Avoiding “Toxic” Days Leads to Greater Business Success

Trying to understand what leads a team member to engage in a day of particularly exceptional work can feel like trying to catch lightning in a bottle. But researchers at Virginia Commonwealth University say there may actually be a way to dig into this phenomenon and, thus, find ways to facilitate a working environment that best leads to success. In a recently published report, the researchers assessed 11,000 workers, asking them to identify five typical workday experiences and decide how the factors that influence those characterizations made them more or less creative on the job. They say workplace experiences that are “dull,” for example, have an impact on a person’s performance. The research team identified 5 main experiences that they say typify daily work for participants, characterizing them as: Ideal, typical, crisis, disengaged, or toxic days. Ideal and typical days make up more than two-thirds of workdays for most, with crisis days — those spent wrestling key or timely problems — consisting of another 20%.