If you think that bullying is something reserved for the playground, think again. Bullying adults are a major problem from a HR perspective. Moreover, such actions can often go unnoticed in the workplace for prolongued periods costing the organisation both monetarily in terms of reduced productivity and intangibly in terms of lower staff morale and motivation.
Research in Europe, the US and Australia indicates that emotional and psychological abuse represent the greatest threat to workers, HR managers and ultimately organisations. Such abuse is variously referred to as bullying, mobbing, workplace harassment, mistreatment and emotional abuse, rather than physical violence. It is estimated that around one in six employees experience bullying at some point in their working lives. This applies to all sectors, and of most concern is the fact that some 75% of those cases identified a manager as the bully. Bullying emerges when staff, as individuals or in a group, persistently perceive themselves to be on the receiving end of negative actions from others. In such scenarios staff at the receiving end have difficulty in defending themselves against such actions.
The cost of workplace bullying
According to a recent report by the International Labour Organisation, bullying in the workplace leads to an increase in sickness, absenteeism, increased turnover rates, additional retirement costs and reduced productivity for the organisation. There may be further costs due to damage of equipment as well as costs in connection with grievance and litigation, e.g. investigation and mediation costs. A potential public loss of goodwill towards the organisation may be another more intangible cost. A US study estimated the cost of bullying for any organisation to account for up to HK$1 million per year for each individual affected. A recent Finnish study of more than 5,000 hospital staff found that those who had been bullied had 26% more certified sickness absence than those who were not bullied. Research also suggests that for every victim of bullying, there are around five observers. One of the reasons why the behaviour of bullies often goes unchecked in the workplace is the aura of secrecy and shame that can be built up and the compliance of other members of staff who are happy enough to stand on the sidelines and watch it happen. Senior level staff too, may display bullying behaviour, adding a new dimension of power into the equation.
Detection
There is disagreement about what a bully actually is. Some psychologists argue that bullying occurs more frequently in male dominated old-boys-network type organisations while others say females are more likely to bully and be bullied via gossipmongering. Bullies may even be low level psychopaths, not necessarily serial killers, but those defined as lacking the ability to empathise with others. Frequently, however, they are quite normal psychologically, with good self-esteem and were not necessarily previously bullied themselves.
The point being that there is no standard checklist HR managers can use to weed out potential bullies before they join your organisation. There are, however, some typical behavioural traits to look out for including:
- Direct verbal and physical threats
- Intimidation
- Unfair use of disciplinary and assessment procedures
- Blocking access to promotion
- Limiting training opportunities
- Restricting overtime
- Setting unrealistic deadlines and targets
- Withholding information essential to do the job properly
- Excessively tight supervision
- Public humiliation including being shouted at
- Persistent and undue criticism including inaccurate accusations about quality of work
- Undermining responsibility
- Abusive references to age, sex, race, disability or other personal characteristics
- Spreading malicious rumours
- Physical isolation or exclusion from other workers
- Assigning meaningless tasks unrelated to a person's job
- Deliberately changing work rosters to inconvenience particular employees
Prevention
Bullies within the workplace normally try to gain the approval of other colleagues by bullying with an audience present. Therefore one of the best ways of preventing such behavioural traits within your organisation is to have a zero-tolerance approach with clear guidelines as to the difference between bullying and the jocular interaction that happens in most offices. HR managers should also ensure that all staff members understand that simply being a passive bystander and failing to report such incidents of bullying is also a breach of company policy. This hardline is vital at all times as when management does not deal effectively with bullying, workers may perceive that there is an acceptance of it in their workplace. The aim of an organisation should be to provide a safe, supportive environment in which bullying is perceived to be totally unacceptable. Only when workers feel free to support others and report bullying behaviour will productivity be likely to increase.
The following is a list of some measures that HR managers can take to prevent incidents of workplace bullying:
- Commit themselves in writing to eradicating bullying as part of their HR policy
- Outline what victims should do, who to contact and follow-up procedure
- Clearly outline what bullying is and what behaviours are typical of bullying
- Report and record all incidents or allegations of bullying
- Train and make supervisors and managers clear of their responsibilities
- Protect people who come forward and keep complaints confidential
- Physically isolate bully from target or put in effect a ¡§workplace restraining order¡¨
- Take steps to ensure that retaliation doesn't occur. Sometimes bullying can get worse after it is reported
- Dismiss staff for repeated bullying
- Train staff in assertive skills, raise awareness and provide education
- Create teams and build morale so that people support each other and no one is isolated
- Assume it can exist then look for it, don't just wait to hear about it
- Lower level bullies may be taking a lead from senior level bullying staff
- Acknowledge that this is a serious problem for the bully's target then act
- Remove opportunities for bullying to occur such as isolated storerooms
- Make it clear that all staff who are bystanders are participating in bullying and that action will be taken
While a considerable amount of research has been done into bullying in Europe, the US and Australia, very little has been done in Hong Kong or Asia as a whole, but a recent ILO report states sexual harassment is of particular concern in Hong Kong. Currently Hong Kong has no specific legislation related to workplace bullying unless it can be related to the Disability Discrimination Ordinance, the Sex Discrimination Ordinance and the Family Status Discrimination Ordinance. Bullying, however, is not the same as harassment based on gender, race or ability, although all of these types of harassment may be used by a bully as a part of their scare campaign. Workplace bullying, which falls outside of these laws, often takes place and what's more, close to 80% of complaints filed with the Equal Opportunity Commission are employment related. Hong Kong is lagging behind other countries such as the US, UK, Australia and European countries, most of which have now included specific anti-bullying legislation into their workplace laws. For example since 15 August 2005 employers in South Australia can be fined up to AU$100,000 for failing to ¡§adequately manage¡¨ bullying behaviour.
Anti-bullying policies are an essential part of any psychologically healthy workplace and also help to meet HR goals such as retention of staff, increasing productivity, reducing staff costs related to leave, litigation and compensation.
Source: HR Magazine
