How to Fix a Toxic Culture

'Well, it was always going to turn toxic, wasn't it?'

I overheard that on public transport once, two strangers discussing a workplace neither of them seemed to like very much. It's stuck with me because it's precisely the belief that lets toxic culture take hold in the first place: the idea that it's inevitable, that nobody could have stopped it, that it just happened.

It didn't just happen. Toxic culture isn't inevitable — it's one of the most preventable things in business, and yet it keeps making headlines — in entertainment, sport, finance, law, banking, technology and government, sometimes four different scandals in four different countries in a single month. If organisations don't take allegations seriously, they should expect to face the consequences of their inaction.

It's rarely the culture. It's usually a person.

The distinction that many organisations miss is that a toxic individual is not the same thing as a toxic culture. However, most toxic cultures stem from the behaviour of one or more individuals, left unaddressed. The culture only turns toxic when leaders know about it and choose to look away.

I once worked with a team whose culture had been quietly poisoned by one person's behaviour. The team addressed it directly; when the individual wouldn't change, it was escalated and, eventually, they were exited. The culture recovered almost immediately. That's the pattern, again and again: deal with the individual, and the culture heals. Ignore the individual, and the culture rots around them.

The warning signs are rarely hidden. They include: excuses made for poor behaviour, one rule for managers and another for everyone else, gossip that's tolerated rather than challenged, no real consequence for poor performance, people routinely and deliberately excluded, and a performance management process so slow or so discouraged that nobody bothers using it. If several of these feel familiar, the culture isn't inevitable — it's being allowed.

Toxic leaders come in three recognisable types

Toxic leadership isn't new — the term was coined by political scientist Marcia Lynn Whicker back in 1996 — but it's remarkably consistent in how it shows up. There are three styles worth knowing, because naming them makes them easier to spot:

The enforcer needs hierarchy, certainty and money, and apes the toxic style of whoever they answer to.

The street fighter is egotistical, often charismatic, and operates on gut instinct — winning at all costs, using reward and punishment as their only tools.

The bully is angry, combative, and bitter about their own past failures, seeking to denigrate anyone who outperforms them.

All three share one trait: they care more about their own reputation, remuneration or self-preservation than the people around them. And they're often very good at convincing the people above them that they're indispensable - which is exactly how the behaviour survives as long as it does.

Whose job is it to fix toxic culture?

Every single person in a toxic culture carries some degree of responsibility, but not equally. Managers are responsible for building day-to-day culture and dealing swiftly with poor behaviour before it spreads. Employees are responsible for how they show up and for not tolerating undermining behaviour in silence. But when the toxicity reaches the top, or when a manager themselves is the source, it becomes the board's job - or the most senior leader available - to act before the organisation becomes a media story.

Ultimately, the senior leadership team bears full responsibility for a toxic culture and for the response to it. That doesn't let anyone else off the hook. It just means the buck stops somewhere specific, and everyone else's job is to make sure it doesn't have to travel that far.

The five cultures every team lives in

Whether a culture is toxic, thriving, or somewhere in between comes down to the two factors playing out together, every day: emotional intelligence and engagement. Low on both, and a culture is stagnant. High emotional intelligence but low engagement produces a pleasant culture - nice, but weak, missing targets. High engagement with low emotional intelligence produces a combatant culture - targets get hit, but people burn out doing it. Leave a combatant culture running too long, and it tips into toxic. Get both dials turned up together, and you have a vibrant culture: low attrition, people who leave on good terms, and a track record of hitting stretch targets without burning anyone out.

Knowing which of these five you're actually in — rather than which one you assume you're in — is the starting point for fixing anything. It's why I built the Five Cultures Quiz, which takes a few minutes and gives you a genuine read on where your team sits right now.

Fixing toxic culture: a practical sequence

Name it, specifically. Not "morale is low" - which individual, which behaviour, which specific incident. Vague diagnoses produce vague action plans that achieve nothing.

Deal with the source, fast. If it's one person, address it directly and escalate if it doesn't change. Delay is the single biggest reason toxic behaviour becomes toxic culture rather than staying an isolated incident.

Don't mistake surveys for action. Engagement surveys are still one of the best diagnostic tools available - but running one and then filing the results is worse than not running one at all. Employees notice when feedback goes nowhere, and it corrodes trust further.

Rebuild deliberately. Once the source is dealt with, the culture doesn't automatically heal. It needs new energy, new agreements on behaviour, and a genuine chance for people to help redefine how the team works together, rather than having it dictated to them again.

Watch leadership hubris. A team can be recovering well and still slide backwards if a leader starts believing their own press — dismissing feedback as resistance, taking credit for wins while assigning blame for losses. Confidence is essential in leadership; arrogance is what turns it toxic again. I've written more about why leadership hubris is the enemy of culture if you want to spot it before it takes hold.

None of this is complicated. It's consistently under-invested in, which is a different problem entirely — usually because leaders assume culture change takes years and can't be measured. Neither is true when the change is intentional rather than accidental.

Is toxic culture ever really unavoidable?

No. Most toxic cultures trace back to one or more individuals whose behaviour goes unaddressed. The moment leaders choose to look away is the moment a bad actor becomes a toxic culture.

Frequently Asked Questions?

Who is responsible for fixing a toxic culture? Everyone has a role, but the senior leadership team carries ultimate responsibility, both for how the toxicity took hold and for the response to it.

What are the earliest warning signs of a culture turning toxic? Excuses for poor behaviour, inconsistent standards between managers and staff, tolerated gossip, no real consequences for poor performance, and a performance management process people are quietly discouraged from using.

How is a "combatant" culture different from a "toxic" one? A combatant culture has low emotional intelligence but high engagement - targets get hit, but people burn out achieving them, and risk-taking runs high. Left unaddressed for too long, a combatant culture is what tips over into toxic.

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*Further reading:

Companion reading: Detox Your Culture · Toxic Culture Isn't Inevitable · Who's Responsible for Toxic Culture?

About the author

Colin Ellis is an award-winning author, speaker and workplace culture consultant who has spent the last 10+ years helping organisations create vibrant, high-performance cultures where people thrive and results follow. As a senior leader, Colin led change initiatives in the UK, New Zealand and Australia before building a global consulting and speaking practice. He has now worked with over 125 different cultures in 25 countries across 5 continents, including organisations such as Red Bull, Microsoft, AFC Bournemouth, Cisco, KPMG, Atlassian, Manulife Insurance, Bluescope Steel and Amgen.

He is the creator of the Culture Dial™ and the Five Cultures Quiz©, author of seven books including five bestsellers — The Project Book (Australian General Business Book of the Year 2019), Culture Fix, Culture Hacks, The Hybrid Handbook and Detox Your Culture — and host of the Colin on Culture podcast. Originally from Liverpool, UK, he spent six years in New Zealand, eleven years in Australia, but now lives in Winchester, UK, with his family.

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