Workplace Bullying, Harassment, Mobbing and Victimisation. Have you ever been bullied by a psychopath? If not, then you are lucky...for now! as chances are you will eventually come across their path sooner or later. Psychopaths and Bullies are everywhere in Australian corporate offices.
How to identify the bully, the impact & effects of bullying and how to survive.
If there is a bully lurking behind you, move forward to put the bully truly Behind You.
If you run a company in California, you have to take state-mandated anti-harassment training every two years.
This October, Matt MacInnis, founder of a digital distribution business called Inkling, clicked through two hours’ worth of slides about inappropriate touching and sexual comments in an online course produced by an HR services company. As he answered multiple-choice questions to prove he’d paid attention, a thought occurred to him: This is a farce. MacInnis couldn’t see how an online training course would keep “an a--hole from still being an a--hole,” as he puts it. “There is a laudable goal, but the way we address sexual harassment now,the whole system is flawed,” he says. “I mean, is there anti-murder training?”
The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC), which by law must investigate all federal harassment claims before they can proceed in court, received 13,000 sexual-harassment complaints last year (16 percent of them from men), outpacing the number it received for racial, ethnic, or religious discrimination. “We by no means think that’s the extent of the harassment,” says Peggy Mastroianni, the organization’s legal counsel. She estimates that as many as 90 percent of people who experience sexually inappropriate behavior at work never take formal action. Many who do are contractually obligated to litigate through private arbitration, which the EEOC can’t track. But decades of surveys show that harassment remains prevalent: In a 1981 Harvard Business Review survey, 60 percent of women said they’d been “eyed up and down” by male co-workers; last year the EEOC reported that somewhere from 50 percent to 75 percent of women have experienced sexual comments or touches that made them feel uneasy at work.
For more than three decades, U.S. companies and institutions have addressed such behavior through corporate policies and awareness programs, although there’s little evidence they’re effective. Compliance training makes up a sizable portion of what market-research company IBISWorld estimates is a $4 billion HR software market. In California, which has the most robust training requirements of any state, companies spend hundreds of millions of dollars on courses every year. About 80 percent of companies offer some form of training, although only three states—Connecticut and Maine, in addition to California—require them to do so. (Thirteen more states order training for at least some government employees.) They use all sorts of courses, produced by dozens of companies, from the cut-and-dried to risible theatrical re-creations.
Skillsoft makes compliance videos covering everything from data privacy to environmental sustainability for about 7,000 companies; it leans heavily on hired actors who demonstrate legal definitions in generic corporate scenes. HR Learning Center advertises one of its courses with a picture of a man and a woman making out on top of a filing cabinet. Inspired eLearning, which MacInnis used at Inkling, starts one of its videos with the words “charges of sexual and other forms of harassment can land your company in court,” followed by a picture of a frightened gray-haired man on what appears to be a witness stand. Emtrain, which creates online courses and runs in-person events for companies such as Chevron, Netflix, and Nordstrom, urges employees to mentally color-code their comments—green is respectful, red is offensive—and to call out their co-workers with gentle warnings such as “that’s a little orange.”
Early versions of these programs first cropped up in the 1980s, but their use didn’t pick up until two U.S. Supreme Court decisions in 1998 clarified when companies can be held liable for harassment. In the cases, which considered what’s known as “hostile work environment” harassment (frequent sexualized comments or touches), as opposed to the “quid pro quo” variety (the classic “sleep with me or you’re fired”), the court decided that a company will be held liable when a boss harasses a subordinate unless it can prove that it takes steps to prevent and address such behavior.
Catchall policies that disavowed harassment quickly became the norm. Pick any major institution today, and you’ll find one: “We do not tolerate harassment or inappropriate conduct,” JPMorgan Chase’s official code of conduct reads. Apple is committed to “a workplace free of harassment.” In addition to the standard prohibitory language, Google urges its employees to “be excellent to each other.” Goldman Sachs says it does “not tolerate any form of discrimination prohibited by law.” Despite the recent outpouring of harassment complaints regarding former Fox News Chairman Roger Ailes, the policy at the network’s parent company, 21st Century Fox, says that “unwelcome sexual advances [or] … verbal or physical conduct of a sexual nature” aren’t allowed, and people should feel free to report any harassment they see or experience.
