Service departments continue to invest heavily in advisor training, yet many dealerships still fail to see lasting gains in CSI, sales performance, retention, and customer experience. Joining us on today’s episode of Service Drive is Lee Harkins, President and CEO of M5 Management Services, to discuss five key reasons service advisor training often fails and what dealers can do about it.
“The challenge that we have in service… the biggest challenge I think we have is consistency.”
Reason 1: No clear objectives
The first thing Harkins notices when entering a service department is the absence of clear objectives. Harkins notes that dealerships simply haven’t defined what success looks like before training begins. Leaders often expect training to immediately lift NPS scores, CSI, and average repair order value without first establishing measurable operational targets.
Therefore, Harkins argues that stores must anchor priorities to tire sales, customer retention, labor sales, and service performance before launching any training initiative. Training without objectives, he warns, breeds unrealistic expectations and inconsistent execution, adding that no training program can fix operational problems that leadership hasn’t clearly defined.
Reason 2: No written process
Without documented procedures, advisors develop their own interaction styles and workflows, producing wildly inconsistent customer experiences across the service drive.
Harkins believes that dealerships can quickly find themselves running four or five different processes simultaneously, creating confusion, undermining accountability, and eroding service quality. He asserts that achieving consistency is nearly impossible when processes exist only in conversation rather than on paper.
Reason 3: Imposing rather than collaborating
Harkins states that training is ineffective if dealerships simply give advisors an external system and expect them to follow it. Instead, he suggests developing service drive procedures together and guiding advisors through each step of customer interactions, allowing them to contribute to shaping the process.
Advisors who participate in creating the process are far more likely to follow it in the long term. Generic or “canned” training programs, he cautions, only last as long as the trainer is physically present at the dealership. The moment the trainer walks out the door, the program falters because employees see it as something done to them rather than something they had a hand in building.
Reason 4: No accountability after training ends
Managers who allow exceptions or inconsistent execution after training guarantee that advisors will revert to old habits. Harkins is clear that managers must coach to a measurable standard and close every gap in adherence to process.
He notes that accountability doesn’t end when the training session does, rather, dealerships must continuously monitor compliance and reinforce expectations. Until they improve process consistency, sales performance improvement will remain out of reach.
Reason 5: Tolerating negative influencers
Notably, a single resistant employee can derail an entire team’s culture, particularly when a veteran advisor or technician openly rejects agreed-upon processes and pulls others along with them. Harkins warns that negative leaders spread resistance fast when management avoids confrontation or grants exceptions.
According to Harkins, leadership must address employees who refuse to follow the process, regardless of tenure or production numbers, because tolerating toxic behavior ultimately damages morale, consistency, and long-term performance.
Putting it into practice
Beyond the five pillars, Harkins challenges dealer principals to raise their expectations every single morning by asking their service department three non-negotiable questions:
- How many hours did we produce yesterday? Harkins wants a precise number, not an approximation. He draws a direct parallel to new car sales, that no dealer goes a day without knowing how many units crossed the curb, and service hours deserve the same discipline.
- What is the effective labor rate? Not the customer-facing rate, he says, the overall effective rate. That’s the number that actually goes to the bank.
- How many customer pay repair orders did we write? This tracks the volume driving everything else.
Ultimately, Harkins notes that dealers can also layer in optional metrics, such as customer pay-tire sales, revenue or hours per repair order, and video MPI penetration, but stresses that the first three are the foundation. A 10% production increase in a mechanical shop, he points out, can generate an additional $100,000 to $300,000 in net per year. The opportunity is there; dealers simply have to expect more.
