Nurses’ perceptions of the management of bullying in private hospitals in eight provinces in South Africa

Abstract

There is a lack of knowledge on the effectiveness of managing workplace bullying among nurses. This study examined the role of various intervention strategies available for the management of workplace bullying among nurses from private hospitals in eight provinces of South Africa. A quantitative design was employed to obtain data from the 655 respondents; 25 private hospitals were sampled out of the total population of 49 hospitals. The adoption of problem-solving behaviours (61.83%) and open negotiations (60.31%) were found to be the most effective practices, while discouraging reporting (53.33%) and tolerating bullying (45.45%) were found to be the most ineffective practices in bullying management practices. The study concluded that bullying in the workplace was under-reported, but a more comprehensive approach among all stakeholders in the hospital would be necessary for tackling the phenomenon.