Six Figure Jobs Unfilled! Why Can't We Get Employees?

Imagine getting a $160,000 job. For many that would be a game changer. Yet there are many jobs right now going unfilled. In fact, there's a backlog of job openings for decades.

The problem is greater than many realize, and there is no easy fix. This episode talks about filing key roles and the challenges many companies face. We will also share the solutions you need to apply to get those high demand employees to work for you.

Failing to address this problem could prove costly. Join us to learn what you need to scale.

Please like, share, and subscribe.

[00:00:23.24] - Alice

Welcome to Books in the Biz, the show where real-world business meets real-world results. Hosted by business strategist Dan Paulson and veteran CFO Richard Beltry, this podcast breaks down the stories, trends, and financial insights shaping today's company. Dan brings decades of experience helping leaders simplify operations, build strong cultures, and scale with confidence. Rich adds his deep financial expertise from guiding organizations across healthcare, construction, logistics, and professional services. Together, they dig into what's really happening behind the numbers and what it means for owners, executives, and anyone trying to grow a stronger, smarter business. This is practical conversation, real talk, and tools you can use right now. Welcome to Books in the Biz.

[00:01:13.04] - Dan Paulson

Hello. Welcome back, everyone. Rich, how are you doing today?

[00:01:26.18] - Rich Veltre

I am okay today. How are you?

[00:01:28.08] - Dan Paulson

You are okay. I am just fine.

[00:01:31.19] - Rich Veltre

Just fine.

[00:01:32.29] - Dan Paulson

Here we are, another cold winter day, and this is round two of a brand new year. And you were kind enough last week to share an article in the Wall Street Journal with me. So the Wall Street Journal one was behind a paywall, of course, and couldn't be nice enough to just show what's going on. But I thought this was very interesting as well. And I think there's both operational and other implications financially that we've got to deal with. So I just pulled up Apple News to show some of the different talks out there. But two different ones I want to point you on here, a business outsider, very similar to what Wall Street Journal posted. Ford is desperate for mechanics and giving free tools, Carhartt gear, and I believe in another article, if not this one, they also talk about where they're giving scholarships. What's even more interesting is if you look further down here at the New York Post article, for those of you who are watching on YouTube, Board CEO, Jim Farley, laments that he can't fill 5,000 mechanics jobs at 120 grand per year. And I seem to remember the Wall Street Journal saying something like 160 grand per year.

[00:03:00.24] - Dan Paulson

So I'm going to click on the post one here. But 5,000 jobs. I believe this last month, the unemployment rate went up slightly, a minor tick up, but it did go up. And to me, this is somewhat of a flag that, are we training people for the needed positions or Our school is just pushing people through, and a lot of you figure it out after you leave here type stuff. What's your thoughts?

[00:03:38.17] - Rich Veltre

Obviously, it's concerning, right? Yes. Because we've talked about this before that the workforce has been pushed. The vast majority has been pushed towards college and four-year education. And there's fewer people available for trade-type jobs, mechanic-type jobs. And this is now becoming where it's coming out into the mainstream media. And it's coming out from the head of Ford. Because my first reaction is, well, Ford itself doesn't own the dealership, so it's not really Ford. And then I'm like, but I'm not going to buy a Ford if I can't get the car serviced. So it does have an effect on the CEO. So there's a flow here of a problem for the CEO. And I don't know that he can fix it by himself or even at Ford headquarters, right? I think this is an industry problem. And this is the first time that we're able to say that this is the indicator of an industry problem.

[00:04:51.18] - Dan Paulson

Yeah. And yeah, I think that's why I was so interested in this article when you approach me on it. I thought why this would be a good one to start with this time around, because he needs... Ford needs 5,000 mechanics. But it's not just Ford. There's GM, there's Toyota, there's Nissan, there's Dodge, Ram. If Ford needs 5,000, what do the other ones need? I'm guessing the number is going to be similar, pretty close. And then you're still talking about the independence in the industry. I was trying to get Jay Gonen on here from Wrenchway, because, of course, this is in his wheelhouse. And I think maybe in the next couple of weeks, we'll try and get them back on to talk in more detail about some of the things that they're trying to do to get people in here. But I see Decades of an issue. I don't see a quick fix on any of this right now. And I'm not sure where you're at from a financial point of view. But as you start talking about paying people good Six figure salaries to start with, and then also buying equipment for them. Because from what I heard from Jay and what I heard from some others, including my brother, who is a mechanic, is it can cost you anywhere because you buy your own tools.

