Is Venting at Work Making You More Frustrated?
If you work in a caring profession, you know it can be…frustrating.
Most of us get into teaching or nursing or social work or animal care because we want to…care. We want to help people. We want to take an active role in shaping the world into a better place.
But then we come up against The System. The rules, the policies, the politics, the abysmal leadership. Our ideals hit the realities of working within deeply flawed institutions.
And this can lead us to want to scream, shout, and burn it all down. But in the workplace, the most accessible response is often to find others and vent.
When Does Venting at Work Become Harmful?
This past week, a group of us at work got together and spent upwards of an hour unleashing our fury to each other. We angrily talked about policies that don’t make any sense, we grumbled about past attempts at change, we felt our heart rates increase as we talked about the decisions of leadership.
Venting can be a powerful way to metabolize frustration. But sometimes we stop metabolizing the frustration and start feeding it.
And in that gathering, that’s exactly what happened. At some point, the healthy venting ended and it became unproductive (and harmful) gossip and othering.
None of us had recognized the change in the moment. And all of us left feeling even more depleted and exhausted after.
Because while healthy venting allows us to shake out our body’s tension and connect with others, feeding our frustration takes our energy and directs it toward building walls between us and “the others.”
Healthy venting can help coworkers feel less alone; unhealthy venting can leave everyone more angry, cynical, and depleted than when they started.
What Is Group Polarization?
You might know this experience by another phrase: group polarization.
Harvard scholar Cass Sunstein (and many other researchers) found that when we spend time in groups where everyone already has a baseline agreement, we tend to ratchet each other up toward more extreme versions of our shared beliefs, and calcify down into our own certainty that we are right and others outside the group are the problem.
In other words, group polarization can turn ordinary workplace frustration into a shared certainty that the people or leadership on the other side are the issue.
We see this in our politics all the time:
One group starts coalescing around a specific experience or belief; then, without good-faith conversation with people who have other opinions, they radicalize toward a more extreme position; and finally, the group calcifies into a belief that they must be right and others must be wrong – and even possibly immoral.
Our digital algorithms make this easier to opt into. Where we live in the country makes this easier. Systems of oppression such as white supremacy, patriarchy, and heteronormativity make this easier.
And that was exactly what was happening at my office as well.
We started with healthy venting, but transitioned at some point into ratcheting each other up and calcifying into certainty. It felt good…but it also felt horrible.
And just to say it: this can be especially tricky in caring professions because we often have legitimate reasons to be frustrated with the systems in which we work. The problem isn't that our frustrations are imaginary. It's what happens when frustration becomes the only way we relate to the people and problems around us.
My bet is you have been a part of this process numerous times in your life. Perhaps at work, or in your politics, or just in your feeds and comment sections.
How to Stop Feeding Workplace Frustration
This week, notice when you and someone else are frustrated about something you both care about.
And try asking yourself: Are we helping each other process this – or are we just feeding each other's frustration?
If it’s the second one, try one small interruption:
Take a breath and, if possible, have a good stretch.
Offer an honest question or different perspective.
Name the system without dehumanizing the people in it.
Seek out ideas and opinions of others.
Focus on action and next steps.
Living and working in the flawed systems we do, it’s vital for us to feel our frustration. We need spaces where we can angrily point to what’s wrong and hear someone else say “I know and I’m here in it with you.”
But we also need to maintain our energy and capacity to care, without being consumed by that frustration. Especially for those of us whose work asks us to care for other people all day, protecting that capacity matters.
This is one small way to practice doing that.
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