High School Basketball Pregame Festivities

If you live in the Central Midwest, you know that high school basketball season is in full swing. If you have a daughter, son, granddaughter, grandson, niece, or nephew playing, attending two or more games a week is a great way to enjoy watching exciting basketball. A necessary byproduct of attending games for us is having pregame food and beverages at small-town bars.

The food in small-town bars is varied but typically incredibly delicious and reasonably priced. You can get a frosty mug or pint of draft beer for $ 2 to $ 4, with most bars featuring local area breweries’ beers and the usual domestic and foreign beers. The menu often offers excellent fried food, but many bars offer great burgers, pizza, and other sandwiches or dinner entrees. Most bars have nightly food specials, and many rotate out their draft beers, providing customers with a wide variety of breweries to try.

This past week, we attended a high school basketball game in Eureka, Illinois, and a pregame was at a small local bar called The Outpost.

This visit was the first time at this bar, and with many small-town bars, it’s typically always a great experience, and The Outpost didn’t disappoint. We enjoyed pints of an Imperial IPA on draft ordered before looking at the menu. In the Midwest, we enjoy pork tenderloin sandwiches, pounded thin, battered, fried, and served with a hamburger bun. I like mine with pickles and mustard. Below is a picture of what it looks like served on a paper plate. In the basket next to the sandwich are fried cheddar cheese cubes.

As you can see, you could use a couple more buns, and more often than not, the pork tenderloin can be up to 50% bigger at many bars. The version above was delicious. The person ordering this sandwich at The Outpost wasn’t complaining about the size, as half of it went home in a to-go box.

When I looked at the menu, I quickly zeroed in on something I’d never seen on a menu before—The Hybrid: Pizza Meets Tenderloin.

The Outpost website says, “It’s pizza toppings on our homemade tenderloin….Yeah, we went there!” Who would have thought of putting pizza toppings on a fried pork tenderloin? Genius!

You’d think that a guy who suffered sudden cardiac arrest almost five years ago would consider something different on the menu, but how could you not try it? I ordered the cheese pizza loin with tomato sauce and mozzarella to lean into the healthier choice.

The pizza loin was terrific; maybe a third went home in a to-go box. To complete our table’s order, we added a double hamburger and two orders of fries, but one fry would have sufficed as some of the hamburger, and most of the fries also went into a to-go box. Suffice it to say we often take home food in to-go boxes from these small town bars due to the size of the servings and because we order a few appetizers and multiple entre orders to allow us to try various items on the menu.

We love going to small-town bars before games as we’re typically treated like locals, even if you wear a sweatshirt supporting your team. The food is always great, and I highly recommend the experience. And sometimes you think you’re going back in time.

A Tremendous Gift

One of my brothers-in-law gave our nephew Jack, who graduated from high school last June, a tremendous gift. Over the summer, he introduced him to over fifty people who had achieved great success in their careers. Each told Jack about themselves, their educational background, their college major if they graduated, and how they arrived at their chosen profession. Individually, they spent an hour or two also answering Jack’s questions and asking questions of him. The experience was invaluable to Jack as he met with farmers, insurance agents, investment advisors, doctors and nurses, small business entrepreneurs, executives, bankers, and teachers, to name just a few of the fields he learned about. You get the idea. Each conversation ended with my brother-in-law asking for three pieces of advice each would offer Jack that they believed would help him succeed in whatever field he chose.

A few of the pieces of advice included:

• Be careful who you spend time with; they should be pleased with your accomplishments, not jealous.
• Remain active throughout your life, as much for mental well-being as physically.
• Talk to and listen to everyone. Everyone has something to offer. You have no idea what anyone has to offer until you take the time to listen.
• Do business in person.
• Create a network of people you trust for life.
• Never, ever quit.
• Always be open and honest with people.
• Invest early and, often, get in the habit.
• Be a sponge. Never know a stranger.
• Be careful with whom you spend time, as you’ll become the medium of the five people you spend the most time with.
• Work hard, play hard, and know the difference.
• To win, you must keep learning; you can only fail if you quit.

My three were to be a good listener, believe in yourself, and be willing to take risks, but never risk it all.

The experience was invaluable. Jack learned about professions he would probably try to avoid and gained a perspective of potential roles that sounded personally and financially rewarding. He said about the experience,

“I am incredibly thankful to have had this opportunity. My uncle and the dozens of people I met provided me with advice I will use for the rest of my life.”

