Bullying in the workplace: Don't push us around

Richard Andrews is first assistant at Highgate Golf Club

The more we turn on our televisions and engage on social media, the more we hear conversations about mental health.

From Royalty to celebrity, it is an issue gaining more and more time in the spotlight.

There is an increasing awareness within the greenkeeping industry that the pressures of presenting quality golf courses without increasing resources are having hugely detrimental impacts on the mental health of greenkeepers. I have just returned home from a flying visit to BTME in Harrogate and beyond the usual agronomic chit‑chat, there is a definite and unsettling undercurrent that there are serious problems with the way greenkeepers are treated within some golf clubs.

While it is generally course managers and head greenkeepers who must withstand the pressures exerted by employers, this article discusses those who are not necessarily in senior positions and are victims of bullying. For many suffering from poor mental health, there are deeply embedded problems, very often from childhood, bereavement or trauma; but for victims of bullying, psychological damage can accumulate insidiously.

Bullying is a pattern of behaviour that seeks to undermine, humiliate and exercise control over a victim ‑ for whom it can turn a normally functioning workplace into a place of fear. Generally speaking, greenkeepers work in small teams where bullies cannot hide but, as we work remotely from the clubhouse and the main management structures, bullying can start, develop and continue unchecked.

Harassment is very similar to bullying but has a specific meaning based on » discrimination (such as race, religion, gender) and despite the small difference between the two, bullying is not unlawful – but harassment is. It is a peculiarity of law that a bully can subject a victim to a campaign of unpleasantness but only breaks the law if the campaign is based on, for example, race or gender.

When discussing bullying, an initial reaction might be to think about overt aggression or physical abuse such as that found in the school playground.

However, workplace bullying will include repeated emotional abuse which is far subtler and can include:

• Exclusion and isolation
• Unfair treatment
• Picking on individuals
• Ridicule
• Increased workloads and unrealistic expectations

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The Bully

The motive of the bully is to exert power over the victim. Bullying is not normal behaviour and can often be attributed to underlying psychological causes. It would be fair to say that, to some degree, we all carry our own internal feelings of inadequacy or regret and, typically, a bully is unable to process these internal feelings and they transfer these feelings to a victim. This is a bully’s subconscious method of protecting themselves from emotions that they are unable to manage.

Research has shown that bullies are twice as likely to have previously experienced bullying as those who do not bully. Also, bullies do not properly understand the feelings of others and can misinterpret innocent situations as hostility or personal attacks.

A bully will target key areas to exert their power:

• The self‑esteem of the victim
• The relationships between the victim and colleagues
• The abilities of the victim

Peer to peer bullying in the workplace is far less common than manager to employee bullying as a manager can utilise a position of authority to intimidate and control, to manipulate and terrorise.

Bullies are more likely to come from backgrounds where aggression, violence or arguments are more frequent. Also, marriage breakdown and bereavement are tragedies over which we have no control and some individuals use bullying as a way of reasserting control – the control that was previously lost where tragedy occurred – over their environment. The bully is unaware of these subconscious processes.

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The Victim

It is not always the weaker personality who is bullied but sometimes stronger, more influential and dynamic individuals will be targeted because the bully views them as opposition or as a threat. However, the nature of workplace hierarchies means that victims are largely powerless to defend themselves against a manager who is a bully.

Once the bully has established dominance over the victim, a pattern of behaviour develops whereby the bully continues to bully and the victim becomes more isolated within the workplace. Over time, this isolation makes the victim become withdrawn and this itself creates a negative spiral of isolation and withdrawal leading to a deterioration in relationships between the victim and the victim’s colleagues. And there is a disturbing psychological paradox which contributes to the victim’s isolation: that isolation becomes desirable for the victim and so company and social situations are deliberately avoided. This accentuates the feelings of isolation and withdrawal.

The victim may continue to try to function properly in the workplace but may begin to suffer ill‑health such as headaches, nausea, and sleep disorders. As humans are not capable of compartmentalising serious problems, this ill‑health will extend far beyond the confines of the workplace and therefore personal relationships become strained and the victim can be irritable or overly emotional, apparently without due cause.

Unchecked, these symptoms can develop into stress and anxiety and depression. These are recognised conditions with recognisable » physiological and psychological symptoms and are often life‑changing for the sufferer.

This is a harsh reality for victims and is not uncommon in prolonged attacks of bullying. These conditions can lead to mental breakdown and even suicide.

Can bullying stop?

An approach to dealing with bullies will not work if it is based on the belief that a bully is consciously aware of their own issues, or is capable of remorse. As this conscious awareness is not likely, bullying will only stop when either the bully no longer has access to the victim, or is forced to stop.

There are multiple factors which conspire to allow bullying to continue unchecked:

• There is a fear of retribution for victims who speak out
• Colleagues will remain silent because of fear that they too may become victims

Dealing with bullying is a difficult task. Management may close ranks around senior staff who are bullies because of fear that their business will be placed in a vulnerable situation

The easiest way for management to deal with bullying is to ignore it

The victim can:

• Seek help from various charities
• Keep a diary
• Record witness accounts of bullying
• Understand why bullying is happening and protect themselves from the bully at the time of the attack by objectively analysing and challenging the bullying behaviour
• Take formal action (grievance or employment tribunal) possibly leading to constructive dismissal
• Leave the company quietly

Bullying is widespread and the NHS has a page devoted to bullying issues, ACAS produces a dedicated leaflet and there are numerous anti‑bullying charities. It is an astonishing fact that the National Bullying Helpline is busiest on a Sunday evening with callers anxious about returning to work on Monday.

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Can we help victims of bullying?

For the victims of peer‑to‑peer bullying there is hope, but for those bullied by senior staff, prospects are bleak: they feel trapped, isolated and caught in a downward spiral. The politics of the workplace mean senior staff will be protected by complicit, higher management and the formal grievance procedure route is not only impossibly stressful (particularly for a victim who has been tormented for a long period) but may result in a tarnished employment record.

Clearly, managers are best placed to deal with bullying and while less senior colleagues are in an awkward position to speak out, they can help them by:

• Acknowledging to the victim that they can see and understand what is happening
• Including the victim in work‑related activities, thus resisting the downward spiral of isolation and withdrawal
• Maintaining normal relations in the workplace
• Trying to raise a victim’s low self‑esteem through positive interaction
• Providing witness accounts of bullying

Although these may appear to be minor points, they can represent an invaluable level of support to a victim: the difference between a struggle to maintain normality and a rapid descent into chronic mental health problems.

The greenkeeping industry is growing accustomed to the creaking and groaning sounds of course managers and head greenkeepers buckling under the pressure of ever‑increasing demands. The consequences for those individuals’ mental health are blindingly obvious and stretch far beyond the workplace. But while we remember these folk, let us not forget the little people whose lives are affected by bullying: they are the ones keeping the National Bullying Helpline busy every Sunday night.