If you’ve been in the workplace long enough, you’re likely to have a story or 20 about one horrible place you’ve experienced. We’ve found that many of those toxic workplace environments share a few basic characteristics. As an employer, it’s important to try and avoid these as much as possible.
5 Toxic Workplace Trends
- No employee handbook. If there are no set rules for the place you are working at you may be engaging in the Wild West. Wild West work environments tend to frustrate both new and seasoned employees.
- No true free time after work. Some employers have no shame in calling you at 8:00 at night to get something done. Those employers tend to drive their employees mad who might be cooking, watching a sporting event, or going out on a post-work date. Not allowing the employee to separate work from home will get them to feature a negative attitude in the workplace.
- Senior Management being absent. All management structures are different and you may see some managers more than others. However, if the one’s at the top of the food chain appear non-existent to their employees, the employees can lose purpose.
- Let employees own their ideas. A trend in negative workplaces is a policy in which individualism is shot down entirely while the company takes credit for all ideas. Let the employees feel a sense of success and ownership within the platforms they are assigned.
- HR has an attitude about requests. Nothing will irritate an employee quite like denying their request for a raise or new position like HR treating them rudely. One of the top reasons people leave for new work is the feeling of being trapped.
It is not hard to have a positive work environment. Keeping up with modern workplace policies will be instrumental in finding smiling faces.