Dive Brief:
- A new paper from the Harvard Business School reveals “what may be the world’s most detailed” profile of a toxic worker, the Washington Post reported. Researchers Michael Housman and Dylan Minor used data from 50,000 employees at 11 companies gathered from workplace fitness assessments for job applicants.
- The results aren’t quite what one would expect, the Post notes. Toxic workers are usually insanely productive, but with a rather high “self-regard” score, counts of overconfidence and a supposedly strong adherence to the rules. Despite their productivity, avoiding a toxic worker actually saves more money in the long run ($12,489) than hiring a superstar ($5,303).
- All workers in the study were hourly, front-line service positions, meaning the researchers also had access to the employee’s daily performance data, hiring data and termination data, if applicable.
Dive Insight:
Perhaps most confusing part of the study may be why such productive workers can also be considered toxic – but it also explains why such workers may last in an organization despite their “questionable” ethics, the researchers say. The trade-off with these workers is that they may be corrupt, even stepping over legal bounds in some cases.
Interestingly (and somewhat paradoxically in this case), those who seem dead-set on following rules were the most likely to be fired for breaking them. A lot of that $12,489 saved doesn’t even account for issues like potential litigation, regulatory penalties or reduced morale from such toxic workers.
Additionally, toxic employees had lower scores of “other-regardingness,” something the researchers teased out from data from the job screening program and questions that make applicants choose between two statements: "I like to ask about other people's well-being" or "I let the past stay in the past." Selecting the first would give them a higher other-regarding score, the Post reported.
