Just ONE Thing
How to Bounce Back Faster When Your Auto Shop Gets Off Course
Episode 223
with Rick White, 180BIZ
Good morning. My name is Rick White from 180BIZ. We are a coaching and training company that help auto repair shop owners that feel stuck get unstuck.
So this is my "Just ONE Thing." Let's get started.
We're going to talk about GETTING OFF-COURSE today.
Why do I want to talk about that? We get off-course. It happens. We all do, yes. So what I want to talk to you about is basically just a couple of things that are going to help you when it does happen.
Number one: when you get off course, the thing that I see happen a lot is that people are like, "I'm going this way, and then all of a sudden, I'm over here." People go from over here back to over here to go up, right? So they work on getting back on the course they had before.
What I want to get at is, when you get off course, stop trying to get back up to where you were before. It doesn't work. That place isn't there anymore. It's almost like looking at it as timelines. That timeline no longer exists because you are now over here because of whatever happened. You're off course.
This is really, really important. I want you to understand that when you're on course, and then all of a sudden you get off course, don't work to get back to where you were. What I want to do is give you a couple of steps, but I want you to not work to get back to where you were. I want you to start from where you are. Okay? It's faster.
You spend so much time going from being off course to coming back over here to being back on course. You basically relive all the pain that got you over to here—all the crap that you had to go through—and then you're wasting that time.
Think about it: if I'm going this way, and the shortest distance is a straight line, and then I come over here, if I'm working to come back over here, I'm wasting that time—that distance. Instead of going, "Okay, I was here, I'm over here now, so instead of going to here, I'm going to go to here."
What I want you to do is be able to recognize that getting back on track is an illusion. What you want to do is create a new track. That's what you want to do. That's the takeaway for this, okay? Create a new track. Don't go back on course. Create a new course.
That's what I want you to get. And there's four things you got to do for this, okay.
Number one, you got to be aware. Why do I say that? Because there are people out there—not you, of course—but there are people out there that continue to deny the fact that they're off course.
Let me give you an example. You have a tech leave unexpectedly, but you still expect the same workload to be done in the shop. You don't change your calendar or the schedule, right? So the first thing you got to do is not fight it. You got to be aware of it.
So the first thing when you're off course is to be aware that you're off course. "Hey, man, we're not going where… something's changed," right? Situations, circumstances, events, other people—they have gotten us off course. But there's one more, and I'm going to talk to you about what that one more thing is—that fifth thing that gets you off course.
So this one thing is going to be our one kind of outlier that has a different mentality to it.
So the first thing you have to do is be aware. The second thing you got to do is accept it.
You can fight it if you want to, and that's what we tend to do. When we're not getting what we want or where we feel like we should be going—I don't know about you, but I tend to fight it. I tend to push, and I'm just going to push harder and push faster, and everything is gonna… I'm gonna make it work. But the reality is, it's not going to.
So I have to be aware, and I have to accept this is what is. I didn't want the tech to leave. They were a good team member. I thought they were going to be with us a long time. I've shared things with them. Maybe you thought that tech was going to be your succession plan—I don't know. But the reality is, they're gone. You have to accept it. Just let it go.
But then after that, you've got to adapt. And this is where you create a new course. So you're going to go, "Okay, this is where I'm at now. What do I have to do differently today? What do I've got to do from this point to get to this point?"
And then you act.
Those are the four A's: be aware, right? Awareness, acceptance, adaptation, and then action. Those are the four things to get you back on track—which is not real in any way, shape, or form—except for our one caveat.
What am I doing?
So first of all, if this video is helping you out—if this message is helping, if this is connecting some dots for you—then I want you to reach out. Share this video. Please let other people see this, because I promise you, it is so exhausting to force something that can never happen. It's so much better to learn from it, or change something, and then go forward with it.
Okay, so you're going to be aware, you're going to accept it, you're going to adapt to it, and you're going to take action. But there's one time you don't do that—and that's when you are the reason why you're off course.
When you are off course, what causes that? Distractions. Yep. "Hey, you know something? I was going here, but this got my attention over here, and all of a sudden, I'm over here." Nope, baby. We got to get back on, let's go.
You got to recognize when you're causing it.
So when you recognize you're the issue—based on distractions, frustrations, story you're telling yourself, whatever it is—step back, and then apply these same things. Because the reality is, we can get frustrated, right? You got to be able to step back.
And honestly, if you think about it, those four steps still exactly work. Be aware. Accept it. Accept where you're at. Don't accept that… like, don't mistake your current location for your final destination. That's super, super important.
So that's where we got to accept that this is where we're at. But baby, this ain't where I'm staying. I'm moving forward. I'm going to get where I want to go, no matter what. I love those three words: no matter what.
I got to be aware. I got to be able to accept what is. And then I've got to be able to adapt. And then take action—massive action.
I really found that this was very, very helpful when I finally kind of stumbled on these things. And, you know, for a long time it's like, "Fine, I'm off course. This is pissing me off. I'm off course." Hey, you know something? It is. It just is.
For me, I like to get the emotions down. I'll ask, "What's real?" The other thing I ask myself a lot is, "What's the lesson here? What can I learn from this that will help me step up as a better business owner and a better leader?"
So if these things really make sense to you, again, please share this video. If you want to get more content like this, we have our Pocket Business Genius webinar series. Feel free to do that.
If you ever want help with some of this, feel free to reach out. We're happy to talk with you. My team and I—we're here, we're dedicated to help the automotive industry stop subsidizing repairs for their customers and their clients. I think that's so important.
And then the last thing I want to just mention is we have our Shop Owners Roundtable the second Thursday. It's actually this Thursday night. Our Shop Owners Roundtable: 7:00 PM Eastern. It happens once every month for an hour. It's absolutely free. We get about 50 shops in there, and basically it gives you a chance to get some advice before you start coaching with somebody. It gives you an option to kind of bang things off of other shop owners, as well as my team and I.
So I just want you to write this down. You got to be aware—that's step one. You got to accept—that's step two. You got to adapt—that's step three.
You know why we got to accept? Because if you don't accept where you're at, you can't adapt. You're too busy mad. You're too busy frustrated. You're too busy fighting it. Just accept it. This is where it's at. I can't change it. I can make it better, but I can't change where I'm at.
And then take action.
Okay, all right, everybody. I'm going to ask you: when was the last time you looked to see if you're on track? Right? We're finishing up the third quarter of the year already. Can you imagine that? Third quarter is done, baby. 2025 is three-quarters of the way gone.
My question to you is—even if you didn't hit your goals, it was disappointing, you had grand ideas at the beginning of the year—use this next three months, this next quarter, as a springboard. Use it to ramp yourself up and get something amazing going for 2026.
Just keep going. Don't give up. Guys, don't give up. And ladies—"guys" is a non-gender-specific term.
So thank you all for being here. Have a great week. Go make some money. I'll see y'all next week. Take care. Bye-bye.
