[ANNOUNCER]: Breaking down everyday workplace issues and diagnosing the hidden sickness, not just the obvious symptom. Our hosts, James and Coby.

[COBY]: Did we lose a patient?

[JAMES]: No, that’s just my lunch.

[COBY]: Hey, thanks for joining us. I’m Coby, he’s James. And let’s get started with a question. Are we sheltering toxic leaders?

[JAMES]: I think the simple answer is yes. far too often we see leaders and managers that either they have toxic personalities, which is a big problem, or they create toxic environments, which is probably far more common than just the toxic person. But we see them being sheltered, protected, and mind bogglingly even promote it. And I don’t think that companies set out with any intent to shelter toxic leaders. I think a lot of the problem comes down to how we actually measure success. Because there’s a common saying that what we measure is what matters. And way too often the measurements for that companies or that we put on leaders and managers have little or nothing to do with how they actually treat, treat people or whether or not they burn through their team members or any of the myriad of other negative effects that toxic leadership can have. So I think what I’d like to do in our conversation is to talk a bit about where toxic leaders come from, why we end up sheltering them, and then some examples that we’ve seen of the negative impacts that toxic leaders have not only on the people who they are responsible for because it’s huge and pervasive, but also the negative impact that they have on the company that they are responsible to.

[COBY]: Yeah, it’s a like, like I say, it’s kind of a like interesting question of do, are we sheltering them? Well, yeah, we are. But that’s not, that’s not, that’s not the whole, that’s not the whole answer. Right?

[JAMES]: That’s not the whole picture either. Right?

[COBY]: Yeah, exactly like we are, but like it’s, it’s a bit organic in how and why and what it looks like. And I think one of the problems with this whole conversation about toxic leadership and everything like that is it’s so common. These like, like toxic environments, toxic leaders, toxic, you know, like team dynamics are so pervasive that it’s almost like, you know. Oh, it’s almost like. Yeah, I guess if I have to step back and look at it, yeah, that isn’t great. But it’s so normal that it’s something that it’s really, it’s important to talk about, it’s important to identify and it’s important to put a label to things. So we can step back and look at them a little bit of clarity.

[JAMES]: It is important to put a label to things. I do have some issues with the label because we talk about toxic leadership and it’s not. Or. And I even use the term toxic leaders, which I don’t think is a, necessarily a fair characterization because rarely is it malicious. Yeah, I mean, people who are just blatantly malicious and toxic don’t tend to stick around. Right. We identify those people who. There are people who are just hateful. Sometimes they’re protected. More often than not, we don’t want those people around. And the toxic behaviors or the toxicity comes from not. It’s not who the person is, but it’s a effect of the choices and the actions that they take. And so I, do want to have. Just make sure that we’re talking about. This is rarely. Are we talking about people who are actively malicious and hateful.

[COBY]: Yeah. I think it’s maybe it’s even fair to kind of say the question could be better, like explaining and expanded on by saying, are we sheltering leaders and managers that create toxic environment?

[JAMES]: Yeah. It’s just not as pithy. And.

[COBY]: Yeah.

[JAMES]: It doesn’t fit on the, on the title card quite as well.

[COBY]: Exactly. Yeah. So we’ll stick with the question for the title card. But that’s really what we’re talking about is managers and leaders that create toxic environments and toxic cultures within their teams and within their organizations. So. Yeah. So you said that title. It is. Yeah. I wouldn’t listen to that episode. That sounds boring. but the idea of we should, you know. So you want to talk about where talk leaders come from.

[JAMES]: Yeah.

[COBY]: And then why we’re. Then why we’re sheltering them. So I think that, probably a great first place to see where they come from is they kind of come from. There’s. There’s one thing that I’ve seen a lot is this ignorance to the reality of how messy, leadership is. And the idea that leaders have to be infallible, that, leaders can’t be vulnerable. Leaders have to be. Have to be infallible. And there’s this expectation and there’s cultures that kind of have this baked into them. A lot of traditional mindsets is where a lot of that comes from, that your leader has to be. Has. You can’t be questioned, has to be infallible. Can’t make decision, can’t make mistakes. Every decision is final. And that is where that’s a. That’s a breeding ground for. For toxic Leadership.

