Statistically, bullying and harassment in the workplace is as bad as ever but why?

Firstly, let’s get on a page. Language is very important here. The terms “bullying” and “harassment” are frequently misused. Behaviour covered by protected categories at law is not always unlawful.

Sometimes, behaviours are just annoying or inappropriate, misguided, ill-informed and ignorant, but may not constitute bullying and harassment in the sense of a breach of law. Knowing the difference is essential.

To kick it off, I want to be clear. Being strong, opinionated and direct, having the courage to take things on, speaking truth to power, or demanding a certain level of behaviour and output, is not behaviour that, by default, constitutes bullying or harassment.

This is a simple definition, but for behaviour to be considered unlawful it must be repeated, unreasonable and of a targeted or personal nature and based on a protected category, like gender, race, disability AND it creates a risk to health and safety. If you want to understand more, click here.

Now we have that out of the way, it is true, there are still way too many events where people are unlawfully bullied and harassed at work. One of the most common questions I get asked is “why”? “Surely, after all these years and all that mandatory training, the Me Too Movement, the events of Parliament, we now know better right?”

After a lifetime of conducting hundreds of workplace investigations and living in almost all versions of good and bad cultures and developing better cultures, I think there is one core reason why - workplaces only do the minimum when it comes to bullying and harassment and its not enough. There are 3 things that all need to come together to create healthy workplace environments:

1.Leadership

This comes in 3 parts - self awareness, living the values and behaviours, the courage to deal with situations in a swift and an uncompromisingly fair manner.

Leaders must be trained with EQ principles and diagnostic tools to understand how thinking links to behaviour and how behaviour is being received, as well as how to deploy situational leadership behaviour to adapt to the individual needs of people.

Leaders MUST know their bias and prejudice and how that is impacting the environment.

In many cases I have dealt with, the root cause has been a need for more awareness, too much task focus, the inability to communicate effectively, and the culture.

Leaders must be able to deploy and uphold the values of the business. If you espouse to be something, like a “workplace free from bullying and harassment”, then you have to be able to put your money where your mouth is or it is just meaningless and you shouldn’t claim it.

Leaders must be courageous, when they spot a problem, they deal with it - immediately.

2.Culture

I bought a dog without the approval of my husband. The only way the dog and the marriage would survive this solo decision, was if it was well trained, so I hired a dog trainer. The trainer came to our house. After 15 minutes of chatting, I say: “are you going to start training the dog?”. The trainer replied: “No! The manner in which this dog behaves in this house, be it good or bad, will have very little to do with the dog. It will be utterly dependant on the environment you create, the boundaries you set, and the manner in which you interact with the dog … so I’m going to train you!”.

This is a metaphor for all leaders who shape culture. It is solely up to you - the standard you set is the standard that will be followed. If you want a workplace free of bullying and harassment, you need to proactively create one.

3.Compliance Focus

This is the biggest issue. Workplaces are just way too compliance focused.

Policies on bullying and harassment and mandatory training is the MINIMUM thing to do, not the ONLY thing to do.

I’ve read countless bullying and harassment polices and they all say the same thing. Rote legal language. Nothing distinguishable, all about the do’s and dont’s. They get pulled out only when there is a problem, or at induction and other than that, it’s a silent, ineffective compliance box ticking exercise.

Rarely (never) do I see one that actually steps out “HOW”. What does it mean to have have zero tolerance and how do you know you do? How do you really know there isn’t a problem AND how will you demonstrate that, how you will measure and report on it? What questions will be asked, by whom and how frequently?

But here’s the biggest problem with a compliance approach as the minimum thing you do - it’s reactive not proactive.

Take this example…I had a client that was a workplace that espouse all the right things - values, behaviours, zero tolerance, including pretty statements plastered on walls. They did the mandatory training. They even had videos. Yet most days inside that workplace was like a scene from the movie “The Wolf of Wall Street”. It was a culture that supported and rewarded those who could drink the most and stay out the latest, it turned a blind eye to bad behaviour “if it was in the spirit of partying”, it allowed people who behaved poorly to rise to the top. Many mornings were unproductive due to hangovers - it was moody and broody. It conducted frequent alcohol drenched lunches and dinners and threw lavish parties where unacceptable behaviour was ignored. Any suggestions from HR that this be changed, or modified in someway, always raised tentatively, was scorned. A lot of people felt the need to conform to survive.

The compliance was there, the policy with all the legal language, and the training, but it had no impact on how people behaved because the culture and the leadership created an environment that was inconsistent with it's policy.

This list is in this order for a reason. It’s the order of priority for building an environment that will be less susceptible to events of unlawful bullying and harassment but moreover, it will create an environment where bad behaviour unlawful or otherwise, will be a rarity.

The culture, and the leadership should inform the compliance and then live that ethos. Until that shift is made…

“workplaces will continue to succumb to events of bullying and harassment
because the the leaders set a standard (culture) that is counter to policy.”

Companies that are serious about a “workplace free of bullying and harassment” will have a holistic framework that extends far beyond the MINIMUM compliance requirements. They will have entrenched culture initiatives that builds an environment of high performance, high trust and high integrity so that what they write in policies and say in training will actually be true. Until this time, nothing will change.

If you want to know more, particularly how to develop initiatives to create a holistic framework, make contact now.

Read our article on Trust and Confidence in culture here.