Why removing toxic staff needs to be done right away

Don’t be afraid to let go of that skilled technician who is making life miserable for you and everyone else in your shop.

Choosing to hang on to them is creating an untenable work environment that will end up with your other good staff walking out the door, warned Rick White, president of 180Biz.

“The hardest thing we’re going to do as a shop owner is to release a toxic top performer,” he said in Kansas City during the presentation Business Boss Leader: From Creeper to Leader at the Mid-West Auto Care Alliance’s Vision and Hi-Tech Training Expo.

The longer you keep that employee, the more you’re telling staff that sales are more important than the work environment and culture. Money should not be the standard in your shop, White advised.

You can allow that toxic employee the opportunity to change their ways. “But then it’s their choice,” White said. “I have to have a standard that’s more important than that person or the sales they’re going to generate.”

And it needs to be done swiftly. He’s been through this. He had a toxic tech who would bill 50-60 hours a week. He was highly skilled and meticulous. One day, the service advisor couldn’t find the tech. Turns out, the tech was upset with the advisor and went home. White and the tech talked it through. White was told it wouldn’t happen again. The tech was told if it did, they’d be out of the shop. Three weeks later, the tech did it again. The next day, White had his stuff packed up. The tech thought the initial conversation was a joke.

“And how many of you were at the shop four o’clock that morning waiting to fire’em because you couldn’t sleep? So I was at the shop real early,” White recalled. “And I hate firing people. It sucks.”

But when you do get rid of that problematic employee, you’ll be surprised at what will happen next, he added.

“Everybody else steps up and all of a sudden the shop’s a fun place to be out again,” White noted.

The rest of the staff breathes a sigh of relief. They come to the owner asking what took so long. They’re happy to be in the shop with the toxic personality gone. Because the shop owner doesn’t see everything happening on the floor — the employees live and work with the behaviour daily.

“Other guys came up to me afterwards and said, ‘What took you so long?’ Because they saw stuff I did not see,” White said. “If you’ve got somebody like that [who gives you] that little pit in your stomach when you think about it, it’s time to let them go.”

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