Having a toxic culture at work can be detrimental to not only the welfare of employees within the organisation, but also the profitability of the business. A toxic culture in the workplace can be expensive, with 61% of those in a problematic workforce having to take a period of long-term leave, with 55% saying the emotional distress lasted up to two years, and 34% saying it laster three to four years.
Toxic culture is a common case in the UK, with two in five employees experiencing bullying, harassment, or discrimination at work.
A toxic culture is the number one factor which drives to resignation, so it’s essential for employers to recognise what may create a toxic working environment – and prevent it from causing damage to the business. 28% of employees who left their employment during the pandemic left due to a toxic work culture.
Perhaps you’re happy with the culture in your workplace, but are your employees? It can be hard to determine whether or not your work culture is effective. So, what makes a working environment toxic? How can you uncover the reasons for the toxicity? Is there a way to cure a toxic work culture?
These are some of the questions we’ll be looking at in this article, so let’s start off with what makes a work environment toxic…
What causes a toxic culture?
- Fear-based Leadership. This is where the leader motivates employees through fear, and not reward. It shows through coercive behaviour, such as, “do as I say not as I do”.
- No Recognition or Reward. Because the leader uses fear to motivate employees, the lack rewarding or recognising excellent work their employees may produce. Because of this, employees lose productivity and become unmotivated in the workplace.
- Gossiping, Rumour, and Speculation. When leaders aren’t transparent with their employees, information can become heavily filtered. This causes a gossiping culture were employee expectations are not defined.
- Unhealthy Competition. You may think that competition is a good thing. This is true to an extent, but not all competition is healthy. Managers can create unhealthy competition through pitting employees against each other in negative ways, leading to fighting and drama.
- Favouritism. A natural sign of unhealthy competition derives from favouritism, where there is inequality in hours, wages, benefits, and overall treatment.
The signs that you have a toxic culture
Even when you know the causes of a toxic company culture, it can be hard to recognise it in your own organisation. So, what are the tell-tale signs of having a toxic work environment?
1. The leader’s voice takes the majority of airtime
Whether it’s in meetings or brainstorming sessions, if the leader seems to be the only speaker and is speaking in an authoritative way – then there’s a chance you’re in a toxic work environment.
2. Leaders don’t actively encourage diverging views to be spoken
In the same meetings, if the leader fails to encourage others to speak and give their viewpoints, this prevents a productive meeting which displays a variety of perspectives.
3. Problems cycle
Usually, just as a problem seems to have been solved, it crops back up again. This demonstrates that rather than productively finding a solution for problems long-term, a short-term fix has been put in place.
4. Cutting each other down and showing disrespect
This is a clear sign of toxicity, where it may include eye-rolling, condescending body language, or patronising speech. These can lead to a protective environment, where staff fear speaking up if it’s received badly.
5. Normalises “naming and shaming” or playing the “blame game”
This can lead to higher staff turnover, where employees take action to prevent being embarrassed. This promotes disengagement, disloyalty, and bullying in the business. Rather than reaching solutions to problems, employees and management tend to negatively look at who is to blame for the problem.
6. Lack of reward schemes
Receiving appreciation for hard work is the best way of encouraging a motivated culture. Where there is lack of appreciation, negativity prevents employees from being rightfully rewarded for what they’ve done right.
7. Lack of emotional language
This may not be toxic behaviour in all circumstances; however, it can certainly be a tell-tale sign of a toxic culture. In a toxic work environment, people are less likely to be emotional in their language, in fear of standing out from the crowd. This can be caused from management creating an environment where people feel they can’t be emotional.
How to fix toxic culture
There are many different ways in resolving a toxic culture. The following steps are just a start, and you should look at implementing long-term solutions which create a positive culture permanently.
#1 Take Responsibility
You cannot resolve the issue without taking accountability as a leader, and recognise how your behaviour may have influenced the situation. Your actions don’t have to be deliberate or conscious – stress, workplace politics, and the desire to avoid disagreement can all cause leaders to subconsciously turn a blind eye to bad behaviour in the workforce.
Shrug off any defensiveness you may feel, talk to trusted peers to get their viewpoint. It’s important to have an open mind and respect the opinion of others. Through voicing your mistakes to your employees, you can be a strong leader which promotes transparency and accountability across the company as a whole.
#2 Communicate Effectively
Once you’ve taken accountability, look at your employees. Observe them, have conversations, become familiar with the potential tensions there are among the staff. Is there one person who dominates conversations? Are team members being excluded? Are managers being coercive with their actions? Have the difficult conversation with those toxic members of staff, this can help prevent future problems which avoid the worst consequences.
#3 Live by your Core Values
Core values typically align with your company’s mission. Base all of your actions on the core values which your company revolves around. Try to practice activities for all staff to participate in which are based on your core values. If you don’t have any core values, then create them. Keep the values positive, eradicating any negativity which may be associated to them.
#4 Be Transparent
Be open and honest with staff. This encourages truthfulness, where gossiping and lies can be supressed. This helps promote a trusting culture, which leads to higher employee satisfaction from an empowered environment.
#5 Deal with Absenteeism
A toxic workplace tends to lead to higher absenteeism, which contributes to staff burnout on those who are picking up the slack. This then further creates a more toxic workplace, which increases further absenteeism. It’s a constant cycle. Try and get on top of controlling this absenteeism, but do it in the correct way. Don’t use anger or threats to fuel your points, approach staff in goodwill, and show you care about them. Find out why they don’t show up, and put together an action plan which is positive and helps them have a more positive approach to work.
#6 Deal with Turnover
Similar to absenteeism, staff turnover is a problem and a symptom of a toxic culture. The constant churn of employees is harder on those who stick around, where they’re constantly dealing with training new members of staff. Find out why employees are leaving, and what you can do to prevent this. Is it pay? Benefits? Scheduling issues? A particular manager? Almost everything in that list can be fixed, so don’t look at employee turnover as simply “getting rid of the bad apples”.
#7 Create a Safe Space
Trust is about an underlying sense of safety, and toxic workplaces are anything but safe. Try and create a safe environment for your employees that is safe from bullying, safe to voice ideas and concerns, and safe from fear-fuelled leadership. Put together anonymous polls, organise team-building events, attend regular one-on-one meetings. Having a feedback culture can create a safe culture.
Get started on removing toxicity from your company culture!
We hope this article has helped you understand the value of having a positive workplace culture, and the steps you should take to adopt a positive culture. Remember – culture is essential if you’re looking to become more profitable, so don’t forget about it!
Have any other suggestions for removing toxicity from company culture? Give us an email at [email protected], or let us know on our LinkedIn or Facebook Pages!
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