Toxic Workplaces for Dummies (and Smart Leaders Who Want to Fix Them)

All right. Hello everyone. Thank you so much for coming to today's Live Achieve engagement webcast and training. My name is Zach Doms, president of Achieve Engagement. And as your community lead, thank you so much for taking some time outta your busy schedules, your days, the programs, all the projects that you're working on right now to come in and kind of pause for a second and develop yourselves and sharpen your craft and expose yourself to some new ways of thinking, some new perspectives, some new frameworks that you can then use to make a bigger impact into a world to work. So thank you so much for being part of that. It means the world to us. I love the activity already happening in the chat right now. Andy, I see in California, Laura Milwaukee, that's my home turf. Texas in the house. Rachel, in Colorado. I'm actually in Denver as well right now. Becky in Ohio. We got Houston, Texas, Timothy in Seattle. We got New York, we got San Jose. My gosh, where are we? Got Peter in Sweden. This is awesome. Chicago, Texas, north Little Rock in Arkansas. What's going on, Betsy? I see you here with us. We got Cleveland and Huntington Beach. Alaska's here. Hey, Kathy, appreciate you being here with us. My goodness, this is amazing. Chicago, San Francisco, Hawaii, garden Grove, California, Chicago Land some more. We got Midwesterns in the house here. I love it. All right, y'all, I think this is just a testament already of, part of the value of these sessions is, yes, we're gonna hear from an amazing expert today. We're gonna unpack these things from someone who's been doing this in the field at a high level, and recently came out with a new book. So I can't wait to introduce her and welcome her up. But the other part of today's program, and where a lot of the value can really come today is from all of you, the community. It's that social learning experience and that peer to peer learning and coaching and strategy where we can really start to unpack these things from a few different angles. Because I think sometimes the hardest part of our jobs as HR leaders, people leaders, is not only just learning what the frameworks are, but then we have to customize them and think creatively of how will this actually evolve and fit into our culture, into our industry, into our org structure, into the type of people we have. I mean, that is one of the hardest parts of our job. So I think that's why having this shared learning experience as a community so important. So that's one thing I really encourage you to lean into today. Let's make this a really powerful learning experience for the next hour. I really encourage you to set aside some of the distractions. Maybe open up the the notebook and start to put pen to paper, and then share your own ideas, your own questions, your own strategies on the on, on, in the chat throughout this so that we can learn from each other. So stay on the lookout for that. So as we get into this topic, this is all about solving some of the toxic workplaces for dummies, right? Like, and that's part of me. I think that title is actually geared for me. I'm a dummy ultimately. So I need to break this down at a basic level. And I'd be curious for you all from a scale to zero to five, if you've been to our programs in the past, we'd love to kind of score ourselves. This is part of how we measure where we're at with these things. On a scale of zero to five, where are you with your workplace? Zero being, you know, we have a very toxic workplace today. It's, it's tough. We have a lot of bad behaviors and measurements going on, and we need to intervene. This today. Five being, you know what? We actually have a very productive workplace. It is very healthy. People are collaborating. We have good connections and relationships. People respect each other. Where are you on that scale? And it's okay if you're a zero. I mean, it's, it, it can be tough, right? People are struggling, people are challenging, being productive, being focused. It's easy to fall into toxic behaviors. So that's our role as HR leader. So what do we have? Where are some of you? We got some threes. There's a lot of fours. That's awesome. We have some twos. NI six. It's awesome. Okay, Rachel, I see a zero. We're gonna work on that today. Some twos and ones. A lot of threes. Okay. The other thing I wanna ask the chat here. If you have any experience of some toxic issues going on in your, your organization, what is like one behavior you're noticing today? Like, what is one behavior that you wanna go to work on? Is it, you know what? We have a gossip culture. People are gossiping a ton, uh, ton of discrimination issues. People are just not being ethically equal towards each other, and they're actually discriminating against different teams or types of people. Uh, is it, is it gossip, bullying, bullying's often a big one. Favoritism. I see that in the chat. Assumption. Making gaslighting. Yes, Karen, that's a big one. Yeah. Workplace politics, Kim. My goodness. Yes. Okay, so this is why I wanted to keep you in mind. 