Non Toxic Hybrid Workspaces

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In today’s podcast episode we interview Farah Harris, CEO at WorkingWell Daily, LLC. Farah’s company educates clients in the areas of well-being, leadership development, and engaged workplaces. Today’s podcast focuses on the tools and behaviors necessary in creating a sense of belonging as your employees Team Anywhere.

What Surprised Farah Over the Last 2 Years

Farah shared that she experienced both surprise and disappointment. She was surprised that COVID brought about world-wide dangers and upheaval. And for team management, she was sad that many leaders didn’t really know how to put in the work to show up for one another.

What is a Toxic Workplace and its Characteristics?

A toxic workplace is an environment that negatively impacts an employee’s physical and mental health. This could be in the form of harassment, violence, bullying, ageism, sexism, racism, lack of psychological safety, poor boundaries and gossiping. And according to Farah, these are things that team members often tolerate just to get by and receive their paycheck. In the long term, this causes drastic negative effects for team members and the organization.

Leadership Tools For a Non Toxic Workplace

Farah believes that the practice of the following leadership tools can foster a non toxic workplace.

Elevate Emotional Intelligence (EQ) and Increase Self-Awareness – Elevating EQ through increasing self-awareness helps a leader garner respect and follow-ship.
Practice Empathy – A leader who is able to create a psychologically safe space for team members to open up with their concerns will increase employee engagement, motivation and talent retention.
Define Sense of Belonging – In the hybrid workspace, we don’t necessarily see each other every day, so having the leadership characteristic of conducting intentional regular check-ins will build that connection and sense of belonging.
Get Regular Feedback – A leader should always be open for feedback whether it is good or bad. A team that is built on open communication will actually result in higher levels of productivity, performance, and revenue for the organization.

What Does Working Well Look Like?

According to Farah, a non toxic work environment has these following characteristics listed below.

People are Self-aware – People in the organization are self-aware and have a higher degree of emotional intelligence. And it makes everyone happier to go to work every day.
Clear and Effective Communication – An organization is a good place to work if there is good communication between leaders and their teams.
Work Life Alignment – This means that there are ground rules about responding to emails and dealing with work concerns only during prescribed working hours–and there is emphasis on enjoying life outside of work.
Sense of Belonging – When leaders foster a culture of intentional check-ins with team members, it creates an environment based on genuine connection, not compliance.

Who is Farah Harris?

Farah Harris is a Belonging and Workplace Well-being expert and a licensed psychotherapist with over 12 years of experience. As the founder of WorkingWell Daily®, a company that approaches workplace belonging and well-being from a clinical and emotional intelligence lens, Farah has helped individuals and Fortune 500 companies develop healthier workplaces where employees want to stay and thrive because their leaders and teams have grown in empathy, self-awareness, social awareness, and cultural awareness. She is a contributing writer for Fast Company. Her work has been featured on media platforms such as Forbes, Business Insider, Harvard Business Review, Good Morning America, Essence, Huffington Post, Inside Edition, and Thrive Global.