Kind Regards? Not Really! How HR Can Shut Down Rudeness At Work

The biggest killer of productivity across Australian organisations isn’t TikTok cooking videos or the morbid Erin Patterson murder trial, its employees being rude to each other at work.

It’s the eye roll. The snide remark. The cold shoulder. The dirty ‘per my last email’ at 9:05am. It all sums up to low-key incivility. 

It even happened in the UK House of Commons the other week, when UK chancellor Rachel Reeves made headlines for wiping away tears in a parliamentary hearing. This tells us something important, emotion at work still makes people uncomfortable. 

Incivility means rude or unacceptable behaviour. It might seem harmless to most. You might even put it off to personality clashes. A bit of workplace banter. But research shows that chronic incivility affects creativity, ruins decision-making, and sends culture straight down the drain.

And unfortunately, remote work hasn’t helped much. If anything it’s made things worse because employees now get ghosted in Slack channels, ignored in meetings and stewed over cryptic, passive-aggressive emails late at night.

It’s time HR does something about it because the recurring disrespect employees feel chips away at their morale, trust and their performance. When incivility goes unchecked, it becomes the cultural norm and becomes everyone’s problem, especially yours.

In this blog, we’ll break down how rudeness affects work, how it shows up in the digital world, and what HR can do to stop it.

The cost of rudeness 

Rudeness is expensive.

You don’t need a PhD in behavioural science to know that being around people who are rude are just a drain. One rude email can ruin a morning. A passive-aggressive comment in a meeting can derail a timeline and completely flip the mood.

But here's the part HR underestimates, rudeness messes with people’s brains. Creativity in the room tanks. Decision-making gets worse. Employees don’t speak up. And once that energy takes hold, it spreads faster than gastro in a hospo kitchen. 

Get this. Studies show that rudeness can actually undermine team functioning and endanger your life. 

That’s not an exaggeration. 

Well, in a way. In a medical study out of Tel Aviv in 2010, Israel doctors and nurses were given a stressful neonatal emergency scenario. When the head doctor made slightly rude comments like questioning their skill, implying they weren’t good enough, the whole team functioned worse. They made more mistakes and gave the wrong drugs to children. Because people learnt that it’s safer to stay quiet than to risk being belittled, which meant they didn’t speak up, ask for help and share crucial information.

If rudeness can derail a high-performing medical team in a life-or-death situation, it can also derail employees trying to get a pitch or a deck sent over to their manager in time. Teams stop learning and projects flatline. 

So when someone shrugs off rudeness with, “Oh, that’s just how she talks,” they’re missing the real impact. It’s not about tone. It’s about shutting down the very thinking a team is paid to do.

Digital daggers

Anyone else feel pained by the ‘per my last email’ response?

Digital rudeness is a special kind of stress. It lingers. You can’t walk away from it. You can’t laugh it off in the lunchroom. Research shows that passive-aggressive emails like ‘noted’ or ‘received’ do real damage to well-being. In fact, the weight of passive rudeness has been linked to insomnia with some employees staying up thinking about it. They wake up irritated and it messes with their next day.

And unfortunately, virtual incivility is harder to spot but just as damaging. People interrupt more, ignore contributions, arrive late to meetings, or don’t show up at all. The screen acts like a shield, lowering inhibitions and making people forget there’s a human on the other side.

Managers can’t police every message. But HR can create guardrails. Set expectations around response and encourage cameras to go during meetings.

Next steps for HR

HR can’t train someone out of being rude if no one holds them accountable. And you can’t fix a culture of incivility with a morning tea and a motivational speaker.

Start with the basics. Most companies have a code of conduct. But if that code lives in a PDF on the intranet and no one’s seen it since onboarding, don’t expect it to shape behaviour.

Train managers in how to spot subtle rudeness. Give them scripts. Show them how to step in without escalating. Include virtual examples. People will copy what they see.Then create a way for employees to speak up without risking being labelled “too sensitive” or “not a team player.” 

And when someone does raise something? Don’t brush it off. “I’ve heard worse” isn’t the standard. Investigate, even if it feels minor. Rudeness doesn’t get better with time. It just gets louder, or more passive.

Another good idea is to hold a mirror up in front of executives. If leaders are sending short, rude emails, showing up late, interrupting, or ignoring people then other employees will follow that behaviour too. 

You need to model the right behaviour in HR too. Every email you send, every tone you use, every time you step in, you’re communicating to employees what’s acceptable. So it all starts there, by modelling the right behaviour from the top down! 

About us

At Martian Logic, we help HR teams build healthier, high-performing workplaces, starting with culture. Our simple, scalable HR software supports everything from recruitment and onboarding to performance, engagement, and compliance. If you’re dealing with low morale, poor collaboration, or behaviour that’s starting to cross a line, our tools help you spot the warning signs early and take action. Contact us today to see how Martian Logic can help you create a workplace where people and ideas thrive.