Bullying In The WorkPlace

[Angela 0077]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MC32nbGVuJM

have you faced bullying in the workplace or have you seen someone being bullyed.

I know when l was working at a hotel this person started work and she had been there for a couple of monthes and she was going well at her job until someone passed on to another person that she had bad body odour
These guys l worked with decided that they would get her a birthday present because her birthday was coming up the following week.
They got her a deoderant pack full of soaps and things
They laughed behind her back.
I was disgussed because l thought this person was going to receve a nice present like some poeple would get.
They asked me why l was so qient l told them l was disgusted that they would do this to this person knowing she was getting bullied for this problem
i tod them they were a pack of bitches because when l seen this girls face drop when she found out what it was and sh was clearly upset l had to speak up.
has anyone else incounted bullying if so please post what happened here

 

[Mr. Laser Beam]

Not bullying, as such, but there's this coworker of mine who seems to be bullying all the rest of us by the mere fact that he still has a job. He's incompetent, insubordinate and rude, and has been fired from two other outlets of our store before he got to us. But his mother has threatened to sue us if we fire him. Which of course she cannot do - as long as we fire him for cause, there's nothing she can do. But our managers are such wimps that they won't take the risk. And he's almost literally gloating in our presence, as if to say 'nanny nanny boo boo, you can't fire me'.

 

[Angela 0077]

Well there is different types of bullying and it is sad that you cant get rid of this guy.

Plus when you cant go to the bosses for help would be bad and hard to deal with.
Have you ever thought about going out on strik to get rid of him.

I know in Australia you can do this to some exstent

 

[Mr. Laser Beam]

Have you ever thought about going out on strik to get rid of him

We don't have a union.

 

[Angela 0077]

Thats a shame.

In australia we have unions and l am part of the edcation union where l work
it caters for the teachers catering staff and office workers

I am in the catering department at a private school.
but we have never been on strike yet but last year we were going to because quite a few teachers were going to get the sack.
But they were able to work the problem out.which was good.

Sometimes you can lose some of your pay if you go on strike.

 

[jtkirk]

I was never bullied, but did experience sexual harassment. I worked with a girl that started off by making sexual comments to me & then it escalated to touching & rubbing on my neck. When I caught her on the computer looking up my medical information I was finally fed up & went to the supervisor.

Anyone who has ever worked in an office or medical field knows that a violation of confidentiality is grounds for immediate dismissal. She may have gotten written up, I don't know, but she didn't get fired or even suspended. After all that had happened I quickly got a different job & got the hell out of there.

 

[jtkirk]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MC32nbGVuJM

have you faced bullying in the workplace or have you seen someone being bullyed.

I know when l was working at a hotel this person started work and she had been there for a couple of monthes and she was going well at her job until someone passed on to another person that she had bad body odour
These guys l worked with decided that they would get her a birthday present because her birthday was coming up the following week.
They got her a deoderant pack full of soaps and things
They laughed behind her back.
I was disgussed because l thought this person was going to receve a nice present like some poeple would get.
They asked me why l was so qient l told them l was disgusted that they would do this to this person knowing she was getting bullied for this problem
i tod them they were a pack of bitches because when l seen this girls face drop when she found out what it was and sh was clearly upset l had to speak up.
has anyone else incounted bullying if so please post what happened here

As far as the body odor goes, I do think something should be said. But people should have went to the girls supervisor & handled it in a professional manner. The childish laughter & gift joke was just mean spirited. There isn't an easy way to tell someone they smell, but if her odor is offensive to others then her supervisor should have a talk with her.

 

[Miss Chicken]

I had a boss who was a bully. At the time I was doing the newspaper clipping service for a government department. Each day I had to cut out articles, photocopy them, scan them, print them out into booklets, send the booklets out to various people and departments, place a copy of each days articles on the computer assigning keywords as I did.

Just one example of how he treated me.

Mondays was our busiest day as I not only had to cut articles out of Mondays papers but out of the weekend papers as well. This meant I had to photocopy, print and catalog about 90 articles. This meant I spent much of Monday morning standing at the photocopier.

Late one Monday afternoon, when he knew that my legs were very sore, he asked me to do some extra photocopying which would have taken me about an hour. I asked him, please could I do it in the morning when my legs wouldn't be so bad. He said no, stating that he wanted these particular magazine articles to go into the clippings for the next day. This guy knew I had a disability and he should have taken it into account.

So I photocopied the articles he said he needed for the next day and I was in a fair bit of pain while I did it.