'cause we're gonna jump into the fun part of today. We're gonna help uncover where some of these are coming from. We're gonna talk through how we can be better leaders and fix and approach these things. Maybe build a roadmap of these things. So appreciate the engagement so far. Keep leaning into this. So keep building your self-awareness. Keep in mind of where you scored and some of these behaviors that are top of mind for you. And we're gonna go to work. We're gonna workshop this. So that being said, let's give a warm welcome. And if you can put in a chat, say hello and welcome or use emojis. Kind of click those buttons hard. Let's welcome Catherine Mattis, workplace bullying expert author, TEDx speaker, LinkedIn Top Voice. Recently came out with a new book, navigating a Toxic Workplace for Dummies. So we'll share all of that in the chat here, but we're very lucky to have Katherine with us today. So Katherine, thank you so much for being here. Uh, really excited to learn with you and, and, and really unpack some of the findings you've seen and, and how we can start to solve these things. So that being said, Catherine, the floor is all yours, and, uh, I'll pass it over to you. All right, thank you. And do, let me just make sure my chat window's open. Do keep the chat open, uh, and, and come in. I love to talk to the chat. So keep keep it coming and you'll, you'll all have your own advice and ideas for each other as well. So the chat is a great place to learn beyond the things that I happen to be saying. Um, thank you so much for spending some time with me. Just a little more on me. I started Civility Partners years ago. Uh, I was internal hr, found myself working in a toxic environment, ended up going to graduate school while I was working there. And I was kind of fascinated and frustrated all at the same time with this workplace. And I ended up doing all of my graduate research on the topic of workplace bullying, whatever my class was that I had to write a paper. I focused on workplace bullying. I wrote my thesis on it. So I have a master's in bullying. I like to say, um, over the years, I've had the pleasure of being cited in a lot of pretty cool places, and we've served a huge array of clients. We've had almost clients over years. So, uh, you're not alone if you're experiencing some, some stuff in your workplace. Just real quick to kind of highlight where my expertise is coming from, civility Partners does solve toxic work environment problems. That is our niche. Um, I a joke, we don't, we, we make companies normal, and then somebody else, a different consultant can take them to great from there. Um, we do that through climate assessments. We do our work through taking that data and creating action plans and implementing those actions. Lots of training programs. And then we specialize in coaching for leaders accused of creating, uh, some toxic work environments, um, often on the heels of an investigation for hostile work environment. But, um, the, you know, it's not technically unlawful. So, uh, there you go. So we're gonna talk about toxic workplaces. We're gonna talk about culture using a simple model that we use. And then I'm gonna give you a ton of tips. So I do hope you have pen and paper out. I'm, I move quick. I got a lot to share. Share, uh, Zach already asked you the question, you know, what are you seeing in your organization? And I appreciate understanding some of what is driving you to be in this, uh, webinar. So when we talk about toxic behavior, what does that even mean? Well, it's anything that can fairly subtle, all the way up to harassment and violence. Uh, I think some might argue that toxic is a harsh word for something like incivility. I disagree because that word toxic is about insidiousness. And, um, so, you know, if we allow bad behavior, however subtle it may be to go on, then it, it does, um, evolve into worse things. So this is how I define toxic behavior. It's a pattern. It hurts people and it disrupts relationships and the organization. Um, one thing I I see as a problem in the way that HR often addresses bad behavior and managers too, is that because harassment is unlawful, it really lives in a bucket. And we need it in a bucket when we're talking about legalities and being compliant, compliant. Um, however, it it, it doesn't work that way. That's not a realistic way of, uh, how these bad behaviors function. So I like to talk about bad behaviors on a spectrum. So at one end of the spectrum is, uh, incivility, microaggressions, you know, sarcasm. That's not okay, a negative tone. Um, and so these behaviors are behaviors. We're not going around and micromanaging, but we need to teach our managers how to solve these behaviors because they do evolve over time into worse behaviors. So what happens is, if you have people who are, let's say, sarcasms, part of the, you know, part of your culture, well, sarcasm can easily, as you all I'm sure know, um, sarcasm can start to evolve into getting kind of more and more toxic. We're making more and more jokes, um, that maybe aren't okay or inappropriate. And so then over time, the tolerance for those negative comments builds, and so then they get worse. Um, and we start to really learn that we have permission to speak to each other that way. So that's the problem. Um, and it evolves into abusive conduct, bullying, harassment, and so on and so forth. Um, I wanna share another tidbit, another way to think about harassment. Um, you all know that harassment is a form of employment discrimination, right? It's unwelcome conduct. It's based on a protected characteristic, and it's unlawful when enduring the behavior is a condition of employment, or it's so severe, pervasive, a reasonable person would consider it intimidating, hostile, or abusive. If you look at what is in this, this here, this white box that also describes workplace bullying, harassment, and bullying are the same behaviors. The only difference is who you aim them at. So I want you to start thinking about things like bullying very differently. And it's not a question of lawful or unlawful. Yes, it is. I'm not saying ignore that and pay attention to the reality that just because somebody, uh, isn't engaging in technically unlawful behavior, that you can't put a stop to it. Um, and I think that's a conundrum. HR is sort of in where they, they feel like, well, I can't really regulate this behavior, or I can't really convince the CEO that we should regulate the behavior. 