What is workplace bullying and harassment?

Workplace bullying and harassment are not always obvious.

They do not always look like raised voices or clear conflict.

Sometimes they show up quietly in patterns in the ways someone is made to feel over time.

Workplace bullying is often repeated behavior that undermines, excludes or chips away at someone's sense of safety at work.

It might look like constant criticism that feels personal rather than supportive.

Being left out of a conversation that affects you, having your work dismissed, overlooked, or taken from you, or noticing that you are becoming more cautious, more guarded, more unsure of yourself in spaces that once felt manageable.

Harassment can overlap, but it is defined by unwanted behaviour linked to who you are, your identity, your background, your beliefs, and it does not have to be repeated to have an impact.

What can make both experiences difficult to name is how they are often minimized.

Externally and internally, you might find yourself questioning what you felt, trying to rationalise it, telling yourself it was not that bad, but your experience still counts.

If your body feels tense before work, if you find yourself overthinking interactions, if something in you feels unsettled, unsafe or small, that's not something to brush past.

Work should not come at the cost of your sense of self.

Feeling safe, respected, and able to exist without harm is not too much to expect.

It is the baseline.

And this type of harassment or bullying can be overt or covert and at times it can even be classified as psychological, emotional, or even physical forms.

So if you ever feel that you are in a case where they may be where you had been subjected to some forms of bullying and harassment, it may be worth to seek out support in order for you to get the confidence to then possibly raise this if or when you need it.