Of course the coverup, circling the wagons defensiveness-at-all-costs strategy is invoked only when a similarly highly valued colleague is in trouble. Jerry Sandusky was a legend and got the protective treatment. If the rape had been done by a lowly janitor, he would have been jailed back in 2002 and still be there! For the powerful, the club comes to the rescue.

Now think of PSU as a medium-size corporation rather than as an academic giant sports brand name. The abuser was one of the elite in the eyes of senior managers. He had many allies. When news came that their fellow (who none of them ever saw abuse anyone, by the way) was an abuser, they kicked into cover-up mode.

Employers, regardless of industry, go to great lengths to prevent discovery of abusive conduct by any of the senior club members. When a VP is accused of harassment or bullying or abusive conduct, the senior-most leader denies it. The reporting target is incredulous to not be believed.

In cases not easily denied (i.e., those with multiple witnesses of public acts), the employer throws unlimited dollars into the defense of their beloved buddy.

I am fond of telling seminar and University participants the tale of a former federal government bureau director (in MMS) who brought us in to deal with an egregiously volatile and cruel bully division chief. The bully was convinced to step down. He accepted his fate. The director, however, would not accept our recommendation or his division chief’s voluntary decision. Said the director:

No. I will not accept it. That would make two chiefs to step down in one week (the other had been caught embezzling). Besides, (the bully) is a lunch buddy and a great conversationalist.

The bond between abusers and their executive sponsors should never be underestimated. Organizations tolerate the banishment of countless victims of managerial abuse without guilt. Organizations have no conscience because the executives are allowed to live in their bubble, never seeing that their sycophant allies are abusers, and never having to acknowledge the truth.

The silence that shrouds the fate of millions of displaced bullied targets enables the country to never learn how bad it is. It enables the “best places to work” to wear the badge of honor while hypocritically covering up the ruined careers of many of their best workers because it suited executives to live the lie.

PSU’s behavior is the norm, not the exception. If the abuse victim had not been a child, you would never have heard a peep. The Paterno/PSU mystique would be untarnished in the public eye.

Lessons for this teachable moment in history:

1. Abuse of adults at work needs to be legally actionable. Pass the HWB.

2. Create misconduct reporting systems inside organizations not prone to favoritism or control by executives. #1 makes #2 possible.

Without the law against child abuse pushing PSU, the Sandusky cover-up would never have seen the light of day. The absence of illegality is the principal reason that workplace bullying remains an employer’s best kept secret.

Kudos to sportswriter Dave Zirin, always a cut above, for pointing out that the highest paid players were not willing to allow owners to contract future and discarded players for as little as $75,000 a year. Yes that means the richest among them (count Kobe in) stood unanimously to stick up for future generations.

Zirin wrote:

Maybe they’re fighting for a reason so basic, we’ve missed it. Maybe it’s because they overwhelmingly come from the ranks of the working poor, have career lengths of six years and have been facing off against the ranks of true generational, aristocratic wealth in all its arrogance, personified by the snide, oozing contemptuousness of David Stern. Maybe they’re just tired of being treated as less than men by the people who write their checks.

Maybe they just hate to lose. NBA players: welcome to the 99 percent.

So, don’t dump on the players for having a strong union willing to work on members’ behalf. That’s what all bullied targets want who have a union. Work for me. Look out for my benefit.

1. Sexual harassment violates state and federal laws. Harassers pose a legal liability to employers. Therefore, employers will pay cash settlements to avoid court battles and to silence complainants. If you are bullied but there is an underlying gender or race or age difference, do not ignore it. Forget bullying and use the law that exists to compel the employer to pay attention.

1a. Bullying at work is status-blind harassment. It does not require that the recipient be a member of a group protected by anti-discrimination laws. It is more prevalent and often is experienced in addition to illegal harassment, but it is not yet illegal in any state in the U.S. Therefore, contrary to point #1, employers do not face the same risks of defeat in court, so rarely is a bullied target ever paid.

2. Harassment complainants are paid settlements and typically fired for having dared to complain. Before the separation, though, they almost always suffer retaliation for having the courage to complain.

2a. Bullied targets are fired, constructively discharged (made more miserable than a reasonable person should be expected to tolerate), and thrown out the door without getting a penny. Their post-complaint retaliation led to nothing positive for them.

3. Harassers typically keep their jobs or are promoted. They are allowed to deny their actions because settlement agreements always begin with a clause stating that there is no admission of guilt.

3a. Bullies, in all but 4% of cases, keep their jobs or are promoted. Like harassers, they abuse with impunity.

4. Sexually harassed workers who agree to take cash not only lose their jobs, but they are “gagged” by the terms of the agreement to never speak about their experiences again. This allows harassers to become serial harassers. With the benefit of silence, other unsuspecting employees have to endure the degradation because the employer has not made the harasser quit. The complaint to settlement cycle is repeated, costing the employer more money just to retain the a-hole harasser.

4a. In the rare event that a bullied person wins a severance agreement, she or he is typically gagged. However, by keeping your head during the emotional turmoil that swirls around the complaint-retaliation-settlement sequence of events, you can tweak the agreement terms. Agree to never divulge “the terms of the agreement.” But limit the gag clause to not saying that you received a paltry $35K or $45K as did the Cain complainants. Otherwise, you are free to tell the world how that employer back your bully-harasser and made your life hell.

5. Harassers lie to victims, to their bosses, to legal counsel, to counselors, to investigators, to arbitrators, when being deposed, when testifying in court, to judges, and to juries.

5a. Bullies do the same.

6. Harassment victims are not believed, even when they were paid settlements because the employer feared the legitimacy of their claim. Employers will always say that legal counsel made them pay simply because it is cheaper to settle than to take the battle to court. The truth is, employers can wear down any plaintiff who challenges them. They only pay settlements when they think they will lose.

6a. Bullied targets are viewed by the employer and alarmingly by the public as the “troublemakers.” Why? All they did was insist on dignified treatment at work. Not special treatment. To not be treated abusively.

“Ill treatment” included: unreasonable treatment (reported by 47%), denigration and disrespect (40%), 33% experienced both unreasonable treatment and denigration and disrespect, and 6% experienced violence.

The news headline was that “one million UK workers have experienced violence at work.” Using the prevalence estimates from this new study and Office of National Statistics’ number of private and public sectors workers (29.1 million in July), we arrive at the numbers of people experiencing:

- Unreasonable treatment: 13.6 million
- Denigration and disrespect: 11.6 million
- Violence: 1.7 million
- Both unreasonable and denigrating and disrespectful treatment: 9.6 million
- All three categories: 1.4 million
- Denigration & disrespect and violence: 291,000

The questions which appear below included a modified list of items from the Negative Acts Questionnaire which is a checklist of behaviors that academics use to operationally define bullying. In other words, rather than ask people if they think they were bullied (which actually leads to an underreporting because research shows that people do not want to admit it happens to them), the surveyers relied on the behaviors checked to determine if the respondents were bullied.

With respect to individual survey items, 29% of the sample were given unmanageable workloads or impossible deadlines and 27% had their opinions and views ignored. Employers, managers or supervisors were responsible in over two-thirds of incidents. Coworkers were the primary culprits when withholding information which affected performance.

The two most frequent denigration and disrespect experiences were to be shouted at or having someone lose their temper (24%) and being treated in a disrespectful or rude way (23%). More than 20% of people experienced three or more types of misconduct in this category. Regarding sources, managers were responsible in 40% of cases, in 27% of cases clients, customers or the public were perpetrators, while coworkers were 22% of the sample.

In this British study, men in the middle of their careers were the most likely targets. Disrespect rose as the size of organizations rose.

Targets of disrespect were likely to have psychological disabilities. Of course, the researchers made clear in the report that whether the psychological problems were the cause of the disrespect or the result of it could not be determined. Disrespect for this group of targets came from the public in half of the cases and from coworkers in the other half.

Gay, lesbian and bisexual employees were as likely to be disrespected at the same rate as for people with disabilities. In addition, LGBT workers were the workers subjected to the most violence.

The combination of unreasonableness and disrespect (reported by 33% of the sample) is the closest approximation to workplace bullying. The antisocial behaviors depicted by items in those two categories, derived from the NAQ, exclude physical violence. Bullying necessarily stops short of battery — physical violence. The UK prevalence is nearly identical to the US prevalence (35% in the 2010 WBI US Survey and 37% in the 2007 WBI Survey). Both studies were scientific national samples from their respective nations.

Four case studies of organizations are included in the Report. One: a large financial services company; Two: a large National Health Service public agency; Three: a logistics and communication company; and Four: a global engineering company. Each of these anonymous employers offer examples of how and why having policies to address bullying is inadequate.

The final section of the Report focuses on prevention and intervention strategies. In this regard, the authors show remarkable insight that is all too rare among academic researchers. First, they rightly conclude that the notion that employers can find an easy “one size fits all” methodology is wrong. An over-emphasis on policies and enforcement, the HR-led solution, overlooks informal solution opportunities. We heartily concur. Policies, the “lines in the sand,” are necessary, but insufficient if not supplemented by true organizational commitment.

The second major conclusion is that ill treatment thrives when managers in the trenches fail to intervene or to manage properly. Managers can and must stop it. When management abdicates responsibility, ill treatment flourishes. This is the same conclusion we draw in our book, The Bully-Free Workplace (Wiley, 2011).

We are proud to count Prof. Duncan Lewis, co-author of the study, from the Business School at the University of Plymouth, as a WBI colleague.

Download the Report.

Below is a result table showing the results for each of the 21 questions in the British Workplace Behaviour Survey.

November 15, 2011, from 2:00 PM – 3:30 PM, ET
Hosted by BNA, Bureau of National Affairs. CPE & HRCI credits available.

Register online or call 800.372.1033, option 6, then option 1

updated Oct. 27, 2010

Follow the story of a worker-driven push for change of a government workplace culture to drive out bullying. No ending yet. We support the unions whose workers deserve to be free from abusive conduct and retaliation. And we support the County administration that has the opportunity to turn a PR disaster into triumph and do the right thing.

2010

As in all government institutions, bullying occurs. Of this we can be sure. 8,000 employees work for Ventura County, California. Using WBI national statistics, we can safely estimate that 720 employees at any given time are being bullied; an additional 2,080 have been bullied. It’s a mid-size corporation.

January, 2011

A group of employees complained to the County Grand Jury (GJ). In a role much like consultants, the GJ investigated complaints (in one of their roles in that county) about workplace bullying by current and former county workers. The GJ as investigator concluded that bullying is a problem and employees deserve protection from it. An investigation conducted by HR might have concluded differently (as it nearly always does). The GJ reported that HR procedures are not trusted.

May 24, 2011

The GJ issues its report confirming the existence of the workplace bullying problem. Read the original Grand Jury report The county HR director, John Nicoll, told the local newspaper “We do not tolerate employees being mistreated because they’ve filed a complaint.” This directly contradicted facts about retaliation and fear of it contained in the GJ report. Read the press coverage of the GJ report and response of County administrators.

May-Sept, 2011

County employees are represented by several unions. SEIU Local 721 represents the majority of workers, numbering 4,500. The SEIU forms an Anti-Bully Committee. Meetings on the topic draw large crowds and several heart-wrenching stories from workers. The Committee conducts a survey of its members. Nearly 500 members responded. Read the SEIU Local 721 Bullying in the Workplace Report.

Some of the most compelling survey findings were:
- 60% of respondents have been bullied, compared to the 35% national estimate
- 69% have witnessed bullying
- Over 40% have been yelled at
- Over 40% have been retaliated against

Sept. 27, 2011

Gary Lowery, SEIU, showing the County's Report Card with all F's

The full record of Union Testimony on Sept. 27, 2011

The full responses by Supervisors & CEO M. Powers on Sept. 27, 2011

by Erika C. Collins, New York Law Journal, Oct. 24, 2011

The United States has had status-based harassment and discrimination laws in place for decades, well in advance of most other countries. Though the United States has taken several measures to protect those who are harassed in the workplace based on “protected categories,”(1) it has not introduced legislation to assist those who are “bullied” in the workplace, but do not have such a protected status on which to base a claim. Recent surveys indicate that a significant portion of U.S. workers may fall into this category; 35 percent of U.S. workers reported experiencing workplace bullying, the majority of which was same-gender harassment.(2)

Currently, there is no state or federal law to fill this gap in coverage. The first anti-bullying piece of legislation, the “Healthy Workplace Bill” (HWB), was introduced in California in 2003. Since then, 21 other states, including New York, have proposed bills based on the HWB, though none have yet been enacted. The New York State Legislature, however, is considering such a bill. A bill establishing “a civil cause of action for employees who are subjected to an abusive work environment” provides a remedy for victims of harassment that is not based on a protected category and holds employers civilly liable for maintaining abusive work environments.(3) If the bill is passed into law, New York will become the first state in the country to recognize a cause of action for workplace bullying, though several states have considered such legislation in the past.

Other countries have been more proactive in combating workplace bullying. In particular, Sweden, the United Kingdom, France and Japan have introduced new legislation or have interpreted existing legislation to address bullying in the workplace.(4) This article summarizes New York’s proposed bill. It also analyzes workplace bullying laws in place in Sweden, the UK and France as examples of treatment of workplace bullying outside the United States. Finally, this article provides recommendations to multinational employers that are faced with complying with developing bullying laws.

Healthy Workplace Bill

The New York State Legislature introduced an anti-bullying bill in 2010, which passed in the Senate,(5) but was put on hold in the Assembly. In early 2011, an identical bill was introduced in the New York State Assembly and Senate,(6) and is currently under consideration. Supporters of the proposed legislation are hopeful that New York will be the first state to pass it, prodding other states to follow its lead.(7)

The bill would amend the New York Labor Law by providing legal redress for employees who are subjected to an “abusive work environment,” which exists when an employee is “subjected to abusive conduct that is so severe that it causes physical or psychological harm.”(8) The bill defines “abusive conduct,” as “conduct, with malice, taken against an employee by an employer or another employee in the workplace, that a reasonable person would find to be hostile, offensive and unrelated to the employer’s legitimate business interests.”(9)

A single act will not constitute abusive conduct unless it is “especially severe or egregious,”(10) similar to the standard for hostile work environment claims under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act.(11) Furthermore, the bill requires employees to notify their employers of the abusive conduct.(12) After receiving such notice, employers must eliminate the abusive conduct, and may not retaliate against individuals who participated in the complaint process.(13)

The bill does provide employers with two alternative affirmative defenses. First, an employer may have an affirmative defense against a claim if it can demonstrate that it exercised reasonable care to prevent and promptly correct the abusive conduct and the employee unreasonably failed to take advantage of the appropriate preventative or corrective opportunities that it provided.(14) This defense is not available if the abusive conduct culminated in an adverse employment decision with respect to the complaining employee (e.g., termination or demotion); however, the employer can assert an alternative defense that any such decision was consistent with the employer’s legitimate business interests.(15)

The remedies available under the bill include reinstatement, removal of the offending party from the complainant’s work environment, reimbursement for lost wages and medical expenses, compensation for emotional distress, punitive damages, and attorney’s fees.(16) However, in cases where there was no adverse employment decision, emotional distress damages are capped at $25,000 and punitive damages are not available.(17) As an additional safeguard against unjust enrichment, the bill precludes employees who have collected Workers’ Compensation benefits for conditions arising out of an abusive work environment from bringing a claim pursuant to the law for the same such conditions.(18)

Sweden’s Ordinance

In 1993, Sweden became the first country in the world to enact specific anti-bullying legislation. The Ordinance on Victimization at Work,(19) enacted as part of Sweden’s occupational safety and health laws, offers protection against “victimization,” which it defines as “recurrent reprehensible or distinctly negative actions which are directed against individual employees in an offensive manner and can result in those employees being placed outside the workplace community.”(20)

Unlike New York’s proposed law, the ordinance does not provide a private cause of action for aggrieved employees; instead, it imposes administrative obligations upon employers to prevent victimization, immediately intervene when such misconduct becomes apparent, and attempt to engage in a collaborative process to resolve conflicts.(21) Employers who fail to comply with these obligations may be fined and/or imprisoned for up to one year.(22)

United Kingdom Act

Like the United States, the United Kingdom has not enacted legislation specifically to combat workplace bullying. However, British courts have interpreted an existing anti-stalking law, the Protection from Harassment Act (23) (PHA), as providing redress for victims of workplace bullying.(24) The PHA prohibits individuals from pursuing a course of conduct that either amounts to harassment, or that they should know amounts to harassment.(25)

Courts have interpreted the statute’s vague definition of “harassment” as conduct: (i) occurring on at least two occasions, (ii) targeted at the claimant, (iii) calculated in an objective sense to cause distress, and (iv) that is objectively judged to be oppressive and unreasonable.(26) However, even if the complained of conduct constitutes harassment under this objective test, vicarious liability for the conduct is not automatic; employer liability must be “just and reasonable in the circumstances.”(27) Whether or not an employer has implemented a harassment policy and procedures is one factor courts may consider in determining whether the imposition of vicarious liability is reasonable.(28) This judicial consideration is similar to the first affirmative defense under New York’s proposed law, which is available to employers that take measures to prevent and promptly correct abusive conduct.

There also is a statutory affirmative defense similar to the “legitimate business interests” defense provided in the New York bill, which is available to defendants who can show that the complained of conduct was: (i) pursued to prevent or detect a crime; (ii) legally required; or (iii) reasonable under the circumstances.(29) The PHA provides for remedies similar to those available under the New York bill, including injunctive relief and compensatory and emotional distress damages.(30) Unlike the New York bill, however, there is no cap on the damages that courts may award aggrieved employees. Significantly, a court recently awarded a victim of workplace bullying a record-setting $1.6 million in damages under the PHA.(31)

France’s Law

In 2002, France enacted the Social Modernization Law, which introduced provisions to the French Labor Code that provide civil and criminal penalties for “moral” harassment.(32) The law sets a higher standard for actionable conduct than New York’s proposed legislation does by expressly providing that a single act, regardless of its severity, is not enough to constitute moral harassment.(33) Furthermore, the conduct must have the purpose or effect of degrading the employee’s right to dignity, affecting the employee’s mental or physical health, or compromising the employee’s career.(34) The law places an affirmative obligation on employers to take all necessary actions to prevent moral harassment,(35) and prohibits them from retaliating against employees who report moral harassment or who refuse to be victims of moral harassment.(36)

Labor tribunals have construed the Social Modernization Law as holding employers strictly liable for actionable conduct, even if they implemented measures to prevent moral harassment.(37) Thus, unlike New York’s proposed legislation, there are no affirmative defenses available to employers. The law also provides for the automatic nullification of any employment contract termination resulting from moral harassment.(38) Additionally, labor tribunals have ordered employers to pay damages for breach or “disloyal non-performance” of an employment contract based upon a failure to prevent moral harassment.(39)

Steps Employers Should Take

The practical implications of the global trend aimed at combating workplace bullying are very concerning for both U.S. and multinational employers. To safeguard against litigation and liability for potentially large damage awards, employers should consider taking the following steps:

• Broaden workplace policies to prohibit abusive conduct and retaliation against any employee raising a complaint.

• Include a requirement that employees report abusive conduct, and provide a specific and clear procedure that offers employees multiple avenues to complain about abuse.

• Train all managers on how to handle reports of abusive conduct, and the consequences of retaliation.

• Take immediate and effective action to rectify all retaliation complaints.

• Continually review and, if necessary, revise employment policies to ensure compliance with applicable workplace bullying laws and regulations.

###

Erika C. Collins is a partner at Paul Hastings in New York where she chairs the international employment law practice group. Mina Maisami, an associate with the firm, and Shaira Nanwani, a summer associate with the firm, assisted in writing and editing this article.

Endnotes:

1. Under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, race, color, religion, sex, and national origin are protected categories. The Age Discrimination in Employment Act protects workers who are 40 and older from discrimination, and the American with Disabilities Act protects disabled workers. Under the Genetic Information Predisposition Act of 2008, employers are prohibited from using information regarding someone’s genetic predisposition to disease in making employment decisions. Veteran status is also a protected category under the Vietnam Era Veterans Readjustment Assistance Act. Finally, many states also include sexual orientation as a protected category.

2. Results of the 2010 WBI U.S. Workplace Bullying Survey, WORKPLACE BULLYING INSTITUTE, http://www.workplacebullying.org/wbiresearch/2010-wbi-national-survey/ (last visited July 25, 2011).

3. S. 4258, 2011-2012 Reg. Sess. (NY); A. 4258. 2011-2012 Reg. Sess. (NY) See “History of the Healthy Workplace Campaign, HEALTHY WORKPLACE BILL, http://www.healthyworkplacebill.org/states.php (Oct. 4, 2011).

4. See Katherine Lippel, “The Law of Workplace Bullying: An International Overview,” 32 COMP. LAB. L. & POL’Y J. 1, 1 (2010); Jessica A. Clarke, “Beyond Equality? Against the Universal Turn in Workplace Protections,” 89 IND. L.J. 1219, 1259 (2011).

5. Sen. 1823 B, 2010 Sess. (N.Y. 2010).

6. Assemb. 4258, 2011 Sess. (N.Y. 2011); Sen. 4289, 2011 Sess. (N.Y. 2011).

7. See Tina Susman, “State Bills Against Workplace Bullying Gain Traction,” L.A. Times, March 18, 2011.

8. Sen. 4289 §761, 2011 Sess. (N.Y. 2011).

9. Id. (providing the following examples of abusive conduct: “repeated infliction of verbal abuse, such as the use of derogatory remarks, insults and epithets; verbal or physical conduct that a reasonable person would find threatening, intimidating or humiliating; or the gratuitous sabotage or undermining of an employee’s work performance”).

10. Id.

11. See David C. Yamada, “Workplace Bullying and American Employment Law: A Ten-Year Progress Report and Assessment,” 32 COMP. LAB. L. & POL’Y J. 251, 262 (2010) (describing the domestic interdisciplinary coverage of and responses to workplace bullying and discussing decision of the HWB author to base the standard on that of hostile work environment claims).

12. Sen. 4289 §761, 2011 Sess. (N.Y. 2011).

13. Id.

14. Id. §764. This affirmative defense is similar to the Title VII affirmative defense created by the Supreme Court in Burlington Indus. Inc. v. Ellerth, 524 U.S. 742 (2008) and Faragher v. Boca Raton, 524 U.S. 775 (1998).

15. Id. (providing the following examples of legitimate business interests: “termination or demotion based on the plaintiff’s poor performance,” or a “reasonable investigation of potentially dangerous, illegal or unethical activity”).

16. Id. §766.

17. Id. See also Yamada, supra note 2, at 265 (stating that this safeguard “has the effect of discouraging extensive litigation and promoting quick resolution”).

18. Sen. 4289 §769, 2011 Sess. (N.Y. 2011).

19. SWEDISH NATIONAL BOARD OF OCCUPATIONAL SAFETY AND HEALTH, VICTIMIZATION AT WORK, ORDINANCE (Arbetsmiljoverket [AFS] 1993-17) (Swed.).

20. Id. §1.

21. Id. §§4-6. The accompanying guidelines suggest that management set standards for good behavior by example and clearly communicate to employees that victimization in the workplace is unacceptable.

22. See Frank Lorho & Ulrich Hilp, Bullying at Work 15-23 (European Parliament Directorate-Gen. for Research, Working Paper SOCI 108 EN, 2001), available at http://www.europarl.europa.eu/workingpapers/soci/pdf/108 en.pdf; Helge Hoel & Stale Einarsen, “The Swedish Ordinance Against Victimization at Work: A Critical Assessment,” 32 COMP. LAB. L. & POL’Y J. 225, 240 (2011).

23. Protection from Harassment Act, 1997, c. 40, §1 (Eng.).

24. See Majrowski v. Guy’s & St. Thomas’s NHS Trust, [2005] EWCA (Civ) 251, ¶56 (Court of Appeal); Green v. DB Group Servs. (U.K.) Ltd., [2006] EWHC 1898 (Q.B.).

25. Protection from Harassment Act, 1997, c. 40, §1 (Eng.).

26. See Susan Harthill, “Bullying in the Workplace: Lessons From the United Kingdom,” 17 MINN. J. INTL L. 247, 285 (2008) (citing Green, [2006] EWHC 1898, ¶ 152).

27. Majrowski, [2005] EWCA (Civ) 251, ¶57.

28. Id. ¶59.

29. PHA §1(3).

30. Id. §3(2).

31. Green, [2006] EWHC 1898 (Q.B.).

32. C. TRAV. art. L. 122-49.

33. Id.

34. Id.

35. Id. art. L. 122-51. One measure that employers must take is preparing a written document displaying workplace rules, which includes a provision prohibiting moral harassment. Id. art. L. 122-34.

36. Id. art. L. 122-49.

37. See Loic Lerouge, “Moral Harassment in the Workplace: French Law and the European Perspectives,” 32 COMP. LAB. L. & POL’Y J. 109, 122-27 (2010) (analyzing moral harassment cases before French Labor Tribunals).

38. C. TRAV. art. L. 122-49.

39. Lerouge, supra note 31, at 123.

Bob is the proverbial bully (Bobette when a woman). He operates freely without risk of being punished or terminated. So, every week is Freedom Week for bullies. Since Bob is free 52 weeks a year, dear executive, please use this one week, Freedom from Workplace Bullies Week, to end your relationship with Bob that makes life miserable for everyone else except you and Bob. It will take courage, of course. Here’s why and how to do it.

Bullies torment and abuse others with impunity. They do so because they have spent months, even years, groveling at the feet of a higher-ranking sponsor. That is, they torment down the org chart, but ingratiate (brown nose, ass kiss) up the ladder. All of their time is spent managing their sponsor’s impression of them. While targets keep their noses to the grindstone doing the work they love, the nose of bullies hover near the rear ends of their chosen sponsors. That’s how Bob makes himself indispensable.

On balance, several people have tried to tell you about Bob before. You didn’t believe them. They brought you news about Bob you couldn’t stand to hear. It hurt you to hear, but they were reporting the emotional abuse Bob foisted on them. You had several fired for daring bring this information to you. Others quit out of desperation. Bob convinced you that they all were faulty and he alone is competent.

If you ask anyone other than Bob about the talent lost to your organization, you will find that Bob has been lying to you. Good people were driven out or were demoralized and dehumanized, then left. All of this was kept from you by Bob. In his narcissistic world, only he mattered.

Truth is, Bob has been too expensive to keep. You’ve paid dearly to retain him — lawsuits settled, turnover and replacement of key players, and lots of lost productivity. Just ask your Risk Manager or legal counsel.

So, there is no rational reason to keep Bob any longer. You may worry about a lawsuit from him if you begin to suddenly hold him accountable. Worry less. Take advantage of the “employment at will” principle. He’s gone when you say he’s gone. Will he survive? Yes, he will land on his feet. With that instant stroke of moral courage, you will send a message to all others who work with you that you care more about them than you care about the single person whose lips have been firmly planted on your behind.

And while you are motivated to change the work climate for the better, besides removing Bob, consider drawing a line in the sand, defining the boundaries of unacceptable conduct. With that commitment, you will have a behavioral standard to which all the future Bobs (and there will be many emerging in the future — think whack-a-mole) can be compared. When they fail to act in an acceptable manner, cut them before the losses mount.

Finally, in the future, long after Freedom Week ends, believe the employees who report to you that they have been subjected to abusive conduct. They are not the likely liars. Bullies are the liars. Grow a thicker skin and stop showing your neediness to the cruel people willing to exploit you as they subordinate others.

Good employers purge bullies; bad ones promote ‘em.

Mediation, when agreed to by both parties, is a prefunctory second step in the EEOC case filing process. Both the target and employer agreed. I accompanied the target as her advocate. The day prior, we reviewed all details of her bullying ordeal and the impact on her life. Most important was her decision about her demands. She created combinations of cash settlement amounts, number of months of health insurance continuance, and pension-related contributions. She had high, medium and low payout combinations. We thought she was prepared for anything and was willing to negotiate.

Mediation was a day-long process. The mediator was a kind woman. Her background as a social worker offset, for us, her term as a judge. Her experience in mediation was extensive. She met with the target first to learn about the case because the EEOC form required only limited information. She put us at ease by offering the choice of face-to-face or shuttle mediation. The target wanted the mediator to go back and forth between us and the employer and their attorney in separate room. We never did see the other side that day.

After discovering the basic facts of the case, told partly by me to eliminate much of the emotion, relying on the target for correction of details, the mediator asked what the target wanted to reach a settlement. The mediator stated that we could be open with her since all communication in our room was confidential. She pledged to not tell the other side what she knew and to carry only the messages forward the target approved. We shared the high and medium settlement figures, implying that our opening gambit would be to ask for the highest amount to be made whole.

Thus began the expectation lowering process. Despite her stated sympathy for the target’s plight, the mediator clearly stated that complainants, in all the hundreds of cases involving her, NEVER collected such a huge amount. I think the target asked for 3 years salary and health benefits. The mediator left us to ponder what she said was an “unreasonable” demand. It was not yet time to negotiate settlement amounts.

The mediator left for her initial session with the employer. She returned with news that they did indeed attend willing to settle. She then directly addressed the target with news that the opening bid from not only this employer, but ALL employers, will be $0 (zero). We asked if that was fair. She said that was simply how the mediation-with-employers game is played.

We were so wrapped in the details the rest of the day that involved 22 mediator shuttle trips between the sides, we missed the big picture, the injustice. Mediators uncritically accept and perpetuate the dominance of employers in mediations by allowing the opening bid of $0.

The rest of the day was spent by the mediator racheting down the target’s demands. Evidence was suddenly questioned and discounted by the employer. Because the mediator personally felt attached to one aspect of the demand, she clung tenaciously to that piece to the end. However, when the target asked her to be as strong regarding more months of salary, she chose to not fight for it. Everything that was within the mediator’s personal boundaries set by experience, tempered by resistant, defiant employers, was achieved by the mediator. But she could not and did not advocate for the target when the demand conflicted with what she, the mediator, considered “reasonable.”