[00:06:14.25] - Dan Paulson

It can cost you anywhere from $10,000 on the low end to $20,000 to $30,000 on the... So you got somebody who's coming out of technical college or school with service tech training. And the first big purchase they have to make is the equipment they need to use because that's the stuff they take with them wherever they're working. So this has been a huge issue in the industry is most of that cost has been pushed on the student to come up with. And it's almost as bad as going to college, right? If you're going to college and spending 20 grand a year to go to college, but you don't want to go to college, and this is your choice. But now you got to come up with, we'll say 5 to 10 grand to go to a tech school. And after you graduate from there, you got to come up with another 20 grand to actually go to the job that you've now been trained for. That's pretty deterring for some people who might be more interested in going into this line of work.

[00:07:25.19] - Rich Veltre

I think maybe there's a little bit more to it even, right? When When you think about the policy shift years ago has not pushed people towards going to the four-year college or whatever. And these sound like great ideas of how you can promote and give some money towards it and get people out of that mindset. But how long does it take? If you've been doing it this way for 40, 50 years, and then you come out today and say, Hey, we're going to change policy. Does Does it take you 40 to 50 years to reverse it and send it back the other way? And who's going to reverse? The people in school now are all geared towards how I'm supposed to go to school. And now you're going to tell them, well, guess what? You don't have to go to school. You could have gotten this way. You got better off. But there's just so much of that flip flop that you can throw into that conversation. And I'll throw this out there. I realize we're talking mostly on the trade stuff because it's very, very key for the trade stuff, if you ask me.

[00:08:38.23] - Rich Veltre

But the accountants did this, too. They are all changing the laws state by state. I think the last number I saw was 22. New Jersey was one of the most recent that they have changed their law for who can become a CPA. And now there's two paths to get the CPA. One of those is the one that I passed, how I got my certification 25, 30 years ago. So they've just basically reversed back to 25, 30 years ago. And now they're saying, well, now it's okay. We'll go back to the way it was before. We've been in every newspaper, every publication, as we don't have enough accountants. And you changed this law 25 plus years ago. Now you're trying to flip it back. Now it's okay. We'll Who are you going to flip back now? And how long is it going to take to re-energize a profession? So essentially, it's a parallel conversation to what we're talking about in this article.

[00:09:42.13] - Dan Paulson

How long is it going to take for you to replenish the fact that you're telling you you're this many people short, and you have this many people retiring?

[00:09:53.04] - Rich Veltre

You don't really have a plan. You're throwing spaghetti at the wall to see if it sticks.

[00:10:00.00] - Dan Paulson

Yeah. And that's, I think, the biggest challenge with us whenever... I'll say this has probably started as more of a government issue, because they want to push a lot of people to a four-year degree. Well, that was fine. And I've even told people this, back in the '90s, when I graduated from college, it made sense because the degree paid for itself. You could get affordable good degree that when you graduate with college, you could actually use and you'd make more money than you'd have to pay and what it costs you to get that degree. And what I see now is 40 years later, we push people to this. So we've got parents, and in some cases, grandparents who are told you have to go to college. The common theme I hear from a lot of parents is we need people in the trades. We need people in... We need mechanics because AI is not going to fix any of that stuff. And at the same point, my kid is going to go to school, going to get a four year degree. Well, you're not helping the problem here. You're tied into the old way of thinking, which is everyone has to get a four year degree.

[00:11:14.13] - Dan Paulson

And now we have situations, for example, if you can get somebody to pay for your tools, pay for your clothing, potentially pay for your education, and on top of it, when you graduate, you're already going to start at a six-figure income, which is going to put you within the top 5 % of the population out there right now, why wouldn't you allow your kid to do that if that's what they want to do? If they want to be a grease monkey. I'm like, go ahead, be one. If you want to go into construction, do that because you're going to be better off long term.

[00:11:47.15] - Rich Veltre

Yeah, I think, again, I think it's a big reversal of the policy. And I think that we should be talking about you have a choice. And I think it started. I don't necessarily think it's because this CEO, Ford, is now making mainstream news. People have already been talking about it because the cost of the four-year degree, I think you mentioned it before, the cost of the four-year degree is pushing people out. And then I saw somebody who graduated with my daughter five years ago as a customer service person at the local food store. So how is he paying back for college education as the customer service person at a food store? Yeah.

[00:12:31.16] - Dan Paulson

And how long is he going to be paying on that? And how long does that go?

