Auto Care ON AIR
"Auto Care ON AIR" is a candid podcast dedicated to exploring the most relevant topics within the auto care industry. Each episode features insightful discussions with leading experts and prominent industry figures. Our content is thoughtfully divided into four distinct shows to cover four different categories of topics, ensuring collective professional growth and a comprehensive understanding of the auto care industry.
The Driver's Seat: Navigating Business and the Journey of Leadership
To understand organizations, you need to understand their operators. Join Behzad Rassuli, as he sits down for in-depth, one-on-one conversations with leaders that are shaping the future. This show is a "must listen" for how top executives navigate growth, success, and setbacks that come with the terrain of business.
Carpool Conversations: Collaborative Reflections on the Road to Success
Hosted by Jacki Lutz, this series invites a vibrant and strategic mix of guests to debate and discuss the power skills that define success today. Each episode is an entertaining, multi-voice view of a professional development topic and a platform for our members to learn about our industry's most promising professionals.
Indicators: Discussing Data that Drives Business
This show explores data relevant to the automotive aftermarket. Join Mike Chung as he engages with thought leaders in identifying data that will help you monitor and forecast industry performance. Whether global economic data, industry indicators, or new data sources, listen in as we push the envelope in identifying and shaping the metrics that matter.
Traction Control: Reacting with Precision to the Road Ahead
Every single day, events happen, technologies are introduced, and the base assumptions to our best laid plans can change. Join Stacey Miller for a show focused on recent news from the global to the local level and what it may mean for auto care industry businesses. Get hot takes on current events, stay in the know with timely discussions and hear from guests on the frontlines of these developments.
Auto Care ON AIR
The Hidden Crisis: Building Tomorrow's Automotive and Heavy Duty Workforce
Kenny Meerschaertdidn't set out to revolutionize workforce development in the automotive industry. The Regional Operations Director for Michigan CAT simply faced a problem: traditional recruitment methods weren't filling critical technician positions. What evolved from this challenge has become a blueprint for companies across the industry.
Drawing from his experiences building deep partnerships with educational institutions, Meerschaert reveals how Michigan CAT transformed their approach to talent development by engaging with students as early as elementary school. "We had to learn that the old ways of recruiting technicians and parts personnel just really weren't working for us," he explains, describing the shift toward "growing your own workforce."
The conversation illuminates how effective workforce development requires breaking down communication barriers between industry, educators, government agencies, and parents. Through advisory board participation and curriculum development, Michigan CAT created pathways that make learning relevant to industry needs while changing perceptions about vocational careers. Their innovative Michigan Apprentice Readiness Certificate program now allows high school students to earn credits toward apprenticeships before graduation.
Perhaps most compelling is Meerschaert's insight about the industry's stability and impact: "Think about something you will do today or touch that wasn't touched by our business first." This powerful perspective helps students understand how automotive careers quite literally keep America moving. By mapping clear career pathways with competitive earning potential ($70-100K annually), companies can attract talent looking for meaningful, stable careers.
For industry leaders concerned about future workforce needs, Meerschaert offers this advice: "Plant the tree, take the time, sow the seeds...you're going to get back tenfold every single year." His experience proves that companies who invest in comprehensive talent development strategies today will harvest the skilled workforce they need tomorrow.
To learn more about the Auto Care Association visit autocare.org.
To learn more about our show and suggest future topics and guests, visit autocare.org/podcast
Welcome to Auto Care On Air, a candid podcast for a curious industry. I'm Stacey Miller, vice President of Communications at the Auto Care Association, and this is Traction Control, where we chat about recent news from the global to the local level and what it may mean to the industry, featuring guests on the front lines. Let's roll. This is one of my favorite topics, honestly, because every time I talk to someone they're so passionate about it. So we're in the studio today with Kenny Murchart. Yes, kenny Murchart, he's the Regional Operations Director for Michigan CAT. Kenny, welcome, thank you. I'm very excited to sit down with you here at HDA Truck Pride and we're talking a little bit about workforce development. And I heard a little birdie told me that you were the recipient of not one, but two awards here from HDA Truck Pride, so tell me a little bit about those.