And that’s how it happened. The target was lucky to have a mediator who agreed to put the employer reps in a separate room. She was lucky that the mediator did not discount her story at the start (though she did accept the employer’s denial of mistreatment). However, the veteran mediator achieved a settlement much closer to $0 than the lowest settlement amount the target had prepared herself to accept.

The mediator was a good person, but one does not go to the EEOC to find a friend. The case ended for the target feeling jilted. It is true that she got more than zero, but the employer must have left feeling that it was a good day.

The false claim is that the Post Office is broke. (And Social Security and Medicare did not cause the recession/depression; investment banker gamblers did.) Turns out that Geo. Bush in 2006 torpedoed the USPS with legislation requiring an unprecedented prepayment of anticipated pension funds to cover 75 years of operation!

Issa’s move is both union-busting and privatization of a cherished American tradition. Here’s the real story behind the headlines pronouncing (almost celebrating) the death of the USPS.

More news to come about this important story.

Brodie Panlock 2006 suicide victim

Nicholas Smallwood, convicted bully

We launched The Work Doctor® radio on June 23, 2011. Gary Namie is the host.

In this debut show, Gary discusses the recent Supreme Court decision dropping the job discrimination class action lawsuit against WalMart by six women, representing 1.5 million current and former women employees of the giant retailer.

Joining Gary in conversation is guest Lewis Maltby, Director of the National Workrights Institute,

and author of Can They Do That? Retaking Our Fundamental Rights in the Workplace. Purchase the book on Amazon.com.

Lew is a U. Penn Law graduate, attorney, former HR director, and former ACLU project director. He is the definitive expert.

Mr. Maltby sounds a warning about hidden surprises in employment law that can hurt American workers. He discusses social media and how GPS-equipped, company-owned devices extend employers’ control over workers’ lives.

Betty Dukes at SCOTUS

The June 20, 2011 Supreme Court decision in the Wal-Mart v. Dukes case (1) insulted any worker who dares complain about discriminatory mistreatment at work, (2) made it harder for individuals to join together for lawsuit efficiency in a class action to go up against a behemoth multinational employing corporation, (3) ignored and rewrote a 45-year legal precedent, and (4) cemented Justice Scalia and the conservative block’s motivation to serve corporate interests over those of ordinary working Americans.

Betty Dukes, in 2000, claimed that she had been denied promotion to higher-paying jobs. The incident that provoked the lawsuit was when she needed change to make a small purchase during her break. She asked a friend to open a cash register with a one-cent transaction, a common practice, according to Dukes. For that act she was demoted and had a humiliating cut in pay, accused by Wal-Mart management of misconduct. She still works as a greeter at the Pittsburg, California store. She is also an ordained Baptist minister of a local church. Ms. Magazine named her one of its Women of the Year in 2004. As of May 2010, at age 60, she still lived with her mother because her Wal-Mart hourly wage of $15.23 did not allow her to own a home of her own.

Dukes’ attorney was Brad Seligman, of the Impact Fund in Berkeley, California. The lawsuit with Dukes as one of six lead plaintiffs was filed in U.S. District Court in San Francisco in 2001. Despite the strain that such a lawsuit has caused its namesake, Dukes said, “In this life you have to stand up or be trampled.”

Corporate Ally

Scalia, writing for the 5-4 majority to strike down the class action suit against giant retailer Wal-Mart, said that because Wal-Mart has an official corporate policy that gender discrimination is prohibited (p. 13 in the decision) and because penalties are presumably imposed for violating the policy, discrimination does not occur at Wal-Mart that can be characterized as pattern and practice.

The majority of justices considered credible Wal-Mart’s claim that they did not discriminate because they said so and had a policy on the books. We agree that a policy, a line drawn in the sand, is the requisite starting point for any workplace culture that intends to treat workers fairly. But to argue that the policy’s presence on the books alone is sufficient is naive. Scalia is not stupid. He and the other corporatists on the Supreme Court simply want to ignore complaining employees as whiners not deserving respect.

This Scalia point is the least legalistic of the several arguments to find in favor or Wal-Mart. It is the HR argument. Recently, a Ventura County (CA) grand jury found evidence of bullying and harassment of employees by management. The HR director, John Nicoll, challenged the evidence by stating that the county has a policy and that he would be shocked if bullying really did happen.

Nicoll, and SCOTUS justices Scalia, Roberts, Kennedy, Thomas and Alito all want us to believe that employers do not lie, never deprive workers of their rights, always follow state and federal laws, and always know best. To challenge the corporate line is wrong. The majority of the current Supreme Court is an “HR dream team.”

Wal-Mart is especially happy with the decision that it failed to win in the federal trial court or the Court of Appeals. Luckily the firm saved their pennies so they could take their case to the one place where they had powerful legal allies willing to protect them and other poor defenseless and largest employers in the U.S.

Gisel Ruiz, Vice President of People (not the magazine, rather the slaves that work for her), Walmart U.S. officially gloated that the SCOTUS decision “pulls the rug out from under the accusations made against Walmart over the last 10 years. Every female associate and every customer can feel even better about the company as a result of today’s decision.” Ruiz feels better, why don’t you?

For their investment, Wal-Mart, on behalf of all corporations, will also benefit from Scalia and the Court conservatives decision to rewrite law. Class action lawsuits are governed by Rule 23 of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure. The Rule, prior to June 20, established a low threshold for groups of employees suffering at the hands of a single employer to file a common lawsuit. Many were discriminated against at Wal-Mart, a single employer. Hence the class action.

Scalia and the cons changed the Rule 23 standard to now require groups of plaintiffs to show that they were harmed by the same boss or the same biased employee test, not simply employed by the same corporation with an overarching pattern and practice of misconduct. Wal-Mart’s defense in the Dukes case was that the corporation gives latitude to individual store managers to make local decisions. That dispersion of responsibility was enough to kill the claim of commonality across all Wal-Mart stores for Scalia.

One far-reaching (too “far reaching” according to dissenting Justices Ginsburg, Breyer, Sotomayor, and Kagan) implication of Scalia’s judicial lawmaking — the revision of what defines commonality — will be to force each individual worker to file an expensive lawsuit against the giant employer. Employers will find it even easier now to squash cases with motions for summary judgment or prolonged procedures that bankrupt individuals. The original Rule 23 sought to minimize taxpayer-paid public court expenses. Now smaller and more frequent cases without access to class action status will cost government more without putting a dent in the coffers of giant corporations.

Scalia managed to deal a blow to government at a time of great fiscal pressure and to shove workers’ demands for dignity aside.

Another implication is that the merits of the case must be shown to a judge by plaintiffs before having the case certified as eligible for class action status. In Wal-Mart v. Dukes, the legal proceedings all centered on the applicability of class action status. The case itself was never tried.

Employers have little to fear from employment lawsuits anyway. The Ashley Alford case is the exception, not a regular outcome. Thanks to Scalia and his cohorts in the majority, employers will have it easier.

###

The two major flaws of existing anti-discrimination laws are: (1) that they fail to cover incidents outside the narrow legal boundaries (victim must be a member of a protected status group while the harasser cannot be, thus 80% of bullied workers cannot rely on existing laws for help), and (2) it is a sick and twisted irony that harassers who torment people across boundaries of age, race, and gender — the equal opportunity abusers — have a legal defense for their misconduct. The final injustice related to the Wal-Mart v. Dukes case is that merits were never debated. The entire 10 year battle was not over whether or not women at Wal-Mart suffered discrimination. It was a technical fight over the legitimacy of filing a class action on behalf of 1.5 million current and former women employees.

###

Read the complete SCOTUS decision in the Wal-Mart v. Dukes case decided June 20, 2011.

But it also is a day for demonstrations heralding the causes of working
people and their unions such as are being held on Sunday that were crucial
in winning important rights for working people. The first May Day
 demonstrations, in 1886,  won the  most important of the rights ever won by
working people ­ the right demanded above all others by the labor activists 
of a century ago:

“Eight hours for work, eight hours for rest, eight hours for what we will!”

Winning the eight-hour workday took years of hard struggle, beginning in the 
mid-1800s. By 1867, the federal government, six states and several cities
had passed laws limiting their employees’ hours to eight per day. The laws
 were not effectively enforced and in some cases were overturned by courts,
 but they set an important precedent that finally led to a powerful popular
movement.

The movement was launched in 1886 by the Federation of Organized Trades and
 Labor Unions, then one of the country’s major labor organizations. The 
federation called for workers to negotiate with their employers for an
 eight-hour workday and, if that failed, to strike on May 1 in support of the
 demand.

Some negotiated, some marched and otherwise demonstrated.  More than 300,000
 struck. And all won strong support, in dozens of cities ­ Chicago, New York,
 Baltimore, Boston, Milwaukee, St. Louis, San Francisco, Pittsburgh, Denver, 
Indianapolis, Cincinnati, Detroit, Washington, Newark, Brooklyn, St. Paul
 and others.

More than 30,000 workers had won the eight-hour day by April. On May Day,
 another 350,000 workers walked off their jobs at nearly 12,000
 establishments, more than 185,000 of them eventually winning their demand.
 Most of the others won at least some reduction in working hours that had
 ranged up to 16 a day.

Additionally, many employers cut Saturday operations to a half-day, and the
 practice of working on Sundays, also relatively common, was all but 
abandoned by major industries.

“Hurray for Shorter Time,” declared a headline in the New York Sun over a 
story describing a torchlight procession of 25,000 workers that highlighted 
the eight-hour-day activities in New York. Never before had the city
 experienced so large a demonstration.

Not all newspapers were as supportive, however. The strikes and
 demonstrations, one paper complained, amounted to “communism, lurid and 
rampant.” The eight-hour day, another said, would encourage “loafing and
 gambling, rioting, debauchery, and drunkenness.”

The greatest opposition came in response to the demonstrations led by
 anarchist and socialist groups in Chicago, the heart of the eight-hour day 
movement. Four demonstrators were killed and more than 200 wounded by police
who waded into their ranks, but what the demonstrators’ opponents seized on
were the events two days later at a protest rally in Haymarket Square. A
 bomb was thrown into the ranks of the police who had surrounded the square,
 killing seven and wounding 59.

The bomb thrower was never discovered, but eight labor, socialist and
 anarchist leaders ­ branded as violent, dangerous radicals by press and
police alike ­ were arrested on the clearly trumped up charge that they had 
conspired to commit murder.  Four of them were hanged, one committed suicide
 while in jail, and three were pardoned six years later by Illinois Gov. John
 Peter Altgeld.

Employers responded to the so-called Haymarket Riot by mounting a
 counter-offensive that seriously eroded the eight-hour day movement’s gains.
 But the movement was an extremely effective organizing tool for the
 country’s unions, and in 1890 President Samuel Gompers of the American
Federation of Labor was able to call for “an International Labor Day” in 
favor of the eight-hour workday. Similar proclamations were made by
 socialist and union leaders in other nations where, to this day, May Day is
 celebrated as Labor Day.

Workers in the United States and 13 other countries demonstrated on that May
Day of 1890 ­ including 30,000 of them in Chicago. The New York World hailed 
it as “Labor’s Emancipation Day.” It was. For it marked the start of an 
irreversible drive that finally established the eight-hour day as the
 standard for millions of working people.

###

Dick Meister is a San Francisco-based columnist who has covered labor and
 politics for more than a half-century as a reporter, editor, author and
commentator. Contact him through his website, dickmeister.com

An average of 1 million fewer Americans per month quit than in the previous year. Through April, that’s 28 million workers who would have quit when the job market was stronger. Remember, 54 million workers are, or have been, bullied at work.

Being stuck certainly creates more health-robbing stress. The options for workers are to leave hated jobs and face destitution or stay and grow more ill daily, raising your risk of cardiovascular disease. The American workplace. Aint’ it great?  They have us right where they want us — indentured slaves with too little freedom to pursue options.

Read the Business Week article.

[See post to watch Flash video]

Gawker.com (the source of the video) reports that the actors in the film are both union members.

Steve Greenhouse, New York Times labor writer, reported on the organizing efforts on May 23.

Here’s the local newspaper account:

Grand jury finds workplace bullying a problem within county government by John Scheibe, Ventura County Star, June 16, 2011

The Ventura County Grand Jury recently concluded that workplace bullying is a problem in county government offices and encouraged county officials to develop a policy against bullying in the workplace.

“Unfortunately, bullying is not limited to schools,” the grand jury stated in a letter released in late May.
The 2010-11 grand jury investigated bullying within county government after getting a complaint about it. As part of this, the grand jury interviewed past and current county employees who were the targets of bullying or witnessed it.

John Nicoll, assistant county executive officer and the director of human resources for the county, said county officials are preparing a response to the grand jury’s report.

“We understand the concerns about conduct like that in the workplace,” Nicoll said.

Grand jurors found employees “were yelled at by managers in group meetings and in public areas.”
Also, employees, including some highly experienced ones, “were excessively monitored by managers to such an extent that they left their positions,” the grand jury’s report stated.

Some employees went to other agencies, while others accepted “a demotion to receive that transfer.”
Others left county government for other jobs or retired earlier than they had planned because of a “manager’s bullying behavior,” the grand jury found.

Some employees were isolated both “organizationally and physically,” the report stated.
The report found the county “has no written policy specifically directed against bullying in the workplace.”
It also found that processes to report workplace bullying “are not trusted by employees because the agency with the alleged bullying issue is allowed to investigate complaints using personnel within its own organization.”

Nicoll said there are mechanisms now in place for county employees to file a complaint if they believe they have been discriminated against.

As to the allegation by the grand jury that county employees have left their jobs because of workplace bullying, Nicoll said he “would be upset if someone were legitimately fleeing the workplace if they felt they were being mistreated” and felt they had no recourse but to leave.

“We do not tolerate employees being mistreated because they’ve filed a complaint,” Nicoll said. “I’m disappointed if someone left for that reason.”

Nicoll said he did not know how widespread a problem workplace bullying is in the county government.
However, he said “the county has gotten very limited number of complaints of inappropriate treatment by their supervisors.”

The Workplace Bullying Institute, a nonprofit organization dedicated to eradicating workplace bullying through research and education, commissioned a 2010 study that found 35 percent of workers in the United States have experienced bullying firsthand. Men constitute 62 percent of bullies, while women make up 58 percent of the targets of bullying, according to the study. Female bullies target other women 80 percent of the time, according to the study, done by Zogby International. The study found workplace bullying is a silent epidemic since many workers who are victims of it or witness it fail to report it.

The group, which is based in Washington state, defines workplace bullying as repeated, health-harming abusive conduct committed by bosses and co-workers against others. Workplace bullying is legal in many states across the nation, according to the institute. The institute is working to introduce bills in various state legislatures that would make workplace bullying illegal.

The institute also found that workplace bullying costs companies millions of dollars in employee turnover, lost productivity and lawsuits. The grand jury seemed to agree, stating in its report that workplace bullying costs taxpayers additional money because the county must incur the cost of recruiting and training replacement personnel for those who have left their jobs because of bullying. …

The grand jury is recommending the Ventura County Board of Supervisors issue a policy against bullying and collect data “to identify the existence and extent of bullying in branches of county government.”
Such a policy should include descriptions of bullying behaviors to educate employees on unacceptable workplace behaviors and encourage employees to report this type of workplace abuse, the grand jury said.

###

READ THE GRAND JURY REPORT

###

Solutions for Ventura County can be found in the book The Bully-Free Workplace and at the website for the premier workplace bullying consultants, The Work Doctor®

News from East St. Louis federal District Court: A young woman who was subjected to some of the grossest imaginable humiliation and harassment won a $95 million jury victory. $80 million was for punitive damages against the company, Aaron’s (Rents as in rent-to-own), that earned a profit of only $118 million last year. The jury sent the statement that most of that profit should be turned over to Ashley Alford.

Alford was hired in 2005. In her first year, the sexual jokes and lewd propositions escalated. O’Fallon, IL store manager, Richard Moore, nicknamed her “Trix,” groped her and actually coming up behind her when sitting and hitting her head with his penis. The culminating event was when he threw her to the ground, lifted her shirt, held her down and masturbated on her. He was arrested.

Alford called the corporate harassment hotline in May 2006. She never received a call back. There was no investigation. The assault and battery occurred in October 2006.

The EEOC actually filed the lawsuit in 2008. [Note how egregious and over-the-top the misconduct has to be for the EEOC to act.] Plaintiff Alford joined the case with her private attorney.

The inevitable rollbacks. The jury initially awarded $54 million for Moore violating federal discrimination laws. That award is capped at $600,000 by law.  The rest of the violations — assault and battery (the noted Indiana bullying case was actually decided on an assault charge); negligent supervision (of the store manager by corporate managers; sexual harassment (the classic case of a civil rights violation in this case); and intentional infliction of emotional distress (which is present in most bullying incidents though courts are loathe to consider any conduct by a manager to be sufficiently “outrageous.” It took a male supervisor waving his wang and masturbating on the woman to be considered outrageous!).

In the end, pending appeal, Ashley Alford stands to win $41.6 million for the living hell to which Aaron’s had subjected her.

Anyone know where the former Aaron’s supervisor Richard Moore works now? He still awaits trial for his criminal battery of Alford. Wonder if he had as much trouble finding a job as bullied targets do?

Read the story by Robert Patrick from the June 10, 2011 St. Louis Post-Dispatch

###

As we have said repeatedly, justice rarely is found in U.S. courtrooms when the injured plaintiff fights the employer. In fact, listen to plaintiff Becky describe the painful process of taking on the State of California. Though she won a substantial amount of money, it took a ridiculous toll on her family. To listen to the audio, go to this page and scroll down to “So You Wanna Sue …”

Prof. Jackie Gilbert

An Anti-Bullying Champion in the Academe

University professors can be among the worst bullies. Blame ego, inadequate or absent management training, an internalized sense of privilege and entitlement to operate at the top of the hierarchy, and timid or indifferent administrators. However, one woman at Middle Tennessee State is working hard to stop bullying on her campus. She was instrumental in my visit there earlier this year. Now comes the report that she has recruited students to create an instructional video and to teach others. Imagine, students as change agents on campus! It’s an activism whose time has come. Read the article about Jackie’s good work.

You can read about the new book and order HERE.

Moderator: Sara Adler, NAA Los Angeles, CA; Presenter: Dr. Gary Namie The Workplace Bullying Institute; Responders: Van Goodwin Littler Mendelson San Diego, CA, Carlos Perez Reich, Reich, Adell & Cvitan, Los Angeles, CA, Ami Silverman NLRB Region 21 Los Angeles, CA

A leading expert in the field, along with a panel of experienced practitioners, will explore the issue of bullies in the workplace. Learn about the impact upon employees who are the subject of workplace bullying by either supervisors or co-workers, and how these cases might play out in the arbitration and NLRB arenas.

“Physician, Heel Thyself”

By Theresa Brown, Op-Ed Contributor, The New York Times, May 7, 2011,

It was morning rounds in the hospital and the entire medical team stood in the patient’s room. A test result was late, and the patient, a friendly, middle-aged man, jokingly asked his doctor whom he should yell at.

Turning and pointing at the patient’s nurse, the doctor replied, “If you want to scream at anyone, scream at her.”

This vignette is not a scene from the medical drama “House,” nor did it take place 30 years ago, when nurses were considered subservient to doctors. Rather, it happened just a few months ago, at my hospital, to me.

As we walked out of the patient’s room I asked the doctor if I could quote him in an article. “Sure,” he answered. “It’s a time-honored tradition — blame the nurse whenever anything goes wrong.”

I felt stunned and insulted. But my own feelings are one thing; more important is the problem such attitudes pose to patient health. They reinforce the stereotype of nurses as little more than candy stripers, creating a hostile and even dangerous environment in a setting where close cooperation can make the difference between life and death. And while many hospitals have anti-bullying policies on the books, too few see it as a serious issue.

Today nurses are highly trained professionals, and in the best situations we form a team with the hospital’s doctors. If doctors are generals, nurses are a combination of infantry and aides-de-camp.

After all, patients are admitted to hospitals because they need round-the-clock nursing care. We administer medications, prep patients for tests, interpret medical jargon for family members and double-check treatment decisions with the patient’s primary team. Nurses are also the hospital’s front line: we sound the alert if a patient takes a serious turn for the worse.

But while most doctors clearly respect their colleagues on the nursing staff, every nurse knows at least one, if not many, who don’t.

Indeed, every nurse has a story like mine, and most of us have several. A nurse I know, attempting to clarify an order, was told, “When you have ‘M.D.’ after your name, then you can talk to me.” A doctor dismissed another’s complaint by simply saying, “I’m important.”

When a doctor thoughtlessly dresses down a nurse in front of patients or their families, it’s not just a personal affront, it’s an incredible distraction, taking our minds away from our patients, focusing them instead on how powerless we are.

That said, the most damaging bullying is not flagrant and does not fit the stereotype of a surgeon having a tantrum in the operating room. It is passive, like not answering pages or phone calls, and tends toward the subtle: condescension rather than outright abuse, and aggressive or sarcastic remarks rather than straightforward insults.

And because doctors are at the top of the food chain, the bad behavior of even a few of them can set a corrosive tone for the whole organization. Nurses in turn bully other nurses, attending physicians bully doctors-in-training, and experienced nurses sometimes bully the newest doctors.

Such an uncomfortable workplace can have a chilling effect on communication among staff. A 2004 survey by the Institute for Safe Medication Practices found that workplace bullying posed a critical problem for patient safety: rather than bring their questions about medication orders to a difficult doctor, almost half the health care personnel surveyed said they would rather keep silent. Furthermore, 7 percent of the respondents said that in the past year they had been involved in a medication error in which intimidation was at least partly responsible.

The result, not surprisingly, is a rise in avoidable medical errors, the cause of perhaps 200,000 deaths a year.

Concerned about the role of bullying in medical errors, the Joint Commission, the primary accrediting body for American health care organizations, has warned of a distressing decline in trust among hospital employees and, with it, a decline in the quality of medical outcomes.

What can be done to counter hospital bullying? For one thing, hospitals should adopt standards of professional behavior and apply them uniformly, from the housekeepers to nurses to the president of the hospital. And nurses and other employees need to know they can report incidents confidentially.

Offending parties, whether doctors or nurses, would be required to undergo civility training, and particularly intransigent doctors might even have their hospital privileges — that is, their right to admit patients — revoked.

But to be truly effective, such change can’t be simply imposed bureaucratically. It has to start at the top. Because hospitals tend to be extremely hierarchical, even well-meaning doctors tend to respond much better to suggestions and criticisms from people they consider their equals or superiors. I’ve noticed that doctors otherwise prone to bullying will tend to become models of civility when other doctors are around.

In other words, alongside uniform, well-enforced rules, doctors themselves need to set a new tone in the hospital corridors, policing their colleagues and letting new doctors know what kind of behavior is expected of them.

This shouldn’t be hard: most doctors are kind, well-intentioned professionals, and I rarely have a problem talking openly with them. But unless we can change the overall tone of the workplace, doctors like the one who insulted me in front of my patient will continue to act with impunity.

I wish I could say otherwise, but after being publicly slapped down, I will think twice before speaking up around him again. Whether that was his intention, or whether he was just being thoughtlessly callous, it’s definitely not in my patients’ best interest.

###

Theresa Brown, an oncology nurse, is a contributor to The Times’s Well blog and the author of “Critical Care: A New Nurse Faces Death, Life and Everything in Between.”

A version of this op-ed appeared in print on May 8, 2011, on page WK8 of the New York edition with the headline: Physician, Heel Thyself.

The bullying started with verbal and email confrontations. Paula, a public school teacher who asked her real name not be used, teaches a foreign language to middle school students. Although she had a dozen years of experience, an older colleague who taught the same language began criticizing her lesson plans and teaching style.

When the two had to collaborate on a project to earn state-required continuing education credits, the older teacher demanded they meet after school instead of during the period set aside by the principal for the meetings. Paula, who has grade-school children, refused, and the bullying escalated.

“She would get right in my face and scream that I was not professional and couldn’t get along with people,” Paula recalls. “She would attack me in front of the students. She makes me feel like the worst person in the world.” Paula told her supervisor, who said he understood, but didn’t confront the aggressor. “I think he is just hoping she’ll retire,” she adds.

And Paula isn’t alone. A new survey of 5,700 workers by CareerBuilder found 27 percent of workers say they have been bullied in the workplace. Among the biggest complaints: workers’ comments were dismissed or not acknowledged (43 percent); they were falsely accused of mistakes they didn’t make (40 percent); they were harshly criticized and forced to do work that wasn’t part of their jobs (both at 38 percent).

About one in four respondents said they had been gossiped about; yelled at by the boss in front of other co-workers; and belittled in meetings. One in five said someone else had taken credit for their work. Of the 28 percent of workers who took their concerns to a higher authority in the workplace, the majority — 62 percent — said nothing was done.

Workplace bullying was splashed across the pages of The New York Times last week in a profile about David Sokol, the Berkshire Hathaway executive who is reportedly under investigation by the Securities and Exchange Commission for buying $10 million in Lubrizol stock before proposing the firm as an acquisition for Berkshire. Subordinates told the Times he alienated people with his “brass-knuckles approach,” and suggested that workers who were ill or suffering personal problems such as divorce “be pushed to the side.”

Bob Sutton, management professor at Stanford University and author of “Good Boss, Bad Boss,” says bullies destroy workplace satisfaction for both the victims and co-workers who observe the behavior. A separate poll conducted in 2010 by the Workplace Bullying Institute (WBI) which surveyed all workers (not just those currently employed) found 35 percent had experienced bullying at some point in their careers.

Sutton suggests the numbers may be declining at the moment for several reasons: “The positive one is that companies have gotten rid of the most incompetent and rotten apples in the downturn and things have gotten objectively better. Another is that everybody is so grateful to have a job that they’ve stopped complaining.”

Legislative initiatives designed to discourage workplace bullying have been introduced in 21 states since 2003 without success; 11 states have active bills in their legislatures. Earlier this week, New York State Sen. Diane Savino and Assemblyman Steven Englebright held a town meeting and press conference in Albany to discuss their Healthy Workplace Bill. The bill would amend the labor law to allow employees who have been harmed psychologically, physically or economically by bullying to sue for damages. (It was first introduced in 2006.)

“One of every five workers at some time in his career is subject to bullying,” says Englebright, “and there needs to be an alternative to that type of purgatory. Why employers look the other way is beyond my ability to fully comprehend. It’s reprehensive and needs a counterweight in law, in my opinion.”

Under the New York law, a bully who is found guilty would be liable for lost wages, medical expenses, compensation for emotional distress, punitive damages and attorney’s fees. The court could also order that the person be removed from the workplace. An employer would be civilly liable for failing to address the situation, with liability for emotional distress capped at $25,000 and no punitive damages.

The bill defines “abusive conduct” as malice against an employee by either a boss or co-worker that “a reasonable person would find to be hostile, offensive and unrelated to the employer’s legitimate business interest.” It would include repeated acts of verbal abuse, threatening language or behavior, intimidation or humiliation, or sabotage of an employee’s work performance.

The press conference included testimony by Maria Morrissey, sister of Kevin Morrissey, an editor at the Virginia Quarterly Review who committed suicide in 2010. She says bullying played a role in her brother’s death, which was widely covered by the media.

New York business groups oppose the measure. “We think it sets a terrible precedent for New York,” says Michael Moran, director of communications for the Business Council of New York State. “We think there is already sufficient federal and state law protecting workers from a range of abuses. Creating a private right of action would lead to chaos and people looking to locate business elsewhere.”

But WBI director Gary Namie, author of the forthcoming book “Bully-Free Workplace,” calls it “a very pro-employer bill. You get exemption from vicarious liability if you put a policy in place and enforce it.”

A growing pile of academic studies suggest that bullies diminish the bottom line along with their co-workers and subordinates. Sutton has found that productivity declines as much as 40 percent in workplaces dominated by bullies, “because they distract people and it gets contagious,” he says. People who work for an abusive boss are more likely to call in sick when they’re not, more likely to quit and less likely to put forth extra effort to help the organization, he notes.

In his book “The No-Asshole Rule,” Sutton cites a Silicon Valley company that decided to calculate the cost of a legendary bully who consistently ranked in the top 5 percent of salespeople. He had a terrible temper, routinely insulted and belittled co-workers and couldn’t keep an assistant. Over a five-year period, several employees had lodged “hostile workplace” complaints against him, Sutton writes. The company did a week-by-week calculation of the extra costs of the salesperson’s nasty actions compared with more civilized peers: $160,000. But the bully wasn’t fired. Instead, his employer deducted 60 percent of the costs of his behavior from his year-end bonus.

Namie says victims of bullying should try to calculate the bully’s impact on the company, such as absenteeism rates, workers compensation claims for stress, litigation costs for nuisance suits, and threats of lawsuits that lead to settlements. Try to find others who left the company because of the bully, and try to show how the person is damaging morale and engagement.

“Make a non-emotional, fiscal argument and bring the complaint to the highest level person you can,” Namie says. “If they refuse to see the impact on the organization, you will have to move on.”

Sutton says the only method that works against a bully who is valuable to the organization is a group intervention. He tells the story of a non-profit organization where all the employees went to a board meeting and threatened to quit en masse unless the abusive executive director was fired. They won. “Doing it together is the hallmark of people who are successful in removing bullies,” he says.

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Read the original article

In this audio montage from a recent school board meeting, bully board president Chris Bentley of the Hesperia Unified School District puts on public display his incredible combination of (1) intimidation and humiliation of the superintendent, department heads and other board members (probably in his mind undertaken in response to his “frustration”); (2) whining about spending his weekend plotting the demise of the public school district he was elected to serve; (3) revealing his ideological roots when he refers to the “entitlement highway” and all the things offered free to public school students; and (4) ending with his willingness to twist legalities to fit his plans. What a piece of work!  It’s time to recall this man. Parents and employees ban together and call him out!!!

