In the work environment, spending many hours a week with people with interests and roles different from ours can raise some issues. toxic attitudes
Is about ways of acting and behavioral predispositions that harm us and the rest of the team worsening the work environment and causing the organization’s performance to be hampered, at least in part.
Toxic colleagues: have you had to deal with someone like this?
As it is very easy for these toxic attitudes to become chronic, causing all team members to adapt (and resign themselves) to living with them, it is advisable to detect them as soon as possible and nip them in the bud, for the good of everyone.
Let’s see what these toxic attitudes of colleagues are and how to fight them.
1. The least bad option
Certain co-workers can create a system of basically involuntary manipulation , based on his bad mood. These people take advantage of their moments of bad temper to create small blackmail that puts the overall functioning of the work team at risk. Basically, what they do is try to get the rest of their companions to make sacrifices to appease them, shouldering part of their work as in a strategy in which the lesser evil is chosen.
What happens is that, first of all, The reason these people are in a bad mood has nothing to do with what is happening at work , and therefore in many cases it is not the responsibility of the rest of their colleagues. However, the consequences of his anger do have an impact on the work environment, creating the illusion that it is a company problem.
Thus, others will be willing to “bear” the consequences of a bad mood and they will give preferential treatment to this person. In turn, there comes a point where the partner who is benefiting from this “learns” that his bad mood is rewarded.
In the event that we detect this toxic attitude, the ideal is encourage the Human Resources department to contact this person to explore the origins of their emotional state and see how it can be resolved without negatively affecting the entire organization. Confronting this person with the same emotional intensity that they use in complaining is not recommended, because it can generate a rebound effect and make them seem even angrier, this time making us share in their anger.
2. Making the conflict expand
Within an organization It is relatively common for certain frictions and conflicts to arise between some people The way in which these conflicts are resolved will be decisive in preventing the conflict from affecting the overall functioning of the company, but sometimes people may appear willing to inflate the size of these small fights.
The reason is that, to break their cornered position in the conflict, some colleagues may want to break their isolation by involving people in the dispute who, due to the role they have in the company, do not have to take a position for or against it. someone.
That is why it is worth knowing how to recognize when these cases occur in order to act accordingly according to the nature of the conflict: certain fights are resolved in private
In the intrigues and pseudo-conspiracies that can appear within an organization**, one of the most used methods is to try to win over certain people by giving them gifts that they have not asked for**. Thus, for example, some people may act paternalistically toward us.
Condescending comments to us, or even attempts to make us hear how these false managers speak well of us to other colleagues when “they are not supposed to know that we are listening” are classics of bad taste that we do not have to tolerate if we suspect that they do not. It is part of the spontaneous behavior of these people and is part of a strategy to gain our favor. In these cases, The ideal is to maintain courteous treatment but not show gratitude for these unsolicited gifts In these cases, assertiveness is everything.
4. Information traffic
In the globalized world, information is power, and Some people may spend a significant portion of their workday attempting to gossip about everything that happens in the work and personal lives of their colleagues.
This may be due to the usefulness that certain information may have when moving up in the company, or it may be due to the simple pleasure of browsing. In any case, When faced with this type of behavior, it is good to communicate that there is no valid justification to believe they have the right to know everything about what their co-workers do. Within organizations, the need for privacy remains of utmost importance, despite the existence of teamwork.
Other colleagues can be very insistent with certain criticisms that are, basically, unfounded. In this case, it is very possible that trying to make ourselves complicit in these criticisms is not part of any planned strategy to turn us against someone: there are people who simply like to criticize.
In these cases, the ideal thing to ensure that teamwork dynamics do not suffer is, first of all, be clear that the person in question criticizes without reason , and secondly, make her see in a polite way that we do not think like her. It may also be useful to encourage her to formalize her complaints, since, on the one hand, she will make the reasons for her complaints clearly known, and secondly, she will be forced to adopt a position in which defending her position will require some effort. , which may make you wonder how right you are.