My brother-in-law spent a great deal of time with his nephew, which also was very rewarding for him. The people introduced to Jack were incredibly generous with their time. Each was also very impressed with Jack, and during several of the meetings, Jack received solid job offers once he graduated from college.

If you have a relative or know someone nearing graduation from high school who could benefit from an experience like this, perhaps you’d consider offering something similar to help them better understand what opportunities exist in their future. There’s certainly a time commitment on your behalf, but the experience would be invaluable to the person you’d give the gift to before they begin their career.

Just sayin’.

Damar Hamlin

By now, everyone knows what happened to Buffalo Bill’s twenty-four-year-old safety Damar Hamlin last Monday night in the Bills vs. Bengals NFL football game in Cincinnati, Ohio. From Hamlin’s sudden cardiac arrest (SCA) to heroes attending him on the field for nine minutes performing CPR before getting a pulse to his speaking this morning after doctors removed his ventilator, his recovery has been miraculous. Unfortunately, less than 1% of those suffering from SCA survive with full brain function. I know because on March 19, 2019, I suffered SCA, and it took fifteen minutes before those who gave me CPR brought me back. I pray that Damar Hamlin recovers and fully returns to his life before SCA, as I have.

If this could happen to a professional athlete like Damar Hamlin, those reading this could equally suffer SCA. I’m posting this today because I recommend you check with your doctor to see if you have any unknown heart issues. There are several simple tests to determine if you have issues, and one of them is an inexpensive procedure called a heart scan, also known as a coronary calcium CT scan. This simple, affordable (locally, it costs under $ 100) procedure can discover if some changes in your life are needed. To learn more about heart scans, please visit this link to a Mayo Clinic article.

You can read my SCA experience in more detail by following this link to my blog, Being Thankful.

Three Years Ago Today – 19 March 2022

Three years ago today, I suffered Sudden Cardiac Arrest, and it took 15 minutes for many heroes to bring me back to life. I wrote a blog about the experience titled Being Thankful. The last paragraph in that blog advised those who read it to have a coronary calcium CT or heart scan as it could save their life. I still strongly suggest that you schedule this simple, inexpensive scan at your health provider.

I still occasionally joke with family and friends about Billy Crystal’s character Miracle Max the Wizard’s memorable lines from the movie The Princess Bride about Cary Elwes character Westley,

“Whoo-hoo-hoo, look who knows so much. It just so happens that your friend here is only MOSTLY dead. There’s a big difference between mostly dead and all dead. Mostly dead is slightly alive. With all dead, well, with all dead there’s usually only one thing you can do.”

Dark, I know, but it makes perfect sense to me. I know that I am blessed.

Looking back over the past three years, I can tell you that each day since experiencing SCA has been a blessing. I try to live each day to the fullest as you never know when today could be your last. I suggest that you do the same.

Seize the Day

The coronavirus is possibly the most significant disruptor to companies in the automotive aftermarket repair industries that you’ll experience in your lifetime. It’s solely up to you and your business associates to navigate the turmoil it has caused. How your business survives this black swan event will be determined by how well you can develop new strategies that will benefit your company.

It’s interesting to see how some market leaders in automotive aftermarket repair segments have completely pulled budgeted advertising spend in the face of an 18.6% decrease in miles driven in March 2020 versus March 2019, as reported by the U.S. Department of Transportation – Federal Highway Administration.

During business downturns, historically, companies that continue to keep their marketing and sales strategies in play often capture market share from companies that dramatically reduce spending in those areas. Marketing, advertising, and sales costs are often the easiest to slow or stop completely and then restart.

If you’ve been unable to match the typical spend of the market leader you compete against during good times, that doesn’t mean that you can’t make an impact with potential customers and be known as someone who stepped up long after the market leader restarts marketing spend for attention.

Don’t sit back and wait for your company to recover from the coronavirus downturn; make sure that you, your company, and your personnel are participating in activities that help your community weather this storm. Be sure that you’re seen in the community as someone willing to step up and help others in need. That could be volunteering time and work in the market you serve, offering to deliver meals to healthcare workers, first responders, charities, or offer special discounts for healthcare workers who use your services.

