Bullying Flashcards
Work place bullying involves the persistent (minimum 6 months) negative behaviour toward a co-worker in the form of mainly psychological mistreatment, but can include physical or sexual acts.
persistent
The bullying can encompass non-work-related issues, such as humiliation and insults, as well as work related issues, such as withholding vital information.
humiliation
The victim finds that they have little means of recourse against the individual acts of the bully.
victim
Much research has been done in the past two decades since public acknowledgement of this issue. This essay seeks to examine the characteristics of perpetrators, victims and the organisations they work in that increase the risk of workplace bullying.
characteristics
In regards to perpetrators of bullying it is acknowledged that much of the research has focused on the reports of victims as to the characteristics of their bullies due to the disassociation and difficulty of admitting one is a bully.
disassociation
Bullies are generally in a position of power over the victim whether as a superior or the possessor of vital information or resources.
power
They are described as having abrasive or authoritarian personalities. Some reports have also highlighted that bullies are viewed as being experts in their field.
abrasive
They are assessed as having limited ability to see things from another’s perspective and are inclined toward asserting social dominance over others.
perspective
Victims of bullying are also seen to have a consistent set of characteristics.
characteristics
Factors that were assessed as discriminatory were young age, limited work experience, anxiety, depression, low self-esteem and social skills, and neuroticism.
neuroticism
Victims are seen as submissive and try to avoid conflict. They are conscientious and dependable while being reserved and somewhat anxious and with limited coping skills in stressful situations.
conscientious
Organisational factors also play a significant role in the emergence of workplace bullying.
significant
For example, a poor working environment that is high in workload and high in stress contributes to bullying behaviour, along with role ambiguity within the team, poor leadership, sub-skill level tasks, and staff shortages.
workload
Interpersonal issues include lack of support and competition between colleagues.
support
And finally organisation values focused exclusively on goal orientation support higher instances of workplace bullying.
goal orientation
While it is important, where possible, for employees to stand up to such bullying behaviour, report incidents to senior management and kept good documentation, organisations need to take an active and preventative role in reducing workplace bullying.
employees
Organisations can do this by creating and maintaining a strong corporate culture that discourages such behaviour.
culture
Managers need to act decisively when the behaviour is reported and maintain a zero-tolerance for bullying regardless of perceived threats to the organisation in confronting the perpetrator.
decisively
To avoid such behaviours entering the work environment organisations must invest in training and effective communication amongst members.
communication
Training should include not only awareness for workers but also training for managers in how to respond to workplace bullying accusations and how to treat victims of bullying respectfully and compassionately.
victims