Prior posts about this destructive force of nature

Conflict Escalates
Bentley Can’t Stop
School Board Bully Bentley Retaliates
Board bully Bentley goes Latin
When the School Board Pres is the Bully

A funny thing happened to the ostensibly good employer with a solid reputation of superior corporate responsibility when it crossed the Atlantic and opened the Virginia plant 3 years ago.  It left back home its code of conduct called IWAY that guarantees workers the right to organize and to allow overtime to be voluntary. It left its Swedish traditions of honoring workers and acted like locals who test the limits of what American workers will take and exploit them to the max. Swedish workers at IKEA also enjoy 5 paid weeks of vacation thanks to local laws.

At the Virginia plant, the starting hourly salary was $9.75 in a region where the average is closer to $15 (no great shakes, either). This year, IKEA decided to cut the salary to $8.00. Overtime is mandated. Disagree and you’re fired. Its 335 employees wanted to unionize and affiliate with the Int’l Assoc. of Machinists. But the corporation called in the union-busting attorneys at Jackson Lewis (who probably do not have a branch in Stockholm). Employees were ordered to attend management-run lectures on the evils of unions (how many of you knew employers have this right?).

The resultant mistreatment, a.k.a. bullying, has led to a slew of lawsuits. Nothing IKEA did is considered outrageous or illegal in the USA, especially the nearly union-free southern states. But the company’s conduct, so unbecoming for a Swedish firm, made news iIN SWEDEN! The press there believed it wrong for IKEA to act one way when the workers were Swedish and another way when the workers were third-world exploited labor, in America, as it turned out.

IKEA treats workers like commodities. Go where they are cheapest, as if they are resources like sugar, oil, cotton, or wheat. All of the corporations that use Chinese labor do the same. To do so is to treat the country that provides the workers as if it is 3rd world. To Sweden, America is that 3rd world provider of a cheap commodity.

The double irony for those of us in the workplace bullying movement is that Sweden is the home of the international movement. It is where Heinz Leymann conducted his research, treated the oppressed and traumatized workers, and the country that created the world’s first law against “Victimisation At Work” that went into effect in 1994. Sweden is the Seneca Falls of the movement. It breaks our hearts — for the exploited southern workers, for the southern cities who whore out their people willingly, for the globalized employer mindset that corrupts even the best of the best companies in the world to lower themselves in search of profits.

Read the initial report in the Los Angeles Times.

At Sultana High (17311 Sultana Street, Hesperia, CA) at 6 pm on Monday March 28, there will be a meeting of the Hesperia (CA) School District Board during which Dr. Matt Spencer will present a special 30 min. introduction to workplace bullying at the invitation of Board member Anthony Riley. Watch the sparks fly as Bully Chris Bentley, president of the Board, attempts to derail the info session. We will post video of this public event when it becomes available. Stay tuned.

UPDATE 11

The Hesperia (CA) School District Board is anything but unified. Pres. Bentley has been a divisive force. The bully Bentley has branded fellow Board members Riley and Black “evil” in a March 4 letter to the Hesperia Star newspaper. Then, in a March 25 letter, Hardy Black, reveals one of Bentley’s original motives to get involved with the District — to get his children’s school absences changed from “truant” to “excused.” Read the battle of the letters.

Letter to the Editor by Hardy Black
March 25, 2011

“Bullies thrive where authority is weak.” Tim Field
“Never be bullied into silence.” Harvey S. Firestone
I first became acquainted with Chris Bentley as he spoke during the public comment segment of an HUSD board meeting at Sultana High School the summer of 2006. Mr. Bentley protested the HUSD photo shop and was abruptly cut-off in mid-sentence by Board President Eric Swanson. (I watched the same scenario repeat at every 2006 Board meeting.) Obviously Mr. Bentley was treated quite rudely even though his view of the HUSD photo shop had merit and deserved the Board’s consideration.
I approached Mr. Bentley during the break between “open” and “closed” sessions and questioned him as to why he was so passionate in his assault on the HUSD Board? He explained that his children attended Maple Elementary School and had been unfairly marked “truant.” His attempt to change their absences to “excused” had hit an immovable bureaucratic wall. To Chris Bentley this was intolerable! The establishment would not bend so it was time to dismantle it by declaring “all out war!”
Since that conversation I have watched a pattern emerge. Agree with Chris Bentley and you’re an OK person. He’ll engage you in civil conversation, treat you cordially, and may even express support for you in one of his many “letters to the editor.” But, disagree with him and you likely will become a target of his disdain, a pawn to be ground-up in his personal “war.” Since he does not work to support his family, once he delivers his children at school he has all day to focus attention on the battle of his choosing.
Mr. Bentley considers himself smarter than most anyone else and seems to relish confrontation and pushing things beyond the braking point. In my experience no one “pulls out all the stops” like he does. He will do whatever it takes to cajole, intimidate, harass, bully, beat down, destroy or annihilate anyone who gets in his way!
The list of individuals who have been the object of this treatment is by no means complete but includes:
1. District office personnel: Richard Bray, Rob Challinor, Mark McKinney, Hank Richardson, William Freeman, George Landon, David McLaughlin, Jovy Yankaskas, Matt Spencer, Patrick Traynor, Laura Carevic, Larry Bird, Terry Barrett, Becky Shreve, Ruth Ter Keurst, Jean Campbell
2. School personnel: Bill Pittsford, Karen Elgan, Scott Sheffield, Alan Cota, Karen Prestwood, Dan Boatwright, Jennifer Ruiz, Rebecca Swanson, Sandi Utter, Robert Kistner, Vicki Kirk, Patty Staples
3. Board Members: Eric Swanson, Bruce Minton, Nellie Gogley, Lee Rogers, Hardy Black, Helen Rogers & husband Marlon, Robert Kirk & son Mark, Anthony Riley & mother Cathy Rough
4. School Board Candidates: Ellen Richardson & Chris Lindsay
5. Chala Salsbury and parents of Crosswalk High School
6. Debra Tarver and parents of La Verne Elementary School
7. HUSD police personnel: Chief Michael Graham, Corporal Brian Owen, Officer William Holland, Secretary Rene Woldrige
8. The Hesperia Teachers Association leadership team
9. The California Service Employees Association #684 leadership team
10. Hesperia Star reporter Beau Yarbrough and editor Peter Day
11. Attorneys Dennis Wagner & Tristan Pelayes
I am sure there are many more who have been the objects of Mr. Bentley’s bullying, but these I have personally witnessed, been told by a witness, or the individual themselves. Bullying is debilitating to those uses it on. I call on fellow Board members to do something to stop it! I HOPE THEY LISTEN before it destroys our school district! But bullying is by no means the most insidious weapon in Bentley’s arsenal! In subsequent letters to the editor I will provide more examples of Chris Bentley’s weapons of war!

Editor’s Note: Hesperia Star reporter Beau Yarbrough says he has not been intimidated or mistreated by Mr. Bentley. Others mentioned in Mr. Black’s letter are welcome to share their views or clarify, or deny, Mr. Black’s assertions. Mr. Black is an elected member of the Hesperia Unified School District’s board of education.

March 4 Letter to the Editor by Chris Bentley — Evildoers

March 04, 2011 9:01 AM

Chris Bentley
Hesperia
We have all learned by sad experience that Hardy Black, Robert Kirk, and Anthony Riley are dishonest and deceitful men interested in serving only themselves. Hardy Black, Robert Kirk, and Anthony Riley continue in their attempts to change history to somehow make their long, long, list of past evil actions simply disappear as if they were not involved at all in committing their gross incompetence and atrocities’ that will reverberate throughout our school district for years to come.
Fortunately, there is a long record of well-respected voices that have cried out against the evil of Hardy Black, Robert Kirk, and their minion Anthony Riley.
It started with David Long, a long-term principal in this district, when he described the beginning of the Kirk and Hardy Black era with, “Fear and suspicion seem to be the current governing tactics used by the governing board. There seems to be more time spent behind closed doors in the school district than ever before. People at the district office and the school sites have been forced to spend an inordinate amount of time worrying about offending board members, trying to fulfill arbitrary and time consuming demands only to have their work tossed aside by the board, and trying to find time to do the job for kids they were hired to do.”
This newspaper reported that Long’s open letter to the board blasted school board members Hardy Black and Robert Kirk for governing through “fear and suspicion” and stated that the Black and Kirk had “declared war upon all administrators in Hesperia.”
Only eleven short months later, another employee, long-term well-respected assistant superintendent George Landon, stood up at a meeting and had the courage to state, “It is with great anxiety, and with mixed emotions, that I submit my letter of resignation this evening. I will be resigning in order to maintain my integrity and morals. I can no longer be associated with a district where differing views, opinions, and issues are not discussed and respected.”
Mr. Landon was speaking of the conduct of Hardy Black and Robert Kirk. He could no longer work in their empire; so he moved on to provide his expertise to other school districts.
A week later, Peter Day, the editor of this newspaper, wrote, “Surely, these three (Kirk, Hardy Black, and Lee Rogers) have learned to mellow out a bit and stop their micro-managing of our highly regarded school district. They’re not going to continue to force key people out of our district, I thought. But I was wrong…what has become painfully clear is that Robert Kirk and Hardy Black are over-confident and meddlesome…and that’s a shame.”
These three well-respected opinions in this community only partially described the debauchery of Hardy Black. There were many more who spoke out against Hardy Black’s control and destruction of this district. There were even many more who left the district to go work elsewhere. Hardy Black has literally cost this school district millions of dollars in wasted expenses, legal costs, and legal settlements.
And now Hardy tries to falsely paint me with a similar brush. It simply ain’t true. I stand by my actions and whole-heartily refute any of the flat out lies that Hardy Black tries to throw at me.
Hardy’s lies about me may have speed of circulation among his supporters, but the real truth about me, and my actions on behalf of the parents and students of this school district, has endurance.
I will persevere and endure this Hardy Black nonsensical horse manure thrown madly about and keep my focus on the things that matter in this district—our kids, our parents, our budget, and our employees. And that focus includes working to correct the extensive spiritual damage that was done, and continues to be done, to this district by Hardy Black, his cohort Riley, and their overpaid, incompetent, and divisive staff plants.

Watch the bully himself in action on video (by which he professes to stand) in earlier installments, in reverse chronology.

Board Bully Bentley Can’t Stop
School Board Bully Bentley Retaliates
Board bully Bentley goes Latin
When the School Board Pres is the Bully

UPDATE 10

At the Feb. 14 Board meeting, Dr. Matt Spencer read a letter claiming that over 20 (now numbering over 50) HUSD employees report being attacked, threatened or interfered with by Bentley. That comes up first in the video below. Here is the letter he read.

February 14, 2011
Dear Board of Trustees:

This letter is given to provide the Board of Trustees with additional information for consideration related to the recent reporting of concerns of abusive conduct by a Board Trustee. The Misconduct was reported to the Board the evening of Thursday, January 13, 2011, and an urgent request was made, on behalf of several employees personally known to Dr. Matt Spencer, the Assistant Superintendent of Personnel Services to initiate an investigation into the alleged misconduct.
In the past several weeks, we have become aware of more than twenty employees in our respective sites and departments who desire to give statements regarding the personal effects of the offensive, unprofessional, and abusive conduct experienced from Chris Bentley as well as the thousands of dollars wasted as a result of Mr. Bentley’s mandates to devote hours and hours of their work time to attend to his personal projects and additional expenditure of District funds related to these projects. These employees request that the Board take action to initiate such an investigation and give them the opportunity to officially and thoroughly report their concerns. These employees further request that the Board consider the inclusion of the following components in the structure of the investigation.
1. That the investigation be conducted by a third party with expertise in the investigation of abusive and harassing workplace misconduct
2. That every employee of the Hesperia Unified School District be notified of the conducting of the investigation to give opportunity for others not known at this time to report their concerns
3. The investigation be conducted in a discrete manner
4. For purposes of the investigative report, the statements of the witnesses would remain confidential, and
5. That these employees be given assurances that there will not be any retaliatory action taken against them for participating in the investigation and stating their concerns.
On behalf of these employees, we urge the Board to conduct the investigation, thus giving an opportunity to officially report the offensive, unprofessional and abusive conduct they have been subjected to; conduct that has no place in an educational working environment.
Respectfully,
Dr. Matt Spencer, Assistant Superintendent of Personnel Services
David McLaughlin, Assistant Superintendent of Financial Services
Laura Carevic, Director of Fiscal Services
Michael Graham, Chief of Hesperia School District Police Department
Larry Bird, Principal of Sultana High School
Ruth Ter Keurst, Information Systems Analyst

When the police chief challenged Bentley at a public Board meeting, Bentley unilaterally decided to eliminate the district police force. The next video clip features Superintendent McKinney’s defense of the police department to which Bentley explodes (it’s about MONEY!!!!!). Then two other Board members complain about Bentley’s (1) “political” retaliation against the police chief, and (2) Bentley’s arrogant insistence on moving against the police without consulting the Board (it’s HIS district, after all, isn’t it?).
In the March 12, Hesperia Star newspaper, Board member Hardy Black wrote:

“What you do speaks so loudly that I cannot hear what you say!” Ralph Waldo Emerson
The state of affairs at HUSD are such, much to the actions of President Bentley that I feel compelled after 6 years his antics that “basta ya,” enough is enough. In sequent weeks and months I will bring forth detailed facts documenting the outrageous destructive behavior of Chris Bentley.
In as much as possible I will focus on documented facts and the outraged testimony of those who he has intimidated, bullied and personally attacked. I have been verbally attacked in a profane and vile manner and have personally witnessed at least 25 others receive the same treatment. What does Mr. Bentley think of his behavior? He is in complete and total denial. In his recent email to principals he says: “I personally stand by all of my actions. I stand by my words. Since I have been on the board, I have never spoken an ill word to anyone at a school site.”
What about your recent confrontational visit to Canyon Ridge High School…? Why did six administrators recently present the following letter to the HUSD School Board? Why do you, Mr. Swanson, Mrs. Childs block an open investigation into workplace and school site bullying? If indeed you Chris Bentley “stand by your words and actions” and have nothing to hide, why are you in total denial? There have even been allegations that bullying may have been a factor in the death of an HUSD student last month.
Mr. Swanson wants to keep everything quiet because it “makes HUSD look bad,” but if the problem exists to the degree that many employees indicate, I myself call for a frank and honest investigation!

Board member Hardy Black requested a 30-minute special presentation concerning Work Place/ School Site Bullying to be given during the March 28, 2011 open session HUSD special board meeting at Sultana High. Open session begins at 6:00 PM.

Finally, it seems that Bentley has the closure of Canyon Ridge, the alternative school, on his priority list. On Feb. 17, several students bravely came forward to testify at the public Board meeting against closure. One brave woman student directly addressed Bentley about his visit to the school during which he carried on emotionally in the principal’s office with witnesses. Bentley shamelessly confronts the student, demanding to spin the story in his favor. The audience sides with the student.

The “adult” Bentley bullies a Canyon Ridge student. Has he no shame?  Watch the public video record below and judge for yourself.

Read the previous Bentley record in reverse chronology:

School Board Bully Bentley Retaliates
Board bully Bentley goes Latin
When the School Board Pres is the Bully

Bentley made the superintendent give Spencer 24 hr. notice of termination for vague “shortcomings.” (Spencer had dared to uncover Bentley’s bullying and was interviewed by the local paper as an expert on the topic in schools. This obviously ticked off Bentley since all subsequent actions flowed from that single event.) Spencer defended himself the next day with his report of findings that several staff and administrators had been subjected to abusive conduct at the hands of the overreaching, zealous Bentley who fashions himself a populist education reformer (think Michele Bachman effective).

Taking a page right out of the bully quote book, said Bentley, “These are tough times and they require tough people to make tough decisions.” We’re having a national dialogue about civility and there is a person with a record of bullying insisting on his right to be tough. What are you teaching the children, Bentley???

We see that Bentley quotes Marine Corps Code on his private website with the first proviso: “Take responsibility for your actions, regardless of the outcome.”  OK, Bentley, time to live up to it and resign. Your actions — which would be revealed if you would stop trying to assassinate the messengers and stop the investigation — speak louder than your feeble attempt to dignify yourself by using a Latin quote.

Bentley invites comment by posting his personal phone and e-mail in the linked letter to the editor. WBI site visitors should take the arrogant bully up on his offer.

Chris Bentley, alleged Board bully

Assistant Superintendent: Bentley is a bully
HUSD head of personnel makes accusation about school board president
by Beau Yarbrough, Hesperia (CA) Star Jan. 16, 2011.

UPDATES below – latest on Feb. 4

What we know at WBI

Back in 2008, stay-at-home father of four, Chris Bentley (BA, History, Cal State San Bernardino) ran for the local school board. He marketed himself as a parents’ advocate to sit on a Board that historically did not listen to parents. He was branded a “gadfly.” Evidently, he was an vociferous contributor to the Op-Ed page fashioning himself as an expert in education in the time preceding the election.

Have you noticed that everyone is an expert in education because they attended elementary school! Would the same hubris apply to piloting a jet plane because they had flown in one?

Bentley campaigned to move the district in a “positive direction.” There was a clique of three Board members who isolated the newbie Bentley. It made him mad. In March 2009, he led a coup to oust then-president of the Board, Dr. Robert Kirk, by filing a recall petition that would have cost the District $200,000. Bentley, the fiscal responsibility aficionado, did not care one whit about that fact. Kirk eventually decided to not run again because of the “incivility on the Board” and the toll it took on his family.  The petition read:

“Robert Kirk has created an atmosphere of fear where long standing dedicated HUSD employees are fearful of losing their jobs if they cross him.”

Yet,  since Bentley has been on the Board, it’s been a contentious time. One news report captured the chaos that reigned at one meeting in June 2010. Bentley ignored his time limit, crowing that the “couldn’t care less!” Another Board member called Bentley a “crybaby.”

What the public does not yet know is how meddlesome and demeaning Bentley has been toward District staff. He has crossed the boundary from his governance role to that of administrator. That information may soon become publicly available.

The new assistant superintendent of personnel at Hesperia, Dr. Matt Spencer (a 32-yr. veteran educator with a doctorate in education) introduced himself to staff and assessed the workplace culture in the District. Spencer’s responsibility is to retain and recruit the most qualified staff available. Reports of Bentley’s harassing and haranguing staff for no objective reason were shared with Spencer by staff victimized by Bentley. Bentley even attempted to personally threaten and intimidate the veteran Spencer at District offices.

The 2010 election brought two new members to the Board. Bentley quickly jockeyed for position as the new Board president. And Kirk’s former allies yielded to Bentley.

On January 13, Bentley attempted to oust Dr. Spencer for no cause with only 24 hours notice. He convened the Board in private session. At that meeting, Spencer told the Board about Bentley’s misconduct and interference with the education of children in the Hesperia District.

“If the board would do as I implored them to do, they will find a significant amount of evidence that all of that is true,” Spencer said Friday. “The board members that have been in meetings with him, they have experienced those behaviors first-hand.”

Matt Spencer is an expert in workplace bullying, having received training from the Workplace Bullying Institute and facilitating the implementation of the anti-bullying initiative with the Desert Sands District (La Quinta).  Bentley cannot fool Spencer.

The next move is in the hands of the other Board members. Recall campaigns of elected Board members is nothing new at Hesperia Unified. It’s time for Bentley, the self-described people’s champion to be held accountable for his own misconduct. If he were honorable, after the evidence against surfaces at public Board meetings, he would gracefully resign. But bullies do not tend to fall on their own swords.

You can write to Bentley to share your opinion at his public e-mail:  chris.bentley@hesperia.org

UPDATE 1

On Tues. Jan. 17, Bentley responded with a letter to the editor. He addressed none of Spencer’s allegations. Instead, he deflected by referring to employees as “rats” wanting the district’s “cheese” that he was protecting as Board member — a true white knight and savior. This is a disingenuous claim.

When investigated, it will be shown how his harassment of staff costs the District time and money. If he wanted to be Superintendent and directly affect internal matters, he would get his doctorate in education, pay his dues in the trenches, and apply for the job. He’s a one-man wrecking crew. Matt Spencer is not a “rat.” The lawsuit Bentley cleverly mentions above is not one filed by Spencer. Spencer never had a problem with the HUSD or the Board.  He is an unusually uncompromising principled man.

Bentley can’t stand Spencer and used a technical right of his as Board president to try to oust him. Bentley launched a surprise attack with only 24 hr. notice. Spencer did not need an  internal complaint process (he was not complaining, but defending himself against Bentley’s unwarranted attack.)

Bentley has duped the Board, dominated the timid  Superintendent, and wants to eliminate those who see him for what he is. He’s a career assassin. Maybe because he doesn’t have one of his own, he believes he can rip the career of others apart based on his whims.

UPDATE 2

Peter Day, Editor of the Hesperia Star newspaper where the story initially ran had this to say about Chris Bentley.

It is common knowledge in the school district circle that Bentley can be difficult, brash and abrasive. Perhaps because of his longish hair and hip garb, however, his obvious high level of intelligence is often underestimated. He is thorough, focused and relentless when it comes to pursuing what he believes is right. That can lead to challenging exchanges with people.

Before he was elected to office, he called me at the Star office to discuss a concern about apparent inappropriate comments on our website. His intense anger made for one of the most difficult phone calls I have ever had in my journalism career.

In recent times, however, I have seen a different side of Mr. Bentley. When I ran into him at the Key Game, for instance, he was extremely affable and having a fun time with his children.

Chris Bentley is many things. He is a complex man. He can be very intense, and that can make some people uncomfortable. But is he a bully?

Mr. Day honestly does not know about Bentley, but he sounds much like an apologist for him.

UPDATE  3

Bullies need to lie. It distracts others. It encourages self-delusion. Some come to believe their own manufactured versions of reality. Take Bentley’s Jan. 17 letter to the editor. He claimed among other things:

My record clearly demonstrates that I have been a good steward of the cheese under my care. (no kidding he actually said it!) … HUSD is currently paying salary and benefits for two people in a position known as assistant superintendent of personnel. That’s right taxpayers, two people are being compensated for the same high-level administrative position at HUSD, and I am mad and frustrated as heck about it. And I have been for quite some time now, over two years in fact.

Bentley skipped over the inconvenient truth to make his hyperbolic claim. Assistant Superintendent #1 was reassigned to an assistant principal’s position before Dr. Spencer came on the scene. When Spencer joined HUSD for the school year 2010-11, he was hired as the only Assistant Superintendent for Personnel. Checking the calendar, this school year is not back dated to two years ago near the time of Bentley’s machinations and maneuvering to rid the Board of his perceived enemies. Wow.

Steve Williams at the VV Daily Press mused on Jan. 19 about the veracity of Bentley’s claim. Yes it would be interesting to see the facts.

If Bentley is such a good guy, as editor Day tries to convince himself despite being on the receiving end of Bentley’s wrath before, then why was an innocent Hesperia Star article describing workplace bullying in schools in general published, then pulled from circulation. It was an interview with Dr. Spencer that ran online briefly on Dec. 16, 2010. The headline read:  “HUSD Head of Personnel Seeks to Stamp Out Workplace Bullying.”

That was the trigger for Bentley’s campaign to oust Spencer that the public never got to see. He, like all bullies, is a coward and fears being exposed for who he truly is. The article was pulled even though Spencer said nothing about Bentley or HUSD in particular. Why? Was Day cowed by Bentley? Seems the town “leaders” could use a spine and redefinition of the mission of a free press.

Beware of the faux outrage, indignation and populism Bentley oozes. The man behind the mask will be revealed when an investigation makes public the voluminous record of e-mail exchanges Bentley has had with HUSD administrators and staff. He should resign now before he is disgraced by the record of his own actions.

While the national dialogue continues about the lack of civility in politics by public officials (and that’s the status Bentley bought with his $9,000 election), right in Hesperia, an out-of-control school board president is showing up close the face of incivility. It’s a hatemongerer in action at the local level.

BRING ON THE INVESTIGATION. Bentley tried to oust Spencer. Spencer accused Bentley. Spencer invited an investigation of his own conduct. He has nothing to hide. Investigate Bentley’s conduct since being on the Board, and the truth will be revealed. He has been hiding a great deal.

OPEN INVITATION TO CHRIS BENTLEY. You are invited to write a rebuttal to the charges leveled against you by Dr. Spencer on Jan. 13 in the non-public HUSD Board meeting. Be specific. Demonstrate with evidence that you have not engaged in “public humiliation, shaming, belittling, personal insults, withering and appalling e-mails, rude interruptions, screaming obscenities and other offensive and caustic behaviors” unbecoming an elected official. Prove how your actions do not model bullying in ways that influence the HUSD workplace culture, which in turn, affect the children you should be helping to protect. Your rebuttal will published here without revisions, if all of the above conditions are met.

UPDATE 4

The next public HUSD school board meeting is Mon. Jan.  24. This is a call to all affected employees to come testify to two things (1) in defense of Dr. Matt Spencer if you have found him a valuable addition to the HUSD staff, or (2) your outrage over Chris Bentley’s attempt to oust Spencer for no cause with 24 hr. notice.

Of course, it would be tremendous if individual employees directly affected by Bentley’s conduct via e-mail assaults or in-person disrespectful, contemptuous mistreatment testify to the other Board members about the stealth campaign Bentley has been conducting against the “rats” that work for the District.

UPDATE 5

I eagerly await reports from HUSD staff who attended the Jan. 24 Board meeting regarding Bentley’s next degrading move. Yes, “Virginia,” there is always a next low-blow move or tactic.

In the meantime, the Hesperia Star printed on Jan. 24 my letter to the editor rebutting Bentley’s Jan. 17 letter to the editor (see above). Here’s what I wrote:

Namie on Bentley

Odd that Bentley did not respond to Spencer’s allegations. Bentley is disingenuous and portrays himself as the white knight. When investigated, it will be shown how his harassment of staff costs the District time and money (that he professes to save). If he wanted to be superintendent and directly affect internal matters, he would get his doctorate in education, pay his dues in the trenches, and apply for the job. Instead, he’s a one-man wrecking crew— of past Boards and now of HUSD employees. Matt Spencer is not a “rat” (a hostile, angry analogy for employees who care for your children during the day). The lawsuit Bentley cleverly mentions in his letter is not one filed by Spencer. Spencer never had a problem with the HUSD or the Board. He is an unusually uncompromising principled man. Spencer cares about values and living them in the workplace. Bentley can’t stand that and used a technical right of his as Board president to try to oust him. Bentley launched a surprise attack on Spencer with only 24 hour notice. Spencer did not circumvent an internal complaint process (he was not complaining, but defending himself against Bentley’s unwarranted short-notice attack held during a non-public meeting — again so much for transparency Bentley.)

Bentley has duped the Board, dominated the timid superintendent, and wants to eliminate those who see him for what he is. He’s a career assassin. Because Spencer stood up for principals and staff Bentley has harassed, he was targeted for elimination. Maybe because Bentley doesn’t have a career of his own, he believes he can rip the career of others apart based on his whims. For people like him, it’s personal entertainment. He can wrap himself in all the lofty language of community advocate. His abusive actions belie his words. It’s all packaging.

UPDATE 6

The Hesperia Star published the latest Bentley Bomb in the Letter to the Editor section on Jan. 26. Here is what he wrote.

“Excitabat enim fluctus in simpulo,” said the great Roman philosopher Cicero. It literally means, “he was stirring up waves in a ladle,” or in other words, creating a tempest in a teapot. Matt Spencer and his boss, Gary Namie, are committing the Cicero described affliction of making something that is minor seem larger than it is simply to promote one’s own selfish agenda. And at HUSD, we have far greater problems.

Most people know that it is not odd to not respond to garbage not worth responding to in life. It is, however, proper to respond when one of Matt Spencer’s bosses, from out of state, starts bashing Spencer’s local boss, Mr. McKinney, in our local paper. Because the only way the old boss could make any assessment of Mark McKinney, is if Spencer told him to because Namie has never even met Mark McKinney, let alone have enough of any knowledge base to accuse him of “timidity.”

And it is also proper to narrowly respond to horse manure, particularly since the producers of said manure, Namie and Spencer, don’t even live in our community. They just seem to like leaving their manure in our town.

Mark McKinney, our superintendent, has lived and worked in this community for years. He does not deserve to have Namie/Spencer call him “timid” or any other thing because they don’t know him. Although it is odd that Spencer has decided to clearly disrespect the guy who recommended him for his very cushy and expensive job by calling him names. But Spencer has clearly demonstrated his lack of common sense and professionalism since he started cashing those humongous HUSD checks.

I believe that is proper to deal with false allegations of workplace “bullying,” only when the students that we are supposed to serve are fully protected from the very real bullying that occurs in their world. When each and every one of our students is fully protected from real bullying, then, perhaps, we should start to develop procedures to stop professional adults from engaging in human activity. But, as always, students should come first.

As noted at our last meeting, we may be facing the very real problem of a multi-million dollar hit to our budget—again—if the Governor’s proposed tax extensions do not even reach the ballot or fail to get voter support at the polls. And I have a hard time believing that Californians will vote for any increase or extension of taxes during this difficult economy.

The economy is the very real storm that I have faced in each and every year that I have been in office. It drives everything that we do, every decision that we have to make. There are no easy answers, only very difficult choices to make in this regard. How do you cut an additional 7 million dollars from an already lean budget? My stomach is still churning from the last two years and here we go again.

We have greatly expanded the cost of our cabinet administration while reducing our teachers and classified staff. That is wrong, unconscionable, in my opinion. I challenge the administration at 15576 Main Street and hold them accountable for their actions. It ain’t always easy or pleasant, but that comes with the territory.