Now is not the time to wait and see what happens. Now is the time to be seen as someone in your city that everyone can count on in difficult times. If you do that, not only will it make you feel good, but it should provide your business with the benefit of new opportunities when we return to normal.

Just Sayin’

Photo by Edwin Hooper on Unsplash

Being Thankful

When I woke up the morning of Tuesday, March 19, 2019 I was feeling great. That day began the best sporting event and for me the greatest time of the year. The first play-in games for NCAA Men’s Basketball’s March Madness 2019 featuring Belmont versus Temple and Prairie View versus Fairleigh Dickenson. What I didn’t know was that just a couple of hours later I’d be dead. Not what you could consider the best start for the day. I’m writing this months later, so obviously I didn’t die. My being able to write this is nothing short of a miracle. An amazing number of interconnected actions taken by a number of equally amazing people who in my eyes are all heroes saved my life.

That day started like most of my days by having coffee and reading. Shortly after 10:30 a.m. my wife and I were sitting talking when I suffered sudden cardiac arrest (SCA). I was literally alive one second and dead the next. SCA is defined by The Mayo Clinic:

“Sudden cardiac arrest is the abrupt loss of heart function, breathing and consciousness. The condition usually results from an electrical disturbance in your heart that disrupts its pumping action, stopping blood flow to your body.”

My wife knew immediately that I was gone. She called 9-1-1 from our home phone and the dispatcher that answered, after quickly confirming the address she was calling from, instructed her to immediately begin Cardiopulmonary Resuscitation (CPR).

Within a couple of minutes of calling 9-1-1 a police officer arrived at the front door. Fortunately the officer was only a few blocks away when he received the call over his radio. After quickly letting the officer into the house he took over giving me CPR. After five to six minutes from my wife’s call to 9-1-1 paramedics arrived at the house to take over for the police officer.

The paramedics found me unresponsive with no pulse. They attempted shocking me with a defibrillator several times and were unsuccessful restarting my heart. At the same time the paramedics began utilizing a device called the LUCAS 3 Chest Compression System. According to the web site for the maker of the LUCAS 3 it:

“Deliver(s) high-performance, continuous chest compressions with less strain, micromanagement, and risk for the caregiver. The LUCAS chest compression system, provides benefits both to the cardiac arrest patient and the resuscitation team.”

I was incredibly fortunate that the city I live in had equipped the ambulance that was sent to provide assistance to me with the LUCAS 3 and the paramedics were trained in its proper use. Not all cities equip ambulances with this device.

After the initial call to 9-1-1, my wife, a police officer and a team of paramedics working non-stop to resuscitate me finally got a pulse 15 minutes later. One of the biggest concerns of SCA is a lack of oxygen to essential organs, especially the brain. That is why immediately initiating CPR and continually providing CPR until a pulse is found is so critical. The incredible efforts of my wife, the police officer and the paramedic team who together provided me CPR allowed me the chance to survive SCA.

It’s important to understand that 95% of people who suffer SCA in their homes die before making it to a hospital. Those are pretty daunting odds to overcome. The American Heart Association web site states:

“The majority of cardiac arrest survivors have some degree of brain injury and impaired consciousness. Some remain in a persistent vegetative state.”

The chances of surviving SCA and suffering no brain injury is less than 1%.

After finding a pulse paramedics then asked which hospital my wife wanted me to be taken. There are two major hospitals where I live, and both are within 6 minutes from my home. My wife wasn’t sure which hospital would be best as we hadn’t been to either and she asked for input, but the first responders said they weren’t allowed to make  recommendations. As my wife was thinking which one to choose someone in the room said the name of a hospital. A few minutes later I was taken from the house, placed in the ambulance and transported to that hospital. As it turned out whoever in the room spoke up provided me a better chance of surviving SCA.

Once I arrived at the emergency room you can imagine that I was receiving a great deal of medical attention. Within minutes of arriving a chaplain took my wife to meet the cardiologist who spoke with my wife about my condition. He informed her that I was in extremely critical condition and the chances of my surviving SCA was minute-by-minute. The doctor was asking her questions to learn about his patient. He was already aware of what had happened and my current grave condition, but what he didn’t know was my prior medical history before SCA and he wanted to understand my quality of life before today.  My wife told him that I was the strongest person that she knew and if anyone was capable of surviving SCA it was me. After speaking to my wife the doctor decided to aggressively treat me, and I was moved to a cath lab to check my heart. They found that I had total blockage in one of my arteries which was a contributing factor causing SCA. Two stints were placed in the artery.

