Building Trust and Accountability

We welcome back Jessica Toliuszis, VP of Sales at Highline Warren, and introduce Rob Blitzstein, Senior VP of Vendor Relations and Pricing at The Parts Authority. We unravel the lessons from Northwood University of the Aftermarket's Infusion program, an executive leadership course. You'll hear how unexpected friendships were formed and the lifelong impact of engaging with diverse perspectives in such an intensive environment.

Our conversations reveal the essence of servant leadership and its transformative role within organizations, as we dig into eye-opening sessions on personal accountability and emotional intelligence. We discuss the wisdom shared by former Michigan Governor Rick Snyder, and how these teachings can help not only in reshaping business strategies but in personal growth. The importance of a personal board of directors and maintaining a positive self-image takes center stage as we navigate through the challenges of leadership and the importance of nurturing young talent.

Balancing work-life dynamics becomes a focal point as we discuss our personal journeys, sharing amusing stories of our children and the unexpected lessons learned from them. We delve into creative outlets and finding hobbies to avoid burnout. From forging trust through accountability to juggling the demands of career and family, this episode offers a thoughtful exploration of how personal passions and professional responsibilities intertwine in the complex and ever-evolving auto care industry.

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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

Episode Transcript

Rob Blitzstein (00:00):
we're gonna make it all right, so I'm gonna be
on 2028.

Jacki Lutz (00:05):
All right, so that was the rest of my life.
That was a pretty goodrehearsal.

Jessica Toliuszis (00:08):
You guys want to just like jump right into it
.
You want to just go into it,all right.
So accountability, folks.
Welcome to the spotify.
Are we on spotify?

Jacki Lutz (00:16):
this is spotify right yes, we're in spot, bobby
gets confused bobby's tired.

Jessica Toliuszis (00:19):
See, bobby was never actually invited, but
he came.
No, bobby doesn't get invited,he just.

Jacki Lutz (00:21):
He just comes in you don't know when it's Bobby's
tired.
See, bobby was never actuallyinvited, but he came, he just
showed up.

Jessica Toliuszis (00:26):
No, bobby doesn't get invited anywhere, he
just comes in.
You don't know when it's goingto happen either.
When the sunglasses go on atnight, that's a problem.

Jacki Lutz (00:42):
Welcome to Auto Care On Air, a candid podcast for a
curious industry.
I'm Jackie Lutz, contentDirector at the Auto Care
Association, and this is CarpoolConversations, where we
collaborate on today's mostrelevant power skills.
We're all headed in the samedirection, so let's get there
together.
Welcome everybody to CarpoolConversations.

(01:09):
I have with me for the firsttime a return guest, and I don't
want to hear anything about it.
I had a cancellation and calledin somebody at the last minute
that I know can talk about justabout anything.
So I have Jessica Taliciousback.
Vp of Sales with HighlineWarren.
Welcome back, jessica.
Thanks for having me.

(01:30):
I blame Stacey because she gaveme the keys to the studio.
Yeah, I mean, that was on air,Everybody knows, yeah.
So welcome back.
And I have Rob Blitstein,senior VP of Vendor Relations
and Pricing with Parts Authority.
Welcome.

Jessica Toliuszis (01:44):
Rob, thank you for having me.
I am not going to blame Stacey.

Jacki Lutz (01:47):
No, you shouldn't.

Jessica Toliuszis (01:48):
No, why would I do?

Jacki Lutz (01:49):
that she wouldn't appreciate it.
What's?

Jessica Toliuszis (01:51):
wrong with you?

Rob Blitzstein (01:52):
But the sincerest form of flattery
Constructive criticism.
Feedback.

Jessica Toliuszis (01:56):
A lot of people really love me then.

Rob Blitzstein (01:59):
What a title that is.

Jacki Lutz (02:03):
Well, we are all at infusion together.
That is north.
For people that don't know,that is northwood.
Uh, university of theaftermarkets executive
leadership and strategy course.
We're still trying to figureout what infusion means.
Yeah, we were.
We were trying to look up theword infusion, so that we could
say something really don't lookit up, it's my went down a
rabbit hole and came outempty-handed there.

(02:24):
Yeah, we let rob look it up.
Maybe Went down a rabbit holeand came out empty handed there.

Rob Blitzstein (02:26):
We let Rob look it up Maybe that was our first
problem.

Jessica Toliuszis (02:28):
It seems to me a continuation from
Leadership 2.0, perhaps which iswhere we first met and had that
program together, which is avery cool program.

Jacki Lutz (02:36):
Yeah, it's been kind of fun to have a little reunion
.

Jessica Toliuszis (02:39):
It's been a reunion.
We also have Andrew here.
Are we allowed to name drop on?

Jacki Lutz (02:42):
here.
Yeah, you can name drop Yo.
What's up Andrew?
Yeah, they know Andrew nowbecause he was on our last
episode.

Jessica Toliuszis (02:49):
I hope that wasn't too loud and gets cut out
.

Jacki Lutz (02:51):
That's not the kind of stuff that gets cut out.

Jessica Toliuszis (02:53):
No, I want that in.
I want that in.
Leave it in.

Jacki Lutz (02:55):
Leave it in and we haven't talked about my favorite
part of things like this whichof it because there's something
to be said when you're stuckwith the same.
I say stuck in a mean whenyou're with the same people.

Jessica Toliuszis (03:07):
Yeah you're stuck with us forever, jackie
you're trapped leave it a bodybag.

Jacki Lutz (03:14):
I have the keys.
You know, being with the samepeople for five days straight,
you just get to kind of you.
You kind of hit a differentlevel of friendship and you know
connection than you would ifyou're just, you know, hitting
at a bar for a networking eventonce and then you kind of move
on to the next person.
We have.
What is it?
12, 13 people in this class andit's been so much fun.

(03:37):
Some of them are familiar facesto me, some of them are new,
but getting to learn more abouteverybody.

Jessica Toliuszis (03:43):
Not too many new faces, which is cool, like a
couple.

Rob Blitzstein (03:46):
A couple.
I think small talk is the worst.
So I love the fact that we'vegotten to really know each other
really well and I think I'mquoting Bazelot, I think that's
one of the things that he saidLike we like to get deep, we
like to really get to knowpeople, and when you're in these
sort of small groups with thesereally interesting people, like
Ben who's the head of strategy,I mean the conversations that
you can have about the globalatmosphere and what's happening

(04:08):
at different companies anddifferent parts within our
industry is irreplaceable.
That experience alone has madethis week really valuable.

Jacki Lutz (04:15):
Learning like actually getting to talk to Ben
Spitz has it's been like thehighlight of my week Because
I've seen him around like fallleadership days and stuff but
like kind of a smile situation.
Never said hi to him ever and Ienjoy talking to him.

Jessica Toliuszis (04:29):
Ben is one of the guys from and I uh this is,
uh you know, I encourageeveryone you know to have
mentors or a mentor, uh, but Benis definitely someone who I
signed up as my own mentor.
I don't know if he liked that,I did that, but he's been very
helpful in my own journey ofgrowth with the EQ and such.

(04:55):
Ben is such a great soundingboard and very bright and
innovative.
So, while I'm giving Ben a bitof a plug there, the point is
you need people like that, notonly in your organization, to be
successful, but, you know, foryour own brand.
If you're going to besuccessful, you got to think of
your brand and I learned thisfrom you really uh, you got to

(05:18):
think of your brand as anorganization and you have to
treat yourself as such, and ifyou think that you're going to
run the company with good peoplelike that, then you're also
going to run your own brand withgood people like that, and Ben
for me helps me with my ownbrand.

Jacki Lutz (05:31):
That's a great point .
I may be using that in my talks.

Jessica Toliuszis (05:34):
Did I get a thing too?
Am I a trailer?

Jacki Lutz (05:36):
It's almost like I think we've said like your
personal board of directors kindof thing.

Jessica Toliuszis (05:40):
Okay, yeah.

Jacki Lutz (05:41):
So, like you know, as you look at your career and
stuff, you have like mentors allaround you.
You're mentoring people, allthat kind of stuff.

Rob Blitzstein (05:48):
Yeah, you spoke at parts authority recently.
Did you talk about branding andpersonal brand?

Jacki Lutz (05:52):
Well, we did Um, yeah, we did personal brand.
I didn't go into the LinkedInstuff but yeah, just like basic
personal branding stuff.
Oh my gosh, that was such a funconversation.

Rob Blitzstein (06:01):
I, I, again, uh, again.
It was from those posts thatyou put out there around the
topic and I learned from it andI remember it was like a year
ago it wasn't that long ago thatyou were putting those posts
out there and I had this styleabout myself that I thought was
a way to get through sometougher conversations and that

(06:26):
style was to kind of play thedumb card and say things like
you know I could be, an idiothere.
But right, don't do that.
Don't suggest that you knowanything negative about yourself
.
Right, thinking that you knowbecause I, like I'm not the only
guy that does that.
Right.
I saw someone do it.
I picked it up.
I'm like, oh, that's a good wayto navigate that, not a good
way to navigate that, because ifyou say it enough times, people
are going to start believingyou Like, oh, he's an idiot,
right.

