An Interview with RVTI's Bill Stewart
By Tony Yerman, RV Fixed Operations Consultant for the Mike
Molino RV Learning Center,
As published in RV Executive Today, September 2021. This column is a memorium to Bill, who passed away March 14, 2025.
For complete information on RVTI programs, click here.
Recently, I sat down with Bill Stewart, the education director
for the RV Technical Institute (RVTI). I have known Bill for around 15 years and had the
opportunity to work with him while I was consulting for an Ohio dealership.
After a little reminiscing, we got down to business and I asked some questions
to get a feel for who Bill is and what his plans are.
Q: Your background included a few dealers as I recall. I
worked with you at All Season’s in Ohio and then you went to another Ohio
dealership, right?
A: Yes, I went to Clay’s RV, then worked with Fleetwood and
got sent to Walt Michael’s in Michigan. There I worked with their service and
legal departments.
Q. Was your experience at these dealers limited to service
or did you try your hand in other departments?
A: After Michigan, I went to Best Buy RV where I was
general manager at two locations. Back at All Seasons in Ohio, I worked as a
sales manager. Just before coming to RVTI, I worked for General RV and did tech
training.
Q: After working for all of these dealers, did you notice
much difference in the working culture, in how different departments worked
with different owners?
A: Yes, every dealer was different. Working at different
places and for different people was an education in itself.
Q: I ask about working at the different dealers to see if
you’d received any insight on how these people worked with Repair Event Cycle
Time or RECT. This is on everybody’s mind these days. What do you think can be
done from the dealer tech side to shorten this RECT and to keep customers
happy?
A: At General RV we had what was called, “Keep you camping.”
If a customer called and had an issue that would keep them from camping, they
would bring the unit in, and that issue would be a priority to the point where
parts were next day aired in. If the issue was cosmetic like a tear in vinyl
flooring, that wouldn’t keep them from camping.
Q: How will RVTI training help technicians reduce RECT?
A: Technicians need to be trained to understand diagnostics
and actually repairing an RV. They need to understand principles and know
sequence of operation to efficiently and quickly diagnose problems. I’ve run
across a lot of technicians who have really good intentions but just haven’t
had training. I want to be able to change a person’s life. I feel that RVTI has
the program to offer a person a chance at a real career.
Q: I’ve noticed, in my experience with techs, that some are simply parts replacers. They put new pieces in until the problem goes
away.
A: That’s very true. That’s why I preach about the sequence
of operation. The problem may not be a part at all. Maybe a bad ground in
electrical or low pressure in LP.
They need to understand how things operate and what they need.
Q: We’ve talked about warranty work and how much it pays.
Are you teaching technicians anything about their own time management? Will you
be showing them what to do if a warranty flat rate gives a certain amount of
time and they know they can’t get it done in the time given?
A: Again, I think that if they know how things operate, it
won’t take them as much time to make repairs. There may be some adjustments
that need to be made to some warranty times and that has to be addressed with
the manufacturer. If the tech gets a good write up from the service writer, it
also makes it easier for the tech to find the problem in less time.
Q: In the Mike Molino RV Learning Center courses, we teach
about communicating with customers, technicians, and manufacturers. A service
writer needs to be able to cmunicate a customer’s concerns to the tech and
the tech’s issues to the warranty administrator or parts department. I’ve heard
a lot of complaints when a service writer might quote a customer one hour but
doesn’t communicate it to the tech. The tech runs into other related issues,
fixes everything, and hands in a time ticket for eight hours. Do you talk to
techs about times?
A: I try to teach technicians that if they can’t complete a
repair or diagnose a problem in a half hour, they need to stop and talk to
someone. What needs to be made certain is that there are labor times on the
repair order from the service writer to the technician. There needs to be a
goal for each repair.
Q: With what you know about RVTI and their program, what
are your plans as the education director for the direction of RVTI?
A: This program has been in development for about two years
and was pretty much restarted from scratch. The people involved in this
development have created a good program. I feel that it just needs some fine
tuning and that’s what I intend to do. I believe that most technicians aren’t
readers, they are doers. They want to be hands on and actually perform the
diagnostics and repairs. We now have online courses for Level 1 certification
and a hybrid course for Level 2. The interactive, online courses have the tech
read and then perform the operation in a step by step process. For example,
wheel bearing packing. The student has to put a floor jack under and lift the
unit, then set safety jack stands, then remove the dust cover, and so on. If he
doesn’t place the safety stand he can’t remove the dust cover. My hope is that
he will remember this process.
Q: Any final thoughts you’d like to convey?
A: My hope is to make a difference and to make RVTI the
place to get trained. I want to make sure that we turn out technicians that can
earn money for their dealer and themselves. I really want to make sure they are
trained to do their jobs efficiently and with care for the safety of the
customer as a priority. That can only be done with good training and proper
repairs.
For complete information on RVTI programs, click here.