Leading and managing a team is challenging enough as it is, and having to deal with difficult female employees is probably something a lot of leaders dread, especially males, and especially in inflammatory times like these where everything seems to be about gender. It is an issue that must be quickly addressed because toxicity in the workplace can drain your energy, affect other employees’ morale, and upset the team’s synergy. The key to maneuvering through this ordeal is being objective and empathetic.
You can deal with difficult female employees by discussing their issues in private and by reciprocating offensiveness with kindness. You can also check how they’re being treated in the workplace since their issues might be rooted in unfavorable work conditions. You can also report the matter to HR.
This article will discuss conventional ways to deal with toxicity but also what is specific to female toxicity. We will also discuss progressive ways, such as examining the entire team’s treatment toward her, scrutinizing your own behavior, and reciprocating her negativity with kindness. Let’s start!
How To Deal With Difficult Female Employees
You can deal with difficult female employees by sitting down with them in private to get down to the bottom of why they’re behaving the way they do. You can also try repaying bad behavior with kindness to make them question their own intentions. Reporting the issue to HR is sometimes a good idea.
1. Get to the Bottom of It
Try to nip the situation in the bud by quickly identifying the root cause of your difficult female employee’s behavior. We all tend to act a certain way because of our past experiences, current circumstances, beliefs, or intentions. Invite your difficult employee to a one-on-one talk, and make sure you don’t come off as confrontational or accusatory. This might make her raise her defenses, making your intervention efforts futile.
Listen to what your female employee has to say. Avoid interrupting and jumping to conclusions. Try to see things from her perspective and understand why she’s acting the way she is.
Here are some of the common issues faced by female employees:
Believed Pay Gap Rooted in Gender Inequality
A 2018 report has made a lot of people believe that women are paid 22% lower than their male counterparts, but this turned out not to be true. When controlled for factors such as job title, education, experience, industry, job level, and hours worked, the gender pay gap is less than 0.01%.
But this misrepresentation makes women think that there is a glaring disparity between male and female salaries and can lead to female employees quitting their jobs to look for perceived better opportunities.
Take the opportunity and talk to your female employees, show them the data, and let them draw their own conclusion, or better yet, show them the actual data from your company.
Work-Life Balance
Most women actively play numerous roles in their personal lives. They may be a wife, mother, daughter, sister, and friend, and they need to juggle these roles with the demands of their job. Working mothers, in particular, are expected to perform all the roles expected of them at home without sacrificing the quality of work they deliver in their jobs.
If your female employees continue to struggle and remain unsupported in this aspect, it could take a toll on their mental health, causing them to act up at work.
Harassment
A report from the Institute for Women’s Policy Research stated that, for every 10 women, roughly one-fourth to 8 of them have experienced a form of harassment in the workplace. Often, the advances are from men in senior posts or a position of authority. This makes the workplace an unsafe space for affected women, making some always act defensively and aggressively.
Harassment can come in these forms:
- Sexual advances
- Sexist remarks
- Physical assaults
- Discrimination
Once your difficult female employee has given her side of the story, be clear about what you expect from your team and how much you’re willing to tolerate. Remind her that, as an employee, she must abide by set rules and guidelines. As a team member, she has to learn how to work harmoniously and systematically with the rest of the team.
Offer assistance or solutions to the issues she has raised. Make sure she knows that you’re willing to work with her toward addressing the issues and providing her (and the team) with a safe, conducive space for work.
2. Don’t Take It Personally
When you’re leading and managing a team, there is always so much going on and you may sometimes feel yourself getting overwhelmed, but you always have to remember that learning how to handle your employees is one of your main functions. When it comes to a difficult female employee (or toxic female bosses), things may get tricky, but keep in mind that, most of the time, their bad behavior is really all about them and is in no way a reflection of your brand of leadership.
Some people are mean, and some are not even aware that they are this way. Perhaps it’s in their nature to be straightforward to the point of being rude. Maybe they’re used to being toxic because it’s part of their defense mechanism. It’s also possible that they’re going through a tough time in their personal lives, making them act aggressively at work.
Privately call out your difficult female employee’s bad behavior by talking to her calmly and rationally. Tell her that such behavior is unacceptable in the workplace and that you would like her to contribute to the engaging, positive atmosphere you’ve been trying to create. Be firm, respectful, and specific when citing instances of her unpleasant conduct.
Avoid using “You” statements to prevent her from feeling attacked. Be critical of her behavior, not of her persona. Let her know that your intentions are good and you’re merely looking out for her and ensuring that your team members can work harmoniously with each other. Cite specific instances that showcase how her behavior negatively affects the people around her.
Be prepared for backlash because things might not always unfold as you hoped. She might retaliate by acting more aggressively than before or she might suddenly play the victim card (gender, ethnicity, etc.) and turn things around on you. If this happens, disengage and walk away from the hostile situation. Taking her bait might just unnecessarily escalate the situation.
She might also claim to feel insulted and threaten to quit her job. If you find yourself in this situation, allow her to make that decision on her own. Sometimes, retaining a toxic employee is far worse than having to endure a temporary gap in the team’s systematic flow.
