A LISTENING EAR HELPED RITA GET BACK ON HER FEET

A few years ago, Rita Gielen, a commercial manager at a Flemish SME, was bullied into leaving by her employer. After suffering for a long time, she is now finally leaving that dark place behind. Moreover, she is working on a book about her experiences – and those of the peers she has spoken with over the last couple of years.

It has been almost 20 years since Rita started at the – at the time small—company, which she developed into a solid SME together with the general manager. To put the company on the map internationally and make it grow, she travelled all over the world, and 16-hour working days were normal. The company grew from 3 to 30 employees, and revenues increased accordingly. Everything went well. Until she had a burn-out from all the hard work in 2015.

After the burn-out

“When I returned after three months, I expressed that I wanted to take things a little slower,” Rita tells. “I was ready to resume work, but with an external HR consultant, I had come up with a schedule of what I could and wanted to do, and what not. From that moment on, the CEO that I had worked so well with was never really satisfied. He said that if I couldn’t handle the job, I should leave.”
“The company was no longer running as smoothly either, so new investors came along. They brought in a new general manager and commercial manager. I was in the way. I was willing to take a step back or come up with an arrangement on a new division of tasks. I even hired a personal coach to guide me during this process. But they never responded to my proposals.”

Bullying

That’s when the bullying started “I suddenly received negative evaluations, decisions were made without me, I was snapped at during meetings, my phone calls and e-mails weren’t being answered, I wasn’t involved in recruiting new team members, choices I made were overruled … Whatever I did, I was constantly criticised.”

Rita’s first reaction was to start doubting herself. “Was I really making that many mistakes? Did I do something wrong? I tried to enter into a dialogue about it, but that didn’t work.” When the situation escalated further, Rita talked to the confidant at work. “He was our accountant. A nice man, but he couldn’t help me. And neither could the internal prevention advisor. It’s probably different in bigger companies, but in an SME, it isn’t easy to act against the general manager as a confidant or prevention advisor.”

Breaking point

Rita reached her final breaking point right before her holiday. She remembers the last confrontation as if it happened yesterday. “I was in an office with the owner, the new CEO and the new commercial manager. It was the day before I was supposed to go on holiday. The new commercial manager screamed something in my ear about my ‘silly face’ and that I would always feel him breathe down my neck. The general manager was laughing about it. She wanted to change my function. I asked for some time to think about it. The CEO didn’t say anything. The new commercial manager said: “Just go on holiday, everyone is entitled to time off.” So I left. And never went back.”

During that holiday, she filed a formal complaint with the external prevention service. She also hired a lawyer, who contacted the company to talk about a plan of termination. But they didn’t want to hear about it. On the contrary, they said they wanted me to come back. In reality, they wanted me to resign, so they didn’t have to pay any expensive dismissal compensation. I was too expensive to fire. So they looked for another solution.”

Trip to hell

The formal complaint with the external prevention service was a trip to hell. “First of all, I had to wait for thirty days before I was able to talk to someone. And then I had to write down everything that had happened very factually and chronologically. ‘You think you’re being bullied, but that might not be the case,’ they said. It was torture. There was no empathy at all. To prepare a file, I had to relive everything. It cost blood, sweat and tears. A lot of tears. But I had to go through with it. Nine months later, I received the final report from the prevention service. It stated that everything that had happened ‘could be perceived as bullying’. That didn’t help me. I do understand, though. After all, an external prevention service is paid by the company. So it has little interest in offending their client. But it left me out in the cold.”

“My lawyer continued to negotiate with my employer and was able to secure dismissal compensation. It wasn’t about the money. But it was about recognition. I wanted the bullying to be recognised. But eventually, the complaint was dismissed and justice was never done. The legal rules prescribe otherwise, but they are not applied. I was a good employee and I had a good relationship with my employer. We got along perfectly well. But that changed completely when the new investors arrived and they wanted someone else in my position.”

Listening ear

Slowly but surely, Rita got back on her feet with the help of those around her. “I’ve seen some dark places. I felt worthless because of everything that had happened. A big fat zero. I was broken. A wreck. At one point, I found myself standing by a tree in our garden wondering if the branch would support my weight. I got so scared. I was afraid I was going to kill myself and didn’t want to stay home alone anymore. I made sure that I was alone as little as possible. I knocked on a lot of doors looking for support. It was difficult to find a psychologist at first. There were waiting lists everywhere. Eventually, I did find one and they were able to help me. But I also received a lot of support from ACV at that time. When I asked for help at their Career Guidance Centre, they helped immediately. I was so glad and surprised. Nathalie, my career coach, was the first person, aside from my family and friends, to listen to my story. She made me feel heard, that someone was listening to what I had to say. I was finally being treated as a human being! That was a complete change from all the formal misery I had gone through.”

It has been a couple of years now and Rita has come a long way. She’s working again. At VDAB, where she helps job seekers find employment. Something completely different from what she did before. An empathic job that fits her outlook on life – she just doesn’t like the paperwork. “It’s so important to take care of your employees. Giving your employees opportunities, allowing them to grow, taking care of them as if they were family … It’s so important. But unfortunately, it isn’t self-evident. Employers often think too much in terms of profit and loss in euros, but they think far too little about the gain in experience and knowledge of their employees.