Managing my group is making me sick

[Marasme]

i have several Phd students, spread across Y1 to Y4 (some with multi-extensions), who are generally ok, but for the odd very specific conflicts with each other. A bit part of managing them is dealing with their insecurities and worries, a cheering them on to the finish line. For some, this involves a big dose of pastoral support, which i ve found increasingly difficult, especially when abuse or trauma is the source of need.

i also have 5 members of staff, across all grades, some scientists, some professional services. They all have strengths, but the 4 who work together suck mega chunks of my time with their bickering and demands.

It's appraisal season, and this has ramped up, with emails complaining about one another, in all directions, coupled with demands of promotion. Promotion does not exist, at least not in that way, for the PS staff. It s an eternal issue that i cannot do anything about, but tell them to look for that more senior job elsewhere. Saying that, none of them are ready for it - with v poor understanding of the fact that being good at the bits of the job that you like and ignoring the rest is not enough. I raised this recently with each and invariably, workload was brought as a reason - yet, they all elect to join conferences and training which are not core to their role, and want to continue doing this, as they find it rewarding. It is like talking to a wall. I cannot face that round of appraisals- we won t be talking about progress or development, but on the usual drift topic of "how do i get to the next grade regardless of not meeting my objectives"

i worked with the three of them through illnesses, bereavement, making sure that i supported them in a way that minimised stress and made sure they got everything the uni could provide - sometime at my own cost in doing their job to not impact on the others. Probably a mistake. I am also exhausted after absorbing personal tales that are charged in trauma and personal details (undergrads, postgrads and staff, who share despite me telling them i do not need the details).

What pisses me off is that they treat me as "mum" and would never unload on me as much if i was an old bloke. I barely have time to do academic thinking and my day is doing HR, and conflict management. I was off last week, they knew it, and yet bickered all week and kept sending urgent requests for me to "hear them out" - i have no clue where they learnt to do this. I don t express myself that way, certainly not to my manager.

I don’t work in a university setting but I have done a lot of staff management and I think that you urgently need some boundaries in place.

Put aside 2 hours a week in your calendar for dealing with this sort of thing. Any emails which you get in between send a holding reply of something like “I’m busy in meetings this week, but have put some time in my diary at 3pm on Friday to look at this in depth”

Get yourself a template for meetings/supervisions which you share with the team that has work first and then a space at the end for personal/pastoral. Plan in specific times for meetings so that the final section is no longer than 20 minutes. Find some good resources for mental health - hr probably has something specific in place - and hand them out to anyone struggling with personal stuff. Next meeting, reference “did you engage with the mental health support?”.

Give them all some feedback around professionalism - not moaning about each other, working with people who you dislike, keeping personal stuff personal at work etc - in their next appraisal.

Oh god, this sounds hideous. Have you spoken to HR about this? Your line manager? Are you very clear in PDRs about objectives not being met? Is mentoring or coaching offered by your institution?

The last time I did a HoD role, I had similar with everyone thinking I was their bloody mother. It drove me insane and was a huge amount of emotional pressure at a time when I was really ill (to the point of needing surgery). I hate that male academics just don't have this kind of thing imposed on them.

I think there is a massive issue emerging with PhD students and junior academics having been raised in a system which is all about their mental health, wellbeing and work-life balance. With absolutely no consideration of other people's mental health, wellbeing and work-life balance. I'm often astounded by how selfish some of them are and the expectations that they have of everyone else around them.

I also manage a big group of students and staff. When I got my latest big grant, and hired a lot of people, I made a conscious effort to manage them like I’m in the private sector. I am not their mum, as you say, and don’t want to get involved in their personal lives. Of course I am
onvolved, as one has a long term health condition, one is pregnant etc, and I am supportive of them. I throw baby present coffee mornings and whatnot. But fundamentally I am distant - I try to manage like a senior man.

what this means is - minuting everything, and getting them to write summings up of meetings afterwards, which I amend and send back; not entertaining mild moaning about each other; getting them to print off the promotion forms, highlight what they’ve done, with evidence, and work out what to do next. I instituted four days a week in the office and clamped down on egregious time wasting, even by students. I expect them to be working more or less 9-5 (although I am very supportive of formal working agreements if they want).

what is interesting is they like it. I’m a bit distant from them now, I have no idea where they go out or who likes who or whatever. But boundaries are clear and our productivity has gone through the roof

thank you for the replies and suggestions

as a group, we have templates and processes, which some take more seriously than others. I need to draw a clearer line in the sand on consequences of not following process.

the return to the office is a tricky one - and the little bickering trio is adament that they do not want this, and drag themselves in once or twice a week at most, making a lot of noises about it.

What s grating is the constant noises implying that they deserve more/ better conditions - WFH when they want, 4-day weeks with no time after 5 pm, joining clubs and committees as and when they want - to some extent, that s a direct consequence of the uni trying to craft a development mindset, at the expense of doing the boring bits of the job.

(HR does not give a crap - this is all small chips, and my manager is the head of school, so pretty much the same - and i would not to burden him with that level of nonsense)

the way i see this year / appraisal round is that i will simply be very open that if they want to leave their position, they absolutely can - in fact, we can activate various options to facilitate this. I hate being held hostage - and noone is irreplaceable.

@GCAcademic selfish... totally. It makes me struggle to sympathise with their position. The level of entitlement is insane.

i recently said no to the person who wanted a 4-day compressed week with no hours after 5pm and time off for drop off and pick ups (because that s called a PT 0.8fte, not a compressed 1FTE) and this descended in a long series of accomodation demands. If they do not get what they want, they throw their toys out of the pram.

