New Research
The Tall Poppy Theory of Strategic Execution
When high-performing women are targeted by workplace bullying, the conventional advice often fails them. This research is building the evidence for what actually works.
67%
of targets who formally report face retaliation
Cortina & Magley, 2003
73%
of perpetrators face zero consequences after formal reporting
Workplace Bullying Institute, 2024
61%
of targets who report ultimately lose their jobs
Workplace Bullying Institute, 2024
The conventional wisdom is not just ineffective. For many women, it is actively dangerous. And yet we keep telling targets the same thing: speak up, use the system, trust the process.
This study asks a different question. Instead of asking whether targets should respond, it asks how the way they respond shapes what happens next.
The Framework
The Tall Poppy Theory
There is an old saying: the tallest poppy gets cut first.
In organizational life, this plays out in a very specific way. The women who are most accomplished, most visible, and most effective are often the ones who become targets. Not because they did something wrong, but because their excellence disrupts the existing hierarchy. Their competence becomes a threat.
The Tall Poppy Theory of Strategic Execution is a research framework that examines what happens after a high-performing woman is targeted. It does not focus on why bullying happens or how organizations should prevent it, both of which are well-studied questions with important answers. Instead, it focuses on a question the field has largely overlooked: once a target recognizes what is happening, what strategic options actually protect her career, her health, and her professional standing?
The answer turns out to be less about which path she chooses and more about how she walks it.
Emerging Findings
What the Research Is Revealing
A mixed-methods study of high-performing women across six countries and multiple sectors is revealing patterns that challenge much of the conventional advice given to workplace bullying targets.
Participants pursued a range of response strategies. Some escalated through formal channels. Some chose to leave. Some stayed and endured. No single pathway guaranteed a good outcome. But one factor consistently separated the women who emerged with their careers and wellbeing intact from those who did not.
Execution approach mattered more than pathway choice.
Women who executed their chosen strategy covertly reported significantly higher satisfaction with their outcomes than women who pursued the same type of strategy overtly.
Overt escalation through formal channels consistently produced poor outcomes.
Regardless of the merit of their complaint, women who formally reported experienced retaliation, isolation, and career damage at high rates.
Covert approaches protected careers and wellbeing across all pathways.
Whether a target chose to fight, leave, or stay, doing so strategically and discreetly was associated with better outcomes in career preservation, mental health, and professional reputation.
These findings are drawn from ongoing data collection across six countries. The study continues to seek additional participants to strengthen and refine these patterns.
Read More About the Research
Your Experience Could Shape This Research
If you are a high-performing woman who has experienced workplace bullying, your story matters to this study. Not as a cautionary tale. Not as a statistic. As strategic intelligence that could change how the field advises women in your situation.
Participation is completely anonymous and takes approximately 15 minutes.
Learn About Participating
This research has been accepted for presentation at the International Association on Workplace Bullying and Harassment (IAWBH) 2026 Conference in Canberra, Australia, following peer review. The IAWBH Conference is the premier international forum for workplace bullying scholarship.
The Research
When Reporting Fails: Strategic Options for Workplace Bullying Targets
Background
The Gap in the Literature
Workplace bullying research has made enormous progress in the past two decades. We know far more than we once did about why bullying happens, who perpetrates it, what organizational conditions enable it, and what it costs in terms of human suffering and economic impact.
But there is a gap.
Most of the existing research focuses on prevention, organizational policy, and the experiences of targets as they endure mistreatment. What is conspicuously absent from the literature is rigorous, evidence-based guidance for targets themselves. When formal systems fail, when HR sides with the perpetrator, when retaliation follows a good-faith complaint, what then?
The targets in these situations are not passive. They are making strategic decisions under extraordinary pressure. They are weighing risks, calculating tradeoffs, and choosing among imperfect options. Yet the field has given them almost nothing to work with.
This study was designed to fill that gap.
When institutional protections fail, how does the execution approach (overt vs. covert) affect outcomes for workplace bullying targets across different response pathways?
