Toxic Teammates & the Way Through

Have you ever worked with a team member who’s really (really) great at their job, but regularly uncooperative, obstinate, and sometimes even disrespectful? Yeah, me too. And it will probably come up again in our careers.

You may be comforted (or sad) to hear that this is a very common problem. The topic frequently comes up in conversations with colleagues, mentees, and friends. Here’s how my teammates and I have worked through it—and strengthened our team in the process.

In your gut and heart, do you believe your teammate is having a rough time and said a few off-color things, but is ultimately a good person who genuinely wants to work on improving their attitude and communication? Or, do you believe they don’t really want to change and, as much as you might want it to work out with them, you know it's just wishful thinking?

Whichever you land on, your gut is probably spot on.

Hiring superstar performers and avoiding toxic workers pays enormous dividends. The cost savings associated with avoiding a toxic worker are estimated to be $12,489, whereas the cost savings associated with hiring a superstar in the top 1% are $5,303. The numbers quickly add up.

If you believe in your heart that your teammate does want to contribute in a healthy, constructive, mature way but could use help hitting the mark, it’s absolutely worth investing time in helping them level up. Here are some helpful strategies:

• Have open, honest, transparent conversations. Start with individual one-on-ones to create a safe space. If the situation persists, discuss it as a team.
• Start by asking questions and genuinely listening from a place of humility. “In our meeting on Tuesday, I sensed that you were frustrated with me. Is that true? I’d love to hear how you were feeling and what you were thinking. Are there ways that I could be better supporting our collaboration?” Accept your full share of responsibility. This does not mean absolving them of their full share of responsibility, but it will allow you both to grow and establish a space of trust.
• Offer them constructive feedback—compassionately, but bluntly—about how they can become more collaborative. The Clearing Model from the Conscious Leadership Group works particularly well.
• Establish a common set of principles as a team for how you’ll interact with each other. Because so many company cultures resort to politics and backtalking, some people have never been exposed to or trained in open-minded, respectful communication; they may not even know it’s even an option.
• Take a course as a team on effective communication. At Asana, everyone goes through training from the Conscious Leadership Group. Other great models include Nonviolent Communication (NVC) training. The most important thing is that the team develops a common vocabulary for mature cooperation.

Then there are people in the latter category - people who you know aren’t genuinely open to changing their behavior. These people are, unfortunately, toxic. Here are a few reasons you should immediately heed the warning signs:

1. Toxicity will perpetually breed problems. 
2. You won’t be able to promise a good cultural experience to people you want to hire, which will compromise your ability to recruit great people. 
3. Perhaps most importantly, when leadership is unable or unwilling to address people who don’t contribute positively to the culture, it speaks to a deeper leadership problem. Ensuring that everyone at the company can rely on an affirmative, supportive environment is ultimately the CEO's responsibility, and working with a CEO who can’t or won’t perform that responsibility guarantees a trickle-down effect throughout leadership.

The most surefire way to create a toxic culture is tolerating and/or overlooking toxicity. As we’ve seen from headlines over the last few years, toxic cultures can derail (or even destroy) companies — even companies with great intentions, products, and missions.

Toxic workers wreak havoc on organizational culture. Good employees are 54% more likely to quit when the proportion of toxic coworkers on their team increases by as little as one worker on a 20-person team. The presence of even one toxic worker can cause team performance to plummet by 30-40%. Toxicity is also contagious. The likelihood that a person will become toxic increases by 47% when they’re surrounded by a high density of toxic workers. Extinguish the fire before it spreads.

The tough truth is that addressing a toxic teammate usually means letting them go. I know firing key talent is always painful, but I’ve learned the hard way that it must be done, and the sooner the better. Like you probably have, I’ve wasted too much of my life trying to make things work with toxic people—especially with borderline cases. It didn’t feel that bad to work with them, only subtly soul-sucking. In the moment, they felt irreplaceable and their transgressions were worth the cost. Looking back now, every single one of them has since been replaced with people who are much better fits. Sometimes it took a few months to find a replacement, but it was always worth the wait.

Your work, mission, and teammates should be the focus of your attention. Any time wasted on office politics and mind games would be better spent on recruiting someone better, whose heart and attitude are in the right place, who will be stoked to push your mission and teammates forward.

Fortunately, investing in your culture now will pay dividends for a long time to come. Once you’ve established a healthy, constructive culture (i.e., non-toxic), new teammates will have positive cultural norms to adopt and embrace.

If you’re not sure whether someone is open to evolving their collaboration style, a direct conversation can go a long way: sit down one-on-one, look them in the eye, and ask what their real motivations are. Try using the Clearing Model above and see how they respond. Are they eager to listen to you describe your experience working with them? Are they curious to better understand why things aren’t working, or are they defensive and closed? You can learn a lot from these moment-of-truth conversations, but only if you yourself can come to the conversation with a genuinely open mind and heart.

I know how hard these situations can be, but what a wonderful opportunity to grow, both professionally and spiritually. I'm rooting for you. 🙏

Read more from Justin Rosenstein and his global collaboration initiative One Project.