Abstract
Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to examine the role that conflict management styles play in the relationship between interpersonal conflict and workplace bullying. Design/methodology/approach – A survey study was conducted among 761 employees from different organizations in Spain. Findings – Results suggest that an escalation of the conflict process from task related to relationship conflict may explain bullying situations to some extent. Regarding conflict management, attempts to actively manage conflict through problem solving may prevent it escalating to higher emotional levels (relationship conflict) and bullying situations; in contrast, other conflict management strategies seem to foster conflict escalation. Research limitations/implications – The correlational design makes the conclusions on causality questionable, and future research should examine the dynamic conflict process in more detail. On the other hand, to the authors’ knowledge, this is the first study empirically differentiating interpersonal conflict and workplace bullying. Originality/value – This study explores how conflict management can prevent conflict escalating into workplace bullying, which has important implications for occupational health practitioners and managers.
Highlights
Workplace bullying is an emergent phenomenon; it refers to “a social interaction through which one individual is attacked by one or more individuals almost on a daily basis and for periods of many months, bringing the person into an almost helpless position with potentially high risk of expulsion” (Leymann, 1996, p. 168)
This paper addresses workplace bullying as a conflict escalation process and explores the role played by conflict management styles in the association between interpersonal conflict and workplace bullying
Our results suggest a conflict escalation process as workplace bullying develops since relationship conflict mediates the association between task conflict and bullying at work
Summary
Workplace bullying is an emergent phenomenon; it refers to “a social interaction through which one individual (seldom more) is attacked by one or more (seldom more than four) individuals almost on a daily basis and for periods of many months, bringing the person into an almost helpless position with potentially high risk of expulsion” (Leymann, 1996, p. 168). This has resulted in some valuable suggestions, recent trends have demonstrated the need to move forward and obtain a more in-depth knowledge of workplace bullying by focusing on its underlying interpersonal mechanisms (e.g., Glaso et al, 2009; Neuman and Baron, 2011) To meet this challenge, we follow Einarsen et al (2011), who argue that workplace bullying is “an escalating process in the course of which the person confronted ends up in an inferior position and becomes the target of systematic negative social acts” Findings will shed some light on the underlying mechanisms of workplace bullying, and help managers take more effective steps to prevent bullying at work
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