The favorite answer/response that I have observed over the years coming from the protected enclave of 15576 Main Street is “but that’s the way we’ve always done it.” And that is unacceptable to me for these are not ordinary times. But I support, fully, the work done by our school sites and their staffs. I have not had one single principal, teacher, or classified staff, from our school sites, come to me with any form of the type of allegations that Spencer/Namie throw out. And judging by the number of phone calls I get, my phone numbers are not secret.

I am a fierce advocate for all of our kids. It is not “packaging” for I have demonstrated it for years. I am a fierce advocate for all of our good employees as they do the difficult task of ensuring that our kids have access to the quality education they deserve.
I have never portrayed myself as a “white” knight, and quite frankly, resent the racial overtones of the accusation made by Spencer/Namie. The 9000+ plus people who voted for me got exactly what I said I was when I ran for office; an intelligent, enthusiastic, fervent, and strong advocate for our kids and our employees.

I can be reached at home by dialing 760-949-7417. My cell phone number is 760-887-2288. My district email is chris.bentley@hesperia.org. I will listen, with an open mind, to anyone who wants to communicate anything to me with respect to our kid’s educations or any other issue. Stand up for our students and employees—that is what I was elected to do, what I have always done, and will firmly continue to do in the future.

Bentley has found the ongoing chronicle of his misdeeds at this site. For this, we congratulate him. Before countering some of the more nonsensical statements, let’s all remember the chronology. It’s rather simple and that’s why Bentley hates the truth. Everything he says is bluster and b.s. designed to distract everyone from focusing in on his personal misdeeds.

Matt Spencer was hired 5 months ago as head of Personnel, tasked with protecting approx. 1,800 employees. He toured the District in get-acquainted meetings and was told about the one-man wrecking crew, disruptive force that is Board member Bentley. Reports from several employees were complemented by an e-mail record of his badgering, battering, abusive, disrespectful style. Dr. Gary Namie was called to discuss with Mark McKinney how bullying undermines the District’s mission and what to do about it. Namie learns during that conversation about Bentley’s conduct prior to his becoming Board president.

Dr. Spencer is no ordinary school personnel director. Besides the 32 years of experience as teacher and coach and Superintendent and Assistant Superintendent, he is also a trained expert in recognizing and ameliorating workplace bullying. He claims affiliation with WBI as can all graduates of WBI University. The District is lucky to have this special person on staff.

The local newspaper introduced him in a get-acquainted article (in Dec.) where he stated in a general way how the HUSD would benefit from an anti-workplace bullying program in the future (as every school district could benefit). He assumes that this would be something the Board would eventually adopt since they will see the connection between adults being bullied and the deleterious effects on children and learning. The article is published in the paper’s online edition, then mysteriously pulled.

Dr. Spencer had written a March 2010 guest editorial for WBI describing the process, long before he worked at HUSD. His essay is titled Stealing From Children.

We jump to the post-election period when Bentley is designated president by the two veteran and two new Board members. His public comments express humility and surprise. In reality, he had been jockeying for the president’s role for two years to finally exercise certain privileges attached to the role of president. He was frustrated at not getting his way, revealing his incivility and arrogance in public Board meetings (see news accounts referenced above).

Spencer never backed down when Bentley personally confronted him. That was the turning point for Bentley.

Bentley discovered a little-known privilege of the Board — to remove a poor-performing, non-union District employee on 24 hour notice. He targets Spencer. It did not matter that Spencer was not a poor performer. Bentley ordered superintendent McKinney to deliver the notice on behalf of the Board. He did so with regret. It is unclear if the other Board members were made aware of Bentley’s decision. Bentley had no specific examples of incompetence because Spencer is a model administrator and principled leader and advocate for the children. No evidence of incompetence exists. Watch Bentley try to manufacture evidence.

Spencer never heard the charges against him because Bentley did not make accusations in the public session. Spencer, according to the procedural rules, was allowed to make only a 5 min. statement to the Board in public session. Spencer provided the Board with a letter detailing what time prevented him from saying. Rather than defend himself against a vague and false charge, he took the time to inform the Board about what he had learned about the impact of Bentley’s conduct on the HUSD staff. After the 5 minutes, Bentley convened a closed-door session during which he was free to say whatever he wanted without challenges or evidence to the contrary. I speculate that Bentley took the opportunity to assassinat Spencer’s character with no fear of repercussion. He must have relished the control and power his Board presidency afforded. This is why he bought the seat in the first place! Oh, I would love to have heard what the coward Bentley had to say. We know well the types of confabulations bullies can concoct. Spencer was not fired, but his reprieve will be temporary.

Predictably, Bentley will relentlessly press superintendent McKinney to manufacture a case against Spencer. It would be foolish for McKinney to follow Bentley’s commands. McKinney is Spencer’s immediate boss and should have the courage to defend his staff against frivolous and false complaints by an interloper on the Board, president or not.

The HUSD Administration and Board are partners. It should not be an abuser-battered spouse relationship. They share power. When one party abuses its authority, it is up to the other to inform the other that abuse will not be tolerated.  One partner should not refer to the other disrespectfully as “rats.”

Let’s be clear. Spencer was not filing a complaint against Bentley during his 5 minutes. The statements he made were in response to the charge leveled against him by Bentley. He did not unilaterally decide to expose Bentley. The facts about Bentley were offered in his own defense. If Bentley did not want to be exposed, he should not have attacked Spencer without evidence or reason. Spencer was educating the other four Board members about the petty tyrant within their ranks and his negative effect on the HUSD.

It’s time to investigate either Bentley or Bentley and Spencer. Let the evidence be gathered. Spencer has nothing to fear. He is the true champion for students. Let the public see Bentley for who he really is. He should have nothing to fear if he is telling the truth (which he is not).

Here are my specific rebuttal points to Bentley’s statements about me in his Jan. 26 Letter to the Editor posted above.

• Matt Spencer has a contract with HUSD, not WBI. Superintendent McKinney is his boss, not me, and not you, Bentley.

• The only one with a selfish agenda is you who is trying to fire Spencer without cause because even talking about bullying threatens you, the bully. All bullies are cowards. You are no exception. Admit it, you hate Spencer for standing up to you.

• It is not bashing McKinney to call him timid. And I have met him by phone — for one hour. So I have taken measure of the man. Stop bossing him around. You are not HIS employer!

• Spencer is not calling McKinney names. Using the convention Namie/Spencer or Spencer/Namie like Bentley does not make one person from two. Dr. Spencer is Dr. Spencer and Dr. Namie is Dr. Namie. And sadly, you are just you. Wishing to de-humanize others does not make it so.

• In Bentley’s make-believe world, real bullying happens between children and adult “bullying” is not real, it is a falsehood. Hey Bentley, you’re clever, conniving, devious, manipulating, and loose with facts, but also ignorant. While perusing the WBI site for comments about yourself (your narcissistic vanity does take over at times, doesn’t it?), try clicking on “Research” and discover a world of science out there about real bullying in the workplace studied by academics in universities around the world who know so much more than you. I am one of those producers of research. You’re a bullying denier (again, that’s part of the bully’s M.O.). If you cannot understand it, it does not exist! The campaign against workplace bullying is not about you. You’re just the poster boy who stumbled into our world by making the mistake of attacking a friend. It’s your time to be exposed. Bentley could have operated in the shadows and not been subject to public scorn if he had not run for public office. He now gets to live with the consequences. (Remember, you are big on holding others, but never yourself, accountable for their actions. Resign. It’s the honorable thing that a Marine Corps vet would do.)

• Of course not one of the people Bentley has assaulted will complain to him. Two reasons: (1) he is the source of their misery, and (2) when people refuse to be subservient to his arbitrary and capricious demands, he tries to get them fired. No one complains to the bully about being bullied by others, and certainly never to the assailant himself. Bentley’s record is yet to be revealed. His lame denials and protestations will pale in comparison to the facts.

• “Fierce advocate” ” and Bentley as the “tough” person who can make the tough decisions. Stop with the aggressive talk. Find your civil voice, if you have one. Bentley has declared war on the District and its staff. He slipped and revealed his true nature by calling the employees “rats” wanting your “cheese.”

• When I said Bentley portrayed himself as the “white knight,” I was complimenting him as a self-declared champion for others. Bentley interprets it as racist. Really? Spare us all the faux sensitivity to cultural diversity. Thank goodness your kids are at the HUSD. Home schooling by their stay-at-home dad would be disastrous for their intellectual and emotional development.

I’ve decided that you have no business being involved with schools at all. Get elected to another public commission if you feel the need to push government around for sport. Your closed-mindedness and your historical pattern of abuse and disrespect for others pose a lethal threat to the public education system and the educators who have devoted their lives to helping the development of others’ children.

• Why can I conclude what I do from a distance, not living in Hesperia? Because people just like you thrive in every community. We study them, extensively research the consequences of their misconduct on others, write books, teach college courses about them, tell the media, do on-site consulting where we meet them all the time, and testify in court about them. I can predict nearly every one of your moves without being told by anyone at HUSD. So, neither you nor Hesperia nor the HUSD is unique. You are that predictable.

Anyone working at HUSD can learn how to know Bentley better and how to predict what he will do. Serial killers have taught researchers a lot about psychopaths. Here’s a recommended reading list:

The Bully At Work by Namie & Namie
What Would Machiavelli Do? by Bing
The No Asshole Rule by Sutton
Snakes in Suits: When Psychopaths Go To Work by Hare & Bobiak
Without Conscience by Hare

UPDATE 7     Feb. 3

The Hesperia Star ran an unedited version of Dr. Matt Spencer’s letter to the editor on Feb. 1. Here are some excerpts that illustrate a couple of important points.

“My beliefs and philosophies regarding the working environments for employees are quite similar. I believe that every employee has the right to come to a place of service each day and experience an environment that is safe, clean, helpful, and supportive…an environment where employees can enjoy their colleagues, join in harmony with them toward the common goal of educating children, and give of their unique talents and skills in service to the students. I believe every employee has the right to come to work and not be harassed, harangued, intimidated, or abused in any way. There should be nothing in the work environment that would cause an employee to dread to come to work at the schoolhouse.

As an outgrowth of these core beliefs and philosophies, I made the decision long ago that when I looked into the eyes of the students and employees who gather at the schoolhouse, in whatever school district I would serve, I must say to them what I feel in my heart…”You are deserving of all of my efforts to give you the gift of such an environment to learn or serve.” My commitment to the students and employees I serve is inescapable; I view this commitment as a promise and a duty.”  …

If his belief that no one should dread coming to work sounds pollyannaish to you, you’ve grown to cynical. This is a modest expectation — to work without fear. What Spencer is talking about when he mentions “duty” is what every other industrialized nation imposes on its employers — the duty of care. Employers in those nations, including Canada, have an implicit contract to protect workers’ safety. Only in America is that ridiculed.

Violators and abusers must be stopped, and if necessary, expelled from the schoolhouse. Those who have the responsibility for accountability must be steadfast in the fulfillment of this responsibility. They cannot be distracted or deterred by the kicking, screaming, finger-pointing, or diversionary tactics of those caught in the accountability spotlight.   …

For Board members, administrators, union leaders, community leaders, and elected officials who serve in some leadership role and have an opportunity to influence the destiny of their local school districts, what do you say when you look into the eyes of the children and employees who gather at your schoolhouse? Do you say to them …”You are deserving of all of my efforts to give you the gift of such an environment to learn and serve.” Or do you say “You are not worthy.”

Here Spencer is referring to violators of the principle of duty of care who act with hypocrisy when claiming to hold others accountable for mistreatment or malfeasance when it is they who have acted so. To have branded employees “rats” as Bentley did as if they coveted HIS “cheese,” was the ultimate act of disregard for the committed staff and teachers who take care of the children at the HUSD.

Spencer ended with

“As for the question of whether or not employees in our schools are deserving of a respectful, dignified, abuse-free environment in which to serve…I made my decision long ago. I chose to be an educator. I chose to be an educational leader.”

Revealing his honest motivation. I know the man. He could have been an engineer, scientist, physician, clergyman. Instead, he has served his life in schools. The same cannot be said for Bentley. He is not an educator. This takes me back to something I said in the beginning. Just because a person passes through a public school system as an end user of services does not make that person an expert in that profession.

I still await news that courageous staff and administrators have come forward to share their experiences with Bentley. Bentley/McKinney can’t fire all of you. They wouldn’t dare. Or would they try? Would the community stand for it?

UPDATE 8   Feb. 4

The tug-of-war continues. Chris Bentley dashed off on Feb. 3 yet another Letter to the Editor, He still has not defended his treatment of HUSD personnel. Instead, this pit bull chose to again attack me and Dr. Matt Spencer. At least we get treated to more legendary characters from history. Aristotle this time, Cicero before that. Bentley, the least recognized man of letters and biblical scholarship among us.

He accuses me of making money!  I bet the narcissistic fool thinks WBI was created in reaction to him! It fits his m.o.

The anti-bullying campaign was born in poverty and remains an entirely volunteer enterprise, both this voluminous website and the legislative campaign involving over 60 people nationwide. Not one penny, you schmuck!! He, who ran for political office, dares impugn the integrity of people who work selflessly for a cause bigger than themselves.

Now, Work Doctor consulting is another matter. The speeches and consulting do generate revenue. No apologies there. It’s America. It’s capitalism, still. But it is earned money based on services that prove valuable to clients and based on years of training, experience and wisdom. Try it, if you think you have value that others might want to rent.

The Desert Sands District, where I met Dr. Spencer, paid for much more than a policy. And the fee charged is a fraction of the settlement paid by any District for a single lawsuit. Check within HUSD how much money has been paid to settle past and current lawsuits.

Bentley ended his lie-ridden diatribe with …

(Spencer and Namie) “sought public school dollars for their organization in the last school district Spencer worked at in California. These facts further demonstrate that it is very reasonable to conclude that the Namie/Spencer outsider’s interest in our school district is one borne solely of greed and love of money.”

Matt Spencer was hired by HUSD not by Work Doctor or WBI.  Bentley’s slight-of-hand, loose-with-truth style can trick the casual reader. He implies that Spencer is a plant, hired to accomplish some nefarious agenda. Wrong. Liar. In fact, in Spencer’s Feb. 1 letter to the editor referenced above, he describes clearly why and how he does the work he does.

If anything, Bentley is a plant, more like a cancer, that put himself on the Board and jockeyed to gain more control so he can play out his fantasies of controlling the schools even though he’s never worked for one (at least he never claims to have done so in his bio).

Dr. Spencer is an independent agent. He serves in his capacity as Assistant Superintendent. The fact that he is a trained anti-bullying champion threatens no one except bullies. Methinks Bentley protests too much. The special skill set Spencer possesses since our introduction at Desert Sands complements well his role as head of Personnel. The District gets more bang for their buck by having Spencer on staff, an internal consultant with an additional specialty. Bentley again disparaged Spencer in his Feb. 3 note claiming:

“Educators are found in schools, not district offices.”

I’m not going to defend all administrators, just the ethical and principled ones I know personally. But this statement is outrageous. The journey to a school district position in one’s career nearly always begins in the classroom and school building.

Hey, Bentley, concrete, simplistic thinking works for Sarah Palin, not you. It makes you sound closed-minded and ignorant — not ideal properties to display when professing to improve education for your own children. You model bullying behavior for which you should be scorned and made ashamed. You denigrate those with more principles than you while attempting to elevate yourself with self-chosen terms like “fierce advocate.”  Meet a genuine fierce advocate — me.  You speak with hypocrisy dripping from every written word. Next, you’ll start winkin’ to gain impunity for your shortcomings.

Bentley wants the Board, McKinney, the community of Hesperia, and all HUSD employees to believe that the Workplace Bullying movement is “parochial,” a small thing that may have been invented to attack him.

The faux-wordly Bentley, interpreter of Cicero and Aristotle, needs to read news beyond the Hesperia Star. Check out the various media broadcast and print outlets that proclaim loud and clear how large the problem is here in America. And then there are those pesky foreign places outside So Cal called Europe, Scandinavia, Britain, Ireland, Australia, South Africa, and Canada where the anti-bullying message has taken hold and driven fools like him out of organizations with laws. It’s a world full of scientists, scholars, activists and lawmakers (a group to which he could never belong) who what it is about bullying that Bentley is incapable of acknowledging. Just cause he says they don’t exist does not make them disappear.

To prove that I am not greedy, here are two public offers from Work Doctor, Inc to implement its full corporate Blueprint to Prevent and Correct Workplace Bullying program (the one implemented by Desert Sands) for the HUSD:

1.) For a $0 fee after Chris Bentley resigns from the HUSD Board and signs an agreement to not be involved with the HUSD in any capacity, as elected official or volunteer in any school-related organization, excepting in his role as parent of students attending there,

OR

2.) For a reduced fee of $20,000 with Bentley remaining on the Board. The policy we create would apply to Board members and it would be a short period before he would be accused and confirmed as violator and lose his position. This is a win-win for the District. Dr. Spencer would assist, naturally for no fee since he is an employee of the District.

Stay tuned.

Perspective 1 is through the lens of people who know bullying from the inside, from the perspective of being the target of a bully’s wrath. They have the experience with their employer’s involvement with bullying. People who visit the WBI website and complete a front-page Instant Poll weigh in on a variety of issues. From their answers, we can describe the world through the lens of bullied targets because site visitors (98%) declare themselves to be bullied targets. The research samples are called “self-selected” samples. Despite the polls being “unscientific,” they provide the most useful information for other bullied targets and shed light on the bullying phenomenon.

Perspective 2 is the national snapshot captured when we commission a national poll. We did this in August for the 2010 WBI U.S. Workplace Bullying Survey. Our pollsters, Zogby International, polled 4,210 individuals selected to represent all adult Americans. The sample was a “scientific” one because of the sampling methodology used. It allows WBI to extrapolate the findings to the general U.S. adult population. Surveys like these meet the requirement for publication in scientific journals and at academic conferences. However, when half of the population has no knowledge of bullying (49.6% of the 2010 WBI-Zogby respondents claimed never witnessing and never being bullied), results can be misleading.

What a difference personal experience makes. For instance, we asked in our National Survey and also in one of our Instant Polls:

How engaged is your employer with preventing or correcting workplace bullying?

A large portion — 36.9% — of the national survey respondents said they were “not sure” about employer activity. We did not give the online survey respondents the same opportunity. We eliminated the “not sure” people and adjusted the percentages accordingly for a direct comparison between the two groups. Here are the differences.

For each response category, the percentages for the survey groups are given.

From the online targets’ survey, we see that 81% of employers are either doing nothing to address bullying or actually resisting action when requested to do something. The non-expert public direct comparison percentage is 44.8.

Most startling is how optimistic is the general public that employers are very engaged in the battle against workplace bullying. One-third of adult Americans gave employers credit for having specific policies and faithfully enforcing them. Perhaps this confidence assumes that since schools have been forced to deal with bullying, workplaces for adults would similarly address bullying. Of course, this statistic is not founded on truth. Bullied targets tell us that less than three percent (2.7%) of employers are actively engaged like the public thinks.

The two views about employer engagement are divergent. The differences are so great that the veracity of one or both groups warrants scrutiny. Who shall be trusted — the “average” American or a veteran of the bullying wars? We have 14 years experience with the latter group. They have proven themselves to us to be honest.

It also is true that one cannot imagine the intensity of the defense for the bully coupled with attempts to discredit and demoralize you, the target, until it happens to you. In other words, without direct experience, you might believe the promises that all employers care deeply about the health and safety of their workers. This is a naive belief not supported by the evidence — empirical (as shown in the above table) and anecdotal (if you talk to bullied targets).

The findings above illustrate a second point about the American public. Americans hold myths about employers as benevolent stewards of workers. They want to believe. And as most elections prove, they are susceptible to slogans, broad promises, and symbols. Facts and evidence pale by comparison. Americans are willing to ignore facts when their worldview dictates a contrary view. This indefensible ignorance about employer actions seems to have affected our own national survey.

It is critical that lawmakers understand the reality of the bullying phenomenon and employer resistance to voluntary action. A major point of our advocacy for the anti-bullying Healthy Workplace Bill is that without laws compelling action, employers will continue to ignore bullying. Employer lobbying groups promise that voluntary action will suffice. When lawmakers, the source of much of the over-hyped optimism and sloganeering in our culture, adopt the false belief that a third of employers are doing the right thing now, they will be reluctant to sponsor or support the legislation.

The danger of a society duped by untruths about workplace bullying is that action is stalled. The more credible truth about employer action is that very little is happening. Targets have told us so. And we see the resistance up close as consultants (Work Doctor®) who now focus our work with employers exclusively on eliminating workplace bullying in the workplace since 1998.

Gary Namie, PhD Research Director, Workplace Bullying Institute

© 2010 Workplace Bullying Institute

Zogby International was commissioned by the Workplace Bullying Institute to conduct an online survey of 4,210 adults from 8/18/10 to 8/23/10. The margin of error is +/- 2.2 percentage points. The sample was weighted to reflect accurate gender, age, and regional representation.

You can download a pdf version of this report.

Visit the HR Failed Me Forum to tell your HR story.

The report can be downloaded here. The goals of the were to review the “financial operations and management of the Virginia Quarterly Review” with Ted Genoways as Editor thru July 31, 2010. With regard to financials, Genoways depleted $475,000 of the VQR’s $800,000 in reserve fund account which was independent of other Univ. accounts, a status no other on-campus department enjoyed. “No inappropriate transactions were found” was one of the report conclusions. Genoways, working for then university president John Casteen, said he was told to “spend down” the fund.

The only “corrective action” (and never to be known publicly) to be taken against Genoways was for mishandling receipts and a credit card charge.

Investigative reporter Dave McNair of the local Charlottesville The Hook caught the most significant financial omission from the report.

The report makes no mention of VQR development manager Alana Levinson-Labrosse, the daughter of major UVA donor Frank Levinson (and a major donor herself), whose hiring was exempt from standard UVA posting and search requirements, and who had little or no fundraising experience. In addition, documents obtained by the Hook show that Frank Levinson “tentatively” planned to commit $150,000 to the VQR. In fact, a reliable source says he had already cut a check to the VQR in July for $75,000. According to those same documents, Levinson-Labrosse planned to use the $1.5 million she’d committed to UVA’s Young Writer’s Workshop to help the VQR.

As The Hook reported, Genoways gets to keep his $170,000 compensation package as editor with no campus teaching obligations. He makes as much as the highest paid faculty in the English Department whose accomplishments outshine those of Genoways by any measure.

With respect to WBI’s complaint about institutional negligence, the report noted “there were several institutional notifications of problems within VQR, but no specific allegations of bullying or harassment prior to July 30th.” Thus, there was confirmation that the University, even the President’s office, knew about Genoways and employees’ discontent with him. It was not just Kevin Morrissey.

There was blame leveled at Morrissey for not filing formal charges against Genoways. The report, in the above passage, stated: “no specific allegations” were filed. So, the university did not act because problems were not specifically chronicled!

Here is more of  ducking responsibility. The report said

UVA personnel responded to employee concerns in accordance with institutional policies and procedures, given the information they were provided. However, there was a lack of clarity with regard to certain roles, as well as a perceived lack of independent institutional authority to engage and resolve issues for employees while operating with a general good faith desire to respect employee confidences.

Part 1: No they did NOT respond. Policies and procedures were in place for illegal discrimination but when the information did not meet those criteria (“the information provided”) because Genoways was not accused of sexually harassing anyone, nothing need be done. This is true everywhere. UVa is no guiltier than any other institution. It’s the problem with U.S. employment law that we are trying to fix. However, the report cites the University’s Code of Ethics that tells all campus constituents to conduct themselves “professionally and with civility.” As an expert witness in lawsuits, I’ve learned the difference between the power of a policy that obligates both employer and employee and a “Code” that means nothing more than a Mission or Values Statement. Despite its weakness, why did none of the institutional representatives contacted by Morrissey attempt to invoke the Code and warn Genoways that he was in breach?

Part 2: We know that Morrissey contacted Employee Assistance and the Ombudsman (Brad Holland fashioned himself the on-campus anti-bullying crusader). The report cites the need to bury anything discovered about Genoways beneath the cloak of “employee confidence.” Let’s be clear. When someone is asking for relief, for the sake of their own confidentiality, several institutional reps must keep the secret. Bullying is a phenomenon shrouded in secrecy.

If Brad Holland wanted to fight bullying on campus, he should have started with the people who came to him. He could have asked for a release from confidentiality in order to pursue existing solutions or create new ones like we do with progressive employers. Instead, he kept the secret and Kevin Morrissey is dead.

There is little hope for much change based on the report’s recommendations. Rather than lifting the cloak of secrecy, there is a call for better defining what constitutes “institutional notification.” Too many offices are available for collecting employee complaints but there is too little coordination among them. The report states.

The current structure for receiving employee complaints needs to be re-evaluated by the University. Either Human Resources should be charged with this responsibility and give this employee-reporting function a higher status in its department, or an office that is independent of Human Resources should be established for this purpose. (emphasis by WBI)

The ending to that sentence spells hope for employees. Take the complaint function out of HR’s hands. Combined with the following, UVa could make it better for bullied employees.

A task force should be created and charged to strengthen the institution’s policies and structure with regards to acceptable workplace conduct. This should include emphasizing a culture where all employees are valued, regardless of their position.

This is typically the first step in accomplishing our Blueprint to Prevent and Correct Workplace Bullying.

Or the “task force” could become simply another go-nowhere/do-nothing commission-type stalling tactic. Only time will tell.

In the meantime, the two remaining VQR staffers have been “unequivocal in their condemnation of Genoways’ leadership and his treatment of Morrissey,” according to The Hook. They will be leaving, possibly holding on to university employment but elsewhere. We wish them luck, but why should they have to be the ones to leave?

Again, bullying happens with impunity and a handsome intact salary to boot!

Dr. Gary Namie, Workplace Bullying Institute Director commented on the Bennett accusations on Nov. 18 on CBC Radio Vancouver shows:  On the Coast with Stephen Quinn and All Points West with Jo-Ann Roberts. Welcome CBC listeners.

UPDATE: Check out a recording of this broadcast.

Alyssa Peterson

Sept. 15, 2010 marks the 7th anniversary of Alyssa Peterson’s death in Iraq.

Alyssa Peterson, 27, a Flagstaff Arizona native served in a military intelligence unit of the 101st Airborne in Iraq in 2003. She formally and loudly objected to techniques used against prisoners (which we have all since learned were torture). She was trained in Arabic and interrogation techniques.  She was a Mormon who, prior to deployment, reportedly was questioning her faith. Her family and fellow trainees remembered her as extremely empathetic and kind.

Alyssa was assigned to “the cage.” After only two days, she refused to participate further. The military command reprimanded her for her “empathy” toward Iraqi prisoners. She was re-assigned to different duties and sent to suicide prevention training. An Army sergeant interrogator, Kayla Williams, knew about Alyssa’s internal struggle with the conflict over her personal feelings and professional duties. On Sept. 15, 2003 she killed herself with her service rifle. She left a suicide note referring to the irony that suicide training had taught her how to kill herself. A notebook was found near her body but was blacked out by the Army.

The Army’s official cause of death, which is all that the family knew at first, was death from a “non-hostile weapons discharge.”

The suicide and Army investigation report was uncovered by tenacious KNAU public radio reporter Kevin Elston. [Read the transcript of Elston's 2005 radio report. Listen to his Nov 2006 interview on Democracy Now.]

The Alyssa Peterson case is an extreme example of how one person chose integrity over doing whatever her employer commanded her to do. The case comes with all the complications that accompany suicide stories. However, here was one gentle soul who refused to torture other human beings.

If more refused, people like Alyssa might not have to see suicide as the only way to resolve a personal integrity conflict.

Finally, her sacrifice should serve as warning that witnessing torture demeans witnesses, too. When torture is the norm, we’ve all lost our humanity and the right to claim moral self-righteousness.

This report is an abbreviated summary of a 2-part series by Greg Mitchell for the Nation – “The soldier who chose suicide after she refused to go along with torture.”

Schumpeter wrongly assumes that employers will self-regulate because

Workplace bullying can certainly be a serious problem, and companies should do their best to deal with it, just as parents and neighbours should. But we should resist attempts, like the one in New York, to create yet more workplace regulations.

His primary complaint is the opportunistic spawning of an anti-bullying industry led by “ethics and workplace compliance” consultants. On this topic, we agree.

Prior to the explosion in public awareness of workplace bullying for which WBI has been working tirelessly the past 13 years, any consultants in the area of “sexual harassment,” “conflict,” “ethics,” “respect,” “diversity,” or “discrimination” are opportunists.

If they genuinely believed that bullying was a problem, they would have told their client organizations that this was the case. They would not try package the serious health-harming, career-destroying phenomenon as something simply solved using tired, ineffective and inappropriate tools in their repertoire. The truth is that these bandwagon-jumpers have rarely told executives the truth. (Most get stuck at the HR level anyway in their dealings.)

Who brought workplace bullying to the U.S.?  WBI.  Who created the workplace bullying consulting trade? Work Doctor®, Inc.  Both organizations were founded, and led, by Gary and Ruth Namie. There can only be one original.

The hero is Luis Collazo a former supervisor at Bristol-Myers Squibb, Puerto Rico. A woman scientist in his unit, Diana Hiraldo, complained to him on Feb. 10, 2003 that a co-worker was sexually harassing her on the job. Instead of ignoring the complaint or tipping off the alleged harasser thus triggering an escalation, he arranged and attended a Feb. 20 meeting between Hiraldo and an HR specialist Edgardo Garcia. Garcia explained to her the grievance process. Collazo did the right thing. Agree?
Not according to the pharmaceutical giant. Callazo and Callazo alone was “reorganized” out of his job. He was fired the very next day,  Feb. 21, after the Hiraldo-Garcia meeting despite raving positive evaluations and receiving several President’s Awards over the years. Ironically, the progressive discipline and other HR procedures were not applied to his ouster. In depositions, HR confessed that there was no reorganization or that his performance actually warranted termination.

