What happens to bullies when they grow up and go to work well Diane not surprisingly
the bully on the playground becomes the bully at work uh the jerk on the playground becomes
the jerk at work I have read that nearly forty percent of American workers complain that
they have been bullied at work why is the number so high do you suspect uh I'm slightly
surprised that it's not higher I think the work place environment is where people spend
an awful lot of their time uh there are a lot of intense personalities there uh there
are a lot of people who are frustrated at work and so what they do is a there is sort
of an established pecking order at many businesses and many companies uh and people take out
their frustrations on those that they perceive are weak or those they perceive they can do
it with and unfortunately to many companies don't have strong policies against it uh and
then they don't enforce their policies those that do have policies that that they should
be uh much more vigilant about trying to protect people uh at work from this type of pretty
commonplace bullying some companies have what we call jerks at work polices where they do
have both policies and then training prevention programs uh to try and ensure that it doesn't
that if it doesn't exist or if it exists at all it's quickly eradicated and the employees
are educated on what proper behavior would be in the workplace but it's still way too
few companies actually have strong policies or uh prevention programs about it and so
it still is a big problem it's a huge problem it's a huge problem are there laws on our
books that uh preclude workplace bullying today yeah many many jurisdictions have laws
that would be considered uh to cover such situations certainly anything dealing with
the hostile working environment that might pertain to sexual abuse or sexual uh type
of bullying that would be protected almost anywhere uh but when it's it's different when
you remove the sexual component to it and it's just plain cruelty in bullying that it's
not so clearly covered under uh many states laws as a lawyer have you been involved in
any cases surrounding workplace bullying I have I've had two uh significant cases that
uh uh resulted in exposure significant exposure to the company uh because they failed to properly
uh take care of the initial complaints that were asserted by my clients uh one male one
female in these situations where they over a prolonged period of time different companies
uh they were bullied they were harassed they were attempted to be intimidated and a lot
of it was really just for pure cruelty it didn't necessarily have to do with uh business
situations although the actors clearly are the business leaders in the companies within
the within the supervisory roles so it's even harder to then figure out who do I talk to
who do I go to and if I do complain is it only A is it only going to get worse which
is always one one concern that an employee has and then B who if I can't tell my boss
or my supervisor 'cause they're the people doing this who can i and unfortunately what
we found and what we tend to find in these situations in the workplace uh is that that
the work uh uh environment oftentimes closes ranks and they treat the person even more
so as an outcast making the injury even more significant and by the time that it ends up
on a lawyers desk like myself uh the problem is so significant that the company is likely
going to pay a fortune to have to resolve the situation now uh because the damage is
so extensive and so severe it's unfortunate because if they had a good training program
if they had a good human resource program where employees knew who they could talk to
and what their rights were under the circumstances that that would likely be far less expensive
than the ultimate judgements they're going to have to pay as a result of a litigated
uh court suit where the employee has been seriously damaged as a result of bullying
within the work environment do the bullies actually enjoy inflicting pain and suffering
on their victims uh I think so in the cases that I have had uh I would clearly say that
it was sport uh the clients were slightly uh uh kind more kind and gentle obviously
I would say if you wanted to say they were slightly weaker I think that would be okay
but their personalities were such that they didn't want to make trouble and wouldn't as
a general matter so to some extent I imagine they were seen as easier prey uh and I think
it was a game to see how far you could push someone and to see to what extent they would
snap so I think bullies do it because they can and because they enjoy the reaction that
they get from other people it's really is no different then when we were in second or
third grade uh what is no different as well is when the bully is finally pushed back and
brought under control uh either by the supervisors or by the law or by a lawsuit if that's what
it takes uh things resort back to where they should be is that the bully no longer looks
like they are capable of doing much harm but unfortunately the the harm that they have
inflicted is is pretty longstanding This excerpt is brought to you by the Massachusetts School
of Law