HR Drowning in Manager Complaints

“Fire him. Bad fit. [re: How do you handle a new manager who’s hurting morale when the team is performing well?]”

“Go into that 1:1 with your manager and ask specifically: what decisions do you want me making vs escalating to you, what format do you want project updates in and how often, and what does a successful first 90 days look like. Those three questions will get you way more clarity than asking what your responsibilities are. [re: 1st Time Project Manager, Completely Lost]”

“That’s pretty much the approach I’m taking. I’m meeting with him this week and want to keep it focused on specific behaviors and outcomes, not personalities. The team is performing well, so I also want to understand what he feels needs tightening and why. [re: How do you handle a new manager who’s hurting morale when the team is performing well?]”

“Exactly, that’s the part I’m trying to prevent. The team is performing well, so I don’t want unnecessary micromanagement to start hurting morale or make good employees disengage. [re: How do you handle a new manager who’s hurting morale when the team is performing well?]”

“I’d talk to him directly and soon, and keep it about specific behaviors and outcomes, not about what people are saying. Something like: here are two things I’ve noticed, the team is delivering well and I want to keep that, so help me understand your thinking on how tightly you’re managing the work. Start with his view, since a new manager who’s controlling is often anxious about proving himself, and a tight grip is a common response to that. Then agree on what you want from him in clear terms, l”

“Once experience something like this. We work fine and actually meet our KPI's and more. New manager join and just crush our will to work by micromanaging everything. This person wanted everything to be done their way [re: How do you handle a new manager who’s hurting morale when the team is performing well?]”

“That’s part of my plan. I’m meeting with him this week to understand what he’s seeing and why he’s managing this way. I’ll also meet with him and a few employees who raised concerns to see if we can work through it before our in-person staff meeting the following week. [re: How do you handle a new manager who’s hurting morale when the team is performing well?]”

“I recently brought in a new manager who reports to me. He’s much more direct and controlling than my leadership style, and several employees have started coming to me saying morale is dropping. The difficult part is the employees are doing a good job. There aren’t major performance problems that would justify suddenly managing them this tightly. I want to give the new manager room to lead without undermining him, but I also don’t want to ignore what I’m hearing from the team. How would you handl”

“To add some context I've become the new manager at my shop since I've been here longer than anyone else. This is kinda more of a vent but I would like to know what I could have done better. I know I'm not a very charismatic person and can be blunt which might come off as rude. So this lady called and told me she had a "soft coated long haired wirey dachshund". There were a lot more words than that but I don't remember them. She told me he only had a couple matts on the”

submitted by /u/Helpmehelpyu_ [link] [comments]

“this Guy (mid 40s) was upset and raised a complaint through our channel (part of it written in CAPS). My manager said to call him and see what he wants, though I told her I cannot help him. I. So I called and tried to tell him the system broke again (this was his main frustration and I cannot do anything about it... but we can do something manually. He didn't even allow me to finish. he started calling our work laughable and a joke. He talked down to me, kept repeating how I don't unders”

“We have an associate that made an “anonymous” formal complaint to corporate HR about our current HR manager on property. The complaint involved harassment and I believe the associate’s actions were justified. The on property HR manager is now retaliating against the associate and nitpicking every little thing the associate is doing wrong or “against policy” but not applying those same policy rules for all associates. This on property HR manager is unapproachable, has a horrible attitude and does”

“From my experience he was a great BA, wanted to promote, and managers liked him enough to try. They will later wonder why everything is falling apart [re: TPO on my Team admitted he has ZERO clue as to what he’s doing]”

“it's not lying it's just that management says a lot of things they can't actually make happen when the time comes [re: Does management ever lie about upcoming promotions?]”

“My partner mentioned that I could take on more responsibility as people leave the firm. However, I find it a little odd that my seniors are sometimes overwhelmed with work, yet instead of delegating some of it to me, audits end up getting delayed. He has no reason to lie to me but he says I can be promoted soon when someone leaves. submitted by /u/Opera-learner [link] [comments]”

“I’m new at this organization. Been here for 1.5 months now. My manager has been here for 2 months. His email is in dialogue form, I replaced the names with fake names. “Summarizing the non-technical feedback that I discussed with you yesterday - • I have received feedback on communication - • Let's better target how we are communicating with team - Hannah • Can you provide more context / example? - John • The various emails / teams chats today It's natural for you ask questions as an aud”

“There's a bunch of good suggestions for how to handle the business side (tl;dr: tell the helicopter parent to leave). For the friendship, have a friendship discussion. Pull them aside, and lay out what you want from the friendship, and how the business interacts with that. Find out what they want and discover if there is overlap or not. This discussion is not about you, but about the 'us', identifying the friend overlap, business boundaries. If the relationship is good, it can surviv”

“Quit [re: My manager took a photo of my "anonymous" safety report and posted it in our unit group chat. Now I'm being bullied. What should I do?]”