'cause it's not unlawful. But if you think about all of the things that people do that get themselves fired, a lot of the things that people get fired over are not unlawful, being late, missing reports, bad customer service, right? So, um, we, it's really important to me that you hear that, that while we do have to pay attention to compliance, that's not how bad behavior works in reality. And so we need to pull back from that question of is it lawful or unlawful? And look at this more realistically. And then at the other end of the spectrum is workplace violence. Now, violence certainly includes punching someone or bringing a gun to work, but violence also includes any behavior that causes fear. So as somebody who coaches leaders accused of bullying or harassment, um, I can tell you some of the behaviors I hear about are things like somebody leaning over the table and getting in someone's space and add that with, you know, the aggressive facial expression in the, the shoulders up. And you, like, somebody can really lean over a table and have this real aggressive communication about them. And that's violence. So workplace bullying is violence. Um, you know, and, and I've coached people who have caused, um, panic attacks in their team because the way they were behaving, it's like, that's violence. There's a physical reaction to the way that, um, this person is treating others. You know, this already. Here's the book report of all my graduate years of, um, studying workplace bullying, that when bad behaviors happen, you know, all of this ugly stuff goes up. Anxiety, detachment, absenteeism, turnover. So, you know, you know, the, the bad stuff is going up in a toxic work environment, and the good stuff is going down. People lose loyalty to their team and the company, um, lots of workers' comp complaints around, um, you know, stress at work. And sometimes that stress is caused by negative or toxic behaviors. So, um, you know, this, this is kind of your business case, uh, a summary of your business case for why we need to address this. I see a question without using my name, what if the hostile environment is coming from hr? Um, so that is part of the problem. Every once in a while, it could be HR who's the toxic individual. Um, and that's an unfortunate position to be in because HR is supposed to be the the care center, right? The, the place you go for therapy and help and, um, assistance in dealing with your work environment. Um, so I, I don't have an answer. I mean, the answer is really that you've gotta see if you can get above HR and talk to your CEO about the way this HR person, uh, interacts with everyone else. I suggest bringing, uh, other people with you who have also experienced it and see if you can, um, you know, make a difference. And if you can't, I always tell people, if you feel like you've tried to make a difference and make things better for yourself, and you're not able to, the organization is telling you that they don't care about you. And so you should leave. That's, that's my answer. It's not an easy answer to give, but, um, yeah, let's see. I see comments about Coldplay. Yeah, that was a bad, a bad move, right? Um, something else I wanna point out is that we do often villainize the toxic individual, right? The bully, whatever you wanna call them, and we kind of point to them as like, there's something wrong with them. Why are they like that? But I want you to understand that this is a social phenomenon. So villainizing that person is not, uh, necessarily the, the most accurate way to go about solving it. So what happens is you have the target or targets who have counselors. So in my situation, I spent a lot of time in another person's office, um, venting and complaining, and she was venting and complaining. So we were commiserating over this toxic individual in my workplace. Um, and so we would be counselors to each other. That's, so you have, you know, people that you work with that you can commiserate with or, or get advice from. They're sort of ad hoc therapists. The individual engaging in toxic behavior also has, uh, counselors. So, you know, somebody who's engaging in toxic behavior has buddies at work too, and they may be going to lunch with those buddies complaining about how Joe Bob is so annoying and can't get anything, right? And so they're also venting about what's going on, um, from their perspective. The toxic individual also has advocates and allies, or it's more likely that a toxic individual will have advocates and allies. Unfortunately, often that person is the CEO. So when I get on sales calls with potential clients for coaching, the narrative is very often, I'd say most often, that HR has been trying to get the CEO to address this problem. Much like what I was going through way back when. And much like I saw in all of this research I did in grad school, it's very common, um, because that toxic individual is often also high performer. So as HR is talking to the CEO about this toxic individual, the CEO is being the toxic individual's advocate and ally, don't mess with them, don't break it. They're bringing results. That's just how they are. And they're justifying and denying the other group of people. The largest group of people on the toxic individual side are the reinforcers. So you might call these people, um, witnesses or bystanders. I don't love those terms because that makes it sound like it's passive choice. Um, so a reinforcer is anybody in the organization who is aware of toxic behavior and who doesn't speak up, we understand why they don't speak up. It's scary. So I'm not blaming them for not speaking up, but it's a fact that people are making a conscious choice not to get involved, and that makes them a reinforcer. So if you look at this slide, look how many people are on the tar on the toxic individual side. That person's got all sorts of supporters. So let's, you know, we, we can't villainize the toxic individual. They're receiving the message from everybody else around them that their behavior is okay. So no wonder they act that way, right? Um, what you need to do as an organization is turn those reinforcers into advocates and allies. And that means the workforce needs the message that the organization cares about culture, and that they, people will be supported if they step in, if they observe a bad behavior and get it themselves involved. Um, so we, we have a pretty popular training called from Bystander to