Change Agent - Issue 41

A few years ago, I flew from New York to San Francisco to meet with FCB, the ad agency of record for Levi's. When I arrived, I struck up a conversation with a fellow Internet entrepreneur who was sitting in the lobby. He had flown in from Seattle for a meeting. It quickly became clear that the media buyer had scheduled a meeting with both of us at the same time.

The media buyer sent out his secretary (secretaries are always the silent victims of bullying bosses). She told the other guy, "You don't have an appointment. We're not going to see you. We don't know why you came. Please leave." And sent him home. Just like that.

Needless to say, I went into my meeting more than a little nervous. In the middle of my demo (during which the media buyer took three phone calls and kept telling me, "Yeah, yeah, okay, move on"), my laptop burst into flames. Literally. Smoke started pouring out of the battery pack.

Obviously, there's not much you can do to prepare for this kind of unforeseen development, but I did what I could. I ripped out the battery, watched the wisps of smoke dissipate, and, without missing a beat, continued with my pitch. At the end of our meeting (which, as I recall, spanned a grand total of something like 10 minutes), the media buyer said, "Well, I have to go. Bye." And then he turned back to his desk.

Now, I would have liked to have made a sale, of course. But I've been turned down before, and I can live with it. However, there's no way that the people at Levi's -- who are great -- would have sat idly by if they'd been there to see this performance. They know that it's a bad idea to bully a possible supplier. After I left the meeting, my company instituted a policy: Never call on FCB again. How does that help their client?

Please note: Just because someone is gruff doesn't necessarily mean that he is a bully. Nor is someone a bully just because he doesn't like every one of your ideas. That said, it's pretty clear that bullying is a problem. Given how horrible bullying can be -- both to internal and to external relationships -- why do companies put up with it?

I chalk it up to fear and ignorance: fear that if you stand up to a bully, you'll somehow hurt yourself and the organization, and ignorance about the best way to deal with the bully.

A few years ago, Joanne Kates, who is one of the smartest and most successful camp directors that I know, decided to tackle this issue head-on. She decided to focus all of her energy on making her summer camp bully free. If you have any memories of summer camp, it's unlikely that they're bully-free memories! (And if you never went to summer camp, just summon up your memories of those classic Charles Atlas ads, the ones that feature the big-pecced bully kicking sand in the face of the scrawny kid -- who represents you, of course). The challenge that Kates undertook was a unique one, and I'm pleased to report that her camp is very successful. And you can make her idea work for your company as well.

At Camp Arowhon, they've discovered some remarkably simple (but hard!) ways to come to grips with bullying. Now, I'm the first to admit that summer camp isn't anything like the world of business. For one thing, business is a lot simpler than camp. For another, people at work are a lot easier to talk with, work with, and, ultimately, change than kids are at just about any camp. So I can fearlessly recommend these camp-tested techniques, proven to rid your workplace of bullies.

First, get over the fear. A bully-free company is faster, smarter, more profitable, and more fun. If the bullies quit, fine. You'll survive. And if you replace them with nonbullies, the company will thrive. The benefits of fixing the bully problem so completely outweigh the costs of ignoring it that all you have to do is weigh the two scenarios, and you'll be sold. Compared to failing slowly at an unhappy company, the fear is worth getting over.

Second, develop a bully-ridding tactic. It should be pretty simple, but you have to start from the top. Here are six steps toward a bully-free company:

1. Make it clear to everyone how painful and expensive bullying is, and announce that you'll go to whatever lengths necessary to stamp it out.
2. Keep your promise by backstopping anyone who stands up to bullying. When you see someone taking a stand, comment on it -- out loud -- in front of others who are being bullied. And be sure to use the word bully.
3. Identify bullying behavior that you aren't going to tolerate, and spell the rules out carefully to all of the members of your organization. (Sexual harassment, one of the most common forms of bullying, is already on the decline at many companies precisely because of this step.)
4. Clip out this article and send it to anyone who's a bully. And if you still haven't gotten over that fear thing, it's okay to send it anonymously. If a thoughtful, motivated person gets feedback like this from a few of her colleagues, it can make a huge difference in her behavior.
5. If a bully won't stop, fire him. It's sort of ironic that you have to bully a bully in order to get him to stop bullying, but it works.
6. The sixth step is the hardest one of all for some people: You've got to stop being a bully yourself.

Seth Godin (sgodin@fastcompany.com) is not a bully. He is, however, the author of Permission Marketing: Turning Strangers Into Friends, and Friends Into Customers (Simon & Schuster, 1999) and Unleashing the Ideavirus (Do You Zoom Inc., 2000). Get his latest book for free on the Web (www.ideavirus.com).