These policies often go hand in hand with the training courses, which typically cover the legal definition of harassment and what kind of behavior can get people into trouble. Maine and Connecticut passed their laws requiring training in 1992, in direct response to the Supreme Court confirmation hearings for Clarence Thomas. California followed suit in 2004 after 16 women accused then-Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger of harassment. (“With your background, you probably ought to sign it,” Sarah Reyes, the state assemblywoman who introduced the bill, said about Schwarzenegger at the time.) But according to employment attorneys, HR managers, and the companies that design the courses, their goal isn’t to stop harassment—it’s to guard against lawsuits.
“You’re building a defense in the event of an incident, passing liability from the organization to the individual,” says Eugene Van Biert, vice president for global compliance solutions at Skillsoft. His company offers different levels of training; he says most of its clients pick the basic online course that employees click through to learn the legal do’s and don’ts. “They want to generate a record so they can say they’ve done it, then they want to move on,” he says. Skillsoft’s most comprehensive program includes a way for people to report harassment they’ve experienced in the past, but Van Biert says fewer than 20 percent of his clients choose the service.
Despite its popularity, there’s little research on this kind of training. Last year the EEOC established a task force to investigate workplace harassment and concluded that “much of the training done over the last 30 years has not worked as a prevention tool.” The commission could find only three studies, the most recent of which is 15 years old, that evaluated training programs over time at companies. “These training companies are making buttloads of money off these courses, but what little information we have on them raises serious questions about their efficacy,” says Vicki Magley, an organizational psychology professor at the University of Connecticut who co-authored two of the studies. There’s other academic research, Magley says, but it usually deals with fictional programs designed by researchers rather than actual courses that companies might use. In her experience, compliance courses help employees understand the definition of sexual harassment, but don’t change people’s behavior. “I have absolutely no faith that any kind of an online course is going to do anything to stop harassment,” she says.
The companies that design the courses—and the HR departments that implement them—also have trouble measuring their impact. “I kind of don’t have any answers,” says Phyllis Hartman, an HR consultant who’s been working on anti-harassment training for 25 years. “You just sort of do it and hope it’ll be better.” Emtrain’s chief executive officer, Janine Yancey, says her company plans to publish a report demonstrating how its services decrease harassment complaints, but it hasn’t released any results yet. As a researcher, Magley once teamed up with a company to evaluate its anti-harassment training but had to discontinue her study after the company got nervous about legal liability should she find it didn’t work. “The attorneys from this company came in and said, ‘We are not finding out that information.’ They pulled out of the study because they didn’t want to know,” she says. “If we could ask companies, ‘Have you had fewer HR complaints after taking our training?’ ” says Felix Odigie, Inspired eLearning’s CEO, “and gather that kind of intel, it would be gold. But I don’t know what company would provide that information. I asked the head of my own HR department if they’d be comfortable with that, and she looked at me like I had two heads.”
Focusing on the legal limits of harassment can make these courses culturally tone-deaf. Last year an internal investigation by the University of California at Berkeley found that a renowned astronomy professor, Geoff Marcy, had for more than a decade repeatedly groped female students who worked in his lab. (Marcy referred Bloomberg Businessweek to his lawyer, who did not respond.) And yet the school’s online anti-harassment training course included a hypothetical scenario that was almost the opposite of what the university was dealing with. The course described a fictional female student who “is attracted to her dissertation advisor, Dr. Randy Risktaker, and for months has repeatedly asked him out on dates.” Instead of discouraging a relationship, Berkeley’s training course noted that legally, Randy Risktaker could date the student as long as he first stopped being her adviser. “I have to tell you, that is not a problem most of us encounter as professors,” says Michael Eisen, a biology professor at Berkeley who took the course.