[JAMES]: Yeah. And it, it is a pervasive problem because I, and I, I get it. Because as someone in a position of authority, you want others to look to you as the expert. Right. You want to have the answers to people’s questions. You want to be seen as the, person in charge. And we equate that with having all of the answers. We equate that with never making a mistake or not being able to show vulnerability. And I mean, we don’t need to get into where all that comes from. Whether it’s, you know, media that we consume, television, movies, or you know, just pervasive, expectations that we’ve set. And it doesn’t really matter. I think the important thing to identify is that there is this pervasive perception that a good leader doesn’t make mistakes. Right. And I can tell you the, some of the best leaders and managers that I have worked with have been very flawed and very open about it though. Right. And it’s the desire to do better that tends to be the redeeming quality, the openness to, damn, I, I messed up. But here’s how we’re going to work through this together. Is a really powerful leadership tool.

[COBY]: Oh, it is. And I mean, and it’s, and I think that the need for the expectation of infallibility, like I say, I think it’s a very traditional, mindset that’s kind of been baked in and ingrained and kind of like you say, kind of culture and stuff like that too. But there is an expectation of now that I’m the boss, now that I’m the leader, I have to be perfect, I have, you know, I can’t be questioned and this and that and then some. Sometimes it’s a matter of trying to like enforce that expectation is what kind of creates more, the more overt and the more like aggressive, toxic behavior. and, but the whole idea that it really does is just going to come from this, this absolute ignorance to the reality of the human condition and the reality of the workplace, that leaders are people, they need to be able to try things out, make mistakes. And a good leader is someone that owns that. And it’s not just people that we work with. We’ve seen great leaders in great organizations. And one common thing that most almost, I can see, I can’t think of any of them that don’t have this, is they have the self awareness to kind of say, yeah, I don’t know, and I’m going to ask questions, we’ll try this and I’ll it might make a mistake. They’re willing to be vulnerable. They’re willing to put themselves out there. They’re willing to be wrong. And it’s, it’s such a night and day between those kinds of leaders and the ones that feel they have to be infallible for how effective they are.

[JAMES]: Yeah. That willingness to be wrong is such a powerful. And it’s not only a powerful tool in terms of making sure that things actually get done, because you can’t really try anything new if you’re not willing to be wrong.

[COBY]: Right. Yeah.

[JAMES]: Like that’s what keeps people in the same hamster wheel of doing the same thing day in and day out and getting the same terrible results.

[COBY]: Yeah.

[JAMES]: But also from a personal perspective, when you get to that point of allowing yourself to make mistakes, it’s very freeing.

[COBY]: Yeah.

[JAMES]: Because we all make mistakes. Nobody wants to get things wrong, nobody wants to screw up, but we all do it.

[COBY]: Yeah.

[JAMES]: I mean, there’s no getting around that. And giving yourself permission and acknowledging that with your team when it happens is such a powerful tool for building trust and relation, good relationships with people.

[COBY]: And so I want to focus just on this one that we should move on to.

[JAMES]: Probably going off on a tangent, but.

[COBY]: One last thing I do want to say about it though, is that is again, someone listening to this might be like, well, I’m in the leadership role and the expectation is on me from those above me, from the board or from whomever that have to be infallible. And that’s. And that’s a tough place to be in. But I mean, part of it is, is that expectation overtly said to you, or are you assuming that expectation? And if you’re asking yourself the question of, well, what do I do when the person above me expects that, Honestly, my advice would be to see clarity. Like, just have that as an open discussion.

[JAMES]: Provide.

[COBY]: You have little safety to do that. But I mean, clarify, is it an unspoken expectation or are, you know, or. Or is it that, or is it an assumption? And I think getting that clarity can be helpful.

[JAMES]: It can even come up when you’re looking to do, if you are the leader, if you were responsible for a board and anytime that you’re trying something new, acknowledging with whomever you’re responsible, to that, hey, this is what we’re going to do. There’s, in all honesty, there’s a possibility that it could not work out. You know, create that plan and that dialogue with them could be a way to find out whether or not that’s an overt or expectation or something that you’re reading into.

[COBY]: Yeah.

