Employee mobbing in a nutshell
Being a student of psychology, I had always thought of mobbing in terms of crazed soccer fans, at a soccer match, attacking their counterpart’s fans. However, mobbing can exist in your company – it could be happening even as you read this article! Alison Eloff tells us more.
Psychologists have established the term ‘mobbing’ as ‘hostile and unethical communication directed, in a systematic way, by one or many individuals, towards another.’ In the employee scenario, employee mobbing happens when one or many employees (who usually have a mob leader) gang up against another employee and bully him.
How does employee mobbing occur?
A mob leader will manipulate his subordinates to gang up on a particular person. These subordinates have a relentless hunger to win at all costs. As such, they are all too happy to play ‘follow the leader’ and gang up on the leader’s target.
Important: When someone reports a case of employee mobbing to you, do not simply refer him to an independent counsellor. Investigate the situation thoroughly to come up with a solution. Remember that you, as part of management, have a duty to recognise and investigate early warning signs of mobbing within a department.
6 techniques to prevent employee mobbing in your organisation
1) Create various communication channels in your organisation to raise awareness among your employees about mobbing and bullying. If they are aware of this destructive behaviour, they will be quick to report it.
2) Your company policy must enforce respectful and ethical behaviour. Witnesses of mobbing, corruption or unethical behaviour must be encouraged to come forward and report this. Create a plan to ensure that people who report employee mobbing remain anonymous so they themselves don’t get targeted by the bully.
3) Carry out exit interviews to discuss why exactly an employee is going to leave your organisation.
4) Emphasise an open door policy in your company to monitor the morale in your office and control volatile situations.
5) Appoint managers who can take ownership of their department, and have the necessary skills and experience to do so. They will be more likely to root out instances of employee mobbing.
6) Provide management and staff training on how to identify and control employee mobbing.