Sindy Warren, an employment attorney whose firm, Warren and Associates, investigates workplace harassment, says the best courses go beyond the law. “If you draw lines around behavior that’s just illegal, you’re missing the broader point. Lots of things are not illegal, but they’re not respectful or appropriate,” she says. But she’s quick to point out that compliance training is better than no training at all. The EEOC’s task force doesn’t want to do away with it either; it recommends that companies supplement training with initiatives that emphasize broader topics such as civility and respect.
MacInnis says he tries to do that at Inkling. Because his company has only 150 employees, he often meets one-on-one with people and asks about their concerns. Not long ago, for instance, he had lunch with a recent college graduate, and they wound up talking about the gender wage gap most of the time because it was on her mind. “The idea is that more nuanced engagement will create the kind of environment where, if it’s necessary, people can bring it up,” he says.
Even so, in the seven years since he founded his company, MacInnis has dealt with a few internal harassment cases. “I have friends who are CEOs who’ve dealt with way more gnarly stuff than I have,” he says. “I’d like to say I’m lucky, but usually there’s some sort of observable behavior that you can see before it rises to the level of something really serious.”
A TOWNSVILLE Hospital employee says she tried to commit suicide twice following ongoing workplace bullying and harassment.
Jodi Miller (pictured) said she wanted to share her story so to give others strength to come forward with their experiences. It comes after the Bulletin
revealed numerous employees across the Townsville Hospital and Kirwan
Health Campus had lodged bullying complaints. Since then, 15 employees
have contacted the Bulletin to discuss their experiences.
Ms Miller has been seeing a psychologist for anxiety that she said was caused from chronic fatigue and workplace issues.
She
said while she had been a victim of verbal abuse, failure to address
workload issues and roster adjustments were what “tipped her over”. “I
asked for my rosters to be adjusted between July and August 2015,” she
said. “I was also working every weekend, there was no balance between
work and my family life.”
Ms Miller said there was never enough people on during her night shift, leaving her feeling exhausted. Ms Miller said when her roster was adjusted, it wasn’t what she had requested. “I took three months off with chronic fatigue and then returned to work again on July 13,” she said.
Ms
Miller said she hadn’t been back an hour before she was requested to
help with a patient who became aggressive and bit her on the arm. “I finished the job and burst into tears,” she said. “I went straight to the doctors and was told I had high blood pressure, which I have never had.” Ms Miller said she applied for a work cover claim however it was denied. She
said following an independent psychiatric investigation, it was
determined that the bite on her forearm was not the main cause for her
poor mental health and was told she couldn’t go back to work for three
months.
“My issue is now sitting with Australian Workers’ Union lawyers to see if I can overturn the decision,” she said. Ms Miller said she wanted to bring awareness to workplace bullying. “I tried taking my own life twice, it tipped me over,” she said. Townsville
Hospital and Health Service chief operating officer Kieran Keyes said
the matters raised by Ms Miller had been investigated and welcomed the
opportunity to discuss them with her. “The health service has not received any grievances relating to workplace harassment or bullying from Ms Miller,” he said.
“A
number of the matters raised by Ms Miller are protected by employee
privacy and we remain committed to protecting the privacy of our staff. “We
work with staff to ensure rosters are assigned to ensure a balance
between work and family commitments as well as the organisation’s
operational requirements.” Mr Keyes said there were nine patient handlers rostered on night shifts.
A
secret investigation has been ordered into allegations of workplace
bullying against one of Queensland’s most senior industrial umpires. The high-ranking official within a Queensland government agency pockets $400,000 a year.
Justice
Department deputy director-general Simon Blackwood commissioned the
almost unprecedented independent probe into Queensland Industrial Court
vice-president Dianne Linnane after she allegedly bullied a fellow
judicial officer.
