22:30 work call - completely unacceptable?

[shortbreadconsumer]

I received a work call from someone in my organisation at 22:30 last night. I answered, thinking it was an emergency. The colleague was completely hysterical and impossible to understand. In the end I had no choice but to end the call with 'we can discuss this in the morning.'

This morning I spoke to the persons line manager about it, who said that it was 'unfortunate, but not unreasonable' for this individual to have called me as I had not answered any emails from said colleague over the weekend. They had sent me over 50 emails this weekend. I did not see the emails as seniors within the organisation take an 'if it's urgent, they have my number' approach.

I am more senior than both of of these colleagues and I was 'on call' all weekend as the most senior point of contact in the organisation. However, this was not an issue that required weekend working and, more importantly, it was not an issue that I needed to be consulted on. It was very simple and should have easily been resolved in working hours by this individual alone - her direct line manager would not have needed to input either.

AIBU to think that this was unprofessional and unacceptable from both of them?After no sleep, I've reached that 'was it really that bad' point where I am so sleep deprived that I am not sure whether I am overreacting in my annoyance or not!

How are you sleep deprived if they called you at 22:30?

Whether its harassment is up to how it makes the individual feel. I have to say a colleague/employee turning up at my home at 10.30pm ranting about being ignored when its their own failure to blame would prompt me to call the police and submit a grievance.

People absolutely cannot turn up at colleagues homes because of unanswered emails

Aw don't get me started on them LI posts! Like the "my candidate turned up three weeks late for the the interview with a can of petrol and a lighter and threatened to burn the boardroom down if I didn't give them job, but I know nerves when I see it so I gave them a chance and now they are the best employee I've ever had even if I do have to keep locking the petrol can and lighter in a cupboard that they still bring to work"

@SandyHappy because there is always someone who thinks that because they think it's urgent then it must be. A lifetime working in the public sector brings me to that conclusion. There are people who are completely unreasonable, my job was to try to deal with them in a reasonable way.
Some think shouting is a good way to get results.
Unfortunately, some people are just not capable of following instructions or understanding the reasons for them.

Exactly - transport infrastructure like airports, air traffic control, railways. Power generation. Telecoms. Even the manager of the local M&S would probably want to know if his store was going up in flames.

@ThisTimeWillBeDifferent Some businesses do actually adhere to working hours

Bullshit. Excessive workload and unpaid overtime is the norm in large corporations.

It sounds like you are one of those managers who doesn't provide paid overtime, expects the staff to handle large workloads during unpaid evenings and weekends, and simply feigns ignorance of the whole thing.

Then you will end up dismissed for harassment! That is extremely unacceptable! Your boss isn't your mental health crisis worker! You do not have right to turn up any colleagues house in that manner!

@shortbreadconsumer rather than just speaking to the line manager, did you speak to the person who called you last night today as well to check they're ok?

I can understand it was a surprise/shock for you to receive such a call but your harsh reaction doesn't display the kind of leadership skill I would expect from a senior leader. As many people have pointed out, this sounds like either a personal crisis or a failure of process. Neither of which merits being cross to this extent with the individual who called.

With a bit of time and perspective I would hope you can reflect on how you handled it and how you can help everyone involved learn from the experience.

My starting point would be to contact the person who contacted me to check they are ok. Engage with the person first and the behaviour next.

You don't understand what an on call system is do you! They carry on their ordinary life because it's evening or weekend, they get a small amount of extra money to be on call, they don't get paid to sit and work.

I think this is a very valid point, and I recommend that you get the thread deleted, @shortbreadconsumer.

And people need to be understanding to the reality of what getting everyone of benefits and in to work will actually mean.

Cringe arent they. Obviously posted for clout 🙄

Hear hear.
I am similar seniority to op based on the examples she gave and I think she has come across as quite unpleasant.

In some cases, they don't even get paid extra!!

Yeah thats not something I have a lot of control over.

plus eg. A cyber attack on any business, for instance.
In certain roles we just have to be grown ups and accept we might need to be contactable and that that is factored into our salary package

I voted YABU, but after your first update I changed it to YANBU. I think you have a line manager problem.

Stop talking out of your arse. Lots of employers don't expect staff to work over their contracted hours, and lots of employees feel under no pressure to do so.

This colleague sounds like trouble

She can’t follow a simple instruction.

She was instructed to email the junior colleague then gets hysterical when she emails a senior one 50 times and gets no reply
On what planet was she actually expecting a reply

She needs to get a life

In the time it took to send 50 emails, surely something must have clicked that the notification said to email a different person.

The hysteria is quite worrying and I would get HR and her managers involved to see

Why she was working at the weekend
Can she actually do the job she is paid to do and if so why is she working out of office time.

Why would she think that shortbreadconsumer is working for free.

Why didn’t she follow the instructions

Why is she working for free

What made her ignore the notification

She sounds like she is a risk to herself and HR needs to recognise she needs help otherwise she sounds unhinged

What a massive drip feed.

What’s the point of getting loads of answers and then only clarifying afterwards?!

Why are you going on so much about benefits? Its completely irrelevant to this thread.

And, honestly, if your illness is that severe that you genuinely think it's perfectly reasonable to harass work colleagues at their homes then you are clearly seriously unwell so probably aren't capable of working right now and should be on all the benefits youre entitled to. And I do hope you get better.

Call bullshit all you’d like. You’re the one spouting it. Maybe book yourself a MN spa break to unwind, you sound like you need it. That much rage isn’t healthy.

No not if they are a complete mess and would stalk and harass staff but we've also got to wheedle the workshy who play a game! Like the woman who got caught the other month on an adventure holiday in Mexico who claimed she was was crippled with anxiety to the point of being housebound and unable to.wash, she admitted it was a lie. Getting yourself sacked by stalking and harassing staff is shit behaviour especially if you are doing it just so you can sit on benefits.

Turning up at a manager's house uninvited is harassment. If you are unable to prevent yourself from harassing other people because of your mental health, then you really need to go back to your doctors to say that the current management plan isn't working.

@shuggles Just to say, this colleague who rang me absolutely should not have been working over a weekend.

We take weekend working seriously as an organisation and no one, not even the 'big boss' is important enough that they should be working out of hours outside of their on-call obligations. We have an on-call system to avoid burn-out and protect resilience/morale and that applies to everyone, irrespective of grade. Our 'core' hours are long so protecting down-time is vital or we'd end up unable to function due to the churn of staff.

Although I do not know the colleague personally (I had not even spoken to her before last night as she's not in my 'area'), I do know the sort of work she would be doing at her pay grade/level. And it is not work that should cause significant amounts of stress. As I said, the best analogy is a HEO Civil Servant contacting a DG to ask them to review an internal email.

@ForAzureSeal I have not spoken to her today. I tried to, and told her last night I'd be in the office between X-Y and was happy to talk, but she wasn't in before I had to head out for meetings and I've spent most of the day travelling.

She's also not in my direct management chain (different departments) so I'm very wary of getting too involved as I am sure there are other HR procedures going on that I am not privy to.

I did genuinely try and help last night, and kept telling her that it was fine and if it was urgent it would have come to me via the duty point of contact (having not realised at that point she hadn't contacted them). But she was completely inconsolable and almost impossible to understand - at first I didn't even realise it was someone I worked with as I couldn't understand a word she was saying.