You've "hit the nail on the head" regarding to the toxicity in our team. Person A, with the comms brief, is driven to make improvements to team dox and enthusiastically completes the task at hand before circulating her work. Person B, a legacy employee at the same level, resents not being consulted about changes and colludes with Person C, the manager, to block the work. This cycle repeats for every proposed improvement, resulting in Person A becoming so demoralised and angry that she feels the need to leave an enjoyable job for her wellbeing. Person B's wishes are consistently prioritised over Person A's by Person C. Person C is weak and takes the "path of least resistance" every time. Person B wants to resume control of comms, and his kickback gets him what he wants. 🚫 😡
I've never liked the word 'toxic' as in 'toxic people' and 'toxic culture'. It seems to be yet another 'in word' which crept into our vocabulary around eight years ago. My problem with it is it's vague. What does it actually mean? As soon as someone says I have a toxic boss, just for example, what's the first thing that comes into your head? Well it has to be "I wonder what they mean by that?" And the second thing that comes into your head is the question: "What did they actually do and/or say (or perhaps don't do or say) that makes you label them as toxic? If they can actually answer the question, and I have found in a few cases they can't answer it well, we can then move onto sticking to the facts about exactly what they feel the person has done to warrant the label. Another problem is it is so subjective to make it meaningless. It won't surprise you of course to know one person's toxic boss or toxic employee is another person's great boss or great employee. It's simply too vague and too subjective to be useful.
"It is so subjective to make it meaningless." Amen. The only exception in my mind is for the person who is in a 'toxic' (I use the word loosely) situation who has no other word to help give themselves perspective on the situation. I'm currently editing a second part to this discussion, about the role of HR in resolving toxicity. Kevin talks about culture. That'll be published around the beginning of the year.
You've "hit the nail on the head" regarding to the toxicity in our team. Person A, with the comms brief, is driven to make improvements to team dox and enthusiastically completes the task at hand before circulating her work. Person B, a legacy employee at the same level, resents not being consulted about changes and colludes with Person C, the manager, to block the work. This cycle repeats for every proposed improvement, resulting in Person A becoming so demoralised and angry that she feels the need to leave an enjoyable job for her wellbeing. Person B's wishes are consistently prioritised over Person A's by Person C. Person C is weak and takes the "path of least resistance" every time. Person B wants to resume control of comms, and his kickback gets him what he wants. 🚫 😡
Yah. Whether toxic is the perfect word for this situation... It's semantics. It's not a good place for Person A. :/
I've never liked the word 'toxic' as in 'toxic people' and 'toxic culture'. It seems to be yet another 'in word' which crept into our vocabulary around eight years ago. My problem with it is it's vague. What does it actually mean? As soon as someone says I have a toxic boss, just for example, what's the first thing that comes into your head? Well it has to be "I wonder what they mean by that?" And the second thing that comes into your head is the question: "What did they actually do and/or say (or perhaps don't do or say) that makes you label them as toxic? If they can actually answer the question, and I have found in a few cases they can't answer it well, we can then move onto sticking to the facts about exactly what they feel the person has done to warrant the label. Another problem is it is so subjective to make it meaningless. It won't surprise you of course to know one person's toxic boss or toxic employee is another person's great boss or great employee. It's simply too vague and too subjective to be useful.
"It is so subjective to make it meaningless." Amen. The only exception in my mind is for the person who is in a 'toxic' (I use the word loosely) situation who has no other word to help give themselves perspective on the situation. I'm currently editing a second part to this discussion, about the role of HR in resolving toxicity. Kevin talks about culture. That'll be published around the beginning of the year.