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That's very interesting, because some of your examples do seem toxic or borderline toxic, but some do not. Let's take verbal and physical abuse. Can you tell me

That's very interesting, because some of your examples do seem toxic or borderline toxic, but some do not. Let's take verbal and physical abuse. Can you tell me specifically what was said? Same with physical abuse. There's no excuse for getting physical, unless there's a reason why force had to be used. For instance, at one corporate party one of co-workers got really drunk and pushed another co-worker (a woman) during dancing. The push looked mostly accidental, but the other person nearly fell down, so a bunch of guys had to physically restrict the drunk guy. We forced him into a taxi and took him to a hotel. Next day the guy sobered up and apologized for his behavior and left company/got fired (not sure) soon after. I've seen the entire with my own eyes, but I wouldn't say this is an example of 'toxic workplace', because the company is great and when you have hundreds of people attending a Christmas party, some guys and gals will get drunk and do stupid things. And when drunk people do stupid dangerous things, you have to apply physical force and/or call the police. Also, I've seen two teams working on the same problem exactly for the reason you describe - see who does it better and faster. And the winning team then takes the entire project over. I don't see how it's toxic in any way. Same with other example you have. I absolutely hate micromanagement and has experienced it before multiple times. I think it's stupid and counterproductive but I've never seen it become toxic. Office politics? Happens in every large organization and is inevitalble. Not necessarily toxic, unless you consider that any city hall or local government politics is toxic by default.

piva00 5y ago
Every instance I described was something done in the normal work environment, during day-to-day operations, not drunk people at parties or after work celebrations. Verbal abuse as in: a C-level calling one engineer a "dumb motherfucker, lying to my face" and variations of that over time. An IT manager telling his employees (a team of about 6 people) that they should be grateful for having a job, that as stupid as they were it was a blessing they could still work with him and learn. A shouting match between two engineers, banging meeting room doors, shouting across the hall. Physical abuse, founder of the company slapped an engineer on the face when the engineer refused to implement a feature that wasn't only unethical, it was criminally fraudulent. The engineer raised that concern, they got into a discussion, the engineer called the founder a criminal and got slapped on the face. You've never seen two competing teams on the same feature become toxic? What about when one team starts to actively sabotage the other? And actively bullying them to further demoralise the team after they started to falter behind due to the sabotaging? I've seen that. You have 20 years of career, I have 16, we both have been through office politics, needlessly bureaucracy and lots of other unpleasant things that I wouldn't ever consider toxic, so please believe me, there is some really toxic stuff. I feel you are trying to counter something I've said and I don't understand what, or why.
- JackPoach 5y ago
  Yeah, I'd definitely agree with verbal and physical things as toxic, never encountered anything close to that. Now, if one team sabotages other - that's clearly an individual or individual making own immoral choices. I wound't put that on the company.
  - louwrentius 5y ago
    That is always on the company as they incentivized and tolerated that behavior.

piva00 5y ago

Every instance I described was something done in the normal work environment, during day-to-day operations, not drunk people at parties or after work celebrations. Verbal abuse as in: a C-level calling one engineer a "dumb motherfucker, lying to my face" and variations of that over time. An IT manager telling his employees (a team of about 6 people) that they should be grateful for having a job, that as stupid as they were it was a blessing they could still work with him and learn. A shouting match between two engineers, banging meeting room doors, shouting across the hall. Physical abuse, founder of the company slapped an engineer on the face when the engineer refused to implement a feature that wasn't only unethical, it was criminally fraudulent. The engineer raised that concern, they got into a discussion, the engineer called the founder a criminal and got slapped on the face. You've never seen two competing teams on the same feature become toxic? What about when one team starts to actively sabotage the other? And actively bullying them to further demoralise the team after they started to falter behind due to the sabotaging? I've seen that. You have 20 years of career, I have 16, we both have been through office politics, needlessly bureaucracy and lots of other unpleasant things that I wouldn't ever consider toxic, so please believe me, there is some really toxic stuff. I feel you are trying to counter something I've said and I don't understand what, or why.

JackPoach 5y ago
Yeah, I'd definitely agree with verbal and physical things as toxic, never encountered anything close to that. Now, if one team sabotages other - that's clearly an individual or individual making own immoral choices. I wound't put that on the company.
- louwrentius 5y ago
  That is always on the company as they incentivized and tolerated that behavior.