July 22, 2024 • 31 mins
Zeigler News Week of July 22, 2024
Current Events at Zeigler with Sam DArc, Mike Van Ryn, and Ariah Daniels
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Episode Transcript
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Ariah Daniels (00:05):
The whole point is to come together and talk
about the things that we likethat are happening with our
culture and our relationshipsinside the store.
Sam DArc (00:16):
Welcome everyone to the Driving Vision Podcast
brought to you by the ZiglerAuto Group. And here with me,
Auto Group director of TalentDevelopment, Mike Van Ryn.
Welcome, Mike. Hey. Thanks, Sam.
Be sure to subscribe to thepodcast. Like it if you do, and
leave a comment. Hey, everybodyin our internals, future of Zach
Today in Driving Vision podcastwith me today. So we have 2
(00:37):
special guests who are notstrangers to the podcast. So
Araya Daniels with our trainingand development department.
Araya, welcome.
Ariah Daniels (00:46):
Hello. Hello. Thanks, Sam.
Sam DArc (00:47):
And then, of course, long time, guest and VP of
training and development acrossthe Ziglar Auto Group, Mike Van
Ryn. Mike, welcome.
Mike Van Ryn (00:54):
Thank you, Sam.
Sam DArc (00:55):
So it's crazy. We're all here, you know, doing our
work stuff, and we pause for aminute on this Friday just to
have a conversation about whatthe heck's going on in your
world. Right? There's a lot ofreally cool and interesting
stuff going on in the ZiglerAuto Group as it relates to your
departments. Mike, let's startwith some of the awards, and
then let's transition intoculture surveys.
So Zigler has a unique culture.We've talked a lot about that
(01:17):
the past several weeks on thepodcast. And, Mike, there's some
pretty cool awards that teamZiegler has achieved and earned.
Mike, what what are theyrecently?
Mike Van Ryn (01:25):
Yeah. 2024 awards, Sam. They've been a lot, for us
recently, but, it's a tribute toour team and everything they do
for each other, our culture, andthen our customers. But we
received the best and brightestcompanies to work for award, for
Chicago, 11 time winner. WestMichigan, 18 time winner.
(01:45):
Milwaukee, a 3 time winner. Wewon the elite award there. And
then nationally received theaward and were a 6 time winner.
In addition to that, Sam andAraya, we actually had Glassdoor
best led companies award thisyear. And this was the 1st year,
that they've ever done thisaward.
So it was neat to be on theroster there. And then Glassdoor
(02:07):
best places to work award, whichis our 2nd year running. So lots
of awards, and we just wannathank our team for everything
they do.
Sam DArc (02:15):
So, Mike, the Glassdoor stuff is kind of
interesting because that's anational award. It's a really
super well recognized company.And you sit alongside some other
really large companies,Starbucks and Delta and
Southwest. That's pretty cool tosee an auto group sitting so
high atop a ranking for an awardlike that. And it speaks to
culture, which is what Araya isworking on right now.
(02:37):
So, Araya, for the past manymonths, you've been running
around not running around.You've been traveling around the
Ziegler Auto Group. Do you feellike you've been running, Araya?
You have been running.
Ariah Daniels (02:47):
Honestly, yes. But all in good fun and good
spirit and obviously for a goodcause. So Yeah. A lot
Sam DArc (02:53):
of companies out there, Araya, talk about culture
and they say it. And we alwaystalk about as soon as you talk
about culture, it kinda slipsbetween your fingers because
it's tough to really figure outwhat culture is. Araya, I'm
aware of many other auto groupsthat say, hey, we do anything
beyond, like, an annual survey.Well, you're out actually
talking to teams deliberatelyand intentionally. Tell us about
(03:14):
what you've been up to thesepast couple of
Ariah Daniels (03:16):
times. You know, when you say something, I think
that's really important, Sam,is, like, culture is this
buzzword. Right? And so when wethink about culture, it's made
up of so many different areasand facets and so many different
dynamics. And when you have 25100 employees across 40
different locations, I mean,that that can get lost.
And so it's something that'sreally important to us and go
back to that word intentional.We're intentional about bringing
(03:38):
our teams together andcollaborating, and we've done
that for many years. So thisyear, we decided to do something
a little bit different. In yearspast, we actually sent out an
anonymous survey, and it kind ofgot lost in the shuffle over,
like, a good 2 month periodbefore we got the information
back and before we were able todeliver that to our teams. And
so this year, we decided to trysomething different where we
(04:01):
went, in person to our teams andinto our stores and actually did
live surveying.
And so that would capture reallywhat's happening in real time
across our stores. And soinstead of getting, you know, a
survey that was 60 days old,we're able to capture really
what's happening at the timethat's going on in the stores
with different processes andprocedures. And the whole point
(04:23):
is to come together and talkabout the things that we like
that are happening with ourculture and our relationships
inside the store, and then wespend some time talking about
maybe the things that need somesome improvement and some
tweaking. And, yeah. So we'regetting down to the wire of
those, and they've been sowonderful.
It made a lot of differentactions that we've done across
the board so far.
Sam DArc (04:43):
So I have a question, Araya. This is a brand new
process for this year. Right?Before it was a survey. I won't
even ask which store you startedwith.
But there are people that are inthe auto industry that are like,
oh my gosh. You go into a storeand you say, hey. What could we
do better? And you would just bejust there would be a 1,000,000
things thrown at you. So, like,that first store you walked
into, you're sitting in aconference room.
(05:04):
You've probably got 40 or 50people there, and you ask the
question, what was that likethat first day? Was it
intimidating? What was it like?
Ariah Daniels (05:11):
You know, this year, not necessarily. You know,
if anything, I think it's sorefreshing because Yeah. There's
something about getting everyonein the same room with all of the
same thought process that we'rejust here to be better. And so,
like, I think when you do thatand we we really set the tone
of, like, hey. We're respectfulof each other's opinions and how
we see things.
We all have differentperceptions of things, but
respectful of each other'sopinions and how we see things.
(05:33):
We all have differentperceptions of things. But
ultimately, at the end of thisconversation, we're gonna leave
with better ideas on how to justbe better, better as a team, and
more successful, and moreprofitable. Like, all those
things go go hand in hand. So Iguess I wouldn't say it was
intimidating, but nonetheless,for everyone else, just was
refreshing to be able to speaktheir minds.
Sam DArc (05:55):
I love that, Araya, because I think a lot of
companies, they fear asking thatquestion for the answer. They
don't want to create drama,trauma, and trauma. They don't
want to, like, they don't wantto disturb something that they
figure if left, unspoken orundone or unaddressed, they'll
just go away, but it doesn't.Right?
Ariah Daniels (06:09):
Yeah. Because I think sometimes people will come
in and they'll feel stronglyabout something and we have to
really figure out, okay, like,where's that drama? Like, let's
cut that off, bring together asolution if we're upset about
something, and that's where theconversations are just
different. We're not there tojust talk about things that
maybe we're unhappy about. Weactually are bringing together
solutions on how to improvethem.
Sam DArc (06:30):
So as I've watched you go through and do this process
in multiple different stores,one of the other challenges that
you think of in other, autogroups, not Ziegler, but, you
know, somebody from corporateswings into a store. They create
this drama. They throw a bunchof people under the bus.
Somebody gets fired, and youmove on. You haven't done that.
Right? Like, you're there trulyto give the store tools to
address things on their own.Right?
Ariah Daniels (06:50):
Oh, yeah. Correct. Yeah. There's never any
you know, I'm sure from from afew people and just across the
board, there are times wherepeople feel a little,
intimidated or less lessinterested to speak up, but we
really encourage those kind ofdifficult I hate calling them
difficult, necessaryconversations or Jim
Sam DArc (07:08):
Craig said that last week. Yeah.
Ariah Daniels (07:10):
Yeah. Necessary conversations to have, and
they're they're challenging attimes. There there are times
where we get a little heated andwe debate back and forth, but,
ultimately, everyone's just onthe same page and has good
feelings about where the storeis headed after those
conversations.
Sam DArc (07:24):
What is it about those necessary conversations that
once had it's really the portalto progress. Right? Without
having those, everybody callsthem tough conversations. Jim
Craig said necessaryconversations. Once we have
that, we can progress in a waybefore we could, Mariah.
Ariah Daniels (07:39):
Oh, yeah. Well, it creates a level of trust, I
think, you know, like everyoneis finally on board and maybe,
you know, agree to disagree oncertain things. But ultimately,
there's trust there becauseeveryone is has the same common
goal and that's just to becomebetter.
