Bullying

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Acknowledgement

I would take this opportunity to thank my research supervisor, family and friends for their support and guidance without which this research would not have been possible.

DECLARATION

I, [type your full first names and surname here], declare that the contents of this dissertation/thesis represent my own unaided work, and that the dissertation/thesis has not previously been submitted for academic examination towards any qualification. Furthermore, it represents my own opinions and not necessarily those of the University.

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Table of Contents

INTRODUCTION2

THE EXISTING LITERATURE4

DEFINING WORKPLACE BULLYING4

ASSESSING THE EXTENT AND NATURE OF BULLYING AND HARASSMENT6

MEASURING SUCCESS OF BULLYING AND HARASSMENT POLICIES10

SUMMARY OF THE LITERATURE12

DEALING WITH WORKPLACE BULLYING13

THE CORPORATE CHALLENGE17

HOW TO DEAL WITH BULLYING19

METHODOLOGY21

MEASURES OF BULLYING AND TRUST IN THE ORGANISATION22

FINDINGS: THE SITUATION INHERITED23

WHAT IS THE EXTENT OF AND NATURE OF THE BULLYING PROBLEM?24

WHAT DID THE CEO DO: THE DIGNITY AT WORK POLICY25

DID THE BULLYING INITIATIVE WORK?26

DISCUSSION28

CONCLUSION33

REFERENCES35

APPENDIX41

Bullying

Introduction

Bullying at work is widespread and seems to be spreading like an epidemic. In the past people could reasonably expect to go through their working lives without meeting a serious bullying incident, now anyone can be at risk of being severely bullied, perhaps several times in their career. This is an issue which has come out of the closet in recent years. More and more is being written on it. There is still a lot to do in the actual workplace.

Sadly, workplace bullying is a reality in today's place of work as it has been estimated that one-fifth of all employees have experienced bullying and harassment (Godwin, 2008). Further headline figures portray an alarming picture of the workplace, with a survey of 860 IT professionals, for example, having revealed that 65 per cent had experienced bullying (Thomson, 2008). Moreover, the Workplace Bullying Institute believes that 54 million employees have been bullied and refer to the phenomenon as a “silent epidemic” (Sutton et al Visser et al 2009).

The impact of bullying has been well documented in the literature and has been found to have a negative affect on self esteem, physical health, psychological wellbeing and emotional health (Einarsen and Mikkelsen, 2003; Keashly and Harvey, 2005; Crawford, 2001). From an organisational perspective, such a climate has been found to contribute to increased absence and turnover (Djurkovic et al., 2008), not to mention the legal implications of reported grievances. Bullying and harassment has therefore been a subject of considerable discussion in the practitioner literature in recent years (HR Focus, 2008).

This paper examines an attempt by an organisation to address this crucial issue, as defined by the workforce, bullying and harassment. Significant efforts by the case study organisation were made to reduce workplace bullying through a comprehensive policy and this paper examines the extent to which the policy has been successful (Hamarus, Kaikkonen 2008). The paper first examines existing literature on bullying and harassment before considering human resource management's response to the bullying predicament. The next section provides information on the case study by:

* measuring the extent of the problem;

* summarising the CEO's response to the problem; and

* measuring the ...