The Mental Load Women Carry in a Toxic Work Environment
The Mental Load Women Carry in a Toxic Work Environment
Women are burnt out, stressed and grappling with a mental health crises. Everywhere you turn there's a new article explaining how much work, both paid and unpaid, women are tasked with. One thing we're not including in this data are the countless hours women spend navigating the mental load it requires to survive in a toxic work environment.
In my coaching practice I hear countless examples of women who describe the invasive, negative impact that an unsupportive work environment (think micromanaging or manipulative boss, lack of supportive policies, high pressure, cut-throat or always on culture) can have on their ability to perform.
Daily I hear of a new experience where one or more of my female clients feels disrespected, scared or stressed due to unsupportive leadership. When this type of energy is present in our working environment it consumes our thoughts, making it impossible to fully focus on our priorities, goals and expectations at work. Our experiences at work also shape the experiences of our lives outside of work. When we find ourselves in a constant state of stress, discomfort and unhappiness at work this impacts all aspects of our life.
Below are the most common challenges women bring to me. I share these so that leaders are aware of concerns women are faced with on a daily basis and the time and energy they spend working through them in addition to their paid work and in many cases domestic care responsibilities. With this awareness hopefully we can collectively make changes to better support our people.
Discouraged to be authentic
There is rarely only one way to approach something. However, I often hear that my female clients have been encouraged to conform to how their leaders conducted themselves. They have been instructed that there's only one way to solve challenges, sell products or reach goals. This forces my clients to go against their intuition. I've been told it feels like being forced into a box that they don't fit into. It's extremely hard to find success when we are not allowed flexibility or to show up authentically.
Many managers are promoted based on high performance as an individual contributor. High performance in many organizations is measured in metrics driven ways, primarily focusing on attainment towards a goal. With this criteria as the main way of evaluating performance, leadership character traits such as integrity, humility, accountability, collaboration, courage, justice and humanity are not objectively factored into the process. This can translate into the promotion of people who do not have developed leadership traits. When this happens, it's common for leaders to expect the individual contributors on their team to show up exactly as they had.
This often leads to the dismissal or disregard of different ideas and approaches towards reaching a goal. Out of fear, people with different learning styles or ideas stay silent and conform. This way of leading presents itself as: Micromanaging, lack in psychological safety, dictating vs. collaborating and motivation through fear or power.
Misalignment with values
My clients often struggle inside of their working environments when their values are compromised. The most common values misalignments I hear about pertain to disrespect and unethical behavior. Most of my clients are in sales and I consistently hear about frustrations pertaining to loopholes (lack of regulatory compliance) to encourage cheating to “get ahead.” The clients I work with know they could also take advantage of these oversights, but feel morally unable to do so. The result, they are outperformed. While they feel good about sticking to their values they feel detached and frustrated with the organization for allowing it.
I also consistently hear about situations where my clients are encouraged to apply unnecessary pressure to others in an effort to meet or exceed quota attainment. On multiple occasions clients have been instructed to inflate discounting, make false promises and apply daily pressure to prospects or customers in an effort to get them to purchase or expand their spend. My clients feel extremely misaligned with this approach and believe that selling happens when there's a true need, justifiable timeline and value is provided.
Leaderships inability to present clear, specific and objective feedback
It's no secret that leaders avoid tough conversations including giving honest and productive feedback. This happens for a multitude of reasons.
In many cases leaders have not been taught how to properly do this using objective framework. In other cases a lack of courage and cultural norms of "nice and polite" come into play. What happens when leaders are unable to provide clear, specific and objective feedback? There's a lack in clarity, which diminishes trust and engagement. When trust and engagement are eroded gossip, detachment and passive aggressive behavior start. Leaders need development in this area and consistent reinforcement.
I've personally found the SBI (situation, behavior and Impact) method to be helpful in delivering objective feedback. The goal is not to sugarcoat the truth, but to be direct and concise with word choice and kind with delivery.
My clients consistently inform me that formal feedback sessions are virtually non-existent. I have even worked with more than one client who received no feedback before being put on a performance plan. Feedback conversations should not be a gotcha moment. Giving feedback should be engrained in the culture. Not delivering feedback is a huge disservice to the employee, team and organization.
Fear tactics to motivate
This approach uses scarcity vs. opportunity to motivate. If you don't accomplish X you could lose your job, be put on a PIP, be removed from a team, etc. It threatens consequence instead of outlining the opportunity. The intention is to get people to work harder and reach goals. Leaders may see short term gains from this approach, but over time, a fear based culture leads to decreased morale, paralysis from stress, underperformance and lower retention.
Using fear to motivate creates a fight or flight response in the body. When this happens, cortisol (the stress hormone) is released. This raises our heart rate. When we are in dangers this is an important biological reaction, but when it happens chronically, mental and physical well-being is negatively impacted.
The goal is for people to lean in and change behavior, but the result is often the opposite. People lean out. They start to lose trust in their leader and detach from the work.
Disregard for flexibility
Forcing people to come into an office every day or work strict hours creates a lot of friction. This is an especially hot topic for parents that I work with. Culture that encourages flexibility (being able to work around daycare pick up, little league games and family dinner) creates loyalty. My clients who feel like they are unable to unplug have not only expressed frustration and resentment, but burnout.
My clients have reported taking longer and more frequent breaks throughout the day because they know they are expected to "work" longer hours. They wish they could create a schedule that fit their needs. If this was possible they report they'd need fewer breaks and would have a deeper connection to the work because they'd feel motivated to get their work done so they can disconnect fully for the day.
When organizations don't encourage flexibility employees are left choosing work over family or other important priorities in their life. When this happens habitually, the result is often frustration and even resentment.
All of these challenges take up a lot of mental space for my clients. When they are faced with these situations additional stress is added to their already overloaded plate. Many of my clients report being unable to turn off these stressors once the workday is over, which means the stress bleeds into their personal life. As leaders we have a real opportunity to address these challenges.
My recommendation would be to start by creating safe ways for team members to bubble up feedback. This should be done using anonymity and/or a non-biased 3rd party resource who can bubble up themes. Once leaders are aware of how their team feels about their culture, they can make conscious choices and take action towards changing it.
