Not Just Kids' Stuff

Bullies aren't confined to the schoolyard. Some grow out of it; others just grow older. That's what Christine Truffet-Lefebvre learned from her job at the semiconductor manufacturing equipment firm Nikon Precision Europe. For her first three years as a secretary at a plant 30 km south of Paris, she enjoyed her work — and, she says, the respect of her boss. But after Truffet-Lefebvre, now 45, was divorced in 2000, she says her manager's attitude changed. "For him, the divorce meant that I would now be free to work on evenings and weekends," she says. "When I wasn't, he began to say that my work wasn't competent." ("Idiot!" read one Post-It note left on her desk.) After being given tasks outside her job description — such as keeping the bathroom stocked with toilet tissue — Truffet-Lefebvre felt "humiliated and very sad" to see much of her responsibility handed to a new assistant. Diagnosed with depression in September 2001, she left the following June after a prolonged period of unpaid sick leave. "I had to stop working there. Otherwise, I would have cracked," she says. She took her case to the local employment tribunal in Evry, and a four-judge panel agreed she'd been the victim of bullying at work, and ordered Nikon to pay €15,000 in pay lost to sick leave. Her boss always denied the claim. Nikon declined to comment on the case, but Barry Vaux, general manager of European administration, says, "Our primary concern is for the safety and well-being of our employees. This not only includes having a safe and harassment-free working environment, but also the policies and procedures to allow any grievances to be heard in a fair manner."

Bullying in the workplace takes many forms, from meaningless tasks and impossible deadlines to rumor, ridicule, and physical or verbal intimidation. In every field, from the arts to the military, there are boundaries of acceptable behavior: in December, British Royal Navy Commander David Axon was permanently relieved of control of the frigate H.M.S. Somerset following allegations that he had verbally abused two service members. According to Charlotte Rayner, professor of human resource management at Britain's Portsmouth Business School, 15% of British workers are victims of repeated bullying. In France, as many as 9% of workers are thought to be targeted, while in Germany more than 11% are bullied during at least one stage of their careers. Cary Cooper, professor of organizational psychology and health at the U.K.'s Lancaster University Management School, estimates that lost productivity from bullying costs developed economies around 1% of gross domestic product.

Who's to blame? More often than not it's a stressed boss venting frustration on subordinates. Against a backdrop of slow growth or high unemployment, pressure to perform and increased competition can lead to bullying. "People are worried about their jobs and tend to be less supportive of their colleagues," says Bärbel Meschkutat, co-author of a German government-backed study into bullying.

Sweden and France have passed new laws to protect staff from bullies — the French introduced such legislation in 2002 — while Britain and Germany rely on existing protections. The Dignity at Work Partnership, a $3.4 million government-backed project launched late last October by Amicus, the U.K. employees' union, is also trying to tackle the problem. With the help of dozens of British firms, Amicus aims to draw up a voluntary charter establishing what companies expect from employees — and how they'll punish wrongdoers. Truffet-Lefebvre, now happy at another firm, would surely approve. "It took someone who talked nicely to me to realize that I wasn't a bad employee," she says.