Bullying: psychological aggression at work

Working life, with work routine and career building, is a challenge to be faced daily. However, in addition to the usual activities, occasional problems and stress, coexistence at work becomes even more complex in situations of bullying.

• Bullying is when there is intentional and continuous exposure of employees to embarrassing or humiliating situations in the workplace. Is it, in fact, a psychological violence that causes workers to be emotionally destabilized, sometimes even leading them to resign ?, explains the behavioral psychologist Letícia de Oliveira.

Unfortunately, bullying is common and can happen to anyone. There is no particular profile that predisposes a person to fall victim to bullying. However, the most frequent victims are women, homosexuals, people with disabilities, the elderly ?, says Marcelle Santana Machado, a labor lawyer at Cavalcante Ramos Advogados.

Although the perpetrator is in most cases someone superior to the victim? bosses, supervisors, carers - it is also possible that bullying is practiced by colleagues who perform the same function as the person being beaten.

The reasons why someone harass a person at work are not always clear or rational. It could be a colleague trying to hurt you to gain more prominence, it could be an attempt by a superior to demonstrate authority, it could be an employer's way of creating an unsustainable environment for the worker to resign and not having to pay the labor costs. a termination.

Read also: How to critique your boss in a mature and professional manner

Regardless of the cause, bullying is never acceptable or justified and should be reported.

What is bullying? 11 situations that fit

It is not always easy to distinguish a bullying situation. Do victims often perceive harassment as "normal"? in the workplace, especially if aggression comes from a superior. Therefore, it is important to remember that bullying is not characterized by occasional tensions at work (such as stress, constructive criticism, eventual demands), but rather by systematic or recurring attitudes.

• Bullying is any conduct of worker exposure to humiliating and abusive situations, where the victim is isolated from the group without explanation, prevented from expressing without justification, hostile, frightened, ridiculed, inferiorized, guilty, repeatedly during working hours and in the performance of their duties ?, points out Marcelle.

Bullying can be identified in situations such as:

1. Requirement of tasks that do not match the function of the worker;
2. Deadlines for fulfilling unreachable activities;
3. Hide information essential to performing a job;
4. Deliberately ignore the person (not greeting, not responding, segregating, etc.);
5. Make criticism or scolding in public, exposing the person;
6. Control the time to go to the bathroom;
7. Criticize work excessively or unfairly;
8. Disregard medical recommendations;
9. Threats of any kind;
10. Ridicule, jokes, nicknames;
11. Exhibition of the employee's private life.

It is worth emphasizing that, regardless of the position occupied by the aggressor? if he is related to the owners of the company, if he is the owner himself, if he is his direct boss, does he occupy a hierarchically similar position to yours? bullying is never justified: no one can subject another person to such violence.

Read also: How to survive in a male-dominated professional environment

How to proceed

Bullying leaves deep marks on the victim. This type of psychological violence can affect a person's emotional health, as well as impair their work life and work performance. Therefore, knowing how to proceed in such situations is critical to take action and seek solutions.

In personal life

As with any type of trauma, it is not simple to overcome a case of bullying. Each has its own way of dealing with problems, which makes the harmfulness of aggression take different dimensions for different people.

• The person who goes through the harassment often ends up with psychological problems such as bouts of anxiety, stress and depression. Moreover, these employees often lose reference to their values ​​and qualities, and can be convinced that they are what their fellow harassers were talking about ?, says Leticia.

Relying on the support of friends and family, pursuing activities and hobbies that help restore confidence, working on self-esteem, and seeking professional help are all ways to begin the process of overcoming yourself.

Sources of achievement and importance will help the victim redefine his qualities and balance his emotional state. Seek therapy as soon as possible so that you can understand the best ways to balance your life again, advises the psychologist.

In the professional aspect

Resolving the situation at work can be the most challenging part: since the perpetrator is often also the victim's superior, the harassed person doesn't know who to turn to. In addition, the idea of ​​communicating aggression may be associated with the fear of making the situation worse, of being punished and even dismissed.