[00:12:35.05] - Rich Veltre

Yeah. So on top of that, let's add a little bit more to the Ford problem. All right? Cars are not cars anymore. Cars are not what they were when we were kids. And it was a combustion engine, and it was something you can work on in your driveway if you wanted to. Now, one of these articles called them rolling computers. So does the mechanic at Ford have to be somebody with a four-year degree who can actually figure out computers and problem-solve? I'm not really sure we have a logical argument coming from somebody like Ford. They're designing cars to be more fuel-efficient, more electronic, more computer-generated. Half the time, I think they don't consider the fact that the cars will need repairs at some point. And they design them based on the design and the cost. And they don't design them on the fact that somebody wants to change their oil. They have to take the engine out of the car. I mean, it gets a little ridiculous that fuel efficiency gets you to the point where your head gasket goes at $85,000.

[00:13:57.13] - Dan Paulson

Right. That's what happened. Well, here's where I will make an argument for the other side. I think, yes, and this is deliberate. And here's the example. If I had time, I'd pull up the article. Unfortunately, we don't have a back crew that can go out and do the research on us. But I saw an article that BMW changed their to be BMW-specific. So you need a specific tool that only BMW allows you to have to work on in your vehicle. And the reason they did that is they got tired of people fixing their own cars. They want to push more stuff to the dealership. And I think that's also part of why stuff is going to electronics. So again, my experience As you know, I'm a car guy, and a lot of people on here know. Gm, to more or less standardize how systems in their cars are updated and what can be done to that car? So by locking down the electronic system or the computer system on the car to only work with their platform, you prevent people from being able to do performance upgrades or any changes to it. Basically, you have to go to a tech, or if you do any changes, A, voids your warranty, B, shuts down your car, which, by the way, is sometimes a problem now with all these computers in it, or C, turns you off and pushes drives you back into an older vehicle.

[00:15:33.16] - Dan Paulson

There's a lot of people out there who already can't fix their cars. They just don't have that mechanical wearwithal because they didn't grow up on a farm or they didn't grow up in the garage with a parent who was busy wrenching on vehicles. So that's all changed already. But now you're almost setting yourself up to a situation where the only way you can get an oil change or the only way you can do minor maintenance is you have to take it to a dealership and spend hundreds of dollars. I want to say average hourly It costs somewhere around $150 or $175 an hour for the dealer mechanic to work on it with a minimum one hour charge plus parts. So it's crazy.

[00:16:14.29] - Rich Veltre

Unreal. When I had my issue with the car, they had the car for weeks.

[00:16:20.20] - Dan Paulson

Yes.

[00:16:21.15] - Rich Veltre

Weeks. And just to get to it, I think at the end of the day, though, I don't think they had more than 20 labor hours on the car. It was just there for weeks just because you had backlog, and you had parts, and you had things that had to get done and farmed out to somebody else to get it done. And you're sitting there saying, I don't know where this is going to end. So I can definitely see the issue. At the same time, it's of your own doing. So how about we figure out how to fix it in a faster way for the consumer, not for your reputation?

[00:16:59.23] - Dan Paulson

Yeah. So now looking at it from a financial perspective, let's take a look at it from a CFO point of view. You are now working for Ford or working with Ford, and this is a problem you're trying to solve. Based on some of the options they've thrown out, what would you agree to or what would you do? And how do you manage that cost from a, I'll say, the franchise level and the private industry level? Because here's the thing, most Those auto mechanics don't work for Ford or GM or whatnot. They work in a shop in a town that's run privately. They're not tied into the franchise. So this, to me, is where the biggest bench is going to happen is those people need mechanics. They don't have the luxury of Ford backing them up and paying these six-figure income. So what do you do about that?

[00:17:58.10] - Rich Veltre

Well, Interesting. Very interesting. Because I don't think I have enough data to be able to give you too specific an answer.

[00:18:05.17] - Dan Paulson

Sure.

[00:18:06.09] - Rich Veltre

But I think that my curiosity here is, what's the end game? If you realize that repairs and maintenance is problem. And I can guarantee you from what I saw, it's a problem for the dealerships. So then how do you help the dealerships? Because the dealerships are independent. If your only thing here is you're going to throw a scholarship program out there or offer to buy some tools. When I saw the number that I think it threw out there, I'm looking at it and I'm going, that really feels pretty small for billions of dollars going into Ford. The amount of money they're throwing at it is tiny. But if this is that big of an issue where I go in and I drop off the car at a dealership, and Essentially, they look at me and go, we're not really willing to fix it. We're just going to replace your entire engine. And so the cost is way over the ceiling. But, yeah, your hours putting that in is probably tiny because what you're telling me. So you're not really... By throwing money into the mechanics pool for scholarships and tools, I don't feel like you're solving the real problem.

