Helen Major has dispiriting news for anyone trying to curb a bully
Who do you turn to for help if your reputation and health are being destroyed by a workplace bully? Since research indicates that most bullies target good employees, you would think that the obvious answer would be that they should turn to HR or their union. The problem is that ten years of international research on workplace bullying indicates that that may be the wrong thing to do.
Web sites dedicated to bully busting, like the site for the Workplace Bullying Institute in Bellingham Washington, bluntly tell targets NOT to trust HR or expect the union to help them unless the target can make a business case for HR or the union’s “own self-interests.”
Curious as to why HR and unions were perceived so negatively, I decided to do some research on my own. I interviewed four HR and four union subjects and they generously shared their personal encounters with work place bullying with me.
Turning to a union
One union subject shared the frustration of helplessly watching a secretary move from work-group to work-group, abusing her co-workers until some got sick and others quit. This subject worked with HR to stop the bully, but the best efforts of both the union and HR weren’t enough to reach a good resolution. When the bully finally re-located to another state she had already caused several excellent employees to leave the company. At the end of our interview, the subject said that the tools the unions have to address bullying take too long — usually six months or more — and that people being bullied can’t wait that long for relief, so they leave.
Another union subject, who represented immigrant laborers with a bully boss, told me that the only way he could help the workers was to teach them to “bully better” than the boss. He insisted that bullies don’t care what the law is and don’t change their behavior unless you make them hurt.
No help from HR either
My HR subjects told me about their struggles addressing workplace bullying. One talked of using a “sting” by placing one of her staff in a work-group undercover to get evidence she could use to fire a bully boss.
Another HR subject discovered workers playing cruel practical jokes to prevent a co-worker from completing an assignment. The jokes included rigging the target’s cube so she couldn’t finish a critical report due for an unforgiving boss. When my subject intervened, the bullies made bogus complaints against her, leading to a reprimand and, finally, to her transferring to another division.
According to a Zogby research study done in 2007, 37% of American workers — 54 million people — have reported being bullied at work. Seven out of ten employees targeted by bullies will be fired or leave their jobs voluntarily. Some will be so traumatized by the experience that they will suffer physical or emotional impairment, further reducing their ability to work. 72% of the bullies are bosses and 54% of the targets are workers. The study, led by WBI Research Director Gary Namie, found that organizations ignore bullying 62% of the time, even when they are made aware of it.
My small sample of HR and union subjects suggest that one reason organizations ignore bullying is that current interventions do not produce positive outcomes, either for the individuals or the organizations. Good intentions by individuals are not enough to protect targets or companies from bullies. It will take leadership and commitment by the whole organization to implement effective intervention and prevention strategies before HR and unions can successfully do the job of stopping work place bullying.
Technorati Tags: workplace bullies, bullying at work, coping with bullies
Related articles by Zemanta
- Work Bullies: Bad for the Bottom Line
- The Cubicle Bully: Workplace Conflict Ruins Careers [Scientific American Mind]
- The bullying epidemic
- Concern over workplace bullying
- Well: When the Bully Sits in the Next Cubicle
August 20th, 2008 at 5:44 pm
In my experience most of the workplace bullies are themselves in position of authority in the institutions making it difficult for HR to take care of them. It is also true that the bullied take too long a time in reporting with the misplaced hope that these are isolated incidents which will pass off. The trade unions do not carry sufficient personal touch for the bullied to open up to them for making a strategic counter offensive on the bully. But they are better placed to handle it as they are free to devise and adopt case specific methods to tackle the problem where as HR mostly adopts structural methods across the spectrum.
August 21st, 2008 at 6:10 am
HR is not there to help the employee. HR exists to protect the company and not individual employees. If you think you are being bullied start recording evidence and talk to an attorney about it. Odds are the bully is keeping a record on you without your knowledge. They do this b/c they know how to work the system and you won’t be their first victim. I’m not telling you to sue but know what kind of evidence you need should it go that way. I’ve learned these things the hard way.
I’ve learned that working in a corporate environment is like being on trial everyday. You are constantly being monitored by your boss and peers and anything you say can and will be used against you. It’s best to have evidence to defend yourself at all times
August 21st, 2008 at 6:19 am
Research would support your experience. Most bullies are bosses and bulling is an equal opportunity vice — nearly evenly split between male and female bosses. One additional statistic that stands out from the research is that women are the most frequent targets for both male and female bosses.