Tell or Keep Quiet?

[ICanStillSayIDontRemember]

If you knew one of your close colleagues could potentially be having a grievance raised against them, would you let them know beforehand so they could be prepared?
Or keep out of it?

Someone did the same for me a few years ago (wasn’t a complaint, a manager was trying to engineer situations to trip me up and I was forewarned) and I’ve been
forever grateful but I don’t know whether to pay the karma forward.

If it was someone who I considered a friend, yes I’d for warn them confidentially.

Can you do it in an informal way. Say XX seems pretty upset with you about YYY. Just in case they are completely unaware....

Depends - do you think the grievance is reasonable?

Some people are so unaware of their behaviour -

I don’t think it’s got any basis and I feel it’s a bit of a witch-hunt.

We are very close and have each other’s back usually. They are much more senior than me and seen (by my same level colleagues) as in the group who aren’t worthy of protection.

I can definitely do it casually.

well why wouldn’t you tell them? The only issue is whether you trust them not to drop you in it. So if you know about this grievance because you overheard something ( or found something on the printer) that’s one thing but I’d the only reason you know is you’re involved in the process eg HR then that’s tricky. You don’t want your friend marching into someone’s office in a rage and dropping you in it.

It really depends on how you know and whether there’s an expectation you’d hold the information confidentially.

He definitely wouldn’t drop me in it and I only know as other people were talking and laughing about it when I was there but they didn’t think I’d join the dots about what they were saying so I didn’t hear it confidentially.

I think I’ll tell him we need to talk somewhere private as I fear if people see us, they’ll know I’m ‘snitching’.

Writing all this down is making me realise what a toxic place it is that I work at but personal crisis at the moment means I can’t leave.

What would you want them to do if the roles were reversed? I say tell them

💯

If you do,do it face to face,no texts, email etc.

Agreed. Leave no evidence that can be used against you.

If you're absolutely sure and it's not just a hunch, then yes I would tell them in a kind way. I think Id want to know if it was me