Fifth Sign of Evil Management:
Management Creates False Appearance
of Dealing with Bully

When low morale becomes an issue, management will usually try to fix the symptoms rather than the underlying problem, which is the behavior of a bully.

Management typically addresses low morale by trying to manage your perceptions, which becomes counterproductive because the hypocrisy is readily visible to increasingly cynical employees.

How management creates the false appearance of dealing with a bully

- They act like they are in full control of the problem - They rationalize a bully's behavior as "tough management" - They discount the severity of a bully's behavior: "It's a minor problem." "He lacks maturity, but he will grow into the job." "He is very aggressive, but over time he will develop his interpersonal skills." - They highlight only one or two incidents of bullying behavior and ignore the overall destructive pattern - They mislabel behaviors to avoid harsh descriptions: Manipulation is called persuasion Backstabbing is called posturing Gossiping is called bonding - They never address the long-term pattern of a bully's behaviors - They ignores the impact of a bully's destructive behavior on others - They never follow up to make sure a bully has improved his behavior

The only exception to management's ineffectiveness occurs in the rare case that a power-hungry bully manipulates a top executive. Then the bully will be dealt with quickly and effectively.

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