While I was in the cath lab another doctor came to see my wife in a small waiting room available for immediate family members. This doctor wanted to talk with her about putting me into a therapeutic hypothermia. John Hopkins Medicine describes the procedure as:

“Therapeutic hypothermia can help only some people who have had cardiac arrest. Some people regain consciousness right after cardiac arrest. These people often do not need this procedure. It is helpful only for people whose heartbeat returns after a sudden cardiac arrest. If the heartbeat doesn’t restart soon, it won’t help. Therapeutic hypothermia can be a good choice if the heart restarted but you are still not responsive. It can raise the chance that you will wake up.”

I had not regained consciousness once I had been resuscitated by the paramedics therefore I was a good candidate for the therapeutic hypothermia procedure. By cooling my body I would have the greatest chance of saving brain functionality, but there were also risks associated with my having the procedure. The hospital that I was transported utilized an internal cooling process that introduces cooled fluids intravenously to cool my entire body to a temperature below 90 degrees Fahrenheit. The procedure would entail keeping my body cooled to that temperature for 24+ hours in an attempt to limit damage to my brain. The other hospital I could have been transported did a similar procedure, but that hospital used cooling blankets and not intravenous fluids. If I had already suffered brain damage the procedure doesn’t reverse the effects, the procedure just helps to reduce further damage.

After suffering SCA everything that could have gone right on that morning did. Taken all together it was the perfect storm for me where literally every minute counts in a SCA timeline.

1. I wasn’t alone when I suffered the SCA
2. My wife called 9-1-1 and immediately began CPR
3. A police officer was only a couple of minutes away and once he arrived he continued giving me CPR
4. The paramedics who arrived at my home were equipped with a LUCAS 3 which provided me the best chance to keep pumping blood to my vital organs and oxygen to my brain
5. I was only a few minutes away from a hospital
6. I was incredibly fortunate that the cardiologist treating me in the emergency room that morning aggressively treated me regardless of my critical condition
7. I was transported to a hospital that had a doctor and equipment capable of providing me the therapeutic hypothermia intravenous procedure

I was released from the hospital 8 days after I arrived at the emergency room and my life quickly returned to normal. I have no memory of experiencing SCA. I have no memory of being in the hospital except for the last day. I know the distress that I caused family and friends, but I have no recollection of feeling any pain or discomfort. Based on what I now know I experienced severe pain so having no memory of it is a blessing.

Subsequent to fully recovering from SCA I’ve learned a few things. The cardiologist that treated me had recently joined a practice at the hospital that I was transported. He had moved into the area from another state and had been recruited to join the hospital team due to his medical expertise related to the heart. I was lucky that he was the doctor on call providing treatment to me in the emergency room. Based on my medical condition many doctors wouldn’t have taken the extraordinary steps he did to treat me. I was without a pulse for 15 minutes and the chances of my arriving at the hospital alive were less than 5%. I had a 1 in 5 chance to survive after arriving at the hospital alive. If I was the 1 patient who survived then there was little chance that I would have full brain functionality.

Once my cardiologist decided to have me taken to the cath lab, if I had died, my death would have been recorded against him and his treatment decisions. In a world were scores matter he took a risk with me. A risk that he was willing to take regardless of the outcome. With my cardiologist making the decision to treat me, that allowed the therapeutic hypothermia procedure to be scheduled. This procedure causes the body to shiver uncontrollably and required my being given paralytic drugs to ensure that I didn’t move during the procedure. The cooling process causes intense pain and they also gave me drugs for the pain and drugs to ensure that I had limited brain activity. My prognosis was grave. Family members were told to expect the worse. Family and friends who are medical professionals who fully understood my condition expected the worse.

After 24+ hours the cooling procedure is slowly reversed to bring the body temperature back to normal. The procedure is considered successful if the patient regains consciousness 24 to 48 hours after the body is back to normal temperature. It could take a patient up to 7 days to awake from the procedure. The cooling process began Tuesday afternoon with the warming process starting late Wednesday afternoon. There was no way to know how I would awaken from the cooling. It was possible that I would never regain consciousness and die, it was possible that I could live and be in a vegetative state, it was possible that I could awake with severe brain damage, it was possible that I could awake with some brain damage or I could awake with no brain damage. To awaken with no loss of functionality is unusual.