Melbourne lawyer
Barry Sherriff has been quietly conducting interviews for months, after
being asked to investigate whether Ms Linnane — who is paid an annual
base salary of nearly $400,000 and has tenure until she is 70 — breached
the state’s Work Health and Safety Act.
She is alleged to have bullied Industrial Court commissioner Minna Knight.
The
judicial officers serve on the Industrial Court and Queensland
Industrial Relations Commission, which are responsible for resolving
workplace disputes. The Australian understands Ms Linnane denies the allegations being investigated by Mr Sherriff and is considering legal options.
The Australian is
not suggesting Ms Linnane engaged in the conduct, only that she is
being investigated for it. She did not respond to questions from this
paper put through the court’s registry yesterday.
The case is highly sensitive for the state, given judges’ right to immunity from prosecution and the separation of powers.
It is doubtful any action could be taken against Ms Linnane by the government even if the allegations were proven.
Under
Queensland law, the only way to remove a judicial officer from their
office is for the governor to order the removal after a vote of
parliament for “mental or physical incapacity” or “misbehaviour”.
It
is unlikely that bullying allegations against Ms Linnane would justify
such an action, and Mr Sherriff is not conducting a general
investigation into her fitness as a judicial officer. Under the
Industrial Relations Act, judicial officers such as Ms Linnane are
afforded immunities similar to Supreme Court judges for performing
their duties.
The Linnane stoush spilt
into the courtroom recently when Industrial Court president and Supreme
Court judge Glenn Martin was forced to order Ms Linnane be removed
from hearing an unrelated case in which Dr Blackwood would be a key
witness.
The case involved public
servant Alain D’Hotman De Villiers, who was sacked by Dr Blackwood from
the Office of Industrial Relations. Lawyers for both the bureaucrat and
the government asked Ms Linnane to recuse herself after she agreed to
sign a notice ordering the production of documents.
The
notice required the production of documents “showing Simon Blackwood’s
involvement in responding to any complaint or complaints” about or
involving Ms Linnane in the past five years, and all documents relating
to the appointment of an investigator of any such complaints.
In
a two-minute hearing in late October, Ms Linnane refused to hear
arguments that she should recuse herself for apprehended bias. The
government and Mr De Villiers’s lawyers appealed, and Justice Martin
ruled on November 3 that she be recused because “the necessary ground
for establishing apprehended bias has clearly been made out”.
When contacted by The Australian to
give Ms Linnane a right of reply, her solicitor, Glen Cranny, said “it
would not be appropriate to comment further at this point in time”.
Commissioner Knight and Dr Blackwood declined to comment.
Industrial
Relations Minister Grace Grace said she was “aware” of the independent
investigation but it was “the sole responsibility of the department”.
Aged
in her mid-60s, Ms Linnane was appointed to both the Queensland
Industrial Relations Commission and the Industrial Court by the Beattie
Labor government in 1999 after a career as a barrister.
In 2010, Right to Information documents obtained by The Courier-Mail
revealed a long-running stoush between Ms Linnane and then-commissioner
Don Brown, in which she ordered him not to enter the commission’s
tearoom, library and his own chambers.
Humiliation, exclusion, harassment and unwanted sexual advances.
