Bullying in the Workplace Is Human Beings Behaving Badly
How can you recognize bullying in 2022? We can describe bullying in a broad sense as intimidating and humiliating behaviors. The purpose of bullying is to demean someone else. Bullies need control over others, and they use degrading behaviors to accomplish their goals.
Bullying regulations don’t dictate individual opinions. You don’t have to agree with or even like the people you work with. Workplace bullying does not negate personal preferences – instead, it’s about how individuals or groups express those opinions in the workplace.
The Poisoned Workplace – Recognize Bullying
When individuals or groups begin expressing their sentiments in a degrading and perhaps physically violent fashion, the entire workplace becomes hostile. Fear and anger, defensiveness, and justifications abound. It doesn’t take long before every shift, department, and location is toxic with hostility and a poisonous stench.
Examples of bullying behavior can range from obvious to quite indirect and subtle, and all are dangerous.
Before we further discuss the bully in the workplace, let’s clarify what bullying may look like in your workplace.
Bullying Behaviors
- Physically abusive or aggressive behavior such as pushing, hitting, finger-pointing, or standing close to the victim in an aggressive manner.
- Verbally abusive behavior such as yelling, insults, and name-calling
- Persistent, excessive, and unjustified criticism and constant scrutiny
- Spreading malicious rumors
- Sexual comments, inuendos, inappropriate touching, suggestive gestures
- Excluding or ignoring the victim
- Undermining the victim’s efforts by setting impossible goals and deadlines
- Sabotaging the employee’s work
- Hindering an employee’s efforts at promotions or transfers
- Making false allegations in memos or other company documents
Next week we will address how to recognize the signs of someone who has or is being bullied – even if you don’t see the actions in real-time.