Speaker 2:Sure, one of our parts persons, john Hahn, spent time in the HDA University going through different modules, spent a bunch of time. He was actually one of the highest learners in the HDA University last year and, as a company, all of our learners put together as a percentage were one of the highest users of the HCA University last year.
Speaker 1:And what does it mean to be one of the highest learners?
Speaker 2:Overall, it was an opportunity to go through the classes, go through the university. But from our standpoint, a company, it's a development process that we've been using to supplement training that we don't have within-house. It's a lot of good information, a lot of bumper-to-bumper for the on-highway business and just an overall, it's been a good experience for our on-highway personnel.
Speaker 1:So continuous learning and education seems really important to Michigan CAT. Tell me why.
Speaker 2:I think the why kind of lends itself to a little bit of a history lesson, and we had to learn that the old ways of doing business, the old ways of recruiting technicians and parts personnel, just really weren't working for us. If you go back in time to the recession in Michigan 2007, 2008, 2009, that was at a time when we were actually looking to maybe reduce our overall headcount. We did rotating layoffs to keep as many people as we could, but as we came out of that 2010, 2012, even all the way up to 2013, we started to see that there were gaps and those gaps really were in again, traditional methods and the availability of good workers in the workforce. So that was the start of us having to learn a lesson of growing your own, building your own workforce over the course of time. So I think it's been important for us to continue that tradition and expand it as we move forward.
Speaker 1:Absolutely. I mean, one of the biggest things that we hear throughout the industry, no matter what segment, is that. You know we have a workforce issue. We need more qualified technicians, we need more people who are interested in the workforce development arena and, from what I understand, you're really hands on in those programs. So I want to dig really deep into it, because some of the things that you were sharing with me were absolutely fascinating. I think the industry does a lot in terms of workforce development and we throw a lot of things out there, like you know job fairs, we want to help get funding, trying to get more programs in the schools. But what I'm hearing from you, and I think one of the things that I want to dig into first, is you kind of have to do it all in order to be really successful and while that may seem daunting, it sounds like you've kind of cracked the code, kind of regionally, in doing that. So tell me a little bit about what your approach is to finding and helping develop, you know, the next generation of talent.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think that's a great question because in the past, you know, if we were, I guess we first have to start with that Again. That traditional workforce just isn't out there, right? If you have somebody that's walking through your door with 20 or 30 years of experience, there's probably a little birdie in the back of your head wanting to ask why are you here, why are you not working? Why have you left a job? And sometimes there's good reasons People are moving back to Michigan to be with family or whatever. But it's typically, you know, because people have good jobs and there's not that many. So as we realized that there was there, there wasn't a Calvary over the hill, we weren't putting up postings on Indeed or or or in the local newspaper, or what have you, and having a hundred people apply anymore, we really kind of started to go towards how do you develop, how do we find somebody young, how somebody we can help create a culture with and like, like I'm sure a lot of people do, we would walk into a high school a week before graduation and say who wants to come work for us and really quickly realized that that wasn't going to work.
Speaker 2:There was a lot of changes in schools over the years. Near our area there was some of the shops went away or some of them were mothballed. The classes weren't there, there wasn't the interest from the students. There was a big push for college prep and so that created this first wave of this gap of employees. And so we realized, the more we started to get engaged, that there was a disconnect to some level. There was people that wanted to help. There was educators that wanted to do more. There was teachers that wanted to help. There was educators that wanted to do more, there was teachers that wanted to be more engaged. There was government agencies that wanted to help and we wanted to help. How could we help?
Speaker 2:But it seemed like you would sit in these meetings or advisory boards and there was just kind of this disconnect, almost like everybody was speaking a different language, and so we kind of had to work to break those barriers and say this is what I mean by help. We can help with parts, we can help with examples, we can help with books. What do you need? Sometimes we can help with donation or money, but really it was more about curriculum. It was more about what do you need from a student, what do you need from a product that they wanted to produce, from the school level, having a curriculum and the ability to learn within the schools as it was.
