Consultants To The Aftermarket     

Heavy Duty Branch Manager Survey Finds Majority Concerned About Lack Of Training

 New workforce participants not getting information
to make them effective and competitive

      Wade&Partners has released the results of an nationwide telephone survey of heavy-duty truck parts branch managers.

The study sought opinions on the current level of educational support offered to distributor personnel by suppliers. Highlights of the results include the following:

·        More than 50% of respondents said that manufacturers were not providing sufficient training for counter and outside sales people, especially at the entry level;

·        Managers indicated that as little as two days per year were being devoted to product training;

·        80% could name no real standout among suppliers or their training programs;

·        60% responded that they were not comfortable with the product knowledge of direct factory or manufacturers’ reps;

·        65% indicated that there was at least one key line for which they themselves required better training.

“I was surprised at the commonality of the opinions expressed, even with a broad geographical cross section of branch managers,” said industry veteran Chuck Vollman, who conducted the study for Wade&Partners.

“There is a lot of frustration out there. A number of these guys said that they were probably losing sales opportunities every day due to uncertainty about the technical aspects of some of their lines, and many were concerned about the inability to recruit new people who were familiar with these products.”

The study was conducted in late August and involved telephone interviews with over 100 randomly selected independent distributor branch managers. It is the broadest survey of satisfaction with information flow and training in recent years.

“ Some of the verbatim comments probably best reflect the overall sentiment that was being expressed”, Vollman concluded. These statements included:

 “Technical training is getting sparse. Just getting a catalog won’t get us by anymore”… Midwest location

 “In depth training looks like a thing of the past. I’m not even sure who to ask”…  Northeast location

 “I feel we’re pretty much on our own when it comes to training new employees”… Far west location