To ban talk of children in the workplace?

[Kanfuzed123]

Chatted to my friend today over coffee. She’s snr leadership at quite a big company, very successful and generally v lovely. She is struggling ttc, and the ‘wrong side of 35’ (quote is from a dr she has seen not me)

She mentioned She wanted to escalate a work issue around a few specific individuals, talking about their children. She wanted to escalate this higher and ban talk of children at work and get thr repeat offenders basically ‘told off’… not a disciplinary but getting someone more snr than her (and she’s pretty snr) to talk to them as they’ve been ‘upsetting people’ over ‘repeated insensitive comments’.

To be clear this isn’t the case of people saying ‘why don’t you have kids?’ ‘When are you having them’ because I do think there could be a conversation there. It seemed more of office chit chat like hi Bob what did you do this weekend?’ ‘Well Dave I took my kids to the aquarium’ sort of thing or you know introductory calls/ getting to know each other, ‘hi I’m Dave, 45, background in computer programming, originally from New Zealand, 2 kids both are football mad and a cocker spaniel called fluffy’ sort of thing

I’ve been through infertility myself and it’s hell, but I think to raise this issue higher and actively ban your direct reports talking of their family is not the sort of precedent to set. I actually think suggesting it to people higher up will not make her look good at all and could be a HR issue. Where does the line get drawn, can people talk about or mention their parents? Someone has probably lost a parent somewhere in the wider team etc.

I could tell she was quite worked up about it today over our coffee so I didn’t say anything about it from a ‘don’t do that’ point of view but we’re going shopping tomorrow and I do feel like I should maybe say something as when she gets sometbing in her head she does plough ahead with it and I think it doesn’t make her look too good.

am I wrong?

I try to be sensitive in a work context but that is bananas.

Don't start like that. Start by telling you you're worried about her - because you are, and it then means that you start from a place of empathy for her. If she insists she can't see what harm her policy would do then explain how something sort of similar affected you, which might make her see it from another perspective, but don't begin with it.

That is ridiculous. She cannot ban talking about children. If there's no chat at all at work about people's families/lives outside of work/hobbies, whatever, teams have more difficulty bonding and it becomes a very sterile, unpleasant environment.

It's awful for her that she really wants a child but is struggling - but unfortunately that is her problem and not anyone else's. (I think I've phrased that badly but can't think how to put it more nicely). What I mean is, that if it's affecting her so much (and I can understand why it might) that she has got to the stage of wanting all talk of children banned, then she needs help to deal with this - counselling etc. Because everywhere you go in life you are going to be confronted with children, parents, people talking about children, kids on TV etcetc.

People still need to be sensitive towards her - eg. if someone becomes pregnant, perhaps not too much pregnancy chat and showing scans when she is around. But an all out ban? No.

This right here.

@Kanfuzed123 friends don’t let friends torpedo their careers. You need to give it to her straight.

To abolish conversations about kids and or family in the work place would be detrimental to morale and completly unethical.

I would see this as being a human right issue and once the media got hold of the story all hell would break loose which would cause untold damage to the reputation of the organisation.

If you wanted to see how your colleagues feel about this subject, why not do a vote.

If your friend was my manager, and tried to impose this rule the very first thing I would do would be to raise a complaint with HR and request to be moved to a team with a different manager. Of course I would be sympathetic that her mental heath wasn't great, however i wouldn't trust her managerial skills and critical thinking to trust her to manage a team rationally.

If I was your friends manager, and she asked me to help enforce her proposal. I would still have to go to HR regarding mental heath support and how to manage her sympathetically. This would involve a review of her entire job, as I would assume she is being distracted significantly enough by her peers mentioning their DC's to the point she has had to come to me, that perhaps she is struggling with the job role also.

Either scenario, it would be your friend facing some sort of repercussion. It is not a logical request and couldn't possibly be imposed.

She's bonkers OP, but you know that, or you wouldn't have posted.

That being said, I'd stay well and far away from this. Whatever you say is either going to encourage her to do something bonkers, or she's going to be mad at you.
She's going to cause ructions in her workplace if she pursues this, but that's on her tbh.
I'd just perfect the thoughtful nod, the "hmmm" and the "interesting... so what have you watched on Netflix lately?"

I attended some great D&I training recently where we were asked to try to answer the question ‘what did you do at the weekend’ and answer follow-up questions without using names, without referring to our partners using sex-specific pronouns, and without using place names. The idea was to try and get us to think about what it’s like to be a gay person who needs to hide their sexuality at work. And it was an eye-opener because it was incredibly difficult to give relatively normal answers without telling outright lies.

This reminds me a bit of that. She’d be asking people not to be themselves at work.

She needs a friend to tell her she needs professional psychological support, not to take her problems out on the people who work with her. She doesn’t need a friend who knowingly lets her make an absolute pillock of herself and show herself to be incapable of managing others at work properly atm.

@MissChanandlerBong80 that’s a really good exercise.

Your friend is going to make herself look so foolish and unprofessional if she raises this with her bosses.

At my work, a lot of the team have bonded over sharing stories of children and grandchildren, in the same way others have over pets and holidays.

I really feel for your friend, she must be having a really tough time if she’s considering this, but there are other, better ways to combat these feelings and I agree, she would probably really benefit from some counselling.

i think I’m going to start by talking about how in my first pregnancy my manager told me my pregnancy (which I hadn’t announced) was making people uncomfortable and I should have been more considerate and then proceeded to make my life hell

Jeeeze no. Please don't. Because your "hell" would still be her heaven. You were pregnant, and at this point that's all she wants.

