Tackling the Misery Caused by Workplace Bullying and Bad Behaviours

If you are being bullied at work the Good News is that nowadays there is a great deal of information and support both on and off the Internet on the subject.

The Bad News is that if you are a victim you're unlikely to be able to solve the problem through the usual staff care channels.

There is a growing awareness that not only is abusive behaviour to others at work a sign of incompetence, and causes untold personal stress and emotional misery, the realisation has been slowly dawning that bullying is costing business billions every year.

A massive survey of 26,000 US workers revealed that 57 per cent of them were being bullied by someone at work at any one time. Since bullying causes many problems ranging from absenteeism, sickness, recruitment and staff retention problems to arson, sabotage, other crime and even suicide clearly the problem is epidemic.

Your manager, boss and Human Resources department are likely to want to avoid this issue. They may deny it or procrastinate, or put it down to a 'personality clash'. Around 75 per cent of bullying victims are being bullied by a manager. When you do finally flag up the bullying one or more of the following will happen:

The bully will turn things around and make you the 'bad guy' in the company's eyes

The bully might be part of a bullying pairing or even big group which is very good at concealing their behaviour behind a good guy image - some companies have an all-round bullying culture

Others who know you are being bullied may not stick up for you for fear of the same treatment

The boss may also be an insecure, badly trained person and believe that bullying is just adopting a 'robust management style'

You may find yourself, instead of the bully, the subject of a disclipinary and/or eventually be fired

Litigation against bullying is unusual and notoriously unrewarding for the litigant
There is more good news.

Next year, Britain is likely to sign up to a voluntary code, already in operation in the European Community, to ban bullying at work. This is likely to start applying pressure to comply with guidelines and create Best Practice on workplace behaviour. So what is bullying?

Here's quick checklist of the main strategies: Nitpicking, name calling, verbal abuse, excluding, silent treatment, overloading with work, sudden work pattern changes, undermining remarks to colleagues, sexual prying, gossiping or touching, poor references, poor assessments, shouting, physical abuse, threats, blackmail. Not to mention bullying on grounds of race, religions, disability or lower status.

......and how do you tackle it? Well, bullying is always all about power. Bullies have low self worth, are often underqualified and trained, and are sometimes actually mentally ill. They feel powerless, so pick on someone to undermine and demolish in order to make themselves feel powerful and hide their own shortcomings.

It is highly unlikely that the victim has done anything that warrants this bad treatment. It's not even personal most of the time. Contrary to popular belief, bullied people are not weak, neither have they done anything to 'deserve' bullying.

They tend to be effective, mature people who are popular and good natured, often too willing to give the benefit of the doubt. They invoke envy and hatred in the bully simply because they are 'ok'.

I have had many many clients who were bullied at work because they got in the line of fire. I also realised when I started to research the subject a few years back that as a former worker and manager that I myself have been bullied in about three quarters of the places where I've been employed over the years. And I was not weak, badly behaved OR incompetant.

Power acquired and misused in the workplace is very difficult for the victim to counter. Bullies are cunning, will lie, cheat manipulate and trash their victims in all kinds of ways.

Helplines and advice are great - I run one myself - and will help you understand and maybe feel better, but they do not get down to the grass roots of the problem.

What is really needed is for the company to realise how much this is really costing, take courage and hire outsiders with expertise to come in and troubleshoot.

Projects like this have a fourfold advantage
1. The outsiders do not have any history with the company or agendas with the bullies so cannot be manipulated or threatened by the bully
2. The outsiders are neutral experts and can see the dynamics in the bully's environment clearly
3. The outsiders are working for the benefit of the company and want the issue resolved
4. The outsiders, once the issue has resolved, can also help the company design and embed Best Practice Codes of Behaviour so that the problem will not arise again

I am not talking about Conflict Resolution. This is a process which has to be adopted when relationships have broken down.

Therapeutic, or psycho-emotional group dynamics strategies are a very good way of processing this issue in companies and organisations of all sizes.
This is because therapists are qualified to carry out not just 360 staff assessments but mental health assessments.

This means that if they spot an employee who they feel needs psychiatric attention or care then that particular person can get the care they really need.
Therapists are honest, non violent, neutral, non judgmental and where practised at groupwork, can achieve several things. One is to create a safe environment where everyone can be honest without the bully being attacked or punished.

The bully will be left in no doubt that they have been busted and must take responsibility for their behaviour, and that their behaviour must stop!
The bully will also get support for any problems they have - better training and supervision, help with family, social or substance misuse problems and so on.

This means that the victim can remain at the company and resume good functioning, the bully won't be fired to go operate their stuff elsewhere, the company saves money, everyone wins and that's when it all becomes Good News.

For More Information:

www.brightonhovecounselling.co.uk

email: info@brightonhovecounselling.co.uk or at info@highgatecounselling.co.uk