Speaking up or staying silent in bullying situations: the significance of management control

Abstract

A frequent prescription for providing voice for employees with respect to bullying is a policy supported by a procedural complaint mechanism. Yet research points to a pervasiveness of employee silence in workplaces in situations of workplace bullying. We examine the efficacy of workplace bullying procedures as a voice mechanism for employees in countering bullying and explore the role of management in shaping employee propensity to speak out against bullying utilising procedures. In doing so, we advance knowledge on workplace bullying by using an industrial relations perspective and placing employer control as a conceptual lens. Based on a large survey of nurses in Ireland, the findings demonstrate that managerial actions have significant influence on employees' propensity to utilise bullying procedures. The findings also provide some empirical support for the premise that management seek to use bullying behaviours to constrain employees' contestation of management decision making.

“It’s Not Us, It’s You!”: Extending Managerial Control through Coercion and Internalisation in the Context of Workplace Bullying amongst Nurses in Ireland

“…The quantitative questions were drawn from pre-validated measures, namely the revised negative acts questionnaire (NAQ-R) [68], and those developed by Whiteside and Barclay, 2013 [69], and Harlos and Pinder 2001 [55] to explore propensity to speak up or stay silent in the workplace. These quantitative findings of the survey are reported elsewhere [5,14] and thus we do not refer to them in this paper. This article focuses specifically on participants' perceptions of, and responses to, managerial control and workplace bullying.…”

“…Deetz (p. 87) [64] captures this succinctly, stating 'the modern business of management is often managing the "insides"the hopes, fears, and aspirations-of workers, rather than their behaviors directly'. Workers internalise the signals and make decisions on this basis as to whether or not speaking up with respect to bullying is a feasible option [5] (see also [65]). Thus, workers may be reluctant to report/resist bullying because of a sense of fear of retribution by those in power or a sense of futility, i.e., that nothing will be done [66].…”

“…Bullying refers to situations where an employee(s) perceives themselves as subjected to repeated negative actions of others. It is well documented that bullying entails negative outcomes for the organisation and individual employees including in respect to employee engagement, turnover, job efficacy, and employee health and wellbeing [4][5][6]. Employees can try to resist bullying for instance by using workplace complaint procedures, or through their union if one is present.…”

“…The first is that despite the potential for strong worker agency, such as where workers are highly unionised, studies point to an enduring prevalence of bullying and a strong reluctance of employees to report bullying. For example, nursing is a sector with generally high unionisation levels, yet studies indicate significant levels of perceived bullying and under-reporting [5,9,10]. A second apparent contradiction is that despite the negative impact of bullying and other negative behaviours on organisations, and the establishment of procedural mechanisms, organisational responses are often weak [11].…”

“…Not only can organisational responses be ineffective, but research highlights the role of management in tolerating and perpetuating bullying [11][12][13]. Ineffective managerial responses can influence victims and observers' perceptions of the efficacy of reporting bullying in the future [5,14].…”