I’m amazed by what triggers my thought process. I was going to send out a completely different newsletter, but reading yesterday’s paper changed all that. I’ve heard Rhona Raskin on the radio and she has even interviewed me on t.v. But I’ve never read her column until yesterday. One bit of her advice made me think about what we do with bullies and negative people at work.

Ms. Raskin was responding to a concern from a 17 year old about her boyfriend who wasn’t treating her nicely. Rhona replied “A life-enhancing rule to have early in one’s existence is this: I don’t hang out with anyone who treats me poorly, or makes me feel bad about myself. It’s really simple and works with friendships too. Your enemies have no regard for your feelings, and strangers can be off-hand and uninterested. The people who are in your inner circle should be your fans. That’s the definition of caring.”

Good advice, I’d say. Certainly good advice for our personal lives and I do my best to adhere to it. But how does this apply to our time at work? When you’re working with someone who is negative, or who isn’t very nice on a daily basis, or who is in fact an outright bully, what do you do? Regardless of the workplace situation, I always say it comes down to three options. You either: 1) put up with the status quo; 2) make positive change; or 3) quit. It’s really that simple.

Most people will chose either 1 or 3 and I’d guess the status quo usually wins out over quitting. I wouldn’t advise putting up with the status quo because 9 times out of 10 it’s not going to get any better. In fact there’s a better chance bad or negative behaviour is going to get worse.

In some cases, quitting is the best thing a person can do. If the bully or negative person is the owner then he or she is making a choice about the way the business will be run and it’s unlikely that person will change. The cost of losing a good employee, finding another candidate and training that new employee comes right out of the owner’s pocket and he or she (for some reason) doesn’t seem to mind.

If a rational discussion will get that owner to change his/her ways, then that’s good news. If not, then spend your off-hours looking for a better workplace.

So how about option 2 “make positive change”? There is a lot of good advice from people who give tips about subtle ways of avoiding the negative or bully bosses and colleagues. I’m not going to criticize that advice. In fact I’ve given such advice in the past and when brainstorming for alternatives, I may give it again. However, I’m going to give you an alternative to that advice.

Be firm. Be direct. Use your workplace policies. Go formal fast.

Every person reading this knows the amount of useless time we spend on negative and bullying people. We try this. We try that. We make improvements for a short time and then it goes right back to the way it was and we’re starting all over again.

And by the way, if you catch bad behaviour right at the start and correct bad behaviour quickly, that’s not useless time. That’s good management. Here’s a bit more detail:

Be Firm
Some of the best teachers and bosses I ever had were firm people. They were pleasant. They were competent (often very competent). They were productive. And they were firm. I knew where I stood with these people and if I screwed up I not only was told to correct my behaviour or mistake, but I accepted it because I knew they were right.

Too many people think they can’t be firm or somehow there’s a law against firmness. I suggest you’ll retain more good people by being fair and firm than you will by being everybody’s friend and letting people get away with bad behaviour, just so no one rocks the boat. Guess what – the boat is already rocking, and it’s likely because of all the people jumping off.

Be Direct
Don’t give mixed messages about the behaviour of people who are causing problems. Talk to them directly about what is wrong, what needs to be corrected and what will happen if there is not a positive change. Don’t bother starting off the conversation about how wonderful they are at other things. Get to the point about the bad behaviour.

Most people don’t get called on their behaviour and when they do, the conversation is about as direct as my way home was when I had to take a note home to Mom and Dad after school. That being said, make sure you give credit when an employee does a good job.

Use your Workplace Policies
Sometimes I get frustrated when people ask me for advice and then they don’t follow it. I don’t pretend to know everything (some days I feel like I know nothing) but when someone tells me they work for a decent organization with good policies and/or collective agreement language to deal with problem employees, and yet they choose to do nothing, I want to scream. The revolution is over. Numerous pieces of legislation are in place. Workplaces spend a fortune fine-tuning their policies.

And yet some people will never stick their neck out in case something won’t go 100% as planned. Well, it ain’t goin’ very well now, so what have you got to lose? If there’s something wrong with the policies, then spend some time fixing them. If your policies are fine, then use them.

Go Formal Fast
I’m the first person to tell people to correct problems as informally as possible, and from inside an organization. However, when the informal isn’t working, don’t get sucked in to a long drawn out process that’s going nowhere. If you find nothing is happening due to office politics or bad management, then utilize the formal part of your internal process to get action fast.

It’s in the best interest of the negative or bullying employee to string things along, but that is not in your best interest, nor the best interest of your business. I tell people to avoid going formal if you don’t have to, but if you’re getting nowhere, formal might be the only reasonable option.

So listen to Rhona Raskin when she says stop hanging around negative people and if you want more of her advice, go to www.rhona.com. Since we spend so much time at work it’s not just business, it’s personal. Life’s too short and negative people can make the workday seem very, very long.

Stephen

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Stephen Hammond, B.A, LL.B, CSP, is a speaker, trainer and author working in the field of workplace human rights. Articles, tips and his books Managing Human Rights At Work: 101 Practical Tips to Prevent Human Rights Disasters and Steps in the Rights Direction: 365 human rights celebrations and tragedies that inspired Canada and the world are available on his website www.stephenhammond.ca. Contact Stephen at 866-685-8338 or stephen@stephenhammond.ca