Still, reporting is an important step and should be done for the responsible departments of the company to find a way to solve the problem. If the aggression is done by colleagues, the victim may report the case to a superior or direct boss. When the perpetrator is the superior himself, the complaint may be made at other offices.

? The victim should report bullying to the company's human resources or personal department for factual disclosure, as well as to the company's Internal Accident Prevention Commission (CIPA) and the Occupational Safety and Medicine Specialized Service (SESMT), if any, and also inform the professional union of its category, which usually has a legal, medical and social service body. Unsuccessful, the victim must report bullying to the Ministry of Labor and the Public Prosecution Service ?, advises Marcelle.

Legally

In addition to the internal complaint, the victim may choose to take the situation to the legal level, even if the bullying has no specific legislation.

Being unsustainable to remain in employment, the victim should seek a lawyer in order to file a labor claim seeking the indirect termination of the employment contract, by providing evidence in the process, by conduct by the employer provided for in Article 483 of the CLT, as there is no specific regulation on bullying ?, explains Marcelle.

Compiling evidence of the situation may not be easy. Colleagues who know what is happening or have witnessed an assault can serve as witnesses and written message logs can also be helpful.

• The employee must gather all supporting documentation to demonstrate the bullying suffered. It can often be demonstrated through offenses carried out in corporate emails. Can the employee confide to the closest coworkers for the purpose of knowing the facts to be possible witnesses ?, says Clênio Denardini Pereira, lawyer specialized in labor law.

With evidence accepted by the judge, termination without just cause for serious misconduct by the employer will be ordered, in addition to the requirement to pay moral damages.

Such termination is considered to be the serious misconduct of the employer and consequently the employer shall bear the costs of termination in the same manner as the employee's unfair dismissal. That is, should bear indemnified notice, thirteenth proportional salary, vacation, overdue and proportional, 40% FGTS fine, salary balance, issuance of unemployment insurance guides and FGTS, etc. ?, explains Clênio.

Depositions

Testimonials from those who have suffered bullying further highlight the seriousness and harmfulness of this type of aggression, damaging their professional life, emotional health and physical health. Check out the testimonial of one of the interviewees:

? I worked in a place where the boss made the lives of employees who were getting? Expensive? to the company in a hell. Since the company had a career plan, as one climbed that plan, the more her life became difficult. He only took bad jobs that paid fewer hours and everything only got worse until the person decided to resign. I think this was a form of harassment because the intention was to make the person resign so that the company would not have to pay the company to resign or pay what the person should receive at the time of the career plan.

Bullying does not only happen in private companies: in public institutions and academia it is also possible to find cases of people who have experienced it. That's what happened to L., a victim of bullying during his master's degree.

“My advisor made me and his other students go through extremely embarrassing situations, followed by various types of charges. He always held group meetings and harshly criticized each student in front of everyone else. We were often humiliated for not knowing something. We could not think otherwise of him, for we were automatically wrong.During this time, I developed gastritis and my pressure, which was always normal, started to get a little higher. During the defense of my dissertation, at the end of the course, he humiliated me in front of all my family and friends present, punctuating even the smallest mistakes at work (such as typos) to attribute to my "incompetence". Today, I try not to remember details of everything that happened. I can say that I overcame, and that what brought me the best was learning not to reproduce this kind of behavior.

In the following documentary, produced by the Public Prosecution Service of Rio Grande do Sul, you can find some more testimonials from people who suffered with bullying.

Dealing with psychological and emotional marks can be a big challenge for those who have been through this. But it is possible to overcome trauma: the support of friends and family, the search for therapy, and activities that help restore confidence and work on self-esteem are great ways to seek overcoming.

Is it important to reinforce that bullying is never justified, regardless of who commits the aggression? direct bosses, company owners, colleagues in the same role. Reporting the perpetrator to the appropriate instances is an important step for the victim to be able to guarantee their rights.

Bullying in the Workplace and Psychological Aggression with Ed Stern (March 2024)