u/StrictWatercress3034

lol

I'm a team lead for a team of 8 at a marketing agency. One of the people who reports directly to me, let's call her Megan, is honestly one of the strongest people I've ever managed. She consistently reaches around 160% of her targets. Her campaigns are polished, the clients love the work, and since she joined, she hasn't missed a single deadline.

The problem is that Megan is very difficult to deal with for almost everyone around her. She interrupts people in meetings. She sighs or makes faces when someone asks a question she thinks is basic. And in the past six weeks, she has made three junior staff members visibly upset because of the way she gives feedback.

I've had four one-on-one conversations with her about this issue. Every time, she says something along the lines of "I'm just being honest" or "people need to have thicker skin." She doesn't seem to understand that there's a difference between being direct and making people feel stupid.

At the start of this month, I received an anonymous message from the team saying they would rather lose her output than keep dealing with the atmosphere she creates. That was the part that made me realize this isn't just one or two people being upset. The whole team has started working around her instead of with her.

I talked to my manager about it, and his response was basically that Megan is too important to lose, and that I need to find a way to "manage her personality." So now I feel like I'm being asked to absorb the damage because her numbers look good in the report.

I don't know what to do. If I let this slide, morale will keep getting worse, and I can see people possibly leaving eventually. If I push harder, Megan might resign or her performance might drop, and I know leadership will blame me for losing a top producer.

Has anyone dealt with a high performer who is toxic to the team before? How do you protect people without acting like the numbers don't matter?

update : I do not know how to say this but many people of my team have sent their resignation because of her they told me they will work remotely to give more time to their families sad how the attitude of some employee can make the others run away I wish for them the best , but I guess I will recommend for them that tool u guys talked about all the time interviewman and I scrolled in that sub it gives great tips I will recommend for them too

😫

Our salaries are calculated on the basis that we work 42 hours a week, but most of us regularly work more than that. The job involves a lot of nights and weekends because of programs, meetings, and assignments, and sometimes it requires us to drive very long distances. We're constantly so busy that nights and weekends are often the time when we catch up on the normal things that didn't fit into the workday. Even though the baseline is 42 hours, the expectation has always been that this extra time is part of the role since we're salaried.

Then this morning we got a very direct email from the manager "reminding" us that we're expected to work 42 hours a week. My guess is that they looked at a login/activity report and saw that someone had a slightly lighter pay period? Honestly, I'm annoyed. We're all grown adults in our fifties. The work is getting done, everyone is covering what they're supposed to cover, and nothing is falling through the cracks. No one is ignoring assignments or leaving others to carry the workload for them.

What bothers me is that we don't get overtime, and no one tracks or credits us for all the extra nights, weekend events, travel time, and catch-up hours we regularly put in. And no one complains about that part. But the moment it looks like someone maybe didn't hit the exact number, we get a "friendly reminder" about the hours required of us.

How do I answer to this, if I answer at all? Should I point out the extra hours we're constantly working over the 42, or will that just make things worse?

edit: I am done with all of that + Don't wanna to spent my last work years before retirement in very exhausting schedule ,its time to start my own business and work remotely and I will use Interviewman as employer to give me the right questions I should ask my candidates , feel excited to do this and thank you for your kind words

...

Edit : to take care of your health isn't privilege it is a right for everyone and to make it so expensive I read about people asking for second job to to bring medicines to their sick kids and it breaks my heart and he don't blame mangers he says he cant pay for your Medicare In case you were in such situation quit and find better job with better salary and do your interviews with interviewman because no one should live in pain