Sam DArc (07:53):
Yeah. Yeah. Boy, I like that. So the other thing
that makes Ziegler, I think,unique and and and, you know,
I've worked with auto dealersacross the country for decades.
We compete against each other ina way that very few companies
compete, and then we collaboratein a way that very few companies
collaborate.
How has that come out in theculture surveys and and your
(08:14):
interactions in the stores thesepast months?
Ariah Daniels (08:16):
Yeah. So it's funny, and I know Mike can
probably chime into this too andand attest to the stores that
he's gone into, but it seemslike almost always some of our
action plans align with otherstores' action plans. And a lot
of the times and really what wesaw quite a bit this year is
just different communicationprocesses. So communication
within each department orcommunication between
(08:36):
departments or as a store as awhole, everyone really just
wants to feel included andinvolved in what's going on. And
sometimes, you know, we get sobusy and we've got so many team
members in our our stores thatsome of that information can get
lost.
So so it's all about bringing usback together to to to really
set the standard of what we wantour communication to look like,
(08:58):
what do we want our culture tolook like. So by having those
conversations, it's it's similaracross all of our stores in a
sense of that way. Way. Mike,you're probably seeing the same
thing in the ones you've done.
Mike Van Ryn (09:09):
Yeah. Very similar. Well said, Araya. One
of the things I've seen toothat's been rewarding Sam and
Raya's over the years. I mean,we started this thing in 2006,
and we didn't know where itwould go, but we've continued to
improve every year.
And it's from ideas andsuggestions from our employees
or our team members, I shouldsay. And just to see things that
have come out of these meetings,right, or I have that we've been
(09:30):
able to implement for theirstore, but also for the whole
auto group. I mean, a coupleexamples would be I know in a
few minutes, we're gonna talkabout our product knowledge and
walk around competition. Thatthat came in as an idea out of
one of these sessions. Thepresident's circle for service
technicians and how we rewardthem and honor them, the service
technicians and serviceadvisors.
(09:51):
That was an idea from one ofthese sessions. The the last one
is just simple, but it's, everymorning on on Monday, we get an
email and it's employees'birthdays for the week. That
came as an idea out of one ofthese sessions. Those are 3
tangible things that have becomea part of our culture that came
out of these meetings, Sam.
Sam DArc (10:08):
So it's interesting, Mike and Araya. People talk
about money. Right? Money is animportant component of an
employment contract and what wedo when we work for we we give
up a portion of our time. I'veoften said that the automotive
is the the last great Americaninstitution.
Right? You can bring all yourtalents, whatever your
background, from whateverdiverse area you are, and you
(10:29):
can the sky's the limit. Thereis no limitations. Right? And
it's interesting because inautomotive, also, we wanna feel
like we're making a difference.
It's almost a human bill ofrights that I can be employed,
give up my time, and I wanna beable to make a difference. And,
Araya, both you and Mike aresaying that. Right? Employees
are saying, I want to work, givea little bit of my life, and I
(10:52):
wanna see that what I'm doingmakes a true difference in the
world, Araya. Right?
Is that showing up in thesurveys you're seeing?
Ariah Daniels (10:58):
Oh, yeah. Absolutely. I think there's
there's so much respect for eachother, and we really do operate.
It's it's funny because youthink, like, every store has
maybe a little bit different ofa culture, but ultimately at the
end of the day, everyone reallyis a family in our stores. And
that's so cool to see just thethe relationships that have been
fostered and the things that,you know, each one of our stores
(11:19):
does, but, yeah, I think you hitit on the head, like, everyone
is just so, empathetic andsympathetic to each other's
goals and aspirations andpersonal and professional
growth, to to back that up andbe able to have that support in
each store is totally, totallythere.
Mike Van Ryn (11:35):
And a lot of that comes down, Araya and Sam, to,
selection selection of the rightpeople for our team.
Ariah Daniels (11:41):
Yeah.
Mike Van Ryn (11:41):
And Araya and I always say when we're doing our
training development sessionsthat everybody that comes on
board either takes the cultureup a notch or takes our culture
down a notch. It never remainsstagnant. Yeah.
Ariah Daniels (11:54):
For sure.
Sam DArc (11:56):
That's true. That's awesome. That is awesome. Well,
thank you to you both for doingthis process. And, it's fun to
see as people go, as teams havegone through this, they've
become more cohesive and they'vebecome a bigger, better part of
our overall team.
And this elusive culture thingsomehow becomes, somehow becomes
(12:18):
stronger. And it's fascinatingbecause, again, going back to
this idea, some companies don'teven wanna ask because they're
afraid of the answer. TeamZiegler, we're not afraid of it.
We're gonna deal with that toughstuff.
Ariah Daniels (12:27):
We definitely embrace it. You know, we look at
we look at challenges like that,and I love that about our
organization is that we almostinvite challenges because we
embrace it as as an opportunityto just become better. Right? I
I just love that we do that.And, to do just that.
Sam DArc (12:42):
I interviewed this week an an author of a of a book
that does sales training, andit's been associated with some
large groups like Sewell andothers that'll play in months,
in coming weeks. But one of thethings he talked about is it's
important for a winning team anda winning sales person to have
adversity intelligence. So toknow how to overcome it, how to
(13:03):
approach it, how to go throughit. Like, we've been hit by
adversity recently. Right?
And it's it's interestingbecause every piece of adversity
ends up kind of contributing tothe bigger whole. So Aaron
talked about, you know, in oone, there was a recession. In o
eight, there was a massiverecession. The biggest we've
seen in the car business eversince there was recession, the
biggest we've seen the carbusiness ever since there was
COVID. Right?
And each moment helped grow thecompany. And then, you know, we
(13:26):
had the CDK outage. And, I wasblown away by the responses of
our teams when we talk aboutculture. Rather than closing the
doors and saying, hey. We'redone.
We're not gonna go any further.People, like, just said, you
know, we can't do this anymore.They said, how do I do this
different? And a team's abilityto innovate and be resourceful
(13:47):
instead of looking for theresources, they started to go to
paper and whatnot. I don't knowif either of you have thoughts
about how kind of the team dealtwith the challenge that was that
shutdown, but, you know, it was10 days.
It was crazy while the Russiansgot our data back. And it wasn't
even us. It was a partner.Right? So it had nothing to do
with us.
Ariah Daniels (14:06):
Right? So it's volumes to our culture. I think
if if our culture, was not in away where it was productive and
positive and we didn't haveprocesses in place, then we
probably would have wentbackwards. Right? So I think
it's important it's such animportant piece that when you
have good processes in place andand good relationships with
people that you can get throughanything.
(14:28):
So
Sam DArc (14:28):
Yeah. So to all of our teams that are listening to
this, thank you for your hardwork during that period. You
know, we had a finance meetingthis past week. We do it every
quarter where we recap bestpractices from the prior
quarter. And I was kind ofexpect Mike, you were there.
You were in the meeting. I wasexpecting everybody in that
meeting to be super tired andkind of exhausted. There'd be
some fatigue and kind of alittle bit of frustration
(14:51):
because maybe things had gonebackwards. And it was
fascinating because there was anenergy. There was an excitement.
There was an engagement. Andmaybe even more important, they
actually held the line very wellduring the outage. Probably
better, I think, you know, as Icompare we met with our
insurance provider, this week aswell. And as I compared notes
with him with what other groupsexperienced, I mean, we we we
(15:16):
were to your point, or I from acultural standpoint, we were
resilient in a way that is alittle bit astonishing.
Mike Van Ryn (15:22):
Yeah. I totally saw that as well, Sam, in the
meeting with you this week andthere was a good energy and
collaboration. And then also,the tie in is really neat coming
from the training developmentside that recently we brought in
a speaker and her name wasRebecca Gregory. And she was 10
years ago, unfortunately, herand her 5 year old son were in
(15:43):
the Boston Marathon bombing. Andshe talked about going through
76 surgeries.
She talked about mindset. Shetalked about resiliency. And,
you know, Sam, we all go throughchallenges in our life. And like
Araya said, we have to look atthose challenges and make them
become opportunities. So thethings that Rebecca Gregory
(16:03):
taught us a couple months ago,you know, just tied in directly
with what we've gone throughrecently.
Ariah Daniels (16:10):
One of our trainers that joins us, Tim
Tarantine, is with us today,actually, across all of our
stores. He's been in all of ourregions, this week which has
been wonderful. And part of ourconversation and topic is
getting unstuck and how do wereinvigorate ourself and how do
we find our passions and ourwhys. And so recentering
yourself to those things is whatkeeps us going. And it's what
(16:30):
it's how we can overcome a lotof these obstacles like the CDK
outage.
