HR Girl 4'11" Blog

Girl Bullies in the Workplace

The fact that 40% of workplace bullies are women, should make you wonder who's really getting their work done. That victim has to put up with a lot of crap from a bully, while maintaining their quality of work. The reality is, bullies are a drain to your business, and could cost you thousands down the road. Even though the person doing the bullying is a manager or a top performer. So what should you do at this crossroads?   

If your company doesn't have a culture, now is the time to get one established along with a set of behavioral standards. A policy has to be written and signed off by all employees, even those out in the field. This policy will fall somewhere in between harassment and hostile workplace tolerance. Which actually should be ZERO. It should cover all the events that are considered bullying, i.e. screaming, shoving, setting traps, nagging, scheming and physical contact etc.

Now wouldn't it be nice if women solved problems similar to men? Like either dukeing it out followed by a handshake and a beer. But this isn't the case. What we have here is simply one woman picking another woman to pick on who appears to be a little weaker or presents some sort of threat to her position. Other factors could include stress on the home front, or just the need to be evil.

But if you would like to hear my opinion, i think that if a woman is taking her career seriously she wouldn't have time to worry about what other women are doing and if she poses a threat, so MYOB.

No body likes a bully, and no business owner wants their profit to suffer because of a bully. Nor wanting to end up in court or face an act of violence in their place of business as a result of retaliation from the victim. At any rate, action should to be taken immediately in order to exterminate the fire so everyone else involved can get back to work.

Swiss Cheesed Candidate

Every cheese has a special taste and flavor which many will like, and some will disapprove. But is it necessary for the cheese to undergo a chewing session by the rat?

Going through an interview followed by a skills assessment is one thing. But undergoing a constant drilling session with a disapproving and doubtful person is another. The feeling of being picked apart by a hiring authority can be quite draining and very discouraging. 

Why are candidates made to feel worthless when they go into an organization seeking employment? The hiring authority should be aware of their attitude towards the candidates? Understandably so, they has alot work to do, and granted there is an overwhelming number of applicants out there to sort through. But keeping the needs of the organization in mind is critical.

What progress has been made if a candidate is treated poorly by a hiring party from an organization? Chances are, the candidates will go back and tell at least 10 other job seekers that the organization is bad news. It's foolish to think that it's ok to treat candidates with little dignity, putting them on the spot and making them fill out endless personality analysis questionaires, and everything shy of a blood sample. All of that, and they never get a single follow-up postcard or email stating a decision. Remember, the hiring process is also the place where an organization can brand themselves, for the good or for the bad.

Don't be the rat, who's primary job is eating away at and poking holes into the candidates. They have enough to deal with already than to have their time stolen and character attacked. When the economy does a 360, the rat will be starving for cheese, but the cheese will stand alone.

Lower Management Beaker

  [caption id="attachment_36" align="alignleft" width="259" caption="Beaker and Dr Honey Dew"][/caption]  Have you seen Beaker in the workplace? Yes Beaker, the guy in the middle who upper management has habitually experimented hair brained ideas on, but those ideas somehow never worked out.

Poor Beaker is left to convey messages to the employees and outside vendors everything that upper management has demanded him to do without a proper plan, objective or execution strategy. He has been blown up, shrunk, cloned and still required to perform and back the decisions of upper management.

 

So Beaker’s role in this economy is the one who is standing in the line of fire from everyone because he has to look employees in the eye and tell them that their job is being eliminated. And he’s the one who attempts to give feedback on what’s going on in the workplace (mostly the negative), but upper management covers their eyes and ears to the information. Certainly Beaker and HR can relate to each other.

 

Have you seen Beaker? Do you feel like Beaker?