Bullying in Veterinary Workplaces | Episode 32 | Reviving Vet Med

Surveys demonstrate that approximately 50% of veterinary team members have experienced sustained harassment in the workplace. Workplace bullying is a rarely discussed but incredibly important problem in veterinary medicine and something that veterinary leaders, practice managers, and team members must take steps to mitigate or prevent. 

In today’s episode, we review the definition of workplace bullying, who it impacts, what the consequences are, and how veterinary workplaces can prevent or address bullying. I also share my own experience with bullying and what I encourage others to do if they find themselves in a similar situation. 

Resources

Bullying in the Healthcare Workplace: A guide to prevent and mitigation (American Medical Association): https://www.ama-assn.org/practice-management/physician-health/bullying-health-care-workplace-guide-prevention-mitigation 

Bullying and Aggression in the Veterinary Profession by Dr. Justine Lee (Clinician’s Brief): https://www.cliniciansbrief.com/article/bullying-and-aggression-veterinary-profession 

Behaviour in Veterinary Practice by Sally Everitt (VetSurgeon.org & VetNurse.co.uk): https://www.vetsurgeon.org/behaviour.pdf 

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Transcript

Hi everyone!  Welcome to another episode of Reviving Vet Med in today's episode we are going to be talking about bullying. 

I must say that I am astounded by the number of people in veterinary medicine who tell me that they have been bullied. These are individuals who've taken my online programs, they've done coaching with me or their friends and former colleagues. And what all of them have in common is that they work in VET Med, and they have been bullied by a coworker.

So during the month of February, we celebrate random acts of Kindness Day on the 17th and pink shirt or anti bullying day. At least here in Canada on the 22nd. So, I thought it was appropriate in light of those celebrations to address this important topic of bullying.

So in today's episode, we will review the definition of workplace bullying. We'll talk about who it impacts, what the consequences are, and how veterinary workplaces can prevent or address bullying. I will also share my own experience with bullying and what I encourage others to do if they find themselves in a similar situation. So with that said, I am really glad to be able to share this important information with you today. So, let's go ahead and get into the episode. 

This is the Reviving Vet Med podcast, and I'm your host, Doctor Marie Hollowaychuk and my mission is to improve the mental health and well-being of veterinary professionals around the world.

So we'll start by saying that there isn't a lot of information in the veterinary literature on bullying. There is a study out of the UK that I will share with you and I will also share with you what we know about bullying in the healthcare workplace because I do think that this information applies to veterinary medicine and this seems to be the most robust amount of information that we have in our similar spaces.

So I'll link to this document in the show notes. But the American Medical Association released a document called bullying in the healthcare workplace, a guide to prevention and mitigation. And they define workplace bullying as repeated emotionally or physically abusive, disrespectful, disruptive, inappropriate, insulting, intimidating, and or threatening behavior targeted at a specific individual or a group of individuals that manifest from a real or perceived power imbalance.

This is often, but not always, intended to control, embarrass, undermine, threaten, or otherwise harm the target. So, I think there's two main things that we want to think about when we think about the definition of bullying and the first one is, is that there is the behavior itself. And I think all of us can relate to being bullied at some point in our lives, whether it was as a child or perhaps as an adult in school or in another situation and perhaps for you, even in the veterinary workplace as well.

But what's important to recognize is that there isn't just the behavior that is associated with this, but certainly in the workplace, there is a perceived imbalance of power. So whether this is an individual who is ranked higher than you, whether it is an individual who you know has power over you because you need them to do your job or they have information that you need or they have control over your job or whatever it might be, but that there is this perceived power imbalance is.

It really, you know, makes bullying what it is, especially as I said in the veterinary workplace. So there are individual organizational and veterinary medical factors that all contribute to the overall workplace climate or culture, and that is what allows this unprofessional behavior, such as bullying to persist. So, this isn't necessarily just a practice issue. Obviously, there's individuals involved. And very often this does stem from the organization or the management itself in terms of the culture or what they do or do not tolerate in the practice.