“I have a manager who would rush me and proceeds to distract me with the littlest review points and then will come back again to me because she missed the first ones. I feel like I’ve been comitting a lot more mistakes and review points when she was my manager. Like it seems endless. Some of her review points don’t even make sense. Some are in the form of questions and some are just her plain laziness to look at the workpaper. She would then raise me to the partners. And it sucks because i’ve bee”

“Let the manager go ahead and delete it. You can just add that to the list of bad things she did. IT can retrieve anything. [re: My manager took a photo of my "anonymous" safety report and posted it in our unit group chat. Now I'm being bullied. What should I do?]”

“I'm going to echo everyone else. Escalate and look for a new job. Your manager is the reason your culture is toxic and she needs to be dealt with by those above her. The situation with the other nurses is not going to improve. You did the right thing 100%, for that nurse to tell you to stay out of her rooms no matter what is insane. [re: My manager took a photo of my "anonymous" safety report and posted it in our unit group chat. Now I'm being bullied. What should I do?]”

“Walkaway get a different job and report it to HR. Take screenshots of the group chat. Probably talk to a lawyer. Whatever you do stop working there its not worth your licence. [re: My manager took a photo of my "anonymous" safety report and posted it in our unit group chat. Now I'm being bullied. What should I do?]”

“Managers will typically notice if you're considered helpful and easy to work with by others or not. That will (or should) matter in almost all situations. It is pretty much expected, though. If you don't show results being helpful and pleasant will do very little on its own when it's performance review time. [re: Does the “behind the scenes” part of PM work count toward performance, or is it just assumed?]”

“Wow. I’m sorry you have to deal with that. It may be common but it’s stupid. As a manager and now partner I think a good Senior is worth their weight in gold. I’ve always liked helping when they ask questions cause it’s my job to help them grow. And the better I do my job the more they help me which makes me better at my job. So it’s win win. [re: Is this type of condescending behavior common from managers in public accounting?]”

“So like, more than likely a boss isn't just spending the last hour of his day combing through his employee's stuff, right? Seems like it'd be a PITA. My company seems to monitor us in a lot of sneaky ways though so I'm starting to get paranoid [re: Employers creeping on Slack DMs?]”

“Every job I've ever had I've had managers complain that I work too slow. When I worked in fast food the dishes would pile up before I had a chance to get through them, especially during rush. I recently got a job as a janitor which I thought would be a nice change, but again I'm being told I spend too much time on each room and that I need to be faster. They initially told me I'm leaving spots behind so I decided to spend more time on each room to make sure everything is as spotl”

“I think we have a slightly different interpretation of what it means to be transparent and open. It doesn’t mean being disrespectful, and I also didn’t read OP’s post to imply that. My last company was the best environment I ever worked in. During interviews they were very open about what they expected a candidate to be like snd what their work culture is like. They favoured a high integrity but middle of the pack developer over a rock star asshole. I was skeptical at first but I eventually real”

“Long post, TLDR at the bottom. I work on a small, fairly high-level team. There are 7 of us: 4 engineers, a deal lead (manager), and 2 economists (I'm one of the economists). About a year ago, my boss hired the deal lead (manager) because she was spread way too thin. The engineers report directly to her, and the economists report to the new manager. Pretty much from day one, I've had this ongoing issue where my manager keeps involving one particular engineer in meetings and tasks that fa”

“Well, you made to Friday. Let's recap our workplace drama from this week. Coworker microwaved fish in the breakroom (AGAIN!)? Let's hear about it. Are the pick me girls in HR causing you drama? Tell us what you couldn't say to their smug faces without getting fired on the spot. Co-workers having affairs on the road? You know we want the spicy. The new VP has no idea who to send cold emails to? No, of course they don't. They've never done sales for even a day in their life. An”

“Your new manager is a cuck. We do 50 hour weeks in January and outside of that its 40hrs. Maybe pitch in an hour here and there as needed. I wouldn't give a day of my time to a company who treats understaffing as a key part of the business model. [re: Are the 40 hour work weeks truly over?]”

