Embodying Dealer Performance: Adam Krey

The Embodying the Strategic Priorities series aims to highlight employees ingrained in the day-to-day work involved in executing and advancing the priorities. The employees profiled in this series are not strategic priority leads or champions.

International’s dealers are front and center of our business. When a customer enters a dealership, every part of their interaction can leave a lasting impression, from the amount of time a repair takes to a simple greeting from dealer personnel. The Dealer Performance strategic priority emphasizes the importance of aligning International’s dealers with our brand promise of moving our customers forward and working as one network.

For Adam Krey, manager, Dealer Development & Continuous Improvement, his 14 years at International have been focused on the vast universe our dealers dominate, immersing himself in Dealer Performance every day.

With a degree in automotive technology from Southern Illinois University (SIU), taking a turn toward the trucking industry was a shift Adam never expected but was rightly prepared for. For years, he worked side gigs in towing, as a repair technician in auto shops and even detailing cars. When an opportunity to work at International rose post-graduation, he jumped at the chance.

“I started as a contractor, then spent several years as a Repair Advocate (RA) analyst, a team dedicated to improving uptime through maintenance, and eventually led the team,” said Adam. “I spent a lot of time on the phone, being that important touchpoint for our dealers, helping improve uptime for some of our biggest fleets.”

But when Adam made a shift to field service manager, he truly found his niche. Being in the field, driving from dealer to dealer, and seeing their operations in person had the gears in his brain constantly turning with new ideas. This is where the importance of dealer performance really began to take hold, and Adam knew the secret sauce for getting dealers invested too.

“Relationships drive everything on the dealer side of the business, especially performance,” he emphasized. “Coming from the corporate side, you have to strike a balance to help dealers understand the OEM [original equipment manufacturer] is there to help as best we can.”

Adam understood better than anyone that coming from a technical-driven background and being popped into a business operations-heavy position involves a lot more than taking a class or learning on the job.

“Many of the service or parts managers are promoted because of their hard work, but without the business knowledge to be successful in their new role,” explained Adam. “We are asking them to improve overall dealer performance without telling them how. Sitting down and helping them understand business operations has resulted in so much continuous improvement and growth at their dealerships.”

In his current role, Adam is primarily focused on creating continuous improvement initiatives and performance improvement plans, both of which propel dealer profitability and enhance customer experience. Through constant coaching and mentoring, he has realized that this type of support is what drives true dealer performance.

“These men and women are a wealth of knowledge about subjects we can only scratch the surface of,” he said. “It is our job to approach them with humility and empathy, extending a helping hand. You can tell a service manager all day how important an hour of labor is to both his technicians and his customers. It’s when you give them the tools to break it down and understand that they really excel.”

In addition to his vast role in dealer operations, Adam holds a special place in his heart for the technical background that got him here. He sits on SIU’s automotive advisory council and has played a pivotal role in progressing their diesel program with the help of International-backed donations through the equipment donation program.

“Most technicians are very hands-on and visual learners. It is so much more valuable for them to work on real training aids to understand the scenarios they will encounter in the field.”

Adam’s mindset speaks volumes about Dealer Performance: dealers are our partners. Working hand-in-hand with International’s true partners, from helping build the next generation of technicians to teaching dealer personnel the ins and outs of business operations, co-creation is Adam’s secret sauce for success.