Four weeks ago I steered a coaching session with a leader who was working through how to tackle a bully in her workplace. She wasn’t being bullied herself directly but a close peer was. She could see the damage that was unfolding in front of her and wanted to shift the behaviours. We explored some strategies that felt true to her values and personal leadership style. I supported her in drawing on her insights, skill, agency and support from colleagues.
Three weeks ago I came home and turned on Radio 4 in my kitchen to the horror of Trump and Vance ganging up on Zelensky. To me it smacked of bullying. Shortly after the berating of Zelensky, voices piped up all over the media. Many voices spoke of bullying, with some commentators sharing their own personal experiences and others simply shocked at never seen before “presidential” behaviour. Others were celebrating how Vance stood up for America. I felt the urge to write a blog but had other commitments that took up my time.
Two weeks ago I spoke to a leader who was sharing with me the difficulties of different personalities on their team and how the tensions were creating challenges that were starting to feel unworkable. We spent quite some time talking through the impact these tensions were having and the toxicity created. This understanding was needed to establish what was next in an effort to shift the dial.
A week ago I was standing in the vets with my poorly cat. She was explaining that his condition was stress related and unless I knew of any other stressor, the likely cause is a new cat on the block. Some meds were issued and I’ve had a fragile cat on my lap since.
My countdown is not comprehensive for the time-period of just one month. There have been plenty more conversations that imply a level of bullying occurring in their daily working environment. The countdown doesn’t include all of the power dynamic dramas that have been witnessed on the international political stage. It also doesn’t include the low level of fighting that goes on between my two cats before they even exit the cat-flap to face their external tormentors.
Bullying is a tricky subject. Whilst the research on bullying in the workplace has advanced substantially in recent years, there are still plenty of challenges when considering this psychological aggression at work. Defining bullying is the starting point of the trickiness. Neilson and Einarsen, in their review of bullying see it as “a unique, and especially detrimental, form of aggression at the workplace”.
Three factors characterise workplace bullying. Firstly the psychologically aggressive and negative behaviour is experienced on a systematic level. The next is that an employee’s experience is repeated and happens over a prolonged time period. Finally, the targeted individual for whatever reason is unable to defend themself against this mistreatment that is happening on a systematic level. On this last point, some people may be surprised to learn that leaders can experience bullying at the hands of their subordinates.
The problem with bullying is that it can be experienced in the same way as a frog in a pot of water slowly coming to the boil. It can happen slowly and incrementally, to the point where it becomes difficult to take action. These unwanted negative social behaviours can grind one down and lead to questioning one’s own sanity.
At a conference I attended a couple of years ago, there was a theme of bullying (not amongst delegates, but in the content of a number of research presentations, thankfully!). It was fascinating to listen to the research projects, and observe how there was a sub-community within Europe’s Occupational and Organisational Psychologists who study bullying. One of the presentations stood out to me. Their quantitative research studied the link between personality type and victims of harassment.
When I looked at the wider research on this question recently, I found it to be inconclusive – some research supports there are clear differences in personality dispositions between victims and non-victims of harassment. Whereas other studies don’t find the same differentiation. What struck me though, is that it is a curious thing to look at the victim, and my first response was dismay that there could be an element of victim blaming in the research hypotheses. This wasn’t the intention and it was pointed out that victims of bullies can often turn into perpetrators, so it is worthwhile studying patterns of behaviour that may offer insights into breaking the cycle of negative social behaviours.
This bigger picture, however, will unlikely be of any reassurance to someone in the midst of harassment. Instead, what can help is a sense of the red flags associated with bullying so that you can seek support to help you navigate your way out, or that of your colleague’s. This list is by no means exhaustive, so if you don’t see a behaviour particular to your situation, it doesn’t mean it’s not your reality.