[JAMES]: But I think, getting back to the actual question of are we sheltering and where do they come from? I think a big part of where they come from is people gaming the system. We see this a lot in more corporate environments, honestly. in large corporate structures where there’s many, many, many layers and levels to the hierarchy. and people can kind of use, you know, position themselves and use titles creatively to continue their career advancement. And there’s nothing necessarily wrong. There’s nothing wrong with career advancement. There’s nothing wrong with internal succession. But it really, to me I think it relates closely to the Peter Principle. Right. This idea that people get promoted in a hierarchy to kind of the level of incompetence. Essentially you get. Employees get promoted based on their success in previous roles until they reach a level where they’re no longer competent because the skills that they had to perform their previous role are no longer the skills that they actually need to perform their new role. I mean Dilbert’s a great comic, that talks about this all the time. Right? Yeah, I love it. but that idea of not being properly prepared for the new role that you are taking on, whether that’s through, you know, you’ve been legitimately successful and you’ve got promotion after promotion or unfortunately we see people not being successful but being very successful in navigating the internal politics of organizations being promoted into a place where they are completely ill suited.

[COBY]: Yeah. Well, and one of the things that’s. That’s tough kind of, kind of tying into the gaming kind of gaming the system and building their career kind of through the politics is often it’s a quest for the benefits of the promotion of the authority, the pay, the prestige and wanting that, but not necessarily the job.

[JAMES]: Yeah.

[COBY]: And some of that comes from you know, when the lower, when in the hierarchy, when compensation and you know the actual like, you know, employee benefits, everything like that don’t really help you with your quality of life until you reach a certain level. That’s when people are trying to get to that, that level for that they don’t. It’s not about the job. It’s. It’s just about kind of getting to that point because they feel like there’s a, There’s a big disparity and a lack of equity between know, kind of salary, bans. But a lot of times it’s really more about the authority and the prestige I want. You know, it’s like I’m really good at what I do. But you know, but everyone wants to get promoted. You want the next job, you want to climb the ladder. Is that what everybody is what I’m supposed to do?

[JAMES]: That’s what we’re trained to want.

[COBY]: Yeah, yeah. And so, so we, we, we seek that job. Wanting the authority, wanting the pay, wanting the prestige, but not really wanting the job and not being prepared for the realities of the job that you’re seeking. So you so hard. Right.

[JAMES]: And I want to make sure that I point out the not being prepared is not only on the employee, it’s not only on the person who’s going after the job. Because companies do a terrible job of preparing people for new roles of having like we do a pretty. It’s pretty easy to develop internal succession programs where we have career trajectories where we help people advance through the ranks and gain more experience, promote prestige, authority. But we don’t train them which is mind boggling. We keep putting people into positions where we’re setting them up to fail and the company is the one who ultimately yeah. Is done a disservice. I mean yes, it has a direct impact on employees lives and that should be a motivating factor. It rarely is, especially in a corporate environment. But selfishly, as the company we should want to inv. Make sure that the people we’re putting into authority positions have some level of training so that they don’t drive all of our employees away.

[COBY]: Right. No. So I think that, I think that that’s a pretty decent explanation about kind of where these toxic leaders or where these leaders that ah. Create toxic environments kind of come from.

[JAMES]: But the real non exhaustive list.

[COBY]: But yeah, yeah. So let’s just say these are kind of three big two or three things that we really see very often. It’s not again by no means is it. You know you can get into things like nepotism and stuff like that too. But like these ones about expecting availability kind of gaming the system M and people wanting the authority, pay and prestige but not the job are probably the three that are most common. Like staggeringly most common in the work that we do.

[JAMES]: Yeah.

[COBY]: but that, but, but going back to the original question, are we sheltering these leaders? Is really what we are trying to get to. And there are kind of like again we got, we love threes. We kind of have three main, main ways that we’re doing that. Again not an exhaustive list, but again very common. Like you know why? And I think the first one that I want Us to talk about briefly is I think the. Or, sorry, is the reason it seems that many businesses, when they, when they have these leaders who are creating toxic environments, who are really not prepared for the job, who are, you know, like having these issues that are, that we’re talking about and then we can say, well, why are they still there? Right? Like, that’s really kind of the question. I’m sure that’s a question that you listen or wanting us to get to. Why are they still there? And a big reason is a lot of businesses kind of see them in that role as a sunk cost. They’re already there. It’s too hard to replace them. We’ve already invested this much time in them. They’ve already gotten the promotion. You know, we’ll see how it all works out, you know. Well, it’s, you know, it’s too much. It’s to too much work to kind of replace them or this or that.

[JAMES]: Or if we replace them, we might have to put them in a different position or we might have to offer them severance or we might have to do X, Y or Z or it’s going to be disruptive and yeah, it’s.

