It’s hard to say if toxic workplaces are becoming more common, but the advent of the internet and social media has created a public forum for people to speak out. Throughout the year, Elon Musk continued to make headlines as workers at Tesla, SpaceX and X filed discrimination suits against their employers.
Even bosses who would be considered “nice” or “inclusive” in the public sphere, like Jimmy Fallon and Lizzo, became embattled with allegations of toxic work environments. It may have many employers wondering, “Is my workplace toxic, too?”
HR professionals may also be wondering how to proceed if they feel certain managers are creating a toxic work environment but their actions haven’t risen to the level of U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission concerns.
Even when toxic bosses aren’t quite compliance risks, they can be a threat to a company’s culture, suggested Natalie Norfus, founder and managing owner of the Norfus firm, an HR and DEI consulting company.
In her interview with HR Dive, the talent management professional broke down telltale signs of a toxic workplace, solutions to the issue and ways HR can practice preventative care.
So what makes a toxic workplace?
The most obvious sign of a toxic workplace is one where employees don’t feel comfortable speaking up, Norfus told HR Dive. As someone with a labor law background, Norfus performs HR investigations at her firm, and finds that the most common fear in a toxic workplace is that of retaliation.
Workers “either feel afraid to say something about it or they feel like nothing will be done about it,” she added.
Beyond textbook identity discrimination, toxic workplaces are also environments where employees experience a fear of challenging the status quo.
“Maybe it’s not much ‘Hey, I think I’m being harassed or mistreated,’ but ‘I think we could be doing business differently.’ And if people are afraid to broach that conversation, that’s another indicator of a toxic workplace,” Norfus said.
What are toxic workplace warning signs?
Low engagement survey scores are one red flag HR can heed. Not only are numbers worth watching, but qualitative data should also be examined.
Additionally, turnover can also be an indicator of a toxic workplace. Pay attention to retention rates, Norfus suggested.
A leader behaving badly is another major driver of toxicity. “Leaders who yell, are condescending to those that they work with or who give unnecessarily short answers” are ones to watch.
“If you were a child in a household where there was a lot of yelling, that creates a certain kind of trauma and fear — where you’re not sure why you upset someone,” Norfus said. “And certainly when you’re at work, you shouldn’t be in a position of trying to avoid upsetting someone. You’re there to work, or contribute your intellect and your value.”
Likewise, mandating unrealistic turnarounds for deliverables and engaging in favoritism are also red flags.
Stakeholder storytelling is one toxic workplace solution
If an HR person has examined their pulse survey results or collected rumblings of dissatisfaction, what next steps should they take? In this instance, Norfus said, her first step is to ensure she’s regularly engaging in “storytelling” with business leaders.
Often, HR leaders bring lots of little anecdotes to the C-suite, Norfus said. These don’t tell a complete story.
“What we find is that if business leaders don’t have a bigger picture context, it becomes easier, easy to think [these incidents are] not that big of a deal,” she said.
Another solution: Get rid of “toxic rockstars”
If one person in particular is fueling workplace discomfort, it’s HR’s job to still be fair.
“You want to start with the hope that someone can adjust their behavior. A lot of times toxicity persists, because it’s not checked. The answer is not always to just fire someone,” Norfus offered. That being said, if an employee receives feedback following the complaints and doesn’t change in 30, 60 or 90 days — whatever timeframe feels appropriate, with follow-ups — then an employer can reasonably consider firing as an option.
“Don’t let that go for too long,” Norfus said regarding toxic work situations.
She brought up Harvard Business Review’s 2022 plea “Leaders, stop rewarding toxic rock stars.” Building on this concept, she illustrated an example of a sales leader who closes many deals and brings in a lot of money for a company — but is a horrible co-worker.
“Is that really success if, along the way to earning all those sales, you burn bridges, burn people, mistreat them?” she asked. Many employers need a reset, she added.
“Do you want all these sales at the price of people’s day-to-day mental health and long-term retention issues?”
Preventative care looks like comprehensive performance reviews
A positive spin on addressing a toxic workplace is to encourage employees to be good corporate citizens or good organizational citizens. (This means being transparent, collaborative and thoughtful colleagues, Norfus explained.)
“We often are encouraging our clients that, when they’re doing a performance evaluation, criteria should include whether [a worker is] a good corporate citizen,” she said.
Norfus also warned against falling into the toxic positivity trap, as well. The end goal should be to “move forward and progress in a way that is sustainable. It’s not sustainable to have people be mistreated regularly — be talked to any old kind of way. Those are not things that that work in the long run,” she said.
Preventative care also includes L&D
The sort of learning opportunities Norfus recommended are ones that emphasize the concept of psychological safety. “I don't know what makes you safe, but I can engage in certain behaviors to build trust,” Norfus offered.
In her practice, she explained, she is a big fan of micro content. This ensures that there’s continuous learning and development. “It’s more smaller amounts of information, more often — as opposed to like one or two or three big trainings in a year.”
This is important because, little by little, an evolution occurs. “One training, one conversation, one thing” is not going to create positive workplace behaviors,” Norfus said.
Human connection is the ultimate positive workplace secret
“Whether we’ve talked to employees in France, Brazil, Canada or the U.S., there’s this desire for authentic human connection. And authenticity has a basis in trust,” Norfus shared. She acknowledged that this can be a lot of work to foster, but it’s worth it, from her perspective.
“We are really heavily pushing our clients and our HR teams to really focus on getting back to the basics. How can we get better at how we communicate with one another? And be mindful of each other, and not center ourselves in every conversation?”
