“Once you let go of all the negative people in your life…positive ones appear.”  – Autumn Kohler

I’ve been thinking about a challenging topic lately because it keeps popping up.  Most recently, I was involved in a meeting with one of our clients and watched an individual behave poorly.  They were extremely negative, borderline disrespectful, and generally sucked all the life from the meeting.  Just like they’ve done repeatedly in the past.

That particular individual in that particular meeting was just one example of what happens over and over and again in organizations.  People drag the whole team down, nothing is done, the team suffers, and the cycle repeats, sometimes for years.

Why do we as leaders allow that to happen?  It’s not like it’s a secret.  After the meeting I mentioned above, the leader acknowledged that this has been going on for a long time.  And yet, I’m almost 100% certain they won’t do anything to address it.

There are a lot of excuses we can make.  Maybe we’re afraid of conflict.  Maybe the person in questions perform some role that we view as important and we’re afraid they’ll quit if we try and address their behavior.  Maybe we rationalize that their behavior really isn’t that bad.

Whatever the case, we as leaders need to stop making excuses.  When we have people in our organizations that drag everybody down, we can’t just pretend it isn’t happening.  We have to address it.  We can’t tolerate people behaving in a way that damages the team and the entire organization.

I’m not suggesting that you immediately go out and fire everybody who’s sometimes difficult in a meeting, but I am suggesting that you have to be prepared to move on from anyone in your organization who’s holding you back.  Have the necessary conversations, work with that person in an attempt to correct that behavior, etc., but if it doesn’t work then get them out the door.

I’ve never heard leaders say that they regretted letting that type of person go.   I have repeatedly heard leaders say that they wish they’d let that person go a long time ago.  Don’t prolong everyone’s misery.  Be ready to move on and move forward.