Right? So
Sam DArc (16:35):
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So so, actually, to our external
audience and to our internal,you can go back and find and
search Tim Tarrantyne in ourepisodes. He's been a many time
guest.
He's a partner within the ZiglerAuto Group in a lot of us the
same ways as Jim Craig is. Sowe'd love to have him, back,
soon to talk more about thisgetting unstuck. But it is
interesting. Like, when youthink about a large team, how do
(16:57):
you go from adversity and havingto be super resourceful and
expending a lot of energy tojust continuing that? And and I
and and I was impressed, withyou know, it was impressive and
very interesting as a socialexperiment, you know, how how
well they did that.
Now, Mike, you you brought upRebecca Gregory, and and we've
talked a lot on this show aboutthe Ziegler speaker series. So
(17:18):
she was part of that. Just togive some background, Ziegler
speaker series, multiplespeakers every single year from
different disciplines. I don'tyou know, it's interesting,
Mike. We've never really hadlike maybe the closest person in
the in the, car business we'vehad in that is, like, Grant
Cardone.
Right? But now he's in realestate. Right? It's not people
that are vendors in automotiveor automotive specific. They're
(17:43):
outside the industry, andthere's a reason for that, Mike.
Share that with us.
Mike Van Ryn (17:47):
Yeah. You know what, Sam? Great question. It's
all walks of life, thesespeakers. And we typically bring
in about, 5 speakers a year forus to learn and grow.
And a lot of times, our teammembers will even bring a family
member in with them. Some ofthem bring their kids in to
learn. Yeah. So they're learningthings professionally, but also
personally outside of work. So,you know, Rebecca Gregory was 1
(18:07):
and and Sam, we interviewed heron our podcast.
So you can go back and check outRebecca Gregory. Another one
definitely is, Jimmy Urie. AndJimmy was just in about a month
ago. And Jimmy may not recognizehis name, but, you know, names
like Kenny Chesney, Tim McGraw,Rascal Flats.
Sam DArc (18:25):
Who's Tim McGraw, Mike? I don't know who that is.
Mike Van Ryn (18:28):
You've seen McGraw. Concert, Sam. Come on
now.
Sam DArc (18:30):
I I know he's married to a Faith Hill. I don't know
who Tim is, but I know who Faith
Mike Van Ryn (18:33):
is. Jimmy's good. Country music, singer and
songwriter. Yeah. And he'swritten so many different,
songs.
Sam DArc (18:41):
So, Mike, who's coming up in the speaker series? Who
can we look forward to in thecoming months? Not to put you on
the spot. I know you're workingon some things. Any any, any any
teases to tell us about?
Mike Van Ryn (18:52):
Well, while we're working on a few things outside
of, outside of the norm, thingswe've
Sam DArc (18:57):
not
Mike Van Ryn (18:57):
had before. So maybe Okay. Could be a could be
a bodybuilder.
Sam DArc (19:01):
Oh. What do
Mike Van Ryn (19:01):
you what do you think of that?
Sam DArc (19:03):
Actually, that'd be fun. Araya's got a super big,
you've got kind of an an iconicInstagram following, Araya,
watching you. Oh, I
Ariah Daniels (19:09):
am no bodybuilding.
Sam DArc (19:10):
Your workout routine, I would love to figure out the
bodybuilding thing. I'm tryingto figure out how to how to do
that. I drink more proteins thanI
Mike Van Ryn (19:17):
drink there.
Sam DArc (19:17):
But yeah. That'd be fun.
Mike Van Ryn (19:18):
Jimmy Urie. Check Jimmy Urie out too on our
podcast, Sam. And, also, he'sgot a song right now on the
charts. It's called She'sSomebody's Daughter by Drew
Baldridge. Jimmy wrote thissong, and last week, it was
ranked number 8.
This week, it's projected to beat 5 on the Billboard charts.
Sam DArc (19:37):
Wow. Wow. Okay. So Ziegler speaker series, that's
awesome. Let's also talk aboutperformance groups.
So we have several groups acrossthe auto group. For our internal
employees, they know aboutthese. For external, they may
not. If I wanna become a financemanager, I can join a group and
learn a little about it. If Iwanna become a general manager,
I can join a group, learn aboutit, and become proficient.
(19:59):
Aaron even talked about it onthe dealers Dealership Car Guy
podcast with Yossi, how, hey, wecan teach you how to become a
general manager as an example.So this past week, we just
graduated 10 finance managers.Right? Mike, you were there.
Tell us a little bit about whatthat experience was like to see
10.
We started with 22, 23, so itwas less than half that
(20:20):
finished. Because it's not easy.It's not a layup. You've gotta
do things. But, give give meyour thoughts on that.
Mike Van Ryn (20:26):
Well, the word rigorous comes up. Right? It
must be a rigorous curriculumthat they're going through. And
they raise their hand and say,hey. I wanna learn more about,
finance.
And I may be in a sales role. Imay be in a office role. I may
be in any role with theorganization, but they raise
their hand and challengethemselves, get out of their
comfort zone. And, Sam, I knowone of the things you do with
them, along with our friendsfrom Brown and Brown is have
(20:48):
them do role playing. And it'suncomfortable when we're role
playing in front of our peers.
But no need to see those 10graduates, come through the
program. And Sam and Araya, asboth of you know, through our
development program at ZieglerUniversity, we've had so many
people be promoted from within.That's what it's all about.
Hanging on, to our our teammembers, our retention at
(21:11):
Ziegler, and then also helpingpeople achieve their goals.
Sam DArc (21:14):
Hey. So, Mike, is it failure that only 10 out of 22
or 21 graduated 6, 7 monthslater? Or is that success?
Mike Van Ryn (21:21):
That's a great question. You know, as leaders,
we have to look upon ourselvesand make sure that, we're doing
everything we can to coach andmentor people.
Sam DArc (21:28):
Mike, the answer is it's success. Darn it.
Mike Van Ryn (21:31):
So so I don't know, man. Come on. Oh, there
may be some self reflection inthere, Sam.
Sam DArc (21:36):
It's success. So it may be failure on my part for
not getting everybody through,but, it also could be success
that not everybody is suited forevery job. Right? And so
initially, I may hand raise andsay, hey. I wanna become a
finance manager.
Do you know one thing I learnedas as we went through this
session? So 2 things I learned.I'll share it with you here. You
didn't even ask. Araya asked,what did Sam, what did you
(21:57):
learn?
And I'll share.
Ariah Daniels (21:58):
Sam, what did
Sam DArc (21:59):
you learn? Oh, fantastic. I'm gonna tell you.
So there were two things thatare fascinating. Number 1,
finance manager, for those whoare outside the industry, is a
leadership role withoutquestion.
But in a traditional setting,you have no higher fire. You
don't sign paychecks. You don'tdo performance reviews. You
like, you're not a traditionalleader with a bunch of followers
(22:20):
who are assigned with you. Sofinance managers lead by
influence.
They don't lead by title. Andthat can be the toughest thing,
but it can also be the greatestthing to learn. It is an awesome
way to lead, but not everybody'ssuited for that. So if somebody
comes into it thinking, hey. Ican lead by title, and they
(22:40):
expect people to follow bytitle, they are going to, a, be
miserable because they're gonnabe like, hey.
Somebody's supposed to belistening to me, and they're
not. And they're gonna fail. Theother thing that's interesting
about the finance role is carswere selling tangible. You can
touch, see, feel it, get excitedabout it. In finance, it's not
as tangible because you'reselling protections, and that's
(23:02):
a big switch.
So not everybody's well suitedfor it, but I love here at our
group that if you have aninterest in it, you can hand
raise. You can learn about it,figure out if it's a good path.
And then we've got some otherperformance groups to go down go
down the path of if that doesn'twork, Mike, I think you're
Ariah Daniels (23:19):
gonna to say that I think it's such an important
piece that you're stating. And,like, obviously, we we want and
we encourage people to raisetheir hand to wanna try new
things. Right? But I'm a hugebeliever. We all have different
talents and strengths that makeyou good at what you do, and we
wanna help people pull thoseout.
And I'll be the first to admit,I went through finance at one
point, and I hated it. Right?So, like, I that was I hate to
(23:41):
say it to the finance guy that Ididn't like finance, but
Sam DArc (23:44):
You're not supposed to say that. Come on.
Mike Van Ryn (23:46):
Can we edit that? No.
Ariah Daniels (23:48):
I'll say it wasn't my strength. Right? So it
wasn't my strength. It was notmy strength. But
Sam DArc (23:52):
No. You know, you how boring would the world be? How
boring would the world be if weall did the same thing in our
strength for all of us? Right.Like, if we just had a company
of 25100 general managers, howboring would that be?
