Why Bullying Happens

Understanding why bullying happens doesn't excuse it, but it does change how you respond to it. Most workplace bullying follows patterns that have far more to do with the bully's own insecurities and the environment around them than with anything the target actually did.

It's Rarely About the Target

One of the hardest things for people experiencing bullying to internalise is that it's almost never really about them. People who bully are typically driven by their own insecurity, a need for control, or unresolved stress they're offloading onto someone else, and they tend to select targets who are competent, well-liked, or otherwise perceived as a threat to their own status — not people who've done something to deserve it. This is why bullying so often escalates when the target is performing well or gaining recognition; the behaviour is frequently a reaction to feeling threatened, not a response to genuine wrongdoing.

Power and Insecurity Drive More of It Than People Expect

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A significant amount of workplace bullying comes from people in positions of some authority who feel that authority is precarious — a manager worried about being outperformed, someone anxious about their own job security, or a person who's been treated poorly themselves further up the chain and reasserts control by pushing it down onto others. Bullying gives an insecure person a sense of dominance and predictability in a situation that otherwise feels out of their control. It's a coping mechanism, even if a deeply damaging one, more often than it's a calculated strategy.

Organisational Culture Enables It More Than Any Individual Trait

Individual personality explains some bullying, but culture explains far more of why it persists. Workplaces where results are prized above all else, where managers face little accountability for how they treat staff, or where complaints are historically dismissed or handled quietly to protect a "high performer," create exactly the conditions bullying thrives in. In these environments, bullying isn't an aberration — it's a rational (if toxic) strategy for someone who's learned that aggressive or belittling behaviour gets results without consequence. This is why the same person can behave completely differently in a workplace with strong accountability versus one without it.

Bullying Often Gets Passed Down

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Many people who bully were bullied themselves, or were managed by someone who modelled exactly this behaviour as "just how things are done here." Without deliberate intervention, this pattern tends to repeat — someone who was humiliated by a manager early in their career, and saw it "work," often replicates it once they're in a position of authority themselves. This doesn't make the behaviour acceptable, but it explains why bullying so often clusters around particular teams or particular management lineages rather than appearing randomly across an organisation.

Groups Behave Differently Than Individuals

Bullying that involves more than one person — exclusion from a group chat, several colleagues echoing one person's criticism, a team that goes quiet when a target walks in — often happens because bystanders feel safer going along with a dominant behaviour than opposing it. Group dynamics create a diffusion of responsibility: each individual bystander feels less accountable because "everyone" is involved, even when most of them wouldn't behave that way on their own. This is part of why bullying can spread through a team quickly once a senior or influential person sets the tone.

What This Means for You If You're the Target

Knowing why bullying happens won't stop it on its own, but it can protect you from the most damaging part of the experience — believing it's a fair judgement of your worth or performance. It's a pattern rooted in the bully's own dynamics and the environment enabling them, not evidence of something wrong with you. What does help practically is documenting what's happening as it occurs — dates, specifics, witnesses — using something like Bully Log so you have a clear, factual record if you decide to raise it formally, rather than relying on memory once things have escalated. If it's ongoing, your union, HR, the Fair Work Ombudsman, or ultimately the Fair Work Commission's stop-bullying process are the practical paths forward — this article offers general information, not legal advice, so for guidance on your specific situation, those are the right places to turn.