Toxic workplace

A toxic workplace is a workplace that is marked by significant drama and infighting, where personal battles often harm productivity. Toxic workplaces are often considered the result of toxic employees, or workers who are motivated by personal gain (power, money, or special status), use unethical, mean-spirited and sometimes illegal means to manipulate and annoy those around them; and whose motives are to maintain or increase power, money or special status or divert attention away from their performance shortfalls and misdeeds. Toxic employees do not recognize a duty to the organization for which they work or their co-workers in terms of ethics or professional conduct toward others. Toxic employees define relationships with co-workers, not by organizational structure but by co-workers they favour and those they do not like or trust.^[1]

Quite similarly, Harder et al. (2014) define a toxic work environment as an environment that negatively impacts the viability of an organization. They specify: "It is reasonable to conclude that an organization can be considered toxic if it is ineffective as well as destructive to its employees", and hold that toxicity arises when employees suffer a breach in psychological contract.^[2]

In the United States, the issue of workplace bullying is getting increasing attention from state governments; twenty-six states have introduced a version of the Healthy Workplace Bill which provides a definition of this conduct and support for employers to address the behaviour through discipline.^[3]

Corporate and organizational results

This phenomenon harms both the company and the other employees, including those who are not direct targets. Co-workers are distracted by drama, gossip and by choosing sides in the ongoing animosity. This can translate into lost productivity.^[4] While employees are distracted by this activity, they cannot devote time and attention to the achievement of business goals. Positively motivated and ethical employees may try to speak up to a toxic employee but this can make them a target (see whistleblower). Over time, positively motivated employees drift away from the workplace and only employees comfortable in the negatively charged atmosphere remain on staff.

Fellow employees may begin to experience physical symptoms from the stress and worry over whether they or someone they care about in the work place may be targeted. This can even develop into a clinical depression requiring treatment.^[5]

Prevention and resolution

Interventions to address this negative behaviour in the workplace should be undertaken carefully.^[6] A four-tiered approach involving fellow employees is suggested by Dr. Gerald Hickson and colleagues at the Vanderbilt University School of Medicine. This approach starts with an informal intervention, then, if that is not effective, moves on to a true awareness intervention, an authoritarian intervention and finally, discipline.^[7]

When toxic employees leave the workplace, it can improve the culture overall because the remaining staff become more engaged and productive.^[8] Companies who articulate a strong set of cultural values regarding communication, respect and professionalism as well as a performance evaluation system that ranks both technical performance and the professional treatment of fellow employees are felt by HR professionals to be less vulnerable.^[9]

See also

Wikiversity has learning materials about Toxic workplace at Motivation and emotion/Book/2011/Toxic workplace

References

Further reading

• Durré L Surviving the Toxic Workplace: Protect Yourself Against Coworkers, Bosses, and Work Environments That Poison Your Day (2010)
• Kusy M & Holloway E Toxic workplace!: managing toxic personalities and their systems of power (2009)
• Lavender NJ & Cavaiola AA Toxic Coworkers: How to Deal with Dysfunctional People on the Job (2000)
• Lavender NJ & Cavaiola AA The One-Way Relationship Workbook: Step-By-Step Help for Coping with Narcissists, Egotistical Lovers, Toxic Coworkers & Others Who Are Incredibly Self-Absorbed (2011)
• Lubit RH Coping with Toxic Managers, Subordinates ... and Other Difficult People: Using Emotional Intelligence to Survive and Prosper (2003)
• Sue MP Toxic People: Decontaminate Difficult People at Work Without Using Weapons Or Duct Tape (2007)

Aspects of workplaces Topics Absenteeism Abusive supervision Aggression Bullying Conflict Control freak Counterproductive behavior Coworker backstabbing Culture of fear Cyber-aggression Democracy Deviance Discrimination Diversity Divide and rule Emotions Employee engagement Employee monitoring Employee morale Employee silence Employee surveys Empowerment Evaluation Feminisation Fit in or fuck off Friendship Gender inequality Gossip Happiness Harassment Health surveillance Humor Incivility Intervention Jargon Kick the cat Kiss up kick down Listening Machiavellianism Micromanagement Mobbing Narcissism Office politics Performance appraisal Personality clash Phobia Positive psychology Privacy Probation Profanity Psychopathy Queen bee syndrome Rat race Relationships Revenge Role conflict Romance Sabotage Safety and health Spirituality Staff turnover Strategy Stress Toxic workplace Training Undermining Violence Wellness Work–family conflict Workload See also Corporation Employment Factory Job Office Organization Whistleblower Templates Aspects of corporations Aspects of jobs Aspects of occupations Aspects of organizations Employment