Full disclaimer – if you take issue with women working in Automotive – leave now.
We have several professional women working for us. Our company is owned by a woman. You won’t find any of our employees questioning whether a woman can handle working on cars, or writing service. We hire professionals based on training, experience, and their ability to work under pressure yet maintain a polished attitude.
Unfortunately, that’s not how the majority of the automotive industry works. In industry circles, it’s still referred to as a ‘male-centric’ business. It’s been a hard road working towards the little gender equality we do have in automotive, and it looks like it’s still going to be tough.
But when you look at some of the top achievers in the last decade, several amazing women stand out.
Jamie Bullis recieves ASE Master Technician of the Year
People like Jamie Bullis – Bridgestone ASE Master Tech of the Year in 2014. Jamie was honored out of thousands of ASE Master Technicians for her exemplary professionalism, leadership, test scores and customer/community service.
Female leaders in car repair aren’t just limited to technicians, either.
Pioneers like Stephanie Lopez, a mechanic and owner at Woosters Garage in Wisconsin are leading the charge for women who have the technical know-how for automotive technology, and also the management skills to own a business.
Stephanie has been working on cars for almost 20 years now, and operates what is possibly, the only female-owned auto repair shop in Wisconsin.
An engineer works to program the Controller Area Network in a modern vehicle.
Nearly any female you talk to in the auto repair industry will be able to tell you – it’s tough. It’s not the work, or the knowledge, or the customers needs that are tough to handle. It’s repeated issues with second-guessing, doubt, or just plain disrespect that make it hard. But none of them are shirking from driving change.
From the standpoint of customers, most of you aren’t really concerned with what your mechanic looks like, or sounds like – you just want someone knowledgeable who gets the job done, and done correctly.
However, there are still a lot of customers, and professionals in the field; who seem to take serious issue when they encounter a woman working in auto repair.
Take this example, of a customer who, “Didn’t want ‘that chick’ working on his car.” In this example, there wasn’t anyone else trained and qualified to do the work! When you’re in this kind of scenario, sometimes it’s best to take Margaret Atwood’s advice, “If you can’t say anything nice, don’t say anything at all.”
Turns out, the ‘chick’ was his only chance of getting his vehicle fixed at all. Even when informed, the customer wasn’t willing to have a ‘girl’ touch his car, and left.
It’s not just limited to mechanics and technicians either.
Female counter personnel can suffer some of the exact same treatment. At one of our store locations, the manager is female. She is highly-trained, both technically,
ASE Certified Service Writer and Store Manager Macy Havens displays her certifications to brook no arguments.
and in management/service writing, with more than a decade of automotive experience. We still run into customers and service-professionals who ‘want to talk to the real manager.’
Auto repair is a highly challenging, and technically advanced field at this point. The automotive industry has seen a shift in the last several decades, from the grease-rag-holding mechanic shop – to often state-of-the-art technical facilities, capable of working on cars that may be worth more than half the cost of your home!
We aren’t arguing that any random person is capable of working on modern vehicles – because it’s simply not true.
Auto repair today requires expensive tools, advanced training, and can often require skills far outside typical automotive education. This means that automotive repair and maintenance services demand top level performers, however, these requirements have nothing to do with gender.
Medicine, accounting, engineering, software design, IT Management – these are all highly technical fields that require vast knowledge and skill – and women are widely accepted in these fields. Mechanic work is just as demanding, and rewarding, as any of these fields. Arguably, it is closest to the field of medicine, except the patients are cars & trucks instead of humans.
So why is it so difficult to accept women working on cars, and managing auto repair facilities?
We don’t have the answer, but we’re happy to be one of the teams working towards breaking out of the stereotype that automotive repair is a ‘male-centric’ industry.
