ready for us. The brand-new Service Business Development Center for our store was starting out a little rockier than I anticipated. Change brings out the best and the worst in people. In that particular moment, I felt like it was bringing out the worst in almost everyone around us. We were embarking on a huge cultural shift. I knew I was going to have my work cut out for me to see the vision through. The success of our stores and my fledgling Service Business Development Team depended on it. THREE KEY INGREDIENTS TO SERVICE BDC SUCCESS Six years later, you would never guess that a Service Business Development Center stacked with accolades and achievements had such a humble beginning in the back of a service drive. I have talked with many Business Development Managers, General Managers, and automotive leaders over the years. Most people cannot believe that the office space housing the team handling thousands of diverse phone calls each month began as a file storage room. While the current Cohesive communication is the building block from which all other processes and strategies are built. Without collaboration, your business development facility space and office furniture are impressive, they are not what makes a business development strategy successful. Over the last decade, I have seen firsthand how a dealership's business development center can be prosperous. I have also witnessed how mishandling and poor execution can ultimately lead to high turnover or abandoning such a department altogether. In this current business environment, fixed operations departments cannot afford to operate without a comprehensive business development strategy in place. While there are many potential ways to structure a business development center, there are only a few key ingredients that are absolutely critical to success. These can be broken out into three specific processes: 1. cohesive communication strategy 2. ongoing training development plan 3. personnel empowerment JULY AUGUST 2021 || FIXED OPS MAGAZINE 13http://infomedia.com.au