New research has found adult employees are increasingly finding
themselves struggling at work and are victims of cruel and juvenile
taunts that were once exclusively reserved for the school yard. However, is workplace bullying on the rise, or has there been a shift
in culture to where it is no longer tolerated? With employees more
confident to report abuse. Government body, Safe Work Australia, has released a report that
found one in ten employees claim they have been bullied at work, either
by a boss, colleague or customer. The research also found employees believe that it is not co-workers, but supervisors who commit majority of the bullying. Alarmingly, instances of isolated conflict are even more prevalent,
with one in three employees saying they have been verbally berated,
while another one in four have said to have been publicly humiliated. One in five also report to have been physically assaulted by a customer, client or in the medical industry, a patient. Safe Work Australia found that bullying is most likely to occur in
the power and water supply sectors or the transport and mining
industries. It is also women who are more likely to be physically
assaulted or sexually harassed. On the other hand men are subject to being sworn at or racially abused. And the implications of such bullying don’t come cheap. These heartless acts are costing us $36 billion a year in healthcare and lost business productivity, according to the report. Meanwhile a number of women have spoken out about what it feels like when a customer crosses the line. Fairfax spoke to about 20 women who work across a range of industries including hospitality, retail, education and health. Many women confessed to verbal or physical harassment and in some cases rape and stalking incidents also occurred. Many employees believe putting up with such events is “just part of
the job” however many are unaware that a change to the Sex
Discrimination Act has made it illegal for customers to sexually harass
employees. However the lack of campaigns to protect staff against these acts has many fuming. “If we were seeing those sorts of injury rates for a piece of
machinery, you’d expect to see ads on TV, there would be approved
training, there’d be prosecutions,” workplace relations and
discrimination lawyer Lisa Heap argued. “You’d have to conclude it’s entrenched sexism in regulating authorities.” Any unwelcome sexual behaviour which makes a person feel humiliated, offended or intimated falls under the new law. Source: https://tenplay.com.au/news/national/november/bullying-and-sexual-harassment-rife-in-the-workplace
Bullying can be as harmful in the workplace
as it is in schools, causing well-understood effects on people, plus a
long list of challenges for organisations. More sobering to business
leaders are the irrefutable statistics – bullying is costing businesses
billions annually.
As explained by Lisa Castle, the vice president of
human resources at the University of British Columbia in Canada:
"Its
impact is enormous: disengagement; loss of creativity and productivity;
sick leave, benefit and turnover costs." For every short-term result
that a bully achieves, there is a list of longer-term negative business
impacts that far outweigh any temporary benefits.
The
good news is that increased public awareness, research, and an expanded
appreciation of the costs/effects of bullying have paved the way for
efforts to address it.
Further, there are many tools, experts and ideas
for formulating an effective action plan. In the highly diverse Middle
Eastern workplaces, to effectively address bullying, it is essential to
have skills and a common language to talk about difficult things, across
differences and in a consistent manner. While managing aggressive
behaviour is difficult, it’s worth speaking up and taking action – for
you, your workplace culture and the bottom line. Having
a discussion about bullying is never enjoyable but that doesn’t mean it
should be avoided. Most organisations are generally unprepared and
terrible at managing workplace bullying. There are many contributors: Business leaders are afraid to confront bullies
While
most leaders are aware that workplace harassment is a severe problem,
they are often afraid to deal with it. Bullying is a sensitive topic
because it requires a difficult discussion – confrontation, conflict and
courage as much as it requires tools. Fear often feeds the problem:
fear of the actual confrontation, of what else might be uncovered. Having
talked with plenty of executives, it is fair to state that fear of
having that discussion is a serious impediment to eliminating the issue.
The result is paralysis, and so the bullying continues.
A focus on results In
our hyper-competitive world, there are intense demands for results.
Organisations become so focused on short-term results that they ignore
how they are achieved. If there is one commonality among bullies, it’s a
gift for whipping up results. Misinterpretation of a "competitive workplace" Organisations
confuse healthy competition with a "survival of the fittest" model for
workplace behaviour. There have been stories about Amazon, Apple and
other global companies where staff members are regularly challenged to
outperform their colleagues using over-the -top rewards for the winner. It
is possible to have both workplace respect and healthy competition.
Staff members do not need to be abused to perform to their fullest. The
truth is that by addressing bullying and empowering staff, leaders
improve workplace culture, increase employee engagement and motivate
innovation. A belief that bullying is a leadership style Bullying
is the opposite of leadership. In my opinion, executives who use this
excuse to support a tormentor are probably afraid to confront the
problem. They discount the level of the bullying, rationalise it as a
leadership issue or find another excuse to avoid actively engaging. They
leave the mess alone, hoping it will sort itself out. That never
happens if leaders don’t speak up.
