Free Yourself from a Toxic Work Environment

Quit the lousy job or the bad boss and steer your own career.

Image created via Midjourney

From the inside, toxic work environments rarely realize that they are toxic.

There is a pervasive message that “everything is fine” or, worse, that you are the problem.

From tyrant managers to unreasonable or unclear expectations, there are a lot of crappy companies out there. And for a long time, this was tolerated. Understandably so: The Great Recession in the late 2000s brought a lot of stress to a lot of people, from the collapse of the housing market to high unemployment. People felt like they needed to toe the line and keep their mouths shut or risk losing their jobs.

I’ve been there. My company laid off 30% of its workforce at that time — a necessary measure to stay in business. I survived the layoff, but it scared me into submission for a long, long time. Dedicated, hardworking employees were let go, which made me believe that no one was safe.

Fast-forward more than a decade, and employees have realized that they are in the driver’s seat. They don’t need to put up with toxic work environments anymore because many, many other companies will gladly appreciate their talents. Research data shows that a toxic corporate culture is 10x more powerful than compensation…