Customer Reviews

Toxic Emotions at Work: How Compassionate Managers Handle Pain and Conflict

5 star:		(5)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

I picked up this book because I am familiar with the author from days when I, then firmly planted in the academic world, assigned his articles to graduate students learning to do research. I knew his academic credentials are impeccable and I was prepared to trust what he wrote. And that, I think, accounts for the success of Toxic Emotions.

Toxic Emotions covers ground that has been worked before. Workplace pain has been discussed by self-help authors ("working wounded") and academics who have studied burnout and stress. Frost's remedies also remain conventional: get exercise, stay detached, be positive, find space outside work.

The willingness of executives to explore feelings is no longer new either. See Marsha Sinetar's The Mentor's Spirit and Mark Albion's Making a Life, Making a Living. And I once heard a speaker insist that therapy was no longer a taboo topic. "Everybody either has been in therapy or has a family member in therapy," he said.

The book's contribution comes from integrating these topics and putting them together and offering a research rather than a self-help context. The "toxin" medical metaphor offers a creative context to explore workplace pain and make the topic more accessible to those skeptical of new age "woo-woo."

Toxic Emotions seems directed entirely to managers and focuses on what managers can and "should" do --
and that's both the strength and limitation of the book. Employees are depicted as passive victims who need management intervention to survive.

Unfortunately, most people aren't as lucky as the clerk who was "rescued" from a toxic boss. They need to learn to protect themselves and take charge of their own lives.

And some very fine managers will never be able to function effectively as healers. I was surprised to see no reference to outside resources, such as coaches or consultants. I can understand the author's suspicion of the coaching industry (coaching schools tend to be atheoretical, to say the least) but carefully-selected coaches and consultants can often be less costly and more effective than managers whose gifts lie elsewhere. And, while confiding in a manager may bring short-term emotional relief, someday those confidences may backfire. Hiring a coach seems cheap if the only alternative is to risk your career by being too open.

Consultants can also help managers and employees implement Frost's suggestions. For example, they can teach employees to develop positive attitudes and create more balance in their lives. Saying "Just get a grip!" works well with some people but others remain clueless -- and some, temperamentally, cannot just shed their frustrations the way they shake water out of an umbrella. They need to learn to compensate or find a new workplace -- both time-consuming options that call for one-on-one learning experiences.

We also need to consider the bigger picture. All organizations may contain the potential for developing toxins. Even Southwest Airlines has been sued by an employee who felt victimized by an overzealous prank. And some employees are more susceptible to toxicity, just as some sneeze more during allergy season.

I suspect a large amount of workplace pain comes from feeling trapped, a source not mentioned here . We need not just empathetic managers but an infrastructure to support alternatives to corporate employment.

The absence of cultural support and societal infrastructure to support self-employment, discussed by Pink (Free Agent Nation) and Bridges (JobShift), accounts for a large part of workplace pain.

There's a bit of irony in the book's opening anecdote. The author learns he has cancer -- from a call his oncologist makes on a Friday night!

Frost was set up for a weekend of helpless worry. Couldn't the call wait till Monday morning, when he could at least go into action right away or at least get an emergency appointment with a therapist? A reminder that toxic systems exist in every sector -- so taken for granted that the author doesn't even comment.

The title is pretty self-explanatory, and the book is a marvelous description of an emerging phenomenon that results from complex and challenging work environments. The notion of toxic organizations isn't new, everyone has a story about one. What is new is the way leaders and managers are trying to deal with toxicity in organizations. As more and more managers develop their authenticity at work, they become more and more open to the swirling currents of emotion that surround them. Mangers who help to manage these currents in organizations become "toxin handlers" and require a whole set of strategies aimed at preserving their health and the health and compassion of the organization.

This book opens up a whole new side to management, leadership and action with purpose. It's based on stories of actual practice and contains tools and discussion aimed at increasing the capacity of organizations and people to lead with compassion in times of rapid and emotionally exhausting change.

So often, books about business or leadership either ignore emotions or focus on crassly instrumental manipulation of emotions to promote career success. In contrast, Professor Peter Frost uses everyday language to explore, honestly, the positive and negative emotions that surface in any organization. He is especially eloquent when he describes how pain (associated, for example, with illness, death, career troubles, or family problems) surfaces or is suppressed at work. His vivid, real examples make these problems come alive. Next, he shows how leaders who are unafraid of being honest about emotions, can ease and comfort those who suffer, helping to make work a better place. The stories of these emotional heros and heroines offer leaders a new way of thinking and behaving that could benefit us all.

"Toxic emotions at work: how compassionate managers handle pain and conflict" is quite a remarkable book in the field organization and management research. First of all, it is as much a book for people in organizations as it is a book for people studying such organizations. And second, it is a book about the role and actions of heart in organizations, which speaks to your heart as well as about it. In this way, it is a groundbreaking piece of research in its form as well as in its content.

