Phonecall from HR -telling off

Astral92

A few days ago I approached my manager about my assistant manager being a victim of bullying (exclusion, not being shown dignity and respect in front of customers and other staff) but my manager didnt want to know anything about it, which is always the case, my manager just doesnt want to know anything bad going on and has her head stuck in the sand.
I found my assistant manager very upset on her own one day and she told me everything that was being done to her and how horrible she is made to feel by a couple of staff members.
She said she didnt have the confidence to report it to Head Office of the company. This really bothered me because I have good time for this girl and feel she is being bullied out of jelousy. I went and reported it via email to HR. Today at work I received a scathing phone call from them and told me it wasnt my place to get involved(which I agree and totally see that from their point of view) but me being quite brave in nature I told them that if a friend and colleague is being bullied in my workplace, then I would make it my business to get involved until it gets resolved. I found this woman to be quite aggressive in her tone and I dont think she liked it that I was arguing against her. What are your thoughts on this situation?

TimeToShine

Astral92 wrote: »

A few days ago I approached my manager about my assistant manager being a victim of bullying (exclusion, not being shown dignity and respect in front of customers and other staff) but my manager didnt want to know anything about it, which is always the case, my manager just doesnt want to know anything bad going on and has her head stuck in the sand.
I found my assistant manager very upset on her own one day and she told me everything that was being done to her and how horrible she is made to feel by a couple of staff members.
She said she didnt have the confidence to report it to Head Office of the company. This really bothered me because I have good time for this girl and feel she is being bullied out of jelousy. I went and reported it via email to HR. Today at work I received a scathing phone call from them and told me it wasnt my place to get involved(which I agree and totally see that from their point of view) but me being quite brave in nature I told them that if a friend and colleague is being bullied in my workplace, then I would make it my business to get involved until it gets resolved. I found this woman to be quite aggressive in her tone and I dont think she liked it that I was arguing against her. What are your thoughts on this situation?

Is it a big company?

If so, you should go over her head. She'll be reprimanded for sure.

If this is a smaller company then unfortunately it probably is in your best interests to stay out of it.

witchgirl26

Speaking as someone who helped investigate things like this in my old job, your company should have some way of anonymously reporting concerns like this. However if the subject of the concern (in this case your friend/assistant manager) does not wish to engage or pursue it, then it can be very difficult on HR to actually be able to do anything about it. They'll need to get something from her that they can question the alleged bully on and if that information isn't forthcoming from a first hand source (someone who actually heard/saw it themselves) then they don't have much to go on.

I get that you want to help her and that is admirable but your energy would be best spent to trying to get her to report it herself.

I also don't understand why, if you agreed with HR that it wasn't your place to be involved and could see their point of view, did you argue with them. I don't think that it was disliked that you were disagreeing with them but maybe more your manner about it.

seamus

There is no question of it being "your place" to get involved. There is nobody in the company who is too low or too high on the ladder to report, commit or be a victim of bullying. Anyone with half a brain recognises this. Like fraud or assault, reporting bullying where you see it is a duty of all employees.

So now you have two issues to report - your assistant manager's bullying, and a HR person's apparent attempt to silence you about it.

Tbh, it sounds like you're not in this for the long haul, so not overly concerned about burning bridges. This leaves you in a fairly unique position to do the right thing.

If it's a big company with a head of HR, get in contact with that person. If there's no head of HR, then contact the CEO.
I'm not a big fan of email for this stuff; it's good to have it written down, but particularly when contacting "head of" people, there's often a secretary or another member of their staff who may pre-filter their emails. Send an email and follow it up with a phone call, or even better a quick word face-to-face, "I sent you an email about a sensitive matter, I just want to make sure you've received it".

Any email or communication you send should be accurate, concise and non-emotive. Just the details of what it is that you're reporting - make sure you're clear about what you've personally witness -v- what's been said to you.

When you're describing the conversation with HR, avoid being one-sided. If you said anything you think you regret, don't leave that out.

It's very easy to dismiss a complaint as a rant when the complainant uses really emotional language and deliberately leaves out information that makes them look bad. When the complaint is presented factually, warts and all, the reader is much more likely to trust it.

Any system that requires or encourages staff to ignore bullying unless the victim is the one who complains, is broken.

Astral92

Astral92 wrote: »

............ I found this woman to be quite aggressive in her tone and I dont think she liked it that I was arguing against her. What are your thoughts on this situation?

she sounds a cnut.
I know someone who had a breakdown & attempted suicide due to workplace bullying.

jimmycrackcorm

She said she didnt have the confidence to report it to Head Office of the company. This really bothered me because I have good time for this girl and feel she is being bullied out of jelousy. I went and reported it via email to HR. Today at work I received a scathing phone call from them and told me it wasnt my place to get involved(which I agree and totally see that from their point of view) but me being quite brave in nature I told them that if a friend and colleague is being bullied in my workplace, then I would make it my business to get involved until it gets resolved. I found this woman to be quite aggressive in her tone and I dont think she liked it that I was arguing against her. What are your thoughts on this situation?

Follow up with an email reiterating what you reported and insist they clarify their verbal response with a a written response.

Denny_Crane

There are two forms of process when it comes to employment disputes; formal and informal. At the moment you're at the informal stage. It's two (or more) people just having a chat. If you want it to go further I would suggest raising a formal grievance. I would suggest doing this is general terms, such as bullying on site X. A full investigation should then take place and no one should be speaking to you, unprofessionally or otherwise, off the record.

It's everyone's place to prevent bullying and kudos to you for doing what you thought was right. Any employer that indicates the contrary, frankly, isn't worth working for.

GreenFolder2

That's crazy stuff. Silencing whistle blowers is utterly counterproductive - we've seen this very publicly in the state sector and the exact same thing applies in the private sector. If you shoot the messenger you just cut off communication and your organisation will eventually implode with hidden problems ripping it apart.

I would also suggest that you cite their bullying policy in the email. Any company with formal HR will have one. It'll probably be in some employee manual somewhere.