3 Signs to Immediately Recognize a Toxic Manager in Action

For nearly two decades, I’ve combed through research to discover the top mistakes managers frequently make to disengage their workers and suck the life out of them.

Some of the findings aren’t surprising. Because of a shortage of good leaders, more and more individual contributors are being promoted to management roles without the proper skills and competencies to effectively lead human beings.

Add to that the shifting workplace dynamics caused by the pandemic and you begin to see that managing people is no easy task.

Whether you manage people virtually or not, there are common patterns and traits of toxic management that will work against you. Here are three of the biggest mistakes managers make that cause people to quit.

In one survey I conducted on LinkedIn, I asked respondents a simple question: What is the one mistake your manager makes more frequently than others? Not surprisingly, micromanagement rose to the top as the No. 1 mistake. In micromanaged environments, I found people reporting an absence in:

• The expression of creativity or free flow of ideas
• Open and transparent group discussion or input into a decision
• Team motivation

Granted, micromanagers are human like all of us and hard-working professionals with mostly good intentions. What they lack is the conscious day-to-day understanding of what it takes to motivate people intrinsically. They live in another paradigm altogether. In the end, micromanagers operate their way because it’s about power, and power is about control.

In a recent poll conducted by ResumeLab on what makes someone a terrible manager, it was found that an alarming 72 percent of the surveyed population was treated in a rude or disrespectful manner by a bad boss and 90 percent didn’t like that kind of treatment. Additionally, nearly 70 percent of respondents were criticized in front of their peers, and 83 percent of them felt bad about it. Finally, and perhaps the worst case of all, an eye-popping 42 percent of toxic bosses blamed others for their failures, which 84 percent of employees feel is unfair.

Toxic managers operate on the assumption that, because they’re the boss and in charge, they have to have the last word on everything. This is a person riding on the wheels of low emotional intelligence. When a manager doesn’t solicit the opinions of others, get buy-in from team members, and listen to the collective voice of the team in pursuing a particular strategy or vision, people don’t feel cared for, respected or valued. Consequently, trust erodes and morale goes in the tank.