upstander, and that's what that training is about. What could you do if you observe somebody being yelled at in the hallway? Uh, and the answer ranges from just walking by to let make it known that like, Hey, I hear you all the way up to, hey, you're screaming at this person. Could you maybe, you know, lower your voice? Um, or it could be about going to hr. So, um, you know, that's what you need to teach your workforce. I'm gonna pause for a second and see what's going on in the chat here. Uh, let's see. Yep. Often there's an anonymous line, um, although I, I feel like a lot of HR people, it's like, if you're gonna make an anonymous complaint, then I can't help you. Um, and I, I find that response odd. I think if you got an anonymous complaint, it's worth if you can figure out where the problem is, it's worth looking at. Um, uh, I see Denise commenting that you can write a letter to the board of directors. Perhaps. I have seen that, um, that I, I have had clients where that was what caused them to reach out, that like, we got this horrible letter about somebody in the organization, um, and we need to make sure that's solved. Let's see. Toxic bosses want to keep authority and accountability. Yep. You do need accountability. Um, yeah, bullies sometimes wait until there's no witnesses. Um, and that makes it difficult as well. Um, but generally, a person engaging in workplace bullying is not only picking on one person, it's their personality. So while you might be feeling like I am receiving this behavior and nobody hears me or hears about it, or knows about it, um, I would bet my life that there are other people in the organization that also are at the receiving end of that behavior. So if you can find those people, now you have power in numbers. So really the solution then, if, if we're not villainizing the toxic person or the bully, um, because there's a lot of other factors at play, then that means we need to look at the organization as a whole. So this is how culture happens. You have the oil model, organizational behavior, so the organization's processes and systems and policies and technology and all of the, the ways the organization functions. You have individual behavior, and that's individuals at every level. And then you have leadership team behavior. So for this is the general example, let's whittle it down a little bit. So for example, your organizational behavior includes things like your performance management system, your onboarding process, you know, how you complaints are filed. Um, so this is all the ways that the organization is behaving, and that's about their systems and processes. Organizations often attempt to influence individual behavior with training and coaching, right? We get calls, we want everybody to be respectful. Can you deliver a training on respect? And the answer is usually we can, but what's driving the problem or the request, and let's dig into it further. Um, and then the leadership has to care and engage in behaviors that highlight their support for the culture that we're seeking. They have to, you know, be exemplifying those behaviors. They have to put resources toward it. So I know there's a lot of, uh, problems these days around DEI, lots of organizations taking a step back claiming that they haven't seen any ROI, uh, on their DEI and so they're not going to do it anymore, or they're phasing it out. Well, here's, here's my pushback on that. If your organization says there isn't any ROI or business case for having a DEI program or initiative, that tells me the organization implemented it incorrectly, that these three things weren't aligned, that the organization may be allowed inclusivity to be added to the core values. And that, um, you know, maybe they said they would audit their hiring practice, but they, they're not, it's keeps falling to the bottom of the list. Um, so the organization wasn't doing the things that would really drive a true DEI, uh, result. And then, you know, in terms of individual behavior, maybe they had somebody come in and do a training on implicit bias. Um, maybe they have a few employees who behave in ways that are pushing DEI forward. Um, and then, you know, maybe they decide to have some sort of committee, but then the leadership team isn't playing their role either, right? They're, they don't care or notice that their leadership team's not diverse. There's no budget. So these, the, the three things here, the oil is not aligned. And so you can't have a culture of inclusivity because these three things are misaligned. On the flip side, give you an example of how these things align. So if the organization says, we want individuals to be respectful, that means they need to have a core competency around respect. Um, so people are measured on respect within the performance system. And this is the way you can hold people accountable, right? If you have a bully and they're not being respectful, then you, you know, give them some coaching, you put them on a PIP and you let them go if you need to. Um, you know, don't promote people who are disrespectful. You're, you know, rewarding and encouraging people to be respectful. So that's the organizational behavior piece. Um, and then the organization has to influence the individual behavior with training and coaching. And then of course, the leadership team has to engage in behaviors that support the culture of respect by putting budget toward it. Uh, let me see. Robert says we need to share frameworks and habits that maximize trustworthiness. Yeah, rhythm, not leave trust to chance. This is very true. That is, you know, if we leave culture to chance, um, it goes sideways. Um, and by the way, everything I'm saying today is in the book. This is, that's why we called it what we did. This is like a super high level summary of all sorts of good tidbits from the book. So if this is all of interest to you, I do of course hope that you'll, um, purchase it. I forgot to mention at the beginning, I am going to do a giveaway. We'll do two free