[00:19:28.02] - Rich Veltre

I feel like you're solving possibly the labor number problem. But you're not fixing the customer experience. Because now, what? I go down there and I've got 120 or $160,000 new guy working on my vehicle, and maybe he can't work on my vehicle because you set it up where the vehicles are so complicated that he may not even know what the problem is. So I realized maybe I'm rambling a little bit there, but I just feel like the number that they threw out there that they're investing trying to fix the problem doesn't sound like it's big enough to fix a five or six thousand mechanic shortage just on his company. Now, like you said, it's all the industry. It's the whole thing. Multiply that time, six, seven, eight big brands. And so I think there's more money that has to be spent. I think there's almost a reeducation that has to be spent. Who knows how long that would And I think that put the money into it, put the money into this is what's going to solve our problem. I mean, my first reaction was, do the dealerships have to be assisted to go out and buy some of these independent repair shops?

[00:20:50.16] - Rich Veltre

That's a fast way to get people. It's a fast way to get experienced people who know what the problems are. And I have personal opinion. I don't want to go to the dealerships anymore. I absolutely got turned off 100 %. And I was dealing with a local guy who, number one, fixed my problem, number two, was 100 % honest and did it with a reasonable price. And I'd give him all my oil changes in every maintenance at this point because Dodge was my brand. Dodge drove me into this guy's shop.

[00:21:30.00] - Dan Paulson

Right. Yeah. And so it's interesting. You're talking about investing more money, which I agree with. And my understanding has somewhat limited. But again, because I deal with the industry maybe a little bit more because of the toys I play around with. The mechanics now, like you said, they need to be taught a completely different skill beyond just the wrenching side of things. There also is now this computer side of things that they have to understand, which to To some degree is an advantage for new people coming into the industry because most of them have been raised on computers their entire life. They understand how they work. Basically, there is a module you plug into the computer on the car that gives you what's called an error code. And depending upon that error code can give you three, four, five different possible problems that you need to look into. It might highlight what the more likely problem is, but it might also point out some other other potential issues as well. How do I know this? Because I went through a very similar problem to what you did with my Dodge. Well, actually, my Jeep that our son uses.

[00:22:40.06] - Dan Paulson

And we were trying to figure out what was going on with it. And my brother, who, again, is a mechanic, We took it to his shop, and he's like, well, we think it's this, but it could also be this, this, and this. So we're going to try this first, and that being the lowest cost option, and see if that addresses it. If that doesn't address it, bring it back in, and then we got to go to the next and so on. And I'm seeing that more and more where in the past, when it was just a mechanical issue, you didn't have to deal with the umpteen different computers that are in the car. You could just deal with the physical mechanical problem that's not working. And in most cases, a good mechanic back in the day could listen to what the engine was doing and go, it's this problem. Fix this, that takes care of it, and it costs this much. Nowadays, there's diagnosis There's all this other stuff that goes into it. So I agree with you that you need to spend more money to get people trained up and get them prepared for it.

[00:23:39.11] - Dan Paulson

And possibly, though it concerns me a little bit that they would go out and try and consolidate a lot of the independent dealerships, but that seems to be the world we're coming to, it's still going to cost us more to fix our cars. That's the thing. It sucks.

[00:23:56.10] - Rich Veltre

Yeah. I don't know whether it's a good thing or It's not your bad thing that the Ford CEO is the guy out on the news. He's the guy making this statement. If the problem is at your dealerships, why are you the face of the problem on the repairs and maintenance side? Because to a certain extent, you're still involved, right? You're guaranteeing the vehicle. So I get that you have some degree of connection to it. But the independents are the ones who need the support. They would be the ones that I would want to see, well, how can these guys get the funds to go get an acquisition going on an independent repair shop? Or is there a better way at that level to get the independent repair shop to be able to handle the problems that you have? Outsourcing a lot of times, is cheaper than building it all yourself. And I think a lot of these independents probably already have some of this stuff figured out. And they're not complaining because they've figured out how to figure it out. They've figured out how to move forward so that they can fix the stuff that goes to the dealership and the dealership fails.

[00:25:19.04] - Rich Veltre

And then everybody has to find that independent. So is your problem really that you have to build up your own, or do you just have to support the fact that your stuff can be fixed by others?

[00:25:32.16] - Dan Paulson

Yeah, what I'm seeing, at least with the independents, where I think they... And this is more the operational potential solution, is really communication and culture are the two things that I see. Part of this is because I am now working with an auto shop. And when I'm talking with their service managers, the owners, and a lot of these are family run businesses, it might be second or third generation even. Yeah, they got some of the systems figured out, but there's a lot, again, they're doing that old school way. So it worked back 20 years ago. Now it's gotten more complicated. Now they're running into some problems. But that's, again, a lot of that stems from communication between the service managers, the customers, the owners, is the trifecta there. But then it's also putting in place the systems and processes and making them consistent. So that's where it'll be interesting when we get Jay back on, because he can talk a little bit more about that. And I think that would be where he would probably even share some agreement, where systematizing your shop allows you to then go look at other shops and consolidate that way.

