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Customer Focus

ProLift Earns 18th Toyota President’s Award

March 29, 2012

Toyota Material Handling, U.S.A., Inc.(TMHU) recently announced the 2011 winners of its prestigious President’s Award. TMHU selects its top dealers, representing approximately the top 20 percent of the dealer body, each year from a nationwide network of dealers, recognizing them for demonstrating excellence in parts, service and equipment sales, customer satisfaction and overall dealership operations.

 

This year, 15 winners earned the coveted award  and were acknowledged at Toyota’s National Dealer Meeting in Phoenix, Ariz.

“The President’s Award provides TMHU with a way to recognize our dealers that went above and beyond to demonstrate top quality service and support,” said Jeff Rufener, president of TMHU. “The winning dealers clearly exemplify Toyota’s dedication to their customers and set the bar for industry excellence.”

The winners are:

  • Atlas Toyota Material Handling, Schiller Park, Ill. – Al Rawson
  • Bell Fork Lift, Inc., Clinton Township, Mich. – Wayne Bell
  • Brodie Toyota-Lift, Lawrence, Mass. – Ron McCluskey
  • Conger Toyotalift, Green Bay, Wis. – Anika Conger-Capelle
  • Florida Lift Systems, LLC, Tampa, Fla. – Jeff Fischer
  • JRC Toyota-Lift, Worthington, Ohio – Sam Swartz
  • Lift Pro Equipment Co., Inc., Sioux Falls, S.D. – Bob Overby and Craig Schoen
  • Madland Toyota-Lift, Inc., Bakersfield, Calif. – Mary Madland
  • Nationwide Lift Trucks, Inc., Hollywood, Fla. – Joe Conte
  • ProLift Industrial Equipment, Louisville, Ky. – David Graffy
  • Shoppa’s Material Handling, Ltd., Fort Worth, Texas – Jim Shoppa
  • Summit ToyotaLift, North Haven, Conn. – Larry McKevitt
  • Toyota Lift of South Texas, San Antonio, Texas – Leslie Doggett and Ken Townsend
  • ToyotaLift of Houston, Houston, Texas – Leslie Doggett and Jim Flowers
  • Westquip, Inc., Oklahoma City, Okla. – Fred Stanley

The President’s Award, TMHU’s highest honor, has been awarded to select dealers since its inception in 1990 to acknowledge their outstanding business accomplishments. To demonstrate the company’s appreciation, each President’s Award recipient received an exquisite Tiffany & Co. crystal award. TMHU also is hosting a trip to the Bahamas for the award recipients.

About Toyota Material Handling, U.S.A., Inc.

Celebrating 45 years of established operations, Irvine, Calif.-based TMHU is the supplier for the No. 1 selling lift truck in North America since 2002. In addition to the full line of high-quality lift trucks sold under the Toyota brand, the company’s extended industrial equipment solutions include Automated Guided Vehicles and tow tractors.

Quality is the hallmark of the Toyota Production System practiced at all Toyota manufacturing facilities, including Toyota Industrial Equipment Mfg., Inc. (TIEM), a zero-landfill facility in Columbus, Ind. TIEM, named a 2011 North American Best Plant by IndustryWeek magazine, is a member of the National Safety Council, complies with the ISO 14001 standard from the International Organization for Standardization and has produced more than 400,000 Toyota lift trucks since its opening in 1990.

Toyota’s commitment to excellence in customer service extends throughout the U.S. and Canada. With more than 70 authorized Toyota Industrial Equipment dealers and more than 220 dealership locations throughout North America, Toyota dealers offer comprehensive customer service and support, including one-stop shopping for both new and used lift trucks, rentals, parts and service, fleet servicing and financing. For more information on TMHU, please visit www.toyotaforklift.com, www.facebook.com/ToyotaForklift or twitter.com/ToyotaForklift or call 1-800-226-0009.

Toyota Completes North American Integration

October 24, 2011

As part of its global strategy to focus on its material handling business and as the number one full line supplier of lift trucks in North America, Toyota announced Toyota Material Handling U.S.A., Inc. (TMHU) has completed the acquisition of the Industrial Equipment Division (IED) of Toyota Canada Inc. (TCI)., effective October 1, 2011. Toyota now offers seventy-three authorized Toyota Industrial Equipment dealers with a total of 224 dealership locations, throughout Canada and the United States.

“We are elated to build on Toyota’s material handling experience, dealers and associates in Canada and the U.S. to create greater material handling synergies and efficiencies for our customers,” said Brett Wood, president of TMHU. “This alignment advances TMHU’s goal to continue providing industry-leading products and service to our North American customers.”

Rob Reinders, who previously served as TCI IED director, has been appointed TMHU Director of Canadian Operations.

