• 07
  • December
    2011

California employers and those in other states are discovering negatives involved when workplace bullying is allowed. Bullying activities include harassment, retaliation, insults, derogatory remarks, poor performance evaluations and instructions, and the freezing out of employees from certain social or workplace activities.

Employees and California employers are beginning to work together to help prevent bullying in the workplace, in part because laws against that activity are limited. Most bullying and harassment is same-gender activity, according to a 2010 survey by the Workplace Bully Institute. The institute's data indicates roughly one third of all employees have experienced workplace bullying.

An increasing number of those accused of bullying are female supervisors. Bullying can originate from either supervisors or other employees; when the supervisor is guilty of bullying, it can cause severe stress on employees. This is not good for business because bullied employees are likely to become less productive or quit their jobs. Turmoil in the workplace is never conducive to productivity or profit.

Some countries, like Sweden, Great Britain and France, have been ahead of the curve by instituting laws banning bullying in the workplace. In the U.S.A., Minnesota legislators tried but failed to pass a law against workplace bullying.

Legislation that does exist that bans workplace bullying contains different criteria than anti-discrimination laws. Some of those laws do not apply to gender-neutral harassment that is common with bullying at work. According to the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC), retaliation complaints make up the largest category of workplace bullying incidents. This may also be due to new favorable court rulings that allow employees freer pursuit of retaliation complaints. Moves to prevent workplace bullying can be developed by California employees working jointly with employers.

Source: Star Tribune, "Business forum: It's time to banish bullies from the workplace," Marshall H. Tanick, Nov. 27, 2011