You take pride in humiliating your staff, not just in your chambers but in front of their team. You get good vibes to see his or her face hung in shame because your position provides you the protection to do so. There are several articles written on the victims of bullying at work but this one is for you, exclusively for the bully.
Times are tough out there, businesses are suffering and owners and managers are always at tenterhooks. It's natural to have emotions fly and then things take a rough turn. One way to vent out one's frustrations to take it out at staff and this particular trait has now caught up at an alarming rate. Holding a fancy title doesn’t give a leader permission to disrespect and antagonize their employees. Today’s leaders must be emotionally intelligent enough to know when they are crossing the line. Unfortunately, many people lack maturity as leaders and find themselves insulting their employees all too often. (shorturl.at/HPQ24)
Glen Llopis in a Forbes article mentions 9 different ways leaders regularly humiliates team members, these are:
- Unappreciative of efforts
- Lack of recognition or respect
- Constant criticism
- Expecting employees to be like them
- Hypocrisy
- Delegate too much or too little
- Micromanagement
- Manipulative
- Don’t value employees
Humiliation can be defined as an act of dishonor, embarrassment, or causing shame to a person. Humiliation hurts a person very deeply, and it affects a person mentally. Workplace bullying has become very common. Research has shown that incivility can have a negative impact on employee engagement. First, what level of incivility are we talking about? Clearly yelling and overt aggressive behavior is out of bounds. But even low-level and covert negative behavior can cause employee engagement to decline. Talking over another person, “forgetting” to invite them to a meeting, or even rude looks or ignoring another person can be just as harmful as more forceful behaviors. Further, you don’t have to be the victim of incivility to be impacted. Both observed and experienced incivility can cause emotional upset, distrust, loss of productivity, and can even cause employees to leave the organization. And, of course, if rude or negative behavior is being exhibited by a manager or executive, the negative impact on employee engagement is multiplied, because employees don’t believe they can do anything about the situation. Powerless employees are disengaged employees, (Infosurv Research).
Negative behavior breeds more negative behavior in individuals at all levels. Going through or observing rude and hurtful behavior in the workplace gives employees “psychological permission” to behave similarly. Apparently, in the case of this type of behavior, one bad apple really can spoil the whole barrel! As Amy Morin reported in Forbes, “Just one malicious employee among the ranks can wreak havoc on your company culture. Toxic employees have an unhealthy ripple effect that harms co-workers, managers and subordinates alike.” (infosurv Research)
Bullying Affects Job Performance
Bullied workers can’t perform their jobs to the best of their ability. Performance issues include
- Having trouble making decisions
- An incapacity to work or concentrate
- A loss of self-esteem
- Lower productivity
Bullied workers not only lose motivation, they lose time because they are preoccupied with:
- Trying to defend themselves
- Avoiding the bully
- Networking for support
- Ruminating about the situation
- Planning how to deal with the situation
What’s more, targets of bullying feel a sense of isolation. In fact, workplace bullying can leave the victim so traumatized that they feel powerless, disoriented, confused and helpless.(Verywellmind)
IMPACT OF YOUR RUDENESS
Imagine yourself being a perpetrator of all this havoc and through your character or vile intentions getting people into situations that are not normal. Individuals are spending days and weeks in depression and anxiety feeling despondent at all times. People spend more time at work than with families and coming home regularly with this feeling is nothing but inhumane.
CULTURAL TRAITS
There have been instances where certain traits have been acceptable in certain cultures but are not taken well in others. With the world becoming a global community we are on the move all the time. I have seen people being yelled at and regularly demeaned in large multinational organizations just because the others could take it. What we do not realize is that this is the beginning of all corruption by demeaning humans to the lowest levels. If your country happened to be a manufacturer of a certain brand and you are sent on an international assignment to lead a local team, this does not give you a right to act like a local viceroy and rule over your minor subjects. I can site examples but then it can get a bit nasty and I do not wish to point a certain nationality or culture but you know it when you read this.
YOU ARE KILLING PEOPLE
You are destroying lives, you are creating havoc in the life of people and relationships are being destroyed. It's because of you that people are taking it to the bottle or even worse, substance and becoming addicts. They have to get their children out of school and move into compromising localities, all because of their ego. You also know well that it's not only performance that irks you but also the person's nationality, color, creed belief, or else he or she is refusing your sexual overtures. You have a nice weekend with friends and families while your victim is breathing acid all this time. You are a silent killer and you need to stop, jobs are scarce and you know it, do not use this to torment people.
STOP JUST STOP
This is the right time to stop, please halt all this and stop this. Go see a psychologist if this is some childhood trauma or revenge where you were bullied the same. Just remember that what goes around comes around and someday somewhere you will be haunted by the memories of what you have done. PTSD is not a case in the military but in real life as well. Do not let the memories haunt you. There are some fantastic books available on the subject in case you require help and you can send me an email to get more info at kazi.najib@playtorium.com.
THE VICTIM If you are a victim then don’t take this bullying and harassment as a norm, these tormentors are sick individuals. Would you walk around a mental asylum unassisted just because you have to? Seek help and speak to people and look for any and all opportunities to escape this place. Did you ever face Humiliation in the workplace? from your managers or colleagues or your boss? If so what was your action supposed to be? Well, some people feel this is foolish and unfair and often retaliate or look for revenge. But isn’t that the way they are supposed to behave………….look for help and talk to your friends and colleagues for an escape.
Would love to receive your comments at kazi.najib@playtorium.com
Originally published at https://www.linkedin.com.
