Workplace Bullying

Don’t Be A Workplace Bullying Bystander: Identify The Signs And Act

Wraps up in 13 Minutes

Author: Gavin Altus

Published On January 28, 2021

Quick Answer

A workplace bullying bystander is anyone who sees or hears bullying at work. An active bystander does something about it: they speak up when it is safe, interrupt the situation, get help from a manager or HR, check in with the person afterwards, or keep a record of what happened. You do not have to confront the bully to make a difference, and your own safety comes first. This is general information, not legal advice.

In this guide

Why compliance training matters
How culture shapes bystanders
The bystander effect
How to be an active bystander
The 5 Ds of bystander action
How employers can support bystanders
FAQs

Bullying usually involves not just a bully but a target and potentially bystanders.

Bystanders play an important role in dissolving or exaggerating workplace bullying.

Workplace bullying policies should recognise the role of bystanders as a priority.

Awareness about bystanders’ responsibilities and roles should then follow.

Bystanders play an important role because they are at ground zero, can change the situations directly and also act as witnesses.

Workplace bullying compliance training in businesses should aim to instil a sense of responsibility for the bystanders and increase their confidence and effectiveness in responding appropriately to bullying.

Importance of workplace compliance training

Raising awareness and adult learning programs are common methods in compliance training.

Workplace compliance training in equal employment opportunity and workplace discrimination shows positive effects on preventing workplace bullying.

For instance, some studies suggest that businesses that offered compliance training to managers received fewer lawsuits over managers’ actions.

This was because managers were better informed about the consequences of their conduct and therefore behaved in the best way possible.

Furthermore, it was noted that employees complained more to the authorities because of the knowledge of their rights.

Most harm at work is never formally reported. In the Australian Human Rights Commission’s Time for Respect survey, only 18% of workplace sexual harassment was formally reported, and only half of workers said their employer had given them information on how to make a report. When so little reaches a formal complaint, the colleagues who see what happens are often the best chance of it being stopped.

Organisational culture affects bystanders

According to studies, when managers and leaders are set to appropriate cultural values, it lessens employees from being accustomed to a climate of bullying and developing norms that perpetuate it.

This shows the importance of creating a culture of workplace compliance and how effective it is to send a strong message from the top down.

Moving beyond lip-service

Developing policies and providing training on workplace compliance is not sufficient to stop workplace bullying.

Organisations and leaders should cultivate caution and responsibility for bystanders who may possess varying degrees of understanding of human relationships and psychological well-being at the workplace.

Setting the culture right is of utmost importance. Culture sets the norm of valid behaviour. Leaders are the ones that have the most effect on the culture of any organisation.

Restorative organisational culture

There has been a new concept in organisations of Restorative organisational culture.

It aims to create a culture that fosters proactive responsibility for addressing workplace bullying-related behaviours.

To create a workplace culture that restores workplace ethics and general decency, workplace compliance training, mitigation and prevention should be adopted.

Positive roles such as intervening and defending, discussion of the dangers of negative roles, how to avoid being a passive bystander, and how to avoid bullying incidents should be covered in the training.

The Genovese Effect

Social psychologists John Darley and Bibb Latané popularised this concept following the infamous murder of a woman named Catherine Susan “Kitty” Genovese in New York City in the year 1964.

The 28-year-old woman was stabbed to death outside her apartment while the neighbours failed to step in to help or even call for help.

Later research found that the early newspaper reports of the case were exaggerated. A 2007 review in American Psychologist found no evidence that 38 neighbours watched the attack and did nothing, and some neighbours did call the police. The bystander effect itself has been studied many times since, and the idea still applies at work: when everyone assumes someone else will act, often nobody does.

Latané and Darley explain the bystander effect as a perceived diffusion of responsibility and social influence.

The bystander effect, also known as the Genovese effect, occurs when the presence of other people discourages a person from intervening as a witness in an emergency situation like bullying, assault, kidnapping, theft, etc.

It is hypothesised that the greater the number of bystanders, the less likely it is of an individual to offer help to a person in distress.

People are more likely to act proactively in a crisis when there are few or no witnesses present.

Many factors contribute to the bystander effect in the workplace, including compliance culture, readiness of the organisation to deal with such cases, along with the presence of other passive employees that reinforce mutual denial of a situation that needs bystanders to be active and not passive.

How to be an active bystander

The behavioural and social paralysis occurring in the bystander effect can be reduced with awareness and workplace compliance training.

One technique is to take action as if you are the only person witnessing an incident.

Often, when a single person takes action, even if only to shout out, “Hey, what’s going on?”, it can encourage others to take action as well.

Being an active bystander is most effective when you assume that you are the sole person in charge and also give directions to other bystanders to assist.

To be an active bystander, you need to understand some of the following signs of bullying and act immediately.

Aggression: Yelling or shouting at an employee is one of the most common forms of anger in the workplace.

Personal Insults: insults that are made on a personal level are considered more reprehensible and intolerable than others and can cause psychological damage.

Intrusive behaviour: can be explained as any behaviour that crosses the boundaries of a person.

These boundaries are not only physical in nature but emotional as well. Things like pestering someone with questions about their personal lives, intimate details about their relationship, questions about their income, giving unsolicited advice on a person’s appearance, etc, are some examples of intrusive behaviours that are not physical in nature.

Tampering with someone’s personal belongings without them knowing, unnecessarily lurking around their desk, stalking, spying, etc., are examples of intrusive behaviour that are physical in nature.

Coercion: is an ugly form of manipulation. Here the bully aggressively forces or persuades someone to do or say things that are against their will, desire and judgement.

Punishment: Punishing an employee with physical discipline, salary deduction, psychologically through passive aggression, or emotionally through isolation or any other tactics when not necessary is toxic.

