Table of Contents
Toxic coworkers can cause significant disruption to team dynamics, productivity, and the overall health of a workplace. Yet, it’s not uncommon to see such individuals escape consequences, sometimes even receiving preferential treatment. This discussion explores the reasons behind managers’ tolerance of toxic employees—especially those who frequently report on coworkers, engage in brown-nosing, highlight others’ mistakes, and manipulate peers. Each section sheds light on the workplace dynamics that enable these behaviors to persist.
Perceived Loyalty and Dependability
Toxic employees often thrive under accidental managers—those promoted without formal training in managing people. These managers may equate frequent check-ins or task completion with loyalty, even if the employee’s behavior disrupts team dynamics. Without a strong foundation in leadership skills, accidental managers are more likely to prioritize perceived dependability over the broader impact on team morale. This is further reinforced by the willingness of these employees to take on tasks others may avoid. Their perceived reliability becomes a substantial benefit in the manager’s eyes, often overshadowing the harm they inflict on the rest of the team.
Information Pipeline
Another reason toxic employees are tolerated is their role in providing a steady flow of information. Often, they serve as the manager’s eyes and ears, keeping tabs on team dynamics, internal issues, and coworkers’ mistakes. For managers, this information can be incredibly useful, as it helps them monitor the team’s performance without having to observe every interaction directly. In this way, toxic employees play an unofficial surveillance role, one that managers may find indispensable despite the harm it does to team cohesion.
Office Intelligence
When toxic employees point out their peers’ mistakes, they might be seen as offering valuable insights into the functioning of the team. From a manager’s point of view, these individuals provide a form of internal quality control. They may believe that such employees are helping to maintain high standards by catching problems before they escalate. However, what managers often overlook is how this behavior damages morale, turning what should be collaborative work into a hostile environment.
Brown-Nosing and Manipulation
Some employees are particularly skilled at currying favor with their superiors. Through flattery, constant praise, and volunteering for high-visibility tasks, they craft an image of themselves as the manager’s strongest ally. This behavior is often enough to make the manager feel valued, and in return, the employee receives favorable treatment. While peers may view these individuals as manipulative or even harmful, their ability to present themselves positively in front of leadership shields them from criticism.
By reserving their toxic traits for interactions with coworkers, they maintain a different persona in front of management. As a result, complaints from peers may be dismissed as minor interpersonal conflicts rather than being seen as serious issues.
High Performers: The Dilemma
Toxicity in the workplace becomes even more challenging to address when it involves high-performing employees. Individuals who consistently meet or exceed their targets are often seen as irreplaceable, making it easier for managers to overlook their toxic behavior. In performance-driven cultures, results often take precedence over how those results are achieved. This creates an environment where high-performers, even if toxic, can be rewarded for their individual contributions, leaving the overall team’s well-being in the shadows.
Enforcing Accountability
Some employees make it a point to constantly highlight their coworkers’ mistakes. While this may create a hostile work environment, some managers see it as a way to enforce accountability. They might believe that these employees are helping to maintain high standards by ensuring that errors don’t go unnoticed. The vigilance these individuals exhibit can make managers feel that a certain level of quality control is in place, even if it comes at the expense of team harmony.
Gaslighting and Subtle Manipulation
Gaslighting, a more insidious form of toxic behavior, often goes unnoticed by managers. Employees who gaslight their coworkers create confusion and self-doubt, subtly eroding their peers’ confidence over time. Managers often fail to recognize this behavior because it is rarely overt. The gaslighter maintains a friendly, competent image in front of management while reserving their toxic behavior for their peer or those below them in the hierarchy.
What makes gaslighting particularly difficult to address is its gradual nature. Coworkers who are targeted may struggle to articulate what’s happening, and without clear evidence, managers may dismiss their concerns. This allows the gaslighter to continue unchecked, manipulating the workplace dynamic.
Conflict Avoidance
Confronting toxic employees is uncomfortable, requiring managers to engage in difficult conversations and address potentially volatile situations. Some managers, particularly those who prefer to avoid conflict, may find it easier to ignore the toxic behavior as long as team objectives are being met. As long as these employees don’t directly cause problems for the manager, it can seem like the path of least resistance to let the behavior continue unchecked.
Negligible Impact on Metrics
In some workplaces, managers focus primarily on performance metrics, which can lead to the tolerance of toxic behaviors if they don’t appear to impact the bottom line. Toxic employees can often achieve their goals while creating a negative environment for their peers. When these metrics are prioritized over team well-being, managers may feel little incentive to intervene, especially when the toxic employee meets their objectives.
Emotional Blind Spots
Finally, toxic employees can exploit their relationship with managers by providing emotional comfort. Praise, perceived loyalty, and consistent alignment with the manager’s goals create a strong bond that makes it difficult for managers to view them objectively. In these cases, managers may develop blind spots, dismissing complaints from others as misunderstandings or isolated incidents. This reluctance to confront the problem can prolong the toxic employee’s harmful influence on the team.
Are Trained Managers Better?
While training equips managers with tools for conflict resolution, emotional intelligence, and recognizing toxicity, it is not a guaranteed solution. Managers who rigidly apply textbook methods or focus excessively on policies may alienate employees, while others may struggle to adapt their style to the unique needs of their teams. In some cases, an empathetic and intuitive but untrained manager may outperform a formally trained counterpart who lacks interpersonal skills.
However, trained managers generally have a stronger foundation for addressing workplace challenges. They are better equipped to recognize subtle signs of toxicity, navigate interpersonal dynamics, and implement strategies that balance individual performance with team cohesion. By understanding both the technical and human aspects of leadership, trained managers are often more prepared to create a fair and supportive environment that fosters productivity and morale.
