PLAN STRATEGIES TO MAKE MORE MONEYHow to be an effective dealership manager

By Jeff Mowatt

et's be frank - if YOII

work for a dealership,then ~"our primary goalis to make money, Pe-riod, You may have sec-

liiiDli.!d~ondary goals to serve theinterests OfyOUT customers, employees,and be a good corporate citizen, butyour number one prioritv is strictly re-turn on investment. Profit.When I speak at conventions and

meetings on how to boost p rofi isth io ujrh cust.orn e r re te n t io n , 1 oftenfind that business owners and man-agers don't havc their prioritiesstraight. The result is they lost, cus-tomer loyahv, face increasing operat-ing costs, scramble to replace staffturnover, and strugglejust to keep upto thc competition, They llla~' workhard and think positivelv, but theirimpact is marginal.On rhe other hand, by si m plv re-

aligning their priorities. nlanagerscan lead their company or depart-ment in a wav that builds customerand staff lovalty, reduces operatingcosts, makes more mOlJe~', and servesas a model corporate citizen, Youwon 't have 10 work any harder; justsmaru-r. To find out how, answer thefollowing questions according to vourcurrent practices, Then read the ac-companving suggestion for the best,,'ay to optimize vour time and effec-tive ness.

What is normally your first task of the day?a) returning phone callsb) administrative paperworkcl \1"Orl.:on su'alf'gic prujectsdj dcaling with CmLOlT1lT~

cl responding 10 e m plovc c ]"(''1''(,'15

Your first prioritv of the day shouldbe C/ II"m'king on strategic projects de-signed to preycnt problems and in-crease profi ts. Typically howeve r,managers put off st rareg ic wo rk to doother work that has a deadline, The)"confuse tll'gene;' with importance,

It's easy to put offstrategic workIt's alwavs easv to put off

wo rk t ha ts st rat eg ic innature because the dead-line is usuallv non-existentor not urgent, and strate-gic work requires some-thing manv of us prefer toavoid - thinking, Theproblem is that if vou ro n-t in ual lv put off projects jeffMowattdcsigned io increase proleits or reduce problems, ihe n vou e-ndup having more crises to deal with.So you ger caught in th e vicio us rvclcof crisis management.A lot of managers and business <"\"11-

ers secretlv Ion: puuing OUI fires be-cause it makes them fee-l like heroes,In fact, t hcv live in a fools paradise:treating svm ptorns eve rv dav ratherihar curing lht' disease.

A lot of managersand business owners

secretly love putting outfires because it makesthem feel like heroes.

Doing strategic project work for thefirst I to 1-1/2 hours olvour day puts~;Oll in Cl p roa c t ive rn i n d se t . Eve n

though crises rnav spring up duringthe dav at least you hav .•• thc comfortof knuwing \,ol1're doing somethingto preY(,"l1t these problems from recur-ring, In other words, doing str.uegicproject work gi\'es you a sense COIll rnlal1d a feclinf; that th c rc is a light .nthe end of the r n n n e l."\'hen I speak at seminars about the

hour and a hall' of uninterrupted stra-tegic pn~('"(1 work. J often hear a cho-rus of protests horn t h e audience,People talk about the emergencies that

require their attention,The truth is, unless you

work in emergency services,there is almost no problemor crisis or customer re-quest that can't be handled, by someone else in the or-

ganization, or which can'twait 90 minutes for vourpersonal attention. Realisti-call}" you'll accomplishmore in that hour and ahall" of strategic projectwork than the other 7 hours

of crisis managenreru combined,

Of your major project work, which doyou typically work on first?

al Ihe one with the mostpressing deadlineb) the on e that's the easiest to do

quicklyCl the one that will generate the most

profits over the long term

Obviouslv, you should work on c),the project that will generate the mustp ro l i t s ove r the long term, That'swhat voure in business for" Ironically,most managers d on 't do it. They re-act to deadlines, submitting to the tyr-ann~' of the urgent. It's fine to workOil projects with urgent deadlines, but.u least spend the first hour on thelong-term profi t project, then work011 the other projects with the urgentdeadlines.

Administrative activities are some ofthe most important tasks as a managera) truebl false

Answer: bl false, Adminis-uivia is thedav-io-dav organizing- of money (cashflow) personnel (scheduling) and ma-chincr- (inventory). It's the iedious re-puning and paperwork that siruplv has10 be done, And it's the lowest form ofwork for anv manager, It should be au-tomated or delegated.Jf you are doingthis work yourself, you are a clerk- nota dealership leader,

\Varrl'c.:. De-ale-r Business 47