3 ms·

In any organization somewhere between 1% and 10% of people will suck up 80% of leadership's time if you let them. Worse, they make the organization toxic for e

In any organization somewhere between 1% and 10% of people will suck up 80% of leadership's time if you let them. Worse, they make the organization toxic for everybody else. I've come to believe the most important job of a manager is to quickly identify these people and either fire them or neutralize them (i.e. put them in a closet and assign them a meaningless task). This requires a culture shift in most organizations to understand that toxic people (e.g. bullies, narcissists, and those with other serious personality disorders) have an outsize negative impact on productivity and profits and can kill the company if you don't get rid of them quickly.

cptcobalt 4y ago
I've witnessed this across a few people and across a few companies—both in terms of wasting time for the company, or pushing the company to be better. There's definitely folks that take all they can get, scream about unnecessary things, and are just general drama, but overall are basically an underperforming IC. (I've even seen one become "best friends" with a director which caused all sorts of chaos and disorganization in the org below them, with the director blissfully unaware because the toxic person was giving side-channel status update to the director outside of the org hierarchy.) Neutralizing them by giving them unimportant tasks often enables them to be louder elsewhere. There's also people who are loud because they're trying to make the company better. They'll make you uncomfortable as a manager, and they'll make you have uncomfortable conversations with your leadership. They're...probably the ones to listen to. True leadership is knowing who to keep close—even if uncomfortable—and who to rapidly manage out.
r00fus 4y ago
There is an additional dimension here - some people start off great and then become toxic due to external conditions (home problems, health issues, organizational strife). Sometimes those problems are resolvable (or mitigable). Sometimes your "problem child" becomes a stalwart after their situation is resolved. A good manager can root cause these issues and then determine if the resolution is workable in a reasonable timeframe. A great manager keeps this in mind while coordinating all activities and requires their direct reports to assist them in doing this. Finally, great leaders are sometimes not great managers. Another note - even managers can shift from good/great/bad over time.

cptcobalt 4y ago

I've witnessed this across a few people and across a few companies—both in terms of wasting time for the company, or pushing the company to be better. There's definitely folks that take all they can get, scream about unnecessary things, and are just general drama, but overall are basically an underperforming IC. (I've even seen one become "best friends" with a director which caused all sorts of chaos and disorganization in the org below them, with the director blissfully unaware because the toxic person was giving side-channel status update to the director outside of the org hierarchy.) Neutralizing them by giving them unimportant tasks often enables them to be louder elsewhere. There's also people who are loud because they're trying to make the company better. They'll make you uncomfortable as a manager, and they'll make you have uncomfortable conversations with your leadership. They're...probably the ones to listen to. True leadership is knowing who to keep close—even if uncomfortable—and who to rapidly manage out.

r00fus 4y ago

There is an additional dimension here - some people start off great and then become toxic due to external conditions (home problems, health issues, organizational strife). Sometimes those problems are resolvable (or mitigable). Sometimes your "problem child" becomes a stalwart after their situation is resolved. A good manager can root cause these issues and then determine if the resolution is workable in a reasonable timeframe. A great manager keeps this in mind while coordinating all activities and requires their direct reports to assist them in doing this. Finally, great leaders are sometimes not great managers. Another note - even managers can shift from good/great/bad over time.