The next day I cut about 60 relevant articles out of the morning newspapers and passed them, and the magazine articles I had photocopied the afternoon before, to him for checking. He went mad at me for giving him the magazine articles which he now insisted they was no great hurry to put into the clipping as they could be put in on a day when I had fewer newspaper articles (e.g Friday tended to be a bit light on articles).

 

[sidious618]

I tutor high school students who are doing poorly in school. So, yes, I get it all the time.

 

[auntiehill]

Back when I worked retail, I was "promoted" to be head of staff (big whoop) which meant marking down when people were late, not completing their checklist for inventory,etc. The staff were an incredibly lazy bunch of mo'fos. They ignored customers, didn't follow the company procedures, they came to work stoned, and even stole merchandise right out of the store.

Well, because I actually did my job and filed my reports, I had "bitch" scratched into my locker, was ignored when I gave instructions, insulted, and the employees spread rumors about me being a racist--which was completely not true, and upset me greatly. Work became hell for me. If I told employee A to do something, it was because I was a racist, if I told employee B to do something, it was because I thought I was better than her. It never dawned on anyone that I was simply doing my job the best that I could.

The boss was coward who didn't want to make waves, and wanted to be everyone's friend--at my expense. I finally just snapped, handed my keys to the boss and walked out the door.

Less than a year later, the home company shut down the location because they were the only one in town not making a profit.

Now I work from my home office and make more per hour than I ever did for that store. Plus, I don't have to actually SEE any of my co-workers, which sometimes is a damn good thing.

 

[Robert Maxwell]

At my last job, one of my responsibilities was supporting some internal tools developers used. But I spent most of my time making patches, and because that was customer-facing, a high-priority patch always took precedence over supporting the tools.

I had one guy who left me really nasty, threatening voicemails because he had an issue with an internal program and he didn't feel we were responding quickly enough--even though it had only been a couple hours. He just acted in a completely unprofessional manner after I tried to explain to him that I would get to his issue when I could, but I had higher priorities at the time. He ended up going to his manager, who talked to mine, and we had a meeting about it. Turned out that whole team was using the tools incorrectly, which was causing their problems in the first place. Yeah, he was a little embarrassed.

With my current job, I've only had one instance of bullying. One of the original founders of this company stayed on after selling it, working in a developer role. Technically, we had the same boss: the Director of Development. The DOD came to me and she asked me to take over a project from this guy as he was not being cooperative with QA staff and was missing deadlines. I did as much as I could without his help but I did need some of his expertise. He kept blowing me off, though, and it culminated in the DOD and me going to his office.

When we came in, he knew what it was about right away. He leaned back in his chair and closed his eyes. The Director elaborated on what was up, that he needed to give me the information I required, etc. He didn't even acknowledge her presence. She said her piece, sighed, and left. Then he just stared at me, trying to intimidate me out of his office, I guess. I smiled and said, "Ready to start when you are!"

He ended up helping me out since it was clear I wasn't going to leave until I got what I needed. That Director of Development didn't last much longer--she couldn't stand up to anyone or hold her ground.

 

[JiNX-01]

Not bullying, as such, but there's this coworker of mine who seems to be bullying all the rest of us by the mere fact that he still has a job. He's incompetent, insubordinate and rude, and has been fired from two other outlets of our store before he got to us. But his mother has threatened to sue us if we fire him. Which of course she cannot do - as long as we fire him for cause, there's nothing she can do. But our managers are such wimps that they won't take the risk. And he's almost literally gloating in our presence, as if to say 'nanny nanny boo boo, you can't fire me'.

http://employeeissues.com/hostile_work_environment.htm

this might be helpful depending on the specifics of the problem.

 

[propita]

I had a boss that blasted me--for what I don't clearly remember--the complicated multi-part task that needed to be done in three days was done in two. I went to talk with him afterward. He blew up again and I left the room before I killed him. I had thought of 5 ways while standing there. I was the only one in the department who was willing to speak with him. I took this as such a betrayal.

Three weeks later, I talked to Employee Assistance. They direct employees to professional help. I told the guy the story and he said bosses had been killed for less than that and that, had it been him instead of me, he would have punched my boss. He actually said that to me!

