We have just come to the end of National Anti Bullying
Week primarily aimed at raising awareness of school bullying but
the problem goes much deeper than this.
Bullying is one of the most difficult workplace issues
and often the 'elephant in the room' that seems either too
difficult or risky to challenge. However, with surveys indicating
that more than two million people consider themselves as being
bullied at work at any one time and 18.9 million working days
(£2bn per year in sick pay) being lost in the UK each year as
a direct result of workplace bullying, it is a problem that needs
to be tackled. Add to this increased staff turnover, lower
productivity, adverse effects on an organisation's ability to
recruit good staff and the management time and cost of handling
grievances, disciplinary issues and legal claims - and the business
case seems made for tackling this head on.
Help is at hand. There are strategies that businesses can use to
address the causes and effects of bullying in the workplace and
reduce the hidden costs to their organisation and their employees.
These could include:
- Introducing and maintaining dignity at work policies
- Setting and applying clear behavioural standards
- Including appropriate behaviours in appraisal, promotion and progression criteria
- Training managers
- Using occupational health effectively
In view of the potential costs to businesses suffering the unwanted effects of workplace bullying, a half day expert conference has been organised by Rawlison Butler, featuring a world class panel of leading industry and academic experts on 13 February 2013 at Epsom Downs racecourse. Further details at www.rawlisonbutler.com/events.
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