(06:46):
And you're going to startbelieving it Damn right.

Jacki Lutz (06:49):
I do that all the time, kind of like a
self-deprecation.
Don't do that Deprecation.
Is that the word?

Jessica Toliuszis (06:54):
Defecation.

Rob Blitzstein (06:59):
No, the editing, if you want to get some views
don't edit it.

Jessica Toliuszis (07:08):
Don't shit your pants or bleep them yeah,
the greg natelick phase dotepisode.

Rob Blitzstein (07:13):
You're just trying to have a better clip.

Jacki Lutz (07:14):
Oh, yes, trying to lead you guys into just swearing
.
For the next 30 seconds youready don't challenge me.

Jessica Toliuszis (07:22):
I am from the east coast, represent yeah, so
um, but infusion.

Jacki Lutz (07:27):
So what do you guys think so?

Jessica Toliuszis (07:28):
it's been well.
First of all, I came latebecause I was traveling, uh, and
I missed the first day onMonday, but from my experience
that I did get to see.
First of all, I want to thankBosch for hosting us.

Rob Blitzstein (07:42):
Their building and facility here is just
unbelievable.

Jessica Toliuszis (07:45):
Shout out to Brandon yeah thank you, Brandon,
for letting us in and out.

Rob Blitzstein (07:51):
And again all the time.

Jessica Toliuszis (07:54):
Brandon's really been incredible and
really I mean just walking intothat building.
For me it started seeing thatas like wow, this is really cool
that we have companies in theaftermarket doing this beautiful
facility.
Like you would not walk inthere and think, oh, we're in
the auto parts business here,you know it's very cool.

(08:17):
And then getting to hear allthe different speakers and their
perspective really on life Imean this has not been so much
geared towards auto partsnecessarily- but more like you
said, leadership, and I don'tknow if we're going to call it
training or seminars or what,but we had the governor or the
former governor.

(08:38):
You don't say ex-governor,that's like.

Jacki Lutz (08:40):
I don't know.
It feels like it was forced.
It got thrown out, but he did afull eight years.

Jessica Toliuszis (08:43):
Yeah, no good , he was cool.

Rob Blitzstein (08:47):
Jackie that was your favorite part.
The former governor.
I did.
I really liked him.

Jacki Lutz (08:50):
I think partially because I have that connection.
He was the former governor ofMichigan, Rick Snyder, and he
was our governor during a reallyhard time with the Flint water
crisis and all that kind ofstuff.
I just thought he I love thathe didn't get political and he
really had some great points.
I love that he was a nerd.
And he just flew that flag assoon as he got up there.
He's like I am a proud nerd andhe could see that and I love

(09:15):
nerds that can articulate theirthoughts in such simple ways for
sure and I feel like most ofhis message was very simple,
like this is what we need to do,and it was like beautiful for
our industry, like I really wantto get him on the podcast, just
to like that would be coolexplain that to our entire
industry, because I just thoughthis his was really good that's
a great idea, it was was

Rob Blitzstein (09:33):
super impressive the people that they have
pulled together, like Rick, inorder to just talk to us as a
small group it really made usfeel very special.
I liked what he said about hisgovernment.
Employees came from a place offeeling like captors, like they
were in jail and they were onlyallowed to do certain things and
move certain ways, and that hisbig win was that he was able to

(09:53):
free them up to be champions.
So what a line right Fromcaptives to champions.
And he allowed them to do itthrough curiosity and through
confidence and he reallyreshaped them as people and then
was able to reshape the stateof Michigan as a result.

Jacki Lutz (10:08):
Yeah, he turned a big ship.
Yeah, like it's hard to shift aculture of a state and it's
pretty neat that you do thatwalking in from no government
experience whatsoever.
You know, but he's you know,he's been the CEO of several
companies.

Jessica Toliuszis (10:22):
Not being a politician is the best
politician, agreed.

Jacki Lutz (10:27):
Yeah, you know I didn't make this connection
until now, but like we hadtalked about a potential topic
for this episode beingaccountability, because it's
such a huge thing in any in anycareer to be able to one take
accountability for your actionsalso means like people need to
feel like they can beaccountable and admit their
mistakes and failures and notget you know it's a pet peeve of

(10:48):
mine, like if you can't admitwhen you're wrong, you're not
going to learn and but you haveto create that safe space for
people to do that because ifthey believe they're going to
get canned if that's the kind ofculture that you have, then you
don't have that.
I almost feel like that could bea piece of this.

Rob Blitzstein (11:04):
I think it's everything.
As a leader, you want toprovide that and as a team
member, you want to lean intothat or live it.
But it's also a personalitytrait.
You know, some people don'tlike to ever be wrong and they
don't want to admit it, and you,as a leader, you have to learn

(11:27):
how to deal with that as well.
Right, that's theaccountability of a leader,
right?
If you can't figure that out,then are you a leader?
So yeah, it's a real thing.
But to anybody watching thiswho's younger in their career,
the best advice I could give youis to not be afraid to say hey,
that was me.

Jacki Lutz (11:44):
my bad, sorry about that it's a trust-building thing
, right?
I trust people way more whenthey can say ah, that was my
fault, this is what happened.
I learned a lesson.
Now I know this.
Moving forward versus somebodywho did not learn that lesson
won't admit that, that is amistake Like that.
That, to me, is is it's aimmaturity thing and it does not

(12:06):
.

Jessica Toliuszis (12:06):
It does not instill trust.
Making the mistake is not themistake, it's when you can't
learn from it.
If you, if you are legitimatelyin a position where, if you
admit you're wrong and you'regetting in trouble from that,
that's probably not where youwant to be anyway.
So I wouldn't worry about that.
Um, but, but to grow yourcareer, I think that's a really
important um, personality traitor skill set, I'm not quite sure

(12:29):
.
Um, but if, uh, but somethingyou want to work on.
If you're not able to do that,there's people in you know along
the corporate.
If you're not able to do that,there's people in you know along
the corporate journey that arenot going to deal with that.
And it's going to, it's goingto be a ceiling for you.
Learn the hard way.
So let me help you all learnwhat I had to the hard way.
Don't do it.

Jacki Lutz (12:49):
But yeah, so, and then it.

Rob Blitzstein (12:50):
also, you could fix things quicker.
It leads to progression.
I encourage my guys.
You guys make a mistake, buttell me right away.
Don't try to cover it up, don'ttry to fix it on your own.
It's going to be much fasterand more efficient.
If you tell us, it will helpyou.
We know how to handle thesethings.
Trust me, you can't breaksomething more than I already
have.
Go at it, and then it's mucheasier to just work and make

(13:13):
progress for your company.
Yeah, we've probably all mademillion-dollar mistakes, right,
and I think people on our teamhave made million-dollar
mistakes, yeah.
We had a couple of big mistakesthat now have a name.
We have a Bloody Monday and weobserve it every year.
Oh my gosh, you have tocelebrate your mistakes.

Jessica Toliuszis (13:33):
Yeah.
That way people have thatpsychological safety to know
it's true, I know we kind ofeverything I just said is
completely true and I thinkthat's part of the psychological
safety, the fact that we cankind of smile about it and we
have this thing.

Jacki Lutz (13:48):
I'm still giggling about Bloody Monday, yeah.

Jessica Toliuszis (13:50):
No, it's real , it was not good.
It's real, it was not good.

Jacki Lutz (13:53):
And it was your fault, or like a team's thing.

Jessica Toliuszis (13:57):
It was my fault, sure, by way of being a
leader, and we were missingprocesses that are now in place,
but we were missing processesthat prevented bad data from
going out to our customers.
And just wrong price.
We were selling things at like$0 for a couple of minutes

(14:18):
throughout the day there and asfast as we moved that got
expensive quickly.
But it was more a lesson in howwe could improve our own
process and not we needed alarmsand flags that prevent that
stuff from happening.
There's always a bright side tothings, right, and I look at

(14:40):
that and say, well, thank God,we learned that as a couple
billion dollar company, not a$10 billion company.

Rob Blitzstein (14:44):
Right, that's a great way to look at it.
You can't scale withoutmistakes.
Yeah, that's 100% true.
I think a lot of how PartsAuthority grew so fast was not
being afraid to make those.
Randy, our CEO, randy Buller,is a great leader, has great

(15:04):
energy and the first guy toadmit when he makes a mistake.
We make them all the time.
If you have a company that youare running and it's this big
and growing this fast and you'renot making any mistakes, I
think you're probably lying toyourself.
You're probably not moving fastenough.
You're lying to yourself.
Things are breaking somewhere,but it's all growing pains and

(15:28):
lessons that you learn along theway and it does help improve
the company.
But you have to haveaccountability, otherwise you're
going to miss thoseopportunities.
Matt from Moto Rad talked aboutthat today, right?

