Organizational Toxicity: Exploring Factors That Cultivate Toxicity in Air Force Maintenance Organizations and Their Impact on Enlisted Airmen

Workplace toxicity negatively impacts organizations and harms employees within those organizations. However, each organization is subject to various influences and contexts, and understanding toxicity within specific contexts provides practitioners with the knowledge of its origin, influential factors, and how to respond. The U.S. Air Force is rich in culture and subcultures; it is also subject to toxicity, which is affected by several military-unique factors. Yet, toxicity in the military has been primarily explored through the leadership lens with limited insights into other influential elements, such as followers and the workplace environment. Additionally, little attention has been placed on the effects of toxicity from the enlisted perspective or within a specific career field. The purpose of this qualitative descriptive study was to investigate the experiences of senior enlisted airmen in the U.S. Air Force maintenance career field who served under toxic leaders to better understand the social and environmental conditions that influence toxicity as well as any perceived psychological effects and experienced physiological outcomes. Through in-depth interviews, six senior enlisted members from active-duty aircraft maintenance squadrons shared rich data about their experiences with toxicity. The researcher used coding and thematic analysis to identify five major themes, including variations in understanding toxicity, workplace environment and its unique culture, destructive organizational behaviors, negative organizational functioning, and impacts on personal and professional well-being. This study’s findings remained aligned with previous research on toxic leadership and its outward effects but differed in describing the most influential factor affecting toxicity in a military setting. Participants suggested that the workplace environment, consisting of culture, structure, hierarchy, and external demands and pressures drove its leaders and the organization to be perceived as toxic. Furthermore, the nature of military service, its culture, and contractual commitments have limited service members’ ability to respond, escape, quit, or relocate. These constraints require various approaches to mitigating toxicity while building personal and organizational resiliency. Finally, this study found that workplace toxicity in maintenance can negatively impact recruitment and retention, discouraging others from seeking a career in maintenance or committing more years to it.