Wired for Success

I really see a fair amount of this type of bullying in my academic workplaces since a few people with tenure have all the power and the vast majority of people without tenure have almost no power. This rarely gets addressed as a real problem either.

I saw a therapist to cope with my negative feelings, anger, anxieties from this situation, and I was told basically to "sell my soul" and to do whatever I was asked to do by the tenured professors. In other words, therapy wasn't helping me to deal with the situation. Some therapists even made me the problem because I didn't go along with the bullies.

Also, I agree that the more competent employees are the ones frequently bullied. In some organizations where my credentials stood out in a positive way, my bosses challenged me and bullied me more often than weaker employees. My independence and experience threatened them. What I found was the weaker the organization the more strong employees threaten the boss, the more prestigious and stronger the organization the more the boss is similarly attracted to prestigious and strong employees.

This article is interesting but does not go far enough, focusing only on bullying by bosses. Like the first person to comment, I was bullied by a peer in an academic setting at a major university. This person was clearly dangerous and mentally instable and people at the highest level of the university were afraid of her, even though she held a clerical position. When I went to our boss and HR about her behavior, I was told I should learn to live with it, that if they tried to do anything we would "have another Virginia Tech on our hands". I was on medical leave for several months with stress-related illness and, when my doctor wrote a letter saying I was not to return to that position, HR made me the bad guy, insisting that I return or face disciplinary action. I resigned my position. The bully still has hers. I guess having a ticking time bomb working with students every day is a risk they're willing to take.

Organize! Bullying in the workplace is just a reflection of how the corporation -- and now even state governments -- bully workers into putting in longer hours for less money. If we can end this systemic bullying then the individual bullying will also abate because companies will learn that it is not profitable for them to promote tyrants and bullies to manage their workforce. For that to happen, people have to get busy organizing. And U.S. law makes it very difficult to organize a workplace so the organizing will have to be political also. The firs step could be throwing the bums out of the Wisconsin statehouse!

As a writer, researcher and one who has experienced workplace bullying I must say the following:

Workers have more power than they realize and that is what many organizations do not want workers to know or to feel. The problem is more that workers are afraid to speak up and to confront their bully bosses and failure to do so allows them to continue their deviant behavior. Empowerment comes when you take control of the situation instead of allowing it to take control over you.

1. Document any experiences with bullying with the date, the place, who, what, when and where it happened.

2. Do not comment to others regarding your experience unless you know for sure they are not going to go behind your back and label you a trouble maker.

3. If the person or persons continue to consistently harass, bully, etc. you, then report it to your immediate supervisor if they are the one bullying you, then you must report it to that person's supervisor and maybe even one level higher (as I did in my case)sometimes one level up is not good enough because there may be two levels deep of bullies. Better to let upper management know what is going on.

4. Continue to write complaints to the management and upper management to keep them informed about the harassment. If the incidents start to escalate then the management would have the context and background to substantiate your complaints.

Many workers wait until the harassment becomes unbearable and then when they finally complain to upper management they are not believed.

Not speaking up will not save you from the bully; they thrive on intimidating people into helplessness. Standing up may at first bring more grief but in the long run if you do get fired it will be with your head held up instead of down. If they are going to fire you, nothing will stop them except someone who is wiser in upper management and that is the purpose in letting them know!

Wow,several in academe. Ok so watching a Dept chair only read one out of a stack of 30 student eval packets and rest immediately forwarded to the Professors... The one they read was the youngest and most popular of the group. They were gone for about a year after that...the person's evals were not bad at all.. new Chair and they're back..

Interesting that the clerical could bully 'up' so well..
See that frequently as well. To point of students crying, complaining with no resolution and even further inappropriate behaviors, brandy nips at work, coersion to hand over computer program passwords to evade scrutiny of their work by Admins, etc, etc. Ill employees (bullied) not allowed to take time off for serious illness unless formal action is taken by FMLA form through HR office - one situation resulting in premature birth of a child at literal cost of $50,000 to the institution's health insurance.

The monetary cost alone is enough for employers to take notice.

Good article, keep up the great work!

Granted, adults typically don’t show up on the playground or cafeteria flanked by their buddies, punch you in the face, and dare you to slug them back, but there is definitely bullying going on in the workplace.

Workplace bullying tends to be less overt, and offenders may even label them “politically astute.”

Consider these signs of workplace bullying:

Firing someone on-the-spot without cause
Pulling rank to get projects moved ahead “through the system” or to get special privileges at the expense of someone else’s career
Lying about others’ performance in an effort to stall their career or block a promotion

To read more--and learn how to combat bullying with communication techniques--read my article on the topic at http://www.booher.com/booherbanter/2011/09/20/communication-skills-count...

