2-2-09 Apex, NC... The key to getting the economy rolling again in the right direction is to get the Consumer Confidence Index back up. Currently it is 37; a year ago it was in the 80's... we have to fix that. I am no economist, but as a sales expert I can honestly say that no one cuts, scrimps, saves, or eliminates their way out of recession. You must GROW your way out. You must spend your way out. Just the strategy of buying what you need will help jump start the economy. People are holding back, waiting to ...
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Simple not Easy
Have you ever decided to walk from your hometown to Las Vegas? Pretty simple even for me... Just put one foot in front of the other and head in that direction; it is not easy. I could get run over, gosh I might even get wet... But given enough time I will get there. Man I love the Bellagio!!Recruiting is that way right now for me. I have streamlined my process. I have made it simple... But the wallets and purses that be are very slow to open. One dealership told me they were in "LOCKDOWN." A lot of ... -
One Client At A Time. But Is This The Time?
I am either insane or clairvoyant. And I will have a better handle on that statement in 2009. I started my own LLC to help recruit and train a larger array of salespeople in the retail environment. I left my former employer on 9-16. On 9-17, the financial solar system as we knew it imploded into a thousand headlines. This whole situation is kind of like a football team being down 14-0 a minute into the game. Panic and emotion kick in and common sense heads out of the stadium. This CRISIS is 99% emotion and 1% economic. But try ...
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A New Beginning is an Opportunity!
A lot of things in the car business are changing with lightening speed... hybrid Escalades, anti-leasing, any excuse to raise gas prices, cars not trucks, to loan or not to loan... make no mistake about it, we are indeed in an automotive recession.The fact we are indeed in tougher economic times, makes finding the right caliber of sales talent even more important. Salespeople are revenue generators. The WORLD exists as it is today on sales! That dollar more a gallon of gas dilemma everyone faces in the US has put the pocketbook in the trough. People brown bag, combine ... -
Where am I?
I know it has been awhile since my last array of comments. Although we still need people I have been doing recruiting less and less and training more and more. In any recruiting study of note, you will see that just a handful of companies have a single conduit for recruiting. Usually companies have a multitude of managers recruiting, each one for the department they manage. Single source recruiting, one person who recruits and possibly onboards, is the most efficient way to go. Hopefully I will be back at it when we slowly lose employees through attrition. Until then, I ...
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Keep The Peep
Onboarding is THE hot issue in recruiting today. In sales, it is even more critical. Insanity truly is hiring people who leave more quickly than you can hire them.So I need your help. Please e-mail me any idea on onboarding process. Do you have a 14-30 day program to get the new employee onboarded and functionally literate? What works and what does not?Thank you sooooo much. -
Tis the Season to be Scary
I NEED PEOPLE! THEY ARE DROPPING LIKE FLIES! HELP! Nothing like upbeat e-mails to lighten the first moments of my business day. Sales recruiters this time of year are in full motion mode. Honestly, the only time I am not working is when my Crackberry is off and charging on the dresser.Career Fairs, University visits, newspaper ads and e-cruiting are all on the plate as we rev up for the Spring selling season... I can add an hour to the front of my day and an hour to the end of my day and still not be done. My ...
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Leap Year
Can you believe we have 29 chances in February to find candidates to fill positions? The key for the car business is to convince the candidates that they need to LEAP into this career. This is a career full of people not full of hours so you are at the store a lot; and it is also pure commission. No sell no eat. Now that I have the good aspects of what I offer out of the way, I am still looking for people to make the commitment to understand customer wants and needs and be there after the sale ...
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Comfortable?