Speaker 2:To go back even into elementary school and middle school to let students know there was these types of jobs out there, to let teachers know there were these types of jobs out there, to let parents know there were type jobs out there, were tight jobs out there.
Speaker 2:And and the and the real, at the real heart of the matter, a lot of the perceptions that used to come along with some of the vocations in the, in the business, we had to kind of knock down and go listen, you can, you can come out of high school and we can put you through a apprenticeship or a sponsorship program and when you're done, you can make 70, 80, 90,000, 100 grand in a year with working, some overtime and being diligent. And what have you? And when parents start to hear that and they're going I have college debt or you know, I still have student loans and they were seeing that these were out to be available I think it really kind of started to change that tone. So when you, when you, we started to meet with counselors, we started to meet with teachers. We started spending time in the schools and really kind of dug into what, what, what was they needed to give us what we needed at the end, and that really kind of helped start that process.
Speaker 1:You said something that kind of blew my mind for a second. Did you say that you're going all the way to elementary school to help educate these?
Speaker 2:kids engage with some local schools that have the foresight um in Michigan to where they have career fairs, uh, as early as fourth, fifth grade, where students get to come in touch, see, feel, hear about the careers. Um, you know, we'll bring a small piece of equipment in for them to run, or um a simulator to where they can actually drive a truck on the road and and see what it's like to earn a CDL. So it's a really rewarding and engaging opportunity when you go through it.
Speaker 1:That is so cool and I'm going to really embarrass myself right now, but there is a game that I enjoy on the Xbox and it is called Trucking Simulator, and I just find it really peaceful. I wonder if anybody else you know use that approach? Right, like kids, like video games, but what if the video games were career oriented for some of these vocations? Right? And you know, one of the funnier things I don't know you have kids, right, I do. How old are your kids?
Speaker 2:22 and 19.
Speaker 1:Okay. So they're grown, they're in the workforce, basically You're entering the workforce. I don't have children, but I have a young niece. She's five. She loves Blippi. I don't know if you know what Blippi is, I do not. Okay, no-transcript character do this and I thought it was such an amazing thing and I thought, well, you know, you really do have to kind of start him young, as we joke about, in order to, you know, really help increase their awareness of all these other jobs that are out there. So it's interesting to hear it from someone who's worked so hard on these programs that, yeah, you really do have to go to the elementary school. Like, is high school too late?
Speaker 2:Traditionally, you know, go back in time when you, like I said we would go into the high schools and you had a lot of perceptions and preconceived notions and you were giving a.
Speaker 2:You know, maybe this student might work with you, right, and we took a lot of those students and were able to work with them because they were good people. But it wasn't maybe necessarily by their choice. They were maybe lost, didn't know what to do, and we worked with them and so forth. But giving students, giving children that opportunity to see what's out there and available to them, I think it gives us a far greater expanse of opportunity than what you've had in the past. I think when I come through school, right, we took a little test, said, oh, you were either going to be a fireman or you're going to be a policeman or whatever, and I think maybe those were good to start getting guided down the road. But really, now we're starting to see when they had that opportunity, even within the vocations, right, we would go into school and maybe, if you you know a normal school size of a graduating class of 200 or so, you know we were looking for the 10 or 15 percent of the students that might want to go into vocation or might be interested into it. And a couple of things happened. Right, I'm going in, the bricklayers are going in, the electricians are going in, the construction people are going in. So we're fighting for that 10 or 15 percent on 200. Right, so we're looking for 20 kids basically, and I wanted the best one out of that group and really kind of quickly learned that that wasn't going to sustain himself, right, and you start to meet people. I've got on advisory boards, I'm on steering committees and stuff like that. So you meet the people.
