Shared information I shouldn't at work

@PauliesWalnuts you've basically said the exact same as me 🤷‍♂️ could be, depends what’s in the document.

A GDPR governance manager once sent me and 800 other people an email on GDPR and the importance of it within the public sector, Que 200 people all emailing back, while also cc. Ing the 800 people back into the message, literally thousands of emails, bounce back, out of office etc. funny enough he wasn’t there much longer after that.

like I said before, it depends what’s in the document, it doesn’t sound so bad tbh.

It's arguably not confidential. It's just sensitive. The two things aren't necessarily the same.

I doubt there will be any disciplinary sanction of note however the bigger issue will be that your integrity and perceived competence will now be irrevocably tarnished with many of the employees. Mistake or not, I’d never trust you with anything confidential again.

There will also be those who are very much anti unions and this will be manna from heaven for them.

Having read your updates OP I don't think it's as serious as your initial panic told you it was. Sorry this happened, what an awful sinking feeling you must have had.

I think as you and others have said, it's a case of making it clear to your employer that you know it's a serious breach and you do take it seriously and will be accountable by making changes to ensure it can't happen again.

I think pretty much everyone has done something similar at work, forwarded the wrong email on etc, there's likely to be some sympathy for you. Talk to your manager.

Okay, this doesn’t sound quite as bad. The only people management can be pissed off with are you and the other rep, who are named as criticising them. The way the minutes were taken protects your members by not naming them individually - that’s good practice. You really need to speak to someone from the Union asap; they may have a specific process to follow for this kind of breach.

But your union activities are not part of your job, so I can’t see that the company could legally sanction you for an error made while carrying out Union duties. You didn’t mess up at work; you messed up in your voluntary position as a union rep. The powers that be in your company may be annoyed, but my instinct is that they’d be on extremely dangerous ground if they did anything that could be seen as retaliation, since your error wasn’t an error in the work for which they pay you, iyswim. You have every right to discuss management attitudes to union concerns. It’s unfortunate that you made that discussion public, accidentally. But you haven’t revealed any wrongdoing or inappropriate expression of opinions, either by yourself or anyone else, so any retaliation for the contents of the document you shared would, in my opinion, be absolutely illegal. (I am not a lawyer, just a former union rep.)

Try not to panic. A calm response from you will help other people keep this in perspective. Be very clear about what has and has not happened: you have accidentally shared a document which attributes opinions to you and your union colleague; you have not identified any ordinary union members as the source of opinions about management.

You may need to send a response to the incident to your members. IMO, you should make these points:

• the minutes did not reveal any names of individual members who had spoken to union reps;
• concerns from various departments had already been shared with management, so the inclusion of these in the minutes revealed nothing that had not already been okayed for wider distribution;
• the only breach of information relating to named individuals was in sharing the assessment of management responses to concerns, which were attributed directly to you and your fellow rep;
• going forward, there needs to be a best practice plan for distributing minutes; this might include password protecting, or making the minutes available on request rather than sharing to all members on email by default, for example;
• ideally, measures in response to this incident should seek to ensure that the minutes never identify individuals, regardless of how the documents are distributed, since there is nothing to stop a member passing the minutes on to other colleagues, or printing them and leaving them lying around, etc. The distributed version of the minutes should therefore be redacted, removing any information that could potentially identify individuals (including, as in this case, union reps) as the source of opinions or of actions recorded in the minutes.

Good luck with it all!

Yes I think password protecting is one thing but sounds like you do need some training into how to manage meeting governance and the purpose of the minutes for that meeting. Eg. Why are they needed, what happens to them after the meeting etc etc. Also generally best to stick to facts and neutral language. In my experience no-one really wants “he said/she said” type minutes, they want something action focused as “Paulieswalnuts” above suggested.

It's a major breach. It could impact the outcome of whatever the case relates to. So I'd imagine you'd need further training or something. I know it was an honest mistake but not one that can really happen without consequence in your role.

I really don’t think you’ll get sacked for this (human) error.

Id suggest proactively making a point that in future you’ll use password protected documents. I think the key to moving forward is you being transparent and not trying to cover this mistake.

@40YearOldDad - your first sentence is unhelpful and scaremongering. As an administrator/governance officer for 35 years I've never known someone sacked or disciplined for sending out confidential minutes by mistake. Unless it contains market-sensitive information you'd only get a rap on the knuckles and a telling-off.

Like @Redburnett says - the minutes are too detailed and shouldn't contain the sort of information you've disclosed. They should be concise, to the point, and should leave "feelings" and people's opinion out unless that person has requested that their opinion be minuted. Who was there, who wasn't, what was agreed, what wasn't, and who had actions. That's it. Not sure who is writing your minutes but they maybe could do with a refresh, or if they've never been trained (as is often the case) to do a one-dayer course with someone like Reed.

I would urge you not to resign. You can show you have learnt from the mistake by password protection in future. In my experience not many people want any job in a Union as it is mainly extra to your own job. I hope it is a good outcome for you.

I know this doesn't help now. But in future you can put a delay on your emails to send after 5 minutes to stop stuff like this happening.

recall notifications take a bit of time in outlook. You will probably know within 24 hours. Is there anyone you can check with (you trust) if they received it?

Keep calm, admit your mistake and escalate to the necessary people (in your managers absence). Have you been given adequate training and could this be added to any training sessions whereby you suggest a change of procedures for disseminating minutes of meetings? Think about how you can turn a negative into a positive - you can lead the change. Find out which emails have been returned and which have been delivered and read so you are aware of the possible impact. Show that you have taken action to mitigate the mistake and any possible cost to your company. i hope this helps.

How many did you manage to not recall?

You will likely be disciplined, and depending on what information was in the document, you may be sacked.

if it's people's opinions on someone's performance, they should be bringing it up anyway, maybe not in a public way, because now everyone knows Sarah from accounts can't count.

If it's bonus information and any personal details, such as 'Sarah's mental health problems are really affecting her', then it hits differently.

If you're using Outlook you can check the status of the recall and see who's read the email/which recalls were successful etc. Hopefully you can check that and it'll maybe help put your mind at ease that most people didn't read it yet?

To be honest, sounds like gross misconduct to me so I would be terrified in your shoes. Sorry that's not helpful, but if my confidential info was in that document I would be kicking up hell!

As a general rule it is unwise to minute what was actually said, and instead to say something more general like 'x was discussed'. Minutes are most useful if they focus on action points with person responsible and targets or deadlines. This may be advice for the future, but your timing is quite fortunate really as it's likely the offending document will be forgotten about over Christmas.

@lifeisforlaying I said she should offer to resign - not that she should. And to resign from the position of union rep, not her job. (Which is what I said in my post!) To show that she understands the situation she is in.

Yes, it's human to make mistakes. But this was a particularly serious one, given her position in the company. So as you've also suggested, this is really about grovelling, to show that she recognises how serious a breach it has been.

BIWI didn't say she should resign from her job, she said OP should offer to resign from being a union rep. That's not her career and livelihood, as presumably she has a job at which she also represents the union!

FWIW I agree offering to step down as a rep is a good gesture, OP. Also, I wouldn't talk with someone outside the union about it until you've got advice from the union itself.