Belittling: Persistently being dismissive of someone for their ideas, opinions, work, or personal circumstances.

Embarrassment: degrading or humiliating a person. As a bystander, you should stand up and help the individual if they aren’t able to speak up for themselves.

Revenge: Here are some examples:

Sabotaging a colleague’s work.
Spreading a false unpleasant rumour about a colleague.
Hiding a co-worker’s belongings.
Plotting a scheme to get a co-worker fired.

Offensive communication: This is one of the most under-recognised offences bullies get away with.

This is mostly because communicating offensively by using profanity, demeaning jokes, untrue rumours or gossip, or harassment is sometimes considered normal in many workplace cultures.

Blocking advancement or growth: Deliberately withholding information, training or opportunities someone needs to do their job or progress, or setting tasks unreasonably below or beyond their skill level.

Threatening: Threatening in the form of unwarranted punishment, measures to discipline an individual, termination, and/or physical, emotional, or psychological abuse is a form of threatening.

In this case, the bystander should help the employee check their workplace compliance policies and find avenues for reporting this behaviour, such as their manager, HR, a senior leader or the board, or an external body such as the Fair Work Commission or their state WHS regulator.

What to Do as a Workplace Bullying Bystander: The 5 Ds

Knowing the signs is the first step. The next is knowing what you can do about them. The 5 Ds of bystander intervention, developed by the non-profit Right To Be, give you five options. Four of them do not involve confronting anyone, so there is a safe choice for most situations.

Method	What it looks like at work	When to use it
Direct	Calmly name the behaviour in the moment, for example “That’s not okay, let’s keep this professional.”	When you feel safe, the situation is unlikely to escalate, and the person seems to want someone to speak up
Distract	Interrupt without mentioning the behaviour. Ask the person a work question, call them to a meeting or start an unrelated conversation.	When speaking up directly could make things worse, or you are not comfortable doing it
Delegate	Ask someone with authority to step in, such as a manager, HR, a senior leader or a health and safety representative	When someone else is better placed to act, or the bully is senior to you
Delay	Check in with the person afterwards. Tell them what you saw was not okay and ask how you can help.	Always. It works on its own or after any of the other four
Document	Write down the date, time, place, what was said or done, and who else was there. Give the notes to the person and ask how they want to use them.	Whenever you can. Records help if the matter is reported or investigated

Not every disagreement is bullying. Our guide to bullying versus conflict in the workplace explains the difference.

Your safety comes first. If anyone is in immediate danger or there is violence, call 000.

How to report bullying you have witnessed

Talk to the person first if you can. Ask how they would like to handle it. If you believe someone’s health or safety is at risk, raise it even if they would rather you did not.
Follow your workplace’s policy. Most bullying policies name who to report to, usually your manager, HR or a senior leader outside the team.
Stick to the facts. Share what you saw and heard, using your notes, rather than your view of why it happened.
Know the outside options. If the internal process does not work, the person being bullied may be able to seek help from the Fair Work Commission or the work health and safety regulator in their state or territory.

How Employers Can Support Workplace Bullying Bystanders

Work health and safety laws require employers to manage psychosocial risks at work, and bullying is one of them. Bystanders are far more likely to act when the organisation makes it easy and safe to do so.

Name the bystander’s role in your policy. Say what staff should do if they see bullying, and who they can report it to.
Offer more than one way to report. Include a confidential option, so people can raise concerns without going through the person involved.
Protect people who speak up. Make it clear that nobody will be punished for raising a genuine concern, and act on any victimisation.
Train managers to respond. A report handled badly teaches everyone else to stay quiet.
Close the loop. Thank the person who reported and, within privacy limits, let them know the matter is being dealt with.

An incident management system gives staff a confidential way to report what they have seen, and keeps the report, evidence and follow-up actions together.

This article is general information only and is not legal advice. Obligations vary by state and territory and by employment arrangement, so seek advice from an employment law professional for your situation.

Summary

It’s important to acknowledge inappropriate behaviour, be an active bystander, and call out or report behaviour that you perceive to be inappropriate.

Training your staff on workplace compliance is also a way to help keep your organisation safe for all.

Sentrient’s workplace compliance policy builders help you create effective workplace compliance policies in accordance with your brand identity.

With this cloud-based workplace compliance policy builder, you can easily roll out and store policies where everyone can gain access to them whenever they want.

We also provide easy-to-understand courses on workplace compliance designed for Australian businesses including:

Frequently Asked Questions

1. What is an active bystander in workplace bullying?

An active bystander is someone who sees or hears bullying at work and takes safe action, rather than staying silent. That can mean speaking up, interrupting the situation, asking a manager or HR to step in, checking in with the person afterwards, or keeping a record of what happened.

2. What is the bystander effect at work?

The bystander effect is the tendency for people to hold back from helping when others are present, because each person assumes someone else will act. At work it can mean bullying carries on in plain sight, because everyone who saw it waits for someone else to say something.

3. Can I report workplace bullying if I am not the person being bullied?

Yes. Most workplace bullying policies allow anyone who sees bullying to report it. Where you can, talk to the person first about how they would like to handle it, then report the facts of what you saw to your manager, HR or a senior leader.

4. What should I do after witnessing bullying at work?

Check in with the person, tell them what you saw was not okay and ask how you can help. Write down the date, time, what happened and who was there, and offer your notes to them. If the behaviour continues or someone’s safety is at risk, report it under your workplace’s policy.

5. Can I get in trouble for reporting workplace bullying?

Employers should not punish anyone for raising a genuine concern, and workers who make a complaint about their employment may have protections under the Fair Work Act. If you are worried about how a report will be treated, seek advice from HR, your union or an employment law professional.