Lack of effective policies Most
organisations have a harassment policy that outlines what is
unacceptable workplace behaviour. However, many organisations don’t
have an effective complaints process. Without a fair, impartial,
confidential and effective complaints and conflict resolution processes,
the policy is meaningless. The above reasons are why
organisations fail to respond effectively to cases of bullying.
There
are undoubtedly others, too. What is important is that even though the
vast majority of leaders acknowledge the problem should be eradicated,
very few actually do. The effect on organisational success is
significant and totally preventable. With the help of others and a
willingness to confront the problem head-on, long-term improvements to
the workplace culture and bottom line await. by: Paul
Pelletier a consultant with PDSi, a coaching and leadership development
company that has created its own certified programme, HardTalk, to help
individuals and teams have the difficult conversations necessary for
success Source
The interrogation came out of the blue and continued mercilessly, even while she was doubled over sobbing.
The
woman, who was 41 at the time of the incident, has been awarded more
than $1 million in a negotiated workplace bullying settlement.
See here for video interview with Lawyer Australia's million dollar workplace bullying payoutThe lawyer of a woman who was the victim of workplace bullying explains the details of the million dollar case.
The bullying she experienced at a NSW government agency five years ago has rendered her unable to ever work again.
As two
bosses hurled accusations at her during a meeting called to provide her
with feedback on an internal job application, the woman who could only
speak on the condition of anonymity, said she was in shock and
disbelief.
Now aged 46, the victim still has no idea what motivated the attack. Photo: Louie DovisNow aged 46, she still has no idea what motivated the attack
which had come without any warning. A string of psychiatrists have
provided evidence that her mental injury has rendered her unable to
return to work. "I can never get those five years back. I can't do what I used to do," she said.
"My career was going well. The agency had just paid for me to do a
public service management course. I thought I was earmarked for senior
management and then this happened." The woman's lawyer, Lucinda
Gunning from Carroll and O'Dea Lawyers in Sydney, said the more
than $1 million payout was made up of two components – one for total and
permanent disablement, which was paid out by a private insurer, and a
workers compensation payment, for past and future earning capacity.
Lucinda Gunning from Carroll & O'Dea Lawyers says the $1m payout
is the highest sum she has seen paid for a workplace bullying claim. Photo: Ryan Stuart"In my experience, this is the highest sum that I have seen paid for a workplace bullying claim," she said. Like many cases of workplace bullying, the circumstances at first glance appear trivial.
The
woman who worked in middle management had made an error in
an internal application for another job within her state government
agency. She had accidentally duplicated an answer to one question in
response to another. She says she accepted the error had
effectively invalidated the application. However, her bosses
insisted on meeting to provide feedback despite her saying it was
unnecessary because she understood her error.
I can never walk into a room with two people in an interview again because of the way they dealt with me.
When she sat down with a male and female supervisor, they accused her
of having an inappropriate relationship in the office and of passing
off a colleague's ideas as her own, which she flatly denies. "I was blindsided by it. I couldn't understand where the allegations were coming from," she says. "Had
they given me some sort of notice or asked me in a less hostile
environment, I could explain it. It was just incorrect. But they just
kept going and going. "I was sobbing and doubled over and they were still making allegations about information sharing. "It just didn't stop. At one point they said we can put you in contact with the counselling service. "I
said I will absolutely need it after this meeting and still they went
on. I don't know why I didn't walk out. It went on for ages." When the meeting was finally over, the public servant went on annual leave. When she returned to work, she was forced to work with one of the supervisors who had bullied her in the meeting. "I
asked to be moved out of that department. But they felt the need to
humiliate me further by sitting me outside their office and the team I
used to manage," she said. "I wasn't allowed to contribute. "I couldn't breath in there. I felt so useless. "It got to the point where I would sit in the bathroom for six hours and no one would notice I was there. "I didn't do any work because I couldn't." The
woman, who described herself as a resilient person before the
experience with bullying, was sent to a mediation session with the
female supervisor. "The woman attacked me again to the point where the mediator told her to stop. It was horrible," she said. "She
said I had given another industry representative information about a
meeting for stakeholders. But they had sent out a notice of the meeting.
