Fremont, Calif.--Kathy Mello isn't reluctant to invest in training. But she said she's also not afraid to look for help in getting funding for training that will help her staff and her business. Mello is the vice president of TGIF Body Shop, which operates with 20 employees in a 15,000-square-foot facility about 30 miles southeast of San Francisco. She said she's worked through the Department of Veterans Affairs, for example, to get funding for training for military vets she has hired. She said she's also found funding that has covered 50 percent of the first 90 days of on-the-job training for those she has hired through the "One-Stop Career Center" (www.careeronestop.org).
"It's a resource center for people who are unemployed, making a career change, or having to go from part-time to full-time or make more money," Mello said. "The primary focus is for people who are on unemployment or unemployed."
But perhaps the most dramatic "shared investment" in training she's made has involved bringing the concepts and practices of "lean production" to her company. Through a local chamber of commerce event several years ago, Mello said she met representatives of a company that seeks government grants for small businesses in order to offer that business training in a more efficient operation.
Such a grant, coupled with Mello's investment of $5,000 (plus an additional $5,000 deposit which is returned provided all trained employees remain with the company for at least 90 days after the training), gave her a chance to benefit from an estimated $27,000 in "lean production" training and implementation help for her entire team, she said.
"Lean production" is a concept used successfully for decades by Toyota Motor Co. that an increasing number of U.S. companies have adopted. At its core, lean production involves achieving maximum productivity with the least amount of effort or expense. Although it has traditionally been viewed as a manufacturing concept--the company Mello worked with had previously consulted primarily with manufacturers, she said--it is increasingly being adapted to service companies such as collision repair shops.
"I told them we're essentially remanufacturing the car, so would you consider that?" Mello said of her initial contact with the trainers. "And they said, 'Yeah, let's try it.'"
In two phases over the last four years, Mello said her entire staff has undergone training and worked together to implement such aspects of lean production as "sorting" and "standardizing" to eliminate unneeded items throughout the shop and make sure employees have easy access to those items that they need.
TGIF's staff has developed a better-organized system for the large parking lot between the shop's two buildings on the one-acre lot so that it is faster to locate vehicles and so the staff can see at a glance where in the process each parked vehicle is, Mello said. And the staff has drawn up a complex flow chart showing the often twisted path a job takes as it flows through the shop, she said; they are now working to simplify that process.
"The downfall almost always begins with the estimate not being complete, causing us to do things twice," Mello said. "So other than when an estimate is necessary, we're trying to instead use 'pre-diagnosis,' getting a complete work order that doesn't, for example, require a second parts order."
One overall goal, she said, is to achieve a continuous "pulse" of six cars a day working throughout the shop: six cars in, six cars out each day.
Helping enable the shop's body technicians to maintain that pace requires providing them with good equipment, Mello said: a Chief EZ-Liner and three Dataliner frame racks, Car-o-Liner's Car-o-Tronic computerized measuring system, a Rotary lift, a Pro-Spot PR-10 resistance spot welder, and a John Bean Visualiner alignment machine.
The shop sprays Sherwin-Williams paint products, she said, and plans have been drawn up for some changes to the layout of the paint department, in part in preparation for a shift to waterborne products. She said she hopes that in the coming year, the shop's two existing SprayBake downdraft booths will be placed side-by-side with three new prep stations.
Mello cites her involvement in a number of organizations as among the keys to the company's success. First, she said, much of the company's marketing efforts revolve around community involvement: the chamber, sponsoring Little League and local high school athletic teams, even writing a column for the local community newspaper.
She said she has also been involved for about a dozen years in a "20 group," a quarterly gathering of about a dozen other shop owners from around the country who exchange ideas, compare key shop numbers, and discuss business improvement strategies.
And last spring, she served as co-chairman of the newly formed Women's Industry Network's national conference, which attracted more than 100 women involved in various aspects of the industry.
"Our core mission with the conference and organization is to inspire, educate, and empower women already in the industry, as well as to invite new women into the industry, particularly into nontraditional roles, such as technicians," Mello said.
Mello said she is no longer considering building or moving to a larger facility given the lack of appropriately zoned properties in the area.
"We're just committed to staying here and to keep improving this facility," she said. "Our focus is first to work on our efficiency, like we've been doing, and to then also try to pretty it up around here."
