Very difficult work situation - menopause related - advice/experiences needed

[Woofwoofwoofgoesthewolfhound]

I'm one of the senior managers in a small marketing & design agency.

One of the other senior managers recently hired a woman into his team. She's got a strong CV with an excellent record and the specific technical experience we were looking for. She's been in the role for a couple of months and the quality of her work has been exemplary.

But. She is suffering very badly with menopause-related symptoms, specifically rage, which appears uncontrollable. In the short time she has been with us she has already caused huge upset within the team by being rude, critical, argumentative, quick to anger, and basically very disruptive. Her presence has completely unbalanced what was previously a pretty harmonious team, and her manager (my colleague) is struggling to control the situation. A couple of the younger members of the team (one man, one woman) have said privately to him that they are finding the situation extremely upsetting and cannot continue working with her.

I know this could be interpreted as her teammates not liking a capable middle-aged woman who speaks her mind, but honestly that isn't what is going on here - her behaviour has been genuinely awful at times and completely unacceptable in the workplace.

Obviously this has been raised with her directly and she is aware of the problem and clearly very upset about it herself, but says that what she is experiencing feels genuinely uncontrollable. She's seeking help via her GP.

We (the management team) are now facing the difficult decision of what to do about the situation. On the one hand, she is doing great work and we have no reason not to believe her that her behaviour is entirely menopause-related - there are no red flags at all in her CV and she was with her previous employer for a long time and had a good reference. She is actively trying to get help. But on the other hand, we have a duty of care to the rest of the team who are on the receiving end of her rage.

It isn't possible to redesign her role to enable her to work independently of the rest of the team - collaboration is part and parcel of the role. So we have the option of either letting her go now (she is still in her probation period) or expecting the team to suck it up until she is able to find something that helps her.

I'm completely torn on this. As a fellow middle aged woman myself, it feels utterly awful that a woman should lose her livelihood because of the impact of something that is beyond her control. But we have a duty of care to our employees who are understandably feeling bruised and upset by her behaviour.

I'd really appreciate hearing from other people who have been in this situation, either as a manager or as employee (either as the one suffering, or as someone who has been impacted by someone who is).

Yea I imagine some of them do. It's just people have areas that interest them more so they check those boards more than others.

Have you never come across people suggesting to move threads before on here? It happens a lot.

Op your other employees can quite rightly take you to employment tribunal for allowing harrassment and bullying in the workplace. It is illegal and you are culpable. You know and you’re allowing it to continue.

You need a plan of action because menopause is definitely recognised as a potentially protected characteristic.

I'd be very firm about that behaviour being unacceptable in the workplace. If she claims she is unable to control it, then at the minimum, she must remove herself from the workplace until she feels she has it under control. This time off should be unpaid.

If she sticks to that plan then agree a time limit of say six months when it will be resolved by. Then review (because it will be disruptive to your workflow so can't continue indefinitely).

If she lapses then one written warning and out.

Meet with team inform them there's a plan and reassure that they are not expected to tolerate abuse.

Yes, and it’s always stupid.

Has she TOLD you that her symptoms are menopause related, or are you assuming because of her age?

I am one of the people who has suffered enormously but my symptoms have been depression/anxiety rather than uncontrollable rage or tantrums. I do not put up with as much shit as I might have done in my 20s or 20s but think that's a good thing. It's a tricky one as you can't insist she sees her GP or starts HRT, or increases her dose if she's already on it. All you can do is address the specific behaviours.

Menopause can be awful for many women but it's not ever an excuse to behave appallingly with no consequences.

By leaning over backwards to be fair to her, you need to consider: are you then being unfair to your other employees?

I've recently moved jobs from where I was bullied.
The two perpetrators used to fall back on health issues, one being PTSD, the other menopause, to explain why they behaved like this on the odd occasions they were caught in the action.
When I say odd occasion, it wasn't what they were doing was odd occasions but they were able to miraculously control it so that if there were people around who would call the behaviour out, they didn't behave like that.

But the management leant over backwards to say "we must be fair to them".
Result is I now have PTSD from being bullied, depression that at times has gone into being suicidal and have moved job.
is that fair?

So look at the whole situation. You're determined to be fair to her. Are you also being fair to your other employees who may be suffering as a consequence.

Edited to say: And don't rely on the reference to have let you know those issues were happening before. I have it on good word that the reason why one of my bullies changed job was because no one would work with them because of their behaviour and they behaved the same there. They were delighted to get rid of them without having to do anything.

And document everything.

It's actually quite easy to defend a tribunal claim - you just need to be able to evidence that you have been fair and tried to work with the employee to resolve the problem. After that, you've done all your have a duty to as an employer.

No ones saying she has free reign to behave like this.

However, the fact is she has disclosed she has a condition that could be considered a disability, and the rage could be attributed to that condition. Therefore the employer must explore this further in order to ensure a 'safe' dismissal. Particularly as she has said she is seeking help for it (so she's not just saying "tough shit employer")

Ah no worries I always thought it was pretty helpful. Can usually see the quality of advice improves.

Anyway, irrelevant, twas only a suggestion, I'm sure op can decide if it was stupid or not.

The employer must also protect the staff as it is illegal to allow bullying and harrassment in the workplace. She should be put on immediate garden leave and medical reports from her doctor provided.

From the perspective of other employees:
'Your employer has specific duties to protect you from work-related violence and aggression. This includes verbal abuse as well as physical attacks.'

www.hse.gov.uk/violence/worker/index.htm#:~:text=Your%20employer%20has%20specific%20duties,freelancer%20or%20are%20self%2Demployed.

