The word toxic is rather new lexicon.
That is true, however, there has been quite a shift in many many companies and many industries since approximately 2009 and 2010. That was during the rebound after the recession. At that point many companies began, putting in experience managers in place simply because they were cheaper than the experienced managers. They also were removing talented and senior people simply because they cost more.
The recession led to different client and company, partnership agreements, which reduced compensation, leading to these cutbacks. In my industry, marketing and promotions, this led to many of the senior people simply leaving the industry, if they had enough money saved to do so, or they left the industry to go into different fields altogether.
I have been working professionally for 43 years and have been really surprised at this shift. I would say that the last full-time job I left, it was due to a toxic work environment. To be quite frank, they brought in a person with a law degree but no experience in the management of marketing programs. They were trying to cut costs and have this person split between the legal department and our department. The first thing she did was target the five most senior and experienced staffers, and put them on “performance improvements programs” saying all kinds of strange and vague things like they had poor attitudes or poor work ethics when exactly the opposite was true. Clearly her task was to cut the more expensive staffers, but the company decided that the best way to do it was to try to force the people to leave on their own.
Having been in management myself, I attended seminars where this methodology was discussed. If you want to get people to leave on their own, so you don’t have legal problems, you try to make the environment so they will make their own exit.
Other things she did was set people up for failure, not hiring to cover new client wins, transferring people without their consent from one department to another so they had no idea what was going on, even transferring from one company to another within the holding company.
Had I not been a manager who had learned this technique (which is largely legal by the way) I would not have known the handwriting on the wall. Immediately, when I was targeted, I got my résumé out and left on my own, and made a huge jump in salary to a company that really appreciates me.
Two of my coworkers left on their own, but not without being in this toxic environment for a while, and two were in fact, set up to fail, and laid off under the guise that their positions were being eliminated the company instead hired 2 to 3 junior people (with different titles) for each role— and in some cases outsourcing the more complicated tasks to outside vendors, who were lapping up the experienced people who are being cut loose. Several others “retired” out of the industry.
I don’t think this is a long-term plan for a company’s success, but it does take several years for these remaining. flaws to appear. This company example that I’m using, has only one person (from our original group of 12 ) three years later, and they seem to be in a little bit of trouble.
It is only one small example, but it demonstrates overall how some industries are becoming more unpleasant in the workplace. When I started out in my career, companies really DID value their staff and treated everybody like family— you could stay for years and work your way up. Now it is exactly the opposite. It has become very transactional. They treat you as a pawn on a chessboard, absolutely dispensable at the drop of a hat.
It is helpful to always remember that within certain industries that have changed this way. If initially remain with blinders on, like I did, thinking it was like the pre-recession years, you’ll be disappointed. Since then, it’s just a job.
I still approach every day’s tasks (that I love) with happiness and joy. I love the people I work with, but never forget that tomorrow they could show me the door.
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