[COBY]: Going to be an HR nightmare to kind of move the person out or kind of go through disciplinary actions and this and that. And that is the stupidest reason, but also the most common.

[JAMES]: Yeah, yeah, it is. And I think part of that comes from having. So you talk about, you know, having to go through hr, disciplinary procedures. And I mentioned in kind of the intro, one of the reasons why I think this happened so pervasively is because we are measuring people incorrectly. Right. Our performance metrics are for leaders rarely have, any direct, like our result of how they treat people or how they are building up their team. So you get the behaviors that you incentivize. So if you’re incentivizing only, production outputs, then people are going to focus on that metric to the exclusion of all else. And that’s kind of part of the sunk cost. And part of that we haven’t done put the proper, processes and evaluative tools in place to make sure that in the event we have someone who creates a toxic environment, can we actually get rid of them? Can we actually maybe not get rid of them, but how do we either support them or transition them?

[COBY]: Right. Yeah. And you’re right. I mean, like, you know, if, again, if all that matters and all that you’re measuring are things like reduction output and you have people that are burning through employees, but they’re hitting that output. Then isn’t everything fine? And that’s, you know, and to us, that best part of the sun cost. Well, you know, if this is a problem, then we still, we kind of have to uproot our entire metric system and we’re going to have to, you know, do this and that. Well, and to me, I’m like, that’s kind of like saying, yeah, there’s a giant hole in my roof and yeah, rain and snow gets in, but you know, how much work it is to actually fix. I got to call the roofer and I got to do this. And then, you know, and then I.

[JAMES]: Was going to live with the whole tarp over it.

[COBY]: Exactly. Yeah. I’ll just live with it. No one says that. Right. But this is. To me, that’s a pretty fair comparison about how disastrously, effectively dangerous something is to do workplace, just like a giant hole in your roof is to your home. But it’s the idea of we in a workplace, we want to just cover the giant hole with a tarp and kind of say, yeah, it’s good enough because it’s not, you know, because it’s not affecting. Often those that have the power to actually, to influence change is not affecting them enough that they actually want to go through the. Go through, you know, dealing with the sun cost.

[JAMES]: Yeah. And I see, I think that one really, resonates in the corporate environment. the. What I see very often in, kind of less corporate structures, you know, smaller in companies is. Tends to be people prioritizing their, their personal relationships over professional competence. So, you know, the. I, this happens in corporate as well. But, you know, I, I’m buddies with the owner or it’s my. I’m hiring as the owner. I’m hiring my nephew to work in my company. Yeah, the kid doesn’t know his up from down. I will say that’s a better way of framing it. Sure, sure. but, right. They’re prioritizing the personal connection, the personal relationship that they have with people over the professional competence and the actual impact that that person is going to have in their organization on the profitability and stability of their company.

[COBY]: Yeah, I mean, like, we see this all the time and in businesses, you know, where it’s like, you know, well, the managers are all the drinking buddies of the owner. And this, you know, I mean, and this is really, really just what it is. Or, or if it is, you know, hiring family or there’s all kinds of other stuff where it’s the idea of the priority is the, the relationship, not what’s best for the business. It’s what’s best for like the individuals involved, the people, the individuals in power, not for the. What’s best for the company itself. And that’s just the reality of it.

[JAMES]: I mean we’ve talked about nepotism in the past and my personal view is that it’s not inherently bad. It’s m. Often used terribly.

[JAMES]: But in and of itself it’s not inherently a bad thing. Right. I mean if I’m, I’m a. We are business owners. I understand the, the business owner perspective. If I have a family member who I think would be who I to bring into my organization, I have free reign to do so.

[COBY]: Right, right.

[JAMES]: But that also, needs to be coupled with a responsibility to making sure that they are properly trained and equipped to do the job, to support my staff and to not muck up my organization.

[COBY]: Yeah, you’re right. And I mean it is important to kind of again, I guess really ask yourself a hard question. If you’re in that position of authority, why is this person being promoted? You know, and, and again, and if you’re, you know, if you can, if you can, you know, be very kind of direct with yourself and they go, it’s only because they’re family, only because of my friends or because I like them more, then that’s up. to. It’s your call. But just know that there are unintended consequences that come with that call.