[00:26:46.01] - Dan Paulson

Because the more consistent you are in your operation, the more you can replicate that. And I do agree with you, service level at many franchise dealerships or the major brands, they're really structured to make money and not always concerned about customer care. Some are better than others, obviously. But it's really a push to see how much you can get in the door because they know they don't make as much on the car sales, but They make a lot of money on the service side of things and the parts side of things. And that's really where the goal is, I'll sell you the car, I'll sell you the warranty, and then we get you on the warranty work. And after the warranty works done, we get you on the other repairs that need to be done after assuming you're keeping your vehicle for longer than five to six years at this point, now coming up on seven in most cases. Yeah.

[00:27:40.22] - Rich Veltre

Again, not enough data for me to really dive in further.

[00:27:46.14] - Dan Paulson

Sure.

[00:27:47.13] - Rich Veltre

A lot of auto guys and you would probably tell me this might not work, but it's the piece that I'm seeing right now. It's the piece that I think you have to explore, because, again, if he if he wants to rebuild the repairs maintenance, I don't see it being a fast fix.

[00:28:06.03] - Dan Paulson

Right.

[00:28:06.27] - Rich Veltre

The loss of reputation comes down to how much that's going to cost you. Is it worth paying to fund the acquisitions as opposed to trying to rebuild? And how much do all these costs, how much are the options actually? How much do they cost you? And then you can figure out what's the most logical step to move into.

[00:28:34.20] - Dan Paulson

Yeah, I was just and as you're talking about that, I was just thinking, you asked the question, well, why is Ford the face of this? And why is this coming up now? I think Ford is the face of it because they're probably getting feedback from their franchises that, hey, we can't get enough people here. You are making these cars more complicated and also require more service work to come to the dealership. What are you doing about that? So to To me, that's probably why Farley is now being put out in front of people because he's a recognized person, he's a recognized brand. I would actually like to see that more like Mike Row does. Mike Row really was one of the first ones to, on a high level or on a broad scale, raise the flag that we need more people in things like the trades and automotive and more hands on type individuals. And he even talks about, you got to create the right culture and all this other stuff, too. So I think that's where we're starting to see some bigger names speak out about this because they recognize that there is a problem But at the same point, they got to start doing stuff to address it.

[00:29:48.10] - Dan Paulson

And to me, from my perspective, that's getting some of these dealerships or some of these tech shops in schools and getting them to talk again about the trades and about other opportunities that they have that go beyond that four year degree. Because as you pointed out, for 40 years, we've been beating it into people's heads that you need a bachelor's degree at the very least. And often you need a master's beyond that. And it's good. Probably take another 10, 20, 30 years to finally pivot the other direction. You just hope you haven't swung the ship around too far that you're now back in the same problem somewhere else. So I see that as the challenge is that we all have is by the time we catch up, we've already probably gone too far. So how do you measure that is really going to be the the future of how we get the right people in the right spots. But, yeah, we need to move people back to a direction where It's not all about going to get a four year degree. There's other opportunities out there that are far more lucrative right now. And if you're even thinking about graduating from high school, you probably should look at some other opportunities.

[00:31:00.00] - Dan Paulson

So Rich, if these companies, especially these family-run shops, or anybody wants to figure out how to be more profitable, how to build a strategy around growth and scalability, How should they contact us?

[00:31:17.19] - Rich Veltre

You can always send me an email at rich@xcxo.net.

[00:31:21.15] - Dan Paulson

And you can do the same for me, except I'm dan@xcxo.net. Rich, this has been an interesting subject. And we'll have to get, like I said, we'll have to get Jay on here because I'm sure he can share a lot of insight based on his experience on what's going on here. But until next week, we will see you later.

[00:31:42.17] - Rich Veltre

All right.

[00:31:44.10] - Dan Paulson

All right. Here we go. Thanks for listening to Books and the Biz.

[00:31:54.08] - Bob

If today's conversation sparked new ideas for your company, the team at XCXO can help you turn those ideas into action. Xcxo brings together seasoned executives, fractional CEOs, COOs, CFOs, and CXOs who step into your business with the experience, strategy, and leadership to drive real results. Whether you're trying to scale, strengthen operations, improve profitability, or prepare for transition, our experts help you move faster and lead with confidence. To learn more or start a conversation, visit xcxo.net. That's xcxo.net, your shortcut to stronger leadership and a better run business. Thanks again for joining us. We'll see you next time on Books and the Biz.