It’s a bad sign if you have complaining colleagues. This decreases work productivity, sinks morale, and increases employee turnover rates. What is workplace negativity and what can you do about it? Overcoming negativity in the office is inevitable to raise the level of employee engagement and satisfaction.
What is workplace negativity?
Workplace negativity affects business. If the meetings are full of eye rolls, complaints, arguments, groans, and finger-pointing at each other, then you should realize: that something is wrong.
Other than these,
- Blaming other colleagues,
- Not taking responsibility,
- Being always late,
- Boredom,
- Lack of communication and laughter
- Gossiping, and snitching
are definitely signs of workplace negativity.
Toxic employees and their negative behavior at work
The first step in overcoming negative in the workplace is to recognize toxic employees. What are the 7 signs of a negative person?
- They are pessimistic (“we can’t do that”)
- They worry a lot, making them less productive.
- They complain all the time. About the work environment, about their colleagues, about clients, about their boss. Everyone is their enemy.
- Their comfort zone is too narrow, and they don’t want to leave it. So, everyone should adapt to them.
- They’re not risk-taking, and cannot dream big, which doesn’t help innovations.
- They have limited experiences because they don’t try new things.
- They suck other people’s energy.
How to be positive at work in a negative environment?
As an employee, how can you be positive in a negative work environment? Well, there are methods, but later we will give some tips to your managers too, helping them establish a more positive office.
You need to
- Reach out to positive coworkers, and don’t let negative people approach you with their thoughts.
- Practice mindfulness, and take some rest from work.
- Speak to other people joyfully. Don’t hesitate to share your point of view. Don’t let negativity suppress your mind.
- Focus on your future and opportunities, don’t look at the past.
- Celebrate milestones and victories.
- Assume that your colleagues have positive intent.
- Give time for yourself. If someone blames you for a fault, don’t listen to them, just learn from your mistakes, and speak about it openly with your superiors and colleagues.
Overcoming negativity in the workplace: todos for managers
How can you overcome negativity in your office?
Ask people about their feedback and ideas
Place an idea box in the office, or open your email inbox for people to give them the opportunity to share their feedback and innovative ideas on how to improve the work environment, or the working progress. Leave your door open: listening to your employees is the best way to identify problems. If you know what’s wrong, you can think of a strategy to solve negativity.
Have a word with toxic employees
You need to speak with your employees that have toxic behavior. It’s not necessary to ‘threaten’ them with firing, a more collaborative approach will lead to better results. If you think you cannot change these employees, ask for a coach’s help.
Recognize and reward talent
Performance-based rewarding system that also results in the people who optimize workflows will give motivation people to work better. If you only pay the regular salary, whether people work hard or not, don’t expect them to do an extra effort.
Organize team-building activities
Team building events improve team morale, and efficiency, and even help your employees maintain a healthier lifestyle. What do we mean by that?
Avoid negative work with TeamPuli
TeamPuli is also an excellent team-building tool, as it brings colleagues closer together in a hybrid, home office, or fully office-based environment, where they can get to know each other and effective teamwork in a new way. One of the biggest benefits is that they can learn how to compete in a safe environment, so they can put this to good use in real-life situations.
Better communication, better health conditions, better teamwork.