I get a chuckle when I hear the narrative around “can’t find people who want to be a diesel technician”. I’ve heard it since the day I started my career in 2004. The same message persists today. Nothing has changed. I find it counterproductive to try and blame individuals by questioning work ethic and calling generations lazy. Many topics aren’t that complicated–people respond to incentive structures. The main reason why the technician labor pool has been lagging behind is purely economical.

I’ve wanted to write something on this topic for a while and Tom Brady’s retirement presented the perfect opportunity. I’m not surprised at many sports stats, but this graphic highlighting Brady’s excellence in his 40s compared to his 20s blew me away. More TD passes from the age of 40–46 than in his 20s? Ridiculous.

Every marketplace founder yearns for the ‘Magic Moment’, when your marketplace works just as intended. Fortunately for us at Heave, we’ve had a few magic moments in January that reminded me of the inherent advantages of independent technicians.

When you’re the ‘small guy’ you can think differently. Everyone knows the words ‘disruptor’ and ‘innovator’. Building an independent technician network in the heavy equipment space is pretty innovative, but it’s not crazy. What’s crazy is opening up our service marketplace for construction companies to farm out their own technicians to other contractors!

Independent technicians are the backbone of the Heave service app. Some customers have experience with independent techs, but they are largely invisible to the overall market. Independent technicians consist of formerly OEM/dealer trained mechanics who’ve gone out on their own or ones that learned the trade and never wanted to go work for a dealer. Every independent technician on the Heave marketplace has the current software needed to access the major brand’s computer systems and the majority have their own truck with a crane. Companies such as Diesel Laptops broke the software barrier for these individuals to exist as an alternative to traditional dealer service.

Ask construction customers about equipment dealer service. The answers won’t be pretty. In my opinion there are four reasons why dealer service is poor: company culture, economics, labor pool shortage, and a lack of competition.