[JAMES]: Yeah. And it goes beyond even if they are well positioned for that role or not. I mean we’ve talked. We, we don’t need to get into all rehashing all of the same discussions, but there’s huge perception problems that can come with nepotism. and.

[COBY]: Yeah, yeah, yeah. And so if this idea of the nepism piece is interesting, we did an episode at the end of last of end of season two where we talked a bit more about that. I checked that out if that’s of interest. So yeah, so probably, probably the third, the third reason why we tend to shelter, these toxic leaders or leaders that create, you know, toxic environments is kind of that we don’t necessarily know what’s happening in the workplace. If we are in a position of like, you know, if we are a leadership team or if we are a board or if we are a council. You know, we don’t really know, what’s going on. We’re hearing everything, sunshine and roses from, from the people that were talking. They’re talking to us. And if the people that are talking to us, who are directly responsible for talking to us are the problem, we may not realize that everything is not sunshine and roses, you know, to everybody else but them.

[JAMES]: Yeah, it. And that’s a, that’s a big one. trying to. I don’t know who the quote is originally attributed to, but I always heard it as you know, whoever controls the media, controls the mind. This idea that if someone’s in control of the lines of communication, they have full control over the narrative that people hear.

[COBY]: Right.

[JAMES]: So if you are, if you’re a board, and you have a CEO who is toxic or creates a toxic environment, I should say.

[COBY]: Yeah.

[JAMES]: and the only channel of communication you have is that person. You’re probably not going to be given the. They’re probably not going to self report that they are creating a toxic environment.

[COBY]: Yeah, no, that, that reminds me of an organization that we, we work with in the past that after we had after we kind of stopped working with them, a new, like a new CEO had kind of taken over or new executive director or whatever. And m. One thing that I remember talking to some of the staff from there kind of like, you know, like you know, a year and a half later about how different everything was because, because when we were there, the, the person in charge was a super like employee focused. We are in this together. My success is based on your success. So let’s make you successful to a. As the, as the staff had told me again, a year and a half later I started working with them and this new person came in, a micromanager. A person that was really self possessed and you know, and really just what it was really had the exact opposite approach. And what they had done was they had consolidated all communication channels to you know, where like, you know the, where the step so staff could no longer speak to their board or whomever. And where it used to be, there was a lot of communication but that was shut right down. The only voice they ever, the board ever heard was that of the executive director. And it was, you know, like everything is great. My staff are behind me 100% and the board didn’t know any different. Now I, if I was on the board would question why am I only hearing this from one person. I would, you know, I’d want to, I’d have some questions if this was, this was happening, if it was me. But you know, whatever. But the idea was, but in reality was they were dealing with massive turnover. They were dealing with like, you know, just, just incredibly toxic environments. Like, you know, longtime employees were putting in retirement early. Like there’s all these huge warning signs. But you’re right, the executive director, they controlled the narrative.

[JAMES]: Yeah. So the board, the, the board didn’t investigate. They didn’t see the warning signs for what they were. They had a CEO or executive director who was telling them what they wanted to hear, that everything is fine. Oh, this is just normal. Yeah. They, this person’s leaving because they have another opportunity. Oh, this, this long time employee is leaving because they want to spend more time with their family or like. Right. There is always a reason. Yeah, but there was never any verification.

[COBY]: Yeah, but, but you’re right because you know, we say, we’re saying, you know, who controls the line of communication really essentially controls a narrative.

[JAMES]: It’s harvest and.

[COBY]: Right. They had the only direct line to the board, so they get to tell their story and that was the only story they heard. And again, the board didn’t ask many questions to me, you know, that, you know, whatever. But that is exactly what tends to happen. And we see this when, you know, when there is that, you know, you know, CEO, executive director, you know, managing partner or you know, or city manager, whatever. Right. That is a real risk if you’re only ever hearing the story of one person. And because, and then it’s the idea of that is how a lot of the lack of investigation, the lack of verification, everything is going fine is one way that these toxic leaders end up being sheltered.

[JAMES]: Yeah. And I mean in fairness to boards that are in that situation, if somebody is controlling the narrative in that way, they’re also probably ruling by fear. Right. They’re the, their employees would not have the psychological safety to feel like they could actually express those concerns to if they were asked by a board member. Right. Because chain of command, line of communication, very, important things to put in place. But anonymous surveys are a great way to bypass some of that.

