HOW TO KILL A COMPANY Turns out, toxic coworkers are more expensive than superstar hires

Pushy, aggressive, or inappropriate behavior in the workplace—often labeled as toxic behavior—is widely recognized as harmful to morale. New research from Harvard Business School quantifies just how costly these employees can be, and the results are stark.

A November 16 working paper analyzing data from more than 50,000 employees across 11 companies finds that removing or avoiding a toxic employee saves an organization twice as much as hiring an exceptional new worker who performs in the top 1 percent of their role.

The researchers compared two scenarios: the economic upside of hiring a “superstar” employee versus the savings generated by eliminating a toxic one. The savings measured in the study focus specifically on induced turnover costs—the expense of replacing strong employees who leave because of exposure to a toxic coworker.

Notably, these estimates do not include other potential costs associated with toxic behavior, such as regulatory penalties, litigation expenses, reputational damage, or productivity losses. As a result, the true cost of toxic employees is likely even higher than the figures reported.

For the purposes of the study, a toxic employee was defined as someone who causes harm either to the organization or to coworkers through actions such as theft, fraud, bullying, sexual harassment, or workplace violence.

“Most of the work in organization design and human resource management has been focused on ‘positive outliers’—the really top performers,” said Dylan Minor, co-author of the study. “But we’ve all had personal experiences where we have a worker on the other side of the distribution.”

The implication for managers is clear: while recruiting top talent remains important, organizations may achieve far greater returns by identifying, addressing, and removing toxic behavior early. Preventing harm often creates more value than chasing exceptional upside.

In short, vigilance against toxic employees is not just a cultural or ethical concern—it is a materially sound business strategy.