Anthony Robbins once said, "What would you attempt to do if you knew you could not fail?"It is January. A little slow, routine. STOP!!! NOW IS THE TIME. Start changing stuff. Tweak, test, experiment. Make mistakes and adjustments. Get rocking.Do one thing in your recruiting world you have been meaning to do and DO IT. DO IT TODAY.If you knew you would never fail, things would be different...So work hard and have fun... Get passionate. Stop sending boring e-mails...Put your soul into it and drive success with Passion!!!The difference starts with you... THINK UNCOMFORTABLE ... -
Lonely Days
Lonely days and lonely nights, where would I be without my recruits... To paraphraze an oldie, these are the quiet times in the automotive sales recruiting arena. I simply do not have quantity. The quality of the candidate does increase in softer times, but as I recruit to get to March 1st with the people I need I am resorting to more classical approaches... When I meet someone in my spending or social network who impresses me for their customer focus and service, I offer them a job...I know the recruits will come as the year gets older and ... -
Happy Holidaze
When you get your breath, have all the cards sent and the gifts bought, take the time to assess 2007. Focus on 2008 and have a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!!!From my family to yours, much blessings.Jim -
HO HO HO
It is THE heart of the recruiting season. Some people think that because the holidays have arrived there is a decrease in candidates; nope... In fact the car business this time of year is humming like it should in the fourth quarter. We need peeps! That is the slogan of every dealership. Although it is not for everyone, the car business, from an ethical and relationship, is 180 degrees different then what we witnessed decades ago. It is very simple to be in car sales. It just ''ain't'' easy!Have a safe and wonderful holiday season and if you ... -
Overqualifried
We often use the term overqualified. I see or talk to so many people in this category that I am overqualifried!! Maybe 10% of the resumes I see are actually geared to our business. Why would a multi-degreed science-focused doctorial candidate want to sell cars? I know I cannot understand an individual's rationale. It is the personal choice of someone to choose a position to seek; just please change your resume to match the position.It is also becoming more common place to call candidates up and quickly understand that they have no clue who you are. They have ... -
Watch the Monitor (it could be sinking)
We utilize several e-cruit sites to get people, including the most cost effective... www.caryautomall.com and I have to watch them like a hawk to make sure everything is tidy and updated. The last time I did an audit, one site had me off for five days. all they say is oopsie... not what I want in response. If your recruiting ads are sitting out there, be on constant watch; for the sites can change at anytime. The only one who truly gives a hoot is YOU...
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A Fair Day
Tis the season to attend Career Fairs, falalalalalalalala...And just like anything, they can range from good to not so good. College Fairs are all around $500 and draw the grads and soon to be grads to the table. These are pretty solid. If you hire one, it is worth the outlay. The Fairs tied to the local job market are a good choice too because thay cost $50 to $100 to set up your wares and smiles and can often uncover that diamond in the rough. The E-fairs, Internet site fairs are very expensive... $700 to $1000. These can ...
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That Time of Year
As you all can relate, in many instances recruiting never stops. But when you add conferences, recruiting trips, training sessions and career fairs;these additional activities cramp the little things we do for a living... like work.So as you push yourself to these undertakings, count the blessings... you could be the recruitee instead of the recruiter.Enjoy!! -
Generic Version
I get a ton of e-mails and a lot of resumes are attached. But a good majority of them are sent to me without a focus for the car business. I will get a nurse applying for a position in car sales for example, and he/she will attach a resume for a nursing position. No changes at all. Normally that lack of focus has the app go to the bottom of my pile; I will look at it when I am down to it and address it in the phone call, but I am very surprised at how many ...
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Time in a Bottle
My "to do" pile gets a little bigger every day; sure I attack the important stuff, and the immediate stuff, but man it sure would be nice to truly get caught up. Heck it isn't like we do not have 86400 seconds every day. Or do we? If we used each second right we would not need self-checkouts, internet buying, kiosks, drive throughs and the like. If you are truly human, some of your day is wheel spinning and standing still, and the worst time killer of all... bureaucracy... smile when you hear Jim Croce singing that famous 1970 ... -
Simple not Easy
Even the most complicated of business activity can be managed if it is broken down into little pieces and managed "inch by inch". It is pretty simple really. Nothing in our business world is rocket science. But assessing recruiting by defining, trending and measuring is never very easy. How many things in recruiting go as planned? It is like war. Stuff happens. We make adjustments and move forward. By managing recruiting as a system and assessing it process by process, and tweaking as we go, we move forward each day with the confidence we are trying to do things correctly ... -
Frugality
Anyone will tell you that I am a cheapskate (Frugal). I am not a cheapskate personally, although I do cut coupons and look for sales... I am a cheapskate professionally. I hate wasting company moola. Hate it. I would love to have all of our selling and recruiting strategies go to our website www.caryautomall.com By driving our recruits to our website we are being as efficient as we can with the most common acronym know today... ROI. The return on investment is critical. Regardless of time or money, ROI must be assessed in everything we do.Measure, define ...
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