When we’re abused at work, our perception of the world can feel like we’re looking into a tunnel with limited ways out. But painful, crushing experiences CAN lead to a new you according to #1 New York Times bestselling author T.D. Jakes.

It’s about trusting in the universe to lead you to healing after you feel like crushed grapes. Feeling crushed is part of a transformative process. If we’re protected from our pain, we may miss out on our purpose, Jakes says. It’s a lesson that Jen Sincero also teaches in her bestseller You Are A Badass: look for the lesson to help you grow and realize why you’ve been put on this planet.

We become our best selves when we’ve endured things we thought were going to kill us…. We get stuck because we are so adaptable to our environment that we start accepting normatives out of things not meant to be normal in our lives.

There’s a pathology of pain that people get into where if...

My workplace bullying started in May of 2010 when my then husband was on his second deployment to Afghanistan. I worked as an Executive Administrator for seven years coordinating sales training schools.

In September of 2010, my position became full time. After signing the paperwork, the sabotage increased. Management orchestrated it and recruited sales training managers, salespeople in the field, and possibly even a vendor. I just found out the term for this is “mobbing.”

• Things on my documents changed (limo pickup times, rooming lists, etc.)
• Laptop crashed, suspicious issues with computer
• Important papers were taken off my desk
• Excluded from meetings
• Blamed for mistakes that others made
• Workload increased
• Last minute requests increased
• Emails deleted

This was the first time ever in my life that my work was sabotaged. I was in complete shock that people actually behaved this way. I could not imagine doing this to anyone. I had always received positive reviews, and each...

I work for a large telecommunications company. In 2013, offshoring hit my office hard, and I jumped ship, leaving my office job to go to a field position. Because of the contract under which I work, with no experience under my belt, I was able to skip to the highest level of field tech, which generated hard feelings amongst techs who had been in the field longer than myself who were trying to attain the level at which I was automatically placed.

Little did I know what drama this was to incur.

I am also female in my senior years. I was first put under the best supervisor in the field, which gave me a false sense of security because he shielded me from the situation I had unknowingly placed myself. He moved on, and I had another great supervisor who moved on as well.

Then I was placed under a rookie supervisor who 1) did everything his boss told him to do — including bullying me — and 2) did not know how to train a new person so resorted to bullying techniques to protect...

A restaurant I used to work at was run by seemingly brainwashed people who all thought along the same line. If you disagreed with them, they either fired you on the spot or they made life difficult. A lot of people quit.

Most of the staff (except the select) were miserable at work:

• One employee was fired on a rumor that she said something unflattering about the owner.
• Meanwhile one male employee failed to show up for a shift but he kept his job. When the female employee did the same thing (she had a flat tire), she was fired on the spot.
• One employee was fired for making a mistake with a credit card. (This was one month after the brand new restaurant opened).
• One employee was threatened with termination because she came in late when her daughter’s dental appointment ran late.
• A rumor was started that two employees were sleeping together, and the female only was reprimanded.
• Another rumor started that an employee was huffing hairspray. A raid of her belongings turned up...

Workplace health is one important indicator of organizational performance — as a society’s success cannot be separated from the quality of its members’ lives. In his brand new book Dying For A Paycheck, Jeffrey Pfeffer exposes exactly why our workplaces are so toxic and what humans need instead.

“You are the cause of the healthcare crisis because 74% of all illnesses are chronic. The biggest cause of chronic illness is stress, and the biggest cause of stress is work.”
— Global manufacturer Barry-Wehmiller CEO Bob Chapman to a room of CEOs

Companies obsess over their carbon footprint. But what’s their human footprint?

We have environmental regulations to limit environmental risks — but what about employee well-being? We monitor workplace accidents and deaths, but we don’t mention the human impact of abuse, wages, health insurance, or work-family policies. Without measurement, reporting, and requirements for social pollution,...

Shock. Intense grief and anger. Fear. Hopelessness. Rumination. 

These feelings are common when workplace abuse disrupts our lives, leading us to feel stuck and isolated, like a shell of our old selves.

But face-to-face communication is the antidote for feeling alone. Through validation, you'll realize you're not alone — and not the problem. 

With this key discovery, you'll begin your own unique journey to recovery as you seek to re-define yourself and re-discover your self-worth as you heal from the trauma. You'll start to get back that spark so you can tell life who's boss.

That's the goal of the Re-Define Retreat, an all-inclusive, intimate getaway May 1-3, 2020 in a French chateau replica in beautiful Rye, NY, just 30 minutes from NYC.

You’ll transcend your pain, drop stress, get out of a rut, escape your comfort zone, and improve your mental health — using proven coping strategies, tools, and methods of recovery from workplace abuse. With...

We've all seen our Facebook feeds flood with #metoo after the Harvey Weinstein allegations spread, showing the sad culture of sexual harassment and sexual assault far too many women (and some men) have endured. It's a culture most of these sufferers have had to tolerate to succeed "because this entire town [culture] is built on the ugly principals that Harvey takes to a horrific extreme," says Krista Vernoff, who co-runs ABC's Grey's Anatomy (HollywoodReporter.com).

"If I didn't work with people whose behavior I find reprehensible, I wouldn't have a career.... We work within this culture so we can amass some power so we can have a voice. And those who don't do that — those who shout and scream 'this is not OK' when they feel threatened or belittled (those women who DID speak out against Harvey BEFORE the New York Times piece) — they largely live on the fringes of this town. They don't get the power. They don't get the platform that the mainstream...

If we were to create a workplace bullying target persona, she would be a 42-year old, college-educated, full-time, non-supervisory, non-union worker in healthcare, education, or the government.

Targets of workplace abuse are most often motivated to help others — the do-gooders who enter healing and helping professions. When they don't also focus on politics, they become vulnerable to abuse. This mindset generally falls along gender and industry lines.

Targets and witnesses often say that those targeted abuse are often kind and cooperative. Though they also considered targets not likely to defend themselves and vulnerable (a strength often seen as a weakness in our patriarchal culture), it’s important to note targets are cooperators, not competitors. And collaborative work environments are proven to be not just healthier for employees but also for organizations’ bottom lines.

Nursing and teaching: rampant with bullying
...

By guest blogger Jennifer Brown

 
I knew my first job out of college wouldn’t be for life but I didn’t realize just how quickly I’d want to get out of there. The job itself was fine, but while I quickly mastered my role and started to rise through the ranks, I came up against an obstacle I never expected: workplace bullying. The experience completely changed my career path and my life.

How Big of a Problem is Workplace Bullying?

According to Forbes, 75% of workers are affected by workplace bullying. While some workplace abuse is blatant, such as public verbal harassment or outspoken criticism, most office bullies prefer to hide behind the veil of plausible deniability. Exclusion, gossip, and professional sabotage, while hard for an outsider to recognize, wear down an employee’s self-esteem until they feel undermined, incompetent, and unwelcome in their place of work.

When faced with a workplace bully, we tend to focus blame on the individual. However,...