My manager held a staff meeting and spoke negatively about a coworker without actually using her name.

10 Comments

1. AnonymousMay 18,2024 at 7:20AM UTC

   Happens often. Doesn't make it right, yet...

2. AnonymousMay 18,2024 at 5:39PM UTC

   That is unprofessional. Did anyone report it to HR?

3. AnonymousMay 18,2024 at 6:46PM UTC

   No, it was not reported to HR. I assume my manager could get in trouble even though she did not use the employees name. Is that correct?

4. AnonymousMay 20,2024 at 3:57AM UTC

   He said/she said

   Manager will sayit was a "misunderstanding" and HR will not pursue. 8 would not bother reporting

5. AnonymousMay 20,2024 at 3:32PM UTC

   This is not the response of the person who wrote the concern on this page. Who is this?

6. AnonymousMay 20,2024 at 2:01PM UTC

   HR here - realizing that most people on this site already view HR negatively - but in this instance, based on what little info was provided...what would you expect HR to do? Was the employee being spoke negatively about present? Are there other instances the employee could reference where they were treated less than favorable? What was the context of the comments?

   For a little of my background: many years (longer ago than I care to admit), I was in a position here it was the definition of toxic. Whenever anyone in our department screwed up (and it could something even along the lines of not accurately reading our boss's mind), we would all be called into his office, the offending employee would be there and he would berate this person while not looking at them but everyone else. Fun times.

7. AnonymousMay 20,2024 at 3:40PM UTC

   To the HR rep, Thanks for the response. I am the person who wrote about the meeting. The coworker was not present during the meeting. My coworker was out on sick leave. Staff were told , “not to talk to her, to ignore her when she wants to talk” by the manager. How are we supposed to work with an employee and be told not to talk to her. We have to talk to her about work issues. Can management get in trouble for this even though the employees name was not used?

8. AnonymousMay 20,2024 at 5:16PM UTC

   HR here again - I see this from a couple of different angles. 1. Boss is being an asshole. 2. You said your coworker was out on sick leave so possibly FMLA? If this is the advice given because they don't want her doing anything that remotely resembles work while on leave, I can totally get that. On more than one occasion, I've had to have IT suspend individuals' access because they continued working while on leave and this is not what we want and we do not want to be seen as violating the law.

9. AnonymousMay 21,2024 at 3:37AM UTC

   Thank you for responding! The employee is not allowed to do any work from home. She was out sick and other staff were told to “ ignore her and tell her we are busy and can not talk to her “ when she returns to work.

   The employees name was not used but it was obvious who my manager was talking about. Could my manager get in trouble for this even though she did not use the employees name?

10. AnonymousMay 21,2024 at 2:36PM UTC

    As someone said earlier, that could be a 'he said/she said' situation. You can certainly share your concerns with HR and you should be able to do so without fear of retaliation. Did you consider clarifying with your manager what the intent was? Like was it truly they didn't want this employee bothered while she was sick? "When you told us to ignore the employee, did you mean while she was out sick?" I mean, perhaps the manager misspoke (it happens). If that really truly is not the case, then see HR. Provide names of others who were present when this was said.