Navitas Professional Year | Australian Workplace Culture
Workplace bullying is a persistent pattern of mistreatment from others in the workplace that causes either physical or emotional harm. It can include such tactics as verbal, non-verbal, psychological, and physical abuse as well as humiliation, often operating within the established rules and policies of their organisation and their society. In the majority of cases, bullying in the workplace is reported as having been done by someone who has authority over the victim.
Why are people often hesitant to make a complaint?
There is no compensation to be claimed if bullying is found to be occurring, and also the only order you can get is that the bullying behaviour ceases.
The legal definition of bullying is relatively narrow, which makes it hard to make a successful claim.
Practically, the claims are not dealt with very quickly.
Many people do not often realise they are being bullied even if the bullying exists.
It can be tricky to claim against a manager under circumstances involving performance management as an alleged bully's behaviour could be deemed ‘reasonable management’, and thus, the claim would collapse.
Most employees would face a dilemma that they find it intimidating to go one-to-one with their employer whilst bullying jurisdiction is costly.
Would people be victimised beyond the original incident after filing complaints? How to create a culture where people feel safe to stand up for their rights to equal treatment and being treated with respect and dignity?
It is possible for people who file complaints to be victimised beyond the original incident, especially under circumstances where a bully can access the information on who has made the claim.
Therefore, an employer should develop a method of delivering simple safety messages, information and support to workers so that employees can feel comfortable to talk and make complaints.
And also, before consulting with workers, health and safety representatives (HSRs) need to be professionally trained by an approved HSR training provider. Some large companies probably need a seperate department, such as a health and safety committee (HSC), in order to create a safe environment for consultation.
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