Leading a negative team member can be frustrating. You have a vision, and you are enthusiastic about your new solution, but they are skeptical, critical and keep raising problems.
Or, you need to translate new strategic goals to your team and one person just can’t get there. They shake their heads, sigh, and say things like, “Who comes up with these ideas? That has to be the dumbest thing I’ve ever heard.”
Maybe you ask their ideas and they fold their arms, purse their lips and say nothing. When you ask what’s up, they smirk and say, “Right, like you really want our ideas.”
Why do you have a negative teammate?
When you see a consistent pattern of negativity from someone on your team, it can be tempting to jump in and try to coach them out. But until you understand where their negativity is coming from, it’s a mistake. You could be missing out on a great opportunity to improve your leadership, fix a problem, or really help a person be more effective.
There are four areas that can create the behaviors we interpret as negative – and only one of them is a situation where training would be most appropriate.
1. Your leadership
One of the common reasons for employee negativity is poor leadership. Before addressing a negative team member’s behavior, do a self-audit of these common frustrations and make sure you’re not inadvertently causing negativity.
Toxic Courage Shredder
If you use shame, guilt, intimidation and fear to get results, you can expect negativity and fear in return. are you tin Use these negative emotions to get people moving, but they come at a high price. Your team won’t trust you, they won’t want to give more than their minimum effort, and you certainly won’t get any creativity or problem solving.
solution
Remove these toxic behaviors from your leadership before you do anything else. Otherwise, you are modeling and asking for the very behaviors that frustrate you.
Lack of appreciation
No one enjoys feeling taken for granted. Do you consistently encourage and recognize people? If not, the lack of appreciation and recognition for who they are and what they do can lead to resentment.
solution:
Build a habit of regular encouragement. Make it specific, meaningful to the person, and relevant to their results and how they achieved them.
Lack of responsibility or follow-up
No one wants to waste their time or effort. When you don’t practice accountability consistently, you send a message that you don’t value the time and work of your team members who do. When you start new initiatives and don’t follow through, people lose confidence and you can easily find yourself with a negative team member.
solution:
Commit to consistent accountability and follow-up. Invite the team with you on the journey. Accountability is a team game and if you genuinely invite them to hold you accountable, you will see rapid change. Start with a clear shared understanding of what success looks like, check understanding with each other, schedule the end and check progress along the way.
treat people like machines
If you often think (or worse, say): “Just do what I tell you,” then you’ve stopped treating people like people and reduced them to a mechanical job role. Of course, there is a role for training and learning how to do a job. But once a team member is trained, they will have their own experience, ideas and solutions to contribute. When you dismiss their thoughts or always have the best answer, it demotivates people and creates a negative “why bother” attitude.
solution:
Cultivate your curiosity and ask people for their perspectives, ideas and solutions. Encourage people to bring their empathy, fun and humanity to their work.
2. Organizational circumstances
You can be a person-centered leader who appears confident and humble, focused on results and relationships, but still have negative team members. Sometimes, it is the organizational circumstances that lead to negativity. A heart-to-heart talk with team members can help uncover these issues and give you a chance to support your team.
Priorities change rapidly
People like to feel a sense of accomplishment. When priorities keep changing and people can’t finish what they started, it’s frustrating. It’s natural for people to feel like “why bother doing this new thing when it’s just going to change again?”
solution:
You may not be able to prevent a shift in priorities, but you can create a positive environment that creates a sense of accomplishment, respects teamwork, and celebrates accomplishments and learning. Also, just acknowledging the emotional lesson and reality can help build connection and reduce negativity.
Reorganization, layoffs and organizational instability
In larger organizations, these massive changes cause fear and negativity as people lose steam, wonder if they are next, and, as with rapidly changing priorities, feel overwhelmed and wonder “why bother?”
solution:
First, regularly advocate for your team and give decision makers the information they need to make the best decisions. Then, as you lead your team through uncertainty, act to reduce stress. Be transparent – don’t make up what you don’t know. Focus on what is known, what hasn’t changed, and the small victories the team can make with each other. Communicate your appreciation to your people and the value of the work they do.