Speaker 2:And now I wasn't in just selling Michigan cat or the on highway business, I was selling the vocations. And so maybe I would go in and get one or two people before and 50% of the time it might work out. Now I was going in and had the capacity to find five and then I was getting three out of it because you were selling vocation as a whole. Five. And then I was getting three out of it because you were selling vocation as a whole, right, so, and then you know you would, those other vocations would start to return the favor going.
Speaker 2:Hey, I got somebody to come to me that I don't think he's going to be an electrician, but he seemed really technical and wants, you know, work on engines or something like that. So it's about that connection, it's about using those resources, you know, helping helping the schools understand, helping the children understand, helping the government understand, helping the parents understand, right and and and getting everybody on the same page. We all want to do the same thing, right. We're all trying to go in that same direction. But it's been like I said, it's been an interesting little bit of an uphill climb, but I think we're we're we're starting to roll pretty good now.
Speaker 1:Starting to chip away at it, absolutely. You know one of the other things I was thinking about. So we try to make or showcase how appealing this industry really is, because every single person I talk to on this podcast, every single person I meet at an event, talks about how much they love this industry. And once you're in it, you're in it for life. And I wonder how, you know, how do we communicate that to this younger generation? Right, we talk about how do you make automotive sexy? How do you make heavy duty sexy? How do you make on and off highway a sexy career, right, when kids today want to.
Speaker 1:You know, when I was coming up in school, it was like, oh, I really want to work for Facebook, or I want to work for Google or I want to work for Amazon. Now, you know they want to be a social media influencer, be a content creator, like. Do all these like really quick, fast ways to make money, gain, influence type jobs? It's so interesting. And one of the things you mentioned was salary. Right, like, we have really appealing salaries if you put in the work. Are there other factors or things that you think make this industry really appealing that we haven't done a good job communicating or we could do a better job of communicating?
Speaker 2:So maybe actually going back to the development self, when you, when you really start to put something together, right it's it's kind of the that that grow it and then show it. Right, you know, maybe you're you know, if you go back to a little bit of my farm roots, you know that you would plant a patch of pumpkins or something and then you want to go to the local fair at the end to show what a great job you did. But similar to that as far as the development of people and the opportunities, you know you bring things in and we, we, we can map career paths. Now, right, we, we know what these careers look like. We know what the start looks like. We know where the end game is. You know and where people want to drive towards, whether it be owner operators or owners or or, or you know, single owner businesses and stuff like that. And and it's all starts with those foundational things. Right, I used to kind of focus on the money when I was talking to parents going, look, you can make really good money and you can get really good benefits, and the more time I spend, that's maybe that first kind of hook. But then they want to know what is the career like? Right, what can I do? Right, and get back to some of the core values that we exhibit in this business as a whole and in the individual businesses maybe more negative slang don't really fit in our world. You know technicians and owner-operators and you know the whole network itself managers and stuff. Really, those opportunities and those career paths that we're now engaged in mapping out, I think are more interesting than anything else to people because they're like I can see where I'm going to be at in five years.
Speaker 2:Right, there's still the I think we struggled with it as we start to see more generational gaps was that sometimes the kids would come out of college and they'd be in a management role or a management trainee role and then eight months they're coming in and going well, when do you think I can be vice president? Like, well, I've been here 30 years and I'm still not vice president, right, and you know. But I think society, and sometimes colleges or whatever, set those expectations of what's next for me. What's next for me? Right, it's social media.
Speaker 2:What click is next? Right, what? And with this, I think people that are willing to work and have success in this business will look at that and go. Okay, I can follow a path, I can do this to get here and I can do this to get here, and I think that, to me, is one of the things that I think the stability of this business right, the volume of trucks on the road, the volume on highway, the volume of vocations that are out there I think provides clear paths for people and I think sometimes that's comforting for them.
Speaker 1:A lot of stability right In a time that could be considered not so stable or maybe uncertain, right, Right, so I really I do appreciate that I love to share the stability and the resilience of our industry with anybody who will listen, because I absolutely love it here and one of the other things I think about.
