How to Spot and Prevent Bullying in the Workplace

When you think of bullying, you likely picture schoolyard scenes: children pushing, shoving, taunting, and insulting one another. While damaging, this behavior is common in schools worldwide.

However, bullying doesn't stop when people graduate from high school. It changes and evolves, but it still exists in adult culture as much as it does in childhood.

Over the last decade, awareness of bullying in adult culture has grown. More individuals and companies are learning about its problems and looking for ways to address them at the source.

This guide shows you how to handle workplace bullying and stop it for good. Let's get into it!

Why Bullying Is Bad

"It's just teasing; get over it."

"We're all adults here, just ignore it and move on."

"Be the bigger person."

"They're hard to work with, but they're good at their job, so we tolerate it."

How often have you heard statements like these? How often have you or someone you know faced down these sorts of issues? How often are you left questioning whether or not there's a "big deal" happening or if you're blowing something out of proportion? These reactions are part of what workplace bullying can look like.

Situations like these are what workplace bullying can look like, and they can lead to many detrimental outcomes throughout the workplace, from an individual to an entire workplace culture:

• Productivity, efficiency, and profitability decrease as people dislike or actively avoid coming to work or working with specific individuals.
• Employees targeted by bullies tend to take more days off, either taking sick days or simply not showing up.
• Turnover is dramatically increased when bullies turn their workplace into a toxic environment for the people or roles they don't like.
• Loyalty decreases, especially if higher-up employees show any favoritism toward bullies.
• Indirect costs increase as HR hours are spent investigating bullying and its incidents.

There are also tangible, potentially even legal outcomes that can be hugely detrimental to the company:

• Bullied employees, particularly if they need therapy or face physical repercussions, can bring workers' comp suits against the company.
• The Occupational Health and Safety Act of 2004 stipulates that employers must create a safe workplace free of health risks to their employees, including both physical and mental health. Bullying can lead to OSHA fines against the company.
• Minorities and diverse employees are disproportionately targeted by bullying, which is often linked to bigotry. Thus, workplace bullying can lead to discrimination suits as well.

In short, bullying drives up costs, reduces productivity, increases turnover, and exposes the company to legal action. And for what? Usually, it's for no more than inflating the bully's ego, making them feel powerful, and protecting that one individual over the rest of your staff. With that in mind, it's important to look at what bullying can actually look like.

What Does Bullying Look Like?

Bullying in the adult workplace is rarely as straightforward or apparent as shoving coworkers or kicking over sandcastles. It's usually much more subtle and insidious. Here are some examples of workplace bullying from HR Daily Advisor:

• Making threats or behaving in an intimidating way
• Making fun of, teasing, or speaking to others in a derogatory way
• Insulting or otherwise verbally attacking someone
• Starting any physical altercation
• Stopping someone from moving about freely or otherwise encroaching on their personal space
• Retaliating inappropriately toward someone
• Being disrespectful
• Constantly and intentionally interrupting someone
• Intentionally sabotaging someone else's work or ability to complete work successfully
• Withholding communications
• Intentionally excluding information from someone or invitations to meetings that are important for their work
• Spreading misinformation or hurtful information about others
• Continuously giving unwarranted criticism of others
• Yelling inappropriately
• Ignoring coworkers or others in the workplace

From overt intimidation to casual disrespect to subtle negative actions in the workplace, bullying hinders proper business functioning. Often, workplace bullies act under the cover of plausible deniability, making it harder to punish them overtly. This is why recognizing the signs matters.

There are also eight identified archetypes of workplace bullies. These range from the oppressive, screaming bully to the reputation-destroying gossiper to the gatekeeper. Other signs include aggressive self-promotion, taking credit for others' work, and constant criticism.

How Do You Deal with Bullying in the Workplace?

If you're the one being targeted, dealing with bullying in the workplace can feel isolating – especially when it's subtle, ongoing, or coming from someone in a position of authority. Here are practical steps you can take:

1. Document everything: Keep a private log of each incident – dates, times, locations, what was said or done, and any witnesses. Save relevant emails or messages. This record protects you and creates a paper trail if you need to escalate.

2. Set boundaries when it's safe to do so: If possible, calmly and directly tell the person that their behavior is unwelcome. Keep it factual, not emotional: describe the specific behavior and its impact. This isn't always possible, especially if the bully is your supervisor, but when it is, it can be enough to stop the behavior.

3. Report it: Use your organization's established channels – HR, your manager's manager, or an anonymous reporting system if one exists. Bring your documentation. If your concerns are minimized, escalate to the next level of management.

4. Don't retaliate: It's natural to want to fight back, but retaliation can muddy the situation and shift focus away from the bully's behavior. Stay professional and let the process work.

5. Protect your well-being: Workplace bullying takes a measurable toll on mental and physical health. Lean on trusted colleagues, talk to a counselor or EAP (Employee Assistance Program) if your company offers one, and don't wait until you're in crisis to seek support.

6. Know your options: If internal channels fail, you may have recourse through your state's labor board, OSHA (which requires employers to maintain a safe work environment), or an employment attorney.

Strategies to Address Workplace Bullying

Once you've learned the hallmarks of bullying in the workplace, you need to find ways to solve the problem. Generally, a solution to workplace bullying requires several things:

• Promotion of open communication to report bullying without retaliation
• Training and guidance to reduce and eliminate bullying behaviors
• Harsh recourse and penalties for bullies, including termination if behaviors don't change
• The establishment of a clear code of conduct that ensures that bullying is not tolerated
• Ongoing communication and work to improve a workplace culture wrecked by bullying

Essentially, it all comes down to establishing rules, outlining ways to solve the problem, and taking appropriate action against those who fail to change, while also striving to make targets feel safer in their roles.

