Changing toxic work culture

And what happens if we don't

I frequently look back at the ten years I spent training to become, and being, a lawyer and think ‘what the actual f***’. Excuse me for swearing, but my gosh - how did I put up with it for so long? Sure, I needed to work to live. But couldn’t I have chosen something slightly less taxing?

Sixteen-hour days, and sometimes weekends, were fuelled by my deep belief I was not good enough and that hard work would equate to proving myself. Abusive bosses were normalised by my core assumption that there was something wrong with me and that trying harder to please them would equate to figuring it out. Being switched ‘on’, constantly on high-alert, was managed by my faith that, if I noticed, understood, pre-empted, and dealt with everything in my surroundings, pushing through would equate to success.

(Spoiler: those beliefs didn’t serve me.)

These experiences aren’t unique to me, nor to the legal industry, and it is fair to say that this atmosphere would have a damaging impact on anyone. “While society has long associated workplace trauma-induced mental illness with certain occupations like firefighting and the military, the notion of trauma developed from a toxic job or workplace is becoming increasingly recognised throughout the workforce.”

But it was undeniable that by comparison to the majority of my contemporaries, and despite the extra hours I was putting in, I always felt behind the curve. Like I was trying harder than everyone else, to no avail. As an undiagnosed autistic person who has ADHD, it felt like the equivalent of asking someone who is not able-bodied to use the steps to get onto a train when they need a ramp. The mental and physical and emotional energy required to do so is extreme - that is, if it’s even possible.

The answer, I thought? Try harder. Push through. Give more. That’s all I had the language for, not knowing that I needed a ramp.

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I’m slowly unpacking this work chapter of my life in therapy. Whilst the details of who, what, why, and when are private, there is a learning I wish to share. That is: workplace-induced emotional trauma is real whether it arises from racism, bullying, ableism, poor work-life boundaries, job insecurity or otherwise.

I never thought about my various experiences at work, let alone considered they might have been traumatic. So deep in the core belief that the issue was about me, not the people around me or the institutional system I was a part of, that I subconsciously turned a blind eye. In fact, this is a hallmark of PTSD: avoidance. I shut out feelings about the trauma - avoiding the people, places or situations that remind of it. My brain was trying to protect me so that I could continue to survive - because, really, that’s all I was doing.

At this point in life I am well-acquainted with the intensely painful experience of acknowledging my trauma, wherever it may have stemmed from. So I was surprised to be caught off guard during a recent therapy session by the realisation that the work environment I willingly put myself in was toxic and inflicted severe pain on me throughout my twenties.

It’s easy to let myself question: ‘what if I’d understood my brain earlier - maybe the damage would have been less severe? Maybe I would have been able to advocate for myself better? Maybe I would have left on day one like my gut was telling me?’. But I can’t turn back the clock, so there’s not much point in ruminating on the what ifs. Instead, I try to acknowledge the pain, nurture the younger self that experienced that pain alone, and use what I have learned from the experience to better guide my future.

It requires strength and courage, but in my experience the most healing part of this journey has been acknowledging the darkness from which pain emerged. It is there, it was real, it’s not all in my head, it wasn’t my fault.

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A part of this process is critically looking at the work-systems in which young people are taken advantage. The second part to acknowledging it wasn’t my fault that I was subject to abusive behaviour is confidently owning that it was someone else’s. And, more broadly, that it was the responsibility of all of the other people in positions of power who turned a blind eye to the cultural breeding ground.

To boil it down: toxic people create toxic culture. Toxic people protect toxic culture. Toxic culture protects toxic people. But how do the toxic people climb to the top of the pyramid first? Well, it’s not as straightforward or simplistic as that of course, but through the process of elimination in a toxic culture people who are the subject of toxicity - like me - don’t make it. Once the toxic people get to the top they maintain the toxic culture to protect their position and churn through an endless cycle of young employees until they find the few who can either deal with or turn a blind-eye to the toxicity, or are themselves happy to adopt the toxic behaviour on display. I’m not precluding myself from engaging in toxic behaviour - I’m human after all - but it wasn’t something I could, or would, be able to put up with.

So how do we shape culture, with the aim of eliminating toxic culture, if we are not the ones in positions of power? I don’t know - if I did, I’d be more inclined to put myself back in the firing line to try to change things for the future generation. But until I figure that out what I can do is share my experience, and advocate for healthier work environments in the process.

