The Impact of “Silent Sabotage” on Corporate Culture
Negative workplace behaviors can result in trauma and create health and wellbeing issues. Multiple negative behaviors exist, but here, I’m spotlighting what I call 'Silent Sabotage.'
Premise:
A senior leader in a firm 'complains' about the employee to other management and the employee's colleagues. It's 'silent' because employee may not hear from others about the sabotage, and the leader neither addresses concern with employee directly, nor employee's manager directly.
Issue for employee:
Damages employee's reputation among colleagues and senior people at the company (e.g. opposite of 'sponsorship' when a senior leader speaks positively about an employee when they are not in the room)
Impacts employee's credibility, possibly resulting in limited growth/promotion opportunities in other parts of the company
Disrupts relationships between employee and colleagues. Given influence, reach, and authority of a senior leader, other colleagues may be hesitant to engage with the employee for fear of falling out of favor with the senior leader. This could also result in colleagues reducing work-related communications
It can be akin to unconscious bias; a leader complaining about an employee may not know they are sullying employee's reputation and damaging employee's credibility. If leader is doing it unconsciously it's just as damaging as if it were conscious.
Issue for business:
When this is pervasive, it might reduce retention. Once future job candidates hear about this culture and conduct (and word about this kind of thing spreads quickly) it can reduce the firm's chances of onboarding talent
When investors see bad retention numbers, it may raise concerns about how the company is governed- the G in ESG
Let's unlearn this type of behavior. Mindfulness, mentorship, and modeling positive behavior helps organizations- and people - evolve.
Special thanks to Ludmila N. Praslova, Ron Carucci, Caroline Stokes and Harvard Business Review for the inspiration and chart.