Callazo sued for retaliatory termination for daring to protest sexual harassment on behalf of his staff, a legally protected activity. He lost in trial court. That court granted summary judgement (threw it out without considering the merits of the case) in favor of the corporation. However, the First Circuit Court of Appeals reversed the trial court.

The appellate court decision stated: “Bristol-Myers argues that Collazo did not ‘oppose’ any discriminatory conduct because he ‘did not utter words’ during the meetings with García but instead ‘simply listened to Hiraldo.’” The corporate defense was that because Collazo only listened at the meeting where Garcia explained HR procedures, he was not opposing the harassment.

Immediately after the meeting, Collazo told Garcia that the case was serious. He was gone the next day. As with most discrimination cases, retaliation was the basis for the lawsuit that was finally successful on August 5, 2010.

The accountable individuals at BMS, PR were Carlos Lopez, Director of Technical Services for both Barceloneta and Humacao BMS plants in Puerto Rico (Collazo’s supervisor) and the HR Director Viviana Vilanova.

You might want to bookmark Jim Edward’s B-net column, Placebo Effect, since he tracks unscrupulous acts by pharmaceutical companies. His reporting tipped us off to this BMS travesty.

You can download the easy-to-read appellate court decision here.

Another good person is a New York City-based HR professional who blogs and has written a book called the HR Toolkit and works with our NY State group to pass the anti-bullying Healthy Workplace Bill, despite SHRM’s official opposition to the legislation.

I write this love letter at the request of HR folks who hate reading the negative news about how HR does too little to stop bullying within their organizations. Believe me, I hate the fact that HR doesn’t help enough, too.

Really, I want to tout the value HR brings to organizations, but I need proof. I do not demonize HR. They are not wicked, ok maybe threatening, but not demonic. But I report the experiences bullied targets tell us. It’s that simple.

Clearly individuals are separate from the institutional role that dictates that they serve their executive masters and allow bullies to operate with impunity. The caveat is that whatever personal conflict over doing the right thing or the commanded or expected thing should compel more HR folks to be ethical, right and just.

That’s why I rely on empirical and anecdotal data to shape the story. HR folks, here is what 462 people who probably had been bullied told us on our summer 2010 online Instant Poll.

The percentage of cases in which HR took action and stopped the bullying: 3.4. There it is — the good news. Headline:  HR Effectively Stops Bullying (3% of the time). HR you earned it. Celebrate. The 3%-ers are the good people. But what about the rest of you?

In 60% of cases HR did nothing after bullying was reported to them. Doing nothing was followed by an increase in bullying, for 26.6% of respondents.

Worse still, HR botched matters by taking action that helped the alleged bully and hurt the complainant in 32.5% of cases.

This is the reality confirmed by WBI coaches who have listened to over 6,000 detailed tales. And you might want to view the contributions to the WBI HR Forum.

Don’t get defensive. Don’t attack WBI. Just do the right thing for the person hurt by the ones typically more powerful. Stop siding with the powerful just to keep your job or to curry favor from them. Grow a conscience. Be moral leaders. Teach executives about bullying and show them how destructive it is, for people and for leaders.

Now the Good News …

Here’s some great news for HR staffers. Though you have not fooled those who turned to you for help inside your organizations, the general public believes that HR is serving aggrieved employees. This statistic is derived from the latest 2010 WBI scientific national poll.

14.3% of adult Americans credited HR with taking appropriate actions that stopped the bullying with positive outcomes for the target (compared to the 3.4% from the non-scientific online poll of people with actual experience as customers or HR).

Botched efforts occurred in only 5.3% of cases.

HR doing nothing was estimated at 24.9%, allowing the bullying to continue but in only 6.2% of situations was the target harmed by increased bullying.

In the majority of cases, 51%  of adult Americans , survey respondents were not sure if HR was told about the workplace bullying situation.

So, HR, please do not demonize WBI. Do better and we will gladly report it.

Wasserman wrote “nowhere have I seen accounts of harassing behavior intended to belittle or publicly humiliate Morrissey … Nowhere is there persecution or verbal abuse … where was the bullying?” As if bullies or the institutions that harbor them would publicly disclose evidence. The details, known to the university HR folks, are all cloaked beneath the cover of “confidentiality.” That’s why an outsider would not have “seen accounts.”That’s why for years we have called bullying the “silent epidemic.”

He also makes demeaning remarks about Morrissey, the person ultimately responsible for his own suicide. Revealing his true values, Wasserman laments that the Virginia Quarterly Review, a great magazine, might suffer from undeserved media coverage. Boo hoo! Ethics professor, really? VQR over its people? Defend Genoways without evidence? Wasserman’s denial of the reality that bullying could drive a person to suicide seems indefensible.

Go here to get the background on this story.

Listen to the audio report.

Read this Aug. 23 article: “The Rise and Fall of Ted Genoways” by the editor of ZYZZYVASPEAKS, a journal of West Coast writers & authors

Tale of Woe: The death of Kevin Morrissey by Dave McNair, August 18, 2010

Take time to read the several comments, including mine.

Ted Genoways, VQR editor accused of bullying by suicide victim

At universities, people tend to think of teaching and research faculty and staff as the only employees. At the University of Virginia, the president supports a literary journal, the Virginia Quarterly Review, prestigious to poets and fiction writers. Kevin Morrissey, 52, the VQR managing editor had been hired by a young Ted Genoways, 38, new himself to the editor post in 2003.

On July 30, Kevin Morrissey committed suicide after a reported three years of torment by Genoways despite the two having a genuine friendship at the start of their work together.

There was a record of several calls by Morrissey to university institutional helpers (HR, ombuds, EAP, president’s office). Either his call for help was not answered or treated with indifference. Those familiar with Morrissey’s complaints said that the rationalization for Genoways was that creative people like him could be difficult to work with and were often bad managers! In other words, live with him, adjust to him, Genoways is indispensable. Note the abdication of responsibility by this employer for the safe working conditions of its employees.

Said one fawning former intern, “Ted (Genoways) is the creative genius … the fulcrum of discussions about the future of VQR and, honestly, the future of journalism … Ted is the star at the center of VQR‘s constellation.” A publisher familiar with VQR lamented that “A crisis like this  (triggered by Morrissey’s suicide) can be a death blow (sic), even to the strongest scholarly publication.”

The magazine had won awards and Genoways himself won a fellowship allowing him to be out of the office. His focus was on funding and enlisted the help of a 24-yr. old UV graduate, Alana Levinson-LaBrosse (she was so rich she gave $1.5 million herself to the university). Morrissey and she reportedly clashed as she, not Morrissey, was included in activities with Genoways.

Kevin Morrissey

Staff recalled Genoways screaming at Morrissey behind closed doors. Three VQR staffers even accompanied Morrissey to the president’s office to complain about Genoways. They were brushed off. There is evidence that Genoways sent Morrissey an e-mail accusing him of “unacceptable workplace behavior,” without specifications, ordered him to work from home and prohibited communication with other VQR staff. These are all classic tactics employed by bullies who enjoy privileged protection from the CEO (the former university president who left in July).  They not completely unlike torture. The tactics were probably retaliation for Morrissey and Levinson-LaBrosse fighting.

The only tangible response from the administration was an apology by the president’s chief of staff to VQR staff for witnessing the clash between Morrissey and Levinson-LaBrosse at a meeting. No apology to Morrissey. No other official response to Morrissey’s complaints. No holding Genoways accountable. No offer of counseling to Morrissey.

Morrissey’s death followed Genoways’ draconian decisions and one last denigrating e-mail on the morning of his suicide. In that e-mail, Genoways, the espoused “genius” and “star,” accused Morrissey of failing to help a contributor to a VQR story such that Morrissey put that man’s life at risk!

There was a report that some close to the situation warned the university that Morrissey might commit suicide.

Even after Morrissey’s death, the UVa’s official response to the request for complaint and response details from reporter Robin Wilson for the Chronicle of Higher Education (the source for this story), the university hid behind a faux shield of “confidential personnel records.” Morrissey’s surviving sister blames Genoways and the university and may file a lawsuit.

The negligent employer gets to bury the secrets to protect itself from being revealed.

Read Robin Wilson’s story:  What Killed Kevin Morrissey?

###

Epilogue

There’s even more to the Univ. Virginia tale. A couple of years ago, UVa recruited WBI (and others with extensive experience with university communities as well as being researchers and consultants, in other words, heavyweights in the field) to come to campus. UVa instead brought in a “motivational” speaker. At WBI, we pass on several on-site speeches when employers resist creating a solution for the problem that prompted the request in the first place.

The result at UVa was that nothing was done after the speech. The former President’s office was not engaged in discussions about bullying, and possibly the specific Kevin Morrissey complaints. If something had been in place, Morrissey would not have had to resort to pleading with HR and the other institutional helpers as his phone records indicated was done. HR may be implicated in Morrissey’s death. And the feel-good motivational speaker actually encouraged this negligent employer to believe that it had adequately addressed bullying on campus with a speech alone!  Get serious UVa. What will it take to get American employers to stop the carnage within the ranks?

Protecting my interests: HRM and targets’ coping with workplace bullying.

Bullied targets beware! This May 2010 article by IAWBH Board member Premilla D’Cruz debunks some myths about Human Resources positive role in ameliorating bullying.

The context for the study is that previous work has shown that organizations generally do nothing or deem the complainant a troublemaker when bullying is reported. This study explores human resource management’s (HRM) influence on targets’ coping.

I found two HRM typologies used in the study to be pragmatic and useful. The first is Hard and Soft HRM. The former approach exploits employees as inputs in the production process useful only for maximized economic gain. Soft HRM treats humans as assets requiring investment because skilled people add value to the organization. Using the rhetoric of “professionalism,” HR masks hard HRM tactics to better control employees. Professional employees are encouraged to give work and loyalty a higher priority than personal needs ensuring compliance with org requirements, accepting discipline and termination as part of a rational process.

The second HRM dimension is Inclusivist vs. Exclusivist. Inclusivist strategies foster employee loyalty and engagement. The exclusivist approach is transactional in nature focusing on dismissal, layoffs, outsourcing and opposition to unionization.

The authors interviewed 59 telephone call center workers in Mumbai and Bangalore, India whose work is characterized by high volume and service quality demands and the ever-present threat of punishment. Specifically, their methodology adopted hermeneutic phenomenology, the descriptions and interpretations of participants’ work lives as they experienced them. Workers described the work environment as oppressive but that their employer cared about them. From the original group of interviewees, 10 bullied targets who were all new to the call center and not unionized were interviewed about their experiences. Transcriptions of the recorded interviews were analyzed for themes and revealing patterns of themes — specifically how did HRM affect coping with bullying.

The intensive interviews yielded four themes akin to stages of the bullying experience:

• initial confusion (over the bully’s selection of them as targets and the jarring juxtaposition of the espoused professionalism with the unprofessional mistreatment);

• trusting the employer grievance processes for redress (HR initially gives reassurances that a positive solution would result, HR delays are rationalized, eventually senior HR managers admonish complainants and hold them responsible for their fate, HR supports the bullies and the bullies retaliate using the complaint as rationale);

• moving inwards (emotional strain is devastating, social networks make targets feel loved and valued, others convince targets that alternatives exist, once the decision to move is made confidence and productivity return because of their strong work ethic); and

• exiting (though new post-bullying job meant leaving without notice or employer support, sense of regained control, lingering feelings of injustice over having to leave).

The authors conclude that HRM renders employees completely vulnerable because it operates as a one-sided managerial function that looks after only the organizations’ interests leaving the bullied employee with nothing more than their own individual voice. In other words, the maxim that HR is not an advocate for the interests of bullied targets seems true.

Source:  Premilla D’Cruz & Ernesto Noronha. (May, 2010) Protecting my interests: HRM and targets’ coping with workplace bullying. The Qualitative Report, 15 (3), 507-534.

Read the article for yourself.

When a woman passenger rose, before she was permitted, to get her carry-on luggage ahead of everyone else, Slater went to her to stop her. She swore at him and swung her bag that hit Slater. The frustrated (but unarmed) Slater did two unthinkable things. He got on the intercom and sent a public F*** you to the woman who had sworn at him so all the passengers knew. [Read the apology by a contrite veteran passenger who doesn't blame Slater.] He grabbed some beers from the cart (a self-defeating act for the admitted  alcoholic in recovery) and opened the exit door opposite the jetway and inflated the emergency chute and simply left. He made it all the way out of the airport and home where police arrested him. (What does that say about the TSA’s value?)

The dramatic exit was an inventive, and workplace-specific, way to simply leave the situation. It was a “take this job and shove it” move admired by many frustrated workers. Here is the animated version. Given his humble mumblings after release from jail the next day about how good most passengers are, he might have been more ashamed of what he had done and just needed to escape, to escape the only way possible before the jetway door was open.

I think we deserve to know the name of the belligerent, rule-breaking, and profane woman passenger from Pittsburgh. She’s the a**hole in this story.

Slater is a folk hero to the silent masses who suffer indignities from customers and bad bosses. Jet Blue, the employer, will probably can him. I hope his pension, if any has been earned from his quarter century of service in a tough customer service business, is intact. Deployment of the chute was the potentially illegal act that could bring 7 years of prison time. [Wow. Rapists don't serve an average of 7 years, murderers barely. For some reason, the experts say that chute deployment could have hurt workers on the ground.]

According to the NBC legal guy says in the Today Show segment below, Jet Blue might not want the difficulty of finding a jury to try workers’ hero Slater. He lost the job for now. Eager to see where he lands. Another airline picks him up to train attendants using his vast experience — of being in control and of losing his cool that one time. Just hope he doesn’t land his own reality show on the “d” list of cable channels.

The final point of mine is that this is a tale of two men frustrated at their jobs. Thornton had time to plan his aggression. His girlfriend believed he was lashing out a racist workforce that had mistreated him. A frustrated man with ready access to a private gun arsenal resulted in a protypical American massacre to redress his frustrations. The immediacy of Slater’s frustration could have led to an impulsive, unplanned violent episode. However, he had few options. The differences in personalities will never be adequately compared.

Different men, different outcomes. But one thing is certain — without guns present, no one got hurt. I support Slater and you can too.

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

While here, take a second to take the Instant Poll on HR’s efficacy.

The arguments in both sides of the debate follow.

My, my, my. What am I to do with Human Resources, the “Dark Arts” department according to former HR Director Bruce Cameron in the documentary Fired! The Movie and in Denise A. Romano’s new book The HR Toolkit: An Indispensable Resource for Being A Credible Activist? And recently, Yale Law lecturer and Time writer, Adam Cohen, during a discussion on CNN about our anti-bullying legislation stated as a matter of fact that HR is not on the workers’ side in bullying situations (at time1:58 in the video).

Consider some evidence. The stories WBI has culled from 6,000+ hour-long sessions with targets of workplace bullying since beginning this work 13 years ago have produced only TWO (2) stories of HR bravery, courage and morality — of doing the right thing for the target and not for the bully or her or his management allies. Empirical evidence from WBI year 2000 survey of 1,300 targets suggest that HR did nothing in 51% of cases and worsened the situation for targets in 32% of cases. The bully’s bosses were slightly worse (40% did nothing, 42% increased the hurt). You say the findings came from a “nonscientific” study. True.

According to the 2007 national sample polled by Zogby for WBI, of all adult Americans who witnessed or experienced bullying themselves, 44% said that employers (most likely an HR rep) did nothing when bullying was reported and 18% said the employer made conditions worse. That was a large, scientific sample.

The anecdotal and empirical evidence combines with our on-site consulting experiences over the years with HR. Never has an anti-bullying initiative been successful in the long-term when HR was the sole driving force. In most cases, HR undermines the intervention after the Work Doctor consultants leave. In a recent intervention, the HR rep actually denigrated the internal team of peer experts who committed their time and energy to help their colleagues deal with bullying. That HR rep did so during the training, before the program could be implemented. It seems destructive HR practitioners are growing more brazen.

Here is the most frequent scenario. Bullied targets suffer for months, in silence and shame. The well-known history of local HR’s failure to help dampens targets’ eagerness to complain. Powerless to confront or to level the field of combat, they seek the employer’s help finding relief from their uninvited misery. They tell HR their story. The first question considered is if they have the right to complain. If the magic combination of membership in a protected status group by the target while the alleged bully is not also protected is not satisfied, the complainant is rejected by HR. The law simply does not apply in most cases of bullying or plain cruelty. Without laws, there is next to no employer incentive to help workers even though bullying is costly and torpedoes the mission or reason to be in business.Targets are de-legitimized. HR typically alerts the bully that she or he is being complained about. Retaliation for daring to expose the chicanery follows.

If a law (and therefore an on-the-books policy) applies, HR accepts the formal complaint. And in cases of alleged sexual harassment or racial discrimination, regardless of targets’ expectation of safety for simply asking if an anti-discrimination policy was violated, HR launches an investigation without their permission. Reprisals ensue (retaliation in 60% of cases, WBI 2009 survey). HR acts as judge and jury. Typically one person conducts the “investigation.” Petrified witnesses do not cooperate. The bully says she or he didn’t do it. Targets, by then emotional wrecks, are doubted or flatly treated like liars. The bully got away with it. Targets stew over the injustice of such sham “investigations.” In a WBI 2008 study, 40% of targets claimed that HR’s investigations were “unfair or inadequate.” With few findings in the targets’ favor, bullies quickly learn that they can act with impunity (with 89% confidence, WBI, 2009 survey). No one can, or is willing to, stop them — certainly not HR whose primary function is management support (and 72% of bullies are bosses).

That’s the reality for too many innocent targets.

Into the debate I add our 9-year old Healthy Workplace Bill Campaign, the grassroots drive to enact anti-bullying laws for the workplace. The bill holds individual offenders and employers accountable for repeated, malicious health-harming abusive conduct by bosses and co-workers. Sounds like support should be a no-brainer. Who in the world would OPPOSE legislation aimed at humanizing the workplace? Who could assume the morally dubious position of claiming that no law is needed when bullying occurs at the inarguable rate affecting 37% of adult Americans (54 million Americans in the workforce)?  Are you surprised that the HR trade association — SHRM — Society for Human Resource Management opposed the HWB in 2010.

If decent individuals who work in HR stand-up for employees and support the HWB, show me where they have written protests to SHRM to act more humanely and honorably.

Funny thing about the notion of HR as a profession. Professions require some minimal formal education, years of documented practica, licensure, and practicing in a manner subject to state regulations designed to protect consumers. Think of medicine, law, dentistry or mental health counseling as examples of professions. But HR? A 2006 poll of over 5,000 HR reps found that 46% of respondents thought that a college degree (Bachelor’s level) was NOT required to be a “HR leader.” We’re not talking about the lowest entry-level assistant or coordinator. Imagine an uneducated Vice President of HR without a degree! Perhaps just drawing a salary to differentiate oneself from a volunteer is adequate to become a self-described professional.

The trade group, SHRM, substitutes education for its own certification credentials. The acronyms are downright funny. PHR, SPHR (Senior Professional in Human Resources) and GPHR (Global Professional in Human Resources). HR uniforms with fancy epaulets and brass buttons to convey certificated members could be the next step for credibility. The dismal performance record certainly doesn’t match the pomp and bluster.

If HR had helped employees and proven its worth to executives by valuing their contributions beyond merely busting unions and trying to minimize damage from litigation, its practitioners would long ago have achieved parity with corporate finance executives and be beloved by unions. Every HR conference in every year has some variation of the “take us seriously, we mean it!” theme. If it’s a “profession,” it is a vain one, though lacking a healthy dose of profession-esteem.

Am I unsympathetic as an outsider? No. I was an HR director working under two putz VPs in different corporations. One fellow’s sole function was to make sure the multiple CEO’s and fellow VP’ers had company cars. He was the last one to turn out the lights when that corporation drove into the fiscal ditch and dissolved. I also know how HR Management should be run and what it could accomplish with talented people at the helm. I taught graduate university HRM courses in days past.

I share all of this background and evidence to help defensive HR reps and their apologists understand why I criticize HR as a function, a department, a service — not the few brave individuals who buck the trend and act with decency. Broad sweeping generalizations or stereotypes are only unfair if they are not true. I’ve shown above why I can say that HR, with few exceptions, is a morally bankrupt internal organizational service that contemporary organizations should consider dropping.

Any HR types who want to become citizen lobbyists (and risk their jobs for doing so, I might add) on behalf of our Healthy Workplace Bill. Find your state at this website and volunteer. If you are that committed, volunteer to become State Coordinator in the 19 states that don’t yet have a Coordinator.

Cavaet: A Denmark consulting acquaintance reports that in her country HR and the unions are aligned against bullying. HR does not defend abusers. The enemy is the destructive phenonmenon, not employees victimized by it. If only this were true in the U.S. and Canada.

You Lost Me at Disingenuous
by Sharon Sellars, SPHR, GPHR

As an HR professional (yes, professional) for over 25 years, I have seen firsthand the impact that workplace bullying has on employees and employers.  Now, as a consultant, at least 25% of my business is either a request for anti-bullying training or an appeal to assist a client employer with what turns out to be a bullying problem.  When I found your website and learned more about the Healthy Workplace Bill, I was excited that perhaps I could become an advocate to increase awareness of this growing problem in business.

That was before I read your comments regarding the SHRM opinion.  I am a member of SHRM, along with over 250,000 other HR professionals.  That does not mean that I agree with every opinion that it generates any more than any AARP member agrees with everything AARP does or any business agrees with everything the Chamber advocates.  In your response to SHRM’s opinion, you successfully alienated every HR person who might view your website.  Your responses came across as completely anti-HR, anti-business, and pro-union.  By adding these additional ingredients into your bowl, you have created a recipe for failure.

To clarify, by being in the business for as long as I have, I have met 1000’s of people in HR and people who own businesses who sincerely care about the welfare of the employees who work with them.  The business literature is filled with documented facts regarding employers who show that with caring, rewarding, recognition-filled, family-friendly workplaces not only do we increase retention but we also increase productivity.  No matter what you think, I have been an employee advocate all of my professional life and I can introduce you to thousands of others in HR who are as well.  Your comment that only unions are employee advocates is laughable and I could write my own dissertation regarding why unions are more “big business” than any conglomerate I can think of.

My point here is NOT to get into a war of employer vs. union.  There is a bigger issue here.  I sincerely think that the Healthy Workplace Bill has merit and even if it does not pass, it could be very successful in increasing the awareness of bullying in the workplace.  Your biggest potential advocates are the HR professionals as we are the ones who have witnessed it, have had to deal with it, have had to play “CSI” to figure out what is going on.  We are the ones who investigate why a long time employee is suddenly missing work, why productivity in a certain department is down, why the new manager is trying to terminate someone who had high performance marks for previous years and most importantly why employees are enduring emotional distress at the hands of others.  Many times unearth a bully issue.  Even if one HR organization is not going to support your Bill, I believe that you are doing a disservice to your cause by writing off the individual HR professionals themselves.  By one figurative swoop of your pen, you offended the very people who can help this Bill pass.

So the real question here is – do you want the bill to pass or are you just trying to sell books or promote unions?  If it is the former, then I recommend that you rewrite your responses to the SHRM opinion into a fashion where you respond to SHRM’s opinion and not personally attack the HR professional.  If it is either of the latter two, then you are the one who is disingenuous and I will not support your Bill.

S. Sellars
SLS Consulting
Summerville, SC

G. Namie

A 2008 book, Depraved Indifference: The Workers Compensation System by Patrice Woeppel, is described in an interview with the author by Frank Smecker. If you have any doubts that the system was created by and for employers to stave off lawsuits, read the interview and book. The system pays only 27% on average of the illness and injury costs for workers. Corrupt employer-only physicians never acknowledge injuries caused by employers. Having a separate occupational health insurance system locks out work-related illness and injury from the regular health care insurance system. The book author also posits several recommendations for changing the corrupt WC system.

Just like the workplace, it’s the exposure to unremitting stress that injures. Writer Joshua Kors has been reporting since 2007 on the military psychologists’ reluctance to diagnosis PTSD, many electing to prostitute themselves by deceitfully employing the Chapter 5-13 discharge for having a “personality disorder.” A PD diagnosis deprives the warrior vet of post-discharge treatment and medical coverage by the Veterans Administration (VA) earned by her or his service to country.

Michael Wolcoff, VA acting undersecretary for benefits told the Washington Post, “We are acknowledging the inherently stressful nature of the places and circumstances of military service, in which the reality and fear of hostile or terrorist activities is always present.”

More good news:  the change in rules apply to claims that are new or pending and previously denied claimants are invited to re-apply.

More than 400,000 veterans of all military operations receive benefits for the disorder, of which about 19,000 are women, according to the VA. VA compensation is about $27,000 per year.

What could possibly be wrong with the rule change? The private mental health clinicians who treat and diagnosis vets are excluded.  The Army is confident that their clinicians are good (but read the Kors series about psychologists willing to lie when the lies and coverup go all the way up the ladder to Army surgeon general Gale Pollock).

Offering a warning is Richard Cohen, executive director of the National Organization of Veterans’ Advocates. In his legal advocacy role for vets, he has seen federal clinicians with minimal experience with PTSD who had rejected legitimate claims.  Paul Sullivan, executive director of Veterans for Common Sense, a nonprofit group, said that federal clinicians and claims adjudicators were often adversarial in dealing with veterans seeking benefits. “V.A. needs to train their examination staff so that they understand that P.T.S.D. is associated with deployment,” Mr. Sullivan said. “It’s a cultural thing.”

The other shortcoming of the new regulation is its temporary status. An enacted law, however, would lock in the spirit of helping combat vets and the diagnosis of PTSD. Rep. John Hall (D-NY-19th District ) (and 17 co-sponsors) introduced HR 952 in the current Congress. Passing the bill would also allow non-military clinicians to diagnose.

Read the official VA memo announcing the new regulation. Turns out the start date announced was wrong and could screw up the filing process for some vets. Tip o’ the hat to VA Watchdog for catching the error.

What has this got to do with workplace bullying? Because any progress in recognizing traumatization from work could eventually make it easier for bullied individuals at work to be believed and taken seriously when their injuries interfere with living and working through PTSD’s debilitating emotional consequences.

Top-Down/Shut-Up Workplace Breed Disaster

Who says workplace culture doesn’t matter? When oil platform engineers tried to warn BP about potential risks of rushing installation of the well without adequate safety checks, they were told to shut up. The environment and the entire Gulf economy pay. In bullying-prone workplaces, the rules always dictate command and control from the top, no use even raising concerns, you’ll have your head handed to you. Targets pay with their health, jobs, careers. A Gary Namie podcast.

Download Podcast 17 (in .mp3 format)

Unobligated Employers

If nothing else, BP and Goldman Sachs demonstrate clearly that U.S. employers have NO OBLIGATION to society or the world’s economic stability, so why should they care about little ole you? A Gary Namie podcast.

Download Podcast 16 (in .mp3 format)

Read the several wise comments at the Chronicle site to see how few support this notion. The Conflict Resolution industry completely missed opportunities to report and address workplace bullying before the bullying movement appeared on the scene. They have had decades to develop systemic solutions and to educate leaders in their organizations. They have done none of these things.

In other words, if ADR proponents had recognized workplace bullying for the destructive phenomenon it is, they could/would/should have acted. Instead they were blinded by their ambition to sit at the right of CEOs and be taken seriously. When the focus is up the hierarchical chain, the needs of real workers are ignored. It’s an industry in serious need of justifying itself to survive, given its relative invisibility in the C-suite.

Now conflict resolution types are trying to claim part of the solution to bullying simply because bullying is  a “hot topic.” Why has the AAA never contacted WBI to discuss collaborations or to send representatives to WBI University Training for Professionals to learn the fundamentals from us? Because they have no interest.

To ADR practitioners, we say you had your chance to help but blew it. There is ample historical proof that you don’t understand either the impact of bullying on people or don’t care. Both groups are apologists for bullies in the workplace providing institutional cover by making it appear that “something” is being done. ADR solutions are illusory band-aids that accomplish no long-term success. Bullying exists because of explicit or tacit approval of executives. Executives and ADR do not communicate on a regular basis. They are not on the executive team. CEOs do not seek counsel from ADR before acting. Bullying is outside the ADR pay grade.

Solutions should be left to those of us who have championed the value of bullied targets, not hyperaggressive bullies, from the start. Organizations win secondarily when bullying stops. But to make the only goal the appearance of a conflict-free workplace is delusional. Put injured workers first. ADR never did that in their management support functions.

All the workers who have been re-traumatized and betrayed by ADR know where mediators stand on bullying. Too late to change stripes now. The American Arbitration Association’s wandering into the workplace bullying arena is a disingenuous, opportunistic endeavor. For the sake of bullied staff and faculty in American colleges and universities, please stay out. Stick to what you know; it’s certainly not bullying.

Read the many astute comments by veterans of the bullying wars in the academe and David Yamada and Loraleigh Keashly as they tell exactly how mediation produced further injuries. The comments are linked to the Chronicle article.

Finally, our position reflects an opinion about the ADR role in organizations. Roles are separate, in our mind, from the individuals trying to reduce destructive conflict. We have met several well-intentioned professionals who just happen to be ADR proponents. Lamont Stallworth is one such person. However, individual integrity notwithstanding, mediation is an inappropriate tool to mitigate bullying in the academic (or any) workplace.

From the WBI 2000 survey of hostile workplaces (online, non-scientific) 30% of women targets of bullying reported symptoms of posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD); 21% of men targets. Psychological injuries are common in bullying cases.

Fortunately, most people experience intense anxiety, panic attacks, and depressive symptoms rather than the extreme case of traumatization when an individual’s coping responses are completely overwhelmed. PTSD is extreme stress. PTSD is characterized by hypervigilance (an edginess, heightened arousal, agitation, obsessivness, and anger), intrusive thoughts (nightmares, flashbacks, unpredictable interruptions of normal thoughts and feelings), and avoidance (a desire to not visit the same people, places and feelings associated with the traumatizing incidents). PTSD is falsely seen only as a war injury. People are traumatized by the horrors of war (killing and death, witnessed and perpetrated), but also by natural disasters and tragedies the disrupt routine lives.

