Time is one of the biggest obstacles to dealership training.
Chris Craig from RockEd described dealerships as controlled chaos. Service lanes are busy, technicians are waiting, customers are calling, and managers cannot always pull an entire department away from its responsibilities for a traditional class.
RockEd approaches that problem with short-form micro-learning. Training videos generally run between 1 and 3 minutes, allowing employees to complete 1 or 2 lessons during a short break and return to work.
Chris explained that the recommended pace is only a few minutes each day.
“We only recommend 1 to 2 guides a day, about 6 minutes.”
Chris
Parts management requires much more than understanding which component fits a vehicle.
Managers must interpret inventory information, understand pricing, identify trends, monitor performance, and communicate effectively with the employees working directly with customers and technicians.
Chris explained that the curriculum includes training around what dealership data means and what different numbers may indicate. Interactive exercises then require employees to interpret information instead of simply watching a video.
Training can include:
Quizzes and other interactions are used throughout the curriculum to check whether employees understand what they learned. A user may be asked to interpret a number, complete a matching exercise, respond to a scenario, or answer a multiple-choice question.
If the answer is incorrect, the employee can return to the related guide and review the lesson before continuing.
The DMS provides managers with large amounts of historical data, but parts associates often see operational changes before they appear clearly in a report.
Counter employees speak directly with technicians, customers, other dealerships, and repair facilities. That gives them firsthand visibility into changing demand and recurring requests.
Chris emphasized that this information should move upward through the department.
Parts associates can be trained to recognize trends and communicate them to management, while managers can learn to actively ask employees what they are seeing.
An associate may notice demand for a specific component increasing, customer behavior changing, or another operational pattern developing. The parts manager may miss that information while handling management responsibilities away from the counter.
When frontline employees communicate what they are observing, managers gain another source of information they can use alongside DMS reporting.
Training becomes more useful when managers can connect it with an employee's performance.
RockEd includes gamification features such as points, leaderboards, and activity streaks. Some dealerships build additional internal competitions or incentives around those tools.
Managers can also assign training based on an employee's specific performance.
Chris gave the example of an employee whose brake sales are trending low. Instead of offering general coaching, a manager could assign a brake certification course and then monitor the employee's performance after completing it.
Parts departments need structured development that fits the pace of dealership operations.
Short lessons can make training easier to complete without pulling employees away from the counter for extended periods. Interactive exercises can test whether employees understand the material, while managers can assign development based on actual performance.
Training frontline employees to identify trends also gives parts managers information they may not see from reports alone.
For an area of the dealership where employees are often promoted based on experience and then expected to figure out management responsibilities as they go, a more consistent training structure can give both associates and managers a stronger foundation for continued development.