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ARC360, in association with I Love Claims, launched its week-long digital event, The Future in Focus, this morning, with a session titled: The seven habits of highly effective repairers.

The Future in Focus event is taking place on Monday, Wednesday and Friday this week, with morning and lunchtime sessions examining the key issues facing the industry today.

The title of this morning’s session was based on Stephen Covey’s highly acclaimed book, The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People, and was intended to identify the things repairers could be doing to improve their businesses.

Taking part were panellists Victoria Turner, chief executive officer, Activate Accident Repair; Kevin Cooper, product manager, Sherwin Williams; and Chris Weeks, executive director, NBRA.

Here, we explain the seven habits put forward:

1: When to sharpen the saw

Kevin told a story about a man walking through a wood who saw a lumberjack cutting down a tree. However, the lumberjack was making slow progress because the saw was blunt. The man suggested the lumberjack sharpen his saw, but the lumberjack said that because it was taking longer than expected he didn’t have time to stop cutting.

Kevin said, ‘It’s all about driving efficiency, and that means knowing when the optimum time is to sharpen the saw.’

2: Measure, manage, act

‘Whatever gets measured, gets managed,’ Victoria said.

However, she emphasised the value of not being swamped by data and making sure you are only selecting the data you actually need to know.

‘You don’t need to know everything,’ she said, ‘sometimes you must just trust your gut.’

She added that often we only measure those things that have an immediate and tangible impact on profits, such as volumes, and forget about other key areas such as our customers and our people.

Victoria said, ‘Volume is short-term, if you forget the other elements you’ll have a short-term business.’

3. Setting goals

Possibly the most important thing for any business owner is knowing what they want the business to be. Chris suggested that too many repairers get bogged down by the day-to-day and forget what they are actually working towards.

He said, ‘Start with the end in mind. If the business is about growth, profit or lifestyle, you want to be clear about it because they all entail different things. Be clear about your end objective, and communicate that with the whole team.’

4. Plan ahead

Kevin recalled a repair that should have taken two days but took two weeks because they were waiting for parts to arrive. That meant the customer was dissatisfied and the bodyshop wasn’t working efficiently as it had a vehicle on site for much longer than necessary.

‘Take the time to plan ahead,’ Kevin said.

5. Break problems down

Keeping it simple really matters, Victoria said. She encouraged managers to break any large challenge down into seven smaller challenges to prevent themselves from being overwhelmed and freezing in the face of something that seems insurmountable.

‘And prioritise your challenges,’ she added. ‘It doesn’t matter how many there are, face the one that’s coming first. If you’re in a boat surrounded by crocodiles, hit the one on the head that’s going to bite you first.’

6. Be responsible

Chris said that whatever happens, both in life and at work, we are all responsible for the way we react. He admitted that the bodyshop environment can be a difficult one and that the last year has been arguably the most testing, but he said that some bodyshops are still doing well and that means success is attainable.

He said, ‘It’s super tough. But if you blame other people or get angry that’s not going to take you forward.’

7. Know yourself

The panellists all emphasised the importance of managing yourself before trying to manage anything else. Chris advocated setting aside thinking time to provide clarity and calmness, Kevin said it was important to seek to understand before being understood and to focus on a win-win outcome, while Victoria reminded everyone that it’s ok not to be operating at 100% all day, every day, and that taking time out every so often is invaluable.

‘No one is the same person every single day,’ she said, ‘so let yourself be how you are feeling and don’t beat yourself up when you’re just not feeling it.’

ARC360, in association with I Love Claims, is supported by corporate partners BASF, BMS, Copart, EMACS, Entegral, Enterprise Rent-a-Car, Mirka, Nationwide Vehicle Recovery Assistance, S&G Response, Sherwin Williams and CAPS; partners asTech, The Green Parts Specialists, Indasa, Innovation Group and Prasco UK; and strategic partners AutoRaise; NBRA; RepairTalks; and TrendTracker.