It is toxic at the top..

I once saw a TV ad that says tea grown at higher altitudes taste better.. Do not know how true that is.. I am not much of a tea connoisseur myself. But, in corporate world, every rung of the ladder you climb, you get surrounded by toxicity.. and it can get really get toxic at the top.

I am not generalizing here. There are a lot of organizations where healthy culture thrives.. But that is because of efforts and drives that has gone in and goes in, in the creation and sustenance of that culture.

It is said that over the centuries, the Indian subcontinent was invaded, tried to annex and robbed around 200 times. Mahmud of Ghazni is said to have invaded seventeen times, and destroyed the richest cities and temple towns, such as Mathura and Somnath, of India and used the wealth to build his capital in Ghazni.

What was the motivation of these invaders? None other than desire for control over an area for selfish reasons. Before the rise of democracy, all dictators were doing was struggling to cement their power internally and expand their power externally. Wars lost is territory lost and subjects lost and hence power lost. Climbing the ladder of power is tough unless the love of power pushes you up. But, the hunger for power, like greed can be brutal, we look at the wars and all we see is endless bloodbaths over slivers of territory.

There may be lesser wars on the ground, but the wars in the corporate world continues.. you will see these ‘predators’ around you who, the senior managers think are ‘proactive, self-driven and first among the equals’, who blame others for their mistakes, take credit for others’ ideas and work, and belittle those who do not support them or share their views.

Concentration of power in people who do not allow free flow of information and keeps critical decision making to themselves often leads to their pursuing their climb to power, in the process damaging the interest of the organization, often leading to organizational collapse. And this usually is more sever as the rungs of the ladder are high often leading to commercial implications. ?

Big sized organizations and multinational organizations spread over geographically where substantial variation in cultural attitudes toward hierarchy and authority are prevalent, things can get nasty. The colour of your passport also is an element.

This again comes from the animal instincts which lies deep in some of us and that comes out, from insecurities, hostility toward lower-ranking members who might challenge their authority. They divide subordinates and create classes within the organization, for example, they separate the capable of the subordinates from the seniors. They block peer-to-peer interactions that fosters success.

The problem with this kind of culture is that it is infectious. When the followers see that their manager is climbing the corporate ladder stepping on other’s shoes and heads and with creating bloodshed, they will do the same and, in the end, resulting in organizational collapse.

Like Sun Tzu said, one’s who knows how to unite the upper and lower ranks in purpose will be victorious.

For such a culture not to breed and thrive, it is important for the top brass of the organization (like the board of directors) to ensure that they bring in the right leaders with the right attitude and bring in systems and processes, governance and channels of communication that does not hoard information and create islands of power concentrated in few individuals.

Mechanisms must be put in place to identify such predators and must be weeded out before they cause bloodshed which ultimately will result in the collapse of the organization.

Victim blaming, or meditation or turning to god is not the answer when someone become prey to such toxic culture.

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Dedicated to Anna Sebastian Perayil | Opinions are Personal