
Toxic Workers [pdf] - mjn
http://www.hbs.edu/faculty/Publication%20Files/16-057_d45c0b4f-fa19-49de-8f1b-4b12fe054fea.pdf
======
alexandercrohde
This is a very naive analysis. It defines toxicity as propensity to be fired,
only looks at big corporations, and uses self-reports in interview tests (like
paper tests) as the independent variable.

I suppose the reason this piece strikes this community as so silly is that the
general philosophy of the startup is that a group of 5 or 10 people can best
multi-million dollar corporations because corporations are so inefficient. To
turn to such a company's firing decisions as the source of truth of worker
quality feels profoundly backward.

~~~
healsjnr1
I think it's also because people on this community have worked at corporations
where toxic workers aren't the problem--it's toxic managers.

If they are going to do a study on the impact of toxic workers on the
workplace, surely they should do one on managers.

~~~
hwstar
Psychopaths rise to the top. Until the human race finds a way of dealing with
this, it will continue.

~~~
princeb
you first need to make the link between toxic managers and psychopaths, rather
than throw out this trope without a second thought.

~~~
chris_wot
Aspects of a toxic manager:

* Grandiose sense of self-worth

* Pathological lying

* Cunning/manipulative

* Callous/lack of empathy

* Failure to accept responsibility for own actions

* Appears to do a lot of things, but in reality does nothing for the organization

------
msellout
As common in studies of personality, the researchers perform a bait-and-switch
in defining key terms. To ensure mass appeal, like a skillful astrologist
crafting this week's horoscope, they introduce the term "toxic worker" as an
employee who is "harmful to an organization", leaving the authors plenty of
room to maneuver.

Unfortunately for the authors, today's scientific paradigm requires at least
the semblance of a statistical analysis. Finding a numeric measurement for an
aspect of human consciousness, such as "toxicity" (or how much of a jerk you
are), can be quite difficult. For the empirical portion of the paper, the
authors choose to define a "toxic worker" as one who has been fired for "an
egregious violation of company policy" such as "sexual harassment, workplace
violence, falsifying documents, fraud, and general workplace misconduct". In
their data, 1 in 20 employees was eventually deemed "toxic".

While I'm sure most people can identify a jerk at the office, they might also
tell the authors, "You keep using that word [toxic]. I do not think it means
what you think it means."

~~~
analog31
Oddly enough, when I hear "toxic," it's usually associated with someone who
manages to _avoid_ getting fired for misconduct.

------
erikb
The definition surprised me. I mean the actual definition, as it is used
later, not the one presented in the beginning. First they say someone who does
more bad than good is a toxic worker, but then they have some quite strange
attributes to that, like someone being fired for toxicity (which often means
he's annoying to the boss, not that he's toxic), or someone who steals office
supplies (I don't know anybody who would even complain about that, as long as
it's not in exceptional ammounts).

And finally they conclude you should always try to cut losers instead of
fighting for winners. There is no game (in the sense of game theory, not
child's play) in which "always" really makes you better than average.
Sometimes everybody knows that someone is toxic but you can't cut him lose,
because he is in a very specific position (e.g., the brother of your most
important customer). Another time having that one super-star will put you
forward by a dimension, not just a few bucks. "Instead of always do A better
always do B"? No, both is wrong. Don't "always".

~~~
biot
In terms of stealing office supplies, it boils down to intent. There's a big
difference between taking pens home as part of work and not bothering to bring
them back -vs- thinking "my kids need more pens for school" and then going out
of your way to take them home. The former is mostly absentmindedness and isn't
really stealing; the latter is an ethical failure and is stealing.

~~~
ZenoArrow
Just finished watching this video, it's closely related to what you're talking
about, even mentions stealing stationary:

[https://vimeo.com/49462153](https://vimeo.com/49462153)

~~~
erikb
Interesting. Thanks! I watched quite a lot from that guy and always felt I
learned something.

~~~
ZenoArrow
You're welcome ericb. Yeah, I think they're interesting as well. Like the art
style too.

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001sky
This is one of those papers where the title sounds vaguely legitimate, but the
underlying analysis is only tangentially related to the topic. Also, consider

 _" less attention has been paid to the question of how to manage those
workers on the opposite side of the spectrum: those who are harmful to
organizational performance."_

Which is complete rubbish--GE placed a huge focus on doing performance reviews
and culling the "bottom 10%". A practcice which started a trend (called forced
ranking) that grew to include many of the fortune 500, in cluding perhaps
famously Microsoft.

Its either a bafflingly careless omission or a cynical gesture to pretend this
topic is somehow "under the radar" in business school or corporate HR
departments.