Menopause may be a protected characteristic / disability and require employers to make 'reasonable adjustments' to not discriminate against the employee because they are going through menopause. But no one could argue that breaking the employer's legal duty of care to other employees and allowing them to be abused was a 'reasonable adjustment' that the employer should be making for this person.

Action needs to be taken immediately to protect the other staff. Sick leave, extension of probabtion and possibly eventually failure of probation.

Also a potential (and that’s a stretch) disability that makes her impossible to work with, and she failed to declare.

as such if it is a disability they need to put reasonable adjustments in. The op says it is not feasible for her to work in isolation as such they would be legally justified in moving to capability termination.

you can’t have it both ways. If it’s a disability then she needs reasonable adjustments, it it’s not feasible then termination.

if it’s not a disability then they simply terminate.

I’d also add disabled doesn’t mean entitled to employment, it means reasonable adjustments, where feasible.

there is no discrimation, because they’d not allow anyone to abuse and harass staff, well maybe they would.

Op just FYI harassment is unlawful if related to a protected characteristic, although bullying is not actually illegal.

It's vanishingly unlikely your employer would have any successful claims of CD against them as a result of this if they can demonstrate they are working with all involved to improve the situation. As it stands right now, there's more legal risk relating to dismissing the potentially disabled employee without following fair process than there is with the others (unless any of them have a PC and she is discriminating against them when she has her outbursts).

Edited - and don't put on garden leave, that's used when the person has been dismissed.

Op, does this woman behave with rage/anger with clients and management or just team members?

You sound like a very very fair employer.

Another thing I'd do is go back and check references with previous employers to verify that this is definitely menopause related, and not just a personality clash being disguised as a menopause issue.

That’s utter nonsense.

https://www.gov.uk/workplace-bullying-and-harassment

https://www.gov.uk/workplace-bullying-and-harassment

and if she’s disabled as you’re so adamant then her doctor needs ro confirm it and the op needs to agree reasonable adjustments with her. As this involves not working with people then none are to be had, as such, the employer can terminate,

Have you read those links?? 😬

Or any of my posts in fact? I'm not adamant at all, quite the opposite, hence advising op to explore this before any dismissal.

From the link, which confirms what I said. So not nonsense.The lawBullying itself is not against the law, but harassment is. This is when the unwanted behaviour is related to one of the following

(Goes on to list protected characteristics)

It's not acceptable behaviour and other employees should not be subjected to it, no matter what the reason or if it's disability related. She should be removed from the team until her behaviour is under control, whether that's sick leave or not passing probation and being let go.

Anyway, yea, op, maybe do get this moved to Employment 😂

I cannot believe some of the responses on here. And also, what on earth are you playing at? It would be gross misconduct at my work to be aggressive to someone, regardless of disability status.

The first time your employee was aggressive towards another member of staff she should have been given a verbal warning, along with the offer of support if she needs time off for appointments etc. to get help or support from occupational health. The second time she should have been suspended and put under investigation, alternative roles considered, or whether any treatment is likely to prevent it happening again and a final written warning given. If it happened a third time she should be dismissed on capability grounds. This would be exactly the same procedure if it was a violent or aggressive schizophrenic employee. You simply cannot allow your staff to be abused in the work place. You have a duty of care and it would be negligent to continue to allow this. You are far more likely to be taken to tribunal by an employee citing constructive dismissal who has been forced to resign due to an unsafe working environment.

I’m pregnant at the moment so I know what hormonal rage can be like, I still wouldn’t be aggressive to people at work, I might snap or be short with them but if I felt genuinely unable to control my aggression I would leave the room. I would put money on her being able to control herself in the presence of police etc. like a PP said.

Menopausal or not, her conduct is completely unacceptable and I’d go down the managing conduct route, fail her probation and let her go.

I haven’t RTFT but I’m menopausal and if I behaved like this at work I’d be disciplined, rightly.

From someone who is suffering from just about every menopausal symptom and some weird ones thrown in, I thank you for being so mindful of how you deal with your menopausal employee.

I used to get meno rage. It comes over you like a hot anger where you really struggle to keep charge of your emotions. However, it's not acceptable to behave like that in work. My team knew I was struggling with the menopause but didn't know about the rage so if I needed a moment I would excuse myself because of a 'hot flush' or I would say I 'was having a moment' and needed a drink/fresh air/hrt enema.

I am the biggest advocate for menopausal women, however raging at your colleagues is not on. However, as soon as I started HRT, the rages disappeared. So it might be as simple as your employee getting the right medication.

You sound like a fabulous person to work for. Thank you again for being a fair and mindful manager.

OP does this lady drive? Because if she does and she is claiming menopause related uncontrollable rage then she should not be doing so. That may be a starting point in your thought process and maybe in conversation with her what else can she not do because of the rage?....can she control the rage elsewhere? I used to work in the NHS and in such circumstances she would be put on immediate sick leave. We had HR and Occy health which made it easier. Someone has already suggested ACAS which would be a good place to start. it may be in these circumstances that there are no reasonable adjustments that you can make assuming that she is entitled to them....I dunno....having been through menopause myself and worked along side many colleagues who did, I would say that UNCONTROLLABLE rage caused by menopause is quite rare....

Thank you to everyone who has responded, it is genuinely very helpful.

A couple of PPs asked if she has raised it herself or if we are assuming that it is menopause related - it's the former.

I also just wanted to reiterate that I/we are in no way trying to prioritise her wellbeing over that of her teammates. I absolutely understand that we have an equal duty of care to everyone, and that includes protecting them from unacceptable behaviour.

And although it probably sounds like we've already let things go on too long, in the real world these things don't happen overnight - it took time for her colleagues to get to the point when they needed to raise it with us and for her manager to build an accurate picture of what has been going on.