Toxic Coworkers: How to Deal with Dysfunctional People on the Job

Rating:
Summary: BULLIES - FAMILY / WORKPLACE / SCHOOL / NEIGHBORHOOD
Review: I strongly recommend this book for anyone seeking to find help with frequent feelings of loneliness or emptiness, mood disorders, any type of addiction, identity issues, self-esteem issues, reoccurring unresolved anger, troubling relationship, boundary and trust issues.

Excellent compliments to this book are: The Angry Heart: Overcoming Borderline and Addictive Disorders by Joseph Santoro and Ronald Cohen; Emotional Blackmail: When People in Your Life Use Fear, Obligation and Guilt to Manipulate You by Susan Forward and Donna Frazier; Why Is It Always About You?: The Seven Deadly Sins of Narcissism by Sandy Hotchkiss and James Masterson; The Narcissistic Family: Diagnosis and Treatment by Stephanie Donaldson-Pressman and Robert Pressman; Understanding the Borderline Mother: Helping Her Children Transcend the Intense, Unpredictable and Volatile Relationship by Christine Ann Lawson; Living with the Passive-Aggressive Man by Scott Wetzler; Malignant Self Love: Narcissism Revisited by Sam Vaknin and Lidija Rangelovska (Editor); Children of the Self-Absorbed: A Grown-Up's Guide to Getting Over Narcissistic Parents by Nina Brown; Treating Attachment Disorders: From Theory to Therapy by Karl Heinz Brisch and Kenneth Kronenberg; Secrets, Lies, Betrayals: The Body/Mind Connection by Maggie Scarf; Toxic Coworkers: How to Deal with Dysfunctional People on the Job by Alan Cavaiola and Neil Lavender; Bully in Sight: How to Predict, Resist, Challenge and Combat Workplace Bullies by Tim Field.

And if you want to pursue the subject even further, you may be interested in reading The Narcissistic / Borderline Couple: A Psychoanalytic Perspective On Marital Treatment; Charred Souls: A Story of Recreational Child Abuse by Trena Cole; Sickened: The Memoir of a Munchausen by Proxy Childhood by Julie Gregory and Marc Feldman; Parenting with Love and Logic: Teaching Children Responsibility by Jim Fay and Foster Cline.

Rating:
Summary: A must have...
Review: I took my first managerial postition and a few months ago and was aware of an ongoing situation with a few of my co-workers who were now my responsibilty. Toxic Co-workers laid out a variety of disfunctional personality types but more importantly described how to deal with them in layman's terms. I can see this book as a staple for anyone in today's fast paced work environment that has to deal with a Toxic Co-Worker! It has helped me tremendously.

Rating:
Summary: have problems with people at work?
Review: Then you should read this book. This book examines personality disorders in the context of the workplace. It explains why that jerk in accounting is a jerk. It also tells you what to do when confronting these type of people. It's a interesting, well written book, for anyone with problems with people at work or anyone interested in personality disorders.

Rating:
Summary: must have if you have annoying workers!
Review: There are five books that everyone should own: The Bible, the dictionary, anything by Mark Twain or Dickens, Cat in the Hat, and TOXIC COWORKERS. This book is a must have for psycology students and anyone with a job! Cavaiola and Lavender share their insight on a level that is easy to understand, yet not insulting to the intellect. Read it from cover to cover, or use it as a hand book; either way, if you want to know about the people you know and work with, turn here! I believe that you'll find their style inviting to readers of any level and their nonjudgemental tone comforting. Do not forsake the reading of this book!

Rating:
Summary: toxic workplaces
Review: This book explains why Rob in accounting can be such a jerk at times. In other words, it assesses and explains personality disorders in the context of the workplace. I highly recommend it for people with problems at work, or anyone interested in personality disorders.

Rating:
Summary: have problems with fellow coworkers?
Review: This book explains why Rob in accounting can be such a jerk at times. In other words, it assesses and explains personality disorders in the context of the workplace. I highly recommend it for people with problems at work, or anyone interested in personality disorders.

Rating:
Summary: toxic workplaces
Review: This book is a mix of material lifted from the DSM IV (or whatever it's called today) and some anecdotal stories from the authors' own experiences, with some recommendations for 'dealing with type X' as a manager, employee, or coworker.

I'm reminded that the field of psychology would diagnose the majority of us with some form of disorder at some point in our lives, and the authors have extended this to the corporate world in a way that would label nearly everyone I've worked with in my career as suffering from one or more personality disorders. I can only think of a couple who really caused problems. The authors are overly-broad in their categorizations. For example, if your employees think your requests are unreasonable, then they must be passive agressive whiners. But you are narcisisstic or obsessive compulsive for making these requests.

One disappointment is that 'toxic workplaces' aren't mentioned until the second to the last page. Maybe some of the behavior that they describe as disorders are actually reasonable reactions for people in a toxic workplace. The authors describe large corporations, the government, and the military as being a good place for people of this or that disorder. Maybe working for the government makes you that way, not the other way around!

I didn't find much here that would be of help in dealing with bosses or coworkers. I think the various 'dilbert' books would be more genuinely useful, as well as more amusing. I think that most people just want to do their jobs with a minimum of corporate nonsense so that they can enjoy their lives outside of work with their remaining free time, which is why those of us who are not blessed with great wealth are enduring what for most of us are toxic workplaces.

Rating:
Summary: Dealing with Dysfunctional Coworkers
Review: This easily and quickly read book should be helpful to the reader who struggles with a boss, coworker or subordinate. In almost every workplace, there is one person whose behavior generates more negative attention than most others around him (or her). The toxic coworker we all experience at one time or another already has a gun; while we can't change that person, we certainly want to avoid giving her any bullets. Toxic Coworkers can help you understand that person and take appropriate actions that will not contribute further to the time- and attention-consuming behaviors that seem to make everyone around her miserable.

While not all the advice offered is research-based, as a Clinician familiar with coaching supervisors and coworkers to deal with problem personalities, the authors' descriptions of personalities and behaviors are accurate. I believe most readers will instantly recognize their problem-personality type from the descriptions based on the DSM-IV and the authors' experiences.

Cavaiola and Lavender advise against waiting for management to act; instead, they propose that readers arm themselves with the information and tactics that can protect themselves and their families from personality-disordered individuals on the job. I couldn't agree more. The authors repeatedly counsel readers to avoid taking the toxic-worker's actions personally and remind us all that we are not stuck in a hostile work enviroment. This book encourages the reader to take actions for self-protection and personal boundaries rather than to change the other person.

These two-hundred pages are cluttered with a number of typographical errors. I hope readers will allow themselves to ignore these errors in favor of gaining insight into themselves and others.