This is a pre course survey run in readiness for a ‘bullying’ workshop a small group of us planned to run. We wanted to know if all the bullying we were reading about in schools and the workplace were for real or just media hype.
Participants were asked to answer Yes or No to the following questions - feel free to use these questions in your own organisation :
Does your organisation have a dedicated HR department?
How would you define bullying?
Have you ever been bullied?
What effect did bullying have on you emotionally and physically?
Have you ever seen someone bullied in the workplace?
Have you ever been a bully yourself?
Have you ever received a complaint that you are a bully?
Have you ever had to deal with a complaint about bullying?
Do you think that bullying is sometimes misrepresented as something else or the label is attached to something it isn't?
Do you think senior managers in your organisation take bullying seriously?
Do you have a policy on 'bullying' in your Policy and Procedure Manual?
The answers we received were really interesting:
- The first surprise was that 17.6% of respondents acknowledged that they had actually bullied someone!
- The second surprise was that 100% of respondents felt that the bullying label was often used when in fact what was happening wasn't actually bullying.
Some of the actual responses in detail:
Q: How would you define bullying?
- Bullying is any form of behavior that is unwelcome, often repeated and personally intimidating or offensive to the recipient
•Unwanted comments/behavior that makes an individual feel unable to continue their work
•Repeated or significant inappropriate behavior which undermines an individual's right to dignity at work
•Someone being brow-beaten by a colleague or superior
•Repeated and unwanted negative behavior towards a person
•Intimidation, inducing fear for a personal gain
•Intimidating and unpleasant behavior
•Continual eroding of confidence by put downs and threats
•Bullying is behavior that can intimidate, offend, degrade or humiliate a person. It is deliberate actions or behaviours directed towards another person which may take many forms and can often occur over a long period of time
•Imposing someone else's will onto a person, making someone feel uncomfortable, making their lives a misery
In my experience, when a person with power enforces their power through any means - be that acting as a tyrant; using fear to motivate; wielding power and pressure over those you expect to achieve results for you, then this behaviour is unacceptable.
Effects mentioned of being bullied:
•Loss of sleep, not wanting to go to work, tearfulness, fatigue and health issues
•Annoyed, grew from it, moved on
•It caused me to become withdrawn while it was happening. Self doubt creeping in
•It affects the atmosphere in the workplace, you feel down and don't want to be there
•It caused my health to suffer, I ended up stressed which caused fatigue anxiety and then panic attacks. Made me tearful which I am not normally
•Increased negativity, decreased productivity, very unhappy
•Lost confidence, questioned my own abilities, became unhappy and unproductive
•Self esteem plummeted, self confidence vanished - poor productivity
•It had a terrible impact on all areas of my life - loss of sleep, ill health and stress
In answer to the question 'Do you think bullying is sometimes misrepresented as something else or the label of bullying is attached to something which isn't really bullying?' the responses were as follows:
*Performance management can sometimes be seen as bullying by the person in the process
•Perhaps sometimes by the ‘victim' - I think if it is bullying there would be an intent to harm insult or make things personal and fearful, but if the antagonist is simply angry about a situation, rather than at a person, then I don't think it is bullying
•Anybody can misinterpret occasional actions or statements but bullying is repeated, not a one-off
•Employees who are not performing may think they are being bullied when really they are being told to pull their socks up
•Manipulators often use the word ‘bully' as a tool to gain their own goals
•People sometime view a raised voice as bullying but when they are given a definition, it becomes clearer
•Management can often be accused of bullying by those who know that what they are doing should be corrected, but to save face they say they are being victimized or bullied
Sadly very few companies know how to define bullying and/or deal with it, and so basically they don't deal with it. They simply ignore it and hope it will tgo away. It won't!
Bullying is particularly serious and concerning when the behaviour comes from top management. Yet over the years, I've come across managers who say that their staff bully them! Sadly this is another sign of ineffective leadership if the manager doesn't have the skills to effectively respond to abusive behavior from a member of their staff
Every organisation needs to have in place a very clear policy on acceptable behaviours in the workplace. Organisations also need to have a 'what to do if you feel you are being bullied' process in place in their Policy and Procedure manual.
Regards
Ann Andrews CSP, Michael Smyth and Janice Davies
www.thecorporatetoolbox.com
About Ann Andrews CSP
Ann Andrews CSP specialises in working with high performing teams and showing managers how to deal with poor performance.