It was ridiculous. There was a clear explanation for how someone I was
accused of telling found out about the meeting. "I was trying to explain it to them, but they wouldn't listen. "The
woman accused me of trying to take credit for someone else's work in my
job application. I said I wasn't taking credit, I had delegated the
work and I was her boss. "The tone of the meeting could have been
very different. They could have just said: 'Could you just please go
through this with me'. "But they were only interested in attacking me. "As a result they changed my life. I did not leave that office the same person I was when I arrived." By May, 2012, the woman left the organisation feeling "hopeless". Every time she entered a lift she would look to the ground to see if she could identify the shoes of her supervisors. "I was terrified. I couldn't be near them," she said. The woman's complaints were initially investigated in house in what she describes as an unfair process. It took five years to finalise her claim during which insurance companies put her and her children under surveillance. "This is a psychological injury, not a physical one," she said. "Everything was challenged. I was pushed to the absolute limit. I'm surprised I'm actually still here." After five years of "hell", the woman said she had hoped to feel better now the pressure is off. "But I still don't," she said. "I can never get those five years back. I can't do what I used to do."
Do you think backbiting is happening at your workplace or place of study?
Glenn
Rolfsen's talk is about what contributes to a toxic work environment
and what the significant factors are that determine our working life
quality. His approach addresses how to achieve a permanent end to
slander and bullying among adults in the workplace. Glenn D. Rolfsen is a psychotherapist working in corporate health
service in Oslo.
He has also worked as a teacher to educate gestalt
therapists in Norway and several European countries. He is particularly
concerned with the psychosocial work environment in enterprises. As
corporate counsel and leadership consultant, he works daily to improve
working life quality for employees.
There are many great TED Talks on bullying in the workplace, here is one by English Professor Clive Boddy, based on his research findings looking at the link between Corporate Psychopaths and bullying, in Australian and the UK workplace.
Characteristics of Bullies: Enjoy hurting others, cruel, selfish, parasitic, Machiavellian, psychopathic, callous, disrespectful, abusive, lacking in empathy remorse or guilt, and good at political networking skills. 'Corporate Psychopaths are those people who go into organisational and corporate positions rather than a criminal career.' 'Psychologists have slowly come to realised that those from better socio-economic background, perhaps with a good education and good family backgrounds, have worked out early that it's far easier to get the power, prestige and money that they want from a Corporate career, than from a criminal career.' 'Psychopaths have absolutely no conscious'
2008 Study revealed:
AUSTRALIA * 1% of people (Corporate Psychopaths) accounted for the presence of at least 26% of all bullying by Australian mangers (from study sample of 346) * Under normal managers, employees encountered bullying 9x per year * Under Corporate Psychopaths, employees encountered bullying 64x per year
UK * Found more bullying and more Psychopaths in the UK.* 1% of people (Corporate Psychopaths) accounted for the presence of at least 36% of all bullying by Australian mangers * Under normal managers, employees encountered bullying 13x per year * Under Corporate Psychopaths, employees encountered bullying 84x per year Link between Corporate Psychopaths and Bullying WHY DOES BULLYING OCCUR IN THE FIRST PLACE?
* Psychopaths bully as it's predatory, they enjoy doing it, they like to hurt people and damage their careers. * 'Instrumental Bullying' - to create confusion and chaos around them, enables them to form their own agenda to promote themselves, creating a smoke screen so they can get on with their agenda. This explains why Psychopaths get promoted over others, as they are manipulators. *Linking at an organisational level eg: Enron, was reported to have a culture of bullying, of staff, agencies, suppliers, to keep them all in check to perpetuate the fraud. The same culture was found in banking institutions during the Global Financial Crisis, don't ask questions or you'll get into trouble' which covers up fraud.