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Of the three institutions I worked with or for in connection with the legal industry none of them had a culture of understanding around neurodiversity. There was no training, or education, or tolerance for differences in human behaviours, working-style, or access-needs. Given I’m not working in the corporate sphere at the moment, I reached out to my friends to ask them if anything has changed in their fields of work.

My friends are not lawyers, but they work across a variety of industries with a range of skills and experiences. When I raised the questions ‘at your work is there a culture of understanding and neurodiversity? To what extent? Do you have ‘training’ on what it means in a practical sense?’ I was expecting a lot of ‘mmm no, we don’t really discuss that’. But I was taken by surprise, and it became clear to me that things are changing and the version of corporate life I experienced is not necessarily the norm.

One friend, and her co-workers, are having training about neurodiversity later this year from a company called Neurobox, ‘a leading workplace adjustments provider based in the UK, dedicated to fostering inclusive and accessible work environments for disabled and neurodivergent individuals.’

Another friend, who is co-founder and COO of the company he works for, shared that since their leadership teams have started openly discussing topics like neurodiversity over the last year-or-so their employees and interns have felt better able to ask for accommodations to meet their needs at work. He said ‘As we grow, we have more and more brave individuals coming forward with suggestions and it’s been amazing to see what people will openly discuss now. One junior intern disclosed she struggles to process lots of text in front of the whole group. After she said this, four or five others in the room also spoke up and asked for the same accommodation!’.

My friend was honest and explained it can be challenging, especially when people don’t feel they can disclose the accommodations they need at the outset. In a culture where neurodiversity is not yet widely discussed or understood, it can be hard for people to disclose neurodivergence and associated accommodation requests to potential employers because of fear of discrimination. At the same time, assuming that employer is fair and non-discriminatory, in disclosing these things it provides the opportunity for them to help provide a level playing-field increasing the chances of that person’s success and personal wellbeing at the company.

In response to these challenges, my friend introduced an optional questionnaire as part of the hiring process to help cater for any specific needs. He believes this, along with various other responses to needs raised by employees - such as, changing background colours of slides, circulating content to be read before training, giving more time for report writing, including footers on emails to explain things like spelling mistakes, and more broadly heading up projects to promote neurodiversity within the company - have contributed to the increasingly transparent and supportive culture around neurodiversity and individual needs.

Whilst acknowledging they have lots more work to do, he shared ‘we have at least six people who have openly discussed neurodiversity with me in the past year alone. We have our head of HR going through ASD and ADHD assessments as we speak. Obviously my own struggles with mental health. Another who struggles with hearing and sound processing. It’s been eye-opening’.

Hearing my friend’s efforts to actively nurture an open and accepting culture at work healed a little part of my soul. I deeply admire the work he is doing, and his efforts spread a message of hope that change is being made.

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I live with the consequences of the traumatic experiences I went through at work on a daily basis. I hope, with time spent in therapy, the CPTSD I live with will become easier to manage. But it’s gruelling at times. Listening to a work-story shared by my partner, hearing an email notification go off, making a spelling mistake - all things that can easily trigger a slue of panic, shame, fear, embarrassment, and so on. It takes days or even weeks to recover. My therapist’s office used to be located near my old offices and even walking down nearby streets to my appointments would lead to heart palpitations, chest pain, and a triggered nervous system. Needless to say - figuring out how to manage work now, even though I’m no longer a lawyer, is incredibly challenging.

I share this not for pity, but to hopefully help you understand that if you are struggling with this you are not alone and it is not easy. You might be reading this and thinking ‘yeah, sure, but everyone has to work and it’s hard for everyone’. To that I say: yes, work is hard - especially in this economic and cultural climate - but it shouldn’t be so hard that it is making you mentally and physically unwell. If you are aware of people you love - or even co-workers - struggling at work, extend some compassion. Work may be a central part of most of our lives, but that doesn’t mean we should ‘just get on with it’ and shoulder toxic or abusive environments. Offer support and reassure the people around you that they deserve to feel safe at work. Even better, call out toxic behaviour and try to do your part to make cultural change.

Thank you to my friends who contributed to this essay