Bullying in the workplace a twilight issue?
In my first blog, I mentioned that my role is very broad at HRINZ so I get a lot of queries, topics and issues coming across my desk. Over the last two weeks one that seems to keep popping up is ‘Workplace Bullying’.
The one recent article that springs to mind was about the research completed by Massey, Auckland and Waikato Universities which personally I found interesting but very concerning. The article stated that three large industries had been surveyed and over 75% of participants had experienced some form of bullying at work. One of the research recommendations was that employers need to have robust practices and procedures to deal with workplace bullying issues. This is an interesting point especially when the Department of Labour published a fact sheet on bullying on their website a few days later.
So, this got me thinking about why this topic has suddenly started gathering attention again.
Could this be a worrying sign that workplace bullying is now on the increase due to the economic uncertainty? Or has this issue been simmering under the surface for a long time with companies but is gaining their attention due to financial and economic restrictions imposed upon them?
Personally, I think that this issue has been simmering under the surface for a long time for some employers, who have turned a blind eye to this issue, assuming that the employee was just having a whinge and that if they ignore the problem, hopefully it will go away.
I’m still undecided whether their lack of awareness comes from a lack of information and support available to businesses on how to deal with workplace bullying or just the fact that employers don’t want to face the ugly truth that this can happen in our workplaces.
My opinion is that workplace bullying should have all the attention and support it deserves from their companies and government, to ensure that no employee at any time ever, should have to suffer from workplace bullying which has detrimental effects on the employee(s), colleagues and workforce as a whole.
What is your experience dealing with this issue? Do you think this is a good time for organisations to start recognising and addressing this issue further? Or is it another hot topic that has been recycled for discussion this month only to be forgotten about next month?
I would love to hear your thoughts on ‘Workplace Bullying’.
We’ve just reviewed our policy on Harrassment and Workplace Bullying to incorporate new and insidious ways of harrassment which include Social Networking sites and texting.
The change was made after two staff memebers were found to be having an ongoing text war that spilled over into Facebook and Bebo. From our point of view the bullying was silent, and unnoticed for the most part except for the falloff in staff performance