One Toxic Teammate Can Tank the Whole Team

A chronically negative person doesn’t just kill morale... they reshape the emotional climate of a workplace.

When someone shows up ready to shoot holes in the boat, it doesn’t just wear people down.

It forces the entire team to adapt around the damage.

The more impressionable members of your team? Follow suit.

The mature ones? Disengage.

And you, the leader, is left witnessing a poisonous blend of 11 herbs and spices.

The hardest part is that chronic pessimists rarely compartmentalize.

If they’re bitter at work, they’re bitter at home.

Which makes change rare.

They get so used to being miserable and viewing the world through a self defeating lens, that it becomes their default operating system.

Over time, that outlook bleeds into meetings, decisions, and the overall culture.

And if you’re not careful, the team won’t just notice it—they’ll start mirroring it.

So as a leader, how do you deal with it?

Well, you starve it.

Which starts by:

1. Spotting the pattern. 

You’re not reacting to someone having a bad week. You’re looking to identify a pattern or someones default.

• Are they always fixated on what won’t work?

• Do they resist change without offering alternatives?

• Do they deflect responsibility and drag others down?

2. Tracking the spread. 

Negativity doesn’t stay contained to one place so you need to understand the areas of impact.

• Is it bleeding into tone, meetings, group energy?

• Are others mimicking or avoiding them?

• Do your strongest people seem quieter lately?

3. Cutting off the oxygen. 

Much like a fire, the more oxygen you give it, the bigger it gets. Which means you need to snuff it out:

• Ask: “What are you proposing?”

• Say: “This pattern isn’t just unproductive. It’s corrosive.”

• Remove them from influence loops if necessary.

Now none of this is about forcing positivity.

You don’t need everyone to be cheery 24/7, 365.

But if someone chronically sees the worst, assumes bad intent, and resists every form of momentum…

They’re not just hard to work with. They’re hard to build with.

As a leader you have a responsibility to protect the culture so your team can do hard things, without being poisoned in the process.

And whether your team has said something or not…

That negative coworker you’ve been thinking about as you read this?

They’re the same one being complained about at the dinner table and being tore apart over coffee with a friend.