Bullies in the Workplace

I was watching the Today Show this morning and they ran a segment on the problem of bullying in the workplace.  I think all of us have dealt with a workplace bully.  In fact, the problem is so bad that one in eight of us have been bullied.  There is even an organization dedicated to bullying!

You know the person...

• The manager who berates their team or specific member of their team in public or in private
• The manager's people are afraid to approach them because they might "blow up"
• The employee who keeps secrets or "forgets" to share important information with others who need it

I'm sure that the list above is just a start.  In my experience, the bullying manager seems to win out over the bullied employee.  Most employees just quietly leave the organization...deflated, exhausted, and with a bruised ego.   In fact, many organizations actually reward bullying behavior with comments like "they get things done!", "Look at how aggressively they manage!", "I can always count on them to get the message across!".

Have you been rewarding bullying behavior?  As HR professionals, it is our job to protect the organization from itself and to prevent behaviors that prevent the successful accomplishment of the organizational mission.  When is the last time you reviewed exit data and mapped it back to the manager?  Are there things that are occurring that should't be?

Of course, the easiest way to prevent bullying is to not hire bullies in the first place.  I recommend using pre-employment assessment along along with targeted behavior based interview questions to help sift out potential bullies. 

Have you been bullied?  Would you like to share your story?  Feel free to comment!

Comments

[Kerri]

And all those lovely people who make others in the office miserable with management too afraid to approach them. I've been in the experience where numerous people left due to a manager, all mentioned it in exit interviews with HR and nothing was ever done. A true and unfortunate failure. Nice write up Jay :)

[Charlene]

Unfortunately, some people respond to the bullying and this procreates the behavior. I've seen it plenty in sales environments over the past 20 years or so. As you said, the ol' "they get things done." It's wrong, but it definitely happens.