Can a person be too aggressive?
There are many different roles when it comes to a job, and depending on the job that is being performed the job title differs. Tom Parker was a man that enjoyed working outdoors. He has had almost every job one can have when it comes to being outdoors. At the age of 43, he acquired a job with Artic Mining Consultants. With this new job he is responsible for hiring, training, and supervision field assistants for all of the programs. Many of the programs are operated by a project manager who then reports to Parker. On this specific job, himself and his field assistants had to stake a claim, the project team marks a line with flagging tape and blades along the perimeter of the claim, cutting the claim every 500 yards. The 15 claims would require almost 60 miles of line total. The men that were on the job were- John Talbot, Greg Boyce, and Brian Miller, all of which have previously worked with parker. Parker told the crew on the first night that if they got the job finished in a week they would all receive an additional 300 dollars. He told them that he knew that it would be hard work, but he knew they could do it. Each man would have to put up 7 and 1/2 lengths. To his surprise, some of the men could not hold up to that standard. They were only able to get up around 6 a day, if that. As many can probably tell, Parker was not a happy guy about all of that. So he screamed at them every night, telling them that they are pretty much useless and how one man can finish his work and the others can’t. The men were getting flustered and started to not care. They knew that they were not going to finish the job in time so why would it matter to try. It was finally finished on the beginning of day eight, and not to their surprise, they did not received the bonus. Yes the job was done, but none of the men were happy. And unfortunately for parker, not all of the men came back to work for him ever again.
There are many ways that Parker could have had authority over the workers. He chose to tell them what to do, and if it was not done the way it was supposed to, or if some of the men could not finish all of their work, he would resort to screaming and threatening which is not a good way to handle the work. Because of that, he would be considered a micro-manager. According to Merriam-Webster Dictionary, a Micro-Manager is defined as “to try to control or manage all of the small parts of (something, such as an activity) in a way that is usually not wanted or that causes problems). And that right there is something that Parker did, he controlled the way the employees handled their work and then instead of helping them correct their problem and teaching them how to work faster but still put out a good amount of work, he yelled and screamed and went on hoping that they would understand and fix the problem. And to his surprise that just held them back.
There two ways that Parker could have been a better supervisor for the three other employees. One would be to delegate the responsibility, then trust the workers that they will perform the job. One other would be to know the strengths of the employees. Some may not be able to perform as fast as others because of different factors, but understanding their strength allows the boss to align his motives with his/hers goals within the workplace.
We are going to first start off on how a boss can delegate responsibility and from that, having the confidence to trust their employees. In this specific example, Parker could be seen as a micro-manager. When Parker sees the progress of work from day to day, he only hears the numbers that were done, he does not go on the job and look at how the terrain could look, if the land was hilly, a valley, full of trees or bushes, and with those factors can slow or speed up how one of his employees works. One employees can put up 8, whereas another will only be able to put up 6, on paper or through words that can be seen as a big difference but if he were to look at how much rubble could have been in their way, he would better understand why there were only able to put up so much. If Parker would have given his men the proper training on how to succeed and how to perform their best then maybe the men would be able to get up as much as he wanted them too. Parker does not realize that different people have different approaches, and even though he was giving each of them the same work they could have been all doing their work in a different way. One way that Parker could have made sure that the work was done, would be to show them the most efficient way that he would like it to be done, once a good method is in place, then if something were to go wrong he would not be as upset. Instead of Parker forcing his way on to everyone, he should have given an honest evaluation to each employees method, and if it does not work as well as he thought it could, then show them a way that would allow them to play with their strengths. Yelling and threatening will get him nowhere, it will just aggravate the employees and they will most likely not finish their work. Constantly correcting others undercuts their confidence and does not allow them to exercise their own style that they are comfortable with. Yes, it could have been done in a week, but it didn’t. Yelling and telling the employees that they are not worth it is not the way to go. If he would have handled it in the correct way, then he would have every employee still working with him, and they would all be content and happy with working on a similar job with the hopes of receiving a bonus and getting the work done on time.
