varied sizes, ASE and WrenchWay sought to ensure small shops could participate in the School Assist All-Star Awards program and wouldn’t have to dedicate a full-time staff member to working with schools, Wilson said.
“It was a balancing act,” he said. “I don't claim that the numbers we have are perfect, but we wanted it to be a good mix of attainable and not like this big, huge thing that no one even gets started because they think ‘Well, I'm not going to have the time for that.’”
The awards are meant to be “meaningful,” he said, but they’re ultimately an added benefit to creating a funnel of students toward shops and jobs.
An Evolution
This is the first year for the effort, so there’s room for changes and improvements as it continues, Wilson said. The development has come mostly through feel.
“We had to start somewhere,” he said. “I wish I could say there was some magic algorithm or something that we came up with based on these statistics, but part of it was kind of gut feel of what's a fair amount of work, what will help out the schools, what's realistic. And some of it is maybe not overwhelming the schools.”
As the awards evolve, Johnson pointed out, the criteria can become more stringent.
“To me it's about growth,” he said. “You're trying to start at a foundational level.”
Participants will make entries reflecting different levels of quality, and as time passes, the awards can help those who can improve do so effectively.
It’s important moving forward, Wilson said, to amplify awareness of the program so more organizations will apply, and industry members and schools can share information about it on their own platforms and with their networks.
For more information on the School Assist All-Star Awards, visit wrenchway.com/school-assist.
