Manager has asked for a meeting. Am I being paranoid?

[tillymasala]

I'm on maternity leave at the moment. All going ok. My manager has asked if he can have a meeting with me. I've asked him what it's for and he's just said 'I'll speak to you on thursday'

No idea what it could be about. I'm really paranoid and anxious I've done something wrong.

The meeting is over lunch. If it was something bad they wouldn't do it over lunch would they?

I have PND and a bad anxiety disorder which causes me a fair bit of paranoia and 'thinking the worst'

Am I being silly? I'm good at my job and can't think of anything I've ever done wrong...

Manager has asked for a meeting

Give me his number and I'll give him a call and get back to you on that

You wont be sacked over lunch.

Well as you're on maternity leave you can't have done anything wrong. Probably just changes in the company they need to let you know about and Manager is fitting it into their lunch break. Don't stress.

He's travelling to where I'm staying (I work remotely) which is 2.5 hours away. Just seems a bit much! But nice if he's doing that just to update me.

Ugh why do managers do that?! I would never ever do that to someone. I'm sure everything is fine OP but I totally get why you're worried! It's more than likely just an update.

It's really frustrating. Feel like they're going to make me redundant! Or something else awful. So paranoid.

Is there going to be a restructure?

@HollowTalk I doubt it very much. We've just had one!

Restructure is what I immediately thought. But agree you’d have bern hard pushed to do something wrong when you’re on maternity leave.

I think the maybe planning to make some redundancies at work or your employer is making some other material change such as being bought or buying and merging with another company. That's not to say you are going to be at risk of redundancy yourself however. But it is best to prepare on the basis that there is some material change which is currently confidential and which all employees should be advised of at the same time, if possible.

If it was a general catch up, then I would have expected him to say. He's travelling to you hence why the meeting at the restaurant as it wouldn't be appropriate to come to you house on his own and, even if he came with a colleague and you invited him to the house, it's better to meet on neutral territory.

That's going to be a change, and he wants you to hear it from him. My guess is he's resigning.

Ugh this is awful. Doing this immediately makes me feel like I’m going to be told off - I wish managers would make a point of saying ‘it’s not bad, I just need to tell you something and it has to be in person and I can’t do it before Thursday’.

You're very protected if you’re on maternity leave.

Maybe it's just to discuss your return to work and see how you're getting on?

I had similar - my boss told me she was leaving the company

I can understand why you're feeling a bit anxious. I suggest that maybe you ask him for an agenda with the excuse that you can prepare in advance? If he says you don't need to prepare then that could open up your opportunity to ask what the meeting is about?

Maybe he's just in the area and thought it was a good chance to check in?

Could well be it's nothing to do with you but some other changes he wants to update you on.

Easy to say, hard to do; but try to put it out of your mind until Thursday

I thought restructure but if you've already had one then it's unlikely. Could be there's been a breach of GDPR somewhere and he just needs to make sure all employees are up to date with protocol. As you're in mat leave I wouldn't worry too much. It's probably just box ticking. A bit arsey of him not to give you some inkling though.

😥😥😥😥😥😥

How many months are you into your maternity leave?
When are you due back?

Oh I hate when people do this - just tell me what it's bloody about and don't leave me thinking all sorts!

This happened to me recently and I got a pay rise.

I recently did this to a colleague on ML. It was to tell her that she'd been salary benchmarked and was getting a raise.
Don't worry OP, it may be good news!

I've also had PND and they're doing an occupational health referral. They wouldn't be doing that if they were sacking me off... argh I hate being in the dark! My mind races.

Depending on how long you are into maternity leave, I'd assume that manager just wants a chat to try suss out what your plans are , has anything changed, will you be going back as planned, peoples plans do change often on maternity leave and they may feel a chat is warranted , this only makes sense if say you were going back in a couple of months, but do they know about pnd, if they do he may want to make sure he's just keeping in touch with you, a semi welfare check, You cant have done anything wrong when you are on leave. Of course it could be your manager is moving on? that happened to a relative of mine when her boss went while she was on leave and he rang to say he was going and offer her a job, or there is more change going on, but as you said there was restructuring recently that's less likely, but don't be paranoid about it, do you know anyone else in office you can call to catch up on gossip.

No way is he travelling two and half hours (each way?) for the fun of it. You can't have done anything wrong but that journey and the way he brushed off your "what is this about?" question means it's not good: further restructure/someone leaving? If you are friends with any colleagues I would definitely be getting in touch.