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Psychotherapy in West London

Psychotherapy & Counselling with Marcus Gottlieb

Counselling for Victims of Workplace Bullying & Harassment

Learning to take control and dealing with bullies at work

  • Are you being treated less well than your work colleagues?
  • Are you the butt of someone’s anger or cruel ‘humour’ at work?
  • Do you feel manipulated?
  • Are ‘performance issues’ misinterpreted or blown out of proportion?
  • Do you have a nagging feeling that someone in a senior role is targeting you?
  • Are you continually ridiculed or even openly harassed by another member of staff?
  • Have you become afraid of going to your office, or are you losing sleep over these things?

If it’s ‘yes’ to any of these, you could well be a victim of bullying in the workplace. Counselling for workplace bullying and harassment can help you develop the most effective tools for dealing with the situation.

What is workplace bullying?

You might not realise you’re being bullied at first – it can creep up on you. If you’re worried about being isolated from your colleagues, singled out from the team, constantly blamed or under threat of some coercion or discipline, the likelihood is you’re suffering from workplace bullying.

Once they have developed, the bully’s passive aggressive behaviours often form part of a larger pattern of bullying and harassment that includes outright aggression. Workplace bullying can involve:

  • Shouting, intimidation and making threats
  • Name calling or insults
  • Spreading malicious rumours
  • Denying holidays or training opportunities for no reason
  • Being micro-managed
  • Constant nit-picking and fault-finding
  • Not giving appropriate credit for good work
  • Undermining your authority or belittling you in front of co-workers
  • Not including you in workplace conversations or activities
  • Setting unrealistic goals (a type of covert, passive-aggressive attack)
  • Repeatedly taking away meaningful work in favour of menial tasks
  • Handing you an unfair share of workload or not enough of the work
  • Depriving you of career development opportunities or withholding promotion
  • Increasing your responsibility while reducing your authority
  • Restricting personal communication (perhaps using email only, for no reason)
  • Withholding information to prevent you from doing your job properly

What effect does workplace harassment have on a victim?

Whether it’s you or a work colleague that’s being bullied, some of the symptoms to look out for in victims of bullying in the workplace are:

  • Loss of appetite
  • Eczema and other skin complaints
  • Difficulty sleeping
  • Severe fear of going to work
  • Palpitations or panic attacks
  • Depression
  • Suicidal thoughts
  • Relationship problems
  • Anxiety
  • Low self-esteem
  • Irritability

How can you spot a “workplace bully”?

  • A supportive manager will look at all the potential reasons for poor performance in a staff member. A sign of a bullying manager is that he or she will make no attempt to do this, but will rush to blame.
  • A caring manager will be a good listen The bully will regularly ignore, override or dismiss anything you have to say.
  • A bullying manager imposes new standards without discussion. A good manager will agree a new system of working with their team before imposing it on all staff.
  • A bullying manager will not agree standards and will appraise staff according to their own secret criteria so you and your work colleagues are left in the dark. A positive manager will involve team members in agreeing on monitoring processes and outcomes.
  • A good manager will recognise improvements in performance and behaviour. A bullying manager will ensure that it is impossible to tell when standards have improved, so rewards and recognition are random and open to favouritism.

Why do people become bullies in the workplace?

People may exhibit bullying behaviours if they feel someone poses a threat to their position or status. They may attempt to bully someone to divert attention away from their own shortcomings. If a workplace fosters a particularly competitive atmosphere, it could be that the bully has correctly ascertained that they will be rewarded for harsh and aggressive behaviour.

Some bullies don’t appreciate the impact their behaviour has on their victims, and many think of themselves as protectors. In fact, they may have a healthy protective impulse that has become distorted and unhealthy.

In the early stages of being bullied at work, the victim may try to placate the bully by working harder or by complying with their demands, however unreasonable. Unfortunately, this adds fuel to the fire, because the bully learns they are in control, which satisfies a craving in them.

How counselling for workplace bullying can help

If you have become the victim of bullying in the workplace, the aim of counselling is to increase your self-confidence and calm, in order that you can address problems in the work environment effectively and confidently, whether that means, for example, confronting the bully, or reaching out for support, or preparing a legal case.

Behavioural therapy techniques like “somatic experiencing” alter the base level of calm in your mind and body, and improve the sense of perspective and clarity in the rational part of your brain, so that you feel enabled and empowered to ‘fight your corner’ or, if it’s the more appropriate decision for you, to quit the job and move on to a better position.

Techniques such as Pesso-Boyden Therapy or PBSP engage with the parts of the brain and personality that may have unconsciously stood in the way of you defending yourself from harassment at work or blocked your path to self empowerment.

Being bullied or harassed when all you want to do is get on with your work can be distressing and damaging to your health and your career.

Take control of the situation and contact Marcus to discuss Counselling for Workplace Bullying and Harassment.

Contact Marcus


Further information, Articels & Advice about and coping with Bullying and Harassment in work

WikiHow | A good article and advice on “How to deal with workplace bullying and harassment”

CIPD | The Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development is a professional association for human resource management professionals has developed: Bullying at Work | CIPD guidelines for managers

Bullied by the Boss | A blog with interesting posts on work life … Especially Bullying

MIND | A guides developed by Mind.org on Workplace bullying

Harley Therapy | A useful article on being the subject of and coping with Workplace Bullying

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Pesso Boyden Group with accredited practitioners Deborah Clarke and Marcus Gottlieb

Pesso Boyden Group with accredited PBSP practitioners Deborah Clarke and Marcus Gottlieb

Pesso Boyden Therapy (‘PBSP’) is a philosophical process for becoming whole.

