“Workplaces are communities. We must accept nothing less.” Keira Minter, founder Mission Equality
In 2020, 35.6% of government employees reported being affected by bullying. This was discovered from the People Matter Survey interviews of
400,000 NSW government employees.
That is 142,400 people. But shocking as the numbers are, they don’t tell the full story. Bullying is a pernicious variable. Its presence alters the workplace environment outright.
The responses are collated into the NSW Public Sector Report. This data drives key initiatives. One is the Positive and Productive Workplaces Guidelines. They are the sector’s stated strategy for responding to bullying.
But even as a quantitative exercise, the report is incomplete. There is data for targets and data for witnesses. Where are the figures for the successful apprehension of bullying behaviours?
Bullying is a workplace hazard, like toxic chemicals. Imagine a report on toxic chemicals that only calculates the people effected. It tells us nothing about chemicals. We don’t know where they are or what they do. All we know is 35.6% of people are burnt.
From the perspective of a bully, People Matter is a green light. It contains no caution and little consequence. High-conflict individuals are often the first to read anti-bullying material. Many can quote policy verbatim.
I recognise the sincerity behind the report. I also recognise the learned helplessness bullying generates. I’ve even been in that state myself.
My career in education began in the state’s largest juvenile remand centre. Being confined with serious criminals is a crash course in bullying. Young offenders are still working out power. I was witnessing them evolve.
I went on to spend two decades training and educating adults. Whilst I was a devotee of conflict resolution strategies, I discovered a horrible truth. Not all parties want an end to conflict.
Bullying is a sophisticated interpersonal skill. The behaviours are based on a strategic understanding of power. They involve full-blown marketing campaigns. Bullies position themselves exactly where they want to be.
Bullying cannot be seen from above. It is most visible to people with the least structural power.
I saw employees being needlessly demotivated. I saw managers completely oblivious to the cause of their low velocity teams. I saw senior executives baffled by the decelerating performance of their organisations. We weren’t just missing the mark. We were unprotected and standing in the line of fire.
The research is consistent. Only 2-3% of people are invested in causing harm to others. Unfortunately, we are terrified of them. Our systems and organisations protect bullying because challenging it takes courage. We need to find our courage.
Writing the first NSW Dignity and Respect policy made it crystal clear to me. We need to turn the spotlight around. Stop the endless counting and reporting on victims. The grownups need to take charge and set boundaries.
Schools have had bullying policies for a couple of decades. Their students are now showing up in workplaces. They are saying ‘WTF Boomers?’. They expect to be protected and they Tweet.
My research shows bullying shape-shifts in response to the currents of power. It employs subtle terror tactics to provoke invisibility and amnesia. It mutates like a virus. It proliferates like mould in a dark, wet corner.
Personality disordered individuals need to be directed to adapt to prosocial behaviour. Not the other way around, as it currently stands.
When we begin to analyse bullying through the lens of power, everything changes. The unwritten rules of privilege become visible. When I did this, the interventions I developed began to defy those rules. I began to recognise the scaffolding that supports psychological safety.
Now I teach it to others.
I don’t advocate disrespectful, punitive solutions. Naming, shaming and isolating offenders doesn’t work. Investigation and punishment, though important, aren’t enough. They only add to a backdrop of fear.
Psychologically safe communities don’t have ‘whistle-blowers’. I help people have candid conversations that challenge the status-quo. Regularly and fearlessly.
I foresee a time in the near future, when people are safe to be vulnerable at work. The deadening atmosphere that permeates toxic workplaces can regenerate. Workplaces are collaborative communities. We must accept nothing less.
In 2021 we are witnessing the convulsions of rapid transformation. A society built on power abuse is not sustainable. Bullying is being called out in all its guises. Ableism, racism, sexual predation, domestic violence, entitlement, corporate greed. Coercive control.
The resistance has begun.
The People Matter Surveys and derivative interventions are halfway there.
But in times like this, we need new strategies. Interventions that worked are no longer relevant. Things that didn’t work have now reached their time.
We need to clear ourselves of the paranoia generated by the few. Nothing excites me more than witnessing vulnerable people attain agency. Everyone in the team benefits when someone learns to fly. This capacity is our greatest asset.
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