ORGANISATIONAL MEASURES AGAINST BULLYING: ATTITUDES, INTERVENTION AND PREVENTION

In the past two decades there has been an increasing interest in workplace bullying and other forms of inappropriate treatment in the workplace. As a result, a growing number of studies on the prevalence, causes and consequences of bullying have been undertaken However, although these studies have provided us with useful information about both individual and organizational factors that might contribute to bullying and what needs to be taken into account when trying to prevent or intervene in bullying, we still know little about how organizations actually work to prevent and intervene these phenomena and what factors affect the propensity of organisations to take measures. In addition, most of the research has been undertaken from a target, rather than an organisational, perspective. The aims of this study are to explore HR professionals’ views of workplace bullying, to describe organisational measures that have been taken to prevent and intervene in bullying and to explain differences between different organisations. First a pre-study, consisting of interviews with personnel managers were conducted. Then a questionnaire was sent to the Personnel Manager in all Finnish municipalities. In particular, the study aimed to describe to what extent companies have policies on workplace bullying, if information or training on the subject has been given, how many cases of bullying have been reported and how often different measures have been taken to address bullying cases. A number of background variables were analysed as potentially explaining differences between municipalities as for degree of active prevention and intervention. These included size, performance, use of sophisticated human resource practices and characteristics of the personnel manager.