When you’re not delighted to announce – why we can’t talk about shitty culture and vampiric leaders who drain your soul

Toxic positivity reigns supreme on LinkedIn.  Who is with me?

Post after post of delight, pride, awesomeness, inspiration and amazement.  And if you are feeling all of that about your job then no one is more happy for you than me. But friends and colleagues – I see you.  And for some I know the truth of your stories and they are not pretty.

I know you have noticed that it’s career suicide to mention those 18 months of hell which not only ruined your confidence but also your relationship with your significant other, all thanks to a boss who micromanaged you entirely using Outlook as a weapon but couldn’t communicate their way out of a retail checkout.

What about the place you finally escaped from after years of being overlooked for a promotion despite working 50-60 hours a week, interrupting your family life because of your desire to be recognised and applauded, only to find you were just one of the ones who hadn’t figured out it was never going to happen?  The culture was to work you to the bone and give the jobs to their mates.

Did you post, ‘I am delighted to announce that I got the f*!k out of there’?

No, you didn’t. Because that is not acceptable. Not on LinkedIn, not anywhere.

We have no place to talk about some of the hellholes and hell people we have found ourselves spending our waking hours with, because it’s just not the done thing. Corporate bad behaviour, culture which is like a squatter’s fridge, and leaders letting their shadow side run loose on their direct reports - when they should be figuring that out in therapy - can be found everywhere. But dare to mention it and it can have long-ranging ramifications.

Here we are on LinkedIn, bringing our best behaviour, aware of the parameters of the platform and how we are expected to behave keeping the stiff upper lip, as the English say. We keep the façade of everything being okay, even when they pay you out or make the arrangement that you decided to leave to explore other avenues. If anyone can tell me that they still act on information from exit interviews in order to improve the company, you will be an instant guru within the space.

There are ways around those difficult stints which just didn’t work out for us it when we next interview for a job. We will tell them it was time for a change. Or we may suggest that there weren’t any opportunities to progress our careers. Worse, we could say nothing and claim that our last stint, which only lasted a year, consisted of a long sabbatical because naming where you worked would be like calling up Voldemort. But there is a more pernicious angle to all of this.

I think about all the people working from one paycheck to the next, just trying to make ends meet, completely unable to rock the boat, enduring the lack of respect and poor treatment just to put food on the table.  This is where all of you come in. 

Are you part of the problem within your own organisation and could you up your game and get better at being a human that people wish to work with? Could you, in your leadership position, help bring about get a change in culture? Not just with a new brand but with a real revolution where the efforts of the team are recognised and communication is transparent and frequent?

Those of you who are truly delighted with your company and your day-to-day culture, please begin to share your insights about what is working for you and your people and the benefits that come from cultivating a place which is authentically an employer of choice. When talented people come to you and wince as they try to say, ‘I am a capable and creative person, but my last position really stifled me’, listen out for what the truth behind that. Don’t always err on the side of the holier-than- thou corporate giant they just bolted from and think your interviewee is the problem. Because Frank and Gloria and Chris, we have all had an experience of this dark place and someone along the way has helped us back out of the pit and on our way to career happiness and redemption.

I am not suggesting for a moment that you head onto LinkedIn and bag a person or a company because, yes, you will likely be sued or blackballed. But let’s honestly share the great people we work with and the great companies that treat us well and have our wellbeing in mind.

Let’s collectively raise our own individual bar to ensure we are not part of the problem. Let’s take another look at whether our culture is a complete farce (just ask your people to be honest and have a thick enough skin to hear what they say) and commit to addressing the deficit.  Perhaps we can take the pressure off our team and hire the right number of people for the required job output.  There’s a thought, hey? 

If you in a position to make the lives of your team members better, then please step into that and make it an important legacy of your working life. Because those who don’t, their names are on the lips of those enduring them and they are still talked about long after people leave. They quietly warn others not to take the job, regardless of the money they are offering. Be part of what makes us delighted and makes our working lives awesome. Be that human.