[COBY]: Yeah. And that’s why we even created our employee experience inspection tool, which is just a really simple quick engagement where we can do a very short investigation, usually within a couple weeks. It’s not overly expensive to just kind of do a bit of a litmus test on, on how are things validating if things are the way they say they are and everything else like that. And so when, you know, when some leaders or boards are like, you know, because this can even happen with like store managers. So in corporate environments where a store Manager has that the only direct line and they say everything is fine but they’re not hearing any other kind of validating information about that. Little things like the kind of like quick inspections or quick assessments or quick like you said, surveys that are anonymous and protected and well, you know design with strategy can be that quick. Just you know, that quick health check are things. Can we validate that? You know for the leader we want to validate that everything is as good as they say that they are. And so, so we’re just going to check on that. Those can be things that you can do that are not overly time intensive or expensive that can make a huge difference and uncover you know, some of these infrastructural pieces that might protect these kind of leaders.

[JAMES]: Yeah, I feel like we’ve been really hard on leaders so far and I mean it’s kind of by the nature of the question itself.

[COBY]: Yeah.

[JAMES]: But I do want to get back to the idea that oftentimes it’s well intentioned people.

[COBY]: Right.

[JAMES]: Creating toxic environments.

[COBY]: Yeah.

[JAMES]: And there’s a few scenario, there’s a few situations that kind of spring to mind when we talk about this. one in particular stands out. A small business owner who. Very kind person in conversations, personable, does a great job of at least talking about how they really want to support their staff. Very values driven, in their communications but very authoritarian in their management style. Which is kind of an interesting beast to wrap your head around. and it’s not that this person like they’re not this cartoon ogre, where just like always angry and yelling and you know, being ridiculously over the top. I think a lot of it really stems from a lack of self awareness and emotional intelligence and a projection on others the fears that they have about themselves. but what it’s done is it’s created this environment where they just, they squeeze the life out of people because they’re so restrictive because they. I see it as a lack of confidence in themselves and in their position. because knowing this situation they did not work their way through the company and actually didn’t have any prior experience in the industry. They married into the family and took over the, the family business. so I think there’s a lot of self doubt.

[COBY]: Yeah.

[JAMES]: With this individual.

[COBY]: Yeah.

[JAMES]: But well intentioned. But it’s what the, the intention is unfortunately secondary to the effect that it’s having on people because it’s still creating this very toxic environment that’s driving the top performers out of the organization.

[COBY]: Yeah.

[JAMES]: Squeezing people.

[COBY]: Yeah, well and like, I mean like this is a great example of like one of the three deaths of leadership of the modern leader that we talk about which is you know our three deaths are self sabotage, self preservation and my micromanagement. Because the idea is again when you are unconfident in your ability to lead or how you got the job, if confidence is a problematic issue for you, that’s one of the biggest causes of a lot of this toxic behavior. And I mean in this story is this leader really was a great poster child for the self sabotage was you know, this this idea of projecting you know, insecurities onto others on, on using kind of the harsh grip from our project principle of squeezing the life out of people and creating this, this very adversarial relationship with employees while all the time trying to do the right thing. But just every time they almost like go to act it’s the, they end up sabotaging themselves because it’s just you know, the idea of like you know I, I can’t, I can’t show vulnerability. I can’t, you know, I can’t you know, make be let someone else kind of help me. I have to kind of do all this kind of myself or you know, and I have to show my family or whatever that I can do this. But they end up just you know, sabotaging their stuff all along the way. And again it’s not that this person set up to be malicious, it’s just the kind of the, their origin story just created this self sabotage approach which just turns into toxicity.

[JAMES]: And yeah you. Adversarial is an excellent term in this situation because we also talk frequently about consistent consistency and how important consistency is consistency in your behavior, in your communications, the way that you treat people. Because this situation had eroded any form of trust in the organization because the, the person, they are very compassionate.

[JAMES]: They want, and they would talk about all the things that they wanted to do to build up their team and support people and you know how important this is a core value of theirs and the companies. And then their actions ran completely contrary to that. And it’s the, that adversarial approach that the inconsistency between word and deed that created and really started to fester with a toxic environment.

