[9wzYQbTYsAIc]

I think hoorayimhelping has the bulk of what you should keep in mind with regards to toxicity.

To add a little from my perspective, one good way to find out if you are toxic is to speak to some psychologists. Either industrial organizational psychologists for the business or a traditional therapist for the individual.

Alternatively, if there is enough data, some metric comparing rates of resignations over time to your industry norm may be instructive.

[ljm]

Honestly I think this is fairly poor advice. 'Toxicity' isn't a condition that a professional psychologist can diagnose.

Meanwhile some answers in this thread are inadvertently confirming that the theSage actually has a problem they need to deal with and might actually be toxic, with practically zero evidence to support it.

theSage sounds like he's worried about being the reason his colleague left; that it's his fault. We've all had that kind of worry sometimes when something unexpected has happened, and we think it's because of us for some reason.

And in that case, what theSage needs isn't someone to confirm or deny his so-called toxicity, it's a close friend they can confide in over a beer or whatever. They can talk about what work has been like and how someone quit and how they feel about it without involving their ex-colleague.

[9wzYQbTYsAIc]

Thanks for your reply, it addresses a common thread that I’ve noticed in this overall post and it is worth elaborating on.

More directly to your reply, toxicity is certainly something worth discussing with a professional. Not everyone has close friends that they can rely on and using friends as an echo chamber can be detrimental to growth.

The worry that you noted can often indeed be normal but it is also absolutely within the scope of a counseling psychologist to consider for treatment if it is a pervasive, detrimental thing.

Similarly, worrying excessively about the departure of a colleague can be abnormal in some situations. I understand the normal reaction to generally be along the lines of wishing the best for the person, rather than to perform an inquiry (nigh investigation) into the full details of the matter. Granted, if this were a departure along the lines of a foundational employee, then some inquiry would be appropriate, and generally so for any random employee, of course. But the choice of language, at the least, does seem to imply a concern beyond the norm. Not having details, perhaps it is entirely justified. At the same time, if theSage (hi you), is concerned about worrying too much, dismissing that out of hand as something that can be solved over a beer may not be sufficient advice either.

To your point about diagnosing toxicity, there are indeed conditions, both organizationally speaking and individually speaking, that overlap with “toxicity” as a symptom. There are a number of personality issues that can give rise to behavior that would be considered to be toxic to healthy people. Similarly, industrial organizational psychology does include organizational dysfunction within its scope of inquiry. For example, what traits, beliefs, and attitudes, when held by management, are toxic to the health of an organization?

Perhaps an IO psychologist could be consulted by theSage to provide a checklist of organizational traits to be marked as observed or not observed, by the departing colleague. Such a thing is a practice performed during exit interviews for large enterprises.

[ljm]

The issue really is the word ‘toxic’. It’s an intense label that shouldn’t be used so lightly, because we all present a lot of potentially toxic behaviours throughout our lives that, with the help and support of those around us, and our own awareness and resilience, we successfully nagivate through without issue.

The conditions that can be identified and diagnosed might have deeper roots so, yes, it’s better to take that to a professional than to hash it out on a forum. But it should not have been framed as being toxic - that just adds another layer of complexity to the situation.

[9wzYQbTYsAIc]

Yeah, the modern insult “toxic” is pretty interesting. It’s become a meta meme that supersedes the original meaning of the word. I’m pretty sure that the term toxic workplace predates, quite much, the more contemporary, gamer use of the word toxic.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toxic_workplace

[ljm]

This is straight bulllshit. This is the first source:

> a toxic worker is defined as a worker that engages in behavior that is harmful to an organization, including either its property or people.

By that definition, you become toxic when you introduce a bug. You become toxic when you make a mistake.

[9wzYQbTYsAIc]

It’s not bad as far as operational definitions go. Operational definitions are intended to be refined over time and to be used as a starting point, not necessarily an ending point. Qualifying the types of behaviors might have been too restrictive of a definition for their study.

For example, if it read “engages in unethical behavior that is harmful”, you then need an operational definition of either ethical or unethical behaviors. It’d be an understatement to call that a difficult thing to define.

Maybe there’s some way they could have incorporated intentionality into the operational definition, but I suspect that it would introduce some gaps as a model of reality.

I’d argue that an intentional pattern of creating bugs would be the toxic thing whereas a pattern of accidentally creating bugs would be incompetence. Isolated or routine cases of bugs being introduced would be the normal course of software implementation.

Business processes and development techniques would be the organizational defense against the introduction of bugs and would probably be the source of the dividing line between when a worker toxically creates bugs and when not toxic.

[watwut]

Only special kind of person will tell you that you are toxic if you are. It takes even more special person to be able to explain it to you in terms you will understand.

Friends are people who are cool with you, by definition. Even if you are toxic.

You are toxic is also meaningless. Professional can tell you more exactly what is problem and help you solve it.

[ljm]

Also a good friend isn’t going to use the word toxic. They might say you’re being a dick or an asshole about something, and give a gentle nudge within the boundaries of that friendship, but ‘toxic’ is the kind of thing you put out there when you’re breaking the friendship off. At that point the toxic person ignored every opportunity to change, even make a small effort, and either refused to or doubled down on their act.