Many of these examples can be a part of everyday work life. They can be described as bullying when there is a consistent, sustained pattern over time that isn't altered when the bully is alerted to the unacceptable nature of the comment or behaviour.
- Abusive, insulting or offensive language
- Behaviour or language that frightens, humiliates, belittles or degrades, including yelled criticism
- Belittling your contributions
- Constant nit-picking and faultfinding, attempts to undermine
- Displaying material that is degrading or offending
- Distorting your comments
- Deadlines changed without informing you
- Degrading comments
- Enlisting others to question and undermine your contributions, being Excluded
- Falsifying documents purported to be from you, constant Fault finding
- Going to a supervisor to cast doubts on your work
- Hiring another less qualified person to squeeze you out
- Information may be passed on too late for action
- Ignoring and Isolating
- Intruding on a person’s space by pestering, spying or tampering with their personal effects or work equipment
- Jokes at your expense that aren't funny
- Leave is often refused
- Making threats either veiled or subtly, being given Menial tasks
- Misrepresentation of your ideas or contributions, being marginalized
- Never being adequately supported
- Overloading with work, may be given menial tasks, or constant night and weekend shifts
- your work may be Plagiarised
- Pestering
- Questioning your motives, work habits, reliability, emotional state
- Refusal to acknowledge your contribution
- Responsibilities may be increased without adequate remuneration or recognition
- Spreading gossip, rumours and innuendo of a malicious nature
- Being Singled out and treated differently
- Teasing or regularly making you the brunt of practical jokes
- Threats that if you complain, disciplinary action will be taken
- Trivializing your contributions
- Tampering with your personal effects
- Undermining your position, status, worth and value. Unjustified criticism
- Unreasonable expectations
- Unfair treatment in relation to accessing workplace entitlements, such as leave or training
- using Value laden comments to discredit you
- Work equipment may be hidden, locked away. You may need to grovel to gain access to it
- Yelling, in private, or in front of others
- may be academically below average
- aggressive, physically strong, willing to resort to violence
- attention-seeking
- thrives on control and dominance
- cowardly
- poor communication skills
- disrespectful and contemptuous of other children and adults
- divisive, dysfunctional, disruptive
- may have a dysfunctional home life
- lacks empathy
- envious
- exploits others
- needs to impress
- immature in behaviour and emotions
- insecure
- lies frequently
- needs to be respected but can't distinguish between "respect" and "fear"
- does not accept responsibility
- poor social skills
- low self-esteem
- thinks it fun to torment and hurt children who are less physically strong
- uncaring
Tomorrow, I'll look at the Climate in which the bully operates and touch on the Courage needed to stand up to a bully.
The book Working with Mean Girls by Meredith fuller is an excellent resource for both men and women experiencing bullying at work. There are also useful tips for students. Review here.
There are many outstanding resources on line. A couple I find useful are Bullying. No way! an Australian resource for teachers and students, and a UK site Bully On Line. The Facebook group eBossWatch (here) regularly posts links to articles and information on workplace bullying. This is in no way an exhaustive list, and each country will no doubt have equally good or more relevant websites.
If you're being bullied please seek advice from a professional health care practitioner experienced in this area.
Over at jumping aground I'm spending the month playing with alliteration.
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13 comments:
This is a great resource, Sue! Thanks for daring to be a daniel.
Jan Morrison
Wow! I would never have thought all those traits were indicators of bullying. I really am shocked.
I suppose, at some time, we've all exhibited them, too! That worries me.
Jan, thanks, I hope I can keep it up!
Roberto, yes we can all be nasty and make ill-advised comments. The difference is that the bully is persistent in his or her use of these traits and will rarely have any genuine regret that they have tormented someone, in fact they'll often express surprise. If an apology is forthcoming it may be grudging, empty and even flippant. They can have a kind of Jekyll and Hyde personality, they can turn on the charm when necessary, but be vindictive in private. Some are described as a 'snake in the grass'. The lack of let up is the key, as is the quantity of these traits exhibited. Hopefully I'll be able to cover this adequately over the month. Please keep me to task and ask questions as necessary.
interesting Sue. You seem to be a real expert on this topic AND you already have c planned whereas I am winging it. Only 24 more to go!
David, certainly not an expert, but I have a professional interest in it. 24 huh....HELP! I think I've bitten off more than I can chew.
It's such an important topic! My daughter is currently experiencing the teenage girl variety which is its own special kind of hell. Girls can be so manipulative and cliquey, and their memories are so much longer than boys. I haven't thought about it in adults though--very good reminder of what to watch for (and who might need sticking up for)
Hart, and sadly some of those same girls go up to be adult bullies, certainly not all, but they're there. Hopefully your daughter is getting support from the school as well as from you.
Hi Sue, thanks for your sweet comment on not so sweet smelling durian over at my blog, and for following.
And thanks for sharing those annoying traits. I dread to think any of my children or grandchildren being a victim of bullies.
Grandpa
Life on The Farm
...glad I dropped by. As a father of three, bullying is an ongoing issue that my wife and I watch out for regularly. The "Class Bully" is as old as time itself, and curiously is just now being linked to such travesties as teen suicide and youth addictions. It's a very sad, very real problem in our society. Thanks for touching on this issue.
EL
I'm nodding my head at so many things here. Bullies are the bane of my life. Bullied as a chile, now the mother of a son who is bullied. There's never enough awareness of this.
Great post, Sue! And wow - A-Z-ing on BOTH blogs??!!??!! I'm awed.
I wish everyone would help stomp out bullying for good. Thanks for these great awareness posts. :)
A great list you've created. I especially feel sorry for little kids who get picked on by the bullies and often the school system closes their eyes. Thank you for stopping at my blog.
Manzanita
Wanna buy a duck
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