[COBY]: Yeah. And that story also kind of makes me think about another business that we work with where there was kind of a, ah, there was a like a municipality and they had brought in a new cao, or city manager. And they had a More like, you know, their leadership style was pretty, it was, was a, I would call it like an avoidance style. And they really embodied the kind of the second death of the modern leader, which is self preservation. They, you know, were not, they, they really did not like handling conflict or addressing issues head on. And you know, it was something that we kind of came into, kind of once things started to kind of go wrong and to kind of help, you know, try and undo some of the problems that this created. But it seemed like, there’s a lot of lack of confidence in, in their, in the work that they did. So they did a lot of placating. They would reinsure employees to their face, but they would ignore the issues that, that would like, you know, that required uncomfortable conversations. And one thing that was kind of mind boggling when you kind of saw the whole picture after the fact was what they did was when problems, organization problems were coming up, they would just remove authority from the directors and from the managers of these areas. So it’s almost like if they weren’t responsible for these things that were having problems, then there’s no one to report the problems. Then the problems didn’t exist. Yeah, right. And it was again like, and again this wasn’t an intentional thing. It was just kind of them reacting and trying to, you know, preserve their position. They, you know, that they, I, you know, really it seemed like they weren’t confident in their ability to do it. And I think they also kind of did a bit more of that kind of like, you know, the, they control the communication lines and controlled the narrative. So the stuff wasn’t as clear to their city council. But yeah, I remember just like, like just this just perfect example of how self preservation can just destroy an organization with somebody who was a pleasant person. They weren’t two faced. It was just they were drowning constantly and grabbing whatever they could. But it was just they’re holding on too tight to stuff and they were just trying to preserve themselves day to day and had no ability to think long term.

[JAMES]: They were focused on the preservation of their career and their reputation. And the sad reality is, yes, they are a nice person. They are also wholly unequipped for the position that they were in. Yeah. And that not being skilled and equipped to do the job and focusing on solely on how is everything going to reflect on me as the leader is just a recipe for disaster.

[COBY]: Yeah. And to me their story really is just that they wanted the authority, pay and prestige of that position, but they didn’t Actually want the job itself.

[JAMES]: Yeah. How they got the job, I still don’t know, but that’s an entirely different conversation.

[COBY]: Yeah.

[JAMES]: There’s one more style that I unfortunately have seen, and that’s kind of more of a passive aggressive, toxic leadership style and where they really put a lot of guilt and pity on attacks on people, for not meeting their rigid expectations. It’s. I think it’s better said as they were an incredible micromanager where every. Everything had to, really they were over your shoulder making sure that things were done their way. The outcome, successful outcome wasn’t the important factor. It was. Did you do it the way that I told you to? Right. it’s the. This is dumb example, but it’s the difference between, in math. Right. can you get to the answer properly? versus can you follow the 18 different steps that I set out? That’s probably a bad example because math, you actually do need to follow the property, way of doing things.

[COBY]: No one go to James for math tutoring. Just, he’s steering it wrong.

[JAMES]: I am not a mathematician. I love stats, which is hilarious in and of itself. but, okay, terrible example. Scratch that. Pretend that I said something articulate and funny and let. But really it was a case of someone who, again, not a terrible person. I thought they were an absolute terrible manager. I’ve said many times before that I have a very visceral reaction to micromanagement. It’s one of the things that will kill any type of, leadership or management relationship for me. Right. Immediately.

[COBY]: Yeah.

[JAMES]: But this created such a, Such, a toxic environment that the staff didn’t even feel like they were able to talk to each other. Right. The micromanagement was not only in the process of how things are supposed to be done and looking over your shoulder in the work, but micromanaged the communications between teams. So everybody ended up being siloed, which is not a healthy way to operate either.

[COBY]: Yeah, yeah. And I mean, like, again, micromanagement is such a, Again, it’s such a dangerous thing. And it’s the third of the three deaths of the modern leader. And again, all of these kind of deaths of the modern leader kind of come from this lack of confidence. And you know, not to say that the only kind of toxic leaders are confident leaders, but there’s a strong correlation between low confidence in leadership and creating a toxic environment. But I think to be a little bit helpful to people to kind of say, okay, so here’s all this bad stuff. What can you do about It And I think that again, to kind of talking to kind of businesses in general, there’s a relatively simple fix to all of this. It’s at least simple in concept. And honestly it’s trainer managers, like all managers in your organization leaders, managers should routinely and as part of their role be involved in continuous improvement. We should be constantly investing in the people that have the most authority, that have the most impact on a company to make sure that they do have the emotional intelligence to kind of deal with people that they do have, you know, coaches to help them through some problematic areas so they don’t have to feel they have to go with this alone. We have to, you know, allow normalize things like, you know, vulnerability and stuff like that. Give people the confidence to handle the unfamiliar and to handle the pressures that come with their job. And to be honest, if that is probably one of the biggest things that we could do, but is the thing that almost never happens, largely because the people that have the authority to make that happen are usually the ones that are creating the toxic environment and they don’t want help.