Speaker 1:You talked about core values and I wonder if our impact is part of the conversation in talent development. Right, like, you're not just a cog in the wheel, you're a part of this industry that really keeps America moving. Right, like, dumbing it down to like, well, you're not gonna get groceries unless these trucks are on the road, or you're not gonna be able to build a new house without these construction vehicles. Right, there's all these different implications about what we do, I think, and what we contribute to, and I wonder if this younger generation we know, statistically they do resonate with causes and they look to work with brands or buy from brands that provide value to them or they contribute to an important cause. If that could be something that we could use in career development, it might be an interesting idea.
Speaker 2:It's interesting you brought that up. I was at an event recently and we had conversations about. I was at an event recently and we had conversations about. I tease around, right, my kids are of that age where you know they use social media and understand it. You know, I didn't realize the whole what is it?
Speaker 1:chat, snap, the face space. Is that what it's called? I?
Speaker 2:was trying to explain it today, but it's the. I kept saying threads, but it's the streaks. Right, what Within Snapchat they want to do the streaks. I don't know, I have no clue. So, if I understand it correctly, it's whatever they started. Maybe they started with their friend and the one sends a picture, or they send a note or what have you, and then now it's day one of streak. Then you have two days or three days and I really kind of thought, well, it's just one more thing. That's kind of sucking them away from time. But one thing I realized was it's diligence. They want to keep their streaks going. They want to do good, whatever it was. They're getting some type of reward of going.
Speaker 2:I'm dedicated to this. You know, I'm 63 days into my streaks or threads or whatever it may be. And, and when you think about it, that's that's what you want, an employee. That's the kind of culture that you're looking for. That's what we see in this business People that are going to get up at four and five every morning, people that are going to show up to work every day, and and you, you see in this business where people go home and can show where they've done something right. I fixed this, I delivered this. I was able to provide this right and know what they do and I don't know that you can say that in every job out there right now. Right, you know how did I affect people or what did I do. I think in this business you can always go home and actively engage with others and go. I did this today, right.
Speaker 1:I feel good about it. I see a campaign. I'm seeing a campaign in our future, kenny. The campaign tell me if you like it. The campaign is you've got police officers I protect people you know like nurses and doctors, you know I save people's lives. And then we've got people in our industry that are like. You know I helped keep America on the road. I got the groceries to the grocery store right. Like I contributed to that. That could be really interesting.
Speaker 2:It's, it's um. There's a fun game that when we go into the middle school, sometimes the high schools will play um, where it's kind of like um, see if you can stump me or challenge me. But if you think about it, think about something that you will do today or something you will touch that wasn't touched by our business first, right, and it's hard to do and a lot of times I'll get answers from students and be like oh, I got it. Milk. I'm like milk, that's easy, it was in a truck before. You know a refrigerated truck, right.
Speaker 2:And when you really kind of look at that and think about it, there's not too many things. I think the one time somebody stumped me the guy, the one student, I remember him, like it was yesterday he said primitive tools, like, okay, yeah, yeah, you got me, yeah, so, but, um, I said if you're using those primitive tools, you're probably doing something to uh, you know to to make sure you probably collect them as an antique, so you're probably restoring them, so you probably need product that was delivered on a truck or what have you. So, but it's, it's kind of an interesting game if you really start to think about it going. There is not much that doesn't come through our industry in any way, shape or form, even media right, even right, the, the, the, the cords that we're using right now, that's delivered, and things of that nature.
Speaker 1:On that Amazon truck got them here just in time. No-transcript. A challenge for some people who you know they want to contribute to the talent development issue and they expect that. You know we get funding and then someone's going to develop a curriculum and then go to those schools and teach it to the kids and all of a sudden they get some text. But from what I'm hearing from you, it sounds like you have to be pretty hands-on in that process to kind of help guide that, because where else are the schools getting that guidance from?