So this same document also describes different factors that contribute to workplace bullying. They include a bullying culture, poor staffing levels, something that of course we're experiencing in veterinary medicine, excessive workloads, which of course we're also experiencing power imbalances. Which I've discuss poor management skills in terms of not addressing the bullying behavior, role conflict or ambiguity. So this is where individuals might both be supposedly doing the same thing, or there's a bit of ambiguity in that each individual maybe isn't sure exactly what their role is, and so there's conflict or, you know, harassment or, you know, these bullying behaviors that occur as a result of that.

Stress is also a factor that can contribute to workplace bullying as well as a lack of autonomy, meaning that individuals aren't able to do the work on their own without having to check in or connect with other people.

So, there was a 2017 Workplace Bullying Institute survey that showed that 63% of workers are aware of bullying in their work. This means that bullying in the workplace is more common than sexual harassment, and it is initiated by both men and women, so this isn't something that is just relegated to certain individuals, and in fact in the healthcare space, all healthcare workers including physicians, nurses, medical assistants, pharmacists, etc. Are victims and perpetrators of workplace bullying.

Now we do have a study that was performed in veterinary medicine in the same year in 2017. This survey was performed in the UK and surveyed approximately 700 veterinarians and veterinary nurses and found that 50% of those surveyed had been on the receiving end of sustained harassment in the workplace. Overall, 29% felt deliberately overloaded with work, 31% had been shouted or screamed at, 31% were the subject of false or malicious accusations. 35% were belittled in front of clients. 44% were deliberately excluded or ignored. 51% were spoken negatively about to others and 73% were belittled in front of other staff members and similar to the healthcare workers space, all members of the veterinary team, including nurses, vets, practice managers and other team members.

All cited experiencing bullying and we know based on our own personal experience in this research that those same individuals. Are also or I should say those same positions within the hospital are. Also, can all be perpetrators of bullying? So it's not necessarily always the nurses that are experienced in bullying. The nurses can be the bullies themselves.

So they looked at in that particular study what the different groups tended to experience. And they found that for veterinary nurses being on the receiving end of sly glances or feeling deliberately excluded or ignored were what they most frequently reported experiencing, whereas for veterinarians and practice managers it was having their authority undermined. So it's interesting that different groups tend to experience different things, and certainly in my experience, you know, I have spent time in general practice. I've spent time in academia. I was a veterinary student a long time ago, and after that I did an internship and then a residency, and then I spent time in academia.

And since then I've been a locum, which means that I have traveled to different practices as a veterinary specialist, and this means essentially, that I've been in many, many, many different workplaces and unfortunately, in many of those workplaces I have witnessed or experienced bullying.

And at times, students have been the victim of bullying, maybe because a technician, you know was ignoring them, didn't want to help them, or it was maybe an annoyed resident that wanted to give them a remedial task. I've seen interns be the victim of bullying when it comes to faculty members or residents treating them. I've seen technicians be the victim of bullying by other technicians and other veterinarians and members of the team.

And it seems that just because you move higher up in the ranks in terms of being a specialist or a practice manager or even a practice owner, that you would be somehow, you know, excused from being the victim of bullying. But this really isn't the case. We know for sure that based on again, experience and research that all individuals in practice can be the victim of bullying.

And I'm going to link another article in the show notes as well. It was written by a colleague of mine and other emergency and critical care specialist who most of you know from that girl as Doctor Justine Lee and Justine wrote an article in clinicians brief many years ago on her experience with bullying and what can be done about it. So I will link to that note. As well.

So my own experience with bullying has, you know, changed in form over the years. I, you know, experienced bullying, thankfully not often. As a child, I can remember some some minor circumstances in elementary school and thankfully not much, you know.

As I moved up through junior high and high school and really it wasn't until I was working as a specialist that I really experienced pretty bad bullying in the veterinary workspace and for me my experience was an individual who it was another critical care specialist who was making false and malicious claims about me saying that I was treating team members in a not nice way and was speaking negatively about me behind my back and this was at one of my locum.

Practices that I was working at, so this there was a power dynamic here and that this critical care specialist was the lead of the department and basically had a say in whether or not they were going to hire me as a locum. At this practice.