Jessica Toliuszis (15:40):
Matt was great, he was so great.

Rob Blitzstein (15:42):
But he talked about yeah, people on his team
are going to make mistakes andat the end of the day, it's
always his fault.
He doesn't, he doesn't dwell onit, but he needs.
He needs to be able to, at thethe end of the day, say, hey, my
team screwed up.
This is where we're at At theend of the day, it's, it's on me
, and we're going to fix thisand we're going to go forward.

(16:02):
He had so many good pointstoday.
I feel like I, I cried, I lovedhis.

Jacki Lutz (16:04):
I loved his like cause.
You know the whole servantleadership thing is huge, but it
sounds like they really builtthat into their entire
organization and him, you know,like for what you're saying,
it's like the CEO.
He looks at him himself as likethe biggest servant, right, so
he has to make sure his team hasthe right tools, you know, is
going in the right direction,has the training that they need,

(16:25):
like all that kind of stuff.
If they don't, and mistakes aremade, that's why he kind of
like puts it on himself Like youknow he flipped the org chart.

Jessica Toliuszis (16:33):
so if you think, about an org chart upside
down.
The ceo was at the bottom, yeah,and really at the top was sort
of the customers right so herestructured the business around
the different customer segments, um, whether that was, you know
, latin america, or that was theus and canada, and then from
there everything reported backto the customers, and he was at
the very bottom of that trianglehe, uh, he all true, and and

(16:54):
great point for me, what stoodout, uh, when you know from
matt's presentation, was howgenuine he was about how he's
not perfect and and you knowhe's like hi, you know I'm
terrible at these things, orhowever he put it right and, uh,
you know, look, he, and he was,he was very genuine about it.

(17:15):
It wasn, you know, saying it ina way where, like, oh, it's no
big deal, like I know I can dobetter here, but hey, we lead
this big company, like no, hewas like you know, I'm sometimes
too rough on people and I knowI got to get better at that, and
that, to me, is accountabilityalso right.

Rob Blitzstein (17:37):
You know, accountability is many things.
Um, self-awareness comes withit, which, uh, I didn't do so
good on that test today.
Yeah, we took a for the forlisteners.
We took a with with tammytacklenberg actually did two
different sessions today one waswith dei, one was with
emotional intelligence, whichshe claims, which she uses as
like the baseline of dei, so itwas a really nice flow and she
has you take a eq test thatrates you on what was it?
Self-awareness, socialawareness?
I took a picture of there'sanother there was four things,

(17:58):
was it four uh?
It was self-awareness,self-management, social
awareness and relationshipmanagement were the four.
Um, and that's really you knowwhy I said I, you know I.
I think my favorite part so farwas Tammy's presentation.
You know, tammy, well, I thinkall the sessions throughout the
week have done and probably willcontinue to do this, but

(18:21):
Tammy's, you know, asks you tolook inside in a way where the
you know inside yourself in away where the others didn't,
with the EQ test and some ofjust the conversation that was
had throughout the day and someof just the conversation that
was had throughout the day, andseeing that and being aware that
you don't have self-awarenessis quite awakening.
It's like huh.

(18:42):
Like where do I?
start, yeah.
So, yeah, that's real right.
But okay, we have to work onthat if we want to get better.
And it goes right back to theaccountability.
Accountability is so huge, youknow, and I hope that the people

(19:03):
watching A are trying to learnmore about our industry and
maybe even come into ourindustry.
B are a younger crowd, we wantand need younger folks and C
hear the message.
You know it's not just workingin the auto parts business, it's
life.
You know you want to have asuccessful career, a successful
marriage, successful parenting.
You know you have to beaccountable.

Jacki Lutz (19:20):
Yeah, and I, you know I love the idea of taking a
.
You know being accountable foryour own career too.
You know like, yeah, you can.
You need to be in the rightplace at the right time.
It really helps to have theright leaders in place, the
right manager.
That stuff is huge, but thereare things that everybody can do
to take their career, beaccountable for it.

(19:40):
Try to get to trainings likethis.
Raise your hand and tell yourmanager that you have your eyes
set on the Infusion event, orLeadership 2.0 or any of these
other courses we want to know.

Rob Blitzstein (19:50):
It came up again not to keep plugging Tammy here
, but, um, it came up in herpresentation where you have a
large company of thousands andthousands of people in the
company.
You got to think that there'ssomebody you haven't recognized
yet who's really bright, ormaybe a really good programmer
or an analyst, or a salespersonor an operations excellence guy

(20:14):
you know like, or a person younever know.
And to be able to measure,engage the entire team would be,
I think, significant for anycompany to be able to do that,
for the company, right, but alsofor the person that we're
talking about, right, to havethat opportunity and to be

(20:35):
recognized.
Recognized isn't saying, hey,jack did a great job.
Everybody, let's hear it forJack.
Recognized is like, hey, thisguy should be doing this, this
is unbelievable, this personshould be doing this.
It doesn't have to be a guy.
It's a Midwestern thing, Ithink.
Is it Guys?

Jessica Toliuszis (20:54):
For me it's an Eastern thing for me.
Hey, you guys.

Jacki Lutz (20:57):
I say guys all the time and I don't know.
I don't hear that You're in.

Rob Blitzstein (21:01):
Michigan.
I think you're a Midwesterner.

Jacki Lutz (21:03):
Yeah, but I never knew it was a Midwest thing.
It is.

Rob Blitzstein (21:08):
There's so many people we have a shortage of
people and still there's so muchunrecognized talent.
And how do you find that?
It's easier said than done, forsure, but there are, in today's
world and with the technologythat we have and the internet
and the testing that can be donethat way, short profiles.

(21:30):
It doesn't take long to figureout hey, potential candidate for
something here.
I feel like Rob.
I've recently met you, but Iwould have pegged you as pretty
self-aware, so it's a work.

Jessica Toliuszis (21:40):
It's a work in progress.
What are you?

Rob Blitzstein (21:42):
going to do about it now that you have this
information?

Jessica Toliuszis (21:44):
I'm going to go home and cry.

Rob Blitzstein (21:45):
No, uh, we already cried.
You're aware of it Third timetoday, uh, no, I think.
Uh, first of all, you know I'mI'm at a point in my career
where I've entered a leadershipphase and I think sometimes my
experience at least kind ofclimbing a corporate ladder just

(22:07):
for reference, we had a familybusiness that sold to Parts
Authority about 11 years ago nowand Parts Authority was a
corporate ladder and I just, Ithink the nature of our business
you know, in the sense of the,you know old school mom and pop
auto parts store, you know itwas a bit of a rougher

(22:29):
environment than it is today,and growing up in that and then
entering a corporate worldworked very well for me.
And you know there's going to bebattles to be had, whether it's
with teammates or customers orvendors, and a battle doesn't
mean arguing and fighting andscreaming.

(22:49):
A battle, you know, could bewithin right and learning how to
come past that.
But you get to a point whereyou're no longer battling and
you're now leading and you haveto separate those two things,
otherwise you're going to keepfighting and no one's going to
want to follow you.
And and again lessons I'mlearning as I, as I move through

(23:10):
my own career.
But it's not easy.
It's very, very easy to say,not easy to do, but you know I
have been learning a lot, so Iappreciate you saying that.
Well, I you know you're talkingabout parts authority and the
journey that you've had as acompany and different
relationships throughout thatprocess, and I I would say from
my limited experience with partsauthority that one of the

(23:31):
things that you really excel atis prioritizing all stakeholders
and I think as a company or asa leader, it's easy to
prioritize your people right.
We all put our people and ourresources first.
It's easy to prioritizecustomers because that's who
pays the bills at the end of theday, it's easy to prioritize
shareholders or board members,because they are also writing
the checks that you need.

(23:52):
It's a lot harder to prioritizevendors, and I feel like that's
one of the things that yourcompany does exceptionally well
and, as a result, I think yousee that your vendors therefore
prioritize you right back, andthat's part of where you just
got back from Alaska with a lotof your vendors.
That is true.
Yeah, we did our third annualcustomer appreciation trip,

(24:16):
which is really a customer andvendor appreciation trip, but I
would say that it's anincredible opportunity that
Parts Authority put together tobring those two networks
together your customer networkand your vendor network.
And I appreciate you sayingwhat you said.
I don't have really anyexperience at this level outside

(24:38):
of parts authority and I guessI kind of took that.
You know, we talked a littlebit about this earlier and I was
a little bit surprised that Iguess I took for granted our own
company's culture and how we dodeal with the vendors and we
look at the vendor relationshipas a major key to our own
company's success.

