Bullying

7th October 2010

This is a topic which I find extremely interesting as it can appear in all aspects of life, and at any age. Most of us have experienced it to a greater or lesser extent at some stage, and we have therefore had to find ways of dealing with it (even if is has not been first hand, we may have had to support or help others through it).
The thing is although people may typically think of bullying as something which happens in our younger years (probably at school), in fact it carries on throughout life and the older we become, often it becomes more serious and harder to deal with.
The reason I am addressing this subject, is because recently I worked with a client who was being bullied. Not from within his business, but from one of his key customers. Essentially this customer felt he had such a financial hold over my client that he could demand things from him at any time, be rude to him, and generally treat him with a total lack of respect. Equally well, because my client felt so vulnerable because of his dependence on this customer, he would always back down, and do as he was told. In fact it got so bad, that my client started to plan his holidays when he knew this customer was also away, so he wouldn’t be pestered while he was trying to enjoy family time. In the end it came to a head, and my client finally had had enough. He told him that he was not prepared to take the abuse any longer, and if that meant losing the business, so be it. After the initial indignant explosion, and promises that he would indeed take his business elsewhere, in fact after a weekend cooling off, the bully backed down, and now there is a different dynamic altogether.
My belief is that this is by no means an uncommon situation, and whilst I am not suddenly advising everyone to “smack the bully in the nose” as it could clearly result in a serious or possibly terminal loss of business, I am suggesting that perhaps you should ask yourself is your current relationship/situation with clients like this really worth it? In my opinion you can never appease a bully. They love the power they have over you, and they get pleasure from building you up and then knocking you down again. Therefore there are two ways to deal with this, one physical (which I do not advise) and two, adopting the “why should I care what your opinion is” attitude to these people. Obviously if your business is so heavily reliant on one customer’s business, that if you lose it you could go bust, you will need to decide what matters most to you. But self-respect, and being able to sleep without worrying about the next volley of abuse you are going to get, are hugely important, and sometimes even more so than just lying down and taking it.
Obviously different people are in different situations, and it is never possible to give a “one size fits all” kind of advice. However, I have never in any walk of life seen anyone feel happy if they continue to kowtow or ultimately run away from the bully. The only way to beat them is to stand up to them and to show them that you are strong enough to get by without them.

---

Comments are closed.