People who join the military are especially at risk. All trauma and stress risks are magnified with unremitting, prolonged exposure to horrific conditions. It is noteworthy that Britain and Canada treats their military veterans more humanely than the U.S. To minimize the ravages of PTSD, tours of duty are shorter than one year and there is a limit to the amount of uninterrupted time that soldiers and sailors can spend in a war zone. American military leaders have been less caring. Though they sometimes publicly remark that the troops are worn out, “stop-loss” is used to deny the rightful end of contracted military time for soldiers eager to return to non-military society. Stop-loss is an exploitation of the government’s power to make its own rules as employer, not subject to any civilian laws. Stop-loss guarantees an over-exposure to horror that no human should have to bear. It is instrumental in creating the estimated 30-45% prevalence of PTSD among Iraq/Afghanistan veteran. When they can’t escape to healing respite back home, the likelihood of injury skyrockets.

Psychiatrist Dr. Kernan Manion treated traumatized Marine vets and warned his superiors of violence potential on bases and in neighboring towns. “If not more Fort Hoods, Camp Liberties, soldier fratricide, spousal homicide, we’ll see it individually in suicides, alcohol abuse, domestic violence, family dysfunction, in formerly fine young men coming back and saying, as I’ve heard so many times, ‘I’m not cut out for society. I can’t stand people. I can’t tolerate commotion. I need to live in the woods,’” Manion explained to reporter Dahr Jamail. “That’s what we’re going to have. Broken, not contributing, not functional members of society. It infuriates me – what they are doing to these guys, because it’s so ineptly run by a system that values rank and power more than anything else – so we’re stuck throwing money into a fragmented system of inept clinics and the crisis goes on.”

In 2007, Joshua Kors reported on the Army mental health corps’ refusal to own the responsibility for injuring veterans with PTSD (and even some with physical traumatic brain injuries). Instead of making the correct PTSD diagnosis for those vets so they could receive VA health benefits for long-term medication and treatment, some Army psychologists were deliberately labeling the injured as having personality disorders. A personality disorder is a permanent mental health problem, not an injury, and must have begun in childhood. Also the deceitful misdiagnosis prevented vets from VA benefit eligibility. Thus, the Department of Defense, as employer, put its employees in harms way, many are injured as a result, then the employer dodges liability by blaming the employee.

Substitute DoD with the name of your employer. You get hired to perform work and are assigned a supervisor or gang of co-workers who decide that it is more important to bully you than to allow you to do work. You seek relief. The employer denies its responsibility for the work conditions that have begun to harm you psychologically. If you do not escape and the exposure continues, the stress takes its toll on your health. When threats to your safety are severe, you risk PTSD. You find a therapist who correctly identifies your toxic workplace — the mistreating people in it as well as the way work is assigned with no regard for your safety or professional development — as the cause of the severe stress. You beg for relief but are not believed. Soon you lose the job you once loved for no reason other than the fact that some jackass arbitrarily hated you, most likely because your competence posed a threat.

Now from the military comes another tale of terror. Reporter Dahr Jamail posted his essay at the Truthout website. He writes about Eric Jasinski, a 23 year old who enlisted in 2005.  Jasinski’s Iraq tour ended in Dec., 2007. He was troubled and drinking heavily. A military counselor sent him to a civilian doc. He was diagnosed with PTSD by the civilian. He was given medications and waiting for his military contract to end in Feb., 2009.

However, the Army stop-lossed Jasinski adn he was given a month’s notice that he would return to Iraq. The military pharmacy issued a 90-day supply of medication. Another military counselor asked if he was suicidal. Jasinski said no. The hurried counselor said “well, you’re good to go then.” Jasinski knew that he could not serve again without treating his PTSD, so he went AWOL until Dec., 2009 when he turned himself in at Fort Hood, Texas. Jasinski asked for a medical discharge.

Instead, he had a March 31, 2010 court martial. He was sentenced to 30 days in the county jail, not a mental health facility as requested. The Army never did respond to his requests for help. He served 25 days and was released on April 24. Then, unilaterally without discussion or negotiation, the Army notified Jasinski that he would receive an “other-than-honorable” discharge that translates to permanent denial of VA benefits for the wounded soldier.

To better put in perspective the humiliation the Army heaped on this PTSD victim, read Jasinski’s personal statement written while in the Bell County jail.

“When I am taken out of jail back to Fort Hood for any appointments I am led around in handcuffs and ankle shackles in front of crowds of soldiers… which is overwhelming on my mind. My guilt from treating prisoners in Iraq sub-human and I did things to them and watched my unit do cruel actions against prisoners, so being humiliated like that forces me to fall into the dark spiral of guilt. I now know what it feels like to have no rights and have people stare and judge based on your shackles and I feel even more like a monster cause I used to do this to Iraqi people. Even worse is the fact that this boils down to the military failing to treat my PTSD but I am being punished for it… I feel as if I am being a threat to others or myself and still the Army mental health professional blow me off just like in 2009 when I felt like I had no choice but to go AWOL, since I received a 5 minute mental evaluation and was stop-lossed despite my PTSD, and was told that they could do nothing for me. The insufficient mental evaluation from a doctor I had never seen before, combined with the insufficient actions by the doctor on 9 April show the Army is not trying to make progress.”

Feel familiar? Neither did you do anything to warrant the banishment from your livelihood. Employers can do anything they want. PTSD victims are not whining delicate “teacups” like attorney Scott Greenfield suggests.

Gary Namie

What you can do:
Read the Dahr Jamail article

Learn about Chuck Luther’s group the Soldier’s Advocacy Group (SAG) of Disposable Warriors

Help the Iraq Veterans Against the War work for the proper and necessary treatment injured soldiers

Thank Eric Jasinski’s civilian attorney, James Branum

Read Joshua Kors groundbreaking report on abusive Army psychologists and psychiatrists

Tell Scott Greenfield his “teacups” smear is a cheap shot by a bullying attorney

Laura Bassett of the Huffington Post caught wind of a disturbing new American business trend. (How many more ways can U.S. businesses stick it to the people?) The people who are unemployed as the result of corporate decisions are now deemed UNACCEPTABLE  and UNWANTED by hiring companies. A recruiting firm disingenuously self-named “The People Place” has announced its policy that “NO UNEMPLOYED CANDIDATES WILL BE CONSIDERED AT ALL REGARDLESS OF THE REASONS.” Why?  They prefer to poach candidates from the ranks of the happily employed somewhere else.

From its own website, the poorly named, The People Place’s “methodology for sourcing quality talent adheres to rigorous assessments and screenings for all candidates that we present to our clients. This insures that we are not only presenting individuals with qualified resumes, but also profiles that are a match both personally and professionally for the job requirement and the client organization.”

Some unnamed HR troll told Bassett at Huff Post “It’s our preference that they currently be employed. We typically go after people that are happy where they are and then tell them about the opportunities here. We do get a lot of applications blindly from people who are currently unemployed — with the economy being what it is, we’ve had a lot of people contact us that don’t have the skill sets we want … “

Other companies like Sony Ericsson and unnamed ones that post on Craigslist use phrase ad lines suggesting that the unemployed need not apply.

Wow. They throw you out in the street then shut the door to re-enter their closed world. Are these companies shameless or what?

Before I comment further, I want hear from visitors to this site about this alarming new tactic. What is your reaction?

The Foxconn factory in the southern China city of Shenzhen that manufactures our prized gadgets — iPhones, iPads, Dell, and HP products — is actually a self-contained city of 420,000 workers. In this crazy globalized world, American electronic gizmos are made by a subsidiary (Foxconn) of the Taiwanese firm (Hon Hai precision) that exploits low-wage mainland Chinese labor.

Thirteen Foxconn workers attempted suicide in the last year. Ten succeeded. All young people in their 20′s. There are a couple of stories behind the story that could teach American employers some lessons.

Wages begin at $130 per month, $300 per month with 120 hours overtime and everyone wants the more respectable pay. The jobs are so popular, 8,000 people apply every day to work there. All employers control working conditions. Foxconn, however, in the buyer’s market, doesn’t seem to worry about workers’ needs. Individuals are dispensable since replacements stand visibly by, waiting.

Alienation despite crowding

The typical American workplace analyst, coming from either an HR or corporate defense lawyer perspective, would speculate about personality weaknesses in the young despondent workers as the primary reason for the suicides. I call it misdirection.

Terry Gou, chairman of Hon Hai, reportedly said that managing 800,000 workers is very difficult. He is clueless about why so many of his workers commit suicide. On the surface, Foxconn is a good Chinese employer. It pays overtime and built new dormitories and swimming pools for workers. Similarly, the corporate response to the suicides has been superficial. Safety nets have been installed at the dorms to catch jumpers. Guards patrol the rooftops. And the most outlandish of employer requests was reported by the Sydney Morning Herald — workers have been told to sign letters promising not to kill themselves. Further, workers have to agree to be institutionalized for any observed “abnormal mental or physical state.” There you have it. Suicides are committed only by abnormal people.

Workers crammed side-by-side

However, some reports describe aberrant work and living conditions at Foxconn which are the corporation’s responsibility. A newspaper intern took a job there and found that workers stand for 8 uninterrupted hours at a fast moving assembly line. Each worker checks thousands of gadgets every day. Overtime days are 12 hours long, six days a week. Though workers stand shoulder-to-shoulder, supervisors do not allow them to talk to anyone. Said one 22 year old woman, “I feel like I have an empty life and work like a machine.” Company dormitory living conditions force nine workers into a single “apartment.” Turnover is so high and hours spent in living quarters so short that stable social relationships outside of work are nearly impossible. Dorm life is city life but no one is in a family. The intern’s report characterized the Foxconn employees’ world as “alienated.”

Watch a video of workers describing their work conditions.

Alienation is the antithesis of employee engagement and commitment. Alienation may be at the root of workplace violence and murderous shooting sprees (see the film Murder by Proxy). Suicide is workplace violence turned inward.

Stress expert Robert Sapolsky describes social isolation as a painful, stress-inducing life condition for humans who are biologically programmed to be interactive and social. The denial of human conduct when so many others share your physical space seems an especially cruel practice. Bullied targets know very well how effectively devastating is “icing out” a colleague. Through the processes of social influence and imitation, we use others to define our reality. And the power of conformity demonstrates how willing we are to sacrifice a personal worldview to belong to a group of others.

In another essay at this site, I used the characteristics of torture summarized in Biederman’s chart of coercion to describe how bullying can affect a person. Isolation is one torture tactic. Therefore, alienation, is not to be taken lightly or discounted. It can drive a normal, healthy young person to suicide.

torture link

Lesson One, therefore, is stop designing work in ways that force workers to adjust to speedy, efficient machines. Instead, take into account the human factors involved. Stop blaming victims and branding them as mentally deficient. And stop isolating workers from each other. Allow human contact, if only at breaks (which means do not deprive workers of breaks, either).

When news broke about the suicide epidemic at Foxconn, Apple’s Steve Jobs said the contract with the manufacturer would be reviewed. The news was clearly an embarrassment. The Chinese state-run news agency (Xinhua) and Communist party paper have amplified the suicide stories about a contractor company based in Taiwan, China’s avowed political enemy. It is probably a game of political gotcha without which westerners would probably never have heard about the tragedies.

During the same week as news broke about the ninth Foxconn suicide in Shenzhen, the American business press trumpeted the news that Apple passed Microsoft and became the world’s biggest tech company. That is according to market capitalization which is what investors THINK the company is worth taking into account future earnings and future growth. With that speculative metric, Apple is second only to Exxonh Mobil. Of course, the $241.5 billion market cap is not about revenues or profits. (It’s another Wall Street concoction from the same minds that brought the world the great global recession from the innovation derivatives market.) This “accomplishment” is due to Apple’s “string of hits” such as the popularity of products made in suicide-prone Foxconn factories, according to Wired.

There you have it. Lesson Two. Success scored by speculators juxtaposed with the blood of human sacrifice staining the latest must-have gadgets that Americans line up to purchase. Oh, by the way, Canadians are set to get their iPads.

UPDATE June 7

During the last week, Foxconn agreed to raise employee wages for non-overtime work. They will now be paid approx. $290 per week, near what they could make previously only by working overtime. The two pay raises in one week have outraged investors (according to the BBC business report of June 7) who expect the costs to be passed along to Apple and other customers. Nothing, repeat nothing, should cut into stock dividends to be paid to investors, suicides notwithstanding.

Late one afternoon last September, a 23-year-old former assistant programmer at a large Internet company was called into her boss’ office and presented with an offer she couldn’t refuse: Two full title jumps with new job duties that would mean a larger role, more autonomy and more creativity. “I jumped at the offer,” she says.

The young woman kept her old job responsibilities while adding to her plate the tasks of the new title as well as a high-profile project.

But by early December she was sidelined with yet another offer she couldn’t refuse: Her boss “highly recommended” she take a buyout package from the company. It was widely known that workers who were offered a buyout but didn’t take it would likely be fired in the coming quarter.

Eight Signs You Have A Cheating Boss

“I was utterly caught off guard,” she says. While her boss had explained that the new job might not be “as important in the future,” the young woman’s old job had been dissolving from underneath her, with various coworkers taking responsibilities off her plate at her boss’ request.

Adding insult to injury, a contract worker she had personally trained had been offered a full-time position: “My old title, if not my exact old job.”

“I should have realized that my boss didn’t care [about me] anymore,” she says. “That she’d given up on me. I’d just been so busy juggling all the balls thrown at me to notice.”

How does a person go from a high-voltage position to career atrophy? Call it the cheating boss syndrome.

A cheating boss goes beyond the characteristics of a bully boss. The bully boss is hostile and threatening, yells or gives you the silent treatment and is verbally abusive and humiliating. By contrast, “A cheating boss is more insidious,” explains Nicole Williams, author of Girl On Top. “It’s more undermining.” Bullying is in-your-face, but cheating occurs behind someone’s back.

In other words, says Williams, “You can’t even defend yourself.”

Is It Cheating When … ?

If the cheating analogy sounds like a romantic relationship, that’s because there are similarities between a marriage or long-term couple and a boss and a worker. In most romantic relationships the most obvious definition of infidelity is sex with another person. But there are other, more gray areas, such as emotional infidelity. At work, cheating comes in the form of a broken psychological contract.

Although it’s not normally the stuff of employee handbooks, the rules between a boss and a worker boil down to: “Try to be truthful, try to care and to have their back, not just to the letter but to the spirit,” explains Ben Dattner, Ph.D., of Dattner Consulting, a workplace psychologist and author of the upcoming book Credit and Blame At Work.

And the psychological contract can differ, depending on the corporate culture. “In a bean-counting, individual-performance-based organization, my contract [as a boss] is I will monitor your output and count your widgets,” says Corinne Bendersky, Ph.D., a professor at the UCLA Anderson School of Management. “In return the employees know that if they are given the same resources as everyone else, they will be rewarded similarly.” Cheating, then, occurs “not if the boss treats me like a jerk, but if you don’t pay me what I think I deserve.”

In a bureaucratic or corporate environment, Bendersky continues, workers expect that if they follow the rules, decisions will be made in an unbiased, transparent fashion. Here, a boss who strays is generally unfair and unavailable, engages in favoritism or nepotism or deliberately misleads or withholds information.

In a more teamwork-oriented organization, employees expect their overall performance will be judged and prized in part by how well they fit in and are team players. The psychological contract frays each time a boss mistreats an employee interpersonally, such as divulging confidences, bad-mouthing, making empty promises or exploiting vulnerabilities.

What it comes down to, says Bendersky, is “not giving people their just deserts.”

The Power Dynamic

In the end cheating boils down to one thing: power. “Often, all [cheating bosses] know is subterfuge and deception,” says Gary Namie, Ph.D., director of the Workplace Bully Institute in Bellingham, Wash. “It’s about accomplishing personal goals, regardless of the company or organizational goals.”

One 45-year-old former director of marketing at a large high-tech company (who did not want her name used) says her new boss would often quote Machiavelli: “I’m going to surround myself with yes people, my own people.”

Given the new power dynamic in the office, it wasn’t much of a surprise when the boss replaced 50% of the marketing department and skimped on paying the marketing director a promised bonus. “She wanted to get her own people in her camp. I felt cheated.”

The 23-year-old assistant programmer echoes the sentiment: “Is the reason I no longer work there because my boss just moved on from me to the sound of someone new sucking up to her? Someone who was, in all rights, much more grateful for being hired than I was for being given so much extra work?”

To Confront or Not?

Just as in romantic relationships, there’s a short-term upside and a long-tail downside to bosses straying. “There’s a very strong loss of trust on the part of your team, reduced commitment to the job and lower productivity and higher turnover,” says Bendersky. “As a boss, when you lose employees at a faster rate than the rest of the company, it reflects badly.” Interviewing, hiring and training replacements–it isn’t cheap to cheat.

But in the end, it’s a lopsided affair. As Dattner explains, the employee is the one facing a fundamental fork in the road. “Do you confront or not?” he asks. “Be very careful about correcting your boss’ version of reality.”

So what can a wronged employee do? “It’s pretty hard for an employee to say, ‘You cheated,’” says Bendersky. “You can try to withhold work, transfer to a different department or, if you believe it’s safe and anonymous, file a formal grievance. But you have to have strong documentation.”

It’s also a good idea to build a strong network within the workplace. “People who are surrounded by strong social networks are less likely to be singled out,” says Michelle Duffy, Ph.D., of the Carlson School of Management at the University of Minnesota. “It’s like middle school.”

Before you speak out, however, understand that in some instances you may not have the full picture. For example, says Dattner, if the boss didn’t bring up your raise as promised, it might be because it wasn’t the most opportune time and have nothing to do with your work or his or her feelings toward you as an employee.

That said, “There are some situations that are so egregious that you need to be prepared to lose–or leave–your job,” says Dattner. Which brings up a whole other point to consider, one that every jilted woman already knows: You can’t control his bad behavior, but you can control your own. If things get really bad, you can always leave.

See original article: http://www.forbes.com/2010/05/25/boss-cheating-trust-forbes-woman-leadership-work.html

Back on March 18, the MA State House passed a version of the bill 148-0 in the aftermath of reports that Irish transplanted high school student Prince was still being mocked long after her death on social media sites by the same teens that had tormented and taunted her right up to her last day of life. A key factor in the South Hadley High story about Prince was that she allegedly reported her fear of being beaten by Flannery Mullins to a school administrator, according to court documents. Mullins, one of six students was subsequently arrested before he was suspended from school. Remarkably, the school superintendent, Gus Sayer, denied any knowledge of her plight prior to a week before her January suicide. This is the same superintendent who had parents demanding accountability removed by police during a televised March school board meeting. Remember that the school superintendent is the CEO of the school district and manages the site administrators, the principals.

The Massachusetts legislature, which ignored the anti-bullying Healthy Workplace Bill SB699 after a committee hearing in 2010, sprang into action belatedly on behalf of students with another unanimous vote, in the Senate, 38-0. Headlines cause reactionary votes.

By April 29, differing House and Senate versions of the bill were reconciled and the bill was sent to the Governor to become law on April 3.  The bill goes into effect during the 2011-12 school year.

The final bill is S2404 and you can read it in its entirety here. The heart of adult responsibility to act and not be passive do-nothing bystanders to student-on-student violence can be found in lines 123-135 of the text. All adult staff have to receive professional development training on recognizing bullying and ways to intervene. The law requires staff to report it to the principal or the school’s designated person. The principal must immediately investigate (no guidelines given).  The principal may, in turn, determine if the acts are criminal and if so, can call law enforcement. Everyone is to be notified — bullied student, accused bully, parents of all involved students.

The law pertains to both public AND private schools in the state.

In the new law, bullying is defined as the “repeated use by one or more students of a written, verbal or electronic expression or a physical act or gesture or any combination thereof, directed at a victim that: (i) causes physical or emotional harm to the victim or damage to the victim’s property; (ii) places the victim in reasonable fear of harm to himself or of damage to his property; (iii) creates a hostile environment at school for the victim; (iv) infringes on the rights of the victim at school; or (v) materially and substantially disrupts the education process or the orderly operation of a school … shall include cyber-bullying.”

For an enlightened view of how adult bullying affects student safety, read Dr. Spencer’s essay written exclusively for WBI — Stealing From Children.

The bill is not a feel-good bill for everyone. Proponents say it will allow physically abusive bullies to be held accountable. Opposition stems mainly from attorneys who warn the law may not pass constitutional muster. For example, many times parents of accused BULLIES have won lawsuits against school districts because their little bundle of joy is entitled to her or his freedom of speech.

This flies in the face of common sense in a world where the BULLIED are persecuted even worse when they expose the suffering endured at the hands of the unfettered expression of bullies’ speech. Where is the freedom to call for relief from persecution? Not only is this speech not protected, it leads to serious harm.

I had the occasion to hear Pepperdine University Law Professor Bernie James speak at a school bullying conference. His review of several court cases revealed that most state anti-bullying laws for kids do little to protect the bullied in that school districts are NEVER held accountable. So, just having a law is insufficient when the law is weak. Injustice is compounded when the BULLIES are given more rights by courts.

The law against workplace bullying (psychological harassment) in the province of Quebec is weak. A friend of ours who worked very hard for its enactment acknowledges the lack of employer sanctions in the law, but believes that at least the government there once upon a time declared that citizens deserve to work free of abuse.

That sentiment may be the best we can hope for from the Massachusetts law. It would be an improvement to have the law hold the district superintendents responsible for preventing and correcting bullying among students. That way, the CEO’s job depends on it.

Of course, the ideal solution would address the bullying among adults in schools where apparently the only focus is on the students.

Only two school districts have directly addressed the adult-adult problem. They have implemented the WBI/Work Doctor Blueprint to Prevent Workplace Bullying. They are Sioux City, Iowa and Desert Sands in La Quinta, California.

“The workplace bully in America’s schools is a taker…a robber…a thief. The bully steals the dignity, self-esteem, confidence, joy, happiness, and quality of life of the targeted victim. But when the target is a teacher, a great injustice occurs because the bully robs the students of what they want, need, and deserve…. A great tragedy occurs everyday in America’s schools as thousands of children are robbed by the workplace bully of the RIGHT to be nurtured and taught by such honorable, caring, outstanding educators.”

Through the years, I have personally identified a small number of what I refer to as “pillar entities” that, in my view, exist to preserve and perpetuate what is good and right and best in our society.  I put government, education, religion, healthcare, and a few others in this category.  When the devastating malady of workplace bullying is found to exist within these entities, and flourishes in some cases, the magnitude of the impact is multiplied exponentially.  One would think that such altruistic institutions that attract devoted, service oriented people would be immune from such devastating elements.  But unfortunately, they are not as “one bad apple” is hired now and then.  When workplace bullying occurs in these institutions, not only is the employee seriously impacted, but as the quality of service provided by the target diminishes due to bullying, the detrimental effect is transferred onto the lives of people these institutions serve.

For much of my career in education, I have been a human resource professional.  For more than 25 years, I have been directly responsible as a Principal, Director, Assistant Superintendent, and Superintendent of Schools for hiring staff members to work at various sites or departments in the school districts where I served. I have always approached my work in selecting individuals for employment based on a philosophical perspective that developed from actual conversations I had years ago with students and parents.

I noted the answer they gave to the one question asked: “Describe the school you wish to attend (or for the parent, the school you want your child to attend) as if it was a person.  Fill in the blank….”I want my school (or my child’s school) to be a place that is ______________.”  The collective voice of these students and parents was the desire for the school to be a place that provided an outstanding education in a caring, loving, accepting, nurturing, and encouraging environment.  The parents and students wanted the school to be a place where the staff did not judge or limit students on what problems or issues they may have now….where they come from, their home situation, their socioeconomic status, etc.  Rather, the staff to be able to see beyond today and into the future…what the student could be…and did everything possible to help the student get there!

The collective voice of those students and parents became the foundation for my personal philosophy that has guided my work as a human resource professional ever since.  In the interview phase of any selection process, I have made it a practice to never ask a question of candidates about what they know and what they can do (the knowledge, skills, and competencies essential for success in the job) before I probe into their personality and character.  I know from experience that the greatest school employees are the ones who not only have outstanding skills in their area of expertise, but also have the essential foundation of what I refer to as the “heart and character of an educator.”

If in the first phase of the interview it is found that the candidate’s character, personality, heart, and other essential qualities match the criteria mentioned above, then he/she continues in the process to determine the level of knowledge, skills, and competencies they possess.  When I find someone with both components…quality character and outstanding skills, I hire them!  In my view of the grand scheme of things, I know that if each and every person we hire in our school district is caring, loving, accepting, nurturing, and encouraging, over the course of time the school and the school district will become that way too.

In education, what happens in the classroom between the teacher and student is where “the rubber meets the road.”   So, let me begin to narrow this down to make a point about the impact of workplace bullying on the loss of productivity in schools.   Let’s talk about what happens when a school hires an outstanding teacher who becomes the victim of a workplace bully.

As I shared, I know that students (1) want a teacher who is caring, loving, accepting, nurturing, encouraging, etc…and (2) has the essential knowledge and skills so crucial to being an effective teacher.  When I find such teachers, I know I have found wonderful, capable professionals who can’t wait to come to work each day and give every ounce of their passion, care, talents, and skills to their students…what the students want, need and deserve from their teacher.  You can envision how it unfolds as the school year begins.  Within the first few days of school, the students quickly realize they are blessed with a teacher who is not only an outstanding teacher, but one who truly loves and cares about them…wants the very best for them…sees beyond today and envisions a bright future for each and every one of the students.  The students and teacher look forward to class, they are never late or absent because they don’t want to miss an opportunity to gather together, share, learn, and grow.

These great teachers are they the ones that students throughout the years have voiced and written great expressions of thanks and appreciation for the impact made on their lives.  You, I would be hopeful, have been impacted by at least one such teacher in your life.  Even today, many years later, when you think their name and recall the memories of those learning experiences, a smile comes to your face and your heart warms.

And if a teacher who touched your life in this manner walked through the door of your home or office today, even though you may not have seen them in years, you would warmly greet them, embrace them, and unreservedly ask if there is anything you could do for them.  Why?  From the day you first met, you knew in your heart that this teacher loved you, cared for you, and devoted themselves to being there every day to give you their best so you could realize your goals, your potential, and your dreams.

Each year, outstanding teachers such as these are hired for service in schools all across America.  They can’t wait to get to work in their classroom at their new school and begin the process I described above…loving and caring for their students and giving them an outstanding educational experience everyday!

But it’s only a matter of time when to many of these teachers finds themselves in the crosshairs of a bully; a predator that roams the halls of their school looking for a victim.  The bully could be an administrator, a fellow teacher, a custodian, or anyone in the organization.  But the bully has selected a teacher as a target and begins the devastating assault on this unsuspecting servant of the common good.  Day after day the bully selects the tactic, the place and the time to unload on the undeserving target in the hallways, offices, and workrooms of the school.  Incapable of stopping the assault, the barrage on the target continues and the predictable effects of workplace bullying begin to be revealed and take their toll.  The loss of sleep, nausea before coming to work, anxiety, hypersensitivity, depression and other symptoms systematically set in.

The schoolhouse which was once a place of honorable service has now become a chamber of horrors.  Before the bullying began, this teacher would be there every day, eager to share the learning experiences custom-crafted to meet the student’s needs.  But to avoid the unbearable suffering that will be inflicted by the bully, the teacher exhibits avoidance behavior and does not report to work.  All available sick, vacation, and personal time is used.  And as the days, weeks, and months go by, the once high-quality educational classroom experiences enjoyed by well-deserving students given by an eager, caring, loving teacher slowly and significantly erode.

The quality learning experiences the students once enjoyed degrade into mediocrity and ineffectiveness.  As is tragically the case in 64% of the time, this once outstanding teacher, now a remnant of his/her former self is forced into resignation, quits, or is fired.   Perhaps like so many others who have been bullied at work, this educational professional never teaches again.

The workplace bully in America’s schools is a taker…a robber…a thief.  The bully steals the dignity, self-esteem, confidence, joy, happiness, and quality of life of the targeted victim.  As a workplace bully victim, I fully and completely understand the pain and suffering one endures.   But when the target is a teacher, a great injustice occurs because the bully robs the students of what they want, need, and deserve…a teacher who loves them, cares for them…who comes to work everyday and gives all that he/she has so that these wonderful, deserving children receive an outstanding education…the foundation of becoming whatever they want and dream to be!   A great tragedy occurs everyday in America’s schools as thousands of children are robbed by the workplace bully of the RIGHT to be nurtured and taught by such honorable, caring, outstanding educators.

Educators are constantly looking to identify problems and issues that inhibit the delivery of a high-quality education to our students. From my perspective, the workplace bullying phenomenon in America’s schools is something we can and must do something about.  Boards of Education, working in partnership with the Administration and staff, can and must take a stance against this growing workplace malady that is eroding the quality of education in America.

The workplace bullies in America’s schools must be stopped from continually robbing our students of the high-quality of education they deserve.

Matt Spencer, Ed.D.
Director of Classified Personnel
Desert Sands Unified School District
La Quinta, California

Imagine that. A sane single parent not wanting to deploy. What an upside down world when seen through a mother’s eyes.

North America’s expert on psychopathy is Robert Hare. The documentary, The Corporation, explores the premise that businesses behave maliciously and without conscience. This DVD is recommended viewing.

Hare draws the analogy between people and corporations.

- superficial, style over substance
- grandiosity, we’re number one, none better
- manipulative, that’s what PR is for
- lacks empathy, hey it’s “just business” to rationalize cutthroat competition
- lacks remorse, anything goes if not caught, bonuses after economic crash
- does not accept responsibility for actions taken
- impulsive and reckless, especially in the absence of regulations
- focus on short-term, quarterly stockholder gains are all that matter
- poor behavioral control, irrational and quick to rage
- ignores consequences of their actions on others (the climate, workers, economy)
- actions harm others, anti-social

Read his essay on the topic.