And you know, at the time I remember thinking ohh my goodness. Like I questioned my communication. I questioned the way I was treating my team members. I questioned the way I was handling my stress and felt horribly that I had somehow, you know, had this really detrimental impact on the team.

Ended up reaching out to a counselor to talk about the situation and and talk about, you know what I could do differently and what was I missing in all of this? And it was the counselor who actually brought to my attention that she felt that this was an incident of bullying and that this person. Was being very manipulative in making it seem that I had done these things and said these things and was saying these untrue things about me behind my back to the point where it almost, you know, felt true. Like I thought, gosh, I you know this. I can't believe I said that like; I don't remember saying that. But if that's what you know, if that's what you're saying, then you know, I guess that's what happened. And I have, you know, more clarity now. This was a couple of years ago. So, I can look back and recognize it.

And you know, honor how I know that I behaved and I'm not perfect, you know. Don't get me wrong. I've definitely had my moments of you know, raising my voice, getting angry with someone, losing my temper, especially because I work in a high stress environment in the emergency, in the ICU and don't get me wrong, I don't make that to seem. I don't say that to seem that it's OK. 

And in those instances, you know, I've always apologized and taken responsibility for my behavior. But this was a situation where there were things that were being said that were either. You know, extremely exaggerated, to the point that they were false or just malicious. Ways to manipulate the situation or to make it seem you know that I had had done things that that wasn't actually true and all with the intention essentially of preventing me from coming back to work at this practice. 

So that was a really upsetting time and you know the effects of bullying on individuals and veterinary practice have far reaching impacts, you know, not just to the individual who is victimized or bullied, but to the patients that they're trying to care for the other team members, for the organizations themselves, for the clients, you know and the pet owners themselves.

What we know, based on individuals who experience bullying, is that they can often experience anxious thoughts and depression, which was something that I experienced after my incident and chronic stress and for individuals who are in unrelenting situations of bullying, they may experience a complete. You know, mental breakdown or severe mental health crisis or even suicidal ideation.

So thankfully my experience was short lived in that I wasn't employed at this practice. I, you know, have not returned to work at this practice. Unfortunately, there are individuals who do end up staying within the practice where they're being bullied and becoming very withdrawn or apathetic to their veterinary job. And if not intervened upon, these individuals may choose to leave the profession completely just disillusioned by their experience.

And I've certainly seen this with my friends experiences and my colleagues experiences who have been bullied, who Said to themselves, you know this isn't worth it. This job is stressful enough, and you know there's enough at stake here that I don't need to go into work feeling so anxious about my interpersonal interactions. You know that I can't even concentrate on the work that I'm doing as a veterinary care provider. So the big question is then what do we do about bullying in the veterinary workplace?

So because bullying in the veterinary workplace occurs because of individuals. Because of the organization and because of the systemic factors, when we talked about those factors, you know the caseload, the short staffing, etcetera prevention and mitigation should happen at all levels. So in other words, everyone is responsible. Individuals are responsible, the organization or the owners are responsible, and certainly the practice management and leadership are responsible.

So when it comes to tangible things that practices can do to prevent or mitigate burnout. Practices must implement or improve upon some sort of workplace policy regarding bullying. So an effective workplace anti bullying policy should describe the management's commitment to providing a safe and healthy workplace. This shows that. The leaders are concerned about bullying and that any unprofessional behavior is going to be taken seriously.

In that document, there should also be a clear definition of everything that could be considered bullying, workplace violence, harassment, intimidation, threats and other forms of aggressive behaviors. There should also be a specification as to whom the policy applies to, and quite frankly, the policy should apply to everyone. All members of the practice team, administration and management clients, contractors, locums, everyone who is going to set foot in that veterinary practice.

There should also be a definition of behaviors that are expected and behaviors that are prohibited, and this is something I speak to a lot of practices about in my workplace while being program and in my one-on-one coaching and that is that it's not enough to just, you know have some practice values and say you know we're all about trust, respect. Client care. You know what? Whatever those values might be, you have to outline the behaviors that are in alignment with those values, as well as the behaviors that are not in alignment. So, I'll use the example of respect to respect as a practice value. Then we would speak to each other with kindness.