Keep it all about her professionalism and the effect that her request would have on how people see her. You have to talk from her bosses' perspective, not your own.

So we had the conversation, it was weird.

she actually brought it up again, saying she was going to drop her manager a text tonight saying to catch up with him first thing. Her manager also had children so as per the the gist of the thread I told her that I’m not sure that’s the best idea because of how it comes across. She was quite offended, she said she was looking out for another colleague too who also doesn’t have children, but who hasn’t raised it as an issue but she can ‘tell’ Is upset. I explained why I don’t feel it wise, policing conversations will never be well received and it might make her manager view her differently or result in complaints. If it was too much she could eliminate the ‘how was your weekend’ idle chit chat and just get straight to business for a while but even that isn’t sustainable .

it got slightly heated as she couldn’t see where I was coming from, she thought this is upsetting her and her feelings matter and she should be happy going into work. obviously in principle this is sound logic but in this context it’s messy. I mentioned some counselling but she didn’t take this well, she’d be fine if this specific group of people stopped mentioning their kids and rubbing it in her face. I think she’s hurting (I’m not sure if something has triggered this v recently or if it’s a resentment that’s been building over time) and she’s zoned in on these specific individuals (not all women btw) she said she’s having to start introductory calls saying before everyone says ‘hi my names is so and so and I’m from london , 2 kids and a cat etc’ ‘hi my name is bla bla and no kids’ just so people ‘know’. Or what did you do on the weekend questions she’s ‘having to’ ‘well I didn’t go to the park this weekend because I don’t have kids’.

we had to conclude the conversation with my saying, I don’t think professionally it comes across well, it might be better to talk it trough with maybe a councillor , take a week off maybe and reflect but she’s adamant this is the way forward and needs to be done ASAP to ‘stop the behaviour’. So I just had to leave it, with well I’m not going to tell you what to do; I’ve told you my thoughts and concerns but you’ll do what you think is best.

i do hope she listens. It seems teetering to bullying and I really hope she doesn’t allow this to trickle through into her understanding of these peoples performance

Oh god OP. Well well done you for having the conversation. I cannot abide the "MY FEELINGS TRUMP EVERYONE ELSES" crowd at all. Does she not think people not being able to talk about their familylife as a rule is hurtful to them? She seems very me me me. As I said before, you can be hurt and not weaponise it. Let it go now OP, I'm sure HR having a word in due course might actually give her a dose of reality.

You did your best to help and advise her but since she cannot see that there's nothing wrong with her colleagues 'behaviour', she's just going to have to bear the consequences of forging ahead with this. Her boss will think she's unhinged and her colleagues will have legitimate complaints that this is unreasonable behaviour. She's opening herself up to discrimination claims if her colleagues perceive that she treats them differently due to personal reasons.

Sounds harsh, but her rights and feelings don't outweigh those of other people in the workplace.

And actually showing her hand in relation to these colleagues - as it were - to her manager might actually make the manager look closer at her in future; her relationship with these people, the way she addresses them, treatment of the team, discipline etc etc. Yikes.

You tried your best, but your friend has officially lost the plot. She's going to be in for a rude awakening if she does go to her manager about this. What's next? Banning talk about your dog because a coworker is a cat person? It's madness.

I think your DF might need to think about some counselling. I've been on the IVF journey and it can be brutal emotionally at times.

I like to talk about my DD in the office and it is part of the 'how was your weekend' type of conversation. As long as no one is making personal comments such as 'you need to hurry up and have children' type crap then your friend's colleagues haven't done anything wrong.

the odd thing is, is that she’s completely fine with my children. 1:1 I don’t really talk about them that much I suppose although they do of course come up, and she’s not mentioned if it’s upsetting. But she likes to play with them and pops by to visit them, maybe she just ‘accepts it’ from me I don’t know…

her boss, from what she’s said is a straight talking guy so I’m not sure how he’ll take it but guess we’ll see

OP you did your best.

I don't know the mix of the people she works with but apart from sex discrimination linked to pregnancy, if her employer did implement the policy they are opening up themselves to all other types of equality claims.

Hopefully her boss can talk sense into her.

Obviously people need to avoid talking about babies when someone's baby has just died or not go on about expensive skiing holidays when someone with no money at all at work who can hardly afford to eat is around - you need to be kind to others, but this lady seems to want to take it way too far.

This.

You tried.

She sounds absolutely deranged and will likely be treated as such.

How to really fxxk up your reputation in one conversation comes to mind.

There are so many subjects that can be of a sensitive nature to people, it simply isn't possible to control them.

However, I feel very strongly about people asking others personal questions, as in are you having children, how many, why not etc.

Now THOSE questions are inappropriate and need slapping down firmly.

It's very sad for her, her request is totally unacceptable but maybe she'd benefit from some counselling?

Oh dear. No she can't to that. It won't change anything and will make her look unhinged.

On top of that, she won't even get any sympathy. Unfortunately staff don't seem to recognise senior staff are human too and I'd there's a hint that she priorities her career (ie earning more than they do) they'll be thinking she got what she deserved. It's not right, but it is how lots of people seem to think about bosses.

If it's really that hard, she probably needs a period of sick leave while she gets some help to manage her MH. She can't make it other people's problem.

HR will have a field day with this
She sounds deranged