Another technique that Parker could have incorporated into the workplace would be to know his employees and each of their strengths. A good boss, watches their staff, and gets to know them as individuals. It allows them to enhance, align, and adjust their motives with the supervisor’s roles. This could also have been used with the several employees he brought on during this project. After several days passed, all three of the men started to slack off slightly because of the fact that they knew that they would most likely not finish the work on time. If they were encouraged instead of brought down, the way the group handled the situation as a team would have been different. Encouragement is a great tool to use when a project has to be accomplished in a certain amount of time. It allows each member of the team to work harder and the boss will usually see more results when they work as a team. Parker is a supervisor that has seen, heard, and lived through it all when it comes to the outdoors, so he has a certain standard when it comes to the amount of work that is supposed to be tackled in a day. And if he were to use encouragement as a tool for success, then he may have seen the results that himself and his team wanted.
There are many supervisors that use different techniques to get the job done, Parker can be seen as a good boss, but the way he handles situations are not the best for the employees that he brought on. The best way would be to trust the employees, and delegate the responsibility. There are some pros and cons when it comes to allowing the employees to handle the situation themselves. Some pros would be it allows the employees to be under no stress, they will be able to perform the best when they know no one is breathing down their neck trying to hold them back. It also shows that the boss trusts them and with that the employee will do anything to show the employer that he or she will do anything to get the job done. Maintaining trust requires other skills as well. It also means that the employees is willing to take the responsibility for his or her mistakes when they occur without evasion or getting blame for something. It also gives the employee an opportunity to come talk to the supervisor if they need help. It is not a bad thing to ask for help, and in this situation, the employees that were not putting out as much work as they needed too should have asked for it. It would have brought the team together to complete the task every day. But with all of the pros, comes cons. While it is great to be considered a trustworthy employee, building that trust with a supervisor isn’t always fun. When earning trust, it often means that they have to reveal information about their performance that they would have not known. To retain trust, the employee has to complete the task that was given to them and what they committed too. Unfortunately, that task could mean long hours of working when they would rather be doing something else. Reliable employees can sometimes be rewarded with more and more work because of the fact that the boss knows it will get done. The employee can become overburdened with their work, compared to their less-trustworthy coworkers.
Even though there are some cons, when being a trustworthy employee, the pros outweigh all of them. Why would an employee not want to be trusted, that gives them no room to grow in the business and they are usually looked as being a lazy person and not able to perform the task. Even though the employee that is trusted has a heavy work flow, with time that will all calm down. And if they go to their employer and explain that they appreciate the work but it is beginning to be a lot, most of the time, the employer will understand and help them get through the rest. That right there is another way an employee will be respected and trusted in a workplace.
Tom Parker is an employer that likes to see progress on a day to day basis. He uses his skills in the workplace but does not show his employees his skills. With that, causes problems. There are many other men working on the same job as him, and everybody might have a different way of working and getting the job done. With that, Parker never learned the other ways to work in the field. All he did was push the employees to work harder and harder every day. In some cases this can be a good thing, but in this case, it made the employees not work as hard and become hostel to their boss. They were so used to being torn down they did not care to try anymore. If Parker were to change his attitude towards the work that was being done, then the way the employees acted and felt would have been different. They would have had a good time working with one another and they would start working as a team. As stated above, the preferred solution would be to trust the employees. There are many pros to this solution, but there are also some cons. With the cons, there are many ways that Parker could have addressed them. He could have told the staff that if they had any problems, to come talk to him. That they would all work out a solution to get the job done in a week. Tell them that this is a team job, if someone has a problem or is not able to work at the pace of the others, to ask if someone could teach them a different technique. Lastly, every night when they finished for the day and told Parker the results, instead of each of them getting yelled at because they did not finish, show them a good way to finish and keep up the pace throughout the day. These are just simple steps that Parker and his crew could have taken to have become successful in the workplace. Unfortunately that is not how it went down and because of that there were consequences to the entire staff. They were not able to finish on time, and throughout the time they were working they did not enjoy their stay. Working should be fun and enjoyable and if Parker would have trusted his employees, their time working for them would have been different.

Work Cited
Merriam-Webster. Merriam-Webster, n.d. Web. 01 Apr. 2015
McShane, S. L. and Von Glinow, M. A. (2012) Organizational behavior. United States:
McGraw Hill Higher Education.