Theoretical Foundation
The EVLN Framework
This study builds on the established Exit, Voice, Loyalty, Neglect (EVLN) framework from organizational psychology, which describes how employees typically respond to dissatisfaction in the workplace. In the context of workplace bullying, these four pathways look like this:
Voice
Taking action to change the situation. Filing a complaint, confronting the perpetrator, hiring an attorney, going to the media, or reporting to a regulatory body.
Exit
Leaving the situation. Resigning, transferring, or otherwise removing yourself from the environment where the bullying is occurring.
Loyalty
Staying and enduring. Continuing to work, maintaining performance, and hoping the situation resolves or that leadership intervenes.
Neglect
Disengaging while remaining. Doing the minimum, withdrawing effort, or mentally checking out while still physically present.
The existing EVLN research tells us that targets choose among these pathways. What it does not tell us is how the execution of that choice, whether carried out overtly or covertly, affects outcomes. That is the question at the center of this study.
Approach
Methodology
This is a mixed-methods, practice-based research study using semi-structured interviews and questionnaires. The study includes participants across six countries and multiple professional sectors including healthcare, corporate, nonprofit, education, government, and financial services.
Participants were asked about their professional context, the bullying behaviors they experienced, the response strategy they chose, how they executed that strategy, and the outcomes they experienced across multiple dimensions including career, mental health, financial impact, and perpetrator accountability.
Inductive thematic analysis was used to identify patterns across participants, with particular attention to the relationship between execution approach (overt vs. covert) and outcome satisfaction.
Data collection is ongoing. The study continues to seek additional participants to strengthen and refine the patterns identified in the initial analysis.
Participate in This Study
Academic Positioning
Conference Presentation
This research has been accepted for presentation at the International Association on Workplace Bullying and Harassment (IAWBH) 2026 Conference in Canberra, Australia, following peer review.
The IAWBH Conference, held biennially since 1998, is the leading international forum for research on workplace bullying, harassment, and related phenomena. It convenes researchers, practitioners, and policymakers from around the world to present and discuss the latest scholarship in the field.
- Conference
- IAWBH 15th Biennial International Conference
- Location
- Canberra, Australia
- Dates
- June 3-5, 2026
- Theme
- "How Do We Solve a Problem Like..."
- Presentation Type
- Individual Presentation
- Status
- Accepted for presentation
Sources
Key References
Cortina, L. M., & Magley, V. J. (2003). Raising voice, risking retaliation: Events following interpersonal mistreatment in the workplace. Journal of Occupational Health Psychology, 8(4), 247-265.
Namie, G., & Namie, R. (2009). The bully at work: What you can do to stop the hurt and reclaim the dignity on the job (2nd ed.). Sourcebooks.
Withey, M. J., & Cooper, W. H. (1989). Predicting exit, voice, loyalty, and neglect. Administrative Science Quarterly, 34(4), 521-539.
Workplace Bullying Institute. (2024). U.S. Workplace Bullying Survey.
Participate in This Research
Your experience is not just a story. It is data. And data changes systems.
An Invitation
Your Experience Matters
Every high-performing woman who has been targeted by workplace bullying has had to make impossible decisions with almost no guidance. Some strategies worked. Some backfired. Most women made those choices alone, unsure whether they were doing the right thing, with no research to point them toward a better option.
This study exists to change that.
By sharing your experience, you contribute to a growing body of evidence that could fundamentally reshape how the field advises women facing workplace bullying. Your story does not stand alone. It becomes part of a pattern, and patterns are what create new knowledge.
Whether your strategy succeeded brilliantly or failed completely, your experience matters equally to this research. We need the full picture, not just the victories.
Who Should Participate
Eligibility
You are a woman who has been recognized as high-performing in your field.
This might look like awards, promotions, strong performance evaluations, leadership roles, public recognition, or a reputation for exceptional work.
You experienced workplace bullying.
This could include repeated mistreatment, undermining, work sabotage, exclusion, isolation, false accusations, public humiliation, or deliberate damage to your professional reputation.
You either reported through formal channels or made a conscious decision not to.
Both experiences are equally important to this study.
The incident occurred at least six months ago.
This allows enough time for outcomes to become clear and for reflection on the experience.
