Drama at Dunder Mifflin: Workplace Bullying Discourses on The Office

This study examines the portrayal and affective framing of workplace bullying behaviors on the popular American television show The Office. Quantitative and qualitative content analyses were conducted on 54 episodes spanning the show’s nine seasons. Results revealed 331 instances of workplace bullying, for an average of 6.13 bullying behaviors per episode. Workplace bullying behavior on The Office was grouped into five categories: sexual jokes, public humiliation, practical jokes, belittlement, and misuse of authority. In general, instances of workplace bully were scripted as humorous and lacking significant consequences, which could further contribute to social discourses that perpetuate the problem of bullying in real-life workplaces.

Management: Besting the Workplace Bully

If you’ve ever encountered a workplace bully, you are not alone. Statistics show that bullying has been steadily on the rise and has taken on a variety of different faces.1 Once upon a time, the term “bully” typically conjured up the image of a playground aggressor—someone who used physical force or intimidation to victimize others. In that simpler time, retorts such as “pick on someone your own size” or “sticks and stones may break my bones but words will never hurt me” were common. However, workplace bullying shows little correlation to the physical size of the perpetrator and, among other things, it can involve words that are destructive. The havoc it wreaks can be as bad as—or worse than—what used to happen on the playground. Bullying presents a serious management challenge.