Stephen Palmer stepped into the role of IAG’s senior manager of industry development back in April (2015), but he's hardly wet behind the ears as Sam Street discovered.
Palmer has a wealth of industry experience and has clocked up 29 years at NRMA. He started out in a small rural community in Gilgandra north of Dubbo, NSW in a workshop that offered panel beating, spray painting and mechanical repair. While he enjoyed spray painting he chose the path of a mechanical apprenticeship and is a self-confessed petrol head.
In 1986 he became a NRMA assessor working out of the Dubbo office. “After working for 5 years in that area I moved to Tamworth as the Branch Assessing Manager then Coffs Harbour, then Newcastle - the size of operations got bigger with each move.”
Palmer has held different roles in the organisation including operations manager of motor assessing for Victoria and is currently based in Melbourne.
Reflecting on his first impressions of the new role Palmer said: “With my experience, this is a great opportunity to oversee the strategic relationships with smash repairers, property, niche and commercial products.
My ultimate goal is to strive to build on all that good work we've already done in developing our partner relationships, be they in motor or property.
“We're just looking for opportunities to continue to evolve that relationship with our partners, to improve trust,” Palmer said. “The greater the trust we have in our mutual partnerships, the better off both of us will be in working together to create customer solutions.
“I have an opportunity to listen and then listen some more. I’ll be asking the industry what the key issues are and then working through those issues and seeing what opportunities will be beneficial in this competitive market.
“It is really important today that everything we do is customer-centric. If the customer isn’t at centre of everything we do, then we will fail.
“We're working in really quite an interesting time at the moment. We're trying to deliver solutions to a market that has a wide demographic. We have to be careful we don't head down a path of one size fits all. There has to be a breadth of opportunity so that everybody gets that special service.”
When asked what he sees as the qualities of a good repairer, Palmer thinks it is having a genuine appetite for change.
“Whether we like it or not the smash repair industry in Australia is a small cottage industry-type market and as such benefits from working collaboratively with insurance companies.
“However, today's climate demands that there is greater efficiency and greater effectiveness in the way that we all complete our work. Our policyholders demand that of us so that they can buy the product at a reasonable price. It’s simple - if we don’t sell policies we have less work to give to repairers.
“At the same time there have been huge technological advances in the way vehicles are repaired and the products that are available to effect those repairs. On top of that, there are processes to utlise these products to the fullest potential.
“ It's my role to talk to all about those technologies, products and processes to produce the opportunity for efficiencies and mutual benefits with industry.”
Palmer cites three short term goals for his new role. Firstly getting the ball rolling on a national quoting system, secondly encouraging new blood for the industry via NRMA’s Autopath initiative in New South Wales and “continuing to strive to work with our partners so that we exceed the expectations of our customers”.
“The market needs a quoting system package that's nationally consistent and suits all, I feel that's something that we should really strive towards,” Palmer said.
A nationally consistent system would be beneficial for the whole Australian market place. We’re talking to a range of insurers and industry bodies to sound them out about how we get to that point. It’s not a straightforward exercise because everyone has a strong view. The signs are increasingly that people want this to come about, whereas before there has been reluctance.
“Now there's an opportunity because there seems to be an appetite for a national system.
“Such a system would take away a lot of the anxiety, debate, dispute in the marketplace because the industry - both repairer and insurers - would agree on that national system. I think it is the best way to go forward.”
“We're also working on Autopath in New South Wales which is designed to tweak the interest of children/young adults at high school about career opportunities in the auto industry and not wait until they get to apprenticeship age. That really is fundamental,” Palmer said.
Repair plans
The future direction of the industry is Palmer's prime concern, he points to the increasing European vehicle presence in Australia with its legislated collision avoidance features.
“We’re seeing a significant change in the way cars are manufactured and so there’s a significant change in the way they are repaired. In some cases there’s not a lot in the repair or the car will be written off altogether.
“The marketplace is changing and there will not be the capacity for the number of repairers we have currently - full stop.
“When we went through the RFP process Roy Briggs, the former head of supply chain, made it clear to all we encountered ‘it is not IAG’s responsibility to sustain your profitability in the market’. That’s what we really need to help people to understand.”
Open up Palmer's garage door and you will find a 1969 Camaro, an HSV GTO coupe, an SS V8 UTE, an HSV GTS and a Harley and he likes to tinker with them. Palmer keeps up to date with vehicle technology and feels that repair plans are crucial. It’s hardly surprising to find he is a huge supporter of I-CAR.
“I-Car fundamentally fits with all I’ve said and what I’ll be doing. As a non-profit organisation, what they have done is to deliver repair methodology that was non-accessible to the smash repair industry. I-CAR has become the alternative training in the smash repair industry – it doesn’t replace anything but it is an alternative.
We’ve really supported that and it’s been fundamentally part of our quality control framework from inception. Sixty percent of our assessors have a platinum I-Car status and that in itself is a significant achievement. This has helped the assessors’ confidence in terms of talking to the estimators about the correct methods of repair.”