Unhealthy matrix organization or obstructive bureaucracy
In unhealthy matrix organizations and bureaucratic cultures, it can feel like no one decides or takes responsibility for anything. The consequences are the familiar negative cocktail of resignation, hopelessness and the feeling that nothing can be done.
solution:
If you are a senior leader, invest in making your culture and structure work. The design may make sense on paper and the shared resources make the numbers work, but you will need culture, leadership training and values work to support the structure and make it effective.
If you’re not a senior leader, you can still support your team by helping them learn how to navigate structure and build the cross-functional relationships that will help them succeed. You can also build relationships with other key leaders yourself to create pockets of efficiency within a dysfunctional structure.
3. Their personality or attitude
For some people, their negativity has nothing to do with difficult circumstances or your leadership. It is part of their personality or approach to life. If you told this person he was negative, he would honestly respond, “No, I’m not—I’m trying to prevent a problem, avoid unnecessary frustrations, or keep us on track.”
Often, these team members are analytical and focus on tasks before people. They are valuable team members. They can help you turn great ideas into reality while avoiding unnecessary time and headaches with a little more planning.
And they can appear negative, even when they don’t see themselves that way. Their way of dealing with ideas can feel caustic and cause other team members (or you) to stop sharing ideas because you don’t want to deal with the inevitable list of problems and negativity.
solution:
This is a negative team member where coaching can be very helpful. You can use the INSPIRE method to have a conversation about what you noticed and the impact on the team. Reinforce the value of their thinking and then come up with some ways to bring the full benefit of their analysis to the team.
Maybe share this article with them: How to be less negative and still be yourself. This will give them the tools to validate the ideas they hear, frame their concerns as support, and recognize when they are most prone to destructive negativity.
4. Mental health
The last reason you might experience a negative team member involves challenges with mental health. These can range from temporary problems to long-term conditions. Through the pandemic, many leaders have become more familiar with mental health struggles and the need to support their people through these challenges.
As you navigate these issues, start a conversation with your HR partners and learn how your organization can support people when they need it. Here are some of the most common mental health challenges that can appear in a negative team member.
exhaustion
If your team has had a difficult work environment for a long time, it’s normal for people to burn out.
solution
World-class athletes and their coaches incorporate targeted rest and recovery into their training schedule. Your team needs it too. If burnout hasn’t happened yet, how can you introduce intentional rest and recovery into your team’s schedule? Talk about it as a team. Alternate vacations, lighter chore weeks, and intentional fun are ways to start.
difficult life circumstances
We all have those times. lose a loved one A child’s struggles. Hard Disease. accident.
solution
Start with empathy, acknowledge the situation and that you want to help. Will a vacation help? Or a temporary change in responsibility? Don’t assume you have the right answer for them – take the call. Staying involved in their work may help your team member navigate the challenge.
depression or other conditions
In the United States, over 7% of the population Experience at least one depressive episode, and almost one in five living with some mental illness. Lead long enough and you or a teammate will experience it.
solution:
There are many ways to support a team member living with depression or mental health challenges. Do not diagnose or offer medical advice. Instead, show up supportive and non-judgmental. If the person is going through a depressive episode, Research suggests Simplifying their workload, providing more encouragement and recognizing wins, along with a flexible work schedule that includes interacting with people can help.
When to help a negative team member move on
Not every person fits every group. There will be times when the best you can do for a negative team member is to help them move on. Maybe there is a better fit for them elsewhere or maybe the forced move will help them reevaluate how they move in the world. Either way, the negative person and your team will be better for the change.
Work on the four areas above, and when you talk to the negative team member, the coach, and conduct necessary INSPIRE performance conversations, assess the impact of their behavior on team morale and performance.
If the person drags down morale and performance over time and does not make an effort to perform differently, it is probably time for a change. Don’t let yourself get stuck with a “shiny jerk”.
Finally, there is a range of human behavior and if their negativity doesn’t adversely affect the team or performance, it’s okay to let them be.
your turn
Negative team members give you an opportunity to improve your leadership, your organizational health, and help the individual be more effective. How you help them depends on the cause of their negativity. When you take the time to engage, learn and respond appropriately your team, organization and leadership will benefit.
we’ll be glad to hear from you: How do you support your negative team members? Has a leader ever helped you navigate your negativity? Leave us a comment and tell us!
