Cyber bullying in the workplace… the employer’s responsibility?

Numerous folks simply assume that bullying is an unpleasant experience reserved for the playground. Sadly although, this is not the case. Recent reports have discovered that there are no age-limits or physical confines that exempt you from becoming a victim. The issue is that the older you get the far more resilient your expected to be, so usually a message that somebody finds hilarious can be highly offensive to a person else depending on a number of facets such as gender, race, religion, class and so on. The truth is that it stands with the employer to make sure that there is an acceptable usage policy drawn out and understood by all employees. Much more importantly though, to avoid any legal and potentially costly ramifications… such a policy should be adhered to and this requires monitoring!

What constitutes as cyber-bulling?

The website Safe Workers has noted an array of diverse examples of bullying at work employing electronic indicates as can be seen below.

Offensive e-mail – sending offensive e-mail to a colleague even if it is supposed to be a joke in which a individual may be offended by the content of the message or any photographs which are attached to it and continuing to do send similar messages having been asked to quit
E-mail threats – this can also contain relatively inoffensive messages in terms of content but the implied meaning behind the message can constitute a form of bullying. An example of this may well be where a superior is bombarding you with far more work than you can handle whilst other members of the team are not becoming treated in the identical way
Posting blogs and comments left on social networking sites – fairly often a person could not encounter any direct form of cyber bullying but instead the bullies are leaving nasty or offensive comments about them on blogs and social networking websites which can often be viewed by other people. This intimidation would also fall under the umbrella of cyber bullying
Spreading Lies And Malicious Gossip – social networking websites and blogs are normally the most frequent approaches in which men and women grow to be victim of yet another person’s cyber bullying.
Cyber Bullying Harassment – electronic cyber bullying, or ‘e-bullying’ as it is typically referred to, can also result in instances where the person could not even intend to harm you. For example, you may encounter an admirer at work who would like to establish a closer friendship or relationship with you and they’ll often use e-mail to ‘test the waters’ initial as the fear of rejection is usually far much less if an approach is made that way. Even so, people have been rightfully prosecuted for harassment where persistent e-mails follow, particularly if they have been rejected. This has even led to instances of stalking outside work
Sharing A Person’s Private Data Online – cyber bullying can take on a much much more sinister meaning when men and women post up personal details about you which are obtainable to the general public and which you wouldn’t typically want to share with complete strangers. This can include leaving house addresses and phone numbers for all to see
Employers ‘duty of care’

According to safeworkers, In the context of work, duty of care is legally binding on an employer. Put basically, an employer need to abide by what the law refers to as a standard of reasonable care in relation to employees. Failure to do so can result in claims of negligence if an issue arises, so don’t get caught out!

In relation to the net and email, an employer should be able to exert some level of control over his employees internet usage to minimise the risks of offensive content reaching his employees inboxes. This is effortlessly achieved by employing the use of sophisticated content filtering and spam filtering services that enable employers to monitor the type of mail and content that their employees receive, so they can block emails containing specific words and phrases or mail from unreliable sources that could be spam or a virus that can trigger harm to their computer system.

Employer’s … safeguard your employees but don’t forget to protect yourself!

With regard to monitoring employee’s internet browsing habits and to make certain as an employer you have noted your ‘duty of care’ legalities you can employ the use of a web security service which automatically shows your commitment to your duty of care responsibility.

Such a service enables you to monitor and restrict which sites your employees check out or how lengthy they spend on specific internet sites. This not only protects your employees and you from your legal obligations but it also means that rather than procrastinating on social media internet sites throughout work-time your employees will be a lot more productive!

On top of this, some web filtering services also supply a url filtering feature which protects your computers from viruses and malware which lurk on specific unprotected internet sites which employees may inadvertently click on, and which may possibly result in substantial costs for you if your laptop or computer systems turn into infected or you lose useful or personal data.

The dilemma is that a lot of the troubles that arise from world wide web usage in the workplace…. viruses, spam, phishing, cyber-bulling and legal battles … are usually developed at the hands of an innocent comment, risqué joke or inquisitive click but regrettably this doesn’t make them any less harmful. So don’t risk it… get protected!

In an write-up by Info Security, Eleanor Dallaway discusses the issue of Cyber Bullying with managing director of CQR consulting, David Simpson.

“Cyber-bullying is just a real-time, modern day way of delivering abuse”, says David Simpson, managing director of CQR Consulting, who are responsible for Disconnect, an anti-cyber-bullying campaign. “Cyber-bullies use anonymity as a weapon, without having fear of retribution or punishment. HR departments are struggling to deal with it”, he explains.

Beyond the obvious emotional and psychological repercussions that cyber-bullying causes, it is also a risk to firm reputation, Simpson points out. “If unprofessional behaviour and exchanges are leaked outside of the company, competitive firms use it as industrious espionage – they see cyber-bullying as a tool to damage their rival firm’s credibility.”

Cyber bullying or an innocent joke?

It has to be remembered that what 1 person finds offensive was genuinely not perceived as such by the sender but it’s these simply misunderstandings that can lead to bigger issues if not dealt with appropriately at the time! Keeping workplace morale at a high and allowing time for team bonding activities can usually support garner that understanding between colleagues that is a lot more challenging to understand by way of emails. The factor with emails is that you lose the tonalities of speech that are so essential in conveying meaning. So whilst a sarcastic or jokey comment is simply deciphered from an intentionally nasty 1 when the conversation is oral, when the words are merely printed on a page and received by the recipient these tones are removed and its frequently left with the receiver to convey their own opinion as to how the message was meant which as you’d expect can often lead to a misinterpretation.