© 2022 Fairygodboss. All rights reserved.
Calling your management out on toxic behaviour
Today I called my management out on 'having a go' at my intern who in no fault of her own had to organise help last minute as she was unauthorised to schedule something via hubspot.
I called them out in what I thought was good tone however, I messaged them rather than called (which I think was my first mistake).
I manage my intern, and the person who this is about manages me - so I asked them to kindly discuss feedback with me first rather than going directly to the intern and making her feel upset, and guilty for a problem or issue that was not in fact her fault.
I was subsequently told off for the tone of the message, although I had kept it very polite.
Of course, I am unable to share the messages here as who knows if they will see it.
How do you best recommend calling out your Founders/CEO's on creating a toxic environment for your own team who you manage?
KimmieFH
Reach your goals through positive connections
796
08/26/20 at 3:33PM UTC
Honestly, I don't think it's necessarily a mistake to have done it via e-mail since this creates a record should it become a recurring issue. If it seemed like completely off-hand behavior then maybe a quick call would've been best, maybe they were having a bad day. But if you have any concern of more issues from this manager I think the email was actually the right choice.
I don't know wording of the e-mail but it's possible your positive polite language was taken as sarcasm or passive aggression. For a tense situation like this I recommend sticking to as much neutral language as possible as opposed to trying too hard to be polite. Remain focused on business and use logic over emotion to reason with them. Something like:
"I was informed of an interaction you had with my intern and it has had negative repercussions. I understand your perspective, however, I don't think you had all of the information of the situation and therefore the reaction was unwarranted. In the future, I think it would be best that you bring the issue to me first as I may have more information and can leverage my relationship with my intern to correct the situation without altercation."
I realize it can sound cold and robotic, and trust me that's not my style, but in text it's safer on you to remain neutral. You can have a more personal conversation in person, but this gets the message across. If they read something like that and denounce the tone than it's not the verbiage they have issue with, they are angry that they are getting feedback from someone below them and even if they know they are wrong are reacting emotionally out of embarrassment as opposed to the mature response of taking ownership. It's very possible there was nothing wrong with your tone at all and this manager is in some emotional reactive state and if that's the case it should be addressed in person and possibly with another leader present to support you.
Best of luck to you! Hopefully this is a one-off and they are just having a bad day/week and will apologize.
Anonymous
08/26/20 at 2:47PM UTC
We had this issue constantly at my last job. I focused my comments on the necessity for a hierarchy and asked the person in charge if they would like my employee to discuss issues with them directly. This seemed to make it clear that communication needed to flow through the correct hierarchical channels.
© 2022 Fairygodboss. All rights reserved.