(24:59):
And I I don't really know howother folks think about it, but
if you think you're going togrow a company successfully
without the support and belieffrom your vendors, you're crazy
and that that makes the vendor acustomer and me a salesperson.
Right, I gotta.
I gotta sell this idea and this, this direction and you have to

(25:22):
believe in it because it's notgoing to be easy.
I tell my vendors all the timeI know I don't make it easy but
I hope I make it worth it.
Well, especially you're inpricing and you're in vendor
relationships, so pricingconversations especially can
become very adversarial.
It feels like the two of youare against each other, and I
think there's a way to do itcollaboratively, and it sounds
like you're doing that.

Jacki Lutz (25:44):
I kind of feel like the accountability thing really
comes into play 100% If one ofyour vendors can't admit to a
mistake or vice versa.
You guys can't admit to amistake.
There's really like a buildingtrust thing, which is what matt
talked about a lot.
He's like he started his wholeuh speech today saying like how
much, how important uh trust isgoing to be moving forward just

(26:06):
with all of the the fake.
Uh, what do you call them?
Like ai fakes, what are they?
big fakes or something like thatdeep fakes yeah big big fakes
yeah, but like you know, it'sbuilding that trust and I think
accountability can really goboth ways um with building trust
, both with between companies,between people, between

(26:30):
customers, between vendors, andthen between manager, and you
know yeah it.

Rob Blitzstein (26:35):
Yeah, it's an interesting point.
Yeah, look, maybeaccountability is a two-way
highway.
You know you have to be able todo it for yourself.
And there's usually not justone person involved in an issue,
right?
So when you have one personthat does take the blame, that's
no longer accountability.
That's just like unfair at thatpoint and you're going to lose
that person, right?
You don't want to do that atthat point and you're going to
lose that person, right?
You don't want to do that.
So accountability is sensitive,but important.

Jacki Lutz (26:56):
Yeah, well, I think for young people, you're afraid
to admit mistakes because you'retrying to be taken seriously.
I see often.

Rob Blitzstein (27:06):
I see, sometimes it's not just about not
admitting, or admitting to orrecognizing the mistake, but
it's trying to explain your waythrough it too.
It's like look, just shut up andjust say, hey, I messed it up,
like a lot of people will say.
like I messed it up because Iwas this, this this, it's like
dude, you messed it up.
Period, let's go right Likestop wasting time.

(27:26):
Or blame others Like well, thisperson got it to me late.
Don't do is a two-way highway,right?
And I think it's the type ofthing where make sure your side
of the street is clean, right?
And if you're doing that, theother person will either follow
along or their side of thestreet will always not be clean
and people will pick up on that.
So don't make yourself worsebecause you can't make others

(27:47):
better.

Jacki Lutz (27:47):
Yeah, and it's such a huge opportunity for leaders
because I think, when evenyounger people see leaders
admitting to mistakes, because,Because I think when even
younger people see leadersadmitting to mistakes, because,
like Jessica, you mentioned inour last episode how you have
kind of a system where with yourteam that you guys talk about
failures- you know, and what youlearn, so that, yeah, so, like

(28:13):
you know, other people have theopportunity to learn from your
mistakes so that they don't makethe same ones you know, and
that's how you kind of moveforward at the end of the day.
And when I see leaders like Matt, the CEO of Motorad, saying
today that he takesresponsibility for things, that
just builds the culture of it'srespected to take responsibility
for things and can really startteaching that generation coming
up that it's okay to makemistakes.
We want you to make mistakes.

(28:35):
We don't want you to makemistakes.
We don't want you to feel likeyou have to hide it and then we
can't fix it, and then nobodylearns, so we make the same
mistake.

Jessica Toliuszis (28:42):
You need a leader that fosters that
environment.
You can't admit.
Sometimes people admit to amistake and think that they
admitted to it and owned it andthen still find a way to throw
other people in.

Rob Blitzstein (28:56):
It's like it's not it.
You're not there.

Amber Andracsek (28:59):
Hi.
I'm Amber Andrusak, manager ofMembership Engagement at the
Auto Care Association.
Are you making the most out ofyour Auto Care Association
membership?
Log in to myautocareorg to keepyour profile and preferences
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(29:20):
Slash membership to see all ourbenefits and schedule a
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Jacki Lutz (29:33):
I think too, like with taking ownership of things
and kind of takingaccountability for things and
encouraging that behavior inyour company, you also have to
really think hard about howyou're going to handle those
things.

Rob Blitzstein (29:47):
That's the self-accountability Like I'm
going to make up a term here inself-accountability Like you
have control of your reaction,right, you don't have control of
other people ever and if youtry to, they're going to know
that's the genuine part.
You can't do that.
You could only control yourself, which is not, for me at least,
is not an easy thing to do.

Jacki Lutz (30:05):
Very passionate.

Rob Blitzstein (30:09):
You have a very passionate person, which I think
we all are.
It's so easy to becomeemotional about stuff and want
to fight for it.
Going back to you don't have tofight anymore.
You don't have to lead right ifyou can't.
We said this earlier you couldbe right and wrong at the same
time yeah, you could be totallyright about.
Hey, this issue we got to fix it.
This is a big problem, but ifyou run into the room, what the
bleep are you guys doing?

(30:29):
Right, like nobody wants tohear that they don't they don't
want correctness shoved downtheir throat, right?
So being a leader and beingself-accountable is knowing that
.
You know, hey, I'm emotionaland I can get hot, right, I
gotta slow myself down.

Jacki Lutz (30:45):
I go like how can you turn this into a positive
experience?

Jessica Toliuszis (30:47):
not easy to.
I'm not suggesting I'vemastered this at it by any means
like that's.

Jacki Lutz (30:51):
That's the question that leaders need to be asking
themselves, like how do I takethis thing that you know too bad
it happened, but how do we makethis into a silver lining when
we learned a lesson and now we?

Rob Blitzstein (31:00):
can just like that, exactly what you just did
right ask the open-endedquestions and mean them right.
You can't ask an open-endedquestion knowing the answer you
want, because it's no longer anopen-ended question.

Jacki Lutz (31:09):
Yeah, it's a setup question people see, you know,
people getting their asseshanded to them because they
admitted to a mistake.
They're not going to beadmitting to their mistakes,
which is my point.
Like you know, you need to likecreate this culture where
mistakes are celebrated, andyou're you know.
Let's move on.

Rob Blitzstein (31:24):
Let's learn how to do that, yeah how you do that
and I think how you do that Idon't think you know.
People may wonder like oh well,I see that, how do I do it?
You know I don't you do that.
Uh, aside from knowing whoyou're dealing with, because you
have to adjust yourself ifyou're going to be in a
leadership position to alldifferent types.
You can't expect people toadjust themselves to your type

(31:45):
um, that's, that's what, that'swhat a leader is, I think right.
So, um, and, and I like in myhead, it's all just one big
accountability conversation solike I hope we're giving you the
content.

Jacki Lutz (31:58):
You are.
And another thing, too, that Iwas just thinking is all day
long.
I would rather hold myselfaccountable publicly than be
held accountable by somebodyelse.
You know what I mean.
Get to it first.
Let me throw myself under thebus here.
Yeah, it'll hurt less.
Yeah, I'm going to scoot out ofthe way at the end.
I mean exactly, I'm going toscoot out of the way at the end.
I mean, I would rather do thatall day.

Jessica Toliuszis (32:19):
Yeah, look, that's another thing I want the
listeners to hear.
Right, this term like oh, hethrew me under the bus.
That's never a real thing.
That is a cop-out comment madeby people who don't have any
accountability.
Like you messed up, right, ifyou got in trouble because of

(32:44):
something I said about it,that's on you.
Like you know, that's not myfault.
You got to be a little carefulthere too.
Right, my own.
This is where I'm working on,on myself there.
Right, like you can't show thatattitude.
You could be right, but you'd bewrong to say that right so so
you're very delicate thing tobalance is when you hear stuff
like that.
But you're going to have tonavigate that stuff as you grow
your own career.
You're going to be insituations where people are

(33:05):
going to get called out Ifyou're thinking like, oh, I
don't want to throw them underthe bus, there's no bus.
Where's the bus?
I've never seen one bus runover somebody ever.

Jacki Lutz (33:14):
How do you guys feel about managers who take
accountability for somethingthat went wrong and it wasn't?
Even though Falseaccountability, yeah, kind of
they're almost like protecting.

Rob Blitzstein (33:29):
Again, I think it's a delicate thing.
If you do that too much, you'renot teaching anybody, so you
can you know you can protectsomeone in public and teach them
in private, right?
So you don't want them to getblown up.
Some people aren't thickskinned, right?
I think we mentioned earlier.
So you want to protect thosepeople from the shrapnel of the
blow up.
Sometimes that's knowing youraudience, right.

(33:52):
But if you let that person justgo through life thinking like,
oh, it wasn't my fault,everything's hunky-dory over
here, then it's going to happenagain.
Right, and you're going to.
Your leader is going to haveenough holes in his own body at
some point too, right, so youcan't, as a leader, you can't
die on the battlefield either,right?
So I think you nailed it.

