Is a toxic and high pressure work environment the norm now?

[Wormysquirmy]

Is this the new norm? What are your experiences?

I have worked in different roles, as a professional, in one company for around 15 years. Usually busy, nice colleagues, and I have always been well thought of although am now part time. I am, I think, relatively desirable as an employee in as much as I'm flexible, a good team worker, efficient and get on with people. Perhaps not as ambitious as I could be but I have kids. I have made part time working work well so far.

In the last year or so, the place has become utterly, utterly toxic. We have a new manager who is not really a leader. Overall head is implicitly anti- part time working mothers, long hours and stress culture.lots of people off with stress. People not replaced. The message is "suck it up". I was given a workload that was not do-able and the chap who helped me went off in stress so I struggled. Rather than help make it work, I have been shunned and made to do work for a very junior member of staff.

We are going through a merger and redundancies are looming and I'm convinced they are trying to manoeuvre me out before then (to avoid paying redundancy pay).

Workload is simply unmanageable for the entire team given we are short staffed and have people off. Team head ignores me and cancels one:ones. Most colleagues are very stressed and struggling. I was humiliated publicly in a recent department meeting by ignoring manager who I felt should have raised grievances directly.

Is this the new normal in modern Britain?

My instinct is to leave but I feel like I should receive redundancy pay rather than be forced to go through miserable conditions. I feel if I raise a grievance through HR or similar I will struggle to get another job when a reference is required.

I am feeling very anxious and work now and my confidence is plummeting and I have been in tears since I left today. This is all new for me.

Any tips? Thanks so much. I feel a bit lost.

OP, I hear you. Sounds normal to me. Unfortunately.

My job is fine. But I work abroad as a teacher. There was a thread from a union worker about intolerable working conditions in the union itself. When it gets to that point a much wider toxic working culture must have evolved. And with Brexit coming it will get worse.

I hope you can think straight enough to protect yourself OP.

Absolutely. I’m job hunting in the new year.

Not normal in my job. It has happened in some roles when a bad manager comes in but I don't stick around, I fuck off pretty quickly to a new job, life's too short to be overstressed at work.

People join companies but leave managers.

No! Our place is busy but it's not toxic. We have a fantastic MD and the culture is driven by her. Lots of people have worked their for years (15+) and remember back to a time when it was much quieter but compared to many other companies we have it so good.

A company in the same industry has offices across the road. They were recently bought by a investment company. Loads of redundancies and a few people have joined us. They are all saying how much nicer it is to work at ours!

My OH has found this too.

THankfully I haven't been in a workplace for 20 years.

I believe a wider culture of toxic work environments has evolved since the recession, so over the past 10 years. The credit crunch gave managers the excuse to start the treating employees like crap, eroding their rights and telling them to suck it up because 'you're lucky to have a job at all'.

Meanwhile job security has gone - zero hour contracts, temporary contracts and the gig economy is now the norm. So people with permanent or semi-permanent contracts put up with anything to hold on to their jobs. While hangers-on on temporary contracts also put up with anything in the vain hope that they will get a better contract.

Long hours, presenteeism, unpaid overtime, working through lunch, the expectation that emails will be read and replies to on evenings and weekends - all of these are part of modern working life.

Very much the opposite of my work (public sector, not front line services, my role is not customer facing).

E.G. I am being funded to do further qualifications to get me up the pay ladder that I couldn't have afforded on my own; my boss supported me through some very difficult times last year (if I was in the private sector I would've been out on my arse); and the head of our organisation dressed up as Santa today to give the children at our organisations nursery their christmas presents. I realise I am bloody lucky.

In my most recent teaching post, my department were a joy. The same can't be said for the political climate that we were all in together. Political "tinkering" with minimal budgets to manage the aftermath has a lot to answer for.

I'm off the idea of another teaching post at present as many schools will be far worse. Even there, the tide was turning under an academy chain and new management.

These problems are widespread through the public and private sectors.

Productivity in the UK is low. I do wonder how much that is down to unproductive back-covering bureaucracy coming before the core of the job, and low morale from exhaustion.

I'm enjoying a lovely break as a SAHM as my family appreciate my time much more than an employer!

It feels like it. Fewer staff and a higher workload at our place. General shittiness, higher management not listening and miserable blame culture. I work PT and appear to be an inconvenience to my manager.