That's why we always talk about,like, the detailer is such an
important job. No matter who itis, what if they do their job to
the best of their ability, theyknow their job, they do their
job. We are better as a team.And and so I like that. Tell us,
(24:17):
what are some of the otherperformance groups for those
internally or and evenexternally that might be
interested in joining some ofthose opportunities?
Go for it.
Mike Van Ryn (24:25):
I'll share a couple, then I'll turn it over
to Araya that, she has onekicking off here in a week or 2.
Sam DArc (24:29):
Oh. But Cool. I want the others.
Mike Van Ryn (24:31):
Yeah. So many other things we've had, Sam. And
and I'll say this. I'll I'llI'll say I was really proud of
our performance group for, F andI, and we had 3 of our new
stores represented there, Sam.That was pretty neat too that we
just brought online last year.
But,
Sam DArc (24:45):
Subaru Fort Wayne, Subaru Lafayette, they did a
they did a nice job. Yep.
Mike Van Ryn (24:49):
And Holland too.
Sam DArc (24:50):
And Holland. Yeah.
Mike Van Ryn (24:51):
Yeah. Pretty neat. So we have a general manager
performance group
Sam DArc (24:54):
k.
Mike Van Ryn (24:55):
That meets regularly with Aaron Ziegler and
Yep. Dan Scheid and and you,Sam.
Sam DArc (25:00):
Yep. We also
Mike Van Ryn (25:00):
have, an academy class that's very similar to the
NADA Academy.
Sam DArc (25:07):
It's It's like a dealer 20 or NADA Academy.
Mike Van Ryn (25:09):
Yeah. Yeah. So those are two levels. And then
Araya's kicking one off here ina couple weeks, I believe.
Sam DArc (25:14):
So Araya.
Mike Van Ryn (25:15):
Really neat.
Sam DArc (25:15):
So this is not live, and and this isn't happening
right now. Give us a tease onwhat's going on.
Ariah Daniels (25:20):
Yeah. I'm really excited. We've got well,
actually, you know, we have somany different facets going on
and 2 that are kicking off againnext week. So we actually have,
our women in leadership group.So we've just recently started a
women leaders of the ZAG groupthat brings together a bunch of
female leaders in theorganization.
It's just a way to connect andinspire and empower, what
(25:41):
typically has been a nondominated field in, you know, in
our industry for for women. Sowe've got a coaching call on
that next Thursday, but we'realso kicking off a new series of
our aspiring leaders course,which is really for any leader
in the organization who'sinterested in just growing in a
capacity of their leadership andmaybe they have, future
(26:03):
endeavors to wanna grow into anew role. And so we go through
kind of a 5 series class andcurriculum where they get to
learn from so many differentleaders inside the organization
and go through some differentthings that help them really
step out of their comfort zoneand grow as a person personally
and professionally. So we'vewe've always got something going
on, but those are the 2 that arecoming up, in the next week,
(26:23):
which I'm really excited for.
Sam DArc (26:25):
So, Rya, what if I wanna join one of those? What if
I wanna join one of those 2groups? How can I get more
information now? I know thefirst one I can't join, but, the
second one I might be able to.What, who do I reach out
Ariah Daniels (26:36):
to? Just raise your hand. Honestly, at this
point, raise your hand. You canalways reach out to me or or
Mike or really even just yourmanager, your general manager,
like, really have thatconversation. I always tell
people, anyone coming in is tonever assume that your managers
are mind readers.
No one knows what your goals areand where it is that you wanna
go. You're master of your ownship and it's you for you to
(26:56):
decide where it is that youwanna go with your life and your
career. And so I always telleveryone, speak up. And so we
are more than happy to, to helpguide someone in in where to
start and what that looks like.
Mike Van Ryn (27:08):
I was gonna say it was neat, Sam, to, that, Erin
Ziegler and I were able to kickoff the, women leadership call
and just need to see that thing,get rolling throughout the
organization. And Ryan Arise hasdone an incredible job with
that. And, we're only able to beon there for 5 minutes, and we
get kicked off.
Sam DArc (27:23):
Well, I was gonna say what a cool meeting that would
be. There's some incrediblewomen across our auto group in
in one Absolutely. Besidesyourself, obviously, Araya, but
our head of security. So theonly person in our company who
carries a gun every single dayand is constantly thinking about
protecting the auto group,Carrie Ann Thomas, she's an
incredible, individual. And sothe depth, the strength, that
(27:44):
those will be fascinatingconversations that you have.
You keep looking over yourshoulder eyes. Tim Tarrantyne
there?
Ariah Daniels (27:50):
You know, Tim's here, but also, Bob Kiel, our
fixed ops director, is here, andhe's just making a few comments.
Sam DArc (27:56):
Comments. So I'm having. Oh my gosh. Wait, tell
Bob to
Bob Kuehl (27:57):
come over here. Bob?
Sam DArc (27:58):
So Bob is actually
Ariah Daniels (27:58):
another great instrumental part of, one of our
Sam DArc (27:59):
academy classes.
Ariah Daniels (27:59):
Yeah, have
Sam DArc (28:04):
have Bob tell us about the academies. Hey, Bob. What
what service academy do we havegoing on here?
Bob Kuehl (28:09):
Well, we have a couple of them going on.
Obviously, we just did a partssegment of our nada academy and
the next one is on service butthen we have our technician
university that, we're in our3rd session. So by the end of
this year we will have 33technicians that we have
graduated and put into theworkforce within the company.
Sam DArc (28:27):
And not only are those technicians graduated that
didn't have that experienceprior to, but we formed a
special relationship with a toolprovider through NASCAR. And
that tool provider has,delivered through a partnership
with Ziegler tools to theseaspiring technicians. It that's
a pretty cool thing. Tell uswhat you get when you graduate
from us the Aspiring Technicianscourse.
Bob Kuehl (28:48):
So with our academy, the auto group supplies you with
$3,500 worth of tools, topurchase at your discretion. We
didn't wanna just buy a toolset, because some guys are at
different levels of their oftheir tool inventory, so to
speak. So we we have set up thatand then with our relationship
with Mac Tools through NASCAR,being we are it is an education
(29:09):
based situation that we set up.They, allow our people to
purchase at a 50% discount. Sothat $35100 turns into 7000
overnight.
Sam DArc (29:17):
Props to Mac Tools, Black and Decker, and and and
Robert Newman who helped us putthat together. But, that's not
totally a secret. That's apretty cool thing. Here's the
interesting thing I found in theworld. It's not so much having
the information and knowing whatto do.
Everybody knows what to do. It'sdoing it. It's executing on it.
It's like my friend, just acouple days ago trying to get a
(29:38):
rental car from a place that hadno rental cars. It's not about
taking the reservation.
It's about holding thereservation. That, by the way,
is a Seinfeld line. So Bob,thank you for all you're doing
on the, aspiring technicians,creating technicians across the
Ziglar Auto Group, one of thetoughest positions to hire for.
And, Araya, we know you've gottago because you're busy getting
(29:58):
back into the Tim Tarrantynething. Before we break, one
question for all for both ofyou.
Auto and retail, in particular,is a tough gig. Like, it takes a
lot of time. It takes a lot ofattention. The hours are long.
Yet we stop to do these thingsevery now and again, culture
surveys, Tim Tarrantynetraining, podcasts, meetings
(30:22):
with Ziegler speaker series.
What's that all about? Why taketime out of our day to do things
that aren't directly revenuegenerating that don't sell a car
in this moment, Araya? We'llstart with you, and then, Mike,
well, let you have the lastword.
Ariah Daniels (30:33):
Oh, man. It because they matter. It's it
it's what brings everyonetogether. It's what helps
everyone continue to grow. Ithelps us collaborate.
It helps us just do so manydifferent things that are just
beyond what our day to day rolesand responsibilities are, and
that's just a part of theconnection that we create and
the culture that we have, andit's an elite one. So, all those
(30:54):
things are just so instrumentalinto creating an organization
that is a winning organizationfor sure.
Sam DArc (31:01):
That's awesome, Mariah. Mike.
Mike Van Ryn (31:03):
It's about Kaizen. Continuous improvement.
Sam DArc (31:07):
We
Mike Van Ryn (31:07):
wanna continually improve and get better for our
customers every day and getbetter for each other and
continue to build our worldclass culture across Zingler
Auto.
Sam DArc (31:16):
Thank you, everybody. Appreciate for being on the
podcast today. Special thanks toMike Van Ryan. Alright. Daniel's
Bob Kiel came in at the very endfor contributing this week's
episode.
