Face Up to Bullies in the Workplace

Bullying is the intimidation or maltreatment of a weaker person by an aggressive one. For over ten years, bullying has been moving along silently in the workplace.

Dr. Duncan Lewis advises that it is already time to take action and deal with the issue objectively in a productive way. Lewis is the head of the department of strategy at the University of Glamorgan's Business School.

It has been revealed in academic studies and trade union researches that 10%–25% of the British workforce suffer from bullying at work.

One of the best helpful tools to address the workplace bullying issue is to write policies and introduce training programmes to support workers and protect them.

Employees who suffer from bullying become open to emotional or physical danger or harm. They are unable to take their issues to unions or the personnel department.

A victim’s feeling of embarrassment, or just plain foolishness, makes it more complicated to go to the right persons for help.

Victims of bullying continue to suffer because they prefer to keep silent or just leave the company to escape from the hostile environment.

Bullying is a great issue simply because of the how it is dealt with. Instead of letting the bullies pay for what they did, they get away with it.

It is evident that there are non-productive effects in an environment where bullies exist. These common effects are reduced productivity, poor quality of work, increased and lengthy periods of absences, higher labour turnovers, and damaged reputations.

A group investigating an issue of bullying should neither take the matter for granted, nor underestimate it.

When a bullying issue is raised to higher authorities and if the claims are proven to be true, a big amount of money will be paid to the victim. In normal cases, bullies have to pay damages ranging in six-figure amounts.

An organisation should realise that actions should be taken earlier before the problem has blown out of proportions. They have to be more proactive and vigilant to issues concerning this matter.