[JAMES]: Yeah, that’s true. And so I, I agree with you 100. We need to train people better. We need to support them, we need to give them the skills to be successful in the roles that ah, we are putting them in. But we also have a responsibility to incentivize the right type of behaviors. So if we are going to provide people with new training, new ways of doing things, better skills to manage their teams, then we also need to put evaluative tools in place to make sure that we are reinforcing that. Because again, we. What is being measured is what matters. And if you’re only measuring somebody’s performance based on the whatever production outcome is appropriate for your business, and there’s no metrics around how people are treated, how they are supported, how they are developed. If there’s no, incentive for a toxic leader to change because their evaluation tools are being changed, we’re not going training alone, I don’t think is going to be enough.

[COBY]: No, you’re right, we do. If we’re not measuring the employee experience, then we’re not doing. Then we’re not putting any kind of emphasis on employees and on what it’s like to work there. And you’re right. Just training people without any kind of way to measure progress. Success is not money well spent. No, that’s really good point. Okay, I think this has been a pretty good conversation. anything else you want to add?

[JAMES]: Except for my math analogy, that was Done.

[COBY]: Well, it’s okay. Everybody can. So that’s, that’s a great snap.

[JAMES]: It’s a great showcase of, you’re allowed to make mistakes.

[COBY]: I was going to say that’s a great showcase of the kind of random stuff you kind of say to me off camera.

[JAMES]: Yeah, well, this is what happens when you don’t script, your responses.

[COBY]: Right, Fair enough. All right. so, yes, let me just jump into a quick summary. So our question was, are we sheltering toxic leaders? And the answer is, largely, yeah, we are. And it’s because we’re creating these environments where leaders, managers and leaders kind of create toxic cultures by doing things like expecting there are leaders to be infallible, by promoting, people that are really not necessarily good at the job, but they’re good at gaming the system and kind of like playing the politics to kind of get to the job that they want. Largely, they want it because they want the authority, they want the pay, they want the prestige, but they don’t really actually want the job itself and they’re not prepared for the realities of the role. Why do we do that? Well, it seems like we do it because we are not wanting to, accept the fact that there are sunk costs in these people. We’ve already invested in them, we’ve already put them in this place. They’re there now. And it’s too hard, too expensive, too long a process to do anything about it. Or we promote people based on personal relationships over their professional competence. Or we kind of silo our leadership teams in our boards and those who these leaders are accountable to by letting those leaders be who controls the lines of communication. They control the narrative, they control the perception, and they can leave those above them in the dark about what the reality is, is. So what does this kind of look like? Well, this can look like authoritarian style leadership where, you know, it’s the idea of, you know, holding, holding too tight onto people and projecting insecurities of yourself into, in your job onto those that you work with and driving away your top performers. It can look like avoiding things. It can look like, you know, not addressing or handling conflict. It can look like, you know, removal of authority as a way to maintain control. Or it can look like James’s favorite thing, which is micromanagement. It can look like controlling a team and siloing people to keep everybody in the dark. But if you want to fix these problems, we need to look at things like training. We need to try and make sure that it’s a normal thing and it’s part of most leadership and management positions that people are continuously improving their skills as leaders and managers. But to do that, we also have to start measuring people effectively. We have to create, we have to create clear measurables that, that impact things like the employee experience that actually have things like 360s in your performance reviews in creating you know, performance processes that really leverage what’s really important to the business and ideally that’s more than just the stock price or the production outputs.

[JAMES]: Yeah.

[COBY]: All right, so that about does it for us. For a full archive of the podcast and access the video version hosted on our YouTube channel, visit Roman3ca Pod podcast. Thanks for joining us.

[ANNOUNCER]: For more information on topics like these, don’t forget to Visit us at Roman3ca. Side effects of this podcast may include improved retention, high productivity, increased market share, employees breaking out in spontaneous dance, dry mouth, a version of the sound of James voice, desire to find a better podcast…