Between 8 a.m. and 10 a.m. each morning the hospital had asked that family and friends not be present which allowed them to perform patient tasks. My wife stayed in my room each night and she’d go home during those hours. On Thursday morning when she was leaving at 8 a.m. she was told that the earliest I could be starting to awake from the cooling process would be later that day. When she returned a little after 10 a.m. she was told that I was awake and had already been taken off the ventilator. The doctor arrived and asked me the name of the President of the United States, what year it was and my wife’s name, along with a few other rudimentary tasks such asking me to wiggle my toes. I’m told that I quickly and correctly answered his questions and performed the tasks requested. Over the next few hours and days nurses asked my wife if  I was acting normal and was this my personality. She responded that it was. I’m not sure exactly why they asked that.

As you can imagine I consider myself incredibly blessed that I survived sudden cardiac arrest. The fact that I survived with zero loss of brain functionality is a miracle. There is no question that the prayers of family, friends and strangers made all the difference.

Those who know me will know that I’m a private person. There are relatively very few people, including friends, who know that I suffered SCA this past March. The only reason that I’m telling this story now is that since I suffered SCA a number of family and friends have gone to their doctors for checkups to see if they have any heart issues. Their rational is that if this could happen to me, someone who most believed was in very good health, SCA could certainly happen to them.

There are a number of simple tests you can take to see if you should make changes in your lifestyle, including diet, exercise or medications to dramatically improve your heart health. One of them is an inexpensive procedure called a heart scan, also known as a coronary calcium CT scan. If you follow that link you’ll learn that Mayo Clinic will tell you that:

“A heart scan, also known as a coronary calcium scan, is a specialized X-ray test that provides pictures of your heart that can help your doctor detect and measure calcium-containing plaque in the arteries.

Plaque inside the arteries of your heart can grow and restrict blood flow to the muscles of the heart. Measuring calcified plaque with a heart scan may allow your doctor to identify possible coronary artery disease before you have signs and symptoms.

Your doctor will use your test results to determine if you may need medication or lifestyle changes to reduce the risk of heart attack or other heart problems.”

As I mentioned, family and friends have taken this simple inexpensive (locally it costs under $ 100) procedure to find out if some changes in your life are needed. Several of those who’ve taken this scan have learned that they needed to take immediate steps because of the results. I wished that I would have known about this scan before I suffered SCA as it would have allowed doctors to properly treat me prior to having my heart stop for 15 minutes.

In the movie The Princess Bride, Miracle Max the Wizard, played by Billy Crystal, had a line saying “Turns out your friend here is only MOSTLY dead. See, mostly dead is still slightly alive.” It’s now easy for me to joke about what happened as my outcome couldn’t have been better. I will be eternally grateful for the actions taken by the 9-1-1 dispatcher, the incredible police officer and paramedics who gave me CPR and got me to the hospital alive, for the two life-saving doctors who treated me at the hospital who provided me extraordinary care, for the nurses and staff in the emergency room, ICU and recovery who cared for me and talked to me constantly while I was unconscious and during recovery leading to my full recovery, to family and friends who were by my side or were aware of what had happened praying for my recovery and especially to my wife who initially called 9-1-1 and gave me CPR until others arrived to help.

I can tell you that surviving SCA and all that I experienced since that day is overwhelming at times. To consider the odds of me surviving and suffering no brain damage is difficult for me to fathom. As you can imagine I’ve gone through a number of tests subsequent to experiencing SCA and my doctor found that I also suffered no damage to my heart which is unusual. For me every new day is a blessing. I’m looking forward to spending a long time with family and friends and I’m looking forward to March Madness in the years to come. That reminds me of the Yiddish proverb, “Man plans. God laughs.”

I would strongly advise anyone who reads this to have a coronary calcium CT or heart scan as soon as you can schedule one. It could save your life.

Just sayin’.

What Will Winter 2019 – 2020 Bring?

