Your Work Culture Promotes or Prevents Bullying

Your Work Culture Promotes or Prevents Bullying

S. Chris Edmonds is a sought-after speaker, author, and executive consultant. He’s the founder and CEO of The Purposeful Culture Group, which he launched in 1990. Chris helps senior leaders build and sustain purposeful, positive, productive work cultures. He is the author or co-author of seven books, including Amazon bestsellers Good Comes First (2021) with Mark Babbitt, The Culture Engine (2014), and Leading at a Higher Level (2008) with Ken Blanchard.

If you tolerate demeaning, discounting, and disrespectful treatment of others by anyone, you’ll never have a purposeful, positive, productive work culture. So, does your current work culture quash workplace bullying or enable it?

Workplace bullying is profoundly prevalent in our workplaces. The Workplace Bullying Institute’s 2021 U.S. survey found that 30% of adult Americans have been bullied at work. 49% of respondents reported experiencing or witnessing bullying in their workplaces.

Remote workers are not immune. The WBI survey found that 43% of remote workers experienced bullying through online meetings (50% reported) and email (9% reported).

A single instance of workplace bullying is too much. The costs are just too great:

respect
wellbeing
sanity
safety
creativity
productivity,
and more.

A recent study by the National University of Ireland Galway estimates that bullying in Irish workplaces cost the economy over €239 million – over $279 million in U.S. currency – per year.

We must do better – and we can. Senior leaders can transform their work culture by making respect as important as results.

Managing results is half of the leader’s job. The other half is managing respect. What does that involve?

In our 2021 book, Good Comes First co-author Mark S. Babbitt and I define respect as the demonstration and expression of validation and recognition of team members’ ideas, efforts, and contributions, every day.

A single instance of workplace bullying is too much. The costs are just too great.

CHRIS EDMONDS

Leaders make respect as important as results when all leaders consistently model, celebrate, measure, coach, and mentor respect in daily interactions. Leaders must then demand respectful treatment in every interaction by all players.

Leaders ensure respect is as important as results when they measure how well leaders model their desired values and behaviors throughout their company. It isn’t enough for leaders to promise to be respectful. Leaders must conduct regular values surveys that gather employee perceptions of how leaders behave daily.

That undeniable data helps senior leaders to coach their peers and next-level leaders. They can celebrate aligned leader behaviors, rated by direct reports, and re-direct misaligned leader behaviors.

Over time, every leader then will realize that treating others disrespectfully is not allowed in your workplace.