It is a respectful, interactive group process that heals by embedding new memories in the brain and in the body

Most people consciously or unconsciously have memories – explicit or implicit – of 

1. deficits 

2. traumas 

3. having to take care of others when we were too young – e.g. protecting a sibling, providing the joy in the life of an unhappy parent, unconsciously becoming the ‘spouse’ of a widowed parent, or making the world right after hearing stories of injustice. 

When any of these three categories of memory appear in the client’s work, the client and therapist work together to externalise them, in order to illuminate the client’s ways of handling life and to facilitate change. The client is always in charge of this process – people and incidents from the client’s past will be symbolised in the here-and-now either by people in the group or by objects in the room, all chosen and placed by the client. 

The therapist then works with the client to facilitate an antidote to what happened in the past – a new memory which provides what the client needed at that particular time in their past, from a specific kinship figure. This new memory may be developed over several sessions in a number of steps. In the Pesso approach we don’t change our history; however, we do change our response to our history, leading to a new perspective. 

The way is opened to possibilities of greater pleasure, satisfaction, meaning, integration and connectedness.

 



Deborah has worked as a Performance Coach for over 16 years having trained with Coach U. Her background is in the arts as an actor, theatre director and artistic director. She has worked with a wide range of people from all walks of life. Having first encountered Pesso Boyden as a client, she felt inspired to do the training herself. Since graduating in 2013 she has been running Personal Development workshops using the Pesso Boyden system and is now accredited by the official PBSP U.K. organisation.

Notting Hill Therapist | Marcus Gottlieb Psychotherapist & Counsellor
Marcus Gottlieb is a highly experienced London-based psychotherapist with a particular interest in boarding school survivor syndrome. Having trained alongside Deborah directly under Al Pesso and his closest collaborator Lowijs van Perquin, he is steeped in the work of PBSP and a strong believer in the client’s genetic impulse towards health and expression of their unique potential and individual destiny. He became an accredited Pesso Boyden therapist in 2021.
An Introduction to the Pesso Boyden Method

 

An opportunity to learn about and observe the distinctive techniques of this respectful body-based psychotherapy.

Suitable for both psychologically interested professionals, people seeking personal development/CPD and for people not in the therapeutic professions seeking to address entrenched issues. For all those who are interested in living a larger life. A special price of £35 for the day includes lunch and refreshments. CPD certificates will be available.

PBSP (Pesso-Boyden System Psychomotor) is a powerful, deeply respectful, psychotherapeutic process that uses feedback, ritual, objects and role players in a unique manner to heal the traumas, wounds and losses that affect our personal map of the world.

Its central goal is the imaginative creation of an ‘ideal’ healthy past that a person’s brain processes so that they emerge feeling differently about themselves. As Albert Pesso said, ‘Humanity is responsible for the meaning that surrounds us. The task for each person is to create a meaningful life and then live it with existential courage and passion.’

As well as gaining new perspectives, clients often experience increased pleasure, satisfaction, meaning and connectedness following a PBSP session and find themselves psychologically freer to make the changes they wish for in their lives.
Date: Saturday 7 October 2017
Venue: Notting Hill, London W11
Time: 10.00 am – 4.30 pm
Cost: £35 (inc lunch & refreshments)

 

Register Your Interest


Boarding School Survivor Syndrome Conference

BOARDING SCHOOL: Surviving the Syndrome
Broken Attachment and Childhood Trauma

University of Brighton

Saturday 9 September 2017
9.30 am to 5.00 pm

Conference for psychotherapists, counsellors, mental health workers, boarding school survivors and other interested people.

Conference overall aims are to:
§ Present key aspects of what has been published about the psychological and other effects of boarding.
§ Explore helpful therapeutic approaches for clients who are former boarders.
§ Consider current research and a possible agenda for future research
§ Enable networking amongst those interested in this important topic

Chair: Pam Howard, School of Applied Social Science, University of Brighton.

Speakers: Nick Duffell, Joy Schaverien, Alex Renton, Thurstine Basset, Anni Townend, Olya Khaleelee.

Group Discussion Facilitators: Marcus Gottlieb, Leslie Lund, Nicola Miller, Simon Partridge, Boarding Concern Directors.

For more details, contact Laura Williams:
southcoastevents@brighton.ac.uk

Pesso Boyden Workshop with Ana María Ruiz Sancho and Marcus Gottlieb

 

Pesso Boyden Therapy is a respectful and highly respected, body-based psychotherapy with distinctive techniques aimed at addressing entrenched issues. It is an interactive process that creates new body-based memories to heal emotional deficits of the past.

An exceptionally powerful personal development tool, it uses feedback, systematic procedures, objects and role players in a unique methodology, in order to repair the early traumas, wounds and losses that can powerfully influence the brain’s map of the world.

In shifting underlying perspectives, the way is opened to the possibility of greater pleasure, satisfaction, meaning and connectedness, and an enhanced freedom to effect longed-for changes.

It is expected there will be between 8 and 12 participants, with an absolute maximum of 15. The day will start with an explanation of Pesso Boyden and an experiential introduction, followed by 4 actual client sessions of an hour each.

Venue: Philadelphia Association, 4 Marty’s Yard, London NW3 1QW
Date: Saturday 3 June 2017
Time: 0930 to 1800
Cost: £75

Register Your Interest



Ana María Ruiz Sancho is an experienced psychiatrist and a psychotherapist. She is also a specialist in group dynamics and an Institutional and Team Motivation Consultant.

Ana is the Founder and a Director of VocAcción, as well as being a qualified Pesso Boyden psychotherapist.


Notting Hill Therapist | Marcus Gottlieb Psychotherapist & Counsellor

Marcus Gottlieb works with relationships, sexuality, abuse and trauma, with a particular interest in boarding school survivor syndrome. Qualified in Pesso Boyden as well as other psychotherapies, he is also an Alexander Technique teacher.

Contact Marcus

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