books. So, um, once I get a list, a hold of the, the list of attendees, we will, um, make sure that we choose two individuals and we will let you know. And if you send us your address, we'll send you the book. Yeah, everybody really loved that. Thanks. Okay. So if we're gonna prevent bad behavior, we need to look at risk factors. One way to do that, and there's a longer list in my book, um, of what I'm calling Windows. And these are some examples. Um, and when you look at the list in the book, you know, it's not like you're gonna scroll through it and be like, gosh, we're all positive on all the windows, or We're all negative on all the windows. There's gonna be some crossover. You're gonna, as you look at that list, you'll notice, well, this, we're really good here. Um, this over here is more negative. Um, and so then you can start to kind of develop a action plan for yourself of like, oh, here, wherever the, the answers to these questions are negative, that's something we know we need to address. So, you know, who are the heroes? Who gets celebrated? Are they people who are mean and work hours? Or are they people who exemplify the culture? What kind of stories do we talk about? Um, I think the example there is a pretty good one. You know, there's stories of like po, you know, the founders had grit, they built this thing, they got turned down for a loan, but they mustered through, they almost declared bankruptcy, but they got out of it. Um, and they look here where we are. And so then it becomes a, an inspiring story. Or it's like the founder's grit is like, well, we, I work a million hours a week and I always have. And that's how this company got to where it's at. And um, so you all need to do that too, right? Um, another window. What are the social rules and norms? So again, the book has a longer list. Um, how do we get a free book, Kim? I'm going to choose two winners at random from the registration list. And so you just have to put it out in the universe that you are going to be, uh, chosen. That's how you get your free book. Okay? I have a couple questions. What if someone who's already in a leadership position is the perpetrator of a toxic behavior? Um, I coach those individuals. So sit tight, we're gonna get to that. But that's, that's what you do. You give them some coaching, um, and hold them accountable to better behavior. So I have, I've coached many people over the last maybe years I've been coaching toxic leaders and I see a huge, uh, change in most of them. Uh, let's see. Dorothy says, the struggle is several organizations that leadership insists they don't have a problem when clearly there is. Uh, yep. And that's why a survey can be pretty useful too. 'cause then you can, um, you know, show the data. So I wanna give you an example again, I told you there was a lot in this webinar. Um, lots of action items here. So one thing to think about is if you're gonna prevent bad behavior, for example, any of us in California, we're all required to do the harassment prevention training, right? Um, but if you're really gonna prevent harassment, you have to address the risk factors. So just like a risk manager in a construction zone is looking at where all the opportunities for a workers' comp claim, and let's address those. You can be doing that in hr. Where are all the opportunities for bad stuff to happen? Um, there are tons of examples of risk factors. I'll give you a hint. If you go to, if you just Google EEOC risk factors, you'll find a whole long list there. Um, and they sh kind of like, here's a risk factor, here's why. And here's what you can do about it. So this is another action item for you to take on in all of your free time is address the things that allow the opportunity for bad behavior to occur. Um, I'll tell you that ambiguity, roles in responsibilities, that one down at the bottom over here, um, that is the number one predictor of workplace bullying is ambiguity. So I would, uh, definitely take a look at that. Where is there ambiguity? Let's see, seeing more comments here follows logically that incorporating positive workplace examples at regular meetings during reflections can help build a positive culture. Yes, Callie, that's a great, uh, point. Um, Jenny, who's on the webinar here from my team, Jenny, if you wouldn't mind posting the link to the, um, the leadership facilitators guide. Callie, since you asked that question, we're gonna give the link. We have, uh, exercises. You could do one a month that, um, is exactly to your point, gives leaders or managers a little job aid for months to bring positive conversations into their meetings. Performance reviews should take a approach. We should be able to review. Yep, for sure, for sure. And part of our coaching is , um, through interviews. Let's see, how about when you show the data quarterly from surveys that reiterate the same challenges and they're not addressed? Uh, yahara, I've seen that as well with clients sometimes where the CEO doesn't believe the data. And again, if you're showing data and the, and that there are problems and the CEO o isn't willing to let you fix them, then maybe it's time to find another job. I don't say that lightly, but, um, you've gotta, you know, you've gotta go where you feel like, um, you're valued and the data you're showing is valued. Kimberly, we'd love to understand more why ambiguity is the number one predictor. Um, that's a great question. So humans don't like ambiguity. We like to be in predictable places. That's why we don't like change so much, right? Um, and so when there's ambiguity, a couple things happen. It creates stress for the team because I'm not totally sure what I'm supposed to be doing on this team. Um, it creates opportunities for additional work, extra work because two people are doing the same work without realizing that somebody else was already doing it, for example. There's no clarity about where we're trying to get to. So what happens is all of this stress bubbles up. It's the same with, uh, something