“I will continue to oversee the Canadian field staff to provide continuous service to Canadian dealers and customers,” said Reinders.

To accommodate the needs of the Canadian within the North American organization, Toyota also launched a new website, www.Toyotaforklift.ca. The website is hosted in both English and French and offers dealers and customers information about products and services specific to the Canadian market.

The sale of Landcruiser vehicles for use in Canadian mining operations remains with TCI.

Mentoring the Protégé

August 17, 2011

In a mentor-protégé relationship, helping the protégé understand the business and industry is crucial to their development.  Another opportunity lies in developing his or her ability to think critically and helping him or her determine what unique contribution they can make to the business.

How to Think

In a well-developed mentoring relationship, the mentor has the responsibility to help the protégé learn how to think.  Learning how to think goes beyond training the protégé on such things as what piece of equipment is appropriate for a given application, or how to procure and price parts or how to diagnose a hydraulic failure.  While this type of guidance is important to improving the protégé’s understanding of the business, it does little to help him or her deal with more complex situations.  A certain mental and emotional dexterity is required when complex employee and customer issues arise, such as difficult customer negotiations or inter-departmental turf battles.  It is in these situations where protégé can bring real value to the business by acting as the business-owner’s hands and feet deeper down in the organization.

A key part of this type of development requires the mentor to help the protégé understand and empathize with different perspectives.  We have many different stakeholders in our businesses—shareholders, customers, suppliers, staff and community. The protégé’s ability to understand the different objectives and points of view of all parties in a situation provides him or her with the altitude to see the entire landscape.  From this higher vantage point, the protégé oftentimes is able to bring unique solutions and tends to, although not always, bring together otherwise conflicting positions.  This capacity to see more can be a strategic advantage in developing win-win solutions.

So, what internal decision-making processes does the protégé currently possess? Is he or she able to hold just his or her view of a situation, or can he or she hold all the perspectives and still make informed, timely decisions?  Does the protégé have the ability to communicate in a way that everyone feels heard and their issues are appropriately addressed?  Does the protégé know when it’s appropriate to involve others and share the decision-making?  Does he or she know in which situations to gather information to make a decision on his or her own?  Does he or she understand that people have a certain “style”, mental capacity and way of seeing the world? Does he or she know how to adapt their communication style to match the audience?

It is the responsibility of the mentor to develop the staff’s skills so they know how to think through daily decision-making, as well as identify and respond to opportunities and threats to the business. In helping the protégé think through such situations, it oftentimes is best to ask questions to help them formulate different solutions. Simply telling them what to do misses the opportunity for the protégé to “exercise” their own discernment muscles.

Contribution to the Business

Another point to consider is that mentoring can help the protégé determine what unique contribution he or she is able to make to the business. We all have unique gifts, talents, experiences, educations and passions. A mentor can be a vital resource to the protégé in helping him or her see where their unique contribution lies. This is sometimes described as one’s unique “brand.”

Some things to consider are: Is the protégé technical and analytic or relational and people-oriented? Does the protégé have great tactical or strategic vision abilities? Does he or she favor a historical or future perspective? Does he or she prefer tried-and-true solutions or novel and creative ideas?

Helping the protégé discover their unique fingerprint and interests can be immensely powerful by providing them with a platform from which to lead. Conversely, it also helps them see where their natural blind spots lie. By adding this type of mentoring to the mentor-protégé relationship, the business-owner is able to share their deeper understanding and nuances on running the business, thereby leveraging themselves more effectively throughout the enterprise.

David Graffy, President of ProLift Industrial Equipment.

Extraordinary Leadership – A Big Hairy Audacious Goal

February 11, 2011

As I mentioned in the last post on this subject, we’ve been talking a great deal about leadership at ProLift. To steal a term from Collins and Pouzes Good to Great, I put out a Big Hairy Audacious Goal (“BHAG”).  I told our senior management team that I wanted 300 leaders at ProLift.  Yes, I want every single individual at ProLift to be a leader.  We can’t have 300 leaders, can we?  Who will do the critical and value-added work for our customers if everyone is a leader?  The answer is how you define leadership.   If I may ask a question, is every manager in your organization a leader?  Conversely, is every leader in your organization a manager?  What I’m attempting to tease apart is that you don’t need to be a manager to show up as a leader.   

Further, in our last blog we separated leadership tasks from what is the nature of a leader.   Certainly, there are leadership tasks and responsibilities that fall to management, such as establishing the vision, clarifying and honing the culture, developing strategy and the like.  However, if we can hold our traditional definition of leadership a little lighter, we can see how our 300 associates of ProLift can be leaders.