Jacki Lutz (34:09):
I think it's.

Jessica Toliuszis (34:10):
Yeah, hold everybody accountability.
We said self but accountabilityis still accountability.
Who should be accountable is areal thing.

Jacki Lutz (34:18):
Yeah, yeah, and I think it's great to like correct
people in private too, and justmake sure that there's a lesson
learned there.
But it could also be like as amanager, somebody, you know,
something slipped, you know, inmy world, let's just say like a
Facebook post went out with aspelling mistake, something like
stupid, like that, right.

Jessica Toliuszis (34:34):
Yeah.

Jacki Lutz (34:34):
Yeah, no, then I didn't write the social post.
So was it my fault?
No, but I probably should havelooked or maybe I should have
approved it.
So it could have been my fault,but making sure that that
person understands, you know,this is why we have an approval
process, or this is you know,this is you know.

Jessica Toliuszis (34:52):
Let's learn something from this and make
sure that maybe our processneeds an improvement, that you
were able to make this mistake.

Jacki Lutz (34:58):
Ask the questions Figure out how to fix it, moving
forward.

Rob Blitzstein (35:05):
That's where I think having that psychological
safety is beneficial to thecompany, because you'll find
those opportunities much fasterwhen the people aren't afraid to
make the mistake.
You can't call people out inpublic.
That's never going to work.
You can't hold peopleaccountable in front of other
people right, I think, at leastyou know from from my experience
.
Uh, you know, if I'm, if I'mwrong, then maybe people are a

(35:26):
glutton for punishment and theydo better in that environment.
But uh, typically I've found,you know, nobody likes to to be
corrected in front of anybody.
Uh, even if it's like, oh, meand my supervisor corrected it,
it's like.
If it's like, oh, me and mysupervisor corrected it, it's
like, no, it's like, do it oneon one.
Nobody likes that, right, ifyou want to have two separate
conversations, maybe I'm notquite sure, but I do know, or I
do believe, that you'd neverwant to do that in front of

(35:48):
anyone, right, it's a totallyprivate thing.

Jacki Lutz (35:50):
And maybe like think about patterns too.
Like, is this a pattern or wasthis like a you know, one-off
mistake?
Sure, that's how long you needto spend on that.

Rob Blitzstein (35:59):
Yeah, look, being a good leader doesn't mean
you're going to make everyonegood at work.
Also, you know you got to.
You got to recognize that.
You know part of being a goodleader is recognizing that
you'll have a cancer in yourculture, perhaps, right.
Like yeah he keeps making thesame mistakes.
You know you're leader, thatyou're accountable to keep that

(36:22):
away from the company yeah, sure, sure, sure.
Yeah, you played a part in it.
I think we heard today fromMatt that you can either be
remarkable or you can beinvisible.
And you can't be remarkablewithout having the
accountability, but also withoutscrewing up.
Without having people on yourteam screw up, without having
people around you screw up, youcan stay invisible and not screw

(36:45):
up.
But, it's important to be ableto be remarkable and to be able
to remark on it and to be ableto bring all of that to the
table in order to make thosearound you better, which was the
point, and he used that tree,if you remember the tree, the
roots, the roots you better.

Jacki Lutz (36:58):
Which was the?
He used that tree, uh, if youremember the tree, the roots,
the roots, just for the audience.
Um, he told the story waybetter than I'm about to, but
about, uh, there was this.
Was it like a experiment wherethey had this perfect
environment, perfect soil?
Yeah, no wind perfect sunexposure and they planted trees
there and the trees trees endedup just like dying in the end

(37:21):
because they didn't have theroot systems, they weren't
taught how to live in anenvironment.
Yeah, so they didn't have toever grow roots, so they never
actually grew big.
So, like his point was, youknow, when you go down to where
there's constant hurricanes,like Florida or something like
that, those trees have thestrongest roots, they actually
just grow sideways.

Jessica Toliuszis (37:37):
I'm serious, that's like I've seen trees
growing sideways, like what?

Jacki Lutz (37:41):
They actually have the strongest roots because they
are constantly battling.

Jessica Toliuszis (37:45):
They learn how to live in their environment
.

Jacki Lutz (37:47):
Yeah, and I think that that's kind of what you're
saying.
Jessica, too, is makingmistakes, and learning from them
is one of the best ways tolearn and most important ways to
learn.

Jessica Toliuszis (38:01):
Right learning from them is one of the
best ways to learn and mostimportant ways to learn right.
You've got to look at obstaclesas opportunities you have to
find the calm and the chaos, andbe careful not to chop the tree
down, you know right, if it's,you know, let's get windy, let's
chop the tree and let the treegrow yeah you gotta let you
gotta.
In other words, you gotta letpeople fail.
You know, uh, do their jobreally right.
I think is is probably a good.
You know, do their job reallyRight.
I think is is probably a good.
You know, if you're going to bein a leadership position, let

(38:22):
put people in a position to dothe jobs that they're going to
do and let them do it Right.

Jacki Lutz (38:25):
And I think managers too, like smart managers, are
good managers.
They, I mean my whole life, mywhole career.

Jessica Toliuszis (38:32):
I have been placed in positions I never felt
ready for but like I would tellthem that that's the best job
to have.

Jacki Lutz (38:38):
Yeah, and I was like , okay, I mean, first of all,
are you sure you got the rightperson here?
But okay, you know but, I feellike when they do that, they
know that the risk they'retaking right, that you've never
done this before.

Jessica Toliuszis (38:53):
I think Matt said that earlier right, that's.
And look, you know, you have agood leader that puts you in
that position, that says hey,you have this ability, you have
this talent, you have thiscapability.
Um, you know, if you have agood boss, they'll recognize
that and they will put you.
That's why I said that's thebest job to have is the one
you're not comfortable with assoon as you're comfortable, you
should say something to yourboss, right, like let's move on

(39:13):
right.
This is I'm a little toocomfortable.
That's where complacency comesin.
That's where we've always doneit this way.
Comes in because people gotcomfortable.
Absolutely and the companystops improving and you see
these case studies like Kodak.

Rob Blitzstein (39:25):
Yeah, right, yeah, diamonds are mined under
intense pressure.
Yeah, and so when?

Jessica Toliuszis (39:30):
you I sparkle baby.

Rob Blitzstein (39:31):
Yeah, but that's what you're talking about.
You were put in a position.
You suddenly started to haveimposter syndrome around that
situation.
But imposter syndrome issometimes it's your brain just
saying, hey, I've leveled up,I'm in a new place, this is
awesome.

Jessica Toliuszis (39:45):
I want you to explain that term.
What Was it you that said it?
No, it was Tammy that was usingthat today.

Rob Blitzstein (39:51):
Imposter syndrome.
Do you know what that?

Jessica Toliuszis (39:53):
is.
I didn't hear that?

Rob Blitzstein (39:54):
Oh my goodness, yeah, I think.

Jacki Lutz (39:55):
Matt talked about it too.
Yeah, it's just feeling likeyou don't belong there, like
people are going to find outthat you don't know everything
that they think that you knowbecause you shouldn't have the
seat that you have.

Jessica Toliuszis (40:06):
Got it.

Rob Blitzstein (40:07):
You're constantly worried that
someone's going to find out thatyou're not qualified for the
seat that you're sitting in.

Jacki Lutz (40:13):
That's what I felt at the podcast conference a
couple weeks ago.
People are going to find outthat I'm this isn't a normal
thing you mean no, it is normal,it is.
Oh right, yeah.

Jessica Toliuszis (40:21):
Imposter syndrome yeah I feel like that's
fake until you make it.

Rob Blitzstein (40:24):
Kind of yeah.

Jessica Toliuszis (40:25):
Well, that's a strategy for dealing with it.

Rob Blitzstein (40:27):
Some people don't have any strategies, some
people are stuck in it.

Jacki Lutz (40:29):
Huh so like like, even like this podcast, for
example.
I absolutely love challengesthat I know nothing about,
because there's so muchopportunity, and that's all I
can see.
It's like, yeah, I'm going tomake mistakes.
I've made so many.
We just talked earlier aboutlike how many times I've
forgotten to push record.
Should we start over again?

(40:50):
I did that to.

Jessica Toliuszis (40:53):
I did that to Eric Sills one time, and it was
the most embarrassing moment inmy career, I think.

Jacki Lutz (40:56):
I think failing fast is kind of fun, like you know,
like let's move quickly, let'sdo the thing, let's stop sitting
around and talking about it,let's go, and then like fail
fast and keep going and learn.

Jessica Toliuszis (41:06):
Fail fast is a cool thing.

Rob Blitzstein (41:08):
Yeah, we talked about it.
Today I've been asked to takeon a new challenge at work and I
had with Ken, our president,and I was asking him hey, what
are the first three things youwould do?
What would you do in the first100 days?
What do you see as the goals?
And one of the first thingsthat he said to me was don't
have imposter syndrome aroundthis.
We chose you.
We know you haven't alreadydone this before.

