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occupational health and safety - workplace bullying

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occupational health and safety - workplace bullying
In diagnosing the causes and evaluating the consequences of workplace ill-treatment, discuss the role of factors associated with individual workers relative to factors associated with the workplace context.

Workplace bullying is evident across all workplaces and results in costs to both the organisation and the individual and continues to be an area of concern. Workplace bullying can be defined as ‘a repeated, unreasonable behaviour directed towards a worker, or group of workers, that creates a risk to their health and safety’ (Caponeccia & Wyatt, 2009; Workcover NSW, 2008). Bullying is an OHS hazard, whether it is intentional or unintentional. Through evaluating the findings of a number of sources, we can determine the causative factors of bullying and assessing the costs of this ill-treatment in the workplace using the basis of beliefs around “blame the victim” versus “blame the system”, which will assist in drawing conclusions on methods to improve workplace bullying. By simply recognizing bullying, organisations can take vital steps towards implementation of eradicating ill-treatments by incorporating a risk management approach within their culture to prevent and manage bullying, thus supporting of the “blame the system” viewpoint.

The first key sign of workplace bullying involves repeated unreasonable behaviour (Caponeccia & Wyatt, 2009), such behaviours would be seen as victimizing, humiliating, undermining or distressing to an individual or a group of people (WorkCover 2008). Examples of bullying include: undue criticism, gossiping and name-calling, social or physical isolation, intimidation, withholding information for effective work performance, work overload or not providing enough work, spreading rumours, humiliation and verbal abuse. (Caponeccia & Wyatt, 2009; House of Representatives
Standing Committee on Education and Employment 2012). The second key sign of workplace bullying relates to the harm of a person or person’s health and wellbeing

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