should I complain about my line manager?

[mogwai]

I have recently applied to have a 12 month career break. I have the feeling that my line manager views this as an opportunity to force me to resign as I'm well paid and she thinks she could find someone cheaper. A few months ago she told me that if I ever reduced my hours, she would employ someone cheaper, a comment that was totally out of context at the time.

I asked for the career break 6 weeks ago, and in the interim, she has made numerous comments about "when you leave" and "when you hand your notice in".

My line manager knows that my post can be covered in my absence. She has received e-mails confirming this, but hasn't replied to the sender of the e-mails. It seems she is ignoring the information.

Last week I had a meeting with senior management in which they refused my career break on the basis that my post couldn't be covered while I was away. My line manager knows this isn't true, but she didn't show up for the meeting.

I had to tell senior management about the provision for covering the post and explained to them that my line manager was well aware of this but hadn't shared the information with them.

There was other crucial information that she hadn't shared with senior management that influenced their "no" decision.

They are now reconsidering, but I am fuming at the way my line manager has dealt with this. The sender of the e-mails, who was trying to negotiate providing cover for my post, is angry at being ignored and can't understand why.

Should I formally complain about this? Who would I complain to in the first instance and what grounds would I have?

You should complain, there should be a company grievance procedure for you to follow, but it makes general sense to complain to your manager's manager.

You can complain that you feel you have been treated unfairly, and that your manager, by witholding information, has unfairly biased a decision. You feel discriminated and bullied against on this basis.

The decision hasn't yet been made- they are reconsidering. But I think she tried to bias the decision - though that's just supposition.

Also, Can you complain without following a formal grievance procedure? I can't be bothered to go through a formal grievance while I'm abroad on a career break, but I think that HR should know what she did. If I complain to her boss, will her boss have to inform HR automatically or can she just del with it at her own level?

I hope to return to the department and will probably still have to work with her, but there's no way she's getting away with this.

No, do it formally. It wont hold any weight otherwise.

I doubt you have an absolute right to a career break. It's almost certainly at their discretion. Your line manager sounds unreasonable but imo, going to HR will be highly unlikely to help. They are there to get the best result for the company, not you, and if your manager's objectives include cutting costs/resource then your leaving and her recrutment of a cheaper replacement is a nice easy win for her.

So in your position I'd either:

Stay
Reapply for the break, as you are doing
Resign and consider where you will apply in a years time

But I wouldn't invoke grievance and I can't see that she's done anything serious enough for you to be taken seriously - she can flim flam her way through this one with 'oh, I didn't get that email/I didn't consider it relevant/blah blah.

That's my 2p worth anyway, feel free to disregard!

As an HR professional I would like to respond to MsUnderstood. Our job is, of course, to support and promote company policy, but also to see that it is applied fairly and consistently, partly to protect the company against claims, but also because it is in the long-term interests of the company. If the company policy is to allow career breaks, then applications should be considered failry and consistently for all staff.

When considering a grievance, it is important to think about what you want as an end result. In this case, mogwai (I guess) wants the company to consider all the facts around her application for a career break, not the edited version supplied by her manager. That is already happening. Secondly, mogwai might want her manager to be rebuked in some way so that it does not happen again. I would recommend waiting until a decision is made.

There is no such thing as an informal grievance. Employment Tribunals have shown that a grievance does not need to be raised via a formal process to be valid. The complaint should be made to HR or the the next senior manager, or both.