What is workplace mobbing?

The repetitive, intentional act of teaming up on a target employee is known as workplace bullying or workplace mobbing. The power struggle that causes workplace mobbing can come from a variety of directions. When it is done by a group of employees to another employee, it is called horizontal workplace mobbing. When it is directed by a supervisor and one or more employees, it is called downward workplace mobbing. When it is a group of employees who target their boss, it is called upward workplace mobbing. 

External workplace mobbing is where a company unites with a group outside of their business in order to intimidate the target employee(s). A business within the same industry could unite with their parallel company in order to intimidate a survivor to remain silent. Perhaps the external business has mistreated their employees in a similar way and does not want the other company’s survivor to inspire or empower their workforce legally. As a result, they gas light the survivor into thinking they will not find work elsewhere should they later decide they want to leave their company. External mobbing could mean a business in an industry completely foreign to the survivor’s field cooperates with their company as it believes its interests are also in jeopardy should the company’s truth come out. Perhaps a tourism, retail, or new home construction company believes the survivor threatens their profits so they intimidate the survivor privately, leading them to believe that if they fight back they will endure severe retaliation. Another example of external mobbing is when a labor union unites with a company to mob its survivor. Perhaps the employees’ labor union knows the truth just like the company does: the employee they represented is a repetitive sexual perpetrator and the survivor’s advocacy will reveal their role in allowing illegal discriminatory acts. Perhaps the external mobsters believe those with heavy medical ailment need to be removed from the employee group as they weigh down the company’s (employee’s) health care costs. 

Systematic workplace mobbing is when the government makes laws or decisions that empower the mobsters while disempowering the targeted employees. The government maintains a technological system that makes it difficult for an employee to search for a missing email or lacks any method to track IP addresses on the employee’s computer.  The government grants administrators access to the survivor’s email and google accounts yet simultaneously allows administrators involved in the legal case the ability to delete permanently their files and emails. The government learns about a potential mobbing event but does nothing to investigate it. The government has legislation proposed that would make it easier for public employees to whistle blow yet than rejects the bill. The government refuses to pass laws against workplace bullying after an employee privately testifies this is what they have endured. The government allows companies to isolate survivors with non-disclosure agreements (privacy clauses that force the survivor to remain silent) and with contracts that forbid presenting “false accusations.” 

Finally, institutionalized workplace mobbing is when the public willing accepts group norms that permit mobbing and gas lighting. In other words, institutionalize mobbing is when citizens dismiss, discredit, and disempower workplace mobbing survivors with victim blaming statements. Workplace mobbing victim blaming statements function the same way sexual harassment victim blaming statements do. They demonize the survivor’s character (i.e. you are so narcistic to think they were talking about you or you are just allowing your insecurities to get the best of you or you hold on to things too long), minimize the survivor’s story (i.e. social ambiguity happens all the time or that is how company politics work or people make mistakes), psychoanalyze the survivor’s sanity (your crazy to think the union would cooperate with the company or you are crazy to think a caring employee would intentionally gas light its employees) and maximize the survivor’s responsibility while disguising the mobsters’ role (i.e. you should have asked why you were excluded or you should have restated your suggestion after they ignored you or you should have advocated for yourself). 

Institutionalize mobbing is perhaps the most dangerous form of mobbing as it enables systematic, external, and internal mobbing. The public focuses their attention on the survivor’s perceived personality flaws instead of examining their evidence and testimony. The public also criticizes the survivor’s response without understanding the deceptive, gas lighting context of in which mobbing operates. The survivor feels attacked, surrounded, and helpless because they notice an intentional pattern of deception, betrayal, and manipulation. They are not paranoid. What they see, hear, and feel is a real, organized attempt that attacks them in order to ruin their reputation and push them out of their company.  It is known as workplace mobbing.