Bullies don't have to throw a single punch to do lasting damage to another person's health--or your business's fiscal health. Nearly 14 million adults in America are currently being bullied, and millions more are experiencing the degrading effects of witnessing that treatment. Bullying prevents work from getting done and undermines your mission. It only satisfies the perpetrator's personal agenda at the expense of people, productivity, and passion. The simple truth is that businesses need to address bullying to protect the bottom line.

The Bully-Free Workplace delivers a thoughtful and detailed plan to stop weasels, jerks, and snakes from killing your organization. Written by pioneers of workplace bullying research, this book tells you why and how to create an explicit policy against bullying. It appeals to those managers who value people and who are willing to challenge employers to adopt that value. The Bully-Free Workplace outlines a step-by-step program to correct and prevent workplace bullying. You'll get in-depth advice along with information to support your efforts, including:

• Why the personality of the bully pales in comparison to organizational factors that encourage and sustain bullying
• How to justify taking action against bullying for bottom-line fiscal rewards, productivity, employee health, talent retention, and positioning as an employer of choice
• Why you shouldn't leave a bullying issue to HR departments, and why the issue should be handled by an organization's CEO
• Why you should trust the reports from the trenches, and how to cope when a trusted colleague is the culprit
• How managerial and supervisory expectations without the benefit of specific training can lead to disastrous results

The stakes couldn't be higher: bullying can lead to disastrous (even fatal) health effects for individuals and plunging profits for businesses. As the philosopher Edmund Burke once said, "All that is necessary for evil to triumph is for good men to do nothing." The time has come for you to do something, and this book shows you how.