AUGUST 2024 TECHNICIAN OF INFLUENCE WINNERS
International® is pleased to announce the four winners of the Technician of Influence Award for the month of August. The individuals listed here have demonstrated their commitment to pursuing continuous improvement and delivering the highest level of customer service.
ROOKIES
Service Technician
Alex is an up-and-coming technician who completed his internship last fall through the Crowder College Diesel Technology program and decided to stay full-time with Rush Truck Centers at Joplin. Alex was one of Crowder's top students and is an excellent addition to our technician workforce. After graduating with top honors from high school this spring, he decided to continue his education at Crowder College to complete his degree in diesel technology. He continues to juggle going to school while maintaining a high GPA, coming to work every day on time, and still finding quality time to spend with his family for special occasions like his little sister's birthday party.
In just the short time Alex has been with his Rush family, he has surpassed all expectations and been promoted to a level 2 tech; if maintains his current rate of learning and repair capabilities, he will be a level 3 before the start of next year. He has earned the trust of his fellow peers as an up-and-coming rising star. Alex maintains an average of 100-110% proficiency, is in the top four producers in the shop every month, and is already trusted with performing unsupervised level-three tech repairs. Alex always seems to be in a good mood, even after completing a difficult repair, and will crack a joke or two to get a fellow tech in a good mood.
Service Technician
Kody has already achieved a lot in his young career. After graduating high school, he went into the construction field. A few years later, his brother talked him into joining us at Ascendence Truck Centers where he also works. At that time we had our first Uptime student enrolled in the 2022- 2023 Uptime class. After just four months working here, we could see we had something special in Kody, so we signed him up as well. Since then, it's been nothing but upward progress for Kody and his career here at Ascendance.
Coming from the construction field and living in Rural Wisconsin, Kody is a well-rounded tech and he is willing to work on anything. He has a special charisma and can get any room or shop laughing in a matter of seconds. Our service advisor once handed him a job with a Brand X truck: Kody handed it back to them and said, "I am an Uptime graduate, I only know how to work on International brand." After the service writer walked away with a confused look on his face, Kody laughed and said, " I was kidding, I work on them all, work is work."
Being an Uptime grad, he understands Uptime and the importance of getting the truck back on the road. He comes in on Saturdays when needed, stays late, and is always willing to come in early when asked.
Even though Kody is in the early stages of his career, you can often find him coming off the tool truck with his hands full of tools and a big smile. If asked what he bought, his reply is usually something like, "Need more tools to make more money and keep trucks on the road." Kody is 100% International certified online, hands-on certified in CV, EV, HVAC, DLB, and A26. He is fully Allison certified in 1000, 2000, 3000 & 4000 series and working on getting certified in Cummins ISB, ISL, and X15. This is pretty impressive for less than 2 full years of working with us and being only 21 years old. Since graduating Uptime, Kody’s average proficiency has been 91%. He is a technician our customers can count on to be there and get the job done right the first time and in an acceptable amount of time.
VETERANS
Service Technician
Dennis consistently displays what it means to be a leader and a mentor at HOLT Truck Centers. He takes it upon himself to mentor up-and-coming technicians and stays with them through their development. Dennis is one of the only Diamond technicians in our dealer group. He is ASE master certified, International master certified, and has his Caterpillar, Cummins, and Eaton certifications. He is also International S13, EV, and CV certified.
Dennis is the "go-to" for almost all of the other technicians in the shop. He does not shy away from speaking directly with the customers if asked by a service advisor or another team member. Dennis is always the first one at the dealership every morning to get his work mostly handled so he has more time to help other technicians. He also is willing to help technicians at our other locations as well. Dennis's character reflects his success.
Dennis is always the one who takes on the vehicles that are impossible to diagnose or the vehicles that do not have listed diagnostic steps or a proper wiring schematic to follow. He has been contacted by tech support about several case files so he could explain and discuss how he repaired the vehicles. When it comes to fixing the impossible, Dennis is the go-to. Here at HTC, we measure our technicians based on several metrics, including tech utilization, comebacks, and positive/ negative variance. Dennis regularly bills out the most per month above all other technicians. He also has one of the highest positive labor variances with HTC. Dennis has come in on weekends and offered to stay late to complete a repair, ensuring a vehicle gets back on the road. Dennis has built his legacy out of the OKC location for the past 20 years. His reputation has spread to where we have customers that specifically tow their vehicle to OKC, sometimes from out of state, just to have Dennis work on and repair their vehicle. We are lucky to have Dennis on our team!
Service Technician
Jared has almost 10 years with Cumberland Idealease, committed to completing the best work he can. I have worked with Jared for 8 of those years and have learned a lot from him about Cummins engines, Thermo King reefers, and International trucks. When Jared is asked for help by me or other techs, he doesn't hesitate to help in any way he can. With new techs who are still in school or have just graduated, he will inform them about what tools they need, the extra training that will help them, and ways to complete repairs to reduce downtime for the customer.
Many times I have seen Jared postpone his lunch for a customer needing a repair, not stopping until the customer was back in the truck and ready to drive off the lot. No job is too small for him, even washing and cleaning the inside of rental units and doing PMs.
Jared works the night shift, directing the other techs on the shift on what needs to be completed for the next day. For trucks that come in during 2nd shift, Jared decides what will best work best for the customer/company. Jared has worked past the end of his shift to complete a truck that a customer needs that night or the next morning. The second shift would not be running like a well-oiled engine if it wasn't for Jared's leadership and guidance.
Jared also stays up to date with the industry technology from International, Cummins, and Eaton. He found a recall with Eaton last year before the dealership techs were even aware of it. The dealership was able to start servicing that recall before other locations and before any issues impacted customer trucks. Customers were able to schedule their trucks and avoid unexpected downtime. Because Jared found out about that recall so early, our dealership was paid at a higher warranty rate before Eaton reduced the rate.
A fun fact about Jared: we play EA Sports 24 Pro Clubs together with another friend and we reached rank 761 in the WORLD!
