SmartPulse — our weekly nonscientific reader poll in SmartBrief on Leadership — tracks feedback from more than 190,000 business leaders. We run the poll question each week in our e-newsletter.
How does your organization deal with “bad behavior”?
- We immediately take action and correct/eliminate it: 25.4%
- We deal with egregious cases but tolerate it otherwise: 41.01%
- We avoid dealing with it and hope it goes away: 21.16%
- We have a culture that promotes and rewards it: 12.43%
Fix Bad Behavior Fast. There appears to be way too much tolerance of bad behavior with 75% of you fessing up to varying levels of tolerance. The cost of such behavior in terms of productivity, morale, and turnover can be staggering. People don’t like working in organizations where bad behavior is condoned – much less encouraged. I know you can’t change the entire culture on your own but you can start the movement in your own department. Stamp out bad behavior as soon as you see it. That’s the only way things change for the better.
Mike Figliuolo is managing director of thoughtLEADERS, author of “Lead Inside the Box: How Smart Leaders Guide Their Teams to Exceptional Results” and “One Piece of Paper: The Simple Approach to Powerful, Personal Leadership.”