(41:30):
That's why we chose you andwe're putting you in this
opportunity and we have faith inyou and we're not going to let
you fail.
So, to say that to someone.
I think we should all try tosay that to someone Love it.

Jessica Toliuszis (41:39):
Yeah, I've had conversations in the past.
To me it's a totally normalfeeling.
I guess, this is theself-awareness thing.
That's a thing, right.
But, I've had the conversationplenty of times explaining to

(41:59):
people that like, look, nobodyknows what's going on generally
most of the time in the world,everywhere, right, and you know
that's like governments, evenlike you look around it's like.
That's why, like, conspiracytheorists always crack me up.

Rob Blitzstein (42:05):
It's like you really think people are that
organized it could also be partof the midlife crisis is that
the the more you know and themore you grow and the more you
learn, the less you really know,dude.

Jessica Toliuszis (42:15):
So I have a saying that the older I get, the
less I know.
Yeah Right, like I just getdumber Because you realize
there's so much more Like youcannot give that to.
That's only learned.

Amber Andracsek (42:27):
Right, people try to tell you your whole life.

Rob Blitzstein (42:28):
Right, people try to tell you your whole life
Like ah, you're a kid, you don'tknow, right, right, and that's
a very normal thing.
But then you get to a pointyou're like I had no idea this
whole time and I realized, goingforward, I'm going to continue
to have no idea and I thinkaccepting that is is, uh, you
know, uh, evolution or maturityor getting older, right, and all

(42:49):
the above, probably, um, butthat's what leads to, to that
self-growth and thatself-awareness and the
self-accountability, right it'slike, wow, like you can't get
mad at me for that, like nobodyknew that's why it happened,
right, and it's a very realthing.
You know, I encourage everyleader listening to this to you
know, look for that trait inyour own team and your people.

(43:13):
That's psychological safetymissing.
I think you want to fix thatyeah, accountability.
This is maybe the right time totalk about the midlife crisis
like really you're gonna bringthat up you're wearing the hat,
I am.
You wanted us to bring it upI'm also going bald.

Jessica Toliuszis (43:31):
That's why I'm wearing the hat.
It's just part of my midlifecrisis, I think.

Rob Blitzstein (43:34):
That's a tough decision.
Every man's got to deal with.

Jacki Lutz (43:36):
That's the trigger.
Yeah.

Rob Blitzstein (43:38):
Women too.
Look, it's a real thing.
I'm 40 plus, which, by the way,I'd like to take an opportunity
here to make a recommendationthat we change it to 41 under 41
.
Because I never got the award.
I'm only kidding.

Jacki Lutz (43:57):
Oh Wish there was an awe button.

Jessica Toliuszis (43:59):
You guys did it already, do you want?

Jacki Lutz (44:00):
some applause, because you'll never have them
for that award hey.

Jessica Toliuszis (44:03):
You even interrupted my applause.

Jacki Lutz (44:07):
Thank you, we're happy for you, rob.

Jessica Toliuszis (44:09):
Why did you cut it off so soon?
I wasn't, I'm sorry.

Rob Blitzstein (44:13):
You may be winning awards soon in music.

Jessica Toliuszis (44:15):
Well, so, speaking of the midlife crisis,
right?
So you know I've been askedoften throughout my career
whether it's like with coachesor.
You know, parts Authorityinvests in its people and you
know, throughout my tenure hereat Parts Authority, we've had,
you know, coaches and you know,consultants and people trying to

(44:38):
figure out what's wrong with mybrain.
Come in and talk to me about it.
They've always asked what aresome of your hobbies?
Hobbies?
Counting cores.
What do you mean?
That's what I do on a Saturday.

Amber Andracsek (44:54):
Same, yeah, same.

Jessica Toliuszis (44:56):
And growing up in the industry, people are
always like, oh, how long haveyou been doing this?
I'm like, well, I'm 40.
So about 41 years I was in mymother's womb listening to
phones being picked up.
Can I help you?
I don't really know much else.
I'm Tommy boy.
Really.
Auto parts is my life.
We really are right and I makeany new hires.
Watch that, by the way.

Rob Blitzstein (45:15):
As you should, yeah.

Jessica Toliuszis (45:18):
So I always kind of had this thing like, oh,
you should have a hobby.
I don't know what the hobby isgoing to be.
I don't like hiking.
I don't want to go lift weightsat the gym.
That sounds hard.
I'm usually tired all the time.
But I always wrote music, whichI used lightly because I never

(45:39):
really did anything with it, butprobably more like poetry, I
guess, because that's probablywhat music is when there's no
music involved, um and uh.
You know, as I got older Irealized, you know, I need to be
able to get my mind off of thissometimes, because you should
not occupy your mind with thejob 24 hours a day it's not a
good idea.
I strongly recommend nobody doesthat.

(46:00):
So I found writing and I have aco-worker.
I'm going to give him a plug.
He's probably going to get madat me and anyone who works with
me knows Stephen Lamb.
So, interestingly enough,stephen probably his entire life
has been making theinstrumentals and the beats and
the music and Steven and I work.

(46:22):
Really he's probably the guy Iworked the most with at parts
authority and we've been workingtogether for, you know,
probably about eight years nowand just like a couple of months
ago we were like why don't wejust try to like put some of
this together?
And we did that and we keptdoing that and we are really
enjoying that.
We're not going to leave ourjobs.
Anybody watching from part threedon't worry, but it's a great

(46:45):
outlet for us, but there'll besigns, you'll know when I stop
showing up, there'll be signs.
Price files will be out of date,but it's been incredible to
teach myself how to take my mindoff of the job which is not an
easy thing to do when you did ityour whole life really and then

(47:06):
have something that I could bethis passionate about other than
work because I'm verypassionate about and write about
things that are not car partsbecause you could have gone that
direction.

Jacki Lutz (47:15):
Yeah, really get some things out of your brain,
yeah.

Jessica Toliuszis (47:20):
Maybe, but it's been a really fun journey
and doing it with Steven, who'sPress 1-2,.
In case you wanted to followhim on Spotify on Bobby Shots
Bobby Shots.
We'll take a second here so youall can just kind of go type
that in real quick and follow.

Jacki Lutz (47:34):
We'll just wait and then come back.
Go ahead, it's.

Jessica Toliuszis (47:36):
Bobby Shots.

Rob Blitzstein (47:38):
Follow.
Like, share Follow share,subscribe on.
Youtube Five stars.

Jessica Toliuszis (47:44):
All streaming services.
I think that's my plug now.

Jacki Lutz (47:45):
Did I use up all my time?
It was not a short plug, by theway.

Jessica Toliuszis (47:47):
Thank you um, so, uh, that's been.
That's been a lot of fun doingthat and and and helpful, um.
Yeah, I find myself sleepingbetter most of the time when I'm
not traveling.
I don't sleep that well whenI'm traveling, um, but it also,
you know, think, thinking moreclearly about, you know, giving
your brain a break matters right.

Jacki Lutz (48:07):
So having those little hobbies and outlets, but
yeah, it's been.

Jessica Toliuszis (48:11):
It's been a lot of fun and I must say our
music's really good it's reallygood so we're all fans we're
gonna keep.
We're gonna keep going withthat my head nods when I listen.

Jacki Lutz (48:21):
Uh-huh nods.
You can't me, you can only hearme.
But I'm nodding, not likenodding off.
I'm like what do you call thisBouncing?

Jessica Toliuszis (48:28):
to the beat, getting a little bouncy with us.

Jacki Lutz (48:30):
We'll write a song about it later.
I don't mean like I nod off,it's really.

Jessica Toliuszis (48:33):
Get bouncy with it.

Rob Blitzstein (48:34):
And so you have a studio in your house.

Jessica Toliuszis (48:37):
I mean, I have a table about the size of
this one, with a microphone thatlooks very similar to this one
and a laptop.

Jacki Lutz (48:43):
So it looks like you have everything you need.
Let's hear it I uh go listen onspotify I'm not doing it for
free.

Rob Blitzstein (48:49):
Can you please do a rap for us right now?

Jessica Toliuszis (48:51):
you gotta pay for that it's, it's, uh, it's,
it's definitely a midlife crisisum doesn't feel like a crisis.
I don't know that that's.

Jacki Lutz (48:59):
I'm enjoying it, yeah you just found a hobby in
an outlet.
That's not a crisis.
I'm enjoying it.
Yeah, you just found a hobby inan outlet.
That's not a crisis.
I'm a little disappointed inyour crisis.
Me too Should.

Jessica Toliuszis (49:06):
I just quit my job and go full speed with it
Buy a Porsche.
Buy a Porsche that I can'tafford because I quit my job.

Jacki Lutz (49:12):
That would be a crisis Negative.

Jessica Toliuszis (49:16):
If we're going to sit here and talk about
crises, is it crises?
Yeah?

