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Workplace bullies can intimidate even the most successful and intelligent people. Learn how to spot them and secure your mental health.
You need to be really lucky to have a good professional journey where you not only make good progress financially but also do well in terms of your position in the organisation.
However, I would call it a truly successful journey when you become a master at managing a few different species, who may be physically present around you (or may distantly), but possess the special calibre of making the lives of their colleagues or juniors hell. They feel victorious only by causing some damage to their colleagues’ mental peace and they flourish in many places.
Yes, they are called bullies and they pop up everywhere; and if you are thinking of escaping from your bullying neighbours and reaching your office to get some solace, mind it, they are a breed which can sprout up anywhere and everywhere.
So if you can identify these workplace bullies and have the capabilities to manage them without it having any impact on your mental health, you are a winner.
Through this article, I am presenting 6 typical types of workplace bullies. I hope reading them would make your life easier since you would be able to identify such specimens and tag them as ‘bullies’ and become more aware. You can understand what to do with them and how to manage to keep your mental peace intact.
You have your critics everywhere and it is at times good to have your critics around – it helps you to improve upon yourself. But nitpickers are an exceptional species of critic who ensure that they find faults, however small or unimportant, everywhere they look.
You could have given your blood for a task, but then these nitpickers will not miss telling you about the tastelessness of your blood too. They are those who can never appreciate anything as they have never heard this word in their lives. Nitpickers are finicky and if you find yourself feeling suffocated around them, remember that they are to be ignored. Continue learning and performing your good work.
Ah! I am sure you will meet these on your way throughout life, and especially if you are a woman. Intruders are those who enter a place or situation despite their not being invited. They will push themselves into your private space where you might not be allowing even your family or best friends to enter. These intruders have the ability to barge in and mention any details about you that they have been able to gather at all occasions, to take a tight hold of you and control you. If you are able to identify them around you, be careful and build your guard up immediately.
Now, this one is serious. Gaslighters are often hard to identify. These are the people, who in order to gain more power, make their victims question their own reality. They have a tendency to make the victim doubt themselves. Gaslighting abuse causes a person to lose their sense of identity, perception, and worth. It is a form of narcissism and sociopathic tendencies as they look to gain power over someone.
To identify them, think deeply if you have ever questioned your own capabilities and worth, not because you performed badly, but because somebody has been telling you that repeatedly, which finally made you lose your confidence and self esteem. Be cautious of such people and if something like that is happening, it’s serious and you need to ensure that you take this up with your management. Nobody has the right to pull you down.
Oh! such people are not new. They have a different air around them that stinks and suffocates women. They have those lusty eyes and body language and their presence makes you feel disgusting. They are those organisms who have no other business but to letch around and make woman uncomfortable. The best way to handle these workplace bullies is to avoid interaction with such people or in case you are bound to interact with them, ensure that you have somebody with you, or you have the harassment policy of your organization handy.
These people are the ones you will often find taking a lot of energy by publicly insulting their team members or other colleagues. Either have the courage to snap back or take them immediately to the management. Yes, they can be vindictive but that doesn’t mean that you should be tolerating them day in and day out.
We have heard this word ‘politics’ during our corporate lives and this is produced by the amazingly manipulative people who have perfected the art of playing mind games. You would be happily following their advice and would never know that you have got stuck in a labyrinth. You have no other option than to succumb to their manipulative strokes through which they could easily extract their own success and fame at your cost. All I can say is keep learning from them as they are the biggest teachers!
Remember that you may be the smartest person in this world but there is someone out there who is one step ahead of you or in crude language, tumhaara baap hai! (literally, someone who can be your father – in other words, who outsmarts you).
It is a battle to manage such workplace bullies and emerge successfully without it having any impact on your mental and physical health.
Read them, identify them around you and be alert. Stay healthy and live your life!
Photo by Brina Blum on Unsplash
Ruchi is a new person who has dared to break all walls of monotony in life, a dreamer, a learner and likes to derive inspiration in all situations she is into. Recently plunged into a read more...
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