We’ve seen animations of people who always seem to have a dark cloud over their head, or it’s always raining on them. It’s a humorous way to depict people who seem to mostly see the bad side of situations. Or they have difficulty seeing anything positive when things don’t go perfectly well.
We do our best to insulate ourselves, our family, staff and teammates from these people who are excessively negative. As leaders, parents and coaches we take on responsibility not only to help people with negative mindsets see things differently, but we also try to prevent these people from poisoning the minds of those around them that are under our care.
Having staff around a workplace, either in-person or remotely, who can only dwell on what’s wrong at the company, the office, or a particular project, will dishearten, de-motivate and possibly depress their co-workers. For the well-being of the rest of the team members, this behaviour needs to be corrected, isolated or removed entirely, as quickly as possible. If not dealt with swiftly, it will cause a drop in productivity within the team and the company, it will cause valued staff to leave for other opportunities with a more positive work environment, and worst of all, it’ll impact the well-being of members of your team.
Even simply off-hand comments on the arrival or departure times of a co-worker, comments on a co-worker’s attire or the vehicle they drive, can lead to toxicity in the organization or within the team.
The culture and tone of an organization or a team is set at the top, by the leadership. A toxic tone from the top is sure to lead to a dysfunctional and underperforming team, with lots of turnover. In these situations the CEO, Board of Directors or Head Coach needs to step in and address the situation promptly, or swiftly make changes.
It may be surprising to learn that sometimes the negativity can come from the most junior positions in an organization. Off-hand comments as mentioned above, coming admin staff, logistics or custodial team members may not seem like much, but it chips away at even the most hardened and mental tough members of the team. At some point even they simply don’t want to deal with it anymore, start altering their route around the office to avoid certain people. When your organization gets to this point you have a toxic work environment.
The best way to avoid having a toxic work environment or team culture on your watch is to prevent people with this negative mindset from joining the team to begin with. A bad hire is always the responsibility of the hiring manager, not the employee or teammate who turns out not to be a good fit.
When hiring or selecting members for a team, spending time getting to know their underlying personality is critical. Are they generally a happy person, or do they see the glass as half-empty? When things go wrong do they share in the responsibility or even take full responsibility for the missteps to shelter their co-workers or teammates? Or do they point fingers elsewhere. When you ask them about how they dealt with an adverse situation, do they give you a sense that they learned something about how to handle things differently the next time, or again are they quick to point out the flaws or mistakes of others. These are all red flags for a negative mindset; and, these are signs of people who don’t own their actions and the accompanying results. Don’t hire these people, regardless of how relevant their experience may be.
Experience will be gained over time, skills can be acquired with training. Personality and outlook on life is in a person’s nature. This can be shaped and molded for the better, but understand the additional task you are taking on as a leader or coach. And, does your existing team have the fortitude and elasticity to withstand some negativity prior to your mold taking shape?
When negative mindsets have slipped through the cracks in your hiring process, all is not lost. But once a person with a negative mindset has been identified, they must be dealt with swiftly. As a leader or coach you are undoing years of nature and nurture; it will take time to get such a person to alter their outlook on things, to begin with, and then get them to alter their behaviour and their interactions with teammates and co-workers.
Sometimes a toxic person may not even realize the harm their actions and comments are causing. You’ll need to sit down with them more than once and walk them through examples of their offside behaviour, work through their initial denials and the debates about the examples themselves as they will certainly have seen those situations differently. Once you work through the initial pushback, and reassure them that their work is valued at the organization or on the team (assuming it is...if not, other swift action is warranted!), you should achieve a break-through moment where there is acknowledgement and a willingness to work on improvement. These are the most rewarding situations.
Managing stellar employees or team members is relatively easy...keep them challenged and they are happy. Blatantly bad workers or team members is also relatively easy...cut bait and remove the toxicity. The ones in between require more effort, take long to achieve success and have more ups and downs. But when you see the light and you see repeated corrected behaviour, you get excited. When other members of a team comment on the newfound positivity or joy in working with a previously negative person, you feel pride in playing a small part in their personal development.
Letting toxicity fester in your workplace or on your team, from a person with an excessively negative mindset can absolutely destroy your chances for success.
Identify these toxic situations quickly. Assess the possibility for improvement swiftly. And then act decisively. It’s expected of you as a leader and a coach.
Thank you for investing time in reading this post. Questions and comments are always welcome.
Shail Paliwal
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