Jacki Lutz (49:19):
It would create great music.
Well, I was thinking more likeas a group.

Rob Blitzstein (49:22):
Oh, together we have crises.
Oh, I thought you meanttogether we would have a Porsche
.

Jacki Lutz (49:28):
Like we're going in on a Porsche together through
this crisis.

Jessica Toliuszis (49:32):
I get it on the weekends.
I get it on the weekends.
My rights are on the weekends.

Rob Blitzstein (49:36):
if we do that, I'll just take it during
Christmas and Thanksgiving.
You get the holidays.
Yeah, I'll take holidays.
All right, holidays.

Jessica Toliuszis (49:40):
You're watching it during the week uh,
yeah, look, uh, maybe it's not amidlife crisis, I don't know,
but uh, but, but being able tofind this outlet and uh, get
your mind off of off of the job,uh, especially as your career
grows, it's not going to get anyeasier.

(50:00):
And I've I've used that, uh,when teaching my own team and
some of the newer folks on theteam, the younger guys.
I encourage them, like, don'tgo home and think about this, go
home and go home.
And I think that's reallyimportant, because I have very
passionate people on my team andI'm very lucky for that and I
can be very passionate myself,and if I wanted that culture

(50:24):
where we're like 24 hours, theywould do it and I would be a bad
leader for encouraging that inmy, in my mind I would work 24 7
, if, if I'm thankful like mykids stress me out a little bit,
because in my brain sometimesI'm like, oh, I gotta have so
much to do you're working 24 7already?
yeah, especially if you're aparent.

Jacki Lutz (50:42):
Well, yeah, but like I, I honestly could work on my
job 24 7 and not even realize it, because I I am passionate
about it yeah, but especiallywhen you have kids.
I work so much better when Idon't do that, and that's really
difficult to explain yeah, look, your children will know it.

Jessica Toliuszis (50:58):
You know, when you come home stressed out
and you're doing that 24 hours aday to yourself, like your
relationship will be strainedwith your wife, with your kids,
your husband, whatever it may beuh, you, no, no one owes that
to their company.
You know, sell your soul,basically right, don't do that
right, yeah, and it's not likeit's required.

Jacki Lutz (51:17):
I just you know especially not required well,
especially with my role.
It's more of a creative role,which isn't always easy to do.
Nine to five, you know, andlike, if it's just, if you're
not on, you're just not on.

Jessica Toliuszis (51:27):
Yeah.

Jacki Lutz (51:27):
So you work on other things and like, sometimes when
I'm on is not the nine to five,not when I'm having to, you
know, reply to chats and get onand off meetings and that kind
of stuff we live in a very toughworld to communicate in it is
really, really tough.

Jessica Toliuszis (51:46):
It's a result of technology, it's a result of
COVID, it's a lot of things,but you know, we talked about
this neurodivergence right, assomebody with you know a pretty
fun case of ADD.
That is a really difficultthing to navigate through.
You have emails, you have cellphone calls, you have text

(52:07):
messages, you have chats, youhave video meetings, you have
like I don't there's probablyother things on, like forget
your social media things orwhatever you know, like LinkedIn
or whatever it may be workrelated, Cause that's what you
should be doing at work.
That's a lot, and if you're notlike super organized, you

(52:28):
better get someone on your team.
That is yeah because this is,you know, meetings, schedules
and like everything's so virtual.
There's so many more meetingsnow because it's so much easier
to have them.

Jacki Lutz (52:38):
There's a lot more communication.

Jessica Toliuszis (52:39):
You almost got to be a little careful, like
it doesn't turn into overcommunication I think because I
could see that happening whereyou're not getting anything done
anymore because you'reconstantly on a video call or a
phone call so many companies.

Jacki Lutz (52:51):
Like you know, and it was a you know in my previous
life, I was just back-to-backmeetings yeah, the work got done
there's something's not goingto get done at some point, like
Like I get in trouble sometimes.
This is a new culture of ours.
Right, like most companies,like we, were kind of falling
into this.

Amber Andracsek (53:07):
So before we had teams.

Jacki Lutz (53:08):
how many meetings did we actually have?

Jessica Toliuszis (53:12):
I mean, Before teams before COVID right.

Jacki Lutz (53:17):
Like we could have one a day.

Jessica Toliuszis (53:18):
You could have two a day.

Jacki Lutz (53:20):
Now it's like you could have eight meetings.

Jessica Toliuszis (53:22):
Yeah, so, like at Parts Authority and the
way our company grew, ourleadership kind of got spread
out around the country as wegrew.
So we were probably more in thevirtual world prior to COVID,
compared to the world in generalperhaps.
But then when the COVID thinghappened, it was like this super

(53:43):
force that pushed all thisstuff onto everyone and now all
the vendors want to havemeetings all the time and that
you know the customer is goingto have meetings with us now and
we do that and, um, it's a lot,it's a lot.
And you know something I wasgoing to say earlier.
I like I'll get in trouble oncein a while for missing some
emails.
I miss a lot of emails, but Ilike in my head I'm like, listen
, I could read all my emails andnot work, or I could work and

(54:03):
not read all the emails.
Something's not going to getdone.
There's so much communicationand for me that was a stress
really.
And that's when you go home andyou think about that stuff and
you lose sleep over that stuffand you're checking your emails
at 1, 2, 3 o'clock in themorning.
That is not a healthy thing todo.

Rob Blitzstein (54:19):
Well, Jackie and Rob, how do you put it aside
for the most important job youhave is raising your kids, I
would imagine.
So how do you put that asidewhen you go home?

Jessica Toliuszis (54:27):
You, for me, you learn how to do that.
That's not something.
You had a kid You're like Okay,you know, this is how being a
parent is.
I was just no, I don't knowthat I really do, which is
something I think I've actuallybeen kind of vocal about that.

Jacki Lutz (54:38):
I'm just never been like even.
I think my first episode waswork-life balance.
Yeah, and I talked about that.
I have a terrible work-lifebalance because even if I'm not
working, I'm thinking about itbecause it does consume my life
and I but, it's, it's where I'mvery happy working.

Jessica Toliuszis (54:55):
So you have to do that with intent, you have
to be intentional.

Jacki Lutz (54:58):
But I can be with my kids, yeah and be playing with
them, be watching teenage mutantninja turtles singing the song
with them, be watching TeenageMutant Ninja Turtles singing the
song with them.
But then in my head I'm still.
You know, I'm just alsothinking about a cool idea or
something and working that out.
And you know, if they're busyplaying with each other, I'm
pulling out my computer you know, and it's not my most, you know

(55:20):
my best habit.
It's not something I love toadmit, but it's not my best
habit.

Rob Blitzstein (55:24):
It's not something I love to admit, but
that's kind of my speed rightnow, but it feels like you pull
some of it in because you'vebeen talking about Teenage
Mutant Ninja Turtles this week.

Jacki Lutz (55:30):
Yeah, oh, I like it now.
Yeah, totally, it's a good show.

Jessica Toliuszis (55:33):
I love Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles who
doesn't how does your partner.

Rob Blitzstein (55:37):
And how do your kids?
How do they feel about?

Jacki Lutz (55:39):
it.
My kids do say, like when Icall them they'll be like are
you in a meeting?
Or if I'm ever on the phonewith anybody, they'll be like
mom's in a meeting.
So I do think that they noticeAgain, like for people listening
.
My kids are young.
They're two and a half-ish andfour, so pretty young.
My husband's great he's alwaysbeen great about my work ethic.

(56:01):
He also has a very busy youknow busy work life as well.
We're both very passionate aboutour lines of work, so that's
something we've always supportedfor each other and we're also
really lucky because I have somuch support for the kids, you
know, living next door to mymother-in-law who retired to be
a grandma you know, so like Ihave a lot of really trusty help
and my kids love it there but,they're at ages now where it's

(56:26):
not a big deal, but I can see mehaving to make some changes
down the road when they startrealizing I'm not there and they
start to miss me.
Right now they don't reallymiss me, so it's interesting the
age thing, right?

Rob Blitzstein (56:37):
So I have a 4-year-old and an 8-year-old,
but when my 8-year-old was aboutlike five, four or five is what
I really started like theybecome more human too, right and
like you could now haveconversations and like, do
things that are like you knowlike like they're also
participating in whatever'sgoing on right and and that, as

(56:58):
as my oldest kid, jacob, uh got,got older and gets older, it's
requiring more and more of myattention and I want to give
that to him.
And when you come home from the,I go to work like I go to an
office every day.
I don't work at home because Iwant to.
It's hard to turn it off whenyou're working at home and then
you're staying at home.

(57:18):
It's hard to make thatseparation.
I do enjoy very much going tothe office every day and going
home at six o'clock, and youknow just kind of the way I
always did it and I don't knowif that's a good thing or not,
but I do.
I do enjoy the office life, umand but you can have rough days
at the office.
That's still a real thing.
And um, you don't want to gohome to an eight-year-old and be

(57:41):
mad like they don't get thatpart yet, but they, but they
know you're home, right, so yougotta be a little careful with
that yeah, and I think I thinkit's an adjustment that I you
know it's.