“Hi! I started a new job a month ago. I’m the only female in a group with four guys, and I’m currently in training. I found out that our manager called every single one of my colleagues to check in on training, and one of them actually let me know about it. ​It’s my second week of training, and my manager avoids me all the time. I’ve noticed that when it’s just the two of us, he talks professionally, but whenever we’re with the whole group, he avoids me at all costs. ​Earlier this week, he came u”

“Hello! I have worked for a company for several years under a manager that made me quit my job finally from the following: Repeated instances of expanded duties (e.g., team lead functions, travel initiatives, sales-like outreach tasks) without adequate training, system access, formal communication, clear authority, or proper compensation. Major projects were rolled out with minimal notice, inadequate resources, and poor cross-team coordination, leading to significant backlogs, heavy workloads, an”

“I've been thinking about this a lot lately especially with how much companies emphasize communication during performance reviews and promotion discussions. Every company I've worked with seems to have some version of the same expectations. They want employees who can communicate clearly, present ideas confidently, influence stakeholders, speak up in meetings, and work effectively across teams. And honestly thought I agree...these are important skills, especially as you move into more sen”

“I work at a very small hotel/inn located in a resort town (5 full-time staff, +3 more during peak season) and act as the assistant manager 2 days a week, and do housekeeping 2-3 more days a week. The main housekeeper and her partner (filling in as a housekeeper) have been showing up to work 30 minutes later than they are reporting on their time sheets. They've been doing this for about 2 weeks now. I've noticed since I have access to the cameras, but haven't mentioned anything. The m”

“I recently joined a company and it’s a hot mess operationally. We have to do loads of reports and the reports format and the questions contained in the report are just not fit for purpose. Since joining I’ve made a number of suggestions which have been implemented and I have received no credit at all. My job is to manage a team and assess their work but the team quite frankly lacks the skill and competency to be able to fill in the reports as they are so the completed reports are always shit. I’”

“My manager is an absolute bully and has incredibly volatile moods. If he thinks something, even if it’s entirely wrong, he will only become angrier if you attempt to correct him. He gets an idea in his head based off basically nothing, and then will just berate you based off what he thinks you are or do in his head even if it’s a random no justification idea. He just makes shit up like thinking you have a certain habit or behavior trait or even a type of person you are and if you disagree or cor”

“Or they'll just leave a 1* with no context. [re: Got a complaint today because my employee ‘told off’ a customer for sitting without ordering. Need advice.]”

“I reported a coworker for showing up to their shift drunk. I gave them the chance to just clock out immediately and leave, but they decided to get in my face and scream (with very potent alcohol breath) and they really gave me no choice. Never fun to report someone but sometimes people give us no choice. [re: Why have you reported another nurse?]”

“Yes and no. I've seen yes people get promoted rapidly just as often as I've seen yes people forgotten, burned out, and left behind. More comes down to your likability and how well the people with promoting power like you. [re: In your experience, do people who say yes to every request and work more than everyone else get rewarded?]”

“Had a frustrating exchange at work today. A manager emailed me asking about the cause of a recurring issue. I responded based on what I understood the question to mean and explained the circumstances behind it. They replied saying that wasn’t what they were asking. Apparently, they wanted to know why certain information wasn’t being updated quickly enough and what could be done to prevent delays. The thing is, their original question didn’t actually mention the timing of updates or expectations”

“She should be going to HR. It’s a game now of whether she can build a case against the supervisor it goes further. It’s either that or she should be very actively looking for a new job, probably both. Unfortunately it’s not going to change for the better unless she starts being proactive. I’m really sorry, it’s probably scary for both of you. [re: I think my mom might be fired soon and its breaking my heart]”

“As always, long story short I’m a shift manager at a local business for 5 years and my manager above me recently has had quite a few talks with me after work this year now. He requests to “just talk” but it fast started to turn into a lecture of “Everybody needs to make sure that they respect you and nobody here seems to listen to your leadership and I’m hearing a lot of bad things, if this isn’t fixed soon we maybe have to have you step down as a manager.” At first I listened and was greatly co”

“As a manager of staff, I would fully expect someone to quit if I treated them the way you've been treated. [re: Is this normal in a small accounting firm? Unrealistic productivity expectations, years of backlog]”

“Skip A as fast as you can [re: My PM quit after 3 weeks, now wants back on better terms and I feel uneasy. Rehire him or go with the runner-up? (I will not promote)]”

“Why are you letting A dictate everything to you? They sound deeply problematic. [re: My PM quit after 3 weeks, now wants back on better terms and I feel uneasy. Rehire him or go with the runner-up? (I will not promote)]”

“He misread the part that there’s an unwritten understanding between you and your manager that you’ll start missing work to take interviews. [re: In the middle of being put on PIP and Now Boss is Bugging me About Attendance?]”

