Disrespectful conversations, pettiness, intentional undermining, ignoring emails, using phones in meetings, we have all committed or observed these behaviours at some point. Research shows that 98% of us have been on the receiving end of these behaviours, and 99% of us have witnessed them in our working career. These behaviours are known as incivility. Occurring daily in workplaces, they are having a significant impact on people’s wellbeing and organisations’ operational excellence.

About eight months ago, a friend introduced me to the word “incivility”. I had no idea what it meant and so she explained it to me as “being a jerk” before explaining the impact incivility is having on health and safety at the workplace.

The more people I discussed incivility with the more I realised the term is unfamiliar to most. In this article, I will share some insights about what I’ve learnt and how important civility is in the challenging world we are living in.

What is incivility?

Wikipedia defines workplace incivility as “low-intensity deviant behaviour with ambiguous intent to harm the target”. Incivility is different from bullying. Bullying is unreasonable repeated behaviour that may involve unlawful discrimination or harassment.

Incivility often occurs out of thoughtlessness rather than malicious intent. I like to think of incivility as bad behaviour. We all know that person who scrolls on their phone during a meeting, or the one who “teases” a team member, or someone who takes the glory for good news and then throws the team under the bus when something goes wrong. These indiscretions, while not bullying, can be more sinister, as they are less obvious and easier to brush over. Nonetheless they add up, degrading the employee experience and engagement, employee mental health declines, and negatively impact bottom line and productivity.

A study* conducted in 1998 reported that employees were treated rudely at least once a month. That figure rose 55% in 2011 and 62% in 2016, which is the most current data available. As a society we are being less and less civil as we evolve. I wonder if technology is causing us to lose the ability to connect and communicate in a civil way with one another .

There is little information as to what causes us to act in an uncivil way. What is clear is that people model their behaviour off their manager’s or superior’s behaviour. Incivility is contagious in a workplace.

What is the impact of incivility?

There are no winners when it comes to incivility, with evidence showing that almost everybody who experiences workplace incivility reacts in a negative way, with retaliation to both the offender and the organisation.

A survey conducted by Harvard University of 800 managers and employees across 17 industries assessed the impact of incivility at the workplace:

48% of workers intentionally decreased their work effort.
47% of workers intentionally decreased the time spent at work.
38% of workers intentionally decreased the quality of their work.
80% of workers lost work time worrying about the incident.
63% of workers lost work time avoiding the offender.
66% of workers said that their performance declined.
78% of workers said that their commitment to the organisation declined.
12% of workers said that they left their job because of the uncivil treatment.
25% of workers admitted to taking their frustration out on customers.

These are only the immediate impacts, Over a longer period of time, organisations with low levels of civility:

Are 30% less creative – incivility demotivates us to be creative, we retreat our ideas because we don’t feel psychologically safe to voice different views or ideas.
Team performance and morale can decline by up to 50%. Just observing incivility within your team can impact your performance by 20%.
On average, seven weeks of the year is spent by Human Resources departments managing the aftermaths of uncivil situations.
Twelve percent of people who experience bad behaviour leave the organisation.
Twenty-five percent of customers who experience or observe bad behaviours within your organisation are less likely to engage with your organisation.

Next time you reach for your phone in a meeting or go to cut someone off, remember the tangible costs it can have to you and the organisation.

Let’s be civil

Some things in the world have changed a lot this year, and other haven’t. We continue to live and work in a fast-paced technology driven world. The dynamics of how we do this have certainly changed and the cultures that exist in our workplace have become a little more complex. In the virtual world we are now living in, conversations are prone to miscommunication and misunderstandings – we all know its much easier to be a keyboard warrior than to deliver messages face to face. Below are some suggestions for creating a civil workplace:

1. Set the standards – use everyday language. Code of Conducts are great if the legal jargon can be converted into everyday language. Provide real life examples of what civility is around here and make sure people are familiar with these expectations. In the virtual environment think about what some of the key behaviours are that could be perceived as uncivil and make a conscious effort to focus on them.

2. Walk the talk – know the behaviours and demonstrate them. Leaders are powerful and people follow their actions, display the right ones.

3. Ask for feedback – ask your peers, manager and team members where they see you on the civility scale. I did and I quickly learnt how often I would check my phone notifications in a meeting.

4. Check in – the virtual world is isolating. Take the time to have a conversation with your peers/team on how they are adapting to this way of working. Are they experiencing incivility?

5. Make conscious change – Knowing my notifications were not only impacting me and my team, I made change. Every meeting I go into I put my phone on do not disturb and leave it in my pocket.

6. Call it out – if you witness someone being uncivil, have a chat with them, share with them the outrageously demotivating impact their behaviour is creating and create an opportunity to teach them about the standards around civility.

7. Be thoughtful – think about what acts of kindness you can carry out in the workplace. Shift from the negative to the positive. It’s a rough world at the moment, so let’s think about how we can help one another rather than hinder.

I am not an expert in this field. If you would like to hear more about incivility and how to curtail it to create a positive impact to the way we work, have a listen to our Incivility Masterclass Webinar with Michael McGregor Transitioning Well (Organisational Psychologist) and Randell Fuller Construction Industry Expert here.

*Christine L Porath The costs of bad behaviour: And what leaders and organizations can do to manage it.