And we would listen when another person is speaking without interruption. And what we don't do is any sort of harassing, intimidating, aggressive, you know, or other untoward. Potentially bullying behaviors. The document should also outline steps for employees to take when they feel that they have experienced workplace bullying.

So step one, who do you contact Step 2? What do you do next? Etc. Within those steps there should be contact information and a clear process that clarifies confidentiality. And you know, gives people information as to what should be documented and how things should be reported.

The document should also prohibit retaliation and ensure privacy and confidentiality. And you know, that's something that I think a lot of people feel deters them from reporting bullying because they worry about that retaliation. I've been speaking to someone recently who's been experiencing bullying in the workplace and that's exactly what she has said to me, that she's concerned about is, you know, it's just a matter of time. There's not many people that work with this individual, and she's going to know that it was me, and then there's going to be retaliation because that's what she's done before.

So, it needs to be clear within the practice that retaliation is not acceptable. And quite frankly, in my opinion, should be grounds for 0 tolerance dismissal. There also should be documentation of training requirements, so anybody coming on to the team or if this policy is new, there should be training involved where everyone has some sort of training in workplace harassment and workplace bullying to really understand what falls under this category and what to do in response.

So, in addition to this workplace policy regarding bullying, there has to be concerted efforts to improve the organizational culture. So a lot of the times bullying happens in workplaces because that is the culture in the workplace. In Justine Lee's article and clinicians brief, she talks about like thinking this was some sort of right passage when she was going through her internship and residency because everyone was doing it. It was kind of like, well, yeah, you're an intern. You get bullied by the resident when you're a resident. You get bullied by faculty and so on. And so forth, that means or what that demonstrates to me is that bullying is a culture in that workplace.

We want to cultivate a culture in which bullying does not happen, where there is respect and appreciation among colleagues across all disciplines and ranks. That means it doesn't matter what service you work in, what position you have in the hospital, but that everyone feels safe, secure and confident. in their role and in the work that they do.

So how do we create this type of culture? Well, hopefully the practice is first taking stock of whether or not there is a bullying problem in the practice. So this can be done by surveying team members anonymously and confidentially to ask them what are their perceptions of the workplace culture. Do they think that bullying behavior happens and what are their ideas about the impact of this behavior and not just on themselves, but on the clients, the patients, etc.

We also want to show those employees after that survey that their feedback is being taken seriously, so we would use that survey information to create policies, programs, resources, etcetera for team members. This means making sure that they know what sort of employee assistance programs they have access to so that they have an outlet that is confidential whereby they can talk to someone about their experience of bullying.

We also want to encourage open discussions where team members can talk freely about their problems or encounters with whatever behavior might constitute bullying. Maybe it's a little bit gray area. We're not really sure. Maybe there was gossiping, and you know, is gossiping, bullying while someone’s speaking about me behind my back while they're not speaking negatively, but they're still.

Talking about me when I'm not Privy to it, let's have a conversation about that again. If we can speak openly about that, we can decide as a practice, this is not behavior that we want to condone, even if it isn't bullying. And most importantly, we want to have a culture where situations of bullying are intervened upon as soon as they are reported.

So this means that they are taken seriously and there are consequences for the perpetrator of the bullying, and this is something I'm seeing to be a real problem in veterinary practice is which is where the management does not want to address the bullying. They think. Well, you know that person maybe didn't mean it or person who said they were being bullied is very sensitive. You know, maybe they just need to thicken up their, you know, their skin.

Whatever it might be, but it's really shushed off, and that's exactly what we don't want, because those individuals who are, whatever their experience is, whether or not it is true bullying or not, it must be taken seriously if they feel strongly enough that they have come to you to share their experience, there needs to be follow up and a conversation and it needs to be more than one conversation. In other words, if management addresses this behavior with a bully, there needs to be a planned follow up in which you know at which time they speak to them. Again, to clarify that the behavior is not real.

So another factor in diminishing bullying in the veterinary workplace is to foster psychological safety and a lot of the things I've talked about, you know, creating a healthy culture that doesn't condone bullying, having the the bullying policy in place. These all help to foster psychological safety, which is really the safety to speak up and say when a person you know is experiencing something difficult or when they don't agree with something or when they have made a mistake, whatever it is.