Take some time out to watch ‘the devil wears Pravda’ then channel Miranda.

I’d limit the pastoral stuff to scheduled I21s and develop a sheet to use to record issues and share a copy at the end of each session. Say you need to focus on the academic side and if they have other struggles signpost other services.
Managing staff can suck all your energy and leave you with no time to do your own work; ensure you have time by not allowing anyone to disturb you at fixed times.

Wow. I can't imagine having relationships like this in my workgroup.
Does everyone at your workplace hate most their colleagues, not just the people in your management line?

Agree that channelling Miranda might be your best strategy.

You need to tell them "too bad" and that you definitely can't sort their interpersonal conflicts. Your remit & power is very much smaller.

Almost 10 yrs ago I found out friend was in midst of marital breakdown. Early on I drew firm lines about how emotionally entangled I would get. It took her 6 yrs to divorce... we remain friends only because I just didn't get emotionally caught up with her woes.

That sounds really tough. There’s some good advice here- boundaries and distance, plus using the info available to you to keep it all factual.
In my experience, I’ve had to use strategies I learnt from dealing with toddlers to deal with some adults in the work place. And it’s shit that men aren’t expected to be a surrogate ‘mum’ at work.

In the case you mention, I would have shown them their contract, and asked them to show me how they would fit 37 quality working hours (with no children present) into their working week. I would have told them to schedule a meeting to show me this and I would look at it then. Then refused to discuss until they had done so

if they turned up with a plan that showed 32 hours work I’d have sent them immediately away again. Your time is precious, don’t spend it trying to negotiate with people who want the moon on a stick

finally, DO NOT LOOK AT EMAILS on your week off! When you get back have a meeting and tell them you will not be looking at emails out of work time, and not to send the ‘hear me out’ style of email, as it is not appropriate. If there is a genuine grievance they can make a formal appointment with you when you get back.
this will make you ill, continuing like this. You have to take a big step back. The priority is the work, the science, and ensuring everyone works safely and well.

I would be either looking to unload the professional services onto the registrar and/or bringing in a deputy to take on the bulk of your admin. Make your case, a business case, on the necessity of having a dotted line to professional services. Try to find some numbers to support your argument.

Universities provide a massive amount of resources for mental health (especially for students) and mentoring and training and all sorts of support. Tell them to lean on that rather than you.

set them clear achieveable goals for the science and then maybe meetings can focus more on those goals.

Lots of good advice here OP, they have slipped into a pattern of oversharing and over reliance so it will take a bit of time to get them out if it but you can do it!

the students are tricky, but i can manage them. the staff, on the other hand - i really struggle. It s the mix of unreasonable expectations, struggle with their own workloads, and interpersonal tensions. We are a very organised group - a template and a procedure for everything, except maybe what is standard professionally, because i never thought this needed spelled out.

@medschoolrat they don t hate each other per se - they bicker, and mostly complain about each other to me, but are all sweetness to each other in meetings.

One of them decided today to go air grievances to the lead of another team who they are peripherally involved with - said lead as asked me for a meeting to explore what s happening. I ve shut that down, but i m now really annoyed.

i will be scheduling a team reset point shortly - we need to change our ways of working for my sake, and for theirs. Thank you everyone for suggestions.

I recently was in a situation that has some parallel to yours @Marasme. Luckily, my line manager was very good at backing me up with the issues around promotion (or rather lack thereof) - if you choose to do 'fun' activities not central to your role, you cannot expect to get promoted; if you are on a PS track you joined knowing full well there are no opportunities for automatic promotion, you cannot come to me and moan so that I create a new position at a higher grade for you, and so on. What I learned eventually was to be absolutely adamant that people have to write SMART objectives in their appraisal form that are relevant to their role, and to have a discussion of how this would fit (or not) with their promotion plans. I know this sounds very managerial and bureaucratic but I found the amount of nonsense other reviewers let people get away with (things that are completely irrelevant and related to hobbies rather than work, or things that are completely unspecific like "Considering potentially perhaps doing XYZ") was unbelievable, and I felt that this let people away with a lot - i.e. "I have completed all of these [meaningless, unspecific] objectives - why am I not promoted or rewarded?". Not that it will solve everything and I'm sure you do this already but for me, at least in a couple of cases, it led to a bit of a wake up call where people realized they weren't being as stellar at their job as they thought they were. I would also keep a few links/set phrases handy, both for e-mail and in person - various referrals to the university's counselling service, coaching (if your uni does that - mine does), mentoring, etc. This also sometimes mildly helped, in the sense that it subtly sends the message that whatever they are asking of you, it's not your job.

thanks @aridapricot - it helps (me) to be able to speak about it

appraisals last week were a joke - one was a lengthy whinge aboug unmanageable workloads. When i pointed out that in their ultra busy-ness, they are hardly delivering more than one output per week so i cannot see where the time goes, they accused colleagues of overloading them. Said extra output i ended up having to complete myself anyway. Email and phone calls (singles, not bunches) are scheduled as 30min tasks. Apparently it s "tricky".

so i set some smart objectives with measurable time-bound targets in term of outputs, and guardrails on when and how long. But that's not appropriate because "they value managing their own time" and "the freedom".

The job is also too challenging - they are never comfortable enough to know they are doing everything right. But when i offered to simplify and take away the more challenging stuff, this was not well received... because they like to "be trusted".

It was a long long long session when i lost a bit of respect for their position, and quite a bit of emphathy. A giant word salad of entitlement. They don't want to leave - they want to be promoted.

I work my ass off to win grants to keep these people in roles that they turn their nose to. The song we hear in interview is such a gaslight compared to the reality.