If you read the recent “Farmers’ Almanac’s Extended Forecast 2020” article on the outlook for the coming Winter in North America you’d have seen that it’s predicted to be what the self-proclaimed provider of “perception, experience, and common sense” is calling a “Polar Coaster”. Their forecast for this Winter anticipates that we will experience bitter cold from the Rockies to the Appalachians. A forecast likes this tends to be great news for the retail automotive aftermarket as weather extremes are a key driver whether you’re in the Emergency Roadside Service (ERS) industry or the auto glass repair and replacement (AGRR) industry.

For 201 years the Farmers’ Almanac has been providing seasonal weather predictions and this Winter the worst areas for cold and snow include the Northern Plains, Great Lakes Region all the way to the Northeast. The prediction indicates that the worst weather could take place from late January through early February.

Winter weather often brings feast or famine to the automotive aftermarket depending on whether it’s a colder or warmer season. It doesn’t matter whether you’re a manufacturer of products used by the automotive industry’s that operate in the aftermarket, a company distributing replacement parts into markets across North America or a retailer providing services to the end user, the spikes in opportunities that cold weather extremes bring includes probable logistical and supply issues. Potential issues that extreme cold, ice and snow brings can include keeping plants open and fulfilling increased parts orders, keeping delivery vehicles on the road getting those products to the retailers who also have to deal with scheduling repairs that come along with the increased opportunities.

With the current historically low unemployment rates that we’re seeing across North America an extreme Winter also will bring additional stress due to difficulties finding those qualified to manufacture, distribute and provide repairs that consumers and businesses alike will require. Currently there are numerous examples of difficulty finding and keeping qualified technicians in both the AGRR and ERS industry’s. In the AGRR industry a glass repair or replacement can often be deferred for some period of time, but weather extremes effect on automotive batteries will drive volume spikes in jump starts and replacement opportunities putting strains on companies that provide services in the ERS space.

So if the Farmers’ Almanac prediction turns out to be accurate for Winter 2019 – 2020, has your company planned and prepared its best so that you can take care of your customers parts and service needs? Those who have done the best job planning before any extreme cold, ice and snow appears will be the ones able to capitalize on the opportunities that are available.

Just sayin’.

 

* Photo by Vel Vesa on Unsplash

The New Normal

Today the competitive landscape in the auto glass repair and replacement (AGRR) industry in the United States was dramatically altered. We saw this morning an announcement that Safelite, the largest company in the space, purchased the second largest company. As the clear market leader Safelite was perhaps 14+ times or so larger than TruRoad Holdings. By acquiring the companies that make up TruRoad and bringing them into the Safelite platform the gulf between Safelite and the possible number two AGRR company Glass America is even more gigantic.

You’d have to believe that auto insurers, fleets and even consumers would have a strong interest in ensuring that competition continues to exist for AGRR services. Insurers and fleets especially would have interest in seeing a strong national competitor emerge to keep pricing and service levels in check considering the market share Safelite controls. The prospect of building a true competitor and all that would be required to compete against Safelite in the marketplace would be an incredibly daunting task and in my opinion is highly unlikely considering the new competitive landscape in the AGRR space with Safelite acquiring TruRoad.

Baseball player and coach Yogi Berra was once quoted as saying when asked about the chances of the New York Yankees winning a pennant race one year, “It ain’t over til it’s over.” I’m sorry to say that competition in the AGRR space might be over. Welcome to the new normal.

Just sayin’

The Effect of ADAS (Advanced Driver-Assistance System) to the Automotive Repair Industry

If you’re part of the automotive aftermarket repair industry you’ll find interesting an article titled “Car Safety Systems That Could Save Your Life” written by Mike Monticello (@MikeMonticello) for Consumer Reports. The article detailed a Consumer Reports study on vehicles with ADAS technology onboard and the effect it could have on your business. The study reported that, “ A majority—57 percent—reported that at least one advanced driver-assist feature in their vehicle had kept them from getting into a crash.” Considering that the study involved 72,000 vehicles the potential impact on the automotive repair industry in the years to come could be dramatic.

Mitchell International, an organization providing technology solutions to the insurance industry as well as automotive repair industry, reports that during the first quarter of 2018 the average gross collision appraisal value showed that the average cost of collision repairs was $3,512. When you then consider the Consumer Reports study showing that 57 percent of vehicles with ADAS technology managed to avoid a collision equates to 41,040 fewer vehicles needing repairs. The lost repair value would result in a revenue loss to the collision repair industry of $ 144,132,480. An amazing number considering the small overall size of the Consumer Reports sampling. Imagine the effect this lost revenue will have on the companies that supply the body parts, paints, auto glass and mechanical parts to the collision repair industry.