Until next week, how are youdriving vision today?
The whole point is to come together and talk
about the things that we likethat are happening with our
culture and our relationshipsinside the store.
Sam DArc (00:16):
Welcome everyone to the Driving Vision Podcast
brought to you by the ZiglerAuto Group. And here with me,
Auto Group director of TalentDevelopment, Mike Van Ryn.
Welcome, Mike. Hey. Thanks, Sam.
Be sure to subscribe to thepodcast. Like it if you do, and
leave a comment. Hey, everybodyin our internals, future of Zach
Today in Driving Vision podcastwith me today. So we have 2
(00:37):
special guests who are notstrangers to the podcast. So
Araya Daniels with our trainingand development department.
Araya, welcome.
Ariah Daniels (00:46):
Hello. Hello. Thanks, Sam.
Sam DArc (00:47):
And then, of course, long time, guest and VP of
training and development acrossthe Ziglar Auto Group, Mike Van
Ryn. Mike, welcome.
Mike Van Ryn (00:54):
Thank you, Sam.
Sam DArc (00:55):
So it's crazy. We're all here, you know, doing our
work stuff, and we pause for aminute on this Friday just to
have a conversation about whatthe heck's going on in your
world. Right? There's a lot ofreally cool and interesting
stuff going on in the ZiglerAuto Group as it relates to your
departments. Mike, let's startwith some of the awards, and
then let's transition intoculture surveys.
So Zigler has a unique culture.We've talked a lot about that
(01:17):
the past several weeks on thepodcast. And, Mike, there's some
pretty cool awards that teamZiegler has achieved and earned.
Mike, what what are theyrecently?
Mike Van Ryn (01:25):
Yeah. 2024 awards, Sam. They've been a lot, for us
recently, but, it's a tribute toour team and everything they do
for each other, our culture, andthen our customers. But we
received the best and brightestcompanies to work for award, for
Chicago, 11 time winner. WestMichigan, 18 time winner.
(01:45):
Milwaukee, a 3 time winner. Wewon the elite award there. And
then nationally received theaward and were a 6 time winner.
In addition to that, Sam andAraya, we actually had Glassdoor
best led companies award thisyear. And this was the 1st year,
that they've ever done thisaward.
So it was neat to be on theroster there. And then Glassdoor
(02:07):
best places to work award, whichis our 2nd year running. So lots
of awards, and we just wannathank our team for everything
they do.
Sam DArc (02:15):
So, Mike, the Glassdoor stuff is kind of
interesting because that's anational award. It's a really
super well recognized company.And you sit alongside some other
really large companies,Starbucks and Delta and
Southwest. That's pretty cool tosee an auto group sitting so
high atop a ranking for an awardlike that. And it speaks to
culture, which is what Araya isworking on right now.
(02:37):
So, Araya, for the past manymonths, you've been running
around not running around.You've been traveling around the
Ziegler Auto Group. Do you feellike you've been running, Araya?
You have been running.
Ariah Daniels (02:47):
Honestly, yes. But all in good fun and good
spirit and obviously for a goodcause. So Yeah. A lot
Sam DArc (02:53):
of companies out there, Araya, talk about culture
and they say it. And we alwaystalk about as soon as you talk
about culture, it kinda slipsbetween your fingers because
it's tough to really figure outwhat culture is. Araya, I'm
aware of many other auto groupsthat say, hey, we do anything
beyond, like, an annual survey.Well, you're out actually
talking to teams deliberatelyand intentionally. Tell us about
(03:14):
what you've been up to thesepast couple of
Ariah Daniels (03:16):
times. You know, when you say something, I think
that's really important, Sam,is, like, culture is this
buzzword. Right? And so when wethink about culture, it's made
up of so many different areasand facets and so many different
dynamics. And when you have 25100 employees across 40
different locations, I mean,that that can get lost.
And so it's something that'sreally important to us and go
back to that word intentional.We're intentional about bringing
(03:38):
our teams together andcollaborating, and we've done
that for many years. So thisyear, we decided to do something
a little bit different. In yearspast, we actually sent out an
anonymous survey, and it kind ofgot lost in the shuffle over,
like, a good 2 month periodbefore we got the information
back and before we were able todeliver that to our teams. And
so this year, we decided to trysomething different where we
(04:01):
went, in person to our teams andinto our stores and actually did
live surveying.
And so that would capture reallywhat's happening in real time
across our stores. And soinstead of getting, you know, a
survey that was 60 days old,we're able to capture really
what's happening at the timethat's going on in the stores
with different processes andprocedures. And the whole point
(04:23):
is to come together and talkabout the things that we like
that are happening with ourculture and our relationships
inside the store, and then wespend some time talking about
maybe the things that need somesome improvement and some
tweaking. And, yeah. So we'regetting down to the wire of
those, and they've been sowonderful.
It made a lot of differentactions that we've done across
the board so far.
Sam DArc (04:43):
So I have a question, Araya. This is a brand new
process for this year. Right?Before it was a survey. I won't
even ask which store you startedwith.
But there are people that are inthe auto industry that are like,
oh my gosh. You go into a storeand you say, hey. What could we
do better? And you would just bejust there would be a 1,000,000
things thrown at you. So, like,that first store you walked
into, you're sitting in aconference room.
(05:04):
You've probably got 40 or 50people there, and you ask the
question, what was that likethat first day? Was it
intimidating? What was it like?
Ariah Daniels (05:11):
You know, this year, not necessarily. You know,
if anything, I think it's sorefreshing because Yeah. There's
something about getting everyonein the same room with all of the
same thought process that we'rejust here to be better. And so,
like, I think when you do thatand we we really set the tone
of, like, hey. We're respectfulof each other's opinions and how
we see things.
We all have differentperceptions of things, but
respectful of each other'sopinions and how we see things.
(05:33):
We all have differentperceptions of things. But
ultimately, at the end of thisconversation, we're gonna leave
with better ideas on how to justbe better, better as a team, and
more successful, and moreprofitable. Like, all those
things go go hand in hand. So Iguess I wouldn't say it was
intimidating, but nonetheless,for everyone else, just was
refreshing to be able to speaktheir minds.
Sam DArc (05:55):
I love that, Araya, because I think a lot of
companies, they fear asking thatquestion for the answer. They
don't want to create drama,trauma, and trauma. They don't
want to, like, they don't wantto disturb something that they
figure if left, unspoken orundone or unaddressed, they'll
just go away, but it doesn't.Right?
Ariah Daniels (06:09):
Yeah. Because I think sometimes people will come
in and they'll feel stronglyabout something and we have to
really figure out, okay, like,where's that drama? Like, let's
cut that off, bring together asolution if we're upset about
something, and that's where theconversations are just
different. We're not there tojust talk about things that
maybe we're unhappy about. Weactually are bringing together
solutions on how to improvethem.
Sam DArc (06:30):
So as I've watched you go through and do this process
in multiple different stores,one of the other challenges that
you think of in other, autogroups, not Ziegler, but, you
know, somebody from corporateswings into a store. They create
this drama. They throw a bunchof people under the bus.
Somebody gets fired, and youmove on. You haven't done that.
Right? Like, you're there trulyto give the store tools to
address things on their own.Right?
Ariah Daniels (06:50):
Oh, yeah. Correct. Yeah. There's never any
you know, I'm sure from from afew people and just across the
board, there are times wherepeople feel a little,
intimidated or less lessinterested to speak up, but we
really encourage those kind ofdifficult I hate calling them
difficult, necessaryconversations or Jim
Sam DArc (07:08):
Craig said that last week. Yeah.
Ariah Daniels (07:10):
Yeah. Necessary conversations to have, and
they're they're challenging attimes. There there are times
where we get a little heated andwe debate back and forth, but,
ultimately, everyone's just onthe same page and has good
feelings about where the storeis headed after those
conversations.
Sam DArc (07:24):
What is it about those necessary conversations that
once had it's really the portalto progress. Right? Without
having those, everybody callsthem tough conversations. Jim
Craig said necessaryconversations. Once we have
that, we can progress in a waybefore we could, Mariah.
Ariah Daniels (07:39):
Oh, yeah. Well, it creates a level of trust, I
think, you know, like everyoneis finally on board and maybe,
you know, agree to disagree oncertain things. But ultimately,
there's trust there becauseeveryone is has the same common
goal and that's just to becomebetter.
Sam DArc (07:53):
Yeah. Yeah. Boy, I like that. So the other thing
that makes Ziegler, I think,unique and and and, you know,
I've worked with auto dealersacross the country for decades.
