How to Handle Bullying at Work: A Practical Guide to toxic workplaces & their impacts on your life

Bullying in the workplace by coworkers or bosses occurs so often that it's almost become a new normality. What lacks out there is a practical guide for the bullied on addressing these uncomfortable situations.

You may feel it's a small enough issue to take to Human Resources but big enough that you can't jump out of bed with enthusiasm to get to work. This book also guides you through those in-between Bullying situations.

After working for several years in fast paced teams in the corporate world where Bullying was witnessed, experienced and addressed, this book was put together as a handy guide for you to deal effectively with Bullying.

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Contents

Part One: Assess

1: Am I really being bullied?

2: Into the Bully’s mind

3: The emotional tolls to be aware of

Part Two: Address

4: Acknowledging the truth of the matter

5: Managing your environment to tackle bullying

6: Challenges you may face while addressing Bullying

7: Confronting the Bully

Part Three: Adios

8: Decisions Decisions Decisions

9: In thought, word and deed

10: Moving on from Workplace Bullying

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Chapter One

Am I really being bullied?

“Doubt whom you will, but never yourself.” - Christian Nestell Bovee

One of the first questions, which runs through our minds when we experience bullying, is whether we are really being “bullied”.

The word “bullying” itself is rarely heard at workplaces. Maybe in books, blogs and in casual conversations you can find the word “Bullying”. However, in practice, very few workplaces openly discuss how to handle Bullies in their team and the impact of their bullying. Most companies do have HR policies related to bullying, but do they act to get rid of bullying in their organisation is another question.

Perhaps, a worldwide “#” movement is required to make this happen. But until then, we are involved in conversations which dance around the terms “Bullied, Bullying, Bully”. A silent pandemic of bullying therefore exists at work these days. How on earth are workplaces supposed to effectively deal with something, which they pretend doesn’t even exist. What incentive is there for someone to go around talking about being bullied? You certainly earn no cash-back points by raising difficult issues.

People themselves are uncomfortable to make the self-admission that they are “the Bullied”. Doesn’t it convey weakness, even if to admit this truth to themselves? The self- image we carefully craft about ourselves doesn’t normally include “Bullied at work”. Isn’t being strong in life, one of the first lessons we are taught as kids. Well, the other lesson we have to keep remembering, is to be comfortable with who we are, no matter how the environment around may make us feel.

Accepting weakness and strength in ourselves is also a great strength. Anyway, experiencing bullying itself does not automatically make us weak. It is how we respond to such incidents in life, that tell us a great deal about ourselves. Our self-categorisation of how strong or weak we are should happen after we handle bullying.

Defining Bullying

There are several ways to define bullying and there are several experiences of people who have been bullied in the past. Perhaps you find several definitions of Bullying, which describe your situation or perhaps you find none and fall into the gray area.

Either way, it is important for you to understand that your individual experience deserves equal importance as all the other definitions.