“This is the best way to say it [re: Got a complaint today because my employee ‘told off’ a customer for sitting without ordering. Need advice.]”

“Are you a bot? [re: Got a complaint today because my employee ‘told off’ a customer for sitting without ordering. Need advice.]”

“For real. I'd institute a new policy. Any individual utilizing the space is expected to order or will be banned. [re: Got a complaint today because my employee ‘told off’ a customer for sitting without ordering. Need advice.]”

“Not looking to quit. I love the product, and the base pay is good. I need strategy. The crux: my manager's philosophy is "we all help each other." But in my case, help only flows one way. My territory is small. My peer's is about 10x bigger and full of pre-sold global accounts. When I go above and beyond for the team, it builds her numbers. Even if she helped me back, it would be on accounts a tenth the size. And when I ask for a structure that makes it win-win, I'm seen as”

“I have been working for a company for a few years now. At first when I came in my boss was lovely during honeymoon phase. Then over time she would very accusatory. One time I was talking with a client and she accused me of having a “tone”. Four people sit around me and I asked them privately they all said no and if you did we or our clients would tell you. My boss is the type that always has her door open. She double checks everything I do. The latest feedback had statements that I had a persona”

“So my boss is a micromanager. My boss did a unexpected visit and when I was in a meeting my team told my supervisor that someone in the department watches tv on her phone. I currently allow them all to use their phones as we do repetitive work and if the work gets done, it gets done. However, my boss used to be the leader in my department and has issues with some employees in the department. Unfortunately the employee who was reported is the one she previously had issues with. Let’s call that em”

“Just wanted to get some advice here. We have a new employee and they'll be a part of a team with whom I work closely on a number of projects. They just started about 2 weeks ago. We are a huge, government organization. They came from a corporate organization, not tiny but smaller and probably leaner. The first few weeks of a transition to our organization involves a lot of onboarding and training, which can be kind of redundant and time-consuming. Their boss was out of town for awhile when t”

“You probably got a bunch of middle managers and Visa workers who need to justify sticking around so they make changes that aren’t helpful. It’s a public company if it were private we’d probably have a bit more accountability. [re: Why Make It Look Worse?]”

“Looking for advice on a v frustrating experience I (F in mid 30s) am experiencing at work. My work has experienced a pretty big mass exodus in the last year, which has left me picking up managerial work on top of my typical work, even tho that is not the position I am being paid for. For additional context I have been in my current position for over 5 yrs with no growth. At this point I am an expert on how the department runs, our major clients and the specifics that make this department functio”

“Hello all, I am a 29 Y/O Senior financial analyst working in FP&A with 4 years experience. I have recently joined a new company, which is a Fortune 500 company. Everything has been great so far, except my manager... I am her only report, but I am starting to see why the previous person left her team. She is an extreme micro-manager, who has very high expectations and isn't very good at speaking to people. She continuously tells me that i'm doing great, but she messages me (do this ne”

“Using an alt for this since people at work know my usual account. I’ve been a senior ops coordinator at a regional healthcare staffing company for a little over 3 years. About 6 weeks ago my manager asked me to start training a newer guy on everything I do: vendor contracts, scheduling system, the payroll reconciliation process I basically built from scratch. Her reasoning was that it’s “risky to have all this knowledge in one person” and they wanted coverage in case I’m ever out sick. Honestly”

“A great leader once told me that rockstars can be divas and that managers make the mistake of assuming it's worth it to keep them. There's a ratio of rockstar-to-diva you need to decide you're ok with. I've also found that once you're aware of the ratio, you tolerate less of the nonsense. I'd rather have an excellent A-player who's part of the team, bought into the mission, and humble enough to lead others through example. For me? I would politely decline A's offe”

“Before I start, yes I’m looking for a new job. I started a year ago on a OP procedural unit. Let’s just say it’s a cath lab. Manager also manages Endo. Recently she started forcing 2-3 of us to float to this train wreck of an Endo dept, that has no charge, no organization, and literally 1 nurse who has been there 2 years but is a new grad. She has expected for us to just learn the lay of the land with minimal guidance. The doctors are late, patients come whenever. Manager tells us to come at a d”