We compete against each other ina way that very few companies
compete, and then we collaboratein a way that very few companies
collaborate.
How has that come out in theculture surveys and and your
(08:14):
interactions in the stores thesepast months?
Ariah Daniels (08:16):
Yeah. So it's funny, and I know Mike can
probably chime into this too andand attest to the stores that
he's gone into, but it seemslike almost always some of our
action plans align with otherstores' action plans. And a lot
of the times and really what wesaw quite a bit this year is
just different communicationprocesses. So communication
within each department orcommunication between
(08:36):
departments or as a store as awhole, everyone really just
wants to feel included andinvolved in what's going on. And
sometimes, you know, we get sobusy and we've got so many team
members in our our stores thatsome of that information can get
lost.
So so it's all about bringing usback together to to to really
set the standard of what we wantour communication to look like,
(08:58):
what do we want our culture tolook like. So by having those
conversations, it's it's similaracross all of our stores in a
sense of that way. Way. Mike,you're probably seeing the same
thing in the ones you've done.
Mike Van Ryn (09:09):
Yeah. Very similar. Well said, Araya. One
of the things I've seen toothat's been rewarding Sam and
Raya's over the years. I mean,we started this thing in 2006,
and we didn't know where itwould go, but we've continued to
improve every year.
And it's from ideas andsuggestions from our employees
or our team members, I shouldsay. And just to see things that
have come out of these meetings,right, or I have that we've been
(09:30):
able to implement for theirstore, but also for the whole
auto group. I mean, a coupleexamples would be I know in a
few minutes, we're gonna talkabout our product knowledge and
walk around competition. Thatthat came in as an idea out of
one of these sessions. Thepresident's circle for service
technicians and how we rewardthem and honor them, the service
technicians and serviceadvisors.
(09:51):
That was an idea from one ofthese sessions. The the last one
is just simple, but it's, everymorning on on Monday, we get an
email and it's employees'birthdays for the week. That
came as an idea out of one ofthese sessions. Those are 3
tangible things that have becomea part of our culture that came
out of these meetings, Sam.
Sam DArc (10:08):
So it's interesting, Mike and Araya. People talk
about money. Right? Money is animportant component of an
employment contract and what wedo when we work for we we give
up a portion of our time. I'veoften said that the automotive
is the the last great Americaninstitution.
Right? You can bring all yourtalents, whatever your
background, from whateverdiverse area you are, and you
(10:29):
can the sky's the limit. Thereis no limitations. Right? And
it's interesting because inautomotive, also, we wanna feel
like we're making a difference.
It's almost a human bill ofrights that I can be employed,
give up my time, and I wanna beable to make a difference. And,
Araya, both you and Mike aresaying that. Right? Employees
are saying, I want to work, givea little bit of my life, and I
(10:52):
wanna see that what I'm doingmakes a true difference in the
world, Araya. Right?
Is that showing up in thesurveys you're seeing?
Ariah Daniels (10:58):
Oh, yeah. Absolutely. I think there's
there's so much respect for eachother, and we really do operate.
It's it's funny because youthink, like, every store has
maybe a little bit different ofa culture, but ultimately at the
end of the day, everyone reallyis a family in our stores. And
that's so cool to see just thethe relationships that have been
fostered and the things that,you know, each one of our stores
(11:19):
does, but, yeah, I think you hitit on the head, like, everyone
is just so, empathetic andsympathetic to each other's
goals and aspirations andpersonal and professional
growth, to to back that up andbe able to have that support in
each store is totally, totallythere.
Mike Van Ryn (11:35):
And a lot of that comes down, Araya and Sam, to,
selection selection of the rightpeople for our team.
Ariah Daniels (11:41):
Yeah.
Mike Van Ryn (11:41):
And Araya and I always say when we're doing our
training development sessionsthat everybody that comes on
board either takes the cultureup a notch or takes our culture
down a notch. It never remainsstagnant. Yeah.
Ariah Daniels (11:54):
For sure.
Sam DArc (11:56):
That's true. That's awesome. That is awesome. Well,
thank you to you both for doingthis process. And, it's fun to
see as people go, as teams havegone through this, they've
become more cohesive and they'vebecome a bigger, better part of
our overall team.
And this elusive culture thingsomehow becomes, somehow becomes
(12:18):
stronger. And it's fascinatingbecause, again, going back to
this idea, some companies don'teven wanna ask because they're
afraid of the answer. TeamZiegler, we're not afraid of it.
We're gonna deal with that toughstuff.
Ariah Daniels (12:27):
We definitely embrace it. You know, we look at
we look at challenges like that,and I love that about our
organization is that we almostinvite challenges because we
embrace it as as an opportunityto just become better. Right? I
I just love that we do that.And, to do just that.
Sam DArc (12:42):
I interviewed this week an an author of a of a book
that does sales training, andit's been associated with some
large groups like Sewell andothers that'll play in months,
in coming weeks. But one of thethings he talked about is it's
important for a winning team anda winning sales person to have
adversity intelligence. So toknow how to overcome it, how to
(13:03):
approach it, how to go throughit. Like, we've been hit by
adversity recently. Right?
And it's it's interestingbecause every piece of adversity
ends up kind of contributing tothe bigger whole. So Aaron
talked about, you know, in oone, there was a recession. In o
eight, there was a massiverecession. The biggest we've
seen in the car business eversince there was recession, the
biggest we've seen the carbusiness ever since there was
COVID. Right?
And each moment helped grow thecompany. And then, you know, we
(13:26):
had the CDK outage. And, I wasblown away by the responses of
our teams when we talk aboutculture. Rather than closing the
doors and saying, hey. We'redone.
We're not gonna go any further.People, like, just said, you
know, we can't do this anymore.They said, how do I do this
different? And a team's abilityto innovate and be resourceful
(13:47):
instead of looking for theresources, they started to go to
paper and whatnot. I don't knowif either of you have thoughts
about how kind of the team dealtwith the challenge that was that
shutdown, but, you know, it was10 days.
It was crazy while the Russiansgot our data back. And it wasn't
even us. It was a partner.Right? So it had nothing to do
with us.
Ariah Daniels (14:06):
Right? So it's volumes to our culture. I think
if if our culture, was not in away where it was productive and
positive and we didn't haveprocesses in place, then we
probably would have wentbackwards. Right? So I think
it's important it's such animportant piece that when you
have good processes in place andand good relationships with
people that you can get throughanything.
(14:28):
So
Sam DArc (14:28):
Yeah. So to all of our teams that are listening to
this, thank you for your hardwork during that period. You
know, we had a finance meetingthis past week. We do it every
quarter where we recap bestpractices from the prior
quarter. And I was kind ofexpect Mike, you were there.
You were in the meeting. I wasexpecting everybody in that
meeting to be super tired andkind of exhausted. There'd be
some fatigue and kind of alittle bit of frustration
(14:51):
because maybe things had gonebackwards. And it was
fascinating because there was anenergy. There was an excitement.
There was an engagement. Andmaybe even more important, they
actually held the line very wellduring the outage. Probably
better, I think, you know, as Icompare we met with our
insurance provider, this week aswell. And as I compared notes
with him with what other groupsexperienced, I mean, we we we
(15:16):
were to your point, or I from acultural standpoint, we were
resilient in a way that is alittle bit astonishing.
Mike Van Ryn (15:22):
Yeah. I totally saw that as well, Sam, in the
meeting with you this week andthere was a good energy and
collaboration. And then also,the tie in is really neat coming
from the training developmentside that recently we brought in
a speaker and her name wasRebecca Gregory. And she was 10
years ago, unfortunately, herand her 5 year old son were in
(15:43):
the Boston Marathon bombing. Andshe talked about going through
76 surgeries.
She talked about mindset. Shetalked about resiliency. And,
you know, Sam, we all go throughchallenges in our life. And like
Araya said, we have to look atthose challenges and make them
become opportunities. So thethings that Rebecca Gregory
(16:03):
taught us a couple months ago,you know, just tied in directly
with what we've gone throughrecently.
Ariah Daniels (16:10):
One of our trainers that joins us, Tim
Tarantine, is with us today,actually, across all of our
stores. He's been in all of ourregions, this week which has
been wonderful. And part of ourconversation and topic is
getting unstuck and how do wereinvigorate ourself and how do
we find our passions and ourwhys. And so recentering
yourself to those things is whatkeeps us going. And it's what
(16:30):
it's how we can overcome a lotof these obstacles like the CDK
outage.
Right? So
Sam DArc (16:35):
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So so, actually, to our external
audience and to our internal,you can go back and find and
search Tim Tarrantyne in ourepisodes. He's been a many time
guest.
