Social Psychology
Wanda Williams
DR Evans
The term work place Bullying did not reach the United States until the late 1990's. The husband and wife team Dr's Gary and Ruth Namie both trained in Psychology introduced work place bullying. You may ask what Work Place Bullying is. Work Place Bullying has many different definitions but the most common one. It is constant ill-treatment of one employee who is under attack by one or more employees with a mean mix of humiliation, intimidation and damage of performance. It includes being ridiculed in the presence of other employees, being lied about to others. You always have that feeling being on guards at all times. Not being able to focus on work task, loss of self-confidence on the job, out of control an anxiety, being continually left out of the loop, continually being criticized for no reason at all. Work Place bullies use their authority to undermine, frighten, or intimidate another person, often leaving the victim feeling fearful, powerless, incompetent, and ashamed.
(Bullying At Work - Book by Andrea Adams & Neil Crawford (1992)) describes bulling at the work place is like a malignant cancer. It creeps up on you long before you or anyone else are able to appreciate what is that making you feel the ill effects. Yet despite the fact that the majority of the adult population spends more waking hours than anywhere else, the disturbing manifestation of adult bullying, in this particular context, are widely dismissed. (Adams 1992, p9)
We cannot get workplace bullying confused with everyday disagreements at work, or sometimes loud arguments or just having a bad day. It's also not work place bullying when giving a fair and honest evaluation to a poor performing employee.
Work place bullying behavior is not easily identified because they do their work secretly, on the outside they seem to be nice, civil and cooperative, at the same time they are doing everything they