About this episode

Cait Donovan and Leanne Elliott discuss the distinction between a toxic work environment and a bad fit, emphasizing the role of psychosocial factors in workplace dynamics.

Your workplace might not be toxic. It might just be missing the biology lesson that explains why everyone keeps behaving badly. Work burnout is rarely one person's failure, and this conversation makes that case clearly. Occupational psychologist and Truth, Lies, and Work co-host Leanne Elliott joins Cait to untangle what actually makes a toxic work environment, and what we keep getting wrong when we try to fix it. Before culture initiatives and values workshops, there are psychosocial risk factors: the concrete, measurable conditions that quietly drive stress and erode workplace culture and wellbeing. Cait pushes back from the body, pointing out that biology can make a bonded team reject a new hire without anyone realizing it, and that childhood trauma can permanently rewire how someone reads neutral feedback. Leanne doesn't argue. She acknowledges the limits of what organizational psychology can change and makes the case for cross-disciplinary collaboration as the only honest path forward. One of the more useful reframes here is the difference between a toxic work environment and a bad fit. Real toxicity is behavioral. Workplace incivility rarely looks like explosive conflict…

People in this episode

Host: Cait Donovan

Guest: Leanne Elliott

Topics covered

• workplace toxicity
• burnout
• psychosocial risk factors
• organizational psychology
• team dynamics
• mental health

Keywords

• toxic work environment
• burnout
• psychosocial risks
• workplace culture
• team dynamics
• mental health
• organizational psychology

Mentioned in this episode

Organizations: Truth, Lies, & Work

More episodes of FRIED. The Burnout Podcast

• The 4 Behaviors of A Toxic Workplace a #straightfromcait episode · May 31, 2026 · 9 min
• We’re Expecting the Wrong Things From Leaders And It’s Causing Leadership Burnout: A #straightfromcait episode. · May 17, 2026 · 12 min
• Burned Out and Managing Multiple Generations? What Leaders Get Wrong About Generational Conflict at Work with Kristin Scroggin · May 10, 2026 · 59 min

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