Preparing for Change:
Control Your Time at Work

If you work overtime in a job that is emotionally draining, you may need to cut back your hours while you are fighting a bully. It becomes more important for you to have sufficient energy to fight efficiently then to impress your employer with your commitment to your job.

If you cut back to standard hours, rearrange your workload so your job performance does not decline significantly. This may require turning down work, stretching out deadlines, reducing your responsibilities or finding someone to help with your workload.

Of course, a bully wants the opposite. He wants to overload you with work and give you arbitrary deadlines so you become burned out and emotionally frazzled. This will make you a much weaker opponent in his battle for dominance. Learn to say no to his demands.

If a bully insists on overloading you with work, cut back to standard hours anyway. He will condemn and ridicule you, but that is to be expected. As long as you perform well in the tasks you take on, you can take pride in the quality of your work.

Remember that a bully is going to attack you when you fight back. Why not fight him on your terms instead of his?

CONTINUE TO NEXT PAGE