Through personal stories shared by people from a wide array of organizations, as well as by the author himself, we are invited as readers to get the inside view on life in such organizations. And the journey takes place through the lens of a hitherto largely invisible or hidden topic: the role of compassion and suffering in organizational life. We see how pain and conflicts are handled by people, who work like amateurs at a radioactive site, to quote one of many metaphors in this book. This is an example of living research about what really matters in organizations, putting the spot light on questions of life and death, pain and suffering, compassion and courage, hope and fear, comfort and despair, trust and betrayal.

As the book is written, so to speak, from the line of fire, with many examples of first-hand experience of the topic, it is impossible not to be captured and moved by the stories shared. The phenomenon of toxic handling and pain and suffering becomes very real. Of great value to the field of organizational theory is also the emphasis on all aspects of the human being, not just our social and communicative capacities. Physical, emotional and spiritual strengths and capacities are also discussed and brought to the reader's attention, aspects of which there has been a call in organizational research, in its tendency to treat people as "walking heads".

It is also research which I think, when read in-depth, challenges and questions many elements of contemporary, dominate business ideologies. What will happen when the task of toxic handling is both rewarded and seen in organizations, and when toxic handling is a standard question on the agendas of board meetings? And what would have to change in our cultural framework for that to happen? What will happen when the emotional aspects of organizational life are not only treated as an opportunity or problem for management, and enhancement of productivity? When they are given the space to exist in their own right, and for their own right? These are vital questions for the future in many organizations where there is a struggle for survival today.

In naming this phenomenon, and creating a legitimate language around it, there is the possibility to create new realities in organizations as well. In calling this phenomenon toxic handling, and in showing how research can be an endeavour of compassion also in its form and presentation, Peter J Frost and his colleagues create new perspectives, new frames and new questions for research.

There are, as I have said, many deeply moving stories in this book, especially the author's openness in writing about his own experience and how this led him into this research. It is research, as I said earlier with the power of touching your heart, not just speak about it. I will share one beautiful extract, which touched my heart, to give a sense of the wisdom and knowledge shared on these 250 pages. It is a quote from a dialogue with Dadi Janki, a woman from India, 80 years old, who was one of ten `wisdom keepers' at the Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro, 1992.

"Her stated goal in life is to be of benefit to each person she meets and to turn her thoughts to help lift them into happiness. (...) When asked how she stays in such a state of joy and happiness in the face of the suffering of others, she said: `I do not identify with the pain of the other person. I do not take it on! When pressed for an explanation, she replied: `To take it on would be to double the amount of pain the world!' `How then do you help?' was the next question. `I try to wrap the other person's suffering in love, she replied." (Frost 2003: 107).

This is toxin handling in action. And to live healthier lives in healthier organizations we still need to learn. Peter Frost helps us a step on the way in naming an aspect of life we all know, but many have been afraid to speak of.

I checked this book out for a project I was doing in school on work stress. I never realized that the person who always seems to calm a situation down in the office could be holding in and dealing with so much. The peacekeeper of the group could actually need someone to vent on and some peace of mind themselves. It opened my eyes to a few things and the situation with "Harry" was a perfect example of an overworked person who has lost his job control. If you work in or have worked in any coporation or office job I recommend you read this book.

Peter J Frost. Toxic Emotions at Work: How Compassionate Managers Handle Pain and Conflict. Boston, Mass: Harvard Business School, 2003.

Peter Frost suggests that emotional pain is unavoidable at work, but how organisations respond to pain is critical.

He explores how organisations and people handle emotional pain, how it affects performance, and what can be done to alleviate pain and stop it becoming toxic. "Toxin-handlers", usually self-appointed, have a crucial role, but this can have a toll on their health. They need recognition and support, space to do their work, and others to share the load.