~~~
_delirium
The GE-style ranking is looking at something else, people with poor
productivity. This is looking at people who are productive in their jobs by
the usual metrics you'd use, but are a liability for the company, due to a
propensity to cut corners, break laws, embezzle, etc.

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klagermkii
I read this study via the article [http://qz.com/563683/turns-out-toxic-
coworkers-are-more-expe...](http://qz.com/563683/turns-out-toxic-coworkers-
are-more-expensive-than-superstar-hires/) which pointed out the net savings
between hiring a superstar vs firing a toxic employee, and I was more shocked
that the numbers were so low for superstars. That a Top 1% person in their
field can only deliver $ 5303 worth of extra value to their company over their
whole period of employment? I mean I'm no superstar, but that seemed pitifully
low just from my own experience of the right action at the right time by the
right person being able to secure deals worth a lot for the company.

As per the paper:

"To generate a straightforward comparison of the value of each of these
focuses, we quantify the value of a star performer by identifying the cost
savings from her increased output level. That is, a superstar is a worker that
adds so much value that without her a firm would have to hire additional
workers (or pay for additional hours from existing workers) to achieve the
same level of output as when they have that single superstar worker."

"We calculate the percent in increased performance for each of these
performance levels and multiply it by the average worker salary, based on
company records."

"For comparison, we report in the "Avoid a Toxic Worker" column the induced
turnover cost of a toxic worker, based on company figures. Induced turnover
cost captures the expense of replacing additional workers lost in response to
the presence of a toxic worker on a team."

"Top 1% Superstar: $ 5,303 Avoid a toxic worker: $ 12,489"

"The data were obtained from a company that builds and deploys job-testing
software to large employers. Many of these companies are business-process
outsourcers (BPOs) that themselves provide a variety of business services
(e.g., customer care, outbound sales, etc.) to their clients. The employees
included in the dataset are all engaged in frontline service positions and
paid on an hourly basis."

So these stats are coming from call center staff and telemarketing where
there's a lot more priority on people following the script/process than
showing flashes of brilliance. But all of that gets lost when it gets
breathlessly repeated in the abstract or in articles referencing it.

~~~
stefs
i was immediately thinking the same thing: was john carmack's genius
practically negligible for id software? how about fabrice bellard's worth (for
telekom paris)? could have ten other average ("non-toxic") programmers
achieved what they did?

------
tlogan
HBS always writes about obvious things. This is known to anybody with more
than 20 years of experience: toxic workers ("jerks") exists and they are
mainly super stars. And they will raise in ranks (they will become managers,
directors, etc.). But not necessary by growing the business.

And "toxicity" spreads. Spreads fast.

~~~
hwstar
Earlier in my ex-companies life, they had a real low threshold for terminating
someone who was toxic. As the other CEO's took over, company lost its
customers, and became more financially stressed, the tolerance for wrongdoing
increased until it was basically as the chart in the article stated with
offences having to be pretty severe (bullying, sexual harrassment) to cause
termination. It was almost like the company needed the toxic people to keep
the lights on.

------
calinet6
Three questions:

1\. Why are workers toxic? Is it something you're born with, or something that
you have when you are hired? Is it unchanging, black and white, true or
false—or can it change over time or be impacted by the environment?

2\. Given the answer to the above, what types of things influence workers'
toxicity? Are you able to improve any of those things?

3\. Given that the time and focus of any team is limited, and assuming most of
the improvements from question 2 actually impact everyone in the company
positively, do you truly believe that handling toxic people is the best use of
time for a human management team?

