The effect of mobbing on quitting jobs: An investigation in the banking sector

Mobbing in working life is generally dealt with as anger-hostility and behaviours, every kind of intimidation, suppression, repression and ostracism towards an individual or a group. It is a kind of generally abstract but sometimes concrete way of attack aiming to turn over the active employers of the working life into passive ones. Mobbing, which can be defined also as emotional attack, aims at eliminating the working identity of the individual who became the target of attack by creating psychological pressure and regular, constant and insistent aggression.This study was carried out on the employees who were working in private banks in Çukurova district of Adana in 2012. The purpose of the study was to find out the attitudes of employees working in the banking sector towards mobbing and if mobbing results in quitting their jobs.A questionnaire was conducted in the study. In order to obtain data, the questionnaire was given to 167 employees at first. Although 123 questionnaires returned, 100 valid questionnaires were taken into analysis. The sample of the study was defined randomly and not any departments or groups were selected. In this respect, the analysis is valid and reliable. The methods that were used in this study were factor analysis, chi-square test or Fisher test, Kruscall Wallis tests and Hamilton anxiety scale.The study revealed that the employees were exposed to mobbing according to the findings of gender distribution. Moreover, bringing groundless rumours out, dropping sexual hints and the idea of being subjected to sexual harassment were found statistically significant according to the type of mobbing depending on the gender (p<0.05).According to Likert comparison about the reason of employees choosing the job, it was found out that the employees who were working in this sector as they did not have any other job opportunities were exposed to mobbing more than the others (p<0.05). No statistically significant differences were found in other variables (p>0.05).When the results of Hamilton anxiety scale were studied, it was observed that the employees continued their working lives as they could not find any other jobs with 27.2±8.1. Besides, the Hamilton anxiety scale was analysed in general, it was concluded that the employees who were working in this sector as they could not find any other jobs had the highest anxiety while the employees who were working in this sector fondly had the lowest anxiety (p<0.05).Key Words: Mobbing, intimidation, quitting the job, harassment, organization