The Consumer Reports article goes on to explain that “48 percent for the 2019 model year, according to data compiled by Shawn Sinclair, CR’s automotive engineer for advanced driver assistance systems” have automatic emergency braking (AEB) systems. In 2018 “only 29 percent of new vehicle modes sold in the U.S. in 2018 had standard AEB”. Within the next few years it is expected that the majority of OEM car manufacturers will include basic AEB ADAS technology on new vehicles. Granted it will take a number of years for the automotive repair industry to feel the full effect of ADAS technology across the entire United States car parc of 289 million vehicles, especially with the average age of a vehicle in the United States at 11.8 years as reported by the web site statista. IBISWorld.com estimates that total United States collision industry revenues in 2018 totaled $ 47 billion.

You can just do the math to see what the ultimate effect of ADAS (Advanced Driver-Assistance System) technology across the entire car parc will have to the collision repair segment of the automotive repair industry. The effect to the companies that supply parts and services will also be just as dramatic. What is your company’s strategy to deal with the potential loss of revenue that ADAS technology brings because it’s coming?

Just sayin’.

 

Telling It Like It Is

After a 29-year career, Johnny Miller retired this past Saturday from his job as a golf analyst for NBC Sports and the Golf Channel. Before he took the role as an analyst sitting in broadcast booths located on the 18^th greens of golf tournaments, Johnny spent 28 years as a PGA golf pro. As a golf analyst, he was known for his blunt commentary of the play of professional golfers whom he critiqued. Johnny’s style was to never hold back on his opinions while offering positive or negative comments of a pros play. There were a number of pros who often didn’t appreciate Johnny’s comments on their play, but the television audience appreciated the honesty and teaching moments he provided to amateur golfers with his golf analysis. During Johnny’s career he covered 355 golf tournaments in 33 states and 14 countries around the world. Among those tournaments were 29 Players Championships, 20 U.S. Opens, 14 Ryder Cups, 9 Presidents Cups, 3 Opens (British Opens) and 1 World Olympic (Rio). I trust that Johnny will enjoy his retirement and hope that there is someone willing to step into his big shoes and continues telling it like it is.

In business, leaders should surround themselves with people like Johnny Miller who are unafraid to provide:

1. advice or critique of a potential strategy or tactic under consideration,
2. views on key promotions or new hires to supplement leadership teams,
3. opinions on the value of new products or suppliers and
4. views on potential acquisitions or divestitures being considered, just to name a few.

Those willing to be vocal and share their opinions even when they may not be appreciated are, in my view, one of the most important traits of your most valuable employees. Leaders should be able to surround themselves with those who are unafraid of telling it like it is. By the way, just because they share their views doesn’t mean that their ideas are correct and as a leader you have to follow them, but I would suggest you should still listen.

I’ve greatly valued, even more importantly highly respected, those that I worked with who readily offered their views of a strategy I wanted to follow as either a good, bad or how it could be improved upon. I would suggest that leaders recruit those willing to be like Johnny. So I’d like to say to those like Johnny in my career like Ernie, Charlie, Byron, Mark, John M., David (RIP), Larry, Kevin, Alan, Rick, Ronnie (RIP), Adrian, Louis, Sandy, Nate, Chuck, Jeff, Heather, Terry, Chris, Steve M., Bre, Darshan, Rodney, Warren, Rachel, Ros, Brendan, Robert and Steve K., thank you each very much. (There’s many, many more I could thank.)

Over the years many pros who initially were angered hearing Johnny’ negative televised critiques of their play later grew to appreciate and value his unvarnished reviews. To those whom I worked for who took my suggestions or comments poorly over the years I offer my apologies. But I hope you’ve grown to appreciate those telling it like it is that may surround you today. Leaders incapable of allowing direct reports who work for them that are willing to provide unvarnished advice or critique of critical decisions that are being considered aren’t, in my opinion, going to get the best from them. You might also be at risk losing them to a leader that actively seeks those willing to offer their views.

Just sayin’.

Silverado Country Club, Napa Valley, California