like an imbalance at work. Like if you're too stressed at work, you are, um, ability to monitor yourself and be civil depletes because your energy becomes more about fight or flight. And if you're in fight or flight, you can't, um, stop and think through actions and, and the right things to do. Um, the other piece of that is that people who engage in bullying use that ambiguity to their advantage without necessarily knowing it. It's not like they wake up like, how can I use ambiguity to my advantage today? But, um, it starts to come naturally to them that, well, if the instructions aren't clear or if I don't give you clear instructions and you do it wrong in my mind, then I'm frustrated at you because I think you are a incompetent employee, right? So there's a lot of reasons. Okay. Um, so one other thing you might do, and this is my favorite question, if you take nothing else away from this webinar, what's there in the pink is the greatest question ever. What is our organization doing or not doing that helps or hinder hinders people's ability to behave in the way that we want? So if you want a culture of respect, you have to ask yourself, what's the organization doing? And not doing that helps or hinders people who can, or the people's ability to be respectful. So one of the things that we often do in addition to surveys is we review or sort of audit, um, all of the HR processes. Some of the examples are there, and we are, it's like we compare what you're doing with the culture vision, and then we can say, here's the things you need to evolve and change. Let's see. You guys got some good, um, taking some good, uh, good notes here. Lots of great comments and some great, um, quotes there. Um, okay, so let's talk a little bit about turning around a toxic environment. So one thing to think about, and some of you sort of have said it in a way, is that an assessment is different than an investigation. So back to my original point, um, you get a hostile work environment complaint, you do an investigation, and maybe that behavior is lawful or unlawful or there's no findings, but that only looks at a very small problem. If you do a climate assessment, then you can understand the whole problem because the reality is whoever engaged or didn't engage in that bad behavior, depending on the findings, um, did it in the context of your organization. So again, don't villainize that person. You have to think broader. Why did that person come to work and think it was okay to act that way? It's not just them, it's the context that they're in. So you need to do a climate assessment. Another important point, climate assessments are different from engagement surveys. If you're doing an engagement survey, only you are only measuring engagement. A climate assessment is broader. So understand that you can be engaged and also be in a toxic work environment simultaneously. So this is from one of our clients. They were doing the Gallup Q and had been for several years, and the Gallup Q was giving them, over the average of those years, they'd been doing it. They were getting basically four out of five. So they thought things were good. Um, naturally the leaders were pretty shocked when some really bad things bubbled up. And so when we did our own survey or our own engagement or our own, um, climate assessment, you've got, well, you have people being engaged according to Gallup. You also have almost % of people feeling like their, um, you know, gender or ethnicity is an obstacle. You've got almost % of people saying they personally witnessed discrimination or harassment in the last year. Looks like that cut, cut off. Um, when employees raise concerns, the company takes some seriously, % disagreed and % were neutral, which I would say is % saying we're not taking it seriously. So again, they're doing really great on their engagement survey, but not so great with their actual culture. Um, another example. Our, our climate assessment doesn't normally look at these very specific things in this company. We needed to, based on what was going on, but you can see two different surveys. One from , we worked with the client for a year, and then we did another survey on the other side. And you can see that females feel engaged. They got a, a four out of five on engagement, but there was also a four out of five on being bullied. And even after, and then we reduced the bullying for both males and females, and everybody's just as engaged. Engagement didn't go up just because the bullying went down. So you can be engaged and in a toxic work environment all at the same time. Um, so what we're looking at is engagement and other things. We're looking at job satisfaction, relationships, communication, uh, psychological safety. Um, so these are the things over time that we have come to understand our impacting culture or the factors that make up culture. Um, so we've got a, a assessment, um, kind of job aid for you. If you wanna take a look at what those five dimensions look like, um, shoot us an email and we will send you a super duper simplified climate assessment. I love that. Um, so then how do you address those survey results? Um, so for those of you who are doing surveys, what I suggest is working with a team of employees and developing an action plan. And this is an example. This is straight out of the book. So this action plan is in the book, um, and it's longer in the book, there's more. But, um, you know, you just, you operationalize culture just like you would make a plan for anything else. You can make a plan for addressing the survey results. We come across a lot of organizations who do a survey, but they don't really know what to do after, and then nothing ever happens. And that hurts my soul when I hear that. So please, if you're gonna do a survey, um, oh, can, yes, Jenny will repost the email, it's info@civilitypartners.com. Um, so work with a team of people from within your organization, not necessarily all leaders. You want it to be people from various levels, and