Toxic Culture & Bad Leadership. Let's crush that.
Feb 20, 2026
Oh boy - these are HOT TOPICS!
We tackled both of these at our 2025, Communication Summit; Curiosity in Conversation.
Led, facilitated AND graphically recorded by Dr. Elaine Klemmensen of Evolve Leadership Coaching & Consulting,
Day 1: Misery Loves Company: Solving Toxic Culture
Defining "Toxic Culture": With energetic group discussion, we identified the hallmarks of toxic environments, citing disengaged leadership, the enabling of negative behaviors like gossip and a "lack of alignment" where stated values on the wall do not match the actions taken by the organization.
Who's your Culture Crush?: In contrast to toxic environments, we defined successful cultures as those that offer a sense of belonging and shared passion, where the organization actively invests in its people and ensures teamwork is built directly into the system. We named cultures we had a 'crush' on!
Communication as the Core Solution: The session concluded with the realization that culture is modeled by leadership and that clear, skilled communication is the only tool for building connection, community and solving resistance within a team. No secret sauce here, just learning and practicing communication skills.
Day 2: No Bad Job - Just Bad Leaders.
A powerful metaphor that captured the room's energy was the definition of a leader as someone who "brings out the light in others," which requires the leader to also tend to their own light. This sentiment was echoed throughout this session.
When tasked with identifying how to create better leaders, we generated several passionate, actionable ideas:
- Start Early: There was a strong consensus that leadership and communication training should begin early in life and be integrated everywhere (including schools!) instead of waiting until people enter the workforce.
- Redefine the Role: We advocated for separating leadership from hierarchy, viewing it instead through the lens of mentorship. We know good mentorship relies on good communication.
- Focus on Strengths and Fairness: We highlighted the need for strengths-based leadership, fitting roles to people rather people to roles and to understanding the difference between equality (giving everyone the same) and fairness (giving everyone what they need to succeed).
- Intergenerational Wisdom: We rallied around the value of learning from all generations, acknowledging the wisdom of those who came before us as well as the unique perspectives of younger generations entering the workforce. It's not a "them against us" mentality.
We concluded with a collective call to approach leadership with grace, acknowledging its complexity and for pities sake, to equip leaders with communication skills that WORK.
Treasure curiosity and know that skilled and meaningful conversations have the power to change our own worlds. It's in us to do.