Some of the practical suggestions I picked up in the book included:
- take 24 hours off before addressing heated topics (p.29)
- beware that mulling over negativity and pessimism can actually decrease your health (p.94)
- we all need an 'oscillation' of work and rest (oh derr). High performance athletes realise they need to build in breaks and to build up their reserves. Loehr and Schwartz's model for high performance (in sport or executive life) includes energy renewal after energy expenditure: "The real enemy of high performance is not stress .... rather, the problem is the absenceof disciplined, intermittent recovery." (p.110)
- Physical, mental, spiritual and emotional health are interconnected. People who exercise sleep more soundly and reach deep sleep cycles faster and think sharper when awake than people who don't exercise. (p.113)
- The healthiest toxin handlers help others without taking responsibility for what the people in pain do with the advice and help offered. A Zen story tells of two monks who were travelling together in a heavy downpour who came upon a woman who was having trouble corssing a river. "Come on", said the first monk to the woman, and her carried her in his arms across a shallow part of the river. The monks continued on their journey. The second monk didn't say anything until much later. Then he couldn't contain himself anymore. "We monks don't go near females, why did you do that?" "I left the woman back there," the first monk replied. "Are you still carrying her?" The story reminds us that emotional attachment to an idea or judgment can weigh us down. Let it go! (p.118-119)
- Keep your head where your feet are. (p.125) One VP models balance with this concept: "Right from the start, I was incredibly vocal about work/life balance. I am at work for as long as I need to be to get teh job done. My balance comes from making sure that I am work because I am adding value and not to fill hours or be "seen". In addition, I live by the rule of keeping my head where my feet are. In other words when at home I do not think about work and visa versa. This strategy keeps me sharp, focused, interested and loving my job." (p.176) This encouraged me to consider working more at the library and less on my dining room table.
- University of British Columbia Daniel Starlicki (and others) wrote "What gets rewarded gets done". So celebrate and reward compassion (and whatever else you want done, e.g. integrating faith and teh workplace). (p.154)

The book doesn't try to avoid emotional pain. In fact it assumes that will exist in any organisation trying to do something productive. But it gives some good principles for how to deal with it and how to help people care for one another in the midst of pain. Can you think of any organisations where this might be helpful???!!!

Ignore the words on the cover that might suggest that this book is just for managers. Maybe buying books like this is par for managers and maybe even tax deductible, but it's a good investment for you even if you're not a manager and have to fork out for it yourself.

True, this book has been written to provide the decision-makers in organisations with advice on managing in a more compassionate way so that their actions defuse any unavoidable emotional anguish for their employees. Yet within its covers are descriptions of strategies which are vital to the well-being of any foot-soldiers who have to deal with-or 'handle'-the effects of insensitive decisions made by their employers.

Does work get you down? Do you work in an environment which often seems emotionally toxic because of the way you're managed? And do your colleagues come to you to pour out their grievances? To the extent that you feel even more drained than you might?

I would say this book is 'spot on': the sort of guidance that anyone who finds themselves having to support work colleagues can find beneficial. Don't be put off, if you're a UK reader, by the use of phrases like 'compassion' and 'pain', which initially will seem a sharp reminder of this book's origin across the Atlantic. The contents are sound, and pertinent, and could save your life as well as your working life.

As a busy union rep at a school in the UK, I've made the mistake of getting involved to the extent of taking on the 'pain' of my colleagues and it's exacted a toll on my health. But now I have some research-based advice and strategies which I feel confident will revive my spirits and my health-whatever my managers decide.

I really enjoyed reading this book. It is written with a rare blend of mind and heart, and it is thus both thought provoking and moving. The book flows-by with a genuine tone of care and empathy -- actually, a wonderful example of the kind of attitude that Peter Frost is campaigning for.

The book created for me an opportunity to reflect upon my own life and work experiences, and I felt Frost managed to involve me, the reader, in the lives of the many people he talked with (and about).

I was also impressed by the way Frost managed to put together discussion that cuts
through a variety of disciplines, weaving them all into a convincing argument -- taken up from different perspectives and using various levels of analysis. Thus, on the individual level, the book explores the experiences of emotional pain in organizational lives, the work of "toxin handlers" - people who help others to struggle with this pain; and the toll such efforts put on the toxin handlers themselves. On the organization level, the book offers a thorough exploration of the sources of toxicity in organizations, and how organizations can work to reduce toxicity and help toxin handlers in their efforts to heal pain. All in all, Frost manages to integrate and share with his readers much knowledge from Psychology, Biology, Organizational studies and Business (to name just a few disciplines) - and the book still makes an easy and interesting read!

In sum, I think this is really a great book. It deals with an important phenomenon - pain in organizations - an experience known to us all. It deals with it with a blend of realism (recognizing that organizations will always produce pain), and optimism (a compassionate way of life, and compassionate organizations can elevate the pain); and of ideals (compassion) and practicality (offering concrete ways to handle pain). It's message should be heard, I think, not only in today's workplaces, but in our Western society at large.

Dossey's, "Be Careful What You Pray For," for one, is frightening tripe that can effectively kill spirit and intention. True, one doesn't want just anyone sending wishes -- one should always ask -- but of anyone I have read, Dossey remains one of the people I find most suspect in his thinking. I wrote to him years ago with my impressions of his book - he is not to be criticized.

And here is Frost's book. The Prologue isn't heavy with Dosseyism, but there was just enough to signal a warning that I should dispense with any serious examination of this book. Well, I flit through it all right, and, here's the bottom line everyone: knock off with your power trips, ego trips, guilt over affairs - whatever.. and treat each other with an ounce, even, of decency and courtesy.