- Feeling intimidated. Someone sitting in your seat may seem like a small thing, but when done consistently to displace you, it can really get under your skin. Other intimidations can be setting unrealistic deadlines, or suggestions of overwhelming consequences if work isn’t completed to time or expectations. Unnecessarily copying senior leaders into emails. Comparing you unfairly against other people’s successes.
- Being humiliated. This may be at the hands of one more people. You may experience this in team meetings or in one-to-one conversations. Being laughed at – not to be confused with someone laughing with you. Your suggestions or contributions are never good enough, dismissed or taken for their own. Something you have already agreed and discussed suddenly being reneged on as though that original conversation never happened – undermining your credibility in front of others.
- Unfair blame or constant criticism. Being the scapegoat for a team is never pleasant. We can start to create a narrative for ourselves. “It’s ok, blame me, everyone else does!” Sanctioning it may temporarily provide a form of protection, but in the long term does not make it ok for us. Leaders or line managers can do a dreadful job of giving positive feedback, and prefer to give consistently negative feedback, or no feedback even if asked. Grudges can come into play here. Someone blaming you over and over for a mistake or error that happened months ago, or blocked an apology from you. Jumping on every single micro-mistake, relentlessly flagging them. Thinking about upwards bullying, direct reports can constantly blame and not forgive their line manager for every decision they don’t like, or every wider organisational fault. It can be easy to lose sight of managers and leaders as regular people with feelings.
- Withholding information needed for the work. Promises of training yet to emerge, or job shadowing that never come to fruition. Not being able to access online folders with the important details you need. Coming to the end of a project and realising the objectives you asked for did exist but weren’t shared with you, despite your asking. Not passing down or along, messages from meetings and briefings.
- Being excluded from meetings or socials. Quite simply, you just aren’t invited to meetings, especially the ones where important decisions get made. When you enquire about your invite, it may be brushed off as “we thought you were busy/uninterested/on holiday”. If you are in the room, questioning your right to attend. You may discover that others head off down to the pub, café or golf course and an invite never lands in your WhatsApp. There may be WhatsApp groups that don’t have your name in them. Talking of names, people who deadname, mispronoun or consistently use the wrong name, wrong spelling or wrong pronunciation. Other ways of excluding people when they are physically present are many, but can sound like “you’re too young to understand”, or constantly harking back to “the good old times” when the team didn’t include you.
- Sabotaging work. Speaking at length in your meetings or training sessions, so that there’s not enough time to go through all everything you need to share or discuss. Your shared files accidentally getting deleted or corrupted. Supplying inaccurate information or data. Working towards different objectives, or only working towards an agenda that is self-serving; sabotaging by neglecting shared objectives.
- Micromanaging. This is the most common line manager activity I hear people complain about in my coaching sessions. Micromanaging is rife in across many organisations. Alone, it’s unlikely to be enough to constitute bullying, but it is enough to make people walk out of otherwise decent jobs or go off sick. Even the most senior of leaders can spend their time in the weeds interfering with the minutiae of the work of those who report into them. It inspires nothing but despair and disengagement from those being micromanaged.
Red flags may be helpful in identifying the experience of bullying, but research shows that bullies never admit to being a bully, unless they are on some kind of a one-person hero mission to out-bully existing bullies. A debatable tactic. Two wrongs don’t make a right and it’s not something to be ignored. The impact of bullying is costly to organisations: time off sick, presenteeism, poor productivity, creativity and innovation, grievances and poor organisational reputation.
My work on confidence shows that developing authentic confidence in people at work creates environments where bullying is less likely to occur. Rather than punishing people for their behaviour, work to develop more positive behaviours in the workplace. A leader lacking in self-confidence may follow the rulebook to always be safe, covering their own back. But this tactic means their team may suffer because the leader doesn’t have the confidence to treat each person as an individual with unique needs. Working with each individual requires getting to know them, investing time in listening and coaching. By building authentic confidence leaders will be competent, connected and authentic in their work, with the right mindset for growth and success. This in turn leads to a transformational style of leadership where teams flourish and grow.
Author: Dr Anna Kane