The Workplace Bullying Institute – a 23 Year Odyssey
About Us – The Drs. Namie
Ruth Namie, PhD
Dr. Ruth Namie has a doctorate in clinical psychology. Her personal experience became the impetus for the U.S. workplace bullying movement. Her female supervisor at a psychiatry clinic, a clinical psychologist named Sheila, who hated doing therapy as a profession, tormented Ruth who was beloved by her clients. Ruth’s innate empathic skills allowed her to empower individuals with chemical dependency problems and families facing inevitable conflicts. Sheila could not stand it. She stripped Ruth of duties. The next day Ruth left the large California HMO. Within the year, she was given a severance that effectively ended her clinical career.
Why did Ruth’s previous manager at another clinic not warn her about Sheila? He was a mouse, well aware of Sheila’s wrath. Was it harassment? No. Learning that lesson required hiring and firing a lawyer. Did EAP help? No. She shared confidential info with management but did not reciprocate with info from them. How did HR do? Ineffective, fearful of Sheila. As we ratcheted up pressure, the HR coordinator quit. Was the Administrator responsive? No. She exited immediately into quiet retirement. The internal legal department hired a big S.F. defense firm to handle Ruth’s case. In the end we negotiated her severance.
Ruth and Gary began in June 1997 the organization that became the Workplace Bullying Institute today. On a toll-free line, they heard long-version, painful stories from over 12,000 bullied workers in all industries. Ruth became the definitive expert on the devastating effects of bullying on targeted workers, having personally experienced PTSD. For her personal health, Ruth’s role in WBI over the years has necessarily been reduced.
Together, the Namies wrote the popular books, BullyProof Yourself At Work (DoubleDoc Press, 1999) , The Bully At Work (Sourcebooks, 2009) and The Bully-Free Workplace (Wiley, 2011).
They also publish academic journal articles and book chapters based on WBI research. They appear in the Journal of Consulting Psychology, International Journal of Communication, Employee Rights and Employment Policy Journal, Ivey Business Journal, Journal of Employee Assistance; and contributing chapters in the books Destructive Organizational Communication and Workplace Bullying: Development in Theory, Research and Practice. Most recently, they wrote three chapters for Workplace Bullying and Mobbing in the United States. M. Duffy & D.C. Yamada (Eds.). Santa Barbara, CA: Praeger Press. 2018.
Ruth’s professional life before graduate school found her in Hawaii as Training Director for Sheraton Hotels. That background, coupled with the immersion in workplace bullying, led her to create the only comprehensive training program for professionals in the world on the topic — WBI Workplace Bullying University®. Courses began in 2008 and have been periodically offered every year since. In 2020, University changed from an in-person 3-day intensive course taught in San Francisco to a virtual, remote course spread over two consecutive weekends.
Gary Namie, PhD
Gary is a social psychologist with a long record of teaching graduate and undergraduate university courses in management and psychology — at Scripps College, University of California Santa Barbara, University of Southern California, University of San Francisco and others. He won national and campus teaching awards. He was also corporate manager for two regional hospital systems as director of internal training and consulting services. He began consulting to organizations as The Work Doctor® in 1985.
Remarkably, as a college student, Gary worked 36 months at Washington Steel Corp. in his hometown. Life at the mill (unrealistically all male back then) taught him more about group dynamics, good management principles, positive bonding among workers, and benefits of unions than all of his graduate school education.
In 1997, in response to Ruth’s bullying experience (and his own vicarious one), the couple imported Workplace Bullying to the U.S. from England. Using his research background, he wrote, and WBI commissioned, Zogby analytics to conduct the frequently cited scientific national prevalence surveys. In addition, several WBI-site-based studies have been conducted. The media regard Dr. Namie, after 1,200+ interviews, as the go-to expert. He leads advocates to enact the anti-bullying Healthy Workplace Bill in US states. Dr. Namie is considered the originator of the workplace bullying consulting field. He serves as expert witness in bullying-related legal cases for counsel for plaintiffs and the defense.
In our 23 years, WBI has had only 3 major website designs.
The 2020 version required a team to bring us into the 21st century. Thanks go to these individuals.
