Describe a bullying incident in the workplace?

Answer 1

I worked for the State of Alaska. I had a horrible boss who was in all sense of the word a bully. She had a whole repertoire of things to do to new employees. On the list was making degrading comments under her breath, like when I had never used the type of copy machine the state had, she said, "I thought you knew how to use a copy machine." Another one of her tricks was to continually jump around the corner and say, "How's it going?" This happened every 10 minutes throughout the day. She would also pretend to leave for the day and the suddenly reappear to see if you were working. I was taught how to do data entry on some forms and I would work on these in my spare time. Every time she saw me doing them she would suddenly come up with at least three projects she wanted me to do instead. It's like I was taught to do the forms, but I was never supposed to do them. One day, when I was still speaking to her, I made the mistake of telling her I broke my leg 3 months ago and that it had taken me a while to be able to walk again. The next day she had the brilliant idea of cleaning the entire office which involved moving lots of 50 pound boxes. She wouldn't allow me to use the cart to move boxes because she was using it to put her stuff on it. I ended up re-injuring my leg, as well as my back, and I know she did it purposely. Another job I had was to deliver mail and she accused me of leaving the building rather than delivering the mail on several occasions, even though it wasn't true. Her goal was to get rid of every new employee in 3 months for some reason. She finally managed to get rid of me by digging up something on my background check, which HR didn't feel the need to do, but old bossy did and she managed to get me fired for it. When I applied for unemployment, the state ruled in my favor and said that this woman had created a hostile work environment. However, she did manage to make it so the State of Alaska would never hire me again, in spite of the fact that I worked for several departments and everyone had liked me and my work. Bullies can come in all sizes and shapes. This woman was eventually removed from a supervisory job because of her tactics.

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I am a male care assistant who works in a local care home. I have no problem working with many of the staff, but one of them is in with management and every time I am working with her, she calls me into the office for no reason at all and issues me with a supervision warning. The most recent one is that she has managed to convince the manager that I have been causing trouble with the staff and spreading lies. When the manager herself spoke to me about this she also called me a liar to my face whilst in the office. She almost fired me because of this. Is there anything I can do about such appalling treatment as it happens every time I am on her shift?

• You are in a difficult situation and it might be too late to sort this out satisfactorily.
• You need to ask them to put their complaints in writing, so you know exactly what is the problem from their point of view.
• You should also keep a record of every incident, with times and dates and details of what was said.
• You should look for other support. Do you have a union representative in the workplace or have you contacted the union? Are there other staff who agree with you?
• Is there someone above the manager that your union can approach? Pressure from above can often be the only way to resolve the issue.

A:In New South Wales in 2004 a 16 year old factory worker was the subject of violent bullying - he was wrapped in plastic by his co-workers, rolled around on a trolley and covered in sawdust and glue.

The director and the factory foreman were both found to have breached the Occupational Health and Safety Act 2000 and were personally liable for this bullying. The director was fined $9000 and the foreman $12000 as he was personally responsible for supervising the employees.