Dear Madeleine,
I’m dealing with a very weird situation. I’m on a large cross-functional team made up of leads and managers. Our leader is the new EVP of operational excellence. He seems to really like some of the members of the team and really dislike others. He regularly forgets to include the people he dislikes in critical meetings and decisions. He makes snarky remarks when someone he dislikes floats an idea, only to compliment the next person who says practically the same thing.
He has created a division between the liked people and the disliked people. It is subtle, and I’m not sure I would have noticed it if one of my best friends at work wasn’t on team reject. When she pointed it out, I couldn’t unsee it. I feel lucky to find myself in the in-group, but can also see how the situation is headed for disaster.
I lead teams myself and can’t understand what this new guy is up to, why he is doing this, or how he hopes to succeed. He also does other things that make no sense, but this particular thing is the worst of it.
What would you do in this situation? I am at a total loss.
So Confused
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Dear So Confused,
Getting operational excellence right is hard enough without shenanigans like this. One trait of a toxic leader is to play favorites. It destabilizes teams by destroying trust. There is a good chance your new EVP is totally unconscious of what he is doing and the effect it is having. In my opinion, this is the behavior of someone who needs to have power over others and achieves it by keeping people nervous and jumpy. If he bullies some people and not others, it automatically creates a reflex in the not-bullied group to stay on his good side, and slowly silences everyone.
It sounds like this person is not your direct boss, nor the boss of your friend who has been relegated to the out-group, so it may not affect your performance review if this cross-functional team doesn’t accomplish anything. But that may not be true for your friend.
You have a few choices here, but none of them are attractive.
You can do nothing, which will inevitably impact the relationship with your friend.
You can get together with your friend and brainstorm what the two of you could do to change the situation. You might consider recruiting a few more team members from both the in-group and the out-group to engineer some kind of revolt. If you could manage to pull the whole team together, you could include HR to conduct an intervention of sorts. It would only work if the entire team was on board and unanimously demanded that everyone on the team be treated with respect.
You might consider going to the EVP and pointing out what you are observing—but that could be a career-ending move. People who need to have power over others usually aren’t keen to get feedback from anyone, especially not from someone they see as a subordinate. It depends on how much power he has and what kind of trust he has built with his peers and his superiors. Along those lines, you might practice standing up for people he is snarky with—but again, it’s possible all that will accomplish is to get yourself relegated to “team reject,” as you call it.
Look at the situation from all angles with as many of your team members as you trust. If a majority of the team agrees to stick together, you might have a chance to shift the ugly behavior. At the very least, you can probably ensure that nothing gets done, and let it reflect badly on the EVP. Does it appear that I’m condoning subversive behavior? I guess I am, because if people don’t stand up for themselves and each other, leaders like your EVP end up getting promoted and wreaking more havoc from an even stronger position.
Document every incident you remember and start keeping a running log of unacceptable behavior moving forward. This way, you will have a leg to stand on should the situation escalate. It would probably be up to your friend to take this whole mess to HR and to her boss. You might also mention the situation to your own boss, if you trust them.
The more you can get the team to stick together, the better chance you have of getting the EVP to change—or better yet, getting him removed.
Love, Madeleine
About Madeleine
Madeleine Homan Blanchard is a master certified coach, author, speaker, and cofounder of Blanchard Coaching Services as well as a key facilitator of Blanchard’s Leadership Coach Certification course. Madeleine’s Advice for the Well Intentioned Manager is a regular Saturday feature for a very select group: well intentioned managers. Leadership is hard—and the more you care, the harder it gets. Join us here each week for insight, resources, and conversation.
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