Bullying at Work - 7 Reasons Why Your Colleagues May Not Support You!

Bullying at work continues to happen on a daily basis, and it can happen to anyone, from a University lecturer to a worker on the shop floor, anyone can face the attentions of bullying colleagues or more likely a bullying manager or supervisor.

In many instances of workers being bullied, it can and does happen when colleagues are not witnessing the bullying behaviour, at other times it can be in front of your fellow workers. But even when it happens in front of colleagues, why is it that in many cases they do not support you, they just keep their heads down and pretend it is not happening, or if it is committed when not directly witnessed, why don't your colleagues look out for one another and look for signs of bullying in the office or work area, so that they can support you and help stamp out all workplace bullying behaviour. This is an interesting question!

Some of the reasons are as follows:

1. The first thing to realise is that a work colleague is just that, a person that just happens to be employed at the same place as you; they are a stranger, someone you don't know and have probably never met before in your life, they are definitely not your friend. You may during the course of your working life become well acquainted with them but in most cases they will not become a close friend. You owe them no loyalty and they do not owe you any

2. Many of your colleagues want to earn extra income and status by getting promotion within the company, you and your fellow workers may well be viewed as unwanted competition for any potential future promotions, so a colleague helping you by supporting any complaint you make about a bullying manager or supervisor may not be in their best interests. If they help you the same manager will not look at them favourably at promotion time

3. Some of your colleagues will be happy that someone else is being bullied instead of them

4. There are always some of your colleagues who never get bullied or feel that if they were, they have the ability to counteract the bully on their own, so they think you should do the same, they therefore do not get involved

5. Some colleagues shy away from confrontation, or come to the work just to do their job and do not want to get involved with the office politics

6. The bullying manager may be friends with some of your colleagues, so they will not side with you as this will affect that friendship or their own career prospects

7. All your colleagues need their salaries to pay bills and raise their families; even if they believe you are getting a raw deal, they may fear losing their own jobs so are not going to risk their families financial security for you

Many of us mistakenly think that because we see our colleagues every day they are our friends and have our interests at heart. In reality people in the main look after their own interests first, so helping you with your problems of being bullied at work may rank well down their list of priorities. This is fortunately not always the case, but it does teach you that the one person you can and must rely on is yourself!

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