Speaker 1: Helping leaders motivate their people to a higher level of
Speaker 1: performance through strong human relations, team building, and goalachieving. This
Speaker 1: is the seven minute Leadership Podcast with your host Paul
Speaker 1: fella Aledo.
Speaker 2: Hello everyone, and welcome to this seven minute leadership podcast.
Speaker 2: It's episode three point thirty eight. Don't Confuse tension with
Speaker 2: toxicity is today's topic, so let's get straight to it.
Speaker 2: There's a difference between tension and toxicity, and if you
Speaker 2: don't learn to tell them apart, you'll start cutting out
Speaker 2: the very things that could grow your team. Here's what
Speaker 2: I mean by that. Tension in the workplace often shows
Speaker 2: up during hard conversations, brainstorming sessions, strategy meetings, or team reviews.
Speaker 2: It shows up when people care, when they're invested in
Speaker 2: the work, the mission, and the out come. That friction
Speaker 2: you feel when opinions clash, that's not necessarily a sign
Speaker 2: of dysfunction. That might be the sign of a team
Speaker 2: that gives a damn. Now contrasts that with toxicity. Toxicity
Speaker 2: is sarcasm in place of solutions. It's back channel gossip.
Speaker 2: It's the silent eye rolls in meetings. It's the disrespect,
Speaker 2: the manipulation the people who weaponize feedback to push personal agendas.
Speaker 2: Toxicity is about ego and control, but tension. Tension is different.
Speaker 2: Tension is about ideas. It's about healthy disagreement. It's about
Speaker 2: smart people battling it out not to win, but to
Speaker 2: build something better. And that's what leaders get wrong. They
Speaker 2: try to avoid any conflict, thinking it keeps the peace,
Speaker 2: But what they're really doing is creating a fake harmony
Speaker 2: that sacrifices honesty. They think if it's uncomfortable, it must
Speaker 2: be a problem. But discomfort isn't always the enemy. Great
Speaker 2: leaders don't eliminate tension. They guide it. They make the
Speaker 2: room safe enough for disagreement while making it clear that
Speaker 2: disrespect won't be tolerated. They let people challenge each other,
Speaker 2: but they keep it above the belt. They allow energy
Speaker 2: and emotion, but they anchor it to a shared purpose.
Speaker 2: And here's the leadership trap. If you shut down tension
Speaker 2: because it makes you uncomfortable, you'll create a team that
Speaker 2: stops talking. They'll stop debating, they'll nod in meetings, smile
Speaker 2: in the hallway, but behind the scenes, they've already checked out.
Speaker 2: They're quiet not because they agree, but because they've given up.
Speaker 2: So what do you do as a leader. Number one,
Speaker 2: recognize the difference. Ask yourself, is this tension about the
Speaker 2: work or about the person? If it's about ideas, methods,
Speaker 2: or goals, lean into it. If it's personal attacks or
Speaker 2: repeated patterns of sabotage, address it as toxicity. Number two,
Speaker 2: reframe conflict when tension arises, don't immediately play referee. Try
Speaker 2: saying something like this disagreement is a good thing. It
Speaker 2: means we care. Let's focus on solving, not defending. You've
Speaker 2: just reframed tension as progress, not a problem. And number
Speaker 2: three normalize respectful pushback. Make it clear that challenging each
Speaker 2: other isn't in subordination, its responsibility, especially when it's done respectfully.
Speaker 2: When your team sees that they won't be punished for
Speaker 2: speaking up, the right kind of tension becomes part of
Speaker 2: your culture. In number four, lead by example. Model calm
Speaker 2: during high tension moments. Don't flinch, don't shut it down,
Speaker 2: don't make it personal. You guide it by showing that
Speaker 2: tension doesn't rattle you, it sharpened you. So let me
Speaker 2: tell you something I've learned the hard way. A room
Speaker 2: with no tension is either full of apathy or full
Speaker 2: of fear, and neither of those builds strong teams. You
Speaker 2: want healthy friction, you want passionate voices. You want tension
Speaker 2: that leads to better results, deeper trust, and stronger alignment.
Speaker 2: So don't confuse tension with toxicity. Learn to see it,
Speaker 2: learn to guide it, and make sure to let your
Speaker 2: team sharpen each other without burning the place down. This
Speaker 2: has been the seven minute Leadership podcast, and I thank
Speaker 2: you for listening.
Speaker 1: For more, Paul Fell of Alito Podcasts, visit paulfellofalito dot
Speaker 1: com