Andriana BoyrikovaHave you ever been bullied by another woman in the workplace? If yes, you aren’t alone. According to research, 70% of women have been bullied by a female boss. Sadly, I fall into this category, too. At last, after three years, I have the mental strength to share my experience and what I have learned from it and how we – women together – can take small steps to become role models for collaboration over competition.
I know that sharing such an experience can spiral up into a thorny discussion: first, because we don’t want to admit that we are covertly competing with other women and, second, because we feel that we are betraying our own sex by speaking up or acknowledging that women can bully other women.
However, in the years following the nightmare in my previous workplace, I realized that only by speaking up we can make a difference for the sake of a healthy work culture and employees’ mental health.
Taboo or not, female rivalry in the workplace is a fact
The two women who made my life a misery in my former workplace used to badmouth me the moment I left the room (I accidentally heard them a few times when I had to go back because I had forgotten something). One of them (my supervisor who was supposed to know everything and mentor me but instead assigned an unreasonable amount of her workload to me and blamed me on a daily basis for things going wrong) had told me not to speak up or ask questions in meetings.
The other woman was withholding necessary information from me and keeping me out of the loop on projects that I was supposed to be in charge of.
Once, I confronted in an email (because I was scared to do it in person) my supervisor’s inadequate decisions that led to conflicts between students which I had to solve.
She didn’t reply. Instead, she showed the email to our manager, sparing him the reasons why I had sent it.
I ended up having to listen to my manager’s scolding, “There is a hierarchy here, Andriana, you can’t question what she does.”
Moreover, these two ex-colleagues of mine (I can’t stress enough how happy I am that they are ex-colleagues) regularly excluded me socially, either from meetings or water cooler chats. Once, during one of their regular chats about their weekend shopping sprees – from which they kept me out by pretending I wasn’t in the room – my supervisor suddenly turned to me (somehow remembering that I was there too) and ordered me to go to the other office and start the computer for our upcoming meeting.
At some point, she removed areas of my responsibilities and delegated them to a student without explaining to me why she had done so. I accidentally found out when the student emailed me: “I am in charge of that now.”
I will put a period here and spare you the hundreds of other examples of their undermining me which made me cry almost every evening, find fault with me for things I have or haven’t done, and spend my Sundays dreading to go to work the next day.
It took me more than a year and a half to pull myself out of the dark place they had put me into and be able to trust another woman again.
Unfortunately, I am not the only woman who has been bullied by other women in the workplace.
According to a study by Cecilia Harvey, founder and chair of global showcase platform Tech Women Today, 70% of female executives feel they have been bullied by a female boss. Harvey calls it “the biggest hindrance to women advancing in the workplace.”
What’s more, a report by the Workplace Bullying Institute found that a third of workplace bullies were women. This marks a decline compared to a decade earlier when 4 out of 10 workplace harassers were women. What hasn’t changed, however, were the targets. In both instances, women preferred to bully women in 65% of the cases.
Why do women bully other women in the workplace?
But why do some women sabotage other women in the workplace? Why do we consider it normal to verbally tear apart a woman who happens to be absent? Why do we ambush another woman in a meeting? Why do we withhold information from a female colleague who needs help? Why do we manipulate others into thinking less of a high-performing woman?
According to Bonnie Marcus, executive coach and author, one factor is psychological. Such behavior might stem from insecurity: a woman is mean to another woman when she feels inadequate in a particular area. “She doesn’t believe that her abilities will help her reach her career goals. Consequently, she is always looking for potential threats to her success.” What’s more, she feels that being aggressive is the only way to be taken seriously or to be the only “top” woman.
However, according to Alton B. Harris and Andrea S. Kramer’s study, a major cause for female rivalry is the work environment.
“Women often experience unique difficulties working positively with other women not because of the way women are but because of the biased workplace situations women encounter.”
If the workplace doesn’t offer equal pay and sufficient advancement opportunities for women to reach senior and leadership positions, they become more competitive due to increased scrutiny and they see everyone as a threat.
In a study by Robin Ely in which she picked some male-dominated firms where no more than 5% of partners were female and some other firms where women were slightly better represented in the top ranks, she asked the female lawyers at both types of firms how they felt about their female colleagues. She found that in the overwhelmingly male firms, competition between women was “acute, troubling, and personal.” Compared with the women in firms where they were better represented, women in the male-dominated settings thought less of one another and offered weak support, if any.
If I draw on my personal experience, I can conclude that the problem wasn’t solely in the two bullies: the hostility, unfairness, and badmouthing were entrenched in the work culture.
In short, if the team leaders and the director of the department (the person at the top of the hierarchy) hadn’t tolerated bullying, the two women would never had dared act in such an oppressing way.
This is how together we can stop female rivalry in the workplace
According to Prof. Naomi Ellemers, “avoiding that women are exposed to gender discrimination in the workplace is the most effective way to prevent the emergence of female bullying.” And, I believe, this requires action not only from HR but from senior leadership, too.
It is the people at the top of the hierarchy who need to encourage gender diversity and inclusion in the workplace by, for instance, having women mentor men; showing talented and hard-working women at the company that they are valued; and making it normative to support women to succeed in senior and executive roles.
Apart from that, you and I can blaze a trail and become role models for collaboration over competition with these day-to-day practices:
- We should never talk badly about another woman or gossip. If we have constructive feedback, we should share it with her directly and respectfully.
- Before putting another woman down, we should ask ourselves: what if she is struggling with depression or emotional issues or needs some validation?
- We should learn from more experienced female peers. Reach out to them, talk to them about the battles they have faced and what they have had to overcome.
- We should reach out to a female colleague we have been envious of and ask her opinion or compliment her.
- If we become a witness to bullying, we should step up and confront the act immediately: address the bully and support the target; let her know that the way she was treated was inappropriate and unprofessional.
- We should publicly praise women for their ideas, contributions, and accomplishments — in meetings, over email, and even in casual settings.
- If a colleague feels insecure about a pay raise or discussing a problem with her boss, we should tell her we believe in her and encourage her to do it.
- If we know a high-achieving woman, we should tell her to own her success rather than chalk it up to other people’s help and luck.
- If we are in senior roles, we should invite more women to high-level meetings.
- We should realize that our success isn’t diminished by other women’s success. By helping another woman, we are sending positive energy.
Conclusion
While female rivalry in the workplace is a contentious topic, we can’t just sweep it under the rug because it is uncomfortable to talk about it. We need to understand some of the factors that cause women to sabotage other women in the workplace:
- a psychological factor (such behavior might stem from insecurity);
- a workplace that doesn’t support gender diversity;
- a toxic work culture where bullying is tolerated.
Understanding the causes is the first step to overcome the problem, taking action is the next. HR and senior leadership must promote gender diversity and ensure equal pay and sufficient advancement opportunities for women. At the same time, we – women together – need to lift each other up and remember that another woman’s success doesn’t diminish ours. By helping another woman, we are sending positive energy.
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Have you ever been bullied by another woman in the workplace? If yes, have you spoken up about this experience? Let me know in the comments.
