Bullies Beware!

Bullies, Beware!

A brief note in the Wall Street Journal (7/27/99) tells us that, “bullies have emerged as a workplace problem everywhere”. According to the United Nations-affiliated International Labor Organization, bullying is vindictive, cruel, malicious, or humiliating action by co-workers or customers designed to undermine an individual or a group of employees. In addition, the Atlanta Journal Constitution (9/5/99) indicates that, “bullying is the fastest growing form of workplace violence”. Now, take a deep breath and read this, also from the Wall Street Journal (4/9/99). It seems that an employee of a manufacturing plant sued a co-worker for sexual and racial harassment. She claimed that the man let a door slam in her face, cut her off in the parking lot, and touched her. The case was dismissed. The court held that the defendant was an equal opportunity harasser and jerk. He mistreated his co-workers equally.

As unbelievable as it may seem, it is your responsibility to learn the offensive and defensive skills necessary to deal with meanness because our laws protect the bully.

Consider this. A couple with a son in seventh grade is trying for the umpteenth and final time to get a seventh grade bully off their son’s back. The bully’s parents don’t take responsibility, the school isn’t taking an assertive stance for accountability, so the next step is a restraining order from the police to keep the young lad from bullying the student.

As unbelievable as it may seem, it is your responsibility to teach your children the defensive skills needed to deal with meanness because that bully can grow up to be the equal opportunity jerk who will have the law on his side. After all, he got away with it through his growing up years, didn’t he?

So what can you do? What are you willing to do? Here are five ideas that are immediately applicable if you are willing to honor yourself by using them.

1. Avoid behaving like a victim. Walk tall, give eye contact, and speak firmly. Sweat the small stuff. If someone bullies you, even in a small way, confront. Let the perpetrator know, verbally or in writing, publicly or in private, that you are unwilling to accept his behavior. Bullying, in our culture is escalated disrespect. Deal with the disrespect at the start, whether it’s speaking up when interrupted, confronting when someone else takes credit for your work, or pointing out unfair workloads. If a bully gets away with the small stuff, it’s likely that the disrespectful behavior worsens. Teach your children to manage bullying behavior. Teach them that they deserve to be treated with the very same respect that you teach them to apply in relationships with others.

Here’s a specific example that may sound familiar to your work environment. Some weeks ago, a client chose to engage a psychologist to work on some organizational development issues in addition to my contribution to the same group. Her interpersonal behavior included snubbing others by not saying hello or choosing to look the other way when addressed. She made stinging comments about the value of her work compared to the value of others’ contribution. She pointedly kept company with key leadership and chose not to interact, even casually, with other professionals in the room. She was demonstrating passive aggressive behavior, behavior that is covertly disrespectful. Passive aggressive behavior, like aggressive behavior is damaging to self-respect if left unchecked. Choosing to stand tall, looking her in the eye until she looked away, and consistently speaking fairly and firmly to the issues was the best response. Avoidance or backing down gives bullies the “win”; and the win invites an escalation of their tactics in the next interaction with you. In your assertive response, you don’t look for win-lose, you look for the double win of mutually respectful behavior.

2. Document, document, document. Write down the time, place, situation and people involved when bullying occurs. Your documentation is an essential chronology of your situation with a bully and provides a valuable record if you choose to formalize your complaint. Written records are almost always viewed as more credible than relying on memory. Whether working with an adult or youth, I encourage (and keep my own!) written records of aggressive interactions. It has proven valuable to let an organization as well as the perpetrator know that the written record is being kept.

As a consultant, I have asked clients to not only document aggressive interactions, but also to save voice mails and even tape meetings (openly, of course!) to prove the level of bullying. There was a client situation where an executive left a voice mail that included yelling, swearing, and threats to one of his employees. The employee contacted me, I asked him to save the voice mail, and I confronted the executive. The executive claimed that the voice mail never happened, but when I told him that it had been saved, his specific words were, “well I don’t remember saying the things you say I said, but if I did, I need to change.” In spite of never needing to replay the tape, it was valuable evidence to prove aggressive behavior that needed to change.

3. Keep your antennae up for others who may be on the receiving end of the bully. Seek their willingness to provide the objective documentation that supports the history of the bully’s behavior. We frequently feel embarrassed or awkward about situations where we are the victim. But there often are others who are experiencing the same behavior from the same individual. And the additional documentation is helpful to having the situation taken seriously by human resources and senior management.

In the previous example of the executive’s bullying behavior, it was the executive who encouraged victims of his wrath to step forward and talk with me. It was a valuable message to the executive to become more aware of how widespread his reputation was for having an uncontrolled temper. That documentation was a piece of value in supporting his behavior change.

4. Invest the time in figuring the cost and/or risk to the organization for putting up with the bully’s behavior. At the very least, the behavior impacts productivity. On a larger scale, the behavior can put the organization at risk for a lawsuit and the resulting unfavorable publicity. Use that information to position the need for your concern about a bully to be taken seriously.

Some years ago, while still in healthcare, I worked with an incorrigibly ill-tempered physician. His outrageous temper and tempestuous rages were legendary. But his behavior was offset by being a “million dollar doc”. That is, he was responsible for one million dollars of revenue into the hospital each year and in 1983, that was big! However, over time, his angry outbursts also led to lowered productivity, turnover, employee fear, patient dissatisfaction, and lowered respect from colleagues. One evening, the hospital administrator invited me into his office to ask me the proverbial “million dollar” question. And it was: “Should we fire this doctor?” After wondering briefly where he got the “we”, I responded, “the decision to fire him would, in no way, be mine to make, but my question to you is this, is his million dollars of revenue worth the cost of havoc and dissent throughout this hospital? And is his value worth a potential lawsuit?” Interestingly, he was fired three months later. Bullies who are unwilling to change rarely remain steady in their behavior. As they get away with their aggressiveness, that tacit acceptance is an invitation to escalate to more of the negative. An organization puts itself at greater and greater risk for legal action as the bullying increases.

5. Blow the dust off of your employee handbook. Carefully check to see if the bullying behavior is actually in conflict with company values, codes of conduct or specific policies. If you can talk from the same side of the table as your company about your concerns by also presenting how company wide conduct expectations are not being upheld, you strengthen the probability that your organization will take action. No company wants to be at high risk for the expense and lousy publicity of legal action.

Communities and businesses are choosing to invest time, energy and dollars into reducing violent behavior. Part of the solution is to take the moment-by-moment action that proves respect is upheld and rewarded. Take a stand against bullies by taking an indisputable stand for the youth and adults who must learn to work and play well together.

By: Susan B. Wilson, President, Executive Strategies