Whose fault is it anyway when employees are leaving your organisation when they have been bullied. Time and time again you hear people are leaving their jobs due to stress, mean bosses, organisational restructuring, lost the passion to carry on working in the same organisation.
Many of these issues have often dealt with in a matter of fact manner – ‘part of working life.’ This is such an easy way for an organisation to sweep the real issues under the corporate carpet and carry on as if all these do not matter. I think it is time that organisations step up and make that bold move to prevent all these work incivilities.
Organisations are just too clueless about how workplace bullying can and is affecting the way they function – the cost of replacing employees and the impact of ex-employees bad-mouthing the organisation are some examples. Is there a way to prevent all these?
For starters, I believe the organisational culture needs to be clear and should include policies to deter bullying in the workplace. (see http://www.cio.com/article/2867980/careers-staffing/how-to-prevent-workplace-bullying.html).
The other way to prevent the infiltration of workplace bullies is to use some form of personality questionnaire and robust interviewing to identify them.
As it stands, there is no magic wand to wipe away this phenomenon. What will be a good start is to create awareness which will benefit both victims of workplace bullying and also to organisations. So let us start to be open and discuss real issues that matter.