How To Deal With a Toxic Work Environment

Stephanie is a project process specialist, trainer and mentor. She is the Lead Consultant at Jaeger Consultants Ltd in Nairobi. Stephanie specializes in the human aspect of project management and leadership, and encourages discussion and feedback. She also writes regular blogs on jaeger-consultants.com.

  Organizational Culture  

Most of us experience a toxic environment at one point during our work career. We need to learn how to deal with these situations and put a solid decision-making process into place so that we can decide whether we should stay or leave. During the pandemic, toxic environments seem to have increased since we are all dealing with so many more stressors.

In my career that spans more than 30 years of work, I have encountered quite a few toxic situations—and learned quite a few things from them. I have dealt with them in different ways at different times. Difficult as these situations were, in the end I have always learned something from them.

According to an article from Topresume.com, some of the symptoms of a toxic workplace include:

1. A micromanaging boss
2. A boss/supervisor/colleague who always disregards, criticizes or rubbishes everything you do
3. Outright bullying
4. A company that expects you to read and react to messages, emails, etc. at any time of day or night (and even on your off days)
5. Companies that always call people back from leave
6. Rampant gossip/rumors
7. Narcissistic leadership
8. Unfair policies
9. Lack of work/life balance
10. Low morale, demotivated workforce

This list is not comprehensive, but I think it gives a good idea of what to look out for. Toxic environments will breed high turnover rates, stress-related sickness, negativity and many …

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