Can You Be a Workplace Bully Without Realizing It?

You’re passionate, driven and exacting. You want to do the job right, and you want everyone else to do it right, too. If they don’t, you’re not shy about letting them know, and you’re not one to mince words. Sometimes – more often than not, it seems – you have to step in and do it yourself, or watch carefully to make sure nothing goes wrong.

On the one hand, that drive for good results is admirable and shouldn’t be tempered. On the other, you need to be careful – you might make someone you work with feel bullied, even though you didn’t intend it that way.

Ethisphere reports a 13 percent rise in workplace bullying since the onset of the coronavirus pandemic, even as workplace misbehavior declined in most other areas. That makes sense – with so many people working remotely, there’s less opportunity for misbehavior to occur, but colleagues still interact regularly via Zoom, Teams and email.

That has kept the door open for bullying behaviors to persist, exacerbated by the frustrations of the pandemic and the decline in social skills that happens when people don’t interact face to face as often.

Bullying, even the inadvertent sort, has hit younger workers – the ones who entered the workforce during or after the pandemic – the hardest. The Ethisphere report found that 39 percent of Gen Z workers have experienced workplace bullying or other misconduct that they didn’t report. A huge majority – 85 percent – weren’t even aware of workplace prohibitions against retaliation for reporting bullies.

The cost of workplace bullying on workers’ physical and mental health can play out in greater absenteeism and less job loyalty. A recent study by researchers Daniel Jolley and Anthony Lantian found that workplace bullying can even make employees more likely to latch on to conspiracy theories, further damaging their mental well-being and even putting them at risk of becoming violent because of those beliefs.

What are some characteristics of inadvertent bullies?

• They’re intelligent and expect others to match their level of intelligence.
• They get frustrated easily when others don’t live up to their expectations.
• They have a hard time seeing others’ points of view, often just tuning them out.
• They bluntly point out others’ underperformance in an effort to motivate them through shame.
• They micromanage everything.
• They run down colleagues and subordinates to company leaders and managers.
• They are unwilling to compromise or acknowledge they’re in the wrong when disagreements arise.
• They have a hard time reading nonverbal cues when others are uncomfortable.
• They raise their voices in anger at colleagues.

What can you do to change if you’re an inadvertent bully?

If you read the list above and, upon reflection, realized a few of those things describe your behavior in the workplace, there are three things you can do to help change your approach:

First, pay attention. Do your colleagues tense up when you walk into the room, or when they have to come to your office for something? Do they drop their heads and avoid eye contact? Are their feet pointed toward the door when you’re in the same room with them? Do they avoid bringing concerns to you until they’re in crisis mode? Most telling, do they not do these things with others? If the answers are all or mostly “Yes,” then there’s a problem here.

Second, take stock of your colleague’s strengths as well as their weaknesses – and focus on the former. Don’t expect them to be carbon copies of yourself, or to do things exactly the way you do them. Most likely, they have strengths you don’t have, ways of doing things that are different but just as (or even more) efficient, and fresh viewpoints that can help solve problems and create opportunities.

Finally, and most importantly, commit to the work and process of change. It most likely won’t happen overnight – and even when the changes in behavior start to manifest, it might take some time to win back your colleagues’ trust and repair damaged relationships. Be prepared to say “I’m sorry” – both for past actions and for any slips into old habits as you work through the change.

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For more on developing better workplace relationships, check out Developing Your Emotional Intelligence

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If a colleague is mean to you, explain how. Odds are, that colleague will be apologetic and gracious. If you do see clear and repetitive examples of someone being a bully in the workplace, talk to someone you trust. Look for ways to solve the issue diplomatically. Fighting fire with fire rarely works.

Self-awareness is never a bad thing. Humility, generosity, and kindness help everyone work together to solve workplace problems.

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