He's a partner within the ZiglerAuto Group in a lot of us the
same ways as Jim Craig is. Sowe'd love to have him, back,
soon to talk more about thisgetting unstuck. But it is
interesting. Like, when youthink about a large team, how do
(16:57):
you go from adversity and havingto be super resourceful and
expending a lot of energy tojust continuing that? And and I
and and I was impressed, withyou know, it was impressive and
very interesting as a socialexperiment, you know, how how
well they did that.
Now, Mike, you you brought upRebecca Gregory, and and we've
talked a lot on this show aboutthe Ziegler speaker series. So
(17:18):
she was part of that. Just togive some background, Ziegler
speaker series, multiplespeakers every single year from
different disciplines. I don'tyou know, it's interesting,
Mike. We've never really hadlike maybe the closest person in
the in the, car business we'vehad in that is, like, Grant
Cardone.
Right? But now he's in realestate. Right? It's not people
that are vendors in automotiveor automotive specific. They're
(17:43):
outside the industry, andthere's a reason for that, Mike.
Share that with us.
Mike Van Ryn (17:47):
Yeah. You know what, Sam? Great question. It's
all walks of life, thesespeakers. And we typically bring
in about, 5 speakers a year forus to learn and grow.
And a lot of times, our teammembers will even bring a family
member in with them. Some ofthem bring their kids in to
learn. Yeah. So they're learningthings professionally, but also
personally outside of work. So,you know, Rebecca Gregory was 1
(18:07):
and and Sam, we interviewed heron our podcast.
So you can go back and check outRebecca Gregory. Another one
definitely is, Jimmy Urie. AndJimmy was just in about a month
ago. And Jimmy may not recognizehis name, but, you know, names
like Kenny Chesney, Tim McGraw,Rascal Flats.
Sam DArc (18:25):
Who's Tim McGraw, Mike? I don't know who that is.
Mike Van Ryn (18:28):
You've seen McGraw. Concert, Sam. Come on
now.
Sam DArc (18:30):
I I know he's married to a Faith Hill. I don't know
who Tim is, but I know who Faith
Mike Van Ryn (18:33):
is. Jimmy's good. Country music, singer and
songwriter. Yeah. And he'swritten so many different,
songs.
Sam DArc (18:41):
So, Mike, who's coming up in the speaker series? Who
can we look forward to in thecoming months? Not to put you on
the spot. I know you're workingon some things. Any any, any any
teases to tell us about?
Mike Van Ryn (18:52):
Well, while we're working on a few things outside
of, outside of the norm, thingswe've
Sam DArc (18:57):
not
Mike Van Ryn (18:57):
had before. So maybe Okay. Could be a could be
a bodybuilder.
Sam DArc (19:01):
Oh. What do
Mike Van Ryn (19:01):
you what do you think of that?
Sam DArc (19:03):
Actually, that'd be fun. Araya's got a super big,
you've got kind of an an iconicInstagram following, Araya,
watching you. Oh, I
Ariah Daniels (19:09):
am no bodybuilding.
Sam DArc (19:10):
Your workout routine, I would love to figure out the
bodybuilding thing. I'm tryingto figure out how to how to do
that. I drink more proteins thanI
Mike Van Ryn (19:17):
drink there.
Sam DArc (19:17):
But yeah. That'd be fun.
Mike Van Ryn (19:18):
Jimmy Urie. Check Jimmy Urie out too on our
podcast, Sam. And, also, he'sgot a song right now on the
charts. It's called She'sSomebody's Daughter by Drew
Baldridge. Jimmy wrote thissong, and last week, it was
ranked number 8.
This week, it's projected to beat 5 on the Billboard charts.
Sam DArc (19:37):
Wow. Wow. Okay. So Ziegler speaker series, that's
awesome. Let's also talk aboutperformance groups.
So we have several groups acrossthe auto group. For our internal
employees, they know aboutthese. For external, they may
not. If I wanna become a financemanager, I can join a group and
learn a little about it. If Iwanna become a general manager,
I can join a group, learn aboutit, and become proficient.
(19:59):
Aaron even talked about it onthe dealers Dealership Car Guy
podcast with Yossi, how, hey, wecan teach you how to become a
general manager as an example.So this past week, we just
graduated 10 finance managers.Right? Mike, you were there.
Tell us a little bit about whatthat experience was like to see
10.
We started with 22, 23, so itwas less than half that
(20:20):
finished. Because it's not easy.It's not a layup. You've gotta
do things. But, give give meyour thoughts on that.
Mike Van Ryn (20:26):
Well, the word rigorous comes up. Right? It
must be a rigorous curriculumthat they're going through. And
they raise their hand and say,hey. I wanna learn more about,
finance.
And I may be in a sales role. Imay be in a office role. I may
be in any role with theorganization, but they raise
their hand and challengethemselves, get out of their
comfort zone. And, Sam, I knowone of the things you do with
them, along with our friendsfrom Brown and Brown is have
(20:48):
them do role playing. And it'suncomfortable when we're role
playing in front of our peers.
But no need to see those 10graduates, come through the
program. And Sam and Araya, asboth of you know, through our
development program at ZieglerUniversity, we've had so many
people be promoted from within.That's what it's all about.
Hanging on, to our our teammembers, our retention at
(21:11):
Ziegler, and then also helpingpeople achieve their goals.
Sam DArc (21:14):
Hey. So, Mike, is it failure that only 10 out of 22
or 21 graduated 6, 7 monthslater? Or is that success?
Mike Van Ryn (21:21):
That's a great question. You know, as leaders,
we have to look upon ourselvesand make sure that, we're doing
everything we can to coach andmentor people.
Sam DArc (21:28):
Mike, the answer is it's success. Darn it.
Mike Van Ryn (21:31):
So so I don't know, man. Come on. Oh, there
may be some self reflection inthere, Sam.
Sam DArc (21:36):
It's success. So it may be failure on my part for
not getting everybody through,but, it also could be success
that not everybody is suited forevery job. Right? And so
initially, I may hand raise andsay, hey. I wanna become a
finance manager.
Do you know one thing I learnedas as we went through this
session? So 2 things I learned.I'll share it with you here. You
didn't even ask. Araya asked,what did Sam, what did you
(21:57):
learn?
And I'll share.
Ariah Daniels (21:58):
Sam, what did
Sam DArc (21:59):
you learn? Oh, fantastic. I'm gonna tell you.
So there were two things thatare fascinating. Number 1,
finance manager, for those whoare outside the industry, is a
leadership role withoutquestion.
But in a traditional setting,you have no higher fire. You
don't sign paychecks. You don'tdo performance reviews. You
like, you're not a traditionalleader with a bunch of followers
(22:20):
who are assigned with you. Sofinance managers lead by
influence.
They don't lead by title. Andthat can be the toughest thing,
but it can also be the greatestthing to learn. It is an awesome
way to lead, but not everybody'ssuited for that. So if somebody
comes into it thinking, hey. Ican lead by title, and they
(22:40):
expect people to follow bytitle, they are going to, a, be
miserable because they're gonnabe like, hey.
Somebody's supposed to belistening to me, and they're
not. And they're gonna fail. Theother thing that's interesting
about the finance role is carswere selling tangible. You can
touch, see, feel it, get excitedabout it. In finance, it's not
as tangible because you'reselling protections, and that's
(23:02):
a big switch.
So not everybody's well suitedfor it, but I love here at our
group that if you have aninterest in it, you can hand
raise. You can learn about it,figure out if it's a good path.
And then we've got some otherperformance groups to go down go
down the path of if that doesn'twork, Mike, I think you're
Ariah Daniels (23:19):
gonna to say that I think it's such an important
piece that you're stating. And,like, obviously, we we want and
we encourage people to raisetheir hand to wanna try new
things. Right? But I'm a hugebeliever. We all have different
talents and strengths that makeyou good at what you do, and we
wanna help people pull thoseout.
And I'll be the first to admit,I went through finance at one
point, and I hated it. Right?So, like, I that was I hate to
(23:41):
say it to the finance guy that Ididn't like finance, but
Sam DArc (23:44):
You're not supposed to say that. Come on.
Mike Van Ryn (23:46):
Can we edit that? No.
Ariah Daniels (23:48):
I'll say it wasn't my strength. Right? So it
wasn't my strength. It was notmy strength. But
Sam DArc (23:52):
No. You know, you how boring would the world be? How
boring would the world be if weall did the same thing in our
strength for all of us? Right.Like, if we just had a company
of 25100 general managers, howboring would that be?
