You can't turn a parked car

My wife watches my 2 yr old grandson while his mom teaches school. I often take him back to the school at the end of the day and wait for her to get out of class. If we get there a little early, my grandson likes to get out of his car seat in the back and sit in the “driver’s seat” up front. I used to keep the car running but quickly learned he activated every control on the car and turned the steering wheel wildly back and forth. I did not think that was good for the front tires, so now I turn the car off and he can’t turn the parked car.

I realized this concept is applicable to leadership as you can’t “turn a parked employee” either.? ?You may have an employee at work that has all the traits of a “parked car”. These are employees who have found their life is easier if they do nothing at all. They turn off “their car” and sit in “park.” These are usually employees with a long tenure with the company and slowly morph from a motivated employee to one who is content to bide their time, collect a pay check, and count the days until retirement. They are, in effect, retired in place. These employees did not start their career as parked cars, they slowly let off the gas pedal and started to coast to see if anyone noticed. They may have been energized employees at the start of their career, but lost motivation after a period of years. They tell themselves “I am not making a difference, or no one cares, why should I?”

Occasionally, a supervisor will see they are parked and ask them about it, but the supervisor quickly understands this employee has learned to wait it out and refuses to budge. This type of employee was famous as “Wally” in the Dilbert comic strip.? How do you as a supervisor get this employee out of “park” and driving down the road of productivity?

I was an Emergency Vehicle Operations instructor for many years. I taught that vehicles need movement to effectively turn. Forward or backward movement is required to get a car to go in a different direction. The slower the vehicle is moving, the greater the steering input from the driver is needed to get the desired effect. “Parked” employees also need movement to go somewhere. This is where leadership comes in. I start off with a conversation with the employee to gain an understanding of what is negatively affecting their ability to be productive. Is it something I can mitigate or remove obstacles that hinder that employee from being productive? This conversation can be supportive and non-confrontational in tone. As a supervisor, it is your responsibility to understand and care for your employees to meet the organizational mission and goals. These are conversations most people want to avoid having with an employee, because they can be uncomfortable, but that is your responsibility as a supervisor in moving your team forward toward the common goal.? The other employees all know who is productive and who is not. When the static employees’ performance is not addressed, it negatively affects the morale and performance of other employees.? If “Wally” gets paid the same as other employees and does not have to work or earn it, it causes the other employees to slow down and work less as well. What do you do about the “parked” employee?

You need to break that employee free from their rut and get some movement. The strategy to get the parked employee moving in some direction takes effort, whether pushing or pulling the employee until some motion is detected. The supervisor builds on that motion until the employee finds it easier to “move” than stay in “park”. It takes a lot of energy to overcome the initial inertia, but once we have movement, then it requires less energy on the part of the supervisor to keep that momentum up. At the start of the process, it will take a lot of time and attention to get that one employee up to at least a minimum performance standard. Sometimes it is a change of assignment or squad. It might take a written work plan that results in discipline if performance goals are not met.

Employees who would rather not work hard, find the supervisor who allows that to occur. Often like-minded employees will all bid on the same shift with a supervisor who caters to their slothfulness and allows them to stay “parked” for the entire rotation. Hard charging and motivated employees who end up on a shift like this waste no time bidding off that shift as soon as possible, because they end up doing all the work assigned to that shift by themselves.

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On the other hand, the faster the employee is moving, the less input and direction is needed from the supervisor. The fast-moving employees, who are hard charging and working at a quick clip, need smaller driver inputs from the supervisor.? The experienced supervisor puts small inputs into the steering wheel of that employee and watches the effect those inputs have, because they know if the same input goes into the fast-moving employee as the slower moving employee, the fast-moving employee can spin out and crash. If the employee that is already motivated and being productive has a supervisor who comes along with a heavy hand or micromanagement style, they risk making a high performer into a “parked employee.” Too much steering on the racetrack causes the rear end of the car to spin out and crash.? Poor supervision can turn a productive employee into a parked employee. It is easy to identify the parked employee and the NASCAR employee, most of the employees will land somewhere in the middle. Each one needs to be evaluated and then determine how much direction they need to keep moving in a productive direction.

Is it an option to be a hands off supervisor and “let the Tesla” drive itself? The supervisor who does take their hands off the wheel will quickly find that the TESLA self-driving employee is a unicorn and that a complete hands-off approach will be doomed to failure and some crashing of employees will result. Being a supervisor is hard work. You will have employees that you inherited who are in perpetual “park” and others will be moving at Mach 1 and need minimal direction to be productive.

There is a reason the supervisors are paid a premium wage; it requires constant attention and effort to get those employees entrusted to you form a cohesive work team and be productive members of your organization. Evaluate your team and provide momentum to those who appear to be parked.? Provide only necessary input to those team members who are already traveling at top speed.? Keep your squad from becoming a parking lot or multiple car NASCAR pile up.