you create an action plan with them. Um, and, you know, you go through the data, figure out where's the high impact items that need to be solved, and you start to plot it out. Um, and then of course, you need to create accountability for good behavior. So lots of organizations do training but don't really, um, you know, hold people accountable to the training that the employees have gotten. Um, so if you're gonna do training on a topic, you've gotta put metrics in place, rewards, promotions, and learning opportunities, you know, so that it's not just, here's the training and then we hope you behave that way. It's got to be a throughput to accountability. Um, one other, um, one other way, or there's many ways to hold people accountable. Um, this is an example of how you can take your core values and turn them into core competencies. So we have a couple client examples in this matrix. Um, if you, again, email us at info at civility partners, and we'll send you this, um, recognizing that if whatever your company's core values are, you can define them as core competencies, and then you can train managers to measure people on those core competencies. So again, it doesn't have to be unlawful harassment for you to hold someone accountable. We can hold people accountable to acting inclusivity with inclusivity to being respectful to good communication. Um, so this is a super important tool, um, to, to take your core values, turn them into core competencies, and have them in your performance system. That is a great way to hold people accountable. All right, we'll spend the last little bit of time here talking about coaching. So again, I had a few people ask, can you, um, help leaders already in leadership positions? Um, again, the assumption is often that let's villainize bossiness and belligerence or not core comp. Thanks, Robert. That is true. Um, and that's what's funny too. You know, I go into a lot of companies where it's like, well, I see your core values. Uh, don't make room for bullying. Why am I here? You know, it's because they were words on the wall. Nobody paid attention to 'em. Um, okay, so we make a lot of assumptions about people who engage in toxic behavior, those leaders that, uh, someone was asking about earlier, you know, and it, it does seem that they can't change and that it's intentional because when you're at the receiving end, it certainly feels that way. The thing is that those people don't get up in the morning thinking about all the ways in which they're going to cause harm. What they don't recognize is the impact they're having. So they often know that people don't enjoy working with them, or, and they'll justify it, right? Well, I'm just getting results. I'm holding people accountable. Um, the processes are off and I'm trying to hold them accountable to changing, um, those processes. Um, but they're not understanding that they're causing harm. And so their intention is really about getting the job done. They're focused on results, and that's why they get them. Um, and the thing is that because they're focused on results, they're willing to change, they don't, they, they, well, let me, I'll move to the next slide. They engage in this behavior because they live and die by being absolutely competent. And anything that threatens that competence gives them major anxiety and they engage in anx or, uh, in fight, right? Talking about fight or flight. So they're operating from their reptilian brain a lot more often than they should be because of this fear of looking incompetent. Um, and yes, Denise, I agree with you. Hurt people, hurt people. What I've noticed in my conversations with the, I don't know, I've probably coached at least a hundred people. Um, they're all fighting for competence because of some past experience. Now, I'm not a therapist, I don't dive into that with them. It's just a pattern. I've noticed that, um, that desire to appear very competent comes from somewhere, and they've started living their life of this like re results. You have to get results. And if my team member makes a mistake that looks bad on me, that affects my ability to be competent. What's wrong with you? So they like diagnose employee problems as competence or incompetence, and they don't think beyond that. Um, so here is a little script that's gonna change your life. Are you ready? When you talk to people about this? Um, of course you are going to say something like, I'm getting some complaints about interactions. I'm hearing that your X, Y, and Z, you know, what are your thoughts? This is a coaching conversation. Um, and you want to focus on perceptions. I've been getting some completes about perceptions. So again, another paradigm shift for you. We're not focused on facts because they'll argue with you all day long, right? They're going to say, nuh, I don't do that. They deserve it. What? You know, well, I'm just trying to hold 'em accountable. Um, and so if you try to get in a fact battle with them, they don't hear you. And that is why, 'cause I get this question a lot from hr. Well, I've been telling this person to make change for a long time, and they're not changing. Doesn't that mean they're intentionally doing it? 