What keeps you up at night or causes you to dread going in to work the next morning? For way too many of us, that answer is a toxic workplace culture or working for a destructive leader, or worse yet, both. There is now unequivocal evidence to support why so many experience the “Sunday scaries”—that yucky feeling in the pit of your stomach as the weekend is winding down, or really just any time that you think about heading into the office.
The word “toxic” comes from the Greek “toxikon” which means “arrow poison”. In a literal sense, the term in its original form means to kill (poison) in a targeted way (arrow). Destructive leaders are described as toxic because they are, indeed, poisonous to one’s spirit. Over time, the buildup of this toxicity leaves affected employees feeling devalued, demoralized, and often hopeless. Nothing good ever results from toxic anything.
Research from the Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM), our profession’s largest HR professional association, reports that toxic workplace cultures have driven 20% of U.S. employees out of their jobs in the past five years — at a turnover cost greater than $223 billion! Yes, you read that right. A toxic work culture drives away 1 in 5 employees and comes with an annual $44.6 billion-dollar cost to American organizations.
SHRM’s report, The High Cost of a Toxic Workplace Culture, surveyed American workers to explore the impact of workplace culture on both their well-being and the bottom line of businesses. This report described toxic workplaces as work environments where employees dread going to work, do not feel they can be honest with their manager, and may witness or experience sexual harassment or age discrimination.
Bad bosses are common in the American workplace, despite the reported $166 billion annual spend on leadership development in the U.S. alone. Toxic workplace cultures are created by toxic people who engage in aggressive actions, micromanage, and operate in a way that undermines trust. These behaviors can be indirect, taking the form of hostile jokes and teasing and/or undermining the work and accomplishment of others. Toxic behaviors can be direct as well. Shouting, ridicule, excessive criticism, bullying, and scapegoating are all hallmarks of a toxic company culture.
When an organization’s culture is toxic, trust, a sense of psychological safety, and employee morale are degraded to unhealthy levels and employees suffer from emotional and physical exhaustion, conflict between work and family, high levels of anxiety and stress, lack of sleep, and even psychological distress. In a nutshell, everyone loses. Conversely, there is a strong correlation between a positive workplace culture, satisfied and engaged employees, and business productivity and profits.
SHRM’s report found that toxic cultures create “astronomical” costs to organizations in terms of turnover and absenteeism. In fact, this report noted that the cost of productivity loss due to unplanned absences is approximately $431 billion per year, with up to $86 billion per year attributed to employees calling in sick when they don’t feel like going to work. In addition, the report highlighted common indicators of bad workplace cultures (such as discrimination and harassment) and it underscored the alarming impact that a negative environment has on employees.
Toxicity can manifest itself in many ways at work, including sexual harassment and discriminatory treatment such as ageism or racism. It is commonly the result of a toxic personality—those who demonstrate a pattern of counterproductive work behaviors that cause harm to individuals, teams, or organizations over the long term. SHRM’s findings are consistent with an extensive body of management literature that reports between 65 percent to 75 percent of employees believe their boss to be the worst part of their jobs, as well as voluminous other research which links toxicity to decreased employee-being (exhibited most frequently as chronic anger and anxiety) as well as lower performance.
Unfortunately, the problem is rampant in the workplace. Almost two-thirds of working Americans report that they have worked in a toxic workplace, with 26 percent of them reporting that they have worked in more than one. Why is it so complicated for people to treat others the way that they want to be treated?
Key Findings from the Study
SHRM notes its key findings from the study as follows:
- Only 38% of American employees are “very satisfied” with their current job;
- 49% have thought about leaving their current organization;
- 1 in 5 (20%) have left a job due to workplace culture;
- 58% of those who left a job due to culture claim that their manager is the reason they ultimately left;
- 25% of Americans define organizational culture as a combination of employees’ attitudes, actions, and behaviors;
- 76% say their manager sets the culture of their workplace;
- 36% say their manager doesn’t know how to lead a team;
- 1 in 4 (25%) dread going to work, don’t feel safe voicing their opinions about work-related issues; and don’t feel respected and valued at work; and
- 4 in 10 say their manager fails to frequently engage in honest conversations about work topics.
Also noteworthy was the finding that employees hold their workplace managers directly responsible for creating the toxicity—more than either senior leaders or HR. Moreover, 58 per cent of employees (6 in 10) who quit a job due to culture indicated that their manager is the main reason that they ultimately left.
What are these managers doing that is so wrong? The research identified what appears to be a critical skills gap at the management level. While managers are in a prime position to build strong and positive climates by listening to employees, holding them accountable for their actions, setting expectations, and clarifying information, apparently the perception among employees is that they are not executing these duties very well.
In addition to ineffective managerial skills, the report suggested that a failure to communicate openly and transparently is a leading contributor to the culture issues facing many organizations. Sadly, nearly 25 percent of employees said they do not feel safe voicing their opinions about work-related issues, nor do they feel respected and valued at work. Bad leaders are toxic in every sense of the term and their impact frequently spills over to their friends and family, with 33 percent reporting that workplace culture makes them irritable at home.
Some of the Top Signs of a Toxic Workplace
According to Workhuman, the top ten signs of a toxic workplace include:
- Insufficient or dishonest communication;
- Failure of managers to listen;
- Lack of recognition of good work;
- Performance appraisals that are too negative;
- Rampant office politics;
- Bullying;
- Discrimination;
- Sexual harassment;
- Expectations that employees will take ethically or legally questionable actions; and
- Disrespect for work/life balance.
A price tag to American companies of a staggering $223 billion over the past five years should be more than enough to convince your senior leadership that tackling the issue of a toxic culture is a problem worthy of their attention and resources. That is an enormous amount of misdirected resources that could be spent in other more productive ways. Modeling the way and imposing accountability for those who cannot (or will not) change will allow a positive climate to take root and continue to grow.
The “So What”
All of the data suggests that the payoff of an improved culture can be huge. Frequent and honest communication, showing appreciation, recognizing good work, and treating employees fairly and with respect will create a greater sense of trust, belonging, commitment, and engagement. It will also allow employees to do more than just come to work and pick up a paycheck; it will cause them to personally and professionally thrive and flourish while contributing to your organization’s long-term success.
Importantly, though, implementing these changes is, at most, just partly your responsibility. Senior leaders must also be actively involved in setting your company’s culture strategy and by setting the “tone at the top” that enforces the new ways of operating. According to SHRM’s report:
True culture change occurs when it becomes a shared responsibility among workplace decision-makers.
Make no mistake, HR can influence behavior and make a hugely positive difference to both employees and to the organization—but not by working solo. When it comes to workplace culture, the buck stops at the door of the C-suite.
Excerpted with permission from Toxic Leaders and Tough Bosses: Organizational Guardrails to Keep High Performers on Track by Teresa A. Daniel. Published by De Gruyter.
