Bigg Elephant

“The serial bully feels threatened by colleagues with competence, integrity and popularity, and sooner or later he picks one out and projects onto them his own inadequacy and incompetence. Using unwarranted criticsm and threats, he controls them and subjugates them, without a thought for the contribution they make to the organisation, or their self esteem, self confidence, loyalty or their health. Sooner or later this person – the bully’s “target” – realises that they are not being “managed”, “mentored”, “developed” or “investigated”, but “bullied”, and they start to show signs of intolerance. When this becomes apparent to the bully, sensing that the target might complain to a higher authority and expose his misconduct, he neutralises the target by isolating them and destroying their credibility and reputation among decision-makers and peers, and then putting them out of the picture through dismissal, forced resignation or even early retirement. Once the target has gone, within about two weeks, the bully’s focus turns to someone else and the cycle starts again.” Dr Field