{"id":7317,"date":"2013-12-05T11:26:45","date_gmt":"2013-12-05T11:26:45","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/affinityhrgroup.com\/2019\/05\/the-workplace-bully\/"},"modified":"2013-12-05T11:26:45","modified_gmt":"2013-12-05T11:26:45","slug":"the-workplace-bully","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/theworkplaceadvisors.com\/the-workplace-bully\/","title":{"rendered":"The Workplace Bully"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>By now most people have heard about the Richie Incognito case, where an NFL player is accused of bullying a teammate.\u00a0 Incognito is alleged to have left harassing voice mails for a rookie player that were racially charged and sexually explicit.\u00a0 He is also alleged to have forced the African-American rookie, Jonathan Martin, to pay thousands of dollars to more seasoned players as a right-of-passage.\u00a0 The case makes for a disturbing example of harassment, hazing, and workplace bullying, not to mention extortion.<\/p>\n<p>The emp<span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\">l<\/span>oyer in this case, the Miami Dolphins, is also alleged to have supported many of Incognito\u2019s actions as a justifiable way to \u201ctoughen up\u201d the young player.\u00a0 While this case is extreme, it offers us a clear lesson that workplace bullying is a real thing and needs to be dealt with when it occurs.<\/p>\n<p>Workplace bullying is a situation where there is repeated mistreatment of one or more persons (the targets) by one or more perpetrators that generally takes the following forms:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Verbal abuse<\/li>\n<li>Offensive conduct and\/or behaviors (including nonverbal) that are threatening, humiliating or intimidating<\/li>\n<li>Work interference \u2013 sabotage \u2013 that prevents work from getting done<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><span style=\"line-height: 20px;\">At present, there is no federal law defining or prohibiting workplace bullying.\u00a0\u00a0 Most bullying is subtle and does not usually involve explicitly illegal discrimination or harassment (mal-treatment on the basis of one\u2019s race, religion, gender, age, disability, pregnancy, military service, or sexual orientation).\u00a0 That said, while most bullying may not be illegal, it is quite harmful and common.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"line-height: 20px;\">According to the Workplace Bullying Institute (WBI) (<\/span><a href=\"http:\/\/www.workplacebullying.org\/\">www.WorkplaceBullying.org<\/a><span style=\"line-height: 20px;\">), bullying is four times more common than illegal harassment or discrimination. Only one out of five cases of bullying involves discriminatory conduct. \u00a0In the Miami Dolphins case, however, Incognito\u2019s racially-charged harassment, if found to be true, would certainly constitute illegal discrimination and harassment under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"line-height: 20px;\">Most bullying cases are less blatant than the Dolphin\u2019s case.\u00a0 They are also surprisingly frequent.\u00a0 According to a 2007 study conducted by the polling firm Zogby International on behalf of the WBI:<\/span><span style=\"line-height: 20px;\">\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>37% of American workers (approximately 53 million people) report being bullied at work<\/li>\n<li>Most bullies are bosses (72%)<\/li>\n<li>More perpetrators are men (60%) than are women (40%)<\/li>\n<li>Most targets (57%) are women<\/li>\n<li>71% of female bullies target other women; \u00a0men target men 54% of the time<\/li>\n<li>45% of targets suffer stress-related health problems<\/li>\n<li>40% of bullied individuals never tell their employers<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><span style=\"line-height: 20px;\">The fact that most of this type of harassment isn\u2019t technically illegal doesn\u2019t mean there aren\u2019t risks for employers.\u00a0 Employers who tolerate or ignore workplace bullies can be contributing to a hostile workplace.\u00a0 If bullying is severe enough to be considered threatening, intimidating or creating a toxic work environment, an employer could face a charge of maintaining a hostile work environment or of constructive discharge (creating an environment that coerces the employee to quit).<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"line-height: 20px;\">While the legal risks are real, so are the costs of workplace bullying.\u00a0 Cases of bullying have been associated with low employee productivity, workplace stress, increased absenteeism and high turn-over.\u00a0 In fact, there is a strong correlation between bullying and mental and physical health problems, both of which can have a significant impact on health care expenditures, poor productivity, poor customer service and decreased morale.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"line-height: 20px;\">So what should you do to create a bully-free workplace?<\/span><span style=\"line-height: 20px;\">\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Develop a policy that clearly defines workplace bullying and how the company will handle cases of bullying.<\/li>\n<li>Train your managers and supervisors to recognize bullying and train them on how to investigate and handle incidents of bullying.<\/li>\n<li>Encourage reporting of bullying and clearly state the process and procedures for reporting bullying.<\/li>\n<li>Take all allegations of bullying seriously.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><span style=\"line-height: 20px;\">As with most elements of your workplace, how leadership sets and communicates the standard has a direct relationship to the culture of the organization.\u00a0 In the case of the Miami Dolphins, not only was management alleged to have done nothing to prevent the harassment and bullying of its rookie player, it is alleged to have encouraged it.\u00a0 Even though bullying is not illegal <\/span><em>per se<\/em><span style=\"line-height: 20px;\">, by setting the standard that you do not support and will not tolerate workplace bullying, you will go a long way toward preventing this very real and costly phenomenon from happening in your office. \u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"line-height: 20px;\">By Claudia St. John, SPHR<\/span><\/p>\n<p>President Affinity HR Group, LLC<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>By now most people have heard about the Richie Incognito case, where an NFL player is accused of bullying a teammate.\u00a0 Incognito is alleged to have left harassing voice mails for a rookie player that were racially charged and sexually explicit.\u00a0 He is also alleged to have forced the African-American rookie, Jonathan Martin, to pay [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_uf_show_specific_survey":0,"_uf_disable_surveys":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7317","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"aioseo_notices":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v23.9 - 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