To leave my job/grievance with HR

I've sat in on quite a number of HR meetings and definitely seen men called out on their tone /being too aggressive

I see. 🙂

So you say she said 'something like ' watch your tone? You're post isn't very clear. What actually did she say then? Those words, or something that wasn't like that which you may have taken out of context?

I work in HR and I hate any situation where line managers or staff come to me with allegations of rudeness / tone of voice / aggressiveness / unprofessional behaviours, it is so subjective.

If I was in the meeting, and I thought you were becoming aggressive or unprofessional, I think I would break the meeting for a few minutes, to allow everyone to take a breath. But everyone has a different approach and the reality is that in the heat of the moment it can be really hard.

I would also add people pleasers (people who avoid conflict) are often not good at appropriate challenge. I have no idea if this is true for you, it is just my observation.

If I could hazard a guess about what happened, your line manager / HR came to the meeting with a checklist of points they wanted to cover. So did you. You made your points and then HR / your line manager felt they needed to get the meeting back to their agenda.

That being said, if your line manager is a bully, for your own sanity I would either raise a grievance or get another job.

You seemed to be saying you were not wishing to discuss the questions about your well-being as your manager had not followed all the steps of the policy correctly. I was suggesting they are entitled to ask you to discuss absence/health/well-being if you have been absent. They may have to 'step-back' where they are in terms of the stages of the policy but the question is not unreasonable and being unwilling to discuss it could be seen as unreasonable.

Are you in a union? If not join. Find out how long it will be before they are willing to support you. Having sat on the other side of the table a few times, I've found GMB reps to be really feisty, if I was joining a union now I'd definitely consider that one!

I sat in on an HR meeting last week about absence in a school where I support a new Head. The member of staff was very assertive- no problem with that- but he stepped into rudeness because he did not want to discuss his absence just the fact that previously the last Head did not follow the policy. He thought that meant he could start again from scratch and his absences did not count (not the case) and said quite belligerently 'I don't need to answer this and I'm not going to. The school policy was not followed.'

The HR advisor did exactly what you said and pulled him up on it. He was most upset at this but his union rep actually stepped in and apologised and calmed it down. Afterwards ('off the record') the union rep asked if I thought the member of staff had adopted an unprofessional tone, I said I did. He agreed and said he was going to speak to him about how absence management works.

If you have been absent, you've been absent and the organisation has a right to pursue that and discuss it with you. They may have to step down the absence procedure to an earlier stage if they have not followed it but have a right to discuss absence and well-being with you. I'd expect that in any large organisation or one with an HR dept/advisor.

Well if your manager is a bully and the HE person isn’t doing anything about it they are not doing their job. That said I wouldn’t address something like that with a manager in front of the employee so maybe they are dealing with that aspect behind the scenes.

Life is too short to work for a shit manager though - get another job - there’s so many about at the moment you shouldn’t have any issue and good luck.

I work in HR

Our role is varied but a large part of it is protecting the organisation.

This can be by ensuring policies are legally compliant and enacted fairly, training managers on employment law and best practice and ensuring persistent or long term sickness does not adversely impact the company whilst ensuring employees are supported to return to work and adjustments are in place where appropriate.

I might say to an employee that their tone was unprofessional during a meeting of it was. What exactly did the HR person say? “Watch your tone” would be quite inappropriate but something like “I appreciate this is a difficult meeting for you but please remember to keep your tone professional” might be ok if warranted

I hate HATE that there are always people who sound like your boss around in the workplace. Everyone knows they are - essentially - a bully. They don't bully everyone (that wouldn't work) so they target people. No-one feels they can say anything because they are usually in positions of some power. It's an open secret. Organisations do nothing to hold them to account because they treat individual instances, not seeing patterns.

I don't know what your profession is or whether it is too niche to be transferable, but a career coach/life coach might be helpful in thinking through next steps. If you leave, you haven't let them win - what you have actually done is put yourself first (and hopefully write an eviscerating 'I quit' letter)

Do you have a union rep?

This sounds a bit shit and I would probably start looking for a new job.

I agree, the 'watch your tone' is poor HR unprofessionalism, rather than identifying exactly what you said that HR considered inappropriate.

These posts are always interesting to me as my first thought was, would a man have been asked to watch his tone?

This - HR woman to basically say something like ‘you’re talking to your manager and I suggest you watch your tone’ - is IMO not appropriate. Respectful communication is for everyone we work with, not just our managers and those senior to us. 'Watching your tone' is incredibly subjective - and comes across as a way to shut someone up. If the HR person wanted to raise an issue with your response, then they should be identifying what, exactly, you had said or done that was felt inappropriate. e.g. maybe they should/could have reflected back that you had had a brief discussion about covid mitigation but hadn't discussed your wellbeing in a more general sense. Or acknowledged that these meetings can be difficult and emotional, and our responses might not come across as they seem....etc.

Also, if they were asking you about your wellbeing, surely a consideration should have been given to the fact you might not want to discuss that in front of your manager?

Anyway, your question was about whether you should carry on working for the company. Can you move within the company to be away from current manager? Could you request another HR meeting (with the colleague who observed) to highlight this issue?

If you can get a job elsewhere though, and this one is making you miserable, then maybe it is worth moving. The people you work with is the main thing that makes day to day job life ok or not (IMO).