She came to work early, rarely took a full lunch break, and almost always worked past five p.m. Six of her nine employees considered her an effective leader. She ran a successful department until her other three direct reports drove her out.
Empowered by their victory, this “gang of three” ran off two successive managers before the company’s senior leadership realized they had a problem.
We rarely discuss upward bullying and its impact but should. Researchers estimate fourteen percent of all workplace bullying is upward and can result in career derailment for managers targeted by bullying employees, https://hbr.org/2023/03/ask-an-expert-how-do-i-deal-with-upward-bullying-as-a-new-manager#:~:text=The%20authors%20point%20out%20that,and%20at%20times%2C%20career%20derailment. Even worse, when an organization allows a clique of employee bullies to succeed, they become unmanageable.
Employees who bully.
Like other bullies, employees who bully feel no remorse. Employee bullies may include those who see their manager’s job as a promotional opportunity and will stop at nothing to topple the manager. The uproar they create through backstabbing, gossip, disrespect, and covert sabotage empowers them. They often possess protections that prevent their manager from handling the bullying, such as strong out-of-office or nepotistic relationships with their direct manager’s supervisors.
Why bullied managers don’t ask for help.
Bullied managers rarely ask for help. They may feel shame because others believe a manager should be able to handle an employee’s antics. They may lack power, knowing the bully employee has the protection of a union contract, or friends in high places that don’t see the bully for what he is. The bully employee may possess special talents making them hard to replace, or may have worked in the organization for years, making firing them an uphill battle with significant negative consequences.
How bully employees succeed.
As I describe in Beating the Workplace Bully, https://amzn.to/2UNMcyX, upward bullying often begins with subtle gaslighting, withholding of key information, behind-the-manager’s-back belittling, and other covert behaviors that erode the manager’s ability to supervise. Bully employees generally have more time and opportunity than the manager to connect with coworkers and to turn them against the manager.
Solutions
If this article hits home because you’re a bullied manager or realize you have a bullying-infested department within your organization, realize you need to act justly yet swiftly. The longer you wait, the worse things get. Bullies destroy a work environment with toxic behavior, driving out good employees and frustrating their immediate managers until they reach a boiling point and react.
If you’re a targeted manager and too embarrassed to ask for help, drop your shame baggage. A bully’s problematic behavior isn’t necessarily a direct reflection on your leadership ability, but failing to act would be.
You can’t allow bully employees to run the show or otherwise allow them free rein to act out until things spiral out of control. As the manager, you need to lead. You can’t afford to downplay what’s going on, nor to bury yourself in your work while allowing your bully employee unchecked access to their bully pulpit. No matter how large your workload, invest time in your relationships with each of your employees. Bully employees cultivate covert relationships with their peers and poison them against you. They can’t accomplish this if your employees know and like you.
Finally, let fairness guide you to the right action. Is it right and just to let a bully employee get away with bad behavior? No. You’re the manager, you need to act.
© 2024 Lynne Curry, PhD, SPHR, SHRM-SCP
I had such a “bully employee” work for me once and my greatest regret is not doing anything about it. He bullied his co-workers, his subordinates, and myself (and the next manager as well). For quite a while I didn’t know how bad his bullying of others was-he hid the bullying of others from me, and they didn’t tell me- and he could be charming and had some good qualities such as being 100% dependable, always early to work, and the customers loved him. But in hindsight, he was the reason why some really great employees left the organization. When I gave notice for an unrelated reason, his bullying of me became so ugly that I cut my notice short and left early. And I left that problem for another manager to deal with, which I regret. I had enough political clout to have gotten rid of him, if I had wanted to.
Thanks, Dee, I believe everyone who’s been in management for a while has seen the employee bully, and they’re difficult to handle and can drive many employees, coworkers, and managers out.
The employee bully is known but not often discussed, and thank you Lynne, for taking it on. The descriptions of employee upward bullying and gaslighting are great diagnostic tools and behavioral indicators. I have worked with a coworker whose behavior in part fits the description–especially the withholding information parts and outwardly charming bits. The manager either didn’t see or didn’t recognize the toxic side of this employee and protected the employee against another employee, a mid-level supervisor who also was a saboteur of subordinates, if not precisely also a bully. I found another job, but it was in a situation with a reputation-destroyer/manipulator threatening the organization with the destroyer’s friends and followers in action. Flooding the complaints with instances of outside praise and observations of outstanding performance was fruitless. Eventually I left this job and accepted that I just was going to have a hard time finding a job in my specialty. I would just have to be happy with a steady job with a good boss and hope that I could live on the pay I got. Now, I’m glad to be retired.
Susan, as always a great comment, and stories like yours are why I write, to fix injustice when I can. Thank you.