Trade Secrets

Motor,  Sep 2004  by Cerullo, Bob

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Managing your anger can be difficult, but it's essential to maintain shop morale. Remember, when you point the finger of blame, three more are pointing right back at you.

I recently happened in to a busy shop I visit often, at just the wrong time. Everyone was grim-faced and I could feel the tension in the air. My friend, Ae owner, took me aside and told me what was going on. The more he told me the more aggravated he became. It seems he wanted to close for three full days over a long holiday weekend. The shop is normally open a half-day on Saturday, but my friend wanted everyone, including himself, to have a full three days off.

He broached the idea to his crew of six technicians, and they were all eager for the time off. But they balked when he said they'd all be expected to work overtime Friday evening to get all the work done beiore the holiday. He didn't want to stick any customer without a car for the three-day weekend. My friend became angry because he felt the crew wasn't being fair. One thing led to another, and by the time I arrived on the scene, he had given his crew an ugly ultimatum: Anyone who didn't stay to finish the work on Friday was fired.

Its not surprising that in the midst of his anger he used the phrase "you're fired." Thanks in part to the very successful TV show The Appfgniice, "You're fired!" has become a catch phrase of the day. But what works for Donald Trump on TV shouldn't he used in a heated discussion in a shop...or in any workplace.

The vast majority of technicians in modem, successful auto repair shops are highly skilled professionals who should not and will not stand tor being treated like some group of day lalx)rers grateful for a day's work and willing to put up with anything for the work.

For example, let's say you get a call irom a customer who has just had work done on his cooling system. He IeA your shop about two hours earlier and is now pulled over on the side of the highway with steam billowing out from under the hood. You jump into your pickup and rush out to aid the customer. By the time you get there, the steaming has stopped and you discover that the tech who did the job ibrgot to reinstall the radiator cap. The overheating might have damaged a head gasket.

In the heat of the moment, you might feel justified in calling the tech a moron, a jerk, stupid or something worse. You wonder how he could have been so careless. He might have ruined the engine. And he might have cost you a good customer.

The reality is that he did not do it intentionally. It was a mistake. Cursing at or threatening a tech only makes matters worse and takes the problem to another level. The issue becomes your cursing or threats and the actual mistake becomes secondary. The technician is likely to transfer his anger at himself for making the mistake to you for making it an excuse to curse him out.

The smart tiling to do in such a case is to turn the situation into a learning experience. Instead of berating the tech, you might consider saying something like: "I know you did not do it intentionally; it was a mistake. But let's you and I put our heads together and figure out how to prevent this from ever happening again."

The shop owner who often threatens to fire a technician if he doesn't do something he's supposed to do or makes a careless mistake is creating a very unprofessional atmosphere. While it might not be a serious threat-just the anger talking-it's the wrong tiling to do. There are many employees who may take a threat more seriously than its intended to be and may anguish over it for days. No one wants to work under the threat of being fired for simply making a mistake.

In the long ran, frequent threats of firing undermine the loyalty of even the most trusted employees. Technicians like to believe that if they do the job required of them and come to work on time, they shouldn't have to be worried about being fired. The more skilled a technician becomes, the more independent he becomes. He knows there is now a tremendous demand for skilled automotive technicians, and finding another job would not be too difficult.

A big part of keeping good technicians has to do with the atmosphere in the shop. If a technician knows he'll be treated with respect, he's more likely to be happy. If not, when an opportunity comes along for that technician to try another shop where he would be treated as a professional, the tech would be more apt to leave. Over the years, I've heard many technicians who applied for a job in my shop complain about their previous employers' kick of respect. Money is important, and working conditions and hours are important, but being treated with respect is probably more important to most technicians than employers fully realize.

For any shop to prosper, there needs to be a team atmosphere where everyone pulls together to get the work done. The atmosphere in the shop generally reflects the attitude of the Ixiss. If the owner is quick to criticize a technician for a mistake in a negative way in front of everyone in the shop, that negativity will pervade the shop.