So in order to have a culture of psychological safety or to foster psychological safety, people need to be held accountable for their behaviors. There needs to be 0 tolerance policies for some of these severe behaviors, and we have to have a culture of open communication whereby everyone. Regardless of their role or rank, feels comfortable to speak what's on their minds.

So when it comes to culture, remember that the leaders dictate the culture the managers enact it. They follow through on it. You know, they hold people accountable, they communicate it and the employees ultimately follow. Now they follow if they're being held accountable. If employees are not being held accountable for their actions, then they are just Willy nilly doing whatever. And in that case, it's the managers who have dropped the ball.

Another very important step in terms of mitigating workplace bullying is to educate everyone. Everyone from the veterinarians to the volunteers about why unprofessional or hostile behavior is a problem.

And this way, if the staff recognizes that the leaders are concerned about bullying, they're more likely to come forward when they feel that bullying has happened. Or better yet, if we can create a culture where bullying is not acceptable, when someone witnesses their co-worker being bullied, they're going to speak up and say that's inappropriate. We don't do that here. That's not OK.

So what can individuals do if you have had experiences similar to the one that I described? Or maybe you know of someone who's experienced bullying? You know, ideally in a perfect world, like I said, we would call someone out for their bullying right there on the spot. If that is not comfortable, or if you are the victim of bullying, you want to inform someone right away. Tell your manager, tell your direct report, tell someone.

And if they do not handle the situation soon, then move on to someone higher up. Now, depending on your practice structure, this might be the practice owner. It might be someone in human resources, it might be a regional manager if you feel like your concerns are not being addressed, you escalate it to the next higher up in order to get that addressed.

Now I hope that this is not the case in in most circumstances, but if you happen to be bullied by the owner of the practice themselves, or someone very high up in the organization, this can be a very, very difficult situation to address. You can certainly attempt to correct the behavior with conversations. And in those conversations, you would also indicate the consequences if that behavior doesn't stop.

Sample you might, you know, outline the bullying behavior that you've experienced. I would be very, very specific with what it is that you feel has been inappropriate, how you've been impacted by that in terms of how you feel, how you want that behavior to change and what will happen if it doesn't change for example, it might be you having to, you know, put in your resignation. Now I know these conversations aren't easy, and I do have a download that I'm going to link to you link for you in the show notes so that you have a bit of a guide for that. Again, I cannot stress this enough. You want to take care of yourself if you are experiencing these situations. 

So speak to a mental health professional so that you can have that unbiased outside perspective so that they can offer you some advice or guidance as to how to handle the conversation and so that you feel supported in what you are going through.

As I mentioned before, I spoke to a mental health professional a number of times after my workplace bullying incident and it was very affirming for me, it was a relief. You know, I was just doubting myself and questioning myself so much that I had somehow, like, brought this on myself. Like there was something I had done to deserve being treated this way or there was something I was missing in my own behavior.

And the mental health professional was, you know, unbiased, you know, person who was able to give me her objective opinion and then guide me through how to manage the situation. So I can't stress that enough. Take care of yourself and definitely lean on a mental health provider for support.

So that's it for this episode of Reviving Vet Med. I hope that you enjoyed this conversation about bullying in the veterinary workplace. I urge you, if you know of someone who has experienced bullying, or you know of a practice manager or owner who is working on mitigating bullying in their own workplace.

Please share this episode with them. It's very easy just to send the link along to them via text or e-mail and it might give them some tips and strategies for them to be able to mitigate bullying in their workplace. And of course, If you did enjoy this episode, I would also love it if you would subscribe to the podcast so that you can get episodes as soon as they are released.

I'm excited to share with you that we have a new website of Veterinary Wellness resources available for you. The website is revivingvetmed.com. Please check it out and you will see lots of blog posts and articles posters, handouts and of course my online programs and other resources to help promote veterinary mental health and well-being for all members of the veterinary team, no matter where you are on your wellbeing journey.

I would also like to thank my amazing assistant Jamie for producing this episode, and of course you for listening all the way to the end until next time. Take care of yourself. Bye now.