Step 1: Recognize That Bullying Is an Issue in Your Workplace

Unfortunately, one of the most significant factors contributing to continued workplace bullying is complacency among upper management. All too often, owners, C-levels, directors, and managers all take a stance of "work it out amongst yourselves; I'm too busy for this." They downplay issues and, thus, are complicit in their perpetuation. This is true regardless of whether the issue concerns diversity and bigotry, bullying, or conflicts that a better manager could resolve.

Recognizing that the issue exists is the first step to solving it. Without buy-in from upper management, the company cannot improve.

Step 2: Establish Clear, Unequivocal Rules Regarding Bullying, with Zero Tolerance

Develop and issue a workplace-wide policy that identifies bullying as a problem and sets rules for handling it. This policy should:

• Identify the behaviors that constitute bullying, including physical and non-physical actions, as well as overt and covert bullying.
• Offer a framework employees can use to report bullying they witness or experience.
• Offer a framework for handling issues, with anything from a zero-tolerance policy to a three-strikes policy.

The key is to make this policy comprehensive without turning it into a labyrinth of legalese. It should be clear enough that bullies cannot find and exploit loopholes. It is also recommended to avoid opportunities where bullies can weaponize the policy against their targets, which ties into empowering HR to investigate problems.

Step 3: Open Lines of Communication for Reporting Bullying, Potentially Even Anonymously

Anonymous reporting can be important in cases of bullying when retaliation may occur. If a bully is in a position of power and receives a public report of bullying, it only makes the target even more vulnerable.

However, anonymous reporting can also be weaponized by bullies, who might fabricate or spin problems against their targets. You see this repeatedly through story platforms like Reddit and Ask A Manager.

There's no single Right Answer to this problem. It simply needs to be handled on a case-by-case basis. The best solution is to ensure that the group investigating instances of bullying is as unbiased as possible and empowered to thoroughly investigate issues and make decisions, even against higher-level management. Anyone who is "immune" to punishment for bullying can perpetuate a toxic culture and make the problem unsolvable.

Step 4: Conduct Thorough Investigations Into Allegations of Bullying

You must take investigations seriously. Bullying has such a suppressive effect on your entire workplace culture that you can't afford to take allegations with the weight they require.

How your HR handles allegations of bullying depends largely on the seriousness of the allegations, who is being investigated, and what bullying is alleged to be occurring. Unfortunately, there's no one process we can point to for solving this issue; you need to develop investigations that suit your business. Just make sure they're effective and cannot be subverted by the bullies.

For reference, responses like "it's your word against theirs, so we can't take action" or "we can't determine who is at fault, so you both get punished" benefit bullies more than the bullied. It's always possible to dig deeper into the context and behaviors of those involved to determine the truth and avoid such suppressive outcomes.

Step 5: Offer Bullies Training to Help Adjust or Change the Negative Behaviors

Modern culture often takes a zero-tolerance stance. Often, individuals seem to have no chance to change their behavior, which leads to accusations of "cancel culture". The reality is that:

• People who commit these behaviors typically know they're wrong and have had many opportunities to change.
• People who are "canceled" for their actions are often not significantly harmed by this cancellation.

In a workplace, you can choose to offer training to help bullies change their ways. In some cases, these individuals have not had a chance to learn that they're wrong and how to fix it. Using training materials such as the Conflict Strategies Inventory or the Learning to Listen training program can help teach bullies better ways to handle workplace conflicts.

Step 6: Monitor Ongoing Conflicts and Individuals for Signs of Relapse

Once someone has been disciplined and assigned training for workplace bullying, they are "on thin ice" while they continue to work. You have to monitor that employee's behavior and encourage others to do the same, just in case they relapse. Bullies can potentially change their ways, but if they fall back into old habits, they can still be too much of a liability for the business to handle. In that case, more significant action must be taken.

Step 7: Take Action to Remove Repeat Offenders from the Workplace for the Greater Good

Unfortunately, training is not always enough for bullies. Some do not take training; some pay lip service to it while continuing their bullying behaviors; and some use it not to avoid bullying but to better hide it.

In these cases, it's critical to have more substantial penalties in place. The open palm may win more loyalty than the closed fist, but sometimes the fist is the best choice. In these cases, it's generally better to terminate the employee for their behavior.

This is why the first step of establishing a company policy is essential. Once the bully has been fired, they may retaliate against the company. By having the policy in place and documented violations on file, you can use them as evidence that their termination was justified.

Growing Beyond Workplace Bullying

Unfortunately, people with the tendency to resort to bullying behaviors are in no short supply. Even once your company establishes anti-bullying policies, trains out such behaviors in most employees, and terminates those who cannot adjust, you must keep a close eye on your roster. New employees can be bad influences, and some older employees may exploit the power gap to become the very thing they were initially targeted as. Bullying requires constant vigilance to overcome.

The benefits of doing so are immense. Companies that can solve the bullying problem – and keep it that way – tend to work much more effectively, foster more loyal employees, and react much more effectively to their industry's pressures and competition. When internal strife is not holding them back, they are free to grow and succeed.

Regardless of how it gets addressed, bullying must be isolated and excised from the workplace through any means possible. To help you get to the root of workplace bullying and hostility, we have a customizable course titled Workplace Violence: Prevention & Response. This course explores strategies to minimize hostile and negative workplace conditions by implementing effective workplace policies and addressing issues as they arise.

Has your company had to handle workplace bullying before? If so, what kind of bullying occurred, and how did you go about tackling it? Would you say it got handled correctly? Be sure to let us know all your stories and thoughts in the comments section below! Additionally, if you have any questions or concerns about handling workplace bullying, you can leave them in the comments section, and we'll reply within a day or two! We make it a point to respond to every comment we receive and would love to hear from you.