Identifying Workplace Harassment
2 October 2014
Read by 2978 persons
Workplace suffering is a real problem today. Before men and women collapse, victims of burnout due to harassment, how can we prevent and stop this process? Answers with Marie-France Hirigoyen, psychiatrist and psychoanalyst, who published Moral Harassment, moral violence in everyday life.
How do you define moral harassment at work?
For me, moral harassment at work is defined by abusive conduct (gestures, words, attitudes, behaviors...) which, by its repetition and systematization, undermines the dignity or physical or mental integrity of a person. Conduct that will therefore jeopardize the person's job or degrade the work environment.
It is important to differentiate moral harassment from stress, or a one-off aggression, or even general poor working conditions in the company.
Moral harassment has specific characteristics:
- attacks are most often individualized. They target one person in particular, and always the same one.
- these attacks are repeated endlessly.
- they generally do not concern the quality of the harassed person's work, but their privacy: it is the being that is targeted, not their know-how.
- finally, the hallmark of moral harassment is that there are not two interlocutors divided by a conflict, there is a dominant and a dominated, and above all no objective reason for this sudden outburst of contempt, or even hatred.
The "harasser" never tells their victim what they reproach them for, for the simple reason that these reproaches are most often unspeakable. Harassment most often arises from problems of jealousy, rivalry, or secrets hidden in a company (misappropriation, embezzlement...) that some have the misfortune of getting a little too close to.
Can anyone be morally harassed at work one day?
I think anyone can be a victim one day, whatever their personality structure. But some are better equipped than others to defend themselves: in particular, people who have real self-confidence and who can rely on a solid and secure family and friendly environment.
The people targeted are most often those who have invested a lot in their work and who are aware of doing well. Or those who have a profile different from others, because of their excessive ease, their strong personality or even their skin color or sexuality. These individuals bother some.
Contrary to what one might think, "harassers" do not necessarily target someone for their weaknesses but more for their non-conformity. They then apply a Japanese saying that I find very explicit: "the nail that sticks out will meet the hammer".
They will then try to isolate their victim by any means possible and then continuously attack them, without any reason. And it is this lack of reason that quickly causes one to lose their footing. The harassed person does not understand what is happening to them, tries to find meaning in the attacks but never gets an answer. They end up doubting themselves, no longer know what is normal or not in the behavior of others and in their own. The spiral is unfortunately very rapid.
How to get out of such situations?
It is important to react very quickly because the longer the harassment situation lasts, the more traumatic and profound the consequences will be, and the more difficult it will be for the victim to recover.
Harassment proceeds in a very insidious way, but it still lights up a few warning lights along the way. It is necessary to identify the behaviors, gestures or words that are aggressive, and not to let them pass. Most often, the harassed person prefers to forget them, because they do not understand them or because they are ashamed (a frequent attitude in cases of sexual harassment). It is necessary to verbalize these aggressions, to talk to one's entourage in order not to let isolation set in. Anything that doesn't seem normal must be said. And if the feeling of being a victim appears, it is necessary to react. It is often useful to confront the person who is attacking by asking them for explanations: if they admit that something is wrong, it becomes a conflict between two people that can be resolved. If they deny it, but continue to attack afterwards, it is harassment.
In these cases, it is very important to talk, if possible to someone inside the company, or outside. You should contact the labor inspectorate, a lawyer or a union representative. In order to better defend themselves, I also advise any harassed person to note down day after day the aggressions they are subjected to. And if this person is deeply destabilized, they must receive psychological and medical care.
Laurence Ravier.
Psychologies.com
Posted online on October 2, 2014.
How do you define moral harassment at work?
For me, moral harassment at work is defined by abusive conduct (gestures, words, attitudes, behaviors...) which, by its repetition and systematization, undermines the dignity or physical or mental integrity of a person. Conduct that will therefore jeopardize the person's job or degrade the work environment.
It is important to differentiate moral harassment from stress, or a one-off aggression, or even general poor working conditions in the company.
Moral harassment has specific characteristics:
- attacks are most often individualized. They target one person in particular, and always the same one.
- these attacks are repeated endlessly.
- they generally do not concern the quality of the harassed person's work, but their privacy: it is the being that is targeted, not their know-how.
- finally, the hallmark of moral harassment is that there are not two interlocutors divided by a conflict, there is a dominant and a dominated, and above all no objective reason for this sudden outburst of contempt, or even hatred.
The "harasser" never tells their victim what they reproach them for, for the simple reason that these reproaches are most often unspeakable. Harassment most often arises from problems of jealousy, rivalry, or secrets hidden in a company (misappropriation, embezzlement...) that some have the misfortune of getting a little too close to.
Can anyone be morally harassed at work one day?
I think anyone can be a victim one day, whatever their personality structure. But some are better equipped than others to defend themselves: in particular, people who have real self-confidence and who can rely on a solid and secure family and friendly environment.
The people targeted are most often those who have invested a lot in their work and who are aware of doing well. Or those who have a profile different from others, because of their excessive ease, their strong personality or even their skin color or sexuality. These individuals bother some.
Contrary to what one might think, "harassers" do not necessarily target someone for their weaknesses but more for their non-conformity. They then apply a Japanese saying that I find very explicit: "the nail that sticks out will meet the hammer".
They will then try to isolate their victim by any means possible and then continuously attack them, without any reason. And it is this lack of reason that quickly causes one to lose their footing. The harassed person does not understand what is happening to them, tries to find meaning in the attacks but never gets an answer. They end up doubting themselves, no longer know what is normal or not in the behavior of others and in their own. The spiral is unfortunately very rapid.
How to get out of such situations?
It is important to react very quickly because the longer the harassment situation lasts, the more traumatic and profound the consequences will be, and the more difficult it will be for the victim to recover.
Harassment proceeds in a very insidious way, but it still lights up a few warning lights along the way. It is necessary to identify the behaviors, gestures or words that are aggressive, and not to let them pass. Most often, the harassed person prefers to forget them, because they do not understand them or because they are ashamed (a frequent attitude in cases of sexual harassment). It is necessary to verbalize these aggressions, to talk to one's entourage in order not to let isolation set in. Anything that doesn't seem normal must be said. And if the feeling of being a victim appears, it is necessary to react. It is often useful to confront the person who is attacking by asking them for explanations: if they admit that something is wrong, it becomes a conflict between two people that can be resolved. If they deny it, but continue to attack afterwards, it is harassment.
In these cases, it is very important to talk, if possible to someone inside the company, or outside. You should contact the labor inspectorate, a lawyer or a union representative. In order to better defend themselves, I also advise any harassed person to note down day after day the aggressions they are subjected to. And if this person is deeply destabilized, they must receive psychological and medical care.
Laurence Ravier.
Psychologies.com
Posted online on October 2, 2014.
