Bullying in organizations has become one the prime social phenomena which can have a direct as well as indirect impact on the productivity of employees and managers. While bullying is a part of the fabric of society, the rate of occurrence as well as the severity of bullying acts in the workplace is alarming. This paper puts forth a model that illustrates the triangular relationship and interaction between the three components in the bullying event: 1) the organizational environment and its impact on the occurrence of bullying activities; 2) the characteristics of those that bully; and 3) the characteristics of those being bullied (e.g., victims of bullying). These three interrelated issues form the triangle of bullying that is examined in this paper. This paper posits that a major source of many of the personnel relational problems faced in the workplace between coworker and coworker or manager and employees comes from bullies, just like the ones experienced on the childhood playground. Research shows that child bullies and those bullied as children have the potential to become adult bullies. Combine that with the complex, diverse, global business arena that creates high levels of stress, it is easy to understand why there is the possibility of boardroom/workplace bullies. "Bullying at work is claimed to be more crippling and devastating problem for employees than all other work related stress put together... " (Einarsen, 1999).
Purpose -The purpose of this paper is to examine and develop a cross-level model of the phenomenon of bullying at three levels (e.g. individual, group, and organizational). Design/methodology/approach -This is a theory-based paper operationalizing transactional coping theory across three levels of an organization relative to bullying activities. Findings -There can be spillover from bullying from the dyadic level to other levels in the organization. While bullying is frequently discussed as an individual-to-individual phenomenon, the conflict can reverberate up to the group and organizational level. The interaction between the three levels needs to be taken into consideration when developing effective managerial plans to address the negative consequences of bullying.Research limitations/implications -Additional research is needed to address the interaction effect between all three levels that can be impacted by bullying acts. Without addressing the spillover from one level to another, remediation programs will be less than effective. Practical implications -Bullying appears to be increasing in organizations today and affecting financial as well as human resources. Owing to the increased complexity of conducting business in a hyper-competitive global marketplace, bullying behavior needs to be addressed by management to prevent the proliferation of bullying acts in organizations. Originality/value -The unique contribution of this paper is twofold: the first to identify the externality effect of bullying behavior, and the application of a single coping theory across multiple levels of an organization.
Workplace bullying in global organizations occurs for several reasons, including growing diversity, increased dispersion of employees in geographic locations, lack of experience of managers with new environments, and varying requirements. To gain insight into the bullying phenomenon, one must examine the characteristics of the bully, the target of bullying activities (e.g., the victim or the bullied), observers of the bullying (e.g., bystanders), and resulting changes in the organizational culture because of the bullying. One additional element to be assessed is the means by which bullying activities are embodied in an organization's culture (i.e., social/emotional contagion). This paper proposes a model of bullying in global organizations and examines the potential of social/emotional contagion developing in global organizations’ cultures.
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