Co-workers said that they would've bet that I'd take him in the second round if it had become physical--he wasn't well-liked. I said he'd've been dead in the first. Yes, I was that mad, but had been working on self-control. Someone commented that, 10 years earlier, I'd've punched him, and that 5 years earlier, I'd've thought about it a minute and then punched him. Hubby, who went to school with this guy, was all ready to go in there and beat the shit out of him. I think word of that got back to my boss. (Hubby is 6' 1" and built big; Boss was 5' 6" and scrawny)

An engineer I supported offered me a dummy grenade to put under my boss' chair, just to scare him. Um...no. But thanks.

I didn't speak to him at all after that and people said that if we were in the same room, they could feel the iciness. I was likely a bit rude, but no one cared because no one liked him. I told this guy a year later when he was kinda apologizing, when he was no longer my boss, that I had wanted to kill him in that moment--and that he should be careful in the future with other people who might not hold back. Shook him up a bit. He never thought that his actions might upset people. NEVER thought it.

Last I heard, he's still an asshole.

 

[Thena]

When I was 19, I worked at the deli counter of a local supermarket. There was this one older man who worked a regular job and then worked a closing shift at the deli 3x a week to pay bills left over from his divorce. One day, I was working with him and with another college student. I felt a bit nauseous, realized I was going to be sick, and let another coworker know that I had to take a break ASAP. After getting my stomach to settle, I came back to the deli and immediately ran into the older gentleman. He promptly started screaming at the top of his lungs about how irresponsible I was to leave my coworker manning the deli counter by herself while he was busy elsewhere. It was a very vicious verbal beating. The stupid thing was that it was pointless. The other girl knew I was sick, she told me to go take care of myself, and she did not ask the other guy for help while I was gone.

One of the assistant managers was also a bully. She was this huge woman with a loud voice. One morning, I had to call off my evening shift because I was running a fever. When I explained to her on the phone, she started screaming and cussing at me on the phone. A few days later, she called to apologize for her unprofessional behavior, but a repeat incident later on led to me quitting.

 

[JiNX-01]

It's bad enough when it's a colleague. When, it's a boss who throws his/her weight around, it's worse, because you don't feel safe reporting the behavior.

 

[knine]

I was in middle management at a job long ago. They asked us to fill out anonymous surveys regarding the performance of upper management. All of us in middle management could care less. There were a couple of people in upper management people we highly respected. The rest were a joke. None of us planned on filling out our anonymous surveys. We figured they would not listen.

One of the good people in upper management got wind of this and personally asked me to please fill it out (several others agreed too). I'm a very up front person, so I was up front about my feelings. Mainly:

1 - There was a person that I was over a few years previous. I helped trained him. I helped get him to where he was. Next thing I know a couple of years later, he is my boss in upper management. My performance reviews were great. WTF?

2 - Upper management love to preach the rules and regulations but when it was inconvenient for them, they forgot all about them. One example related to (1) was their claim that when we train others, it doesn't put us in a position to be replaced, it puts us in a position to be promoted.

So I fill this thing out. A few days later the director is all upset and calls me into their office. As I'm walking there, the manager that asked me to fill out the survey tells me he is sorry. The director starts going on and on about how none of what I say is true and demands that I give examples of how people bend and break the rules when they are inconvenient for them.

I looked right at the director and said... you are right now, these surveys were supposed to be anonymous. The director goes on and on about how it's okay they are doing this because it's to help them. Blah blah blah.

Later, I finally ask what was the deal with they guy I trained getting promoted to upper management. I had actually copied the page out of the manual and highlighted the words. I was told they didn't know what I was going to do because I was in college and everything, and they were not sure I was going to stay and they were thinking long term.

I again looked right at the director and said. Did you think to ask me? (I was planning on staying after graduation)

It was then I started looking and I was gone 6 months later.

 

[marillion]

A friend of mine is going through this. She's extremely profecient at her job and employees outside her department think the world of her. She's all about customer service (the customers being company staff) and goes WAY above and beyond to help them with their HR needs.

However, she is VERY introverted and the rest of the women in her department are all "rah rah team" kind of people. One in particular is REALLY pushy and when she doesn't get her way, she beats you down verbally until she does.

My friend already has anxiety and self esteem issues and while she gets along with the ladies in her department, she's constantly butting heads with the pushy, bitchy one, who, as an aside, is constantly pushing work on my friend that she should be doing herself. To make matters worse, the manager of the department, rather than deal with the pushy one, keeps trying to get my friend to come out of her shell a bit more and focus on everyone being "all about the team"..

It's gotten so bad that this morning, my friend, who was sent a VERY condecending email questioning her job ability, had a breakdown. Her doctor has insisted that she take a couple weeks off.