Sick of workplace drama?

Let’s call it out – any workplace drama is exhausting and debilitating.  It affects the culture, well-being, performance and the bottom line.

The rule of thumb here is simple:

“…if the drama feels like it would be typical of a school yard, a reality TV program, or a dysfunctional family, then it is not healthy for a workplace.”

After years in HR I’ve observed it all!  This is a list of “10 Types” of people and behaviours that cause unnecessary drama:

1. The Poor Time Keeper – always late and then spends 10 minutes telling everyone why

2. The Over-sharer – always has a personal life drama and brings everyone along for the ride (in detail)

3. The ‘Unmediated’ – the co-workers that don’t get along and each of them ensure that everyone indepedently knows their point of view on every dispute

4. The Pessimist – the first to tell you its bad, the future is dim, quick to offer up a negative comment, a criticism or a snide or rude remark

5. The White-Anter – finds endless ways to undermine and shaft – blame is their favourite sport

6. The Unsatisfied – nothing is ever good enough – from the ply of the toilet paper to the proximity of their desk to the bus stop

7. The Bitch – default position is nasty – talks behind people’s backs, always bitchy!

8. The Gossip – creates and spreads rumours and scandal

9. The Professionally Outraged – critical, shocked or appalled by most decisions, would always have done it better/differently

10. The Manipulator – walks both sides of the street and taps into all of the ‘Types’ from 1-9!

The impact & the cause

The impact is obvious.  It’s just not fun, creates distractions of no value, and makes it hard for high performers to thrive.  And…it breeds unconscious bias.

Drama saps time, focus and energy from Leaders (the drama free ones), and most certainly from HR, so what’s the root cause?  Here are the top 4 reasons:

1.  Toxic Leadership
It starts at the top!  Leaders who pit people against each other, set people up to fail, thrive in discord, and display any of the “10 Types” of behaviour themselves, are creating the drama – monkey see, monkey do!

2.  Lack of Trust & Confidence
Cultures that lack trust and confidence can quickly become an incubater of drama…read my article here for more ideas about building a healthy (or psycholocially safe) workplace culture.

3.  Lack of Accountability
The framework for acceptable behaviour isn’t clear, Leaders and people aren’t being held to account for their behaviour, it isn’t being managed.

4.  Lack of Transparency
Way too much ‘secret squirrel’, people guessing, Leaders not sharing information in a meaningful and timely way and not creating forums for sharing views, opinions and ideas.

Fixing it!

1. Teach people what the behaviour looks like (think bullying and harassment training) and provide training on how to channel the drama and the negativity into meaningful contributions.

2. Have a zero tolerance policy – all drama gets addressed, not ignored (think about the procedures for your other zero tolerance policies and adopt the same).

3. Have a mechanism for people to vent regularly and listen! Read this article which has some ideas on how to do that…

If one of these “10 Types” hit home a little too hard, do some self reflection and make change.  It may be unintentional but the impact is significant.

Further insights can be found in an excellent book by Patti Perez, The Drama-Free Workplace: How you can Prevent Unconscious bias, Sexual Harassment, Ethics Lapses and Inspire a Healthy Culture (2019).  It’s worth a read.

If you are a Leader or HR practitioner, dealing with drama takes you away from valuable work.   Contact us now to discuss our tailored program that will help you drive change.