Speaker 2:I think it was about two years ago I really got to see that in an in-depth, more in-depth view and we were working with a local school north of the Detroit area and one of the counselors from the vocational side of the business it was a vocational school brought in a math teacher to sit down and speak with me and a couple others and then later brought in an English teacher and they had the foresight to say that the normal English curriculum that was there, that maybe from the state or what was kind of standard wasn and and how to take that stuff that they will be using in the future in their day to day and incorporate it into the lessons, incorporated into the story problems.
Speaker 2:Or, uh, the English teacher was great because she wanted to see our service reports and the type of stuff we were writing, Right and, and so we provided that and she created her, her classwork you know, we're still still meeting that curriculum for their English class but created that classwork that lended credibility, that that was allowed for the interest from the student to go. Okay, I do want to talk about the engine I repaired today, Right and, and we're able to tell that story. So, um, believe it or not, we still see that as probably our two biggest struggles with employees, Even today. You would think, in the today, the age we are at, that people wouldn't have math or writing issues, but it's still an issue. And you think about telling that story, telling that story to a customer.
Speaker 2:Customers want to know what we did to their vehicles, what they did to a customer. Customers want to know what they, what we did to their vehicles, what they did to their trucks, right and document that and have that history of it. Um, so it's, it's, it's going to get better, just just by breaking down those barriers and not having some rigid standard, having something that fits that product that we're all trying to produce.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and when it comes to the curriculum itself for the trade right Like, you've been contributing to that as well I mean, what was that process right? Like, if someone asked me hey, how would you teach a high school kid how to do X, y Z? I would really struggle to figure out where to start. What are the foundations? How much or how little do they need to know in Y, z? I would really struggle to figure out, like, where to start. What are the foundations? How much or how little do they need to know? In what order? Right? Like developing that versus how you learned and how you were brought up through the industry. I mean, how did that differ? Where did you start?
Speaker 2:I think I had an opportunity that maybe most don't have. My kids were at that age, right. They were kind of coming up through school when a lot of the stuff was coming on. My kids were in middle school and maybe just starting my daughter might've been starting high school at that time Really kind of got engaged with the schools itself. I started getting on a lot of different advisory boards, four or five different school districts, became friends with even some of the superintendents. My wife actually became a school board member.
Speaker 2:So I was really exposed to a lot of the educational needs and systems and I think that allowed for me to go in and have those conversations that drove towards an end game, drove towards a product that wasn't just a certificate and when I say product maybe that's a bad choice of words, but having a student that's had a fulfilling opportunity in their educational system, that is driving them towards something that they want to do, right. I think a lot of times you pick easy ones, like nurses. You got to have a certificate. My son's actually working towards being a nurse, my daughter's working towards having her speech pathology degree, right. So those are things that you kind of know what your paths are when you have to go, but with some of the other ones that you don't necessarily need a certificate for.
Speaker 2:You know what does that look like and you have to start with the end game. You know I'd like a good person right. Start with the culture piece right, which sometimes the schools have to help teach as well, and then work towards the skills and education they need and then back into that right and then you can have the conversation going. This isn't going to work for them. We need maybe a little bit more shop, or we need a different math or English. You know curriculum that helps for that applied learning.
Speaker 1:Absolutely. I just find this all so fascinating because I think one of the takeaways that I'm getting from this conversation is that we need to be a lot more involved than we think in order to foster the future of the industry. Right Like, if you have the passion, make the time for it. I think, marty, he's our friend at the education he has up education at.
Speaker 2:HVA.
Speaker 1:Chug Pride. He's fantastic. You know. He said an analogy to me earlier and again. It blew my mind because it's so simple. But he goes, plant the tree. He goes plant the tree, take the time, sow the seeds. You take care of the tree. It's going to come back every year. You're able to prune it and mold it how you like it, but you're going to get back tenfold from that tree every single year. But you have to take the time to do it.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I totally agree. When I first came into this, I think I was blinded by all the leaves on the tree. How would I ever be part of creating curriculum that's for educators, that's for people that know far more than me? And really it wasn't the rocket science I made it out to be. Really, when you kind of break it down, that the core is a seed, it's a tree, right, and it's building blocks and you, just you start with one and, like I said, you know, our whole initiative right now is, you know, we're looking to continue to grow it and as long as we're growing it and we have developmental paths for our employees right then show it, show it to them, show them that here's what we're going to do for you and to get you down a path of a 20, 30, 40 year career.
