Critically evaluate the extent to which workplace bullying is Essay

Critically evaluate the extent to which workplace bullying is facilitated by Organizational rather than individual factors - Essay Example In the article entitled Organizational, Work Group Related and Personal Causes of Mobbing/Bullying at Work, Zapf, D (1999) stated BULLYING is defined as the severe form of social work stress maker. Bullying last very long and often times escalates conflict with frequent harrassing actions that are aimed at one specific person. According to Zapf (1999) further clarifies that the causes of the Bullying is the work place itself, the social system, the bully perpetrator and the victim itself. The unwiling victim employee needs work to feed his or her family. The perpetrator supervisor is given the power to hire or fire the victim subordinate. As a consequence the supervisor is tempted to ask favors which are sometimes immoral or illegal. The supervisor could have been given the same cold bully and victim treatment when the supervisor was just a new subordinate in the company. The supervisor may just want to play the same game but this time he is the supervisor and his subordinate is the new victim. The social system is also cause because the victim employee is forced to endure and accept his or her predicament because it is very difficult to find a job. The victim prefers to swallow his or her pride in return for money to feed his or her hungry family. A survey of two samples of bully victims and bullies have supported this thesis. It is further discussed that bullying cannot be explained well without discussing the other parts of the bullying system (work place itself, the social system, the bully perpetrator and the victim itself)There are a few supervisors who unfairly use their position to exert power to abuse or bully some of his or her subordinates. The supervisor will abusively ask favors which are against the labor law and other discrimination laws in exchange for job retention. The refusal of the employee to obey such illegal overtures may cause the removal of his or her job.Bullying in the workplace can be done many ways. One-way is for the bully to threaten the victim that he may be lost his job or be demoted if the bully supervisor or co-worker's overtures are not followed. Another bullying move is threaten the person's personal work standing such as threatening the victim's work due to the victim's age or sex. Another bully move is to isolate the individual or victim form g etting information, opportunities, outings, and others. Bully could also give impossible project deadlines, make the victim produce more work within the same time schedule and other undue pressure because the victim would not accept the love proposals of the workplace supervisor. The superior feels that the victim is helpless because of the difficulty of finding another job.Still another bully move by the supervisor is to undermine the individual or give a below standard work performance grade for a job excellently done or to give difficult project benchmarks so the victim will fail. The victim can either bow down to the overtures of the supervisor for special favors like having dinner in an expensive restaurant and the like. EFFECTS OF BULLYING IN THE WORKPLACE Bullying will have a long-term psychological effect