Rethinking Bystander Intervention

Bullying, harassment and incivility are alarmingly common at work. In fact, up to 96% of employees experience some form of workplace mistreatment during their careers. These behaviours don’t just hurt individuals; they damage entire organizations by lowering morale, reducing productivity and causing psychological harm. 

To combat this, Canadian laws require employers to take action. Many organizations have responded by introducing what seems to be a logical solution to the problem: bystander intervention training. These programs teach employees how to step in when they witness mistreatment. The idea is simple: if more people speak up, fewer harmful behaviours will go unchecked. 

But here’s the problem: it doesn’t always work. 

With an Insight Grant from Canada’s Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC), Sandy Hershcovis, the Future Fund Professor in Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion at the Haskayne School of Business and her colleagues Zhanna Lyubykh (Simon Fraser University) and Ivana Vranjes (Tilburg University) are digging into why bystander interventions sometimes backfire.  

Hershcovis, widely recognized as a leader in the field and a Fellow of the Society of Industrial and Organizational Psychology, has been exploring workplace harassment in its many forms throughout her career and noticed a troubling trend.  

According to her research, bystander intervention programs are overlooking a critical issue: they can provoke backlash from the very people they’re meant to confront, undermining their effectiveness. 

“Instead of reducing mistreatment, interventions may escalate tensions, leaving bystanders and victims in more precarious positions.” 

For  Hershcovis and her colleagues, this raises an important question: how can we make bystander intervention safer and more effective for everyone involved? 

A New Approach to Understanding Bystander Dynamics 

The research team is exploring three key areas to better understand the emotional and psychological dynamics at play: 

1. Perpetrator Receptivity - What makes someone more likely to respond positively to a bystander’s intervention? Are there certain conditions or approaches that reduce defensiveness and increase openness to change?
2. Witness Reactions - How do other employees, who observe both the mistreatment and the intervention, perceive  what’s happening? Do they feel empowered to act themselves, or do they feel discouraged?
3. Target Responses - How do victims of mistreatment feel when someone steps in on their behalf? Does it help them feel  supported, or can it sometimes make things worse? 

By studying these three perspectives, Hershcovis, Lyubykh and Vranjes hope to uncover what works, what doesn’t, and why. 

Why This Matters 

Workplace harassment is distressing for victims and witnesses alike, but it doesn't stop there. It’s an insidious problem with far-reaching effects. When organizations leave aggressive behaviour unchecked, leading to toxic workplace cultures, they open themselves up to legal and reputational damage, and can cost billions of dollars annually in lost productivity. That’s why organizations are eager to find solutions that actually work. 

Bystander intervention is one of the most widely promoted strategies, but until now, there hasn’t been enough research to guide how it should be done. This new research aims to fill that gap by identifying specific strategies that lead to better outcomes. 

“We want to identify strategies for effective bystander intervention,” says Hershcovis.  “We know that intervention can help, but we don’t yet know the best ways to do it. That’s what we’re trying to figure out.” 

Understanding when and how to intervene is critical. It’s also important to look at everyone involved, not just the perpetrator or the target. We need to understand how bystanders or fourth parties react to interventions and how that might have benefits beyond stopping mistreatment.

What’s Next: Building Better Training Programs 

The ultimate goal of this research is to develop a new kind of bystander training informed by real data and grounded in psychological insight. This protocol will help organizations train employees not just to intervene, but to do so in ways that are more likely to be effective and less likely to cause harm. 

Such a program could be a game-changer for organizational leaders who want to foster healthier, safer workplaces. Instead of relying on generic training modules, they’ll have access to tools that reflect the complex realities of workplace dynamics. 

A Step Toward Safer Workplaces 

Mistreatment at work is a serious issue, but it’s not inevitable. With the right strategies, organizations can create cultures where respect and safety are the norm, not the exception. 

For Hershcovis and her colleagues, this research is a step in that direction. By understanding how people react to bystander intervention, organizations can design smarter, more compassionate approaches to stopping workplace harassment. 

And that’s good news for everyone. 

Dr. Sandy Hershcovis is the Senior Associate Dean of Research and Faculty and Future Fund Professor in Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion at the Haskayne School of Business. In 2020, she was inducted as a member of New Scholars, Artists, and Scientists of the Royal Society of Canada, and in 2021 she was elected as a Fellow of the Society of Industrial and Organizational Psychology. Her research has been published in leading journals in her field, and she has provided expert testimony on workplace harassment cases before House of Commons and Senate committees and on a number of civil legal cases. Sandy holds a PhD and an MSc in Management from Queen's University, and a BComm from the University of Calgary.