'cause they no, because they don't agree with you. You, they don't have emotional intelligence. So when you say, why I'm hearing that you are getting fairly loud in meetings or that you publicly shame your team members, they don't see it. No, I don't. And so you can't, um, you can't get to them, right? So what you're going to do is say, look, I am receiving complaints that your behavior is perceived this way. That's the fact I'm focused on. Um, let's see. So Jennifer says, I was going to say that specific examples need to be included. And this, Jennifer, is where I disagree with you. Um, because what happens, right, is a lot of people will come to you and complain and they'll say, don't tell them I don't, you know, I'm just letting you know I'm remaining anonymous. I don't want you to talk to them about it. Um, and so then what are you gonna do with that information? So, and again, those the, then you end up in a fact battle. You know, if you're like, well, I got a complaint from Susan and she said this is what happened, they're gonna say, that's not what happened. They don't agree with you. So pull away from that. And you say, the perception of you has to change. I'm not going to engage in a fact battle with you. I don't work in your department. I'm in hr. I can just tell you the one fact I know is I'm getting complaints from the people who work with you. And that fact, those complaints have to stop. And so then that, and just keep pushing on them. And so that's why when I coach, I, uh, interview people and it's all about perceptions. Um, staying vague allows people to manipulate the process. Well, let me, let me show you, um, thank you Jennifer, for, for kind of pushing back. I, I'm happy to have this conversation. So the three questions I'm trying to answer are, what are the negative perceptions? What's causing them? And how can we eliminate those perceptions? And you can also focus on those three questions. As an HR coach, I interview people and I move it into themes. There are no facts in here. There is no on Friday at two o'clock this happened. It is the words of the people who work with this individual, and it is their perception, but this document is often pages long. So you got pages of perceptions and they equate to effect. Um, so, and they do push back. Nobody ever gets this document from me and is like, oh yeah, that's totally me. They try to poke holes in it all day long, and I continue to push back on them. And I say, you can either own this feedback and I can help you change it. This is how you're perceived. You can own it or not. If you'd like help, I will help you make changes in the way you're perceived. Um, and there, you know, it's like as long as you're arguing with me, there's nothing I can do. Um, and so they, it's like you got a collection of people who all agree that this is how you behave, then it's a reality, it's a fact. Um, it's more appropriate to address your observations. I mean, that it, yeah, I mean it's, you can, uh, we all have different perspectives. I'm just telling you what I know about how this works. Um, because the, I from my experience, they don't take that in very well. Um, okay, so then over three to four months of coaching, and this is a great example of steps two and three. So step one was to understand the negative perceptions. Step two and three is to understand why that's the perception and how to make change. So, um, this is a, a script from one of my coaching clients. Basically, one of his, um, themes was that he was very egotistical and he liked to name drop. I remember one of the comments was like, I don't care that his cousin played basketball with Justin Timberlake. You know, it was, uh, it was kind of funny. Let me move this little. Um, and so when I said, well, okay, so people, here's this theme around being egotistical. And we had worked our way into this conversation about his Monday meetings and he said, I always start the meeting off with, what'd you do this weekend? And nobody ever says anything. So they're fleeing back to fight or flight. They're fleeing, they're staying silent. Why? Why are they staying silent? And hi, his answer was literally, they're probably ashamed. They know that I'm awesome. They know, I think that if you spend your weekend binge watching that they're an idiot and lazy. And so I'm like, okay, so you're publicly shaming them, uh, looking at this theme. And so then it becomes, well, how can you eliminate this perception that you publicly shame that you're egotistical? Um, and I am happy to share that we get a lot of great results. So this is one case study. Mercedes is one of my star students. She made a literal . Um, she went from feedback that looked like this, that she was condescending and you can't disagree with her's, just too abrasive. Um, after four months of coaching or so, this was the feedback we got. So we do circle back and we re-interview everybody, um, and often are able to show some really great change. Um, so I've given you a lot. Again, everything I've said and more is in my book. Um, if you want the book, you can use the QR code. Uh, I, uh, actually Jenny, I'll have to correct me if I'm, if I'm wrong, I think the QR code takes you to an email so that you can just email us and we'll send you the, um, resources or you can email us@infocivilitypartners.com and we will pick two winners and you will be notified. I see a question. Um, how well does the system work within the public sense sector? My institution is a long history of ignoring, bullying and allows managers to manage as they see fit that, yeah, so Stacy, if that's the culture of your organization, then it's, you know, coaching one person isn't going to work. You've gotta, you know, it's just managers can be however they want. That is, um, a culture problem. Um, so I would start there and do a climate assessment and you know, and we do work with public sector with clients. We've, we've had plenty of cities and counties, um, uh, the military. So we, you know, we've definitely, uh, been out there. Let's see, Emma, thanks Emma. She says the focus on perception is game, game changing. Thank you. Um, okay, well that's it. And okay, so Jenny, so scan the QR code and it'll automatically populate an email to us and then just hit send and that makes it easy on you. Um, yeah, that's it. Thank you all, reach out if you need anything. Thank you all. I appreciate the, the kudos. All right, thank you. Thanks all. And again, reach out info civility partners if you wanna talk more about, you know, something. I appreciate the interactivity. Um, well thanks. I I got you, Sarah. I knew what you were, what you were talking about. Um, the resources will be shared, I think Zed in the library there for you if you're a member. All right, everyone, thank you.

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