First, my BHAG challenge was not to have all ProLift associates doing leadership tasks, although to some extent we may participate in them.  My real challenge is to have all of us “show up” as leaders.  In other words, we show-up knowing who we are and what our gifts, talents and aptitudes are.  Further, we know what we are interested in, what charges us up, what energizes us and what we are passionate about.  We also know and understand that fundamentally we are all in relationship with each other.  This applies to whether the context is a family, a work setting, a customer-supplier dynamic, a community, whatever.  Let me say it again – a leader understands that we are fundamentally in relationship with each other.  As such, we understand that using our gifts and passions somehow in the service of this relationship is what brings us and others happiness, joy, fulfillment and meaning and at work it also brings us a paycheck, benefits and potentially future opportunities.

So, what would it look like if each of us was clear about who we are AND showed-up at work using all of this in the service of each other and our customers?  Imagine for a moment what it would be like if your role at work took full advantage of your gifts, talents and interests.   Would you be more engaged?  Would you be more committed?  Would our customers, owners, suppliers, fellow associates and communities see the difference if we all did this?

I don’t wish to sound Pollyanna-ish.  I understand that it is unlikely that our role responsibilities will exactly mirror who we are and what we have to offer, but it is also unlikely that even in your current role there isn’t some over-lap.  This is where we, as individuals, have control. We choose how much to invest at work, in our families and with our friends, don’t we? 

Here are a few ideas on how to start this conversation with your company or staff:

  1. What do I do that is extraordinary?  Don’t be shy, be bold – you have gifts and talents others don’t have.
  2. Which of these gifts and talents is the most fun to use or energizes you the most?
  3. How can you bring more of the above into your work duties and role?

Extraordinary Leadership … letting your brillance shine

October 26, 2010

Recently we’ve been talking about leadership at ProLift.  In fact, we have several groups in leadership training right now.  Typically, our training has focused on hard-skills, such a technical training for our technicians and product training for our account reps and parts specialists.  We have conducted several soft-skill classes on customer service and the like.  However, the leadership workshops are a different animal.  One of the ideas that emerged during our advanced leadership training was that there are two parts to leadership. 

The first part deals with what leaders do.  For example, leaders ensure a vision and strategy are in place.  Additional examples include making sure the organization’s values and ethics are adhered to and that staff are coached and developed.  But part two is different.  This part was much more difficult to get our hands-around.  Nevertheless, it seems to attend to “who is the leader?”  Stated differently, how does the leader show-up at work and in the world?  Extraordinary leaders appear to possess an intangible quality that attracts our attention.  Like a diamond, extraordinary leaders have a depth and clarity that allows their unique character to shine brilliantly.  It is beyond being merely charismatic.  There’s a groundedness, congruence and integrity to extraordinary leaders such that we want to follow them.  Isn’t this the real measure of an extraordinary leader – our willingness, no, our eagerness to follow them? 

Extraordinary leaders appear willing to act courageously even if it is not popular or politically-correct to do so. They speak powerfully from their experience, and with humility to explore alternatives.  These leaders have an emotional and psychic bandwidth that allows them to respond from a higher altitude in spite of stresses and pressures put upon them.  They have a sense of self that makes them extraordinary listeners.  In fact, sometimes I wonder where their ego is hiding, or even if it has much say with this level of leader. 

In our leadership program we’ve been discussing how to develop this capacity.  While accomplishing this level of development almost feels like a herculean effort, there is one rather simple-sounding thing we all can all do.  It sounds almost too simple, but in fact it is quite difficult.  This one thing is to “pay attention.”  Yes, that’s it, just pay attention.   Why is paying attention so pivotal? Because paying attention provides us with a moment to choose how to respond versus our habitual reacting to situations and people.  It gives us choices beyond what we’ve been trained and accustomed to.  Paying attention essentially slows time.  Further, if you pay enough attention, you will likely know what your interests, abilities, skills and values are and how they can assist you and others move your organization, family and community forward.   So, give it a try . . . pay attention and make your choices deliberately.

Here are a few ideas on how to start this conversation with your company or staff:

  1. Hold a non-mandatory “brown bag” lunch with your management team and ask them what defines an extraordinary leader – or stated differently, ask them who would they’d like to follow and why.
  2. At your next management meeting ask your managers to describe a problem they had within the past month that was solved differently than how they’ve solved similar problems in the past.
  3. Provide training on “active listening” and then role-model the skill for your team.  Follow that up by describing to your team what you heard during the role-play that you didn’t fully understand or appreciate before.
  4. Next time a member of your staff asks you a question, reply by asking them what they’d recommend as the course of action. Pay attention to  what they value and the complexity of their thought process and then coach them into understanding more perspectives.

Contributed by David Graffy, President of ProLift Industrial Equipment

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