1. The employer can do whatever it wants! Contract? Fuggedaboutit.

2. “Executive” is a meaningless marketing term — useful only for bathrooms, ranks of chefs in a restaurant’s kitchen, office furniture, and overpriced upgraded junk (SkyMall crap) misleading consumers to think they are getting something better for their money. Truth be told they rarely came up from the ranks by knowing the business. And they remain remarkably out of touch with those who work for the corporation. NBC exec Jeff Zucker runs the network that is watched by the fewest viewers. He runs an unsuccessful business by his industry’s own best measures.

3. Employers routinely lie to, and betray, employees. Jeff Zucker made Conan wait 5 years dangling the promise of hosting the Tonight Show when Leno left as an incentive for Conan to be “loyal” to the network. Then, he repays the loyalty with termination after 7 months. So much for integrity.

4. Employers who trash workers risk sabotage. Few of us can get even as Conan did in a very public way — on the air.



· Conference Board survey: U.S. worker satisfaction at 45% new 20 yr. low

· Dec. 2009, U.S. employers shed 85,000 more jobs – 17.3% of Americans are unemployed, underemployed or discouraged

· 37% of U.S. workers are bullied and in 2009, 28% said the abuse worsened with the recession

· Number of suicides by those who lost their identities and life purpose when their economic status was reduced to rubble — unknown, but surely rising.

All the happy talk about an economic recovery (for the publicly funded mega-banks) is balderdash in light of the reality for working people. Let’s drop the Dow Jones number obsession and start measuring what counts in real people’s lives. Until there’s an active social movement, the politicians will continue to cater to corporations.

Alexis & Karmani Hutchinson, Credit: AP

She sent the son to her mother back home in Oakland, CA. However, the grandmother, could not provide the needed care and returned the child because she cares for her ailing mother and sister, as well as a daughter with special needs, and also runs a day-care center at her home, keeping about 14 children during the day. Hutchinson then scrambled to find another relative or acquaintance to care for the child. She skipped the Nov. 15 plane sending her unit to Afghanistan after that extension was rescinded.

Major  Gallagher of her unit (3rd Combat Aviation Brigade of the Army’s 3rd Infantry Division) imprisoned Hutchinson instead. The unenlightened Gallagher and First Sergeant Gephart of her unit both believe that Hutchinson’s plight was not a real family crisis. They accuse her of using her son as an excuse to avoid deployment. Her son was taken from her by state child protective services. The mom faces a court martial in Afghanistan. There was also some coverage by the Associated Press.

10.7% of Army members are single parents.  Family Care Plans were formally required effective July 1992. Read the regulation.

The Army was an employer that reneged on the promise of a time extension. Next time you hear about the Army being family friendly, think again. And remember, these are the “Hooah” gang that deliberately blames PTSD victims for their psychological injury from waging war on behalf of the officers and desk jockeys in the Pentagon, Congress and White House.

Bullies present themselves as omnipotent and powerful to dissuade confrontation and to keep from being revealed as something different. Targets intuitively sense that bullying is compensatory behavior, attempts to cover wrongdoing with bluster and bravado. It’s like the Wizard of Oz in the palace who is exposed by Toto, the dog, when he pulled back the curtain showing the small man pretending to be bigger than he was.

It’s nearly impossible to call a bully insecure or cursed with a sense of self-inadequcy because of the power they often enjoy in the workplace. However, the intuition of bullied targets and witnessing co-workers is spot on. Bullies are small people.

In a 4-study research paper to be published in the November issue of the journal Psychological Science, by Nathaniel Fast (University of Southern California) and Serena Chen (University of California, Berkeley) linked aggression at work to perceived inadequacy of people in power (bosses). [Fast, N.J. & Chen, S. (2009) When the boss feels inadequate: Power, incompetence and aggression. Psychological Science, Nov. 2009]

Three of the studies tested working adults and are most relevant to the workplace.

In the first study, 90 working people completed assessments of their formal authority and power at work, the degree to which they feared being negatively evaluated by others (the inadequacy measure), and their level of aggressiveness as traditionally measured (willingness to hit others, ease with which arguments are entered). The aggression survey is a reliable predictor of physical violence, verbal abuse and the tendency to get into fights. For people with organizational power, believing themselves to be incompetent led them to be more aggressive than competent people. This was not true for people without power.

In the second study with working adults, some people were guided to think about their power or competence beforehand. Aggression translated into how loud (decibel levels from 0 to 130) they would be willing to blast a horn at another person who made mistakes over 10 trials. For people who already had organizational power, being primed to think even more about that power made them more aggressive if they also felt incompetent.

The third study of adults asked participants to rate their organizational power and their aggressiveness as in the first study. People were then sorted into low- and high-power groups based the demand their jobs required. Low power tasks typically involved doing simple work, completing tasks, High power tasks involved influencing others — supervising, closing sales. Then, the experimenters manipulated the perceived level of competence for people within each power group. Those subjected to their own incompetence were instructed to write about an experience where they failed to meet a task demand. Competence was primed by having those people recall a time when they successfully completed work projects.

This study also added another manipulated factor. Half of the people in each group were asked to select the value most important to them from a list (social life, relationships, business, etc.). They then wrote a paragraph justifying the value’s personal importance. This was done to bolster a sense of self-worth, a self-affirmation. People in the no affirmation group selected their least favorite value and wrote about how the value could be important to others.

In all three studies, incompetence increased aggression for high-power, but not for powerless, working adults. Aggression decreased when powerful people were reminded of their competence. When incompetence was primed (the person was reminded of failures) for low-power people, aggression decreased. The affirmation factor created some ego defensiveness and it seems to be the explanatory factor for why power and incompetence mix the way they do to lead to more aggression.

Thus, the results point to the dangerous combination of incompetence in the hands of people with power. The authors, Fast and Chen, claim that their work demonstrates that power holders have an increased vulnerability to perceiving potential psychological threats. Rather than feeling safe in their positions of power with the ability to disproportionately affect the outcomes of other people on a routine basis, the feelings of incompetence escalate the perception of threat in the eyes of people with actual power and authority. In turn, this leads to ego defensiveness (a self-protective mental device) that leads to aggression.

There was some limited exposure of participants to flattery, but the manipulations were weak and artificial compared to real-world kissing-up, ingratiation, that bullies receive at work. So, research on flattery’s effect on aggression by a boss is yet to be advanced.

Unfortunately, aggression equals bullying in this study. Regular working people rated their own tendencies to be aggressive. This was not a study of bullies. Of course, bullies do not offer themselves up for research purposes.

It would be an innovative to extrapolate link between perceived threat and aggression to the organizational level. Executive sponsors feel threatened when their bullying toadies are accused of wrongdoing. They react defensively. With guidance from legal counsel and HR, the entire organization responds defensively attacking the bullied accuser who dared to reveal internal weaknesses. But that is a study for another day. As they say, in the academe, further study is warranted.

Gary Namie

You can request this study (A7) at the WBI Research section.

According to the LA Times, Crystal was born into a family of textile workers. By age 17 she was in the mill. In 1973 at age 33 she was working for $2.65 an hour at the J. P. Stevens factory in Roanoke Rapids, NC sporting a union pin. A coal miner-turned-organizer, Eli Zivkovich, was attempting to unionize the workers.

She angered management and was fired for supporting the union. Immediately afterwards, she wrote “UNION” on piece of cardboard, climbed onto a table with the sign raised. The workers switched off their machines. Crystal was arrested. The next year the plant voted in the union. She won back wages (only $13,000) and moved on.

Her subsequent union advocacy cost her a second marriage. The story of her heroism was written in a 1975 book and inspired the movie “Norma Rae,” which led to Sally Field’s Oscar winning performance depicting Crystal. The producers fought Crystal over details of the movie; she forbade them from using her name.

Crystal Lee Sutton worked as a maid and security guard until her health deteriorated.

Her legacy : “It is not necessary I be remembered as anything, but I would like to be remembered as a woman who deeply cared for the working poor and the poor people of the U.S. and the world.”

The District has teamed up with the Waitt Institute for Violence Prevention to create a bullying prevention plan unlike any other. The three day program will help staff to recognize and resolve bullying amongst their peers. In doing so, they hope the program’s outcome will have a trickle down effect.

“Coaches and adults that work with youth, empowering student leaders to help facilitate conversations amongst their peers in high school in particular, talk about some of the strategies to change social norms that basically says this stuff, violence and bullying, is not ok.” says Alan Heisterkamp of the Waitt Institute.

Because the program is so unique, the bully program is being filmed this week for a documentary called “The Bully Project”. It’s spearheaded by Emmy Award winning film makers, Lee Hirsch and Cindy Lowen.

KCAU-TV 9. Sioux City, IA

West High’s anti-bullying program is making history, by expanding prevention to staff and faculty. The training program creates advocates to give both students and teachers a place to report bullying. From the lunch room to the teacher’s lounge, the district hopes to stop the problem before it starts.

Steve Crary, Director of Human Resources for the Sioux City Community Schools told KMEG 14, “As a school district, we’re constantly working with our kids to stop bullying, and the best way to do that is to make sure our adults are modeling the way and leading the way.”

The training sessions also create coaches to continue spreading the message that bullying is not acceptable.

More Information available here

[See post to watch Flash video]

Schools and student bullying are a September tradition. However, this year, there is a new twist. The Sioux City (Iowa) Community School District (SCCSD) is boldly taking steps to prevent bullying among teachers, staff and administrators. They are first district in the nation to launch an anti-bullying program for adult employees.

[Interested school district administrators are invited to call 360-656-6603]

The Workplace Bullying Institute (WBI) is consultant to the District with its nearly 2,000 employees and 28 schools. Through its consulting firm, Work Doctor, Inc., the WBI founders adapted their Blueprint for Workplace Bullying Prevention designed for corporate use to fit the public school district as employer. Work Doctor was the first consulting firm in the U.S. to directly design organizational solutions for workplace bullying.

Last October, with WBI’s help, a group of employees wrote the first-in-the-U.S. district bullying policy for adults. Bullying is defined in the policy as conduct that a reasonable person would find hostile, intimidating, offensive, humiliating or an abuse of authority. Accordingly, the alleged bullying must lead to negative consequences that affect an employee’s ability to perform his/her job.

SCCSD Human Resources Director Steve Crary said that the vision he and Superintendent Dr. Paul Gausman share is “to ensure our district is free of all forms of bullying and to create a respectful climate in our workplace.”

The policy writing group also created a team of current and former district employees, the Bullying Prevention Advocates (BPA), to serve as peer experts on workplace bullying. They will also educate staff and sustain the program in a variety of ways. The BPA group is likely more important than the policy alone because the group is central to creating a school culture intolerant of bullying among adults.

School board member John Meyers told the Sioux City Journal that “the initiative will generate positive role models for our students … if we’re asking students to do something we wouldn’t do ourselves, we’re not being honorable.”

WBI founders and consultants, assisted by WBI University graduate and teacher expert Carrie Clark, lead 3 days of intensive training for the BPA team in Sioux City on Sept. 15-17.

New York-based documentary filmmakers Lee Hirsch and Cynthia Lowen are featuring the WBI project in their forthcoming film, “The Bullying Project” that explores bullying’s impact across the lifespan from childhood through adulthood. Hirsch’s previous film, “Amandla!,” won awards at Sundance and an Emmy Award.

Dr. Alan Heisterkamp of the Waitt Institute for Violence Prevention is the liaison for this and other violence reduction-prevention programs at SCCSD. WIVP also partnered in 2007 with WBI to conduct the first scientific survey of all adult Americans regarding workplace bullying. WIVP and its president, Cindy Waitt, were responsible for this national project to serve as the prototype of how school districts can foster a bullying-free environment for adults as well as students.

“Schools are workplaces, too,” said Dr, Ruth Namie, WBI co-founder and project consultant. “Success here in Sioux City could launch a national movement to rid schools of bullying for adults as well as children.”

School districts interested in following the Sioux City model are invited to visit the Work Doctor website (the Drs. Namie consulting firm) or call 360-656-6603.

For severed union workers, paychecks alone were incentive enough. Union members  are now asked to absorb cuts in medical and life insurance benefits.

Though Visteon has no money to pay long-term and annual bonuses, the company had the nerve to ask the bankruptcy trustee for permission to pay $30 million of the total $80 now. For its part, the firm is willing to delay paying executive bonuses. Isn’t that gracious? But Ford, GM, the UAW,  and the case’s committee of unsecured creditors all filed objections to at least parts of the bonus plans.

For now the judge has denied superior treatment for Visteon execs. However, the corporation files one request after another keeping its hands in the cookie jar, begging for goodies, despite running the company into the ground.

250,000 autoworker jobs have been lost and these clowns insist on paying executive bonuses! A little job insecurity without severance or health insurance is what the executives deserve. They ran the company into the ground, causing pain for workers who did not make the stupid decisions that led to failure.

Even in failure, executives feel they deserve a softer landing. Have they no shame?

Thurman Higginbotham started at the cemetery in 1965 as security guard and rose to his Deputy Superintendent in 1990. Technically, he’s the second ranking executive, but he claims to be the operational chief.

Women in the position of public affairs directors, held by a succession of four women in only two years, seemed especially vulnerable to attacks by Higgenbotham. One woman, Kara McCarthy, was driven out because of a discriminatory hostile work environment (potentially illegal). She claimed that Higgenbotham and other senior managers “did whatever the hell they wanted.”

McCarthy’s successor was Gina Gray hired in April 2008. In her new role after only 10 days on the job, at the funeral of Lt. Col. Billy Hall, Gray clashed with Higgenbotham over a regulation. She knew the press could be present as the had family wished. Higgenbotham instructed her to violate the regs and keep the press far away. He had a history of calling families coercing them to deny press coverage to which they were entitled. The unethical boss won but the press noted the defiant Gray.

Gray was well qualified for her job. She worked 8 years for the Army in public affairs in Germany, Italy and Iraq. She suffered some hearing loss from a 2003 ambush in Iraq. Then, she went back to Iraq as a contractor doing media relations.

Higgenbotham’s campaign of interpersonal destruction began after the publicized incident. Gray complained to Higgenbotham’s “boss” John Metzler. Metzler withdrew support from her on May 27, leaving Gray’s immediate supervisor, Phyllis White, free to hassle her — restricting permission to leave the building, overtime, posters in her workplace and disconnecting her BlackBerry. June 9, she was demoted from director to public affairs officer.

Gina Gray

She filed a discrimination complaint (the pair had both gender and race differences).

Higgenbotham retaliated with trumped-up charges of “poor performance.” On June 27, 2008, Gray was fired. White said Gray had “been disrespectful to me as your supervisor and failed to act in an inappropriate manner.”

On that same June day, Higgenbotham had an IT contractor friend block Gray from access to her e-mail account and transfer access to Higgenbotham who replied to subsequent e-mails as if he were Gray. Gray found out.
The Army investigated and found that the unauthorized access and misuse were criminal offenses. However, the Dept of Justice assistant US attorney declined to prosecute the crime.

Not only did Higgenbotham illegally harass Gray, but he committed a crime and still nothing was done! Of course because of Phyllis White, a woman supervisor, harassing Gray, a woman, the case becomes more a bullying problem than one characterized by illegal discrimination.

Mark Benjamin, the journalist telling this story, discovered that Higgenbotham has falsely claimed he is “Dr. Higgenbotham” despite not having earned a PhD or MD degree. Higgenbotham’s tactic of stealing access to public affairs officers’ computers was confirmed by at least one other woman who held the position.

The kicker, which is no surprise to bullied targets, is that Higgenbotham is also technically inept. Arlington National Cemetery seems to have a gravestone burial records matching problem that was supposed to have been modernized by technology since 2000. Benjamin is filing additional reports that memorabilia left at gravesites are tossed into the trash unlike at the Vietnam Memorial Wall.

Higgenbotham and White are a disgrace to the families whose loved ones gave their lives for their country. They should both be banned for life from federal employment.

UPDATE

You can read Mark Benjamin’s second part of the story about Arlington Cemetery’s policy of keeping the grounds pristine and trashing family momentos and gifts left at gravesites, especially Section 60 where Iraq and Afghanistan war veterans are buried.

The article cites Secretary of State Hilary Clinton’s answer to a staffer’s question: “You know, I have zero tolerance for any kind of bullying. I find it intolerable. I hate people who use a position of either superior rank or physical dominance or any other aspect to lord it over or mistreat other people, especially those in the workplace.”

You can read the context of Secretary Clinton’s March 12, 2009 comment here. Scroll to page 9 to read the question from staffer Shirley Miles and Clinton’s response.

In the State magazine article, Director and Chief Diversity Officer Office of Civil Rights Robinson (202-647-9294) astutely writes: “Managers, be aware: If someone in your office has the characteristics of a bully, it is your duty to counsel that person before his or her behavior creates an uncomfortable situation for your other employees, harms others, leads to workplace violence or subjects the Department to legal vulnerability because timely action was not taken. Finally, ask yourself (or, better, ask others who will be honest with you) if you yourself rely on intimidation or scare tactics in your leadership style as a form of workforce control. Everyone deserves to work in an environment that is safe and bully-free.”

Read Robinson’s one-page essay.

Kudos for taking the first step toward raising awareness. How long before State Dept. employees enjoy protection that only an explicit policy and credible enforcement procedures can make likely?

On the morning of June 2, 2009, a city letter carrier went to work and reportedly fatally shot himself in the head in the locker room at a postal facility in Gastonia, North Carolina. The Gaston Gazette online news report stated that the “Gastonia Police are investigating an apparent suicide this morning at the post office. . . . One of the employees is inside dead from a gunshot wound.”

Prior to my retirement from the USPS, at a former district I worked for, there were three suicides within a two year period that I concluded were contributed to in significant part by how these employees were treated in the workplace. The third employee, a city letter carrier, fatally shot himself in a postal jeep and left a letter stating that he could no longer take the job. The suicide at the Gastonia postal facility was the second since December 2005.

Many people have asked: Why is there so much stress and workplace tragedies in the U.S. Postal Service? The answer to these questions is because the postal culture embraces and reflects core values that center on achieving bottom-line results with little or no regard for employee participation, respect, dignity, or fairness. Additionally, there is little or no accountability for the actions of top management in the Postal Service. Many postal facilities consequently have toxic work environments, and they can be a catalyst or trigger for serious acts of workplace violence, including homicide and suicide. The associated rewards system for behavior consistent with the postal culture core values, moreover, enables systemic organizational and individual bullying of employees at all levels of the organization.

I define a toxic workplace environment as a workplace where there is a high incidence of stress-related illnesses. These stress-related illnesses are manifested by psychological and physical deterioration. In other words, these types of environments seriously erode employees’ health and well-being. The primary factors contributing to a toxic workplace environment are high job demands, low job control, and low social support. Low social support generally entails a lack of respect and validation of employees’ dignity by their “superiors”. It also oftentimes includes organizational practices and methods that encourage the bullying of employees to meet corporate goals.

The name of the city letter carrier who committed suicide in Gastonia, NC on June 2, 2009 is Steven Spencer age 60. According to his obituary, Steven was married and leaves two daughters and three grandchildren. He was a member of the National Association of Letter Carriers/ and state representative for Muscular Dystrophy Association. He was the founder of the National Association of Letter Carriers Food Drive for Gaston County. He was very active in Scouting, attaining the highest rank of Eagle Scout. He also was a member of the Order of the Arrow. Steven was a veteran of the Vietnam War serving his country proudly in the US Navy.

I find it highly improbable that an employee will kill himself or herself in a postal facility or while on a postal route unless it is to send a clear message that a toxic workplace exists and the person can’t handle it anymore. Sadly, it also may be a tragic attempt to better the lot of one’s fellow coworkers by drawing attention to the tragic event itself.

Prior to Steven’s suicide, I was contacted by a relative of an employee at the Gastonia post office in April of this year. She was concerned because of what she reported as a toxic workplace environment at the Gastonia post office, lack of accountability to address employees’ concerns, and that the situation may lead to another workplace tragedy. Unfortunately, her worst concern became a reality on June 2, 2009. She further indicated several employees have resigned their positions at the office because of the toxic workplace environment and others were suffering from negative psychological and physical effects because of this environment. I was told employees’ attempts, mostly city letter carriers, to have their concerns addressed over a two-year period included: filing of discrimination complaints and grievances, unprofessional workplace assessments, town hall meetings, contacts to congressional representatives both locally and nationally, contacts to the Office of the Inspector General (OIG), and petitions to Charlotte postal District officials and representatives of their national postal union. She further indicated that none of these measures contributed to fully addressing the workplace environment or alleviating its negative impact for the employees at the Gastonia Post Office.

In order for the U.S Postal Service to become a safe and healthy organization and thereby prevent future workplace tragedies, which have been at an endemic level over the past three decades, there is an urgent need for congressional intervention and legislation to address its toxic postal culture. Dr. Gary and his wife, Dr. Ruth Namie, along with their colleague Professor David Yamada, have for years pushed for such legislation at the state level. In order for national legislation for the prevention of workplace bullying to have the intended impact, it would require sanctions to employers or their representatives who are in violation of a new workplace statute that defines workplace bullying as a harmful and illegal activity.

Stephen D. Musacco, Ph.D.

http://goingpostal-beyond.com/

WBI Note: Readers of the comments below will see the pattern of abuse described above repeated at the same postal center with other employees. Sadly, other comments reveal a national pattern within the Postal Service. So, readers may also be interested in:

Details of a bullying-related NALC Arbitration and management’s use of “routine” bullying on the shop floor as a defense! and   The 1992 USPS Joint Statement on Violence (policy that supposedly applies to ALL employees, except when a grievance is filed)

Here are 3 examples from May-June, 2009 seminar marketing to HR.

“When Employees Strike Back”
“Banish Bullies and their Lawsuits”
“Make Unions Irrelevant”

1) Hyped sales-oriented headline for a seminar “When Employees Strike Back”

Rationale given: “The number of retaliation claims against employers skyrocketed to record 32,690 in fiscal year 2008, resulting in more than $111 million in monetary awards.”

HR skills to acquire: “Learn how to avoid damaging retaliation jury awards”

This is mythical because retaliation claims by employees can be filed only after original claims of discrimination were answered by employer retaliation. You complain that you were discriminated against — sexual harassment or racial discrimination or age discrimination or your disability caused them to mistreat you — and the sham HR “investigation” concludes no wrongs were done. The employer enabled the harassment to happen in the first place! On top of that insult, the employer demotes you, punishes you in some way or fires you for daring to insist on your dignity. So, you can file a retaliation claim.
Retaliation is the employer, often with HR’s guidance, striking down the employee a second time. How can it be characterized as employees striking back? Funny, if it was not a seminar taught by an attorney helping HR keep complaining employees in their place.

2) Hyped sales-oriented headline for a seminar “Banish Bullies and their Lawsuits”
[This is our favorite.]

Actual title of the attorney-led seminar: “Workplace Shootings, Domestic Violence, and Bullying: New Challenges and Legal Threats for Employers”

Rationale given: “More than 71 million American workers are victims of bullying at work, according to a recent study by the Workplace Bullying Institute.” (Wrong! It’s 54 million who have directed experienced bullying. The 71 million includes witnesses. They found the WBI-Zogby survey statistics but can’t cite them correctly.)

“New pending legislation in 16 states that prohibit bullying in the workplace and what these laws could mean for employers” (Wrong again! Here, they cite the history of the WBI-Legislative Campaign which has had 16 states since 2003 with some version of our anti-bullying Healthy Workplace Bill. In 2009, 12 states had active legislation. And they did not bother to mention that the “toughest” versions of the bill do not carry a mandate requiring employers to do anything. They only get the chance to avoid being sued if they create policies and faithfully enforce them — something they should be doing as good business practice voluntarily. Again, too tough for corporate attorneys to read accurately.)

The seminar contents focuses on workplace violence and domestic violence intruding into the workplace and the security risks they pose. The reference to bullying was limited to coverage of “bully bosses” and the legal liabilities they bring to any organization.” Note that they used bullying as a hot topic sales gimmick.

The presenter is an attorney, author of Workplace Catastrophes: An Employer’s Guide to Workplace Violence, Terrorism and Natural Disasters.

If WBI dared to associate bullying with terrorism, we’d be banished. It would imply that employers hire terrorists to do their bidding as bullies. But evidently it’s OK for employers to brand employees they don’t like terrorists.

3) Hyped sales-oriented headline for a seminar “Make Unions Irrelevant”

Actual seminar title: “Minimize the Impact of EFCA and Unions with Powerful HR Communications”

(EFCA, Employee Free Choice Act, is the proposed federal legislation making union organizing easier, the first new labor law in over 30 years in the U.S.)

For this training, the outline of its content is especially revealing (and funny):

- “Communication techniques to win the hearts and minds of your employees by championing your organization’s sound policies and benefits” (Yea, right. Loyalty in exchange for policies that are not enforced and benefits that are disappearing.)

- “Specific internal communications to demonstrate why unions are irrelevant” (This is the union-busting industry’s best seller. It’s the mandated meetings when union organizers announce they want the employees to vote on having a union.

- “How to establish a first line of defense by monitoring the Internet for signs of organizing activity and chatter about your organization — because it all starts online” (The same people who want to win hearts and minds will conduct surveillance, just in case.)

- “How to overhaul supervisory communications immediately, so your supervisors can become advocates for management, listening posts, and experts in interpersonal relations” (This is a very narrow definition of communications skills. Listening is for surveillance purposes only and then only to report to higher ups what is heard and who is affiliating with whom. Are we clear here? It’s snitching.)

- “The grassroots nature of union communications, which focus on emotive language and an emphasis on people over profits” (Yes, that dastardly emphasis by people on people is grassroots by nature, union-driven, and employee advocacy must be struck down.

Readers will find WalMart’s categorization of which employees are “union-prone” equally illuminating.)

Also relevant to union prevention is the report by Kate Bronfenbrenner at Center for Economic Policy and Research. Employers more than doubled their use of anti-union tactics against employees attempting to form unions between 1999 and 2003. Sixty-three percent of employers use mandatory one-on-one, anti-union meetings with employees. Further, 57 percent of employers threatened to close the workplace, 47 percent of employers issued threats to slash benefits and wages, while 34 percent of employers fired workers during union organizing drives. Read the full May 20, 2009 report – No Holds Barred: The Intensification of Employer Opposition to Organizing

So you see from these three examples, HR is about helping management communication focusing on profits and snitching. Nothing about HR need focus on employee rights, dignity at work, employee safety and health. HR works for the employer and must keep the corporate mission in mind – profits at the expense of people. No bleeding hearts need apply for HR.

G. Namie

So tell your HR story here. Please comment.

BY DAVID P. WILLIS
Asbury Park (NJ) Press
May 26, 2009

You should know it when you see it. Verbal harassment at work, practical jokes, threats, intimidation, and even sabotage, are all the hallmarks of a workplace bully.
As opposed to tough management, “bullying is a level of misery that falls disproportionally on the few,” said Gary Namie, director of the Workplace Bullying Institute in Bellingham, Wash.

A 2007 survey by the Institute and Zogby International found that 37 percent of American workers have been bullied at work. Nearly three-quarters, 72 percent, of the bullies are bosses, the survey said.

And as companies struggle, experts say workplace bullying has grown as people fear job loss.

“It is just really out of fear. Where there is fear there is a need to control,” said Terri Dawe, employee assistance coordinator at CPC Behavioral Healthcare, which has centers around Monmouth County. “It is escalating in these economic times and jobs being tenuous.”

The tight job market has compounded the problem, Namie said. “It’s a buyer’s market. Now the attitude is, ‘I can treat you however I want and you can leave and I can find more like you.’”

Like the school yard, bullies cause problems at work.

“In terms of overall morale, it is horrible,” said Alan Cavaiola, an associate professor at Monmouth University and co-author of “Toxic Co-Workers: How to Deal With Dysfunctional People on the Job.” “Everyone kind of tiptoes around this person. It is very much like walking on egg shells.”

In one case, Cavaiola said a female worker was harassed by two male supervisors, who made sexually demeaning remarks. Her boss didn’t take her complaints seriously, she quit her job and sued.

“They are very narcissistic. They are very self-centered,” Cavaiola said of workplace bullies. “They lack empathy. They lack compassion.”

But unlike schoolyard bullies, bullies at work tend to target people who are a threat to them, said Namie. Their victims may be stronger performers or better liked. “The bully is a political animal and knows how organizations run and knows that aggression pays off and is rewarded,” Namie said. “You have a player against a person who is basically a do-gooder, someone with a social orientation who (keeps) their nose to the grindstone.”

A bully is different from a hard-charging boss, said Red Bank workplace coach Donna Coulson, owner of Donna Coulson & Associates. A hard boss may not smile and give a lot of work to people, but they tend to challenge employees, she said. “A bully will bully you whether things are good or bad or indifferent,” she said.

So what’s a worker to do?

If possible, talk to the person later in private, Coulson said. “If you stand up to the bully, they will eventually stop,” she said.

Oops, Coulson. If targets could have confronted their bullies, they would have – WBI

Dawe said a worker has to recognize bullying which can be hard to define. But once they do, they should make a diary of what they experience, including dates and times, so they can bring it to human resources, she said.

Hey, Coulson. Wrong again. HR won’t do anything – WBI

Namie recommends that workers take a three-prong approach. “You have to recognize that it’s happening to you,” Namie said. “In a way, that takes a long time. They can’t believe it is happening to them, so they are in denial themselves.”

They should take time off from work to check their physical and mental health, and look for violations of company policy, he said. Consult a lawyer, he said. “You need to start to build a business case, the unemotional case, that the bully is too expensive to keep,” Namie said. Take the case to the highest level position who is not pledged or not related to the bully, he added.

