Toxic employees cause significant harm to organizations and decrease creativity. Dr. Mitch Kusy is an expert in everyday civility and has studied toxic personalities in organizations for years. In this episode, he explains how toxic employees hurt organizations financially and otherwise. He discusses why managers don’t deal with them and why they need to. He offers advice and strategies for dealing with people with toxic personalities.
What You’ll Learn
- The financial impact of toxic employees and why you shouldn’t ignore them
- Strategies for dealing with toxic employees to improve your organization and increase creativity
About Mitch Kusy
Dr. Mitchell Kusy, a 2005 Fulbright Scholar in Organization Development, is a full professor in the Graduate School of Leadership & Change at Antioch University. A registered organization development consultant, Mitch has consulted with hundreds of organizations nationally and internationally; he has been a keynote speaker around the globe.
Mitch has helped create organizational communities of respectful engagement, facilitated large-scale systems to successful change, and engaged teams through assessment and team-designed actions—all with a focus on improving organizational culture and long-term return on 
investment. He previously headed organization development for HealthPartners and the leadership development area for American Express Financial Advisors. Before his leadership in national and international organizations, Mitch was a full professor at the University of St. Thomas, Minneapolis, where he co-designed the doctoral program in organization development. Previous to Why I Don’t Work Here Anymore, Mitch co-authored five business books. In 1998, he received the Minnesota Organization Development Practitioner of the Year Award. He resides in Minneapolis, MN and Palm Springs, CA and may be contacted at mitchellkusy@gmail.com.
Resources
- Mitch Kusy’s Website (email Mitch for a free copy of the Kusy Toxic Cost Worksheet)
- Mitch’s new book: Why I don’t Work Here Anymore: A Leader’s Guide to Offset the Financial and Emotional Costs of Toxic Employees
- Book: Toxic Workplace!: Managing Toxic Personalities and Their Systems of Power by Mitch Kusy and Elizabeth Holloway
Weekly Challenge
Apply one of the strategies that Mitch outlined in the podcast episode! He offered these three strategies specifically:
- Conduct the Cost-Benefit Analysis of the situation – Is this going to backfire? Has feedback failed previously? What is my intention giving feedback?
- Look at your own performance management system – Are the values spelled out?
- If you decide to give feedback, look at the nuances in how you can approach it as described by Mitch.
Transcript
Feel like reading instead of listening? The transcript will be available in a few days.
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