That's why we always talk about,like, the detailer is such an
important job. No matter who itis, what if they do their job to
the best of their ability, theyknow their job, they do their
job. We are better as a team.And and so I like that. Tell us,
(24:17):
what are some of the otherperformance groups for those
internally or and evenexternally that might be
interested in joining some ofthose opportunities?
Go for it.
Mike Van Ryn (24:25):
I'll share a couple, then I'll turn it over
to Araya that, she has onekicking off here in a week or 2.
Sam DArc (24:29):
Oh. But Cool. I want the others.
Mike Van Ryn (24:31):
Yeah. So many other things we've had, Sam. And
and I'll say this. I'll I'llI'll say I was really proud of
our performance group for, F andI, and we had 3 of our new
stores represented there, Sam.That was pretty neat too that we
just brought online last year.
But,
Sam DArc (24:45):
Subaru Fort Wayne, Subaru Lafayette, they did a
they did a nice job. Yep.
Mike Van Ryn (24:49):
And Holland too.
Sam DArc (24:50):
And Holland. Yeah.
Mike Van Ryn (24:51):
Yeah. Pretty neat. So we have a general manager
performance group
Sam DArc (24:54):
k.
Mike Van Ryn (24:55):
That meets regularly with Aaron Ziegler and
Yep. Dan Scheid and and you,Sam.
Sam DArc (25:00):
Yep. We also
Mike Van Ryn (25:00):
have, an academy class that's very similar to the
NADA Academy.
Sam DArc (25:07):
It's It's like a dealer 20 or NADA Academy.
Mike Van Ryn (25:09):
Yeah. Yeah. So those are two levels. And then
Araya's kicking one off here ina couple weeks, I believe.
Sam DArc (25:14):
So Araya.
Mike Van Ryn (25:15):
Really neat.
Sam DArc (25:15):
So this is not live, and and this isn't happening
right now. Give us a tease onwhat's going on.
Ariah Daniels (25:20):
Yeah. I'm really excited. We've got well,
actually, you know, we have somany different facets going on
and 2 that are kicking off againnext week. So we actually have,
our women in leadership group.So we've just recently started a
women leaders of the ZAG groupthat brings together a bunch of
female leaders in theorganization.
It's just a way to connect andinspire and empower, what
(25:41):
typically has been a nondominated field in, you know, in
our industry for for women. Sowe've got a coaching call on
that next Thursday, but we'realso kicking off a new series of
our aspiring leaders course,which is really for any leader
in the organization who'sinterested in just growing in a
capacity of their leadership andmaybe they have, future
(26:03):
endeavors to wanna grow into anew role. And so we go through
kind of a 5 series class andcurriculum where they get to
learn from so many differentleaders inside the organization
and go through some differentthings that help them really
step out of their comfort zoneand grow as a person personally
and professionally. So we'vewe've always got something going
on, but those are the 2 that arecoming up, in the next week,
(26:23):
which I'm really excited for.
Sam DArc (26:25):
So, Rya, what if I wanna join one of those? What if
I wanna join one of those 2groups? How can I get more
information now? I know thefirst one I can't join, but, the
second one I might be able to.What, who do I reach out
Ariah Daniels (26:36):
to? Just raise your hand. Honestly, at this
point, raise your hand. You canalways reach out to me or or
Mike or really even just yourmanager, your general manager,
like, really have thatconversation. I always tell
people, anyone coming in is tonever assume that your managers
are mind readers.
No one knows what your goals areand where it is that you wanna
go. You're master of your ownship and it's you for you to
(26:56):
decide where it is that youwanna go with your life and your
career. And so I always telleveryone, speak up. And so we
are more than happy to, to helpguide someone in in where to
start and what that looks like.
Mike Van Ryn (27:08):
I was gonna say it was neat, Sam, to, that, Erin
Ziegler and I were able to kickoff the, women leadership call
and just need to see that thing,get rolling throughout the
organization. And Ryan Arise hasdone an incredible job with
that. And, we're only able to beon there for 5 minutes, and we
get kicked off.
Sam DArc (27:23):
Well, I was gonna say what a cool meeting that would
be. There's some incrediblewomen across our auto group in
in one Absolutely. Besidesyourself, obviously, Araya, but
our head of security. So theonly person in our company who
carries a gun every single dayand is constantly thinking about
protecting the auto group,Carrie Ann Thomas, she's an
incredible, individual. And sothe depth, the strength, that
(27:44):
those will be fascinatingconversations that you have.
You keep looking over yourshoulder eyes. Tim Tarrantyne
there?
Ariah Daniels (27:50):
You know, Tim's here, but also, Bob Kiel, our
fixed ops director, is here, andhe's just making a few comments.
Sam DArc (27:56):
Comments. So I'm having. Oh my gosh. Wait, tell
Bob to
Bob Kuehl (27:57):
come over here. Bob?
Sam DArc (27:58):
So Bob is actually
Ariah Daniels (27:58):
another great instrumental part of, one of our
Sam DArc (27:59):
academy classes.
Ariah Daniels (27:59):
Yeah, have
Sam DArc (28:04):
have Bob tell us about the academies. Hey, Bob. What
what service academy do we havegoing on here?
Bob Kuehl (28:09):
Well, we have a couple of them going on.
Obviously, we just did a partssegment of our nada academy and
the next one is on service butthen we have our technician
university that, we're in our3rd session. So by the end of
this year we will have 33technicians that we have
graduated and put into theworkforce within the company.
Sam DArc (28:27):
And not only are those technicians graduated that
didn't have that experienceprior to, but we formed a
special relationship with a toolprovider through NASCAR. And
that tool provider has,delivered through a partnership
with Ziegler tools to theseaspiring technicians. It that's
a pretty cool thing. Tell uswhat you get when you graduate
from us the Aspiring Technicianscourse.
Bob Kuehl (28:48):
So with our academy, the auto group supplies you with
$3,500 worth of tools, topurchase at your discretion. We
didn't wanna just buy a toolset, because some guys are at
different levels of their oftheir tool inventory, so to
speak. So we we have set up thatand then with our relationship
with Mac Tools through NASCAR,being we are it is an education
(29:09):
based situation that we set up.They, allow our people to
purchase at a 50% discount. Sothat $35100 turns into 7000
overnight.
Sam DArc (29:17):
Props to Mac Tools, Black and Decker, and and and
Robert Newman who helped us putthat together. But, that's not
totally a secret. That's apretty cool thing. Here's the
interesting thing I found in theworld. It's not so much having
the information and knowing whatto do.
Everybody knows what to do. It'sdoing it. It's executing on it.
It's like my friend, just acouple days ago trying to get a
(29:38):
rental car from a place that hadno rental cars. It's not about
taking the reservation.
It's about holding thereservation. That, by the way,
is a Seinfeld line. So Bob,thank you for all you're doing
on the, aspiring technicians,creating technicians across the
Ziglar Auto Group, one of thetoughest positions to hire for.
And, Araya, we know you've gottago because you're busy getting
(29:58):
back into the Tim Tarrantynething. Before we break, one
question for all for both ofyou.
Auto and retail, in particular,is a tough gig. Like, it takes a
lot of time. It takes a lot ofattention. The hours are long.
Yet we stop to do these thingsevery now and again, culture
surveys, Tim Tarrantynetraining, podcasts, meetings
(30:22):
with Ziegler speaker series.
What's that all about? Why taketime out of our day to do things
that aren't directly revenuegenerating that don't sell a car
in this moment, Araya? We'llstart with you, and then, Mike,
well, let you have the lastword.
Ariah Daniels (30:33):
Oh, man. It because they matter. It's it
it's what brings everyonetogether. It's what helps
everyone continue to grow. Ithelps us collaborate.
It helps us just do so manydifferent things that are just
beyond what our day to day rolesand responsibilities are, and
that's just a part of theconnection that we create and
the culture that we have, andit's an elite one. So, all those
(30:54):
things are just so instrumentalinto creating an organization
that is a winning organizationfor sure.
Sam DArc (31:01):
That's awesome, Mariah. Mike.
Mike Van Ryn (31:03):
It's about Kaizen. Continuous improvement.
Sam DArc (31:07):
We
Mike Van Ryn (31:07):
wanna continually improve and get better for our
customers every day and getbetter for each other and
continue to build our worldclass culture across Zingler
Auto.
Sam DArc (31:16):
Thank you, everybody. Appreciate for being on the
podcast today. Special thanks toMike Van Ryan. Alright. Daniel's
Bob Kiel came in at the very endfor contributing this week's
episode.
Until next week, how are youdriving vision today?
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