Namie said he supports a bill in the state Assembly, called the “Healthy Workplace Act.” It would make abusive conduct in a workplace — repeated use of derogatory remarks, insults and epithets that are intimidating and humiliating — illegal. The bill is currently before the Assembly Labor Committee.

“Workplace bullying is an underappreciated problem,” said Assemblywoman Linda Greenstein, D-Middlesex. “Studies have shown that workplace bullying occurs much more frequently than sexual harassment, yet has not received nearly as much attention.”

Kathleen M. Connelly, a lawyer at Lindabury, McCormick, Estabrook & Cooper in Rumson, said employers have to recognize the need to address the problem.”Employers have dropped the ball in not recognizing that an essential element of being a supervisor is managing people, and that means being able to do that in a respectful manner.”

But legislation is not the answer, she said.

“This statute would basically give every employee in the workplace a vehicle to commence litigation,” she said. “Do we want to be in a situation where our court systems become overwhelmed with burdens with every employee grievance?”

David P. Willis: 732-643-4039; dwillis@app.com

Remarkable in this survey is the fact that so many employees can see and feel bullying’s impact on their daily lives while employers feign blindness and deafness. This survey was conducted in BRITAIN where the term Workplace Bullying is in common usage ever since Andrea Adams launched the UK movement and coined the term there. Of course, U.S. employers are motivated to stay in denial, but even British employers still tempt danger by ignoring bullying.

That’s why there must be specific anti-bullying laws! When laws are in place, employer denials will evaporate.

U.K. Survey: Workplace Bullying Ignored

The Times (London) Online
August 2, 2006

Workplace bullying is a growing problem but bosses are failing to take the problem seriously, according to a report out today. Four out of five people have been bullied at work but most are wary of complaining because they do not believe they will be taken seriously, according to a survey by Peninsula, an employment law firm. (in Britain).

Just 11 per cent of 1,300 workers questioned said they would report workplace bullying to a superior, with only 9 per cent saying they thought their boss would take the complaint seriously.

This is despite 81 per cent of employees saying they had been bullied and 71 per cent saying they thought workplace bullying was on the increase.

The survey reveals a sharp distinction between how employers and employees view the problem, with just 13 per cent of more than 2,000 employers surveyed acknowledging that bullying was an issue in their workplace.

Peter Done, managing director of Peninsula, said: “One of the most serious concerns to come out of this research is that few employers believe their companies are suffering at the hands of bullying, yet a high percentage of employees have been victims. This suggests that workers do not feel confident enough to tell their bosses they are being bullied.”

Mr Done said that in adopting such a stance employers were “attempting to brush the problem under the carpet, which can have serious consequences.”

Yesterday Helen Green, a company secretary at Deutsche Bank, was awarded £828,000 (U.S. $1.5 million) in damages after being driven to a mental breakdown by office bullies.

The judge criticised Ms Green’s managers for being “weak and ineffectual” in the face of a longstanding bullying problem in their department.

Richard Martin, a partner at Speechly Bircham, said: “The Helen Green case serves as a salutary lesson to employers to stamp out behaviour of this kind at a very early stage, particularly when the liability of employers for the bullying and harassment carried out by their employees is increasing all the time.”

Employment experts pointed out that cases like Ms Green’s are rare and that employers are able to protect themselves.

Andrew Chamberlain, an employment lawyer at Addleshaw Goddard, said: “When any employee reports bullying or is known to have suffered ill health, it is crucial that firms closely monitor the situation and maintain accurate records to prove they have done so. If it goes to court then it is all too easy for evidence to become a case of one person’s word against another’s but, by maintaining accurate records and taking proactive action to manage the situation, firms will be better protected against such claims.”

Michael Farrier, an employment expert at Boyes Turner, added: “This survey is a reminder to employers, particularly those with considerable resources, to be vigilant and introduce an effective equality and diversity policy as well as anti-bullying and harassment policies. It is vital that employers undertake annual equality and diversity training and monitoring, if they are to be able to demonstrate they take their obligations seriously.”

A City (London) worker has won £800,000 in damages from Deutsche Bank in a landmark workplace bullying case. The award is said by legal experts to be particularly high and likely to be appealed.

High Court judge Justice Owen said that the campaign at the secretariat division of the international banking firm Deutsche Bank Group Services (UK) Ltd. against Helen Green involved a “relentless campaign of mean and spiteful behaviour designed to cause her distress” that left Green on some occasions crying silently at her desk. She worked there from 1997 to 2001.

Owen awarded her a total of $1.5 million for pain and suffering and loss of past and future earnings. He also ordered the bank to pay her legal costs, beginning with an interim payment of $650,000.

The largest part of the award is the £640,000 awarded for future loss of earnings and a pension, and it is this portion which marks the case out as unusual.

“We have seen cases like this before a number of times but the court has awarded such a large amount because it took the view that this person would not be able to work at this salary level for a long time in the future,” said Tom Potbury, a lawyer specialising in employment law at Pinsent Masons.

Green, 36, had said she was subjected to “offensive, abusive, intimidating, denigrating, bullying, humiliating, patronizing, infantile and insulting words and behavior” and subjected to crude and lewd comments from her former colleagues. Her colleagues would move her papers, hide her post and remove her from document circulation lists. She alleged that some of the colleagues had ignored and excluded her, that her personal and professional authority was undermined, and her workload increased to unreasonable and arbitrary levels.

Her lawyer said medical experts on both sides of the case agreed that Green developed a major depressive disorder, but there was disagreement about its cause.

Deutsche Bank said it had not breached its duties to Green and denied that she was bullied, saying she had had a predisposition to mental illness. Deutsche Bank paid for stress counselling and assertiveness training for Green but she had a nervous breakdown before returning to work and suffering a relapse.

“The best way for companies to deal with workplace bullying is to have a clear policy in place and to make sure that employees know about it,” said Potbury. “The policy then has to be enforced. If someone complains it is important that the employer does not sweep it under the carpet,” he said. “That is the best way of protecting yourself against claims. You can better defend yourself if you can show that you have done everything you can.”

Green said she was delighted by the ruling, adding that she had learned bullying was a problem throughout London’s financial world. “My case was not an isolated one,” she said. “At the trial the court heard evidence about other victims. Not only does Deutsche Bank have to put its house in order, but all City (finance) businesses will have to do more than pay lip-service to this hidden menace.”

A Deutsche Bank statement said that “No decision about whether to appeal has been made at this stage”.

Part of Green’s case was argued under the Protection from Harassment Act, a 1997 anti-stalker law that is beginning to be used in employment cases. A House of Lords ruling last month permitted its use in employment cases, and the law differs substantially from existing employment legislation.

“I don’t think anyone imagined when the law was made that it would be used against employers,” said Potbury. “Employers have no real defence against this law. If an employee is harassed at work on more than one occasion they can be liable and there is nothing they can do about it.”

In the case on which the Lords ruled, the NHS (National Health Service) was vicariously liable for the harassment of employee William Majrowski, even though it was not guilty of causing the behaviour or of failing to prevent it. Previously, employees had to prove that the employer had been negligent in preventing bullying, but that is no longer the case.

Though the award will concern other City financial institutions, Potbury said that the problem of bullying at work was very real but very widespread. “It is a problem, but it is not confined to City firms. People get bullied at work everywhere, though the City is a higher stress culture than other workplaces,” he said. “This will make other City firms make sure they are doing everything they can to avoid this.”

1. Targets under report it (40% of targets never tell). Employers simply may not know about it.
2. Most (80%) bullying is legal, rendering laws and law-compliant policies inapplicable
3. Thus, 62% of employers either do nothing or worsen the situation (retaliation) because they can do so with legal impunity.
4. The majority of bullies (73%) are managers; senior managers and HR reflexively side with management when disputes arise.
5. Bullies derive 73% of their support from executives, peer managers and HR
6. Bullies (an unknown percentage) are following orders from above
7. Executives have been bullied by the bullies. They are afraid to act. They have a disproportionate fear of lawsuits brought by the bully if they dare investigate or sanction the bully.
8. Bullies invented their reputation as indispensable high-performers in case they were ever exposed. Target complainants are then not believed.
9. Employers don’t actually know how to stop it. They forgot the lessons learned from having to correct and prevent illegal discrimination.
10. Employers don’t recognize bullying as violence in the workplace. The problem is erroneously defined as “conflict,” and the wrong solutions are applied.
11. Our society is highly aggressive and competitive. Bullies embody these two popular tactics. Hostility is more normative than the exception. So, bullying/abuse/psychological violence at work is positively embraced more often than despised.

WBI

This type of conduct is what I read as an expert witness in court cases involving bullying physicians. Similar things happened in the trial dubbed the “first bullying trial” in Indianapolis, IN in March, 2005 in which I testified.

How rare were angry, hostile, bullying rants by Castro-Moure? Was this the first and only time that an otherwise respectful, gentle man exploded? Not likely. The statement by the chief medical officer about Castro-Moure’s normalcy means little. He probably never works directly with him in the OR, the workplace that bully surgeons terrorize. He only sees him through an administrative lens and as a fellow physician, a club member deserving protection.

The aftermath will be worth tracking. Will the Medical Board do anything since they rarely strip licenses? Will the chief of staff, Altman, have the guts to sanction Castro-Moure or will that be seen as capitulation to nurses? Will Highland Hospital, the county government employer, implement a policy to prevent this from happening again? [We do work with motivated hospitals but eventually they balk at applying anti-bullying policies to the docs.] Will the nurses union demand action to make them safe? Will the patient’s family sue for the involuntary delay?

Bullying in hospitals jeopardizes patient care and staff safety. But most administrators are too timid to confront and constrain thugs like Castro-Moure. This unfortunate incident gives the public and bully sympathizers a rare peek behind the hospital door to show what nonsense is tolerated on a daily basis by nurses.

Highland (Hospital, Oakland, CA) Surgeon Suspended
Drunken Altercation Reported in Hospital’s Operating Room

By Jim Herron Zamora
San Francisco Chronicle
Thursday, March 9, 2006

OAKLAND — The top neurosurgeon at Highland Hospital has been suspended and may be charged with a misdemeanor after what authorities called a drunken altercation with sheriff’s deputies in an operating room, officials said today.

Deputies believe Dr. Federico Castro-Moure, 45, was intoxicated during the scuffle and prosecutors may charge him with public drunkenness and interfering with a peace officer.

“The deputies felt that he was behaving in an aggressive manner,” Alameda County Sheriff’s Capt. William Eskridge said. “He was yelling and put a fist in the face of a deputy in a threatening manner.”

Neither Castro-Moure nor his attorney could be reached for comment.

The incident began about 8:30 p.m. Monday when Castro-Moure argued with nurses recommending that he wait several hours for sterile equipment to arrive before operating on a spinal patient.

Although Castro-Moure wanted to operate immediately, other hospital personnel believed the surgery could be delayed because the patient was stable enough to wait, said Dr. David Altman, the hospital’s chief medical officer.

In such cases, it is the hospital’s policy to wait. But Castro-Moure became angry and physically and verbally abusive, officials said. A nurse summoned deputies to the foyer outside the fifth-floor operating room.

When deputies attempted to intervene, Castro-Moure allegedly shouted obscenities and used his arm and clenched fist to keep them at bay, officials said.

Although the deputies arrested Castro-Moure on suspicion of public intoxication — based upon both his behavior and the smell of alcohol on his breath — Eskridge said the doctor was so uncooperative that deputies could not adequately test him for intoxication.

“He compromised the test by not blowing the amount of time the test needs to get an accurate reading, but the device did indicate there was some alcohol in his system,” Eskridge said.

The unidentified patient was in the emergency room at the time and remained there throughout the incident, officials said. His spinal operation occurred Tuesday morning, and he is recovering satisfactorily, Altman said.

Altman announced Thursday that Castro-Moure has been suspended without pay. Castro-Moure, Highland’s head of neurosurgery since 2003, will be barred indefinitely from practicing at the hospital pending several investigations by the hospital and county health officials, Altman said.

The California Medical Board, which holds licensing power over all doctors in the state, is expected to launch its own investigation of Castro-Moure. The board could potentially strip him of the ability to practice medicine in the state.

“I cannot confirm or deny that we have an investigation because that is not a public record,” said Erlinda Suarez, analyst California Medical Board. “But I can tell you that in any case like this with wide media coverage we would probably initiate an investigation based on media reports,” Suarez said.

Altman said Alameda County Medical Center officials are “very concerned.” Although there is no specific policy banning alcohol consumption by doctors before surgery, Altman said doctors and other employees are barred from working when “impaired in any way by drugs or alcohol.” He also said it is hospital policy to immediately report any person with alcohol on their breath.

“We will not tolerate unprofessional conduct that could endanger our patients,” Altman sad. “That is unacceptable.”

Castro-Moure has been at Highland Hospital since November 1999 and had no history of misconduct, Altman said. Castro-Moure received his medical degree from Collegio Mayor de Nuestra Senora del Rosario in Bogota, Colombia, and his doctorate from Wayne State University in Detroit.

“He is a well-respected neurosurgeon, well respected in his field,” Altman said.

Actions Highlight Myth of HR as Employee “Advocates”

Here is a chilling tale that illustrates post-9/11 threats to free speech in the U.S., the power of an overreaching federal employer, and the role played by an obsequious HR department that can spontaneously launch unwarranted attacks on loyal, veteran employees. — WBI

Event 1: Laura Berg, a 15 year veteran clinical nurse specialist who works in the New Mexico Veterans Administration (VA) Hospital system, wrote a letter to the editor of the Albuquerque weekly newspaper Alibi published on September 15, 2005. It was titled “Wake Up, Get Real.” Berg signed the letter as a private citizen, without citing her VA employer. Her essay criticized how the administration handled Hurricane Katrina and the Iraq War. Read the letter itself below.

Event 2: A few days after the letter was published, VA Information Security employees seized Berg’s computer at the local VA hospital where she works. At the time, she was told this action occurred because of suspicions that she’d composed the letter to the Alibi on government time, on government premises, using government equipment. The computer was returned the next day.

Event 3: On Sept. 19, Berg’s AFGE union representative, Thomas Driber, told Berg that her Alibi letter had been sent through “VA channels” to the FBI in Washington, D.C.

Event 4: Inquiries by AFGE lawyers led to a Nov 9 memo from VA Chief of Human Resources, Mel R. Hooker in which Hooker allegedly admitted that the VA had no evidence the letter was written on Berg’s office computer. Despite this, Hooker claimed the investigation was justified because the “Agency is bound by law to investigate and pursue any act which potentially represents sedition.” HR makes clear its distrust of employees here.

Event 5: Sonja Brown, the head of the VA’s Public Affairs Operations, forwarded the following statement via e-mail to Alibi reporter Steven Robert Allen: “While VA does not prohibit employees from exercising their freedom of speech, we do ask that such activity occurs outside government premises and not during their official tour of duty. When we have reason to believe that this policy is not being adhered to, we have the obligation to review an individual’s computer activity.” An unapologetic tone.

Fact: According to Norman Cairns, a spokesperson for the U.S. Attorney’s office in Albuquerque, “Sedition is only mentioned in one section of the United States Code and the sedition that’s listed there is basically a plot to violently overthrow the United States government by force. Based on the plain statutory language, sedition always seems to imply the use of force or a conspiracy to use force. The penalty is a $250,000 fine and up to 20 years in prison.”

Event 6: Albuquerque ACLU attorneys George Bach and Larry Kronen represent Laura Berg.They both believe the letter is protected speech under the First Amendment. They have filed a Freedom of Information Act request with the VA for all documents pertaining to this bizarre investigation. They demand an explanation for the department’s investigation of this federal employee. They have asked (HR Chief) Hooker for a public apology “to remedy the unconstitutional chilling effect on the speech of VA employees that has resulted from these intimidating tactics.” Laura Berg is not talking to the press, but reportedly fears losing her job.

Event 7: On Feb. 11, 2006, it was reported that U.S. Senator Jeff Bingaman (D-N.M.) asked Veterans Affairs Secretary James Nicholson for a thorough inquiry of his agency’s investigation into the “sedition” threat posed by the publication of Laura Berg’s Sept. 15, 2005 letter to the editor and subsequent VA-FBI tactics.

The “seditious” letter to the editor that spawned the draconian VA response.

Sept. 15, 2005

Wake Up, Get Real

Dear Alibi,

I am furious with the tragically misplaced priorities and criminal negligence of this government. The Katrina tragedy in the U.S. shows that the emperor has no clothes! Bush and his team partied and delayed while millions of people were displaced, hundreds of thousands were abandoned to a living hell. Thousands more died of drowning, dehydration, hunger and exposure; most bodies remain unburied and rotting in attics and floodwater. Is this America the beautiful?

The risk of hurricane disaster was clearly predicted, yet funds for repair work for the Gulf States barrier islands and levee system were unconscionably diverted to the Iraq War. Money and manpower and ethics have been diverted to fight a war based on absolute lies!

As a VA nurse working with returning OIF vets, I know the public has no sense of the additional devastating human and financial costs of post-traumatic stress disorder; now we will have hundreds of thousands of our civilian citizens with PTSD as well as far too many young soldiers, maimed physically or psychologically — or both –spreading their pain, anger and isolation through family and communities for generations. And most of this natural disaster and war tragedy has been preventable … how very, very sad!

In the meantime, our war-fueled federal deficit mushrooms — and whither this debt now, as we care for the displaced and destroyed?

Bush, Cheney, Chertoff, Brown and Rice should be tried for criminal negligence. This country needs to get out of Iraq now and return to our original vision and priorities of caring for land and people and resources rather than killing for oil.

Katrina itself was the size of New Mexico. Denials of global warming are ludicrous and patently irrational at this point. We can anticipate more wild, destructive weather to occur as a response stress of the planet. We need to wake up and get real here, and act forcefully to remove a government administration playing games of smoke and mirrors and vicious deceit. Otherwise, many more of us will be facing living hell in these times.

Laura Berg
Albuquerque

In case, you think nurse Berg is overstating PTSD and its impact on veterans, read The Struggle to Gauge a War’s Psychological Cost by Benedict Carey, New York Times, Nov. 26, 2005

The VA vs. Berg story details were culled from these sources:

Big brother is watching by Steven Robert Allen, Albuquerque Alibi, Feb. 9-15, 2006

Nurse investigated for ‘sedition’ after writing letter to editor, Editor & Publisher, Feb. 11, 2006

ACLU protests investigation of VA employee for ‘sedition’ Jan. 31, 2006 press release by Peter Simonson, Executive Director, ACLU of New Mexico

Wake up, get real by Laura Berg, Albuquerque Alibi, Sept. 15, 2005

[See post to watch Flash video]

A Columbine Victim’s Spirit of Hope Grows

By KIRK JOHNSON
Published: April 17, 2009

ENGLEWOOD, Colo. — Darrell Scott has told the story of his daughter Rachel’s life, death and legacy thousands of times in schools all over the world in the 10 years since her murder at age 17 in the mass shootings at Columbine High School, a few miles south of here.

Read the entire article at the NY Times

However, has it dawned on corporations that it needs to treat its own employees with dignity, compassion and humanity? The employees hear the story of bullying at Columbine and tearfully resonate with the tragic consequences for Rachel, Scott’s daughter. Since 37% of  U.S. adults have been bullied at sometime in their careers at work, they know bullying firsthand. But owners and corporate executives might accept this feel-good message without acknowledging that it happens on their watch in their workplace due in large part to their indifference or loyalty to the abusive bullies who work for them.

There’s a major discconect going on here. Shed the tears for Rachel, but don’t shed any workers in the trenches who are told to grow a thicker skin, to “work it out between yourselves,” or to leavel the job they once loved because someone arbitrarily decided to launch a campaign of cruelty to drive them out.

Oh, did I mention the 600,000 jobs shed per month that allows companies to disassemble families’ economic security, physical and mental health, and hopefulness? And what about those compassionate employers who rushed to dump fixed pensions for long-term workers, to make them gamble in the stock market with 401K plans with lots of stock invested in crappy companies who drove everyone except the executives into the ditch?

So, feel-good corporate stories about discovering compassion have their place. Just don’t let employers off the hook when it comes to bullying in the workplace.

GN

The U.S. Congress publicly berated British Petroleum (BP) as a stumbling, arrogant, public safety-damaging corporation on September 7, 2006. And a bully was outed and betrayed by his executive.

BP in Alaska

In March, 2006, 270,000 gallons of oil leaked from the Alaska pipeline moving crude from the Prudhoe Bay field. Follow-up inspections led to the discovery of significant pipe corrosion. BP briefly shut down the entire oil field on Aug. 6 stopping the flow of some 400,000 barrels a day. Alaska’s economy and the price of gasoline in the U.S. were immediately negatively impacted.

BP Exploration Alaska was the corporate entity responsible for corrosion monitoring. Maintenance and prevention were routine tasks not only part of good business practices but in order to comply with federal regulations. The BP CIC (Corrosion, Inspection and Chemicals) group was the internal division tasked with corrosion inspection. Until Jan. 2005, its head was Richard C. Woollam, a 20 year veteran at BP.

A Fear-Plagued Workplace

BP should have known about the problem. Workers tried to warn BP but were stifled. They turned to an outsider to be heard.

Charles Hamel, a former oil broker and BP critic was contacted by technicians working within the CIC division in 2004 with worker complaints about inadequate attention to pipe corrosion. BP officials ignored his letter on the employees’ behalf calling for an investigation. Speaking at the National Press Club on Sept. 5, 2006, Hamel spoke of the hyocrisy of BP’s declared “open door policy.” He reported that BP workers historically were fired or transferred for daring to raise concerns about problems. That’s why workers had to turn whistleblowers just to do the job they were paid to do.

Anyone who understands the bullying phenomenon knows that the division boss is the one who sets the tone for openness to complaints or tyrannical rule of a fear-plauged work environment where whistleblowers and doubters are sacrificed by the bully boss.

Of course, the first important aspect of this story to the Workplace Bullying Institute was that ethical BP employees who sought to faithfully do their job of monitoring the Alaska pipeline and prevent leaks were dissuaded from reporting potential problems for years. Woollam controlled the workplace for the corrosion inspectors and maintenance staff. In his role, Woollam was responsible for either establishing or sustaining the tradition of punishing conscientious workers.

Woollam Co$t$ BP Big Buck$

Bullying is expensive for BP. In 2006 alone, the budget for the pipe integrity monitoring program at BP was $74 million. That’s $74 million misspent, wasted dollars because the workers rightfully worried that leaks could happen and by ignoring them, corrosion became a problem. Woollam actually prevented the mandated and important work from getting done — just as all bullies do.

Bullies are too expensive to keep! Typical corporations reflexively protect bullies when they are in management. BP did this with Woollam.

The CIC division did not have a manager from Jan. 2005 to July 2006. Corrosion inspection and pipe maintenance clearly did not matter. Corporate actions speak louder than espoused, grandiose statements about commitment to public safety.

A Revealing Congressional Spotlight

On Sept 7, the House Energy and Commerce Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations took the political opportunity to beat up Big Oil by berating BP as “broken pipeline” (Rep. Gary Welden, R-Ore) and “BP’s policies are as rusty as its pipelines” (Rep. Joe Barton, R-Texas). The House members gave the appearance of holding BP accountable for the pipeline leak and neglect of corrosion concerns.

The top federal regulator for pipelines said that BP was warned about the corrosion, but failed to take steps common in the industry to find and mitigate leaks in the pipelines.

Remarkably, Woollam refused to testify before Congress. He invoked his Fifth Amendment protection against self-incrimination.

Even more remarkable was that Steve Marshall, the president of BP Exploration Alaska, conceded that Woollam’s “abrasive nature” and “intimidation” might have silenced workers. BP corporate knew that Woollam was a problem. He received counseling of an unknown nature.

This was the rare circumstance when an executive actually withdrew public support for the bully. Woollam was abandoned by the corporation, allowed to fend for himself.

In 2004, BP hired Houston-based law firm Vinson & Elkins to conduct an internal investigation of alleged workplace harassment and falsification of pipeline-corrosion data. The law firm concluded that some pipeline inspectors experienced “fear of retaliation” for reporting safety concerns and other issues, but said there was no evidence that BP employees or contractors were explicitly told not to raise red flags. Naturally, workers fearing retaliation are unlikely to be explicit with company-hired investigators.

In January, 2005, Woollam was transferred to corporate headquarters as a technical consultant, stripped of supervisory responsibilities. At the time of the Sept. 7 Congressional hearing, he was on PAID leave.

Until Woollam is fired, he is another bully on economic life support by executive fiat. All bullied targets await news of the positive message. Failing to terminate him will confirm the tradition that bullies hurt people (and the public and the corporation in this place) with impunity. Woollam will have bullied with no consequences. How many BP whistleblowers did he fire during the time prior to Jan. 2005?

BP’s Crisis Response for the Future

BP America Chairman and President Bob Malone, who also testified on Sept. 7 announced a two-prong future way to address the pipeline corrosion problems.

With respect to the corrosion itself, a panel of three technical experts were appointed to conduct an independent review and to make recommendations. In the next two years, $550 million will be invested on “integrity management.”

With respect to the workplace climate mess Woollam left behind, all worker allegations raised on the North Slope of Alaska since BP acquired ARCO in 2000 will be reviewed by former federal Judge Stanley Sporkin. Sporkin and a small staff will also provide ombuds services and a 24/7 call line for workers. Sporkin is also tasked with making recommendations regarding worker treatment. As a former Federal District Judge and General Counsel to the CIA, Sporkin is a member of the Gavel Consulting Group (with fellow members Ken Starr, Louis Freeh, Wm. Sessions, Wm. Webster) and is a partner at Weil, Gotshal & Manges, LLP law firm in Washington, DC.

The REAL Solution

1. Fire Woollam with no severance package.

2. Expand the BP “Code of Conduct” to address bullying.
The Work Doctor ® organizational consultants specialize in writing and enforcing such policies. Correct remaining bullies who cost BP so much money and cause so much misery; prevent future bullying with WBI-approved anti-bullying specific solutions. Call The Work Doctor now!

Sources:
BP Appoints Ombudsman to Hear Worker Complaints, Associated Press, 9/5/06
BP Chiefs Grilled About Pipelines, The News & Observer, Raleigh, NC, 9/8/06
BP press releases:
BP Chairman Malone Vowed to Fix Problems at his Company
Written testimony of Bob Malone to House Subcommittee, 9/7/06
Written testimony of Steve Marshall to House Subcommittee, 0/7/06

This essay was published as “Look for the Union Label” in Harper’s Magazine, October, 2004

Labor Relations and You at the Wal-Mart Distribution Center

by Orson Mason

Wal-Mart is opposed to unionization of its associates. Any suggestion that the Company is neutral on the subject or that it encourages associates to join labor organizations is not true. As a member of Wal-Mart’s management team, you are our first line of defense against unionization. This toolbox will provide you with valuable information on how to remain union-free in the event union organizers choose your facility as their next target.

EARLY WARNING SIGNS:

• Increased curiosity in benefits
• Associates receiving unusual attention from other associates
• Associates talking in hushed tones to each other
• Abuse of rest-room visits
• Associates spending an abnormal amount of time in the parking lot before and after work
• Associates who are never seen together start talking or associating with each other and begin forming strange alliances

TYPES OF ASSOCIATES ATTRACTED TO UNIONS:

Unions have learned to identify certain types of individuals who are more susceptible to union exploitation than others:

1. THE INEFFICIENT ASSOCIATE realizes that he will not be able to measure up to the facility’s standards and will be terminated. He is attracted to the union because they convince him that they will clothes him with the so-called shield of “job security.”
2. THE REBELLIOUS ASSOCIATE is attracted to the union cause simply because he is opposed to all management or bosses. He consequently becomes an antagonist to the employer and a respondent to the union propaganda.
3. THE SOMETHING-FOR-NOTHING ASSOCIATE is the typical injury faker who has collected worker’s compensation from most of his former employers. He is always looking for a deal. he takes every imaginable shortcut in his job and sincerely feels that the world owes him a living.
4. THE CHRONICALLY DISSATISFIED ASSOCIATE might be one of the most productive associates, but he will find fault with everything. He is a hopeless griper, as distinguished from a constructive critic. He is truly an unhappy individual. He was probably born unhappy, is going to die unhappy, and is going to be unhappy for the duration between.
5. THE CAUSE-ORIENTED ASSOCIATE will “jump” on any bandwagon that passes through his area. He was the same individual who joined all the “off-beat” organizations in high school or college. He once took a trip to India to visit his personal “guru.”
6. THE OVERQUALIFIED ASSOCIATE is out of his element. He might well be a Ph.D. operating a grinding machine or a former accountant sweeping the floor, but his station in life has deteriorated to the point that his vanity suffers. He will attempt to exert his influence over his fellow associates in an effort to bolster his deflated ego and will be attracted to the union simply because the union will seem to offer hopes of returning him to his previous station in life.

HOW TO RESPOND TO UNION DEMAND FOR RECOGNITION:

If a union organizer contacts you demanding recognition or seeking to show you authorization cards, DO NOT acknowledge that the union represents a majority of your associates, DO NOT agree to look at any proof of majority support — such as authorization cards or membership applications — DO NOT agree to have a “neutral” party examine the offered proof of majority status. The proper response when a union organizer seeks recognition is to refer him/her to your Personnel Manager. Refuse to accept any documents from the union. Immediately after any conversation with a union rep, call the Union Hotline at 501-273-8300.

Staying union free is a full-time commitment. Unless union prevention is a goal equal to other objectives within an organization, the goal will usually not be attained. No one in management is immune from carrying his or her “own weight” in the union-prevention effort. Unless each member of management is willing to spend the necessary time, effort, energy, and money, the Wal-Mart union-free objective will not be accomplished.

The Keene Group, one of many consulting companies proud to prevent unionization for employers afraid to grant employee rights or dignity. Aren’t these the true “job killers”?

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