The Effects of Workplace Bullying

Workplace bullying, being traumatic, is not just an anti-social behaviour that touches negatively only the direct victim, but has serious repercussions for many more besides. The distress, pain and victimisation it causes have a ripple effect on the family and work community, leading to feelings of isolation, marginalisation, dissatisfaction with life, and general demotivation.

To seek to make a serious contribution to current management practice and to investigate ways of improving practice in the area of human relations is therefore a laudable aim, and its relevance and application are appropriate to individuals and organisations in a wide diversity of work situations.

In these pages, I am attempting to discover the effect of bullying among employees as indicated by the victimisation they experience and the frequency of stress-related illnesses. The professions are very badly affected by workplace bullying, but so also are the more ordinary jobs. This is not to imply that bullying does not take place in other work, social, or domestic situations, for it does. Bullying is one of the main stressors leading to personal dissatisfaction, demotivation, and feelings of isolation. Hence, the importance for management practice to improve staff well-being and morale is accepted and must not be underestimated; also, the importance of working hard to establish good inter-personal relationships in the social and community context is implied; and the importance of maintaining excellent relationships within the domestic situation is also a given.

We sometimes wonder why young people desire to get away from home so that they can gain their own freedom and independence. We express amazement that marriages split up without any observable reason. We cannot understand why churches seem to be in a state of continual turmoil, or why nations seem all too often to be ready for war. The incidence of suicides is increasing each year, not only among mature adults, but also among young people and even children; and we wonder why. When relationships are poor, anything is possible! And relationships become poor because the pressure of stress surpasses the ability to withstand it. Much of this stress can be put down to the incidence of bullying, both within and outside the workplace.

Stress also destroys trust between individuals and between victims and general mankind. It damages health, ruins marriages, creates tensions where none existed previously; it destroys careers, robs of joy, takes from the victim any sense of fun that once had. It removes pleasure from what was once enjoyed and life takes on a gloomier perspective.

Hazlett Lynch, Ph.D., is an academic who has researched this phenomenon and is pleased to offer the fruits of his research to a wider reading public. He would draw your attention to his website for further information on workplace bullying.

This substantial downloadable ebook is instantly accessible, written in a popular style, and combines an academic base with personal experience. Six free bonuses are included to supplement the report.

Please visit my website  and give yourself the best chance to recover from the effects of this life-threatening behaviour.

You may also be interested in visiting here to show that there is life after workplace bullying. being self-employed, or working from home, may provide you with the break you need from the trauma you were subjected to, and also to show you that you are not a loser, that you are someone who can do a real job, and earn your way in life.  Look at this site and give your self the chance you deserve.

Depression is a frequent fellow-traveller with workplace bullying.  Visit here to find out how this condition may be treated naturally and without drugs.

What is Bullying?

In this article, an attempt will be made to set out what is meant by bullying and bullying behaviour, especially as it appears in adult life. From one angle, this is not easy, since what may be very fair treatment to one person, is nothing short of bullying or harassment to another. Similarly, as each individual has a different threshold of suffering, both physically and psychologically, so what is bullying or harassment to one person may be nothing but harmless fun to another.

Further difficulties arise because of the problems associated with deciding at what point certain behaviour becomes bullying. Normal youthful banter becomes bullying when the same person or persons are repeatedly on the receiving end of negative attention, against their wishes, but they are unable to stop it.

Deciding on the longevity of certain negative and unwanted behaviours constitutes another problem. Isolated incidents do not demonstrate bullying behaviour, but that there is a definite time factor on it - weeks, months and even years - is required for it to be categorised as bullying behaviour. Hence, the difficulty in defining these terms.

That said, attempts have been made to arrive at a working understanding of bullying so that when the word is used, what is meant by it is clear.

One definition views bullying in terms of its negative impact on the victim, and sees it as the negative and damaging treatment of another in such a manner that is causes the target to suffer and feel humiliated or vulnerable, and which has a detrimental and stressful effect on him/her.

As with harassment, bullying is defined largely by the impact of the behaviour on the recipient, not its intention.

Bullying may therefore be seen primarily in terms of aggression, or long-standing violence, physical or psychological, conducted by an individual or a group, and directed against an individual who is not able to defend him/herself in the actual situation.

It is important, for the sake of accuracy, that the physical and psychological aspects of bullying are included in this definition. Bullying is something that goes on repeatedly and increasingly over a period of time, and is not just a one-off act of aggressive behaviour.