Speaker 1:Absolutely. I think it's really important to thank you for what you're doing regionally and how you're kind of creating the blueprint. Clearly, you're being recognized for it, not only by HDA Truck Pride, but also by the state of Michigan. Apparently you've been recognized. Tell me a little bit about that.
Speaker 2:We had an opportunity to work with the state of Michigan recently to be one of the first. We helped them beta test the Michigan Apprentice Readiness Certificate and really that the quick version of that is. It allows kids in high school junior, senior year is what we're working with to come in and get credits towards an apprenticeship that they could have once they graduate. So, for example, a junior year we might bring them in and maybe work on some very foundational safety onboarding type things. You know, have them do some online classes, have them do some in-person classes, work with mentors and also working hands-on. Then maybe the second year they come in and if they come back and we're interested and they're interested, then we start to get into the foundations of the equipment, the engines, the. You know the different operating systems and such, and so I think for us, a lot of things happen there. One, we get to see the employee, the. You know the different operating systems and such, and so I think for us, a lot of things happen there. One, we get to see the employee. Right, are they somebody we want to invest a future in? Before we get too deep? Maybe they think they want to be in this business and come to find out once they're in it. They don't right. So we're finding that out when they're 16, 17 years old. Wow, we haven't had too many people that haven't want to stay.
Speaker 2:So then you take to the next step. Can they learn the business Right? And so now we're really two years in of seeing who they are as people. Do they match our culture, do they match our business? And then do they have the capacity for growth and development? And then when they graduate high school, we have different options for them. We have an in-house learning program that's headed up that has been very successful. We work with Caterpillar for a sponsorship program called Think Big, and we send some that way, and then we also work with our local union for actual true apprenticeship, and we send some that way, and then we also work with our local union for actual true apprenticeship. So we have a lot of different pathways depending on what type of learner and student you may have. So I think that's just as important as having the curriculum and development is actually having different paths to get to the same place as well, because people learn different different, Absolutely.
Speaker 1:I mean, you have shared so much about all the different paths that you and MichiganCat have been taking in order to foster the future of the industry, and I think you told me something earlier that's really pertinent, and it is that success leaves clues. And I absolutely love that, because I think anybody listening to this podcast that's concerned about the future of the industry looking to support workforce development, looking to support continuing education should look at the things that you've been doing, some of the things that you've shared today, and emulate those in those businesses, because it's going to take all of us to kind of solve this issue right, Like it's not going to be resolved overnight. But through sharing some of these pathways to getting more people interested, getting the schools together, getting all those people in the room talking the same language and breaking down those barriers, we can really make a dent in this problem. And no, that's not a collision joke, I'm sorry.
Speaker 2:I agree I wouldn't if I was. I'm not probably the best person to give advice all the time, but if I was to give the advice is don't be scared to try. You as business owners, the people that are out there that are looking for employees. You know what you want you're looking for and if you know and you can paint that picture, and then you can start to work backwards and find good partners, partners like HDA, partners like schools, like vocational schools, if you can work back, they will help you find that it's just you got to break that unofficial language barrier of understanding that you know what the different businesses can provide. And I and I think that was probably my biggest lesson I had to learn of maybe this isn't as hard as I was making it in my head that maybe we can do this together if we just use our connections- yes, we can.
Speaker 1:Really excellent advice today, and thank you so much, kenny, for joining us. You bet it was a good time. Thanks for having me, thanks for tuning in to another episode of Auto Care On Air. Make sure to subscribe to our podcast so that you never miss an episode, and don't forget to leave us a rating and review that helps others discover our content. Auto Care On Air is a production of the Auto Care Association, dedicated to advancing the auto care industry and supporting professionals like you. To learn more about the association and its initiatives, visit autocareorg.