Jacki Lutz (57:49):
It's definitely because, like I, I absolutely
adore being a mother.
It's so hard to like you'regonna make me cry on this.
I know I like it's it's soevery episode I'm on somebody is
that right.

Rob Blitzstein (57:59):
It's like a jerry mcguire episode.

Jacki Lutz (58:04):
No, I know the lights are tough in here um my
sunglasses but no I forgot, am Ibobby shots right now oh, you
can be all right, don't forgetto like and follow, if you
haven't done that yet no, butlike I adore being a mom, um,
but it's just, it's never been,uh, the it can't just be the
only thing that I do.
It's never been, you know,completely overwhelming, to the

(58:24):
point where, like this, like Icould ever, ever be like a stay
at home mom, I just wouldn't befulfilled.
I have, I need, I need both andthey need to work together, and
I haven't figured out yet quitehow to make them both work.
But what I need to do is stoptrying to fit my kids into my
work life and fit my work lifeinto my kids, and that's where
my prioritization, like I'mtrying to find that balance and

(58:46):
I think I was actually gettingbetter at it.
But then when I switched jobsand you know, the first year in
your job, you're doingeverything for the first time,
you know deciding to do crazythings like starting podcasts
and things you know, it's, it'sjust it's, it's just completely
consuming, and I love it.

Jessica Toliuszis (59:01):
I'm lucky to have an understanding family,
but I realize things gottachange really strong I have a
great time, like I've learned togo home and and be with my kids
, and I think it's becausethey're getting older too, but I
have so much fun with likethey're, like they're a little
they're me, they're they're meand they, they say things I'm
like oh, man, school in thefuture, oh, they're going, they
they ask to be marched to bed soI've brainwashed them.

(59:24):
Yeah, I did that early on.
I told them you're gonna be theauto parts business and you're
going to military school.
They're all in.

Rob Blitzstein (59:29):
You know rob went to military school.
Yeah, for the audience.
They really are they?

Jacki Lutz (59:33):
did they end up being mirrors of you and you can
see your flaws.
You can see your strengths,like when I see my four-year-old
the way he talks to thetwo-year-old and how kind he is
and he'll just be like, it'sokay, let me help you.
I see that he sees the goodright, but then I'll also see
him snap at somebody and I'mlike, ooh, I see it that was me,

(59:53):
I have, we have it in the two.

Rob Blitzstein (59:56):
So we have two boys, and the older boy is my
wife.
I mean, sweet gentle, he's inthird grade and last year he was
in second grade.
Obviously he didn't skip anygrades.

Jacki Lutz (01:00:09):
Is that how that works?

Rob Blitzstein (01:00:09):
He's kind of like me.
I'm surprised he's still inschool, but he got an empathy
award right.
And I'm like that wasn't me.
I have no self-awareness I tooka test and just told it.
It's from his mom.
But then the little guy who'sfour is tough as nails, like the

(01:00:33):
kid, does not care, he doesn'tlisten to anything, he rolls
eyes.
I have one of those too, he'sme, I'm looking at this, I'm
like I got it.
I know exactly how to handlethis.
I encourage it.
I know exactly how to handlethis.
I encourage it.
You know it can't be so tough.
You're going to take an EQ testin about 36 years.
You're going to do terrible onit.
I thought you were stilllearning to handle yourself.
Yeah, no, it's a lot of fun.

(01:00:57):
I like to think I'm a goodparent and discipline the kids
and they show respect and theydon't act up when we're out and
all that stuff.
But they definitely have traitsthat they have to watch out for
.

Jacki Lutz (01:01:07):
I can see that Is Bobby Schatz self-aware.

Jessica Toliuszis (01:01:11):
No, he's an evil villain that came to
Serenade and Destroy.

Rob Blitzstein (01:01:15):
Evil villains can also be self-aware.
Yeah, that's true.
I have no idea.
Some of the best probably are.
That's true.
I have no idea.
Some of the best probably are.

Jessica Toliuszis (01:01:21):
Bobby Shots is a character in the making and
I have no idea what I'm doingwith him yet.
I'm just having fun with Bobby.

Jacki Lutz (01:01:28):
Shots.
Let him guide you.
I think, I think so, I think sosee where he takes you it's
coming from, from the soul can'twait to see the peaks that he
reaches well, thank you guys, Ireally do appreciate you guys
making the timeto do this.
I think it was very valuablevery cool bobby shots you see
that, like and follow that'smarketing working

(01:01:50):
at its finest thanks for tuningin to another episode of auto
care on air.
Make sure to subscribe to ourpodcast so that you never miss
an episode, and don't forget toleave us a rating and review.
It helps others discover ourshow.
Auto care on air is proud to bea production of the Auto Care
Association, dedicated toadvancing the auto care industry
and supporting professionalslike you.
To learn more about theassociation and its initiatives,

(01:02:12):
visit autocareorg.
Hi, if you've made it this farin the episode, I have a little
bonus clip for you.
This is Rob talking aboutpricing and how Parts Authority
works with their vendors onpricing.
I thought it was reallyinteresting and, even though it

(01:02:33):
didn't fit into any of the othernarratives of the episode, I
think it's really useful forpeople in the industry.
So I still wanted to put it outthere.
So if you've made it this far,here's a little bonus for you.
So I still wanted to put it outthere.
So if you've made it this far,here's a little bonus for you.
I will, you know, I don't knowhow much I can or should talk
about it, but I will say thefight on pricing is not with the
vendor, it's with the customer,the sales team in the

(01:02:56):
marketplace.
You know, not that I'm.
You know I'm having thosefights, but that's where the
fight is.
It's in the marketplace,because you cannot control what
your competitor is going to doand why they're going to do it,
and it's never your vendor'sfault for somebody doing
something you don't understand,whether you feel it's

(01:03:19):
irresponsible or whatever thecase may be.
But it's definitely not a fightthat I have with vendors on
their price.
I'm not ever asking anyone tolower their price because that's
not helpful for anybody really,and it is a nature of the beast
type of thing in our industry.
I know and I'm familiar withother industries and we are
definitely more of a price wartype of industry than others.

(01:03:43):
Even in the automotive spacewhen you look at collision and
the 12-volt world and the radiosand the neon lights all of
which I've sold in my careerthose were always the
high-margin items.
Those guys like going up andthe competition in the
marketplace is very cutthroat inour industry.
I think that's what makes youguys special, though, in a huge

(01:04:05):
way, is that it kind of feelslike you look for win-wins so
you don't ask your vendors tocome down on price to help you
win more.
It's like you let them.

Rob Blitzstein (01:04:18):
If you're fighting on price for the win,
you're going to lose.
Yeah, it's more of apartnership.

Jacki Lutz (01:04:22):
I think it's like you're really building a mutual
trust in each other.
Yeah, and you do that and Ilike that it's.
It's almost like you do that360 degrees.

Rob Blitzstein (01:04:31):
Pricing's.
Really it's a very light pieceof the conversation with a lot
of people are.
You know, the relationship withthe vendors shouldn't be
focused on price.
It should be focused on whatthe vendor's job is and in my
opinion, I would say thevendor's job is to keep making

(01:04:52):
new products, make them well,make them reliable, make them
available, make them, getpictures of them and get the
data correct and get thestandards of the data lined up
with what they're supposed to be.
That's a huge job to do and tomove those parts around the
world.
Right, that is not somethingthat you know WD wants to do,

(01:05:14):
right, we don't want to Y'all dothat.
We'll buy everything that youmake.
Right, that's how this issupposed to work and I think
that's our magic sauce.
When Randy, or when PartsAuthority purchased our family's
business, I remember asking himI was so impressed with this
company we had.
You know, my family had a fewoptions of who we could sell to.

(01:05:36):
By the time we decided we weregoing to sell and my dad was
semi-retired and I remember himsaying to me like well, who do
you want to work for?
And I was, like well, clearlythat guy.
So that's what we did and itwas a very fitting environment
for me.
So I remember I said to Randylike what is the magic behind it
?
Like how did you do this?
And he looked at me he's likethere's no magic.

(01:05:59):
You know, I just I haveinventory right, and I have it,
and I have it all.
That makes sense, coming from aone-store jobber environment.
We had a 5,000 or6,000-square-foot building.
We could have this much.
Inventory Parts Authority has,throughout the country, millions
of square feet of warehousing,all the parts that are made.

(01:06:19):
We got it and that's the magic.
So pricing is really not thethe decision maker in it.
Yeah, right, it's.
How good is the vendor?
How much do we trust the vendor?
There's going to be problemsalong the way and when we have a
vendor that we know is going tonot throw their hands up and
say, oh, can't help you likethat's not a partnership, right?

(01:06:41):
So you know.