Name-calling and taunting are not limited to the playground and school hallways.

Bullies can show up in boardrooms, Zoom meetings, and office water coolers. Nearly 75 million workers in the country have been affected by workplace bullying, according to this year’s survey conducted by the Workplace Bullying Institute.

It seems that lawyers, who are trained to make sharp arguments and are often stereotyped – although there is some truth to this – as tough and combative, are also not immune to being adversely affected by bullying.

Here’s the evidence: 25 percent of Illinois attorneys have experienced bullying in the past year, a new report by the Illinois Supreme Court Commission on Professionalism found. The harassment — “acts or comments intended to intimidate, humiliate, embarrass or control” — has become so bad that nearly 20 percent, or about 10,000 practicing lawyers, have left their jobs.

Not surprisingly, the attorneys who are the most abused have a similar demographic to the children who are most at risk: women, members of racial and ethnic minority groups, LGBTQ+, younger people, and those with disabilities.

Meanwhile, only 20 percent of lawyers who were harassed, sometimes by a judge or a senior colleague, reported the behavior to their supervisors. Those who chose to remain silent did not want to lose their jobs and were worried about being perceived as “advertisers” or “weak”. Sometimes bullying is even encouraged, the Professionalism Commission report says.

Some lawyers have been told that bullying is just an “inherent part” of the legal world and that they “should learn to accept” the notion.

we object.

Attorneys should be held to “the same or higher standard because they are officers of the court and pursue justice for clients,” as the commission’s executive director, Erika Harold, told the Sun-Times’ Amy Yee.

Being resilient and able to face challenges are reasonable traits to expect from a lawyer or any other professional. But learning how to put up with or eat abusive remarks, excessive criticism, and ridiculously heavy workloads should never be part of your current job description.

An impact on mental health, the bottom line

Employers and employees who think tough idiots are assets are deluded and out of touch. Bullying, in fact, can have adverse effects on workers’ mental health and self-esteem. Additionally, when employees remain silent about abusive behavior, they may—as you’d expect—become disengaged, demotivated, and less productive. research showed.

Those itching to get ahead also need to reevaluate equating a tyrannical personality with success. Nasty people do get into positions of power, but those who are selfish, combative and manipulative are no more likely to achieve power than generous and reliable workers, according to a 2020. study by researchers from the University of California Berkeley and Colby College in Maine.

Bullying shouldn’t be dismissed from the workplace just because it can hurt the bottom line or doesn’t correlate with a thriving career. Remove it as wrong. The #MeToo movement has put sexual harassment in the spotlight. Bullying among working adults deserves the same scrutiny.

Anti-harassment policies and training, as recommended by the Illinois Supreme Court Commission on Professionalism for Legal Workplaces, should be in place in most offices. More importantly, employees should undergo bystander training, something proven to be most effective in combating workplace harassment.

There is no lack of thugs. When some elected leaders act like Biff Tannen from Back to the Future, their behavior alienates others. It is up to those of us who view bullying as seriously unethical to speak up in the workplace and elsewhere.

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