Like with sexual harassment, workplace bullying in the article is defined in such a way to exacerbate, or ignore, many offenders. I found most bullying to come from co-workers who behaved like they were in high school and to form "cliques". Ironically, sexual harassment complaints are the most popular form of bullying among women bullies who apply it selectively. A member of their clique says something sexist, and they laugh at it. When someone not in their clique says something that can only remotely be considered offensive, they'll file a complaint with HR. In 25 years in the workplace, I have NEVER heard or seen a complaint in my workplace or those of my associates that would fit the original definition of "sexual harassment" (men threatening women with losing their job/promotion if she didn't date them or making her unable to do her job because she was extremely uncomfortable due to sexist abuse.) It ALWAYS is a woman filing the complaint over some minor incident to go after some guy she doesn't like or appears weak. Like I said, high school.

Kudos to Dianna for her FAQ. Here's mine:

1) Check to see if certain people ALWAYS eat lunch together and rarely invite any outsiders to "their table". This is because they're incessantly gossiping about co-workers and ultimately will craft a complaint to pass onto management.

2) Lookout for "private"/public conversations. Cliques will engage in loud banter in the office about sports, TV, etc. and even risque topics such as dating and if an "outsider" joins in, they'll drop the topic. They either don't want to risk you turning them in for SH OR they want to wait to see if you'll start your own topic and they can take notes.

3) Never say no to them or confront them for bullying behavior. Even if they are aware of their behavior, they behave as part of a group and don't accept individual responsibility for their actions.

4) Don't bother with management. The bullies always get some members to chum up with management (such tactics are even part of the promotion ladder)

5) Don't bother with HR. HR takes it over to management...

6) DO get an essential skill and then quietly don't share it. If they come to you to try to learn it (in order to make you obsolete), give them out info as asked but don't volunteer anything. They'll always be one step behind. That single measure beat nearly every bully squad I dealt with.

7) DO take notes. Plenty of them. They get arrogant and make mistakes.

8) Turn them upon each other. This isn't impossible since they are naturally distrusting. One tactic is to take any request they make of you and give them a little info and suggest they finish up with one of their clique members. Cliques try to dump work on non-clique members and redirecting them upon each other will help create tension in their ranks.

The proper term is verbal abuse. I am the moderator of an abused survivors' group, and have written a paper entitled: Society's Hidden Pandemic: Verbal Abuse, Precursor to Physical Violence and a Form of BIochemical Assault.

Verbal abuse shreds ones' soul.

The Verbally Abusive Relationship by Patricia Evans is a book which I feel should be required reading for everyone on the planet.

May I suggest that the following may offer insights into this subject, though not in the usual ways:

"The Gentle Art of Verbal Self-Defense" by Suzette Haden Elgin, not just for it's content, but because she wrote it 30 years ago. We knew about bullying and verbal abuse among and between adults, or at least some us knew, so why has it taken so long for America to confront this? Did we need shootings in schools and workplaces in order to make us open our eyes, see, and think?

Robert W. Fuller's work on Rankism, the ism of all isms, the root of their tree. He wrote "Somebodies and Nobodies: Overcoming the Abuse of Rank" in 1997. If we would uproot our isms, must we not go to the roots?

Abraham Maslow's "The Psychology of Science" 1966. Whenever we turn to science, hard or soft, science or "science," it might help if we remember Maslow's concerns, penned so long ago.

I might look into that book, however (after 36 years of abuse) and years of research, I found that there is no way to defend oneself (OR respond) to verbal abuse.

Disengagement is the best thing to do.

If we understand the "secret" of an abuser, (control) we have the beginning of understanding.....they want/need....our attention and for us to continually defend/explain ourselves. They are vampires and constantly need their "fix."

In other words, it doesn't matter HOW we respond to an abuser. Why? Because they don't care what we think or feel. They are living in a "power over" realm, and not a "personal power" place.

I have been writing to the media for over 10 years to have a chance to speak of this horrific "shredding of souls" and will never stop. I just had a newspaper article written about me and what I am trying to accomplish.

I neglected to ask for a way to read the article you mentioned, the one about you. Can you provide a link? Or the title and published source?

Too often, we pay too much attention to those who speak about experiences, and not enough attention to those who speak from experiences.

This problem is so much more widespread than the general public would believe. Everyone has their own idea of what it's like to be a teacher, but only real teachers know. www.thebulliedteacher.com