Prof Clive Boddy is a Professor of Leadership and Organizational Behavior at
Middlesex University in England. For the past seven years, he has
studied the evidence and effects of toxic leadership, and in particular
the influence of the presence of corporate psychopaths on various
workplace outcomes, including on levels of conflict and bullying at
work.
Stevie-Lee Semgreen resigned from Townsville Hospital in June this year
She did a year of night shift and claims hospital ignored her complaints
Managers and supervisors at the hospital have been accused of bullying
Several employees suffer panic attacks, intense anger or feeling suicidal
The hospital said it provides effective channels for employees to complain
Stevie-Lee Semgreen worked on night
shift for an entire year at Townsville Hospital until she resigned in
June, saying her complaints were ignored by the hospital's management
A
WOMAN has resigned from Townsville Hospital, Queensland, Australia claiming a toxic work
environment has left several employees suicidal and others with
post-traumatic stress disorder.
Managers and supervisors have been accused of bullying and harassing staff over the past three years. Several
employees have taken sick and stress leave while others have suffered
from panic attacks, severe anger and post-traumatic stress disorders,
staff members claim.
They said incidents of verbal abuse had been
reported, including inappropriate comments on people’s weight and
workers being told they were not wanted on their rounds.
One woman, who chose to remain
anonymous, launched an external review of Townsville Hospital after she
lodged a complaint saying she felt suicidal
Hospital managers have been accused of
bullying over a three-year period leaving several staffers suffering
panic attacks, post-traumatic stress disorders and suicidal thoughts
(stock image)
The Bulletin
has been told dozens of complaints had been made to Townsville
Hospital’s human resources department and the Australian Workers Union,
but workplace issues, including heavy workloads, were being ignored.
However,
Townsville Hospital and Health Service acting chief executive Kieran
Keyes said the hospital had proven and effective channels for staff
members to escalate concerns. Former
employee Stevie-lee Semgreen said she resigned as a result of the
ongoing issues in June and has since moved to the Sunshine Coast. Ms Semgreen, who worked for a year on permanent night shift, said her complaints were brushed aside. “I was told by one woman at AWU that by putting in a complaint, I was putting a target on my own back,” she said. “I had asked a few times if I could take my issues further but hospital’s management told me that I could not.” AWU
Queensland branch secretary Ben Swan said the union had been
investigating Ms Semgreen’s complaints before she left the hospital. “The member concerned left Queensland Health and, as a consequence, that part of the investigation ceased,” he said. “Our organisers do what they can to assist members through these processes.” But
two other employees, who requested anonymity due to fear of
repercussions in the workplace, said they lodged complaints months ago
that had still not been dealt with. One woman called for an external review after she was left feeling suicidal.
“I’ve been with Queensland Health for many years and I’ve never witnessed anything like it,” the woman said. “I have had several workers tell me they are dealing with suicidal thoughts in the workplace because the bullying is so bad.”
AWU Queensland branch
secretary Ben Swan said they were investigating Ms Semgreen's complaint
about staff mistreatment before she resigned (stock image)
The
employee said she had lodged complaints to the hospital and the AWU
more than 12 months ago and had still heard nothing back. “We are
isolated and alienated and not given any support,” she said. “Some of
the workers feel they are powerless within their union.” Another employee said she was still waiting to hear back about complaints that she had lodged six months ago. Mr
Keyes said the health service worked closely with staff and unions to
resolve any issues. “The health service works closely and productively
with unions who routinely raise workplace issues and act on behalf of
their members at formal meetings with the health service,” Mr Keyes
said. AWU northern district secretary Bede Harding said complaints were taken seriously. “All
matters reported with the union by our members at Townsville Hospital
have been and continue to be raised and addressed with the hospital’s HR
executive team,” he said. “Matters in relation to the advancement
in careers and workload issues are also being addressed by the AWU
formally with Townsville Hospital management.”