Several of us have had time off with stress.

It feels like it. Fewer staff and a higher workload at our place. General shittiness, higher management not listening and miserable blame culture. I work PT and appear to be an inconvenience to my manager.

Several of us have had time off with stress.

I agree that it is the manager that sets the tone for the department. However, I don't think that it is everywhere. I left a toxic environment, but found a nice place.

The old place changed when we got a new top management.

Move on if you can - redundancy is intended to compensate for a loss of job, but rarely compensates adequately for the damage to your mental health in the toxic run up in a department like you describe. Looking for new work made me feel like I was taking back control and got me thinking positively about the future again. What you are experiencing is a department in melt down - but not everywhere is like this.

Yep, toxic and high pressure sums up my job and workplace perfectly.

10 years ago my job was great, 5 years ago it was tolerable, now it's horrendous... impossible, unachievable workloads, bullying managers, stagnant pay.
it's definitely my work conditions that have changed drastically, rather than my attitude towards the job.

I am pessimistic about this. I think most-in public and private sectors- companies will become like that.
it wont get better, it will get worse.
the companies nowadays mostly prefer hiring those kind of ruthless managers who make the environment toxic for employees.

My last job sounds EXACTLY like this. I was there 10 years and the last 2 years were awful. We were all convinced they were trying to get us to leave so they didn’t have to make us redundant, and if it hadn’t been for being determined to hang on so I’d get my package when redundancies came I’d have left. Sure enough the redundancies came and most of us bit their hand off.

I have a new job now and it’s NOTHING like this in terms of culture. So it’s not inevitable. There are still decent jobs in decent organisations with decent bosses out there.

Me too. I was going to write more, but it turned into a slightly outing essay. Suffice to say, I've been job hunting quite a while. I'm not even that picky - I just want to pay the bills.

I think bullying is the new way to get rid of people.
My last job did that but I sat it out -miserable but didn't want them to think they could treat ppl like that. In the end they paid me proper bonus & notice.
New boss/company are lovely. No blame culture, work as a team. And on the same business park which irritates my nasty old boss hugely

Totally normal in my industry. I try to shield my team from a lot of it. The only way I've been able to deal with the toxicity (more so in my last place); was to become totally passive, bending over and taking it up the ass..led to a breakdown but in the circumstances it would have been worse if I didn't adapt passively. I've never had a non toxic job because of the industry I'm in.

Its common now and getting worse i fear and i worry so much about my own sons who will never know any different.
i hope things work out for you OP.

I am in a toxic working environment. Only been here 9 months. It looked like the perfect job, it is awful. I am applying to get out. I know from experience that it is not like this everywhere.

We are going through a merger and redundancies are looming and I'm convinced they are trying to manoeuvre me out before then (to avoid paying redundancy pay).

How long is it likely to take?
How much redundancy can you expect?
Can you realistically hang in there until the merger is done?
If the answer to that last question is 'No, I think I think I'll crack up long before then', I would start looking for a new job in the new year. Life is too short and mental health too precious to risk doing serious damage. Put yourself first.

And what Tulipsinajug says. I haven't worked for the past 10 years, but DH has had a horrible time and so many friends and relatives have struggled in toxic environments. Increasingly it seems to be the sociopath types that get promoted to management. I think they're the only ones who relish the new dog-eat-dog world.

Public sector and can relate to a lot of what you say:

Unmanageable workload
People not replaced when they leave or retire
Presenteeism
General attitude against part-time employees and women with young kids
People bullied out of jobs
Management not listening
More bureaucracy imposed just because it's the latest craze even though managers know it is useless

The only thing that keeps me there is my wonderful immediate team!

The thing is this kind of culture does not produce good results.

sounds about right

last time I was looking for work - about 3 years ago - I saw a few companies listing "35 hour week" as a benefit!! Presumably because so many full time jobs now stretch to 37.5 or 40.

of course it's now much easier for employers to get rid of people. plus there is a generation cross over. In your 40s, there is a chance you worked for better places and still remember things not being quite so awful - though I think the days of 9-5 and HR actually helping staff are probably memories of 50+.

but now we have 20+ whose only experience is being treated like shit, it's become a new normal and there's always someone willing to suck it up.

it's part of the reason I plan to go freelance next year.