How to develop a snitch culture
On a lovely morning at 8:33 AM, my supervisor pulled me into her office to discuss some issues other people were having with me. I wasn’t taken back but I was curious what it could be. She mentioned that at training, I wasn’t paying attention to the instructor and others noticed it.
I tried to ask for more specific situations so I could get a better grasp. She said when it wasn’t my turn to perform the exercise, I would talk to my co-workers, and other workers from different districts would notice.
Now I was confused because I told her that it was strange because others were doing the same thing. Even supervisors who attended the training were on their phones and even interrupted the instructor with their conversations. Why was it only me that was singled out?
She told me that was what was reported to her. She advised me to read the room, if everyone was quiet, I should follow suit. That people were watching my actions.
In my mind, I was livid, and thought “Are we in a communist country? Are all of my actions being monitored and reviewed?”. I told her there was a double standard since they were doing what I was doing. She told me to call them out.
Her exact words were “You have to be brave about it and say their names”. Brave… I had to catch myself from laughing.
I left that interaction contemplating what kind of environment I was getting myself in. They were okay with having people snitch on each other. Quite the contrary statements of working as a team and a family environment that was pounded into our heads.
Focus on the main thing
The main thing should be to focus on the company goals, and in an ideal world, everyone works together, gets better, and we all reach our goals personally and professionally. The company and the individual wins.
What happens is that things start to become a status game when individuals start to get an advantage over their peers. To appear better than they are, and they’ll resort to nasty tactics to do so.
Whether it’s simple as kissing the boss's ass, appearing busy when people are watching, or spreading rumors, they’ll stop at nothing to gain status. After all, status gains you opportunities and promotions. Once your reputation is set, it’s hard to fix it.
Most people just want to do their job well and have a drama-free environment. But in order to do so, sometimes they have to conform and even join factions to preserve their way of living.
I wasn’t any different when I first started to work full-time — join the popular group and do whatever they want in order to have money to spend. I had rent and bills to pay so I’ll conform for a paycheck.
Then we lose sight of the main thing and then we start to play silly games where instead of adding and progressing the team forward, we take away or deter others.
Here comes the snitching culture — where your actions and behaviors or closely watched by aspiring vultures, who are ready and eager to bring you down.
These types of people will never miss a beat to bring down your reputation and actions negatively. Ironically, these people are often the same people who aren’t high performers and will perform the same actions/behaviors that they look down on you for.
Starts at the top
It becomes a snitch culture when people at the top allow it to be. When my supervisor knew that people were talking, she allowed it to brew and grow. Instead of stopping the small fires, they just became comfortable living in a burning house.
Instead of working to stop all of the gossip, she was more concerned with the outcome. Bypassing the entire process that led up to something, and then acting surprised that it happened is not only confusing but frustrating to hear.
Imagine if you had a nephew who liked to put his hand on the stove. His parents are told know he likes to do that, but yet they take no precautions for prevention. Then gets mad at the child when he puts his hand on the stove.
Would it help if the adults did something about it in the previous times he burned his hand? Did it help the parents get mad at their child for doing that?
Turns out when the parents cook, the child sees the parents disregarding all care for fire safety — touching the stove and pans as they please with no repercussions. Monkey see, and monkey do.
If you don’t want to see a certain behavior, I’d argue you not only address it when it happens but also make it consistent.
You can’t tell someone to not do it, and then allow someone else to do it. Worse is when you allow someone to snitch and reward them for it.
In my case, they got to escape all reprimands by snitching on another person, despite doing the same. There’s no risk at all, only reward for doing so.
When you provide this kind of incentive, it’s tempting and encouraging to start behaving like this. Once enough people do it, you get that type of culture.
Incentives rule the world
I believe in leaving a place if it isn’t working out anymore, and it’s hard to tell someone to stick it out because the world needs more resiliency and all of that hoorah messaging. But if we can, especially if we’re in a position to make some changes, it’s best to start with incentives.
If professional sports had money, fame, and championships as incentives, I’d reckon it wouldn’t be as popular. You can’t feed your family with just the love of the game. There are positive incentives, but it can quickly switch to negative behaviors to maximize those incentives.
As for our snitching culture, if the incentive is to encourage addressing the issue at the moment — a transparency culture, then you would have many people getting called out for bad behavior. We would fix the problem right there and figure out a solution. Instead of going around each other’s backs and then acting like we’re friends in person.
I feel it’s a colossal waste of time to play those kind of games. Granted, not everyone likes being called out for such behavior in public settings. But if you wanted good people, then it’s fine to lose out on people who like to hide behind others and snitch. A short-term loss for a long-term gain.
It also doesn’t have to be as drastic as calling someone out, it can easily be a group meeting where the message is constantly reminded and actions consistently displayed by managers. People have to see that it’s okay to express opinions.
I remember in college, our finance professor knew our class was struggling, and he also knew that no one was coming to him for help. This was evident in our scores. He decided to dedicate a class where we could just talk about what was wrong and how we could improve together. He started with a story of how he was struggling and didn’t speak up until it was too late. He ended up failing that class and had to repeat it. He talked about his struggles and flaws as a student and as a teacher. But in order for us to not end up like that, he would need us to help.
I wish I had the courage to speak up since I had trouble understanding his concepts. He assumed we learned the basics and sped up the class to teach us new things. I still regret not going to my professors for help to this day.
Luckily, a girl spoke up, and then others soon poured in their concerns. People were now more optimistic about class and learning. My grade for the class didn’t get better, but I understood the topics a little better.
There were a few kids who either dropped the class or maintained their lack of interest. But there were a few kids who took a lot out of that class and ended up switching their majors to finance because they saw that someone cared.
It’s these incentives that make a net positive impact in people’s lives that’s worth chasing. There wasn’t an incentive to speak up because students didn’t feel the teacher would listen, and that only changed when he made it worth their time to speak up.
I’d even argued even if you can’t change others, you can still change the internal incentives. You can still make little fun games to play in order to learn from a snitch culture and navigate it.
Realistically, we all can’t quit a crappy work environment. But it’s a chance to learn why it happens and why it continues to be prevalent.
Complain as you like but it’s more ideal to take what you can and develop yourself.
We unfortunately can’t give stitches to snitches… sadly.
Check out my last article on Networking kinda sucks when you’re younger*
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