Only 20% of your team is doing 80% of the work anyways, so focus on the productive ones.
3. Kill Her With Kindness
Treating a difficult female employee with the kindness, respect, and positivity she evidently doesn’t deserve might help curb her toxicity and meanness. It will throw her off and prompt her to think about how she’s been behaving toward you and the team.
Difficult people can sometimes be so caught up in their negativity that they fail to see the bigger picture (which is why it is so important for leaders to communicate goals clearly), sometimes even failing to realize why they’re being so toxic in the first place. By showing them kindness, you force them to stop in their tracks and start to assess the circumstances they’re in.
If you’re lucky, your difficult female employee might begin to realize the futility and inappropriateness of her behavior, and this might prompt her to make the necessary changes.
4. Put It in Writing
Sit down with your difficult female employee and put everything you’ll be talking about in writing. Cite specific instances when her unpleasant behavior negatively affected the team. Then, write down your expectations and the changes you would like to see in her to help make her a more engaging and pleasant person to work with; make sure you lead with honesty and integrity.
Ensure you’re on the same page by mapping out a plan together and asking for her input in developing ideas on how she can better deal with certain scenarios moving forward. Set goals and make sure she’s amenable to these. Also, establish a reasonable timeframe and make certain she’s aware that changing her behavior is crucial to helping you ensure that the team’s morale and productivity remain positive.
Don’t forget to discuss the consequences if she doesn’t deliver her end of the deal. People generally tend to take things more seriously when they see something in writing, and having everything documented will give her a clear picture of the current scenario, what she needs to do to make the situation better for the team, and what can happen if she fails to do so.
It would also be great to conduct regular one-on-one meetings with your difficult female employee to keep track of her progress. This will motivate her to continue striving for improvement and will give her the proverbial pat on the back if she’s doing a great job. On the other hand, if her efforts fall short of your expectations, she’ll be promptly made aware so she can make the necessary adjustments.
5. Take a Good Look in the Mirror
Leading and managing a team can be extremely taxing at times and, as a leader, you must always be aware of the profound effect you have on your team members. How you treat them can affect how they’re able to perform their tasks and how inspired they can be at their jobs.
If you’re faced with a difficult female employee, one unconventional way to deal with this is by taking a hard look in the mirror and analyzing whether or not you have a hand in this. Perhaps your treatment toward her and the team is making her act a certain way.
Here are some questions you might want to ask yourself:
- Have I been a good role model, exemplifying the values I want my team to adopt?
- Am I equitably distributing the workload among my team members?
- Am I keeping my team motivated and challenged?
- Are my expectations reasonable and valid?
- Have I been singling her out for something she previously did that displeased me?
- Am I always critical rather than supportive and solution-driven?
- Is she simply mirroring my behavior?
Sometimes, you might get caught up in the demands of being a leader — deadlines, meetings, quotas, etc. — that you forget what it’s really all about — helping your team strive for excellence in their pursuit of achieving the set goals.
If you’ve pinpointed a possible reason why your difficult female employee has been acting negatively, sit down with her and tell her about your realization. This might take her completely by surprise, but she will undoubtedly appreciate your humility, candor, and perceptiveness. Express your willingness to change for the better and encourage her to do the same.
6. Check in With the Rest of the Team
Sometimes, the behavior of your employees is a reflection of how they’re being treated by their peers. In the case of your difficult female employee, take time to assess whether she’s being toxic and mean only because everyone around her treats her the same way. She might feel compelled to treat everyone else in such a negative manner as part of her defense mechanism or simply because she thinks it’s what they deserve.
Here are some red flags to watch out for
- Gossiping. Team members may be spreading rumors about her, making her feel very uncomfortable and misjudged.
- Disrespect. If she senses that her teammates disrespect, malign, and sabotage her efforts, she might start feeling the need to fend for herself by showing toxic and aggressive behavior.
- Discrimination. If her team members discriminate against her for whatever reason, she might be retaliating by exerting her rights aggressively.
- Harassment. Workplace harassment is pretty common, yet is often swept under the rug. Take a closer look at how her team members treat her and watch out for signs of sexual advances, derogatory remarks, and even physical abuse.
When leading and managing a team, you must ensure that your expectations are met, your rules are observed, and you’re always in control of what’s going on in the workplace. Sit down with the whole team and remind them of company policies. Be clear about what’s acceptable and how much you are willing to tolerate.
If the situation calls for it and if the offenses committed are grave, call out these individuals and be clear about the consequences they would have to face. Then, remind everyone about the value of teamwork and synergy, and how these 2 values will be extremely difficult to observe if team members refuse to engage in the most basic yet crucial step — treating each other with respect.
7. Escalate the Issue
If you’ve done everything possible to help uncover and address your difficult female employee’s bad behavior, you might have to resort to escalating the issue to higher management or, better yet, Human Resources (HR). Approaching HR for issues like this is actually a great idea because their forte is people management.
HR can give you tips on how best to handle your difficult female employee. They might also provide you with tools to help you track her progress and ensure she’s able to meet the company’s expectations. They can also brief you on company policies that can help you have a clearer picture of how to effectively and professionally manage difficult employees.
