iHire Survey: Only 25% of Employees Trust HR to Address Toxic Behaviors in the Workplace

Frederick, Maryland – March 11, 2025 – According to an iHire survey, only 25% of employees trust HR to address toxic behaviors in the workplace. Moreover, approximately 65% of workers who reported harmful behaviors or incidents to HR, managers, or supervisors said their organization did nothing to address or mitigate the issues.

More detailed findings from iHire’s poll of 1,781 U.S. workers include the following:

When asked which behaviors or incidents they’ve experienced or witnessed at their current or most recent job in the past year, respondents noted:

• Favoritism or bias toward select employees (51.8%)
• Gossip (50.0%)
• Dishonesty (39.4%)
• Bullying or harassment (31.4%)
• Discrimination, such as ageism, sexism, or racism (26.4%)
• Unethical or illegal activities (25.9%)

Of those who experienced or witnessed any of the above behaviors or incidents:

• 53.0% reported the behaviors to a manager, supervisor, or HR
• 36.7% did not report the behaviors

Of those who reported the behaviors or incidents:

• 65.2% said their organization did not do anything to resolve or address the issues
• 17.0% said their company did resolve or address the issues

Lastly, when asked if they trusted HR to address toxic behaviors within their current or most recent workplace:

• 45.9% of all employees surveyed said no
• 25.0% said yes
• 16.7% were unsure
• 8.3% said they don’t have an HR department or individual
• 4.0% preferred not to answer

“It’s concerning that nearly half of workers don’t trust HR to address negative or toxic behaviors, including favoritism, bias, gossip, and dishonesty,” said Chrisanne Bowden, Principal HR Business Partner, iHire. “To ensure a positive work environment where all employees can thrive, employers need to work with their HR teams, managers, and other leaders to enable a culture of trust, transparency, and communication with well-defined processes for mitigating conflict.”

Additional survey findings can be found in iHire’s 2025 Toxic Workplace Trends Report: www.iHire.com/ToxicWorkplaceReport.

Research Methodology

1,781 workers across 57 industries in the U.S. responded to iHire’s Toxic Workplaces Survey in December 2024 via the Qualtrics XM platform. Respondents came from iHire’s job seeker databases. All decimal points are rounded to the nearest tenth. For many questions, multiple answers could be selected, so percentages add up to a sum greater than 100%. In some instances, survey questions were skipped by an individual respondent.

About iHire

iHire is a leading employment platform that powers a family of 57 industry-focused talent networks, including WorkInSports, iHireVeterinary, iHireDental, iHireConstruction, and iHireChefs. For more than 25 years, iHire has combined advanced job matching technology with our expertise in the talent acquisition space to connect job seekers with employers in their desired sector. With an industry-specific, candidate-centric, and data-driven approach to recruitment, iHire helps candidates find meaningful work and employers find unique, high-quality talent – faster, easier, and more effectively than a general job board. Visit www.iHire.com for more information.

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