Automotive News Canada - October 2019 - v2 - 28

* O C T O B E R 2 0 19

Best Dealerships To Work For

Birchwood Honda West
Winnipeg, Man.

Dealer principal: Steve Chipman
l
Dealership group: Birchwood
l
Automotive Group
Number of employees: 55
l
2018 new-vehicle sales: 1,047, up 9%
l
2018 used-vehicle sales: 504, up 5%
l

Chief Human Resources Officer
MaryAnn Kempe on unusual
methods developed to reward
employees and show them they are
valued: By leveraging our team members, Birchwood provides referral
bonuses of up to $2,000 for team members who refer candidates from their
personal networks. We have the highest retention from this referral pool.
Every quarter, our top sales, finance

Lally Ford

Birchwood Honda offers staff referral bonuses of up to $2,000 to help the
dealership recruit the best and the brightest. P H O T O : B I R C H W O O D H O N D A W E S T

and service consultants are celebrated and recognized. We hold an annual "Birchwood bucks BB" auction
for all our customer-facing staff, who
earn BB dollars and in a fun evening,

Dealer principal: Vince Lally
l
Dealership group: Lally Auto Group
l
Number of Employees: 80
l
2018 new-vehicle sales: 1,003, up 4%
l
2018 used-vehicle sales: 405, down 7%
l

recruiting people with a desire to get
into the trade at a young age for other
positions in the dealership, and then
graduating them into technician roles.
We need nice people who care about
other people, who possess a good work
ethic and a positive attitude; the rest
can be learned through training and
experience.

General Manager Adam Lally on
attracting and helping young
employees chose a career path:
Promotion from within and staff training have helped to ease a tight market
for skilled workers on both the technical and sales sides. We've had success

Lally on challenges faced to entice/
recruit staff: More people are applying for dealership jobs, but the number of quality, qualified applicants has
decreased. A benefit of having multiple
dealerships in our group is that we are
often able to promote from within the

Tilbury, Ont.

use the bucks to bid on a wide variety of gifts. The annual event brings
our teams together for an evening of
music, food and team member recognition.

General Manager Joe Garcia on the
automaker's practices to promote
or incentivize hiring and retention:
Honda educates our team regarding
recruitment and retention practices
by providing mandatory training.
Participants will explore a variety of
tools and techniques associated with
managing team member turnover,
recruitment, goal setting, training
and engagement. Honda's recruiting
philosophy is "do not hire for the sake
of hiring" and to have other managers involved in the recruitment process.
Garcia on lessons learned from hiring/employment mistakes: We have
had some setbacks when it comes to
hiring team members too quickly.
Our learning lesson is to hire slow
and to gather feedback from the team
to help assess fit and skill set.

[broader] organization where there are
always opportunities.
Lally on the unusual methods
developed to show staff they are
valued: Fun contests and something as
simple as a nice lunch together goes a
long way.
Lally on lessons learned from hiring/
employment-related mistakes: When a
new hire doesn't fit the company culture or takes advantage in some way,
it hurts the business and other employees. In the past, we have taken too
long to part with people who aren't the
right fit.

Staff at Lally Ford don their
Halloween costumes. Management
encourages fun at work, and
"something as simple as a nice
lunch together goes a long way."
P H O T O : L A L LY F O R D

IT TAKES GREAT EMPLOYEES TO MAKE US

THE BEST DEALERSHIP

Many thanks to our dedicated team and congratulations to the Best Dealerships to Work For 2019 Honorees

Automotive News Canada - October 2019 - v2

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Automotive News Canada - October 2019 - v2