Dealing with Workplace Bullying and Harassment Issues
When we find ourselves becoming increasingly annoyed, upset or fearful around someone’s behaviour and attitude over an extended period of time, here’s what tends to happen for many people: We start to have increasingly negative thoughts about that person/persons which in turn causes us to experience a greater level of unpleasant emotions such as anger,…
“We don’t see things as they are, we see them as we are.” ~ Anaïs Nin The above quote neatly captures the psychological phenomenon, that while there is a factual and concrete reality out there, none of us have a truly objective view. There can be many different perceptions of the same situation. As an…
Anti-Bullying Policies. Almost two years ago Maria, a member of a team of ten, was finding it difficult to deal with one of her colleagues Andrea. Maria said she thought Andrea appeared to not value her or take her seriously as a colleague. They had had a number of meetings with their manager, who tried…
When I ask people in training courses and workshops to cite some images or associations they have with the concept of ‘conflict’, I usually get a whole list of negatives (angry, war, hate, stress…) and very few positives. ‘I don’t like conflict’ is a common refrain, so I do my best to avoid it’. Yet…
In recent times there is increased emphasis on resolving workplace conflict, relationship difficulties, bullying and/or harassment, at an early stage and with the person directly themselves. All well and good you might think but that can be a lot harder than it sounds. This challenge is in no way helped either by the language found…
‘All those ideas around conflict resolution are really great Mary, but what about ‘difficult behaviour’ – someone who just won’t sit down and talk things through in a reasonable way…how are you supposed to deal with them?’ This was the comment of a client in a recent team conflict case. She described herself as constantly…
Bullying and harassment in the workplace continue to be one of the most challenging forms of interpersonal difficulties that arise in the workplace. As part of an organisation’s bullying prevention policy, the Health and Safety Authority Code of Practice (2007) in Ireland recommends that employers should name a ‘Contact Person’, whose role is to ‘listen…
To what extent do you engage in constructive conflict? Think about the last time you got annoyed or frustrated with someone… What are the odds that silently or perhaps even aloud, your response was to along the lines of ‘You are unreliable’ or ‘You shouldn’t do x’ . So often when we are annoyed or…
Last month I wrote about dealing with what is termed ‘high conflict’ behaviours and outlined some of the theory that might underpin such behaviour. So here are some concrete approaches to managing such situations. 1. Don’t take the ‘bait: The number one ‘rule’ as it were in dealing with someone who is being perhaps rude,…
One of the challenges I came up against early on in my mediation career is how best to work with and support others in dealing with, a situation where a person didn’t seem able to be reasonable or engage in collaborative behaviours. Rather there seemed to be constant defensiveness and an unwillingness to accept some…
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