Fire when you need to, and ensure you fix mistakes quickly and with
intelligence, but do not focus efforts on the bottom tier. Work to improve the
environment that makes people "go toxic." Ignoring that environmental effect
is the type of behavior that makes toxic _companies,_ which is the far greater
problem, and should be the far greater concern.

We all know toxicity exists, and we've worked with people who, on the surface,
don't belong anywhere near the company. But often the medium that breeds
toxicity—the politics, fear, competition, in-fighting and more—is more
important to tackle than the individuals themselves. There's a reason
companies foster and hire people who tend toward toxic behavior; and there's a
reason they act the way they do.

As W. Edwards Deming said: “Give the work force a chance to work with pride,
and the 3 per cent that apparently don’t care will erode itself by peer
pressure.”

------
codeonfire
Is this a joke? I don't believe HBS would allow its logo to be placed on such
obvious trolling.

~~~
ACow_Adonis
Not sure if serious. I have no idea if this will engender downvotes for
myself, but personally, I've always found HBS to do almost NOTHING BUT lend
its name to pseudoscience twaddle and call it "business" or "management". Rest
assured, in corporate life whenever you get some bullshit speaker spruiking
some bullshit idea, a HBS paper is always eerily near.

Frankly I'm shocked they have the cachet they do...humans and their
authority/prestige structures continue to fascinated me.

~~~
codeonfire
In my B-school program we did read lots of HBS cases and most of those were
about objective things like "could the company have adopted a different
marketing strategy" not "how can the company legitimize its political
machinations in a totalitarian labor system" So I was giving them the benefit.

~~~
msellout
> "how can the company legitimize its political machinations in a totalitarian
> labor system"

That's an excellent TL;DR.

------
jmiwhite
Is there any proof to the value of questions relating abstracts like the
following:

1\. I like to ask about other people's well-being

OR

2\. I let the past stay in the past

Choosing Statement 1 would give subjects a greater other-regarding score,
whereas choosing Statement 2 predicts a subject to be self-regarding

------
nraynaud
Very interesting, currently there is this post and " We all don't know what we
are doing (cyberomin.github.io)" next to each other on the front page.

The whole idea that good leaders wing it and do their best, but that they can
and should detect and weed out toxic workers and end their career with
absolute certainty (because being declared toxic will be very hard to recover
from) is a really interesting cognitive dissonance. Allow margin for error to
good role model, but bad role model are intrinsically bad and unredeemable.
I'm sensing straw man, posturing and feel good speech all the way down.

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TheOtherHobbes
This looks like nonsense, especially the hilarious costs/benefits calculated
to the nearest dollar.

And yes, of course toxic management is more likely to be a problem, even
though it remains curiously unstudied by the HBS.

Even so, I think the takeaway - don't hire self-aggrandising control freaks,
no matter how talented they seem to be - is probably sound at every level.

Except possibly the CEO. (Was Steve Jobs toxic? Bill Gates? Haven't most toxic
CEOs been disastrous for their companies?)

------
mirimir
What struck me is the fine line between superstars and toxic workers. More or
less, they look much alike. The main difference seems to be how they're
perceived by coworkers and management. And how that affects their attitude
toward the organization. I would have liked to see more about the impact of
management style on forking superstars and toxic workers.

~~~
hwstar
I've always viewed superstars who are toxic as flawed. Superstars without
toxic traits are rare. As the article states, you are most likely better off
without the flawed superstars, the problem is, how do you come up with a
consistent and effective way of getting rid of them?

~~~
calinet6
A far better question is, how do you create an environment that helps flawed
people improve?

Most people have flaws. It's 'consistent and effective ways for getting rid of
them' that drives them crazy in the first place. One of many things that
creates a negative feedback loop that drives a toxic culture, which breeds
more "toxic workers."

~~~
hwstar
1\. I believe that termination for toxic behaviour is the only way to adjust
the behaviour of these types of people. There's the PIP, but these individuals
would quit if they were put on a PIP. These individuals aren't dumb, they will
have F.U. money, and some of them would be financially independent.

2\. In electronics, that would be a positive feedback loop as it is
reinforcing the behaviour. A negative feedback loop would reduce the undesired
behaviour.

~~~
calinet6
In behavior as well -- you are correct.

