How Executives unconciously create dysfunctional work cultures
The prison of modern organisations
“…they hate me, I am competent, experienced, empathetic and team oriented, so why are they so nasty, so threatened, so frightened?” said Joanne
“It’s obvious isn’t it?
It is because you are competent, experienced, empathetic, and team oriented…”
Research shows us that modern work cultures, particularly in financial services are often deeply dysfunctional and toxic - frightened executives disabling the emotional working life of others and deliberately so by their own blindness to their condition, and a chronic lack of awareness as to the unhappiness within them that drives their behaviour.
This is manifested in many ways - by false superiority (“the little people, those folks down there” was how one Director referred to employees below her, “we need to restructure the little people”), spiteful rudeness as they seem to think the power system is there to reinforce their own emotional fragility, and deep narcissism - contrary thinking is disallowed - their fear so threatened by exposure as to who they are.
All of which is of course counter to all the schools of management so often espoused by these individuals and their organisations - empowerment, innovation, creativity, agility - apart from any desire to live healthily and create a better place. They espouse ‘diversity’ for example but rarely diversity of thinking and never with breadth or depth - their version is to ‘be like me’ transgender, gay, female or otherwise, just be like me or else.
Joanne came to me again later and was clear, very clear in how unhappy her working life was - “…they really do hate me…and actually I hate them now…but I only hate them because they seem to resent me, my expertise, my friendships, my competence and connections as a manager…the way I run a fun meeting where people laugh, the way I limit Power Points, actually ask for opinions. I just don’t get it, they don’t value that at all though pretend they do”
Not an uncommon situation in modern financial services, where research shows us narcissistic managers are more common than in other other industries, and the alienation they create in the culture pervasive, which becomes self fulfilling as that culture is precisely what they desire. It’s comfortable and known. The thought of human warmth, real connection, and healthy relationships, within or without the power system are deeply threatening, they might after all be exposed as normal, or worse, vulnerable. Put short nastiness gets you in, on, and bonused well.
Much, way too much perhaps, research has been conducted on human motivation in the Workplace from good ‘ol Maslow’s, unbelievably still quoted after all these years, hierarchy, to Dan Pink’s work, to more recent neuro-science based models and everything in between. None though touch directly the influence this psychological condition has upon inadvertently shaping our work and life and work choices.
Codependency.
A construct still little understood or recognised by the unenlightened in the psychology world, though any aware sufferer of the condition is utterly convinced of their affliction and how terminal it can be if untreated. There are as many Codependent help groups as there are for the addictions. Incidentally it is also often a main driver of said addictions.
For a definition of Codependency as a psychological construct refer to Pia Mellody’s ground-breaking work. It is complex and insidious a condition, and has at its roots fear and shame involving:
Chronic issues with esteem, both low and high, often mixed (“I’m in charge” to an obsequious yearning for affirmation of the self through promotion - often concurrently - “X likes me, she really likes me”)
A lack of understanding of boundaries in relationships (“I am in charge, I am the boss so I can do what the **** I want” to ‘sleeping around’ with colleagues, to over indulgence of business class lifestyle that is ‘owed’ to them, to just plain rudeness to those down the hierarchy)
A diminished sense of their own reality (“why aren’t I in charge?” “I am better than X” which can become obsessive)
A lack of appreciation of their own true desires (“I need that promotion” “I know that job will make me happy if only they give it to me, I want to be an X Director, I deserve that job”)
An inability to express their own reality - they cannot see who they are so their associated behaviours may be extreme, ‘weird’, extremely reserved and quiet or power crazed, always flexing to please the hierarchy, bullying, cutting others off ‘weaker’ people where they can mid stream, surrounding themselves with obviously un-threatening (little) people, contorting systems like performance management or talent management to reinforce their position and ‘superiority’, little curiosity about things they do not understand or desire to find out - discovery can unravel)
Put short they have no understanding of who they are so seek to define themselves through what and who is around them, and pleasing those above them, hurting those ‘below’ them. Untreated and unaddressed codependent narcissistic executives see none of this, will never change until they break down, just keep going on like it, for that hierarchy ‘hit’ ‘til the addictive condition overwhelms them, or worse kills them. Codependency is a terminal condition.
But what of Joanne, or John or anyone in-between - quite why do they stay in these organisations and why do they persist in attempting to build a career where they are almost certain to be unhappy working for and around these people?
People stay for many reasons of course - practical ones like money, being too old for another job, or more often just plain and simple lethargy.
Though there are other reasons for some - simplistically it is because they themselves have the same affliction - addicts socialise with addicts, fear feeds off fear, a lack of human intimacy is appealing to those frightened by it. They may lack the narcissistic attribute but feel some comfort in recognition of the game, as it is how they grew up. They usually come from highly dysfunctional family backgrounds that are the cause - a lack of nurturing from childhood - and are attracted to those that reinforce their own dis-ease. Though unhappy, they always were unhappy, unconnected is known, being abused emotionally is expected. The dis-ease is though treatable and the only real way out of the prison is to see that one is a sufferer before it is too late, before too much life has been invested in surviving not thriving in organisations, or in the case of the abusers, damaging them. Only then and with the associated treatment can positive action be taken, be it staying put but with the awareness of what is going on - so dis-empowering the system at work with new behaviours or having the courage against all their fears and insecurities to leave.
Does any of this matter for revenue and profits? Un-researched of course but surely mentally healthier employees are more productive ones - and there is a lot of research that gives that view. Ultimately perhaps the pain that surrounds these toxic people in senior roles creating these cultures and what they reinforce for others tells us perhaps that organisational life is less about ‘achievement’ in the conventional sense and more about protective power games. But, and this is a very big but, how can another rung up the corporate ladder have any meaning if one is totally lost as a human being?
This blog owes a great debt to David Smallwood for the original thesis, Pia Mellody, and CODA
Thanks too to the numerous contributors in and out of recovery rooms and coaching situations who have contributed and shared their experiences over the years of working in Banking and Investment organisations throughout the City of London