What to Expect
What Participation Involves
Participation consists of a single confidential questionnaire that you complete on your own time. There are no interviews, no phone calls, and no follow-up unless you choose to allow it.
- Time required
- Approximately 15 minutes
- Format
- Online questionnaire
- Topics covered
- Your professional context, the bullying experience, what you decided to do, how you carried it out, what happened as a result, and what you would do differently knowing what you know now
- Emotional note
- Some questions ask you to reflect on difficult experiences. You may skip any question, and you can stop at any time.
Your Privacy
Confidentiality and Anonymity
Your anonymity is not an afterthought in this study. It is built into the design.
You create your own anonymous participant code. Your name is never collected.
No identifying information is gathered. The questionnaire does not ask for your employer's name, your city, or any details that could identify you or your organization.
Nothing is published that could identify any individual. All data is presented in aggregate or with heavy anonymization. No direct quotes are attributed, and all identifying details in narrative responses are removed before analysis.
You may withdraw at any time. If you begin the questionnaire and decide not to finish, simply close the browser. Incomplete responses are not used.
Data is stored securely and used only for the purposes of this research.
Data Collection Is Open
Responses are being collected on a rolling basis and will inform both the IAWBH 2026 conference presentation in Canberra, Australia, and future research publications. There is no deadline to participate. Every response strengthens the evidence base.
The Bigger Picture
Why Your Participation Matters
There is a reason most women who have been through workplace bullying keep the details to themselves. The experience is painful. The memory is heavy. And in many cases, talking about it feels risky even years later.
That silence is understandable. But it is also the reason the field has so little evidence-based guidance to offer women in these situations. We cannot build better frameworks without the experiences of women who have actually lived through them.
It validates the experiences of other women.
When your data joins the study, it confirms that other women are not imagining what happened to them. They are not alone. And they are not crazy.
It challenges advice that is not working.
The more data we collect, the stronger the case becomes for rethinking the conventional guidance that puts women at risk.
It contributes to a theory that could change the conversation.
The Tall Poppy Theory needs your data. Not to prove what we already think, but to test it, challenge it, and refine it with real experiences from real women.
About the Researcher
Principal Investigator
Karen Ellis, M.S.Ed.
Karen Ellis is an independent researcher and the founder of Glass Ceiling Ventures LLC. Her work focuses on the strategic responses of high-performing women who experience workplace bullying, with particular attention to how execution approach affects career, health, and professional outcomes.
Karen holds a Master of Science in Education with a concentration in Educational Administration. Her professional background spans economic development, organizational leadership, and community engagement, including serving on the board of the Healthcare Businesswomen's Association (HBA) St. Louis chapter.
Her current research, the Tall Poppy Theory of Strategic Execution, was developed through mixed-methods research with women across six countries and multiple professional sectors including healthcare, corporate, nonprofit, education, government, and financial services. The study has been accepted for presentation at the International Association on Workplace Bullying and Harassment (IAWBH) 2026 Conference in Canberra, Australia, following peer review.
Why This Research
The Question That Started Everything
This research began with a question that the existing literature could not answer.
The field of workplace bullying research has done critical work in documenting the prevalence of bullying, its psychological toll, and the organizational conditions that enable it. Prevention frameworks, bystander intervention models, and legislative efforts have all made important progress.
But when a high-performing woman is being targeted right now, and the systems that are supposed to protect her have failed, the field has remarkably little to offer her. The advice she receives, to report it, to go through formal channels, to trust the process, is often the very advice that accelerates her career damage.
I started this research because I believed there had to be a better answer. The women I have spoken with have confirmed that there is. They found it on their own, through instinct, through strategic thinking, and through hard-won wisdom that no one had ever studied systematically.
This study is my attempt to capture that wisdom, test it rigorously, and make it available to every woman who needs it.
Background
Credentials and Affiliations
- Education
- M.S.Ed., Educational Administration
- Organization
- Glass Ceiling Ventures LLC (Founder)
- Research
- The Tall Poppy Theory of Strategic Execution
- Conference
- IAWBH 2026, Canberra, Australia (accepted for presentation)
- Board Service
- Healthcare Businesswomen's Association (HBA), St. Louis Chapter