If you've spent any amount of time in the automotive industry, you know every season has its own rhythm, especially in the shop. Winter often provides time to come up for air. Summer is a different story altogether. Every bay is full, the phones never stop ringing, advisors are juggling customers, technicians are trying to beat the clock, and everyone is trying to stay one step ahead of the next repair order. In other words, “Welcome to the Thunderdome!” (That’s what it feels like sometimes, anyway!) It's easy to assume that summer simply adds stress to a shop. In reality, it usually does something that we don’t expect: it exposes the habits, systems, and leadership practices that were quietly, slowly developing before business picked up. To be clear, the busy season doesn’t exactly create leadership gaps. Instead, it shines a spotlight on them.

When Slow Seasons Create Bad Habits

During the winter months, a lot of shops settle into a comfortable routine. There’s finally time to catch up on shop projects, improve processes, schedule training events and  courses, and focus on personal development. Consider it our “nesting” phase of the year. All of these items are worthwhile investments because those investments benefit ourselves, each other, and our businesses. Priceless. The hard part is that it’s easy to become so hyper-focused on improvement projects that we unintentionally stop paying attention to the day-to-day health of our teams. Our internal blind spot monitoring system loses communication to our brains, while small habits begin to form in the shop. Policies become a little more forgiving. People become comfortable because the pressure isn’t being applied. An assistant manager spends a little too much downtime scrolling on their phone. A technician starts arriving five or 10 minutes late because no one seems to notice. Individually, these situations may not seem like a big deal in the moment, and a lot of them naturally correct themselves as business picks up. But not all of them do. Some habits turn into daily routines, and routines start to become part of the shop culture.

Then summer arrives.

Busy Doesn't Cause Problems—It Reveals Them

As temperatures climb, so does the workload, and our emotions. Preventative maintenance, vacations, road trips, custom jobs, accessories—customers are everywhere. Suddenly, every second matters. Teams are clocking in early and staying late to do everything they can to stay on schedule and keep the flow from bottlenecking. This is the time when leadership is absolutely needed. If the habits formed during slower months carry into the busiest time of the year, small issues develop into serious operational problems. That assistant manager who spent downtime isolated on a stool may now be unavailable when the team needs support the most. A lack of communication creates confusion. Technicians become frustrated while waiting for information or direction. Advisors struggle to manage customer expectations. Parts delays, backorders, authorizations, and workflow bottlenecks begin compounding. It’s not the pressure of being busy that creates these weaknesses. It just makes it harder to ignore. One of the easiest traps for leaders to fall into during a busy season is believing the answer is simply to work harder. Many shop owners naturally jump into production mode. They answer more phones, write more repair estimates, connect with more customers, and solve more problems in the moment. They work incredibly hard. But leadership isn’t supposed to be about how many fires you can put out. Sometimes, the best thing a leader can do is apply the brakes and slow down.

Why Leaders Need to Slow Down

That may sound counterintuitive during the craziest months of the year, but slowing down doesn’t mean accomplishing less! It means giving yourself enough space to lead intentionally instead of constantly reacting. I’m a mom, so I’m going to quote the movie, “Cars.” Doc Hudson famously says, “turn right to go left.” At the moment, it made no sense to Lightning McQueen, but then he understood that’s what it took to properly drift around the track. What I’m getting at is slow down, so you can keep all four wheels on the tar. Take five minutes to walk the shop. Check in with your people. Ask your management team how they’re doing. Keep your finger on the pulse of operations. Who is waiting on parts? What vehicles need to be delivered and out the door today? How many cars are still waiting on authorization from an extended warranty company? Which customer hasn’t received an update? And, perhaps most importantly ... where did my magnetic flashlight disappear to this time?

Communication Is Your Competitive Advantage

Those few intentional minutes can prevent confusion later. Communication is critical when our pace accelerates. I remember in the past, I’ve experienced quite a few canceled morning meetings because we had to prioritize workflow that day—understandable to some degree. But realistically, having that meeting anyway would have been one of the biggest time savers a shop has. That quick connection creates a sense of stability that reminds us we are part of a team working toward the same goals. It also gives leadership an opportunity to give simple, clear directions that set the expectation for the day. “These customers need updates before lunch.” “Check with parts to identify any parts still on backorder.” “We’re short-staffed today, this is how we’re going to strategize today.” My favorite part of our morning meetings is when my boss asks us if we want to share gratitude to a teammate who helped or did something kind. Morning meetings reduce uncertainty, and uncertainty is very expensive in a busy shop.

Consistency Builds Trust

Just as important is checking in with your leadership team. Ask them about the wins, the frustrations, and the obstacles they’re running into. Keeping the line of communication open, even when you may think they have it handled, builds trust long before problems become crises. The same principle applies to one-on-one meetings. When the schedule is jam-packed and we’re bouncing off the rev limiter, teams don’t always have the time or emotional bandwidth to process issues or emotions in the moment. By scheduling consistent one-on-ones, you’re creating the safe space for employees to share concerns, celebrate successes, and collaborate with you. People are likely to stay with an employer where they feel heard.

Another important mindset shift is separating accountability from punishment. Those two words are not the same thing. Accountability creates consistency so the shop operates smoothly. Clear expectations (as mentioned before), follow-through, and fair consequences help every member of the team understand what the standard looks like. They’ll trust both the process and the managers behind it. Inconsistent accountability creates frustration and can raise questions about retention. It all starts with leadership. Think about pushing a car into the shop. Everyone on the team works together, but almost everyone’s eyes are on the person behind the steering wheel. That’s the person providing clear directions. They’re telling the “push party” where the vehicle needs to go, keeping them coordinated. Without that guidance, they may not all be pushing the car in the right direction. Leadership works the same way. Your team doesn’t expect perfection, remember that. Your team knows you don’t have all the answers or need to solve every problem alone.

But what they do expect is consistency, communication, and your presence. If they have that, the summer season feels more like a time of opportunities and big moves, instead of an intense season of “Survivor.”

If you’ve consistently poured back into your people, communicated expectations clearly, and provided the coaching they need—yet someone still chooses not to contribute with the attitude or effort your team deserves, then making a difficult personnel decision becomes much clearer. Protecting a healthy culture is just as important as building one in the first place! Leadership isn’t about moving faster every time business is booming. It’s about slowing down enough to read the road signs more clearly, investing in your people, and keeping everyone moving in the same direction.