Leadership Jam 2006: Building up Your Destroyers

Have you ever met a builder? How about a destroyer? We’re not talking construction workers here; rather, the two types of employees that all companies encounter: the upbeat team players and those that seem to bring everyone around them down with them. These two groups of people – particularly the destroyers – were the focus of a talk given by Jim Paluch and Bob Coulter, president and consultant, respectively, with JP Horizons, Cleveland, Ohio, during the organization’s 2006 Leadership Jam in Columbus, Ohio.

“Builders are the individuals on your team that come to work with big smiles and open eyes and ears because they enjoy their jobs and they’re there to continue to learn how to do them better,” Paluch explained to the 90 attendees. In addition to having attitudes focused on continued learning, Builders appreciate people, express a great attitude, set goals and keep going until they reach them; they don’t quit. Destroyers, on the other hand, aren’t so easy to work with.

“We all have them in our companies,” Paluch says of the individuals known as Destroyers. “Sometimes we keep them around because they’ve been there forever, and sometimes they have great natural talents that we want to benefit from, but they’ve developed bad habits that don’t match our company culture. The key is to coach these individuals and turn them into builders for your company.”

So, what defines a Destroyer? Generally, a lot of negative feelings, but more specifically, Paluch says Destroyers are frustrated with five specific triggers: Company management, other employees, customers, money and their own families. According to Paluch, these negative feelings often begin with the employee’s own poor self-image, which gives them a bad attitude and creates a cycle of negativity.

“Destroyers dislike management and most of the other people they interact with, but they often dislike themselves the most, which creates a vicious cycle,” he explains. “For instance, Destroyers complain about money because they feel like they’re not being paid what they’re worth. At the same time, they’re negativity is keeping them from being productive, which means they aren’t on a path to earn a pay raise. The more they complain about money, the less productive they’ll be come, and they less they’ll be worth to the company.” 

BUILDING UP DESTROYERS. In addition to simple actions like complimenting destroyers (difficult as it may be) and making them feel good about themselves and their work, Coulter says the right coaching approach can help turn Destroyers around to benefit the company.

“Leadership is about helping people on their journey, but you have to adjust your management style depending on the employee’s level of experience,” Coulter explains. “If you have a new employee without a clear idea of his or her responsibilities – someone who doesn’t know what a ‘win’ will look like for them or the company, that’s going to take a much more directed level of management than someone with knowledge and experience that just needs to change their attitude about the job and the company.”

Coulter says coaching employee and helping them to be successful hinges on a five-point performance plan.

1. Establish a shared vision of success. “A vision of success creates a picture of where you’re going as a company and where you want the employee to go,” Coulter says. “The key is that you and the employee have to agree on what that vision is as well as of where they are right now, professionally. If they don’t agree on those points, the coaching won’t work; without a desire to win, there won’t be any motivation.”

Paluch noted an interesting quote from Dan Ariens, president of Ariens Co., a sponsor of the JP Horizons Leadership Jam 2006: “People will change, or people will change,” he said. That is, coaching will help show an employee how to change their attitude or employers will take steps to show Destroyers the door.

2. Define guidelines and boundaries. Coulter says spelling out the rules of the game will help everyone play fair and know what success looks like. “Employees need to know what’s right and wrong so they know what actions are appropriate and inappropriate,” Coulter says. “Rules don’t have to be negative – they just have to help people be successful.” For example, if company rules say crewmembers must arrive by 7:30 a.m., everyone can agree that coming in by 7:15 is a success, whereas coming in at 7:35 is inappropriate.

3. Provide tools and resources. Beyond providing the right equipment, vehicles and forms to fill out, Coulter says employers need to start seeing themselves as resources for their employees. “Employee’s won’t succeed just because you want them to – they’ll succeed when you show them how to,” he says.

4. Ensure accountability. Believe it or not, Coulter says, people will critique themselves more critically than even a supervisor could. Why? Because they know both what the standards are for quality on a job and where they worked (or didn’t work) to meet them. “Before you apply this to your employees, remind yourself that you are the most important person you need to hold accountable,” Coulter says. “People will be highly critical on self-inspections and as a result productivity will go through the roof. Think of what your organization would look like if everyone was fully accountable to themselves and took actions to change their performance to meet their own expectations.” Coulter notes that watching individuals inspect their own work can give clues regarding what they find important.

5. Allow the natural consequences. Just like knowing the rules of the game, “everyone wants consequences,” Coulter says. Moreover, he notes that consequences must be in place for great, good and poor performance. “‘Consequence’ doesn’t necessarily translate to punishment,” he reminds. “It could be as simple as outlining how the company will benefit when employees follow through on their actions and succeed.” Consequences must be in place for great, good and poor performance, Coulter says, adding that walking employees through a full set of consequences is most helpful in underlining the importance of having rules and goals in the first place. “If an employee comes in late, having consequences doesn’t just mean writing them up or filing something in their personnel file,” he says. “Explain to them that it also means their crew has to leave late because of them, that now they might have to work late to make up the lost time, or that quality on the job will suffer if they don’t apply the appropriate number of labor hours to the job, which ultimately creates unhappy customers and reflects poorly on the company.”

Whether positive or negative, Coulter says it’s essential to fully outline the mutual benefits for the employee and the company when something goes right, as well as explaining mutual consequences when they don’t. “Some behaviors should be universal, but every employee needs to know how those behaviors are specific to their roles in the company and how not exhibiting those behaviors impacts the company as much – if not more – than it impacts themselves,” Coulter says. “Define what a ‘win’ looks like for your employees and help them understand how to achieve that goal.”