I'm not sure whether to complain about my line manager but I'm at the point where I've had enough. I'd like some advice please on how best to approach the complaint. I was thinking of an informal approach, like an email? Because I hate complaining and I always feel guilty (despite that person making me feel shit!)
Background - my line manager used to be a colleague and I've known her all my career here, so nearly 15 years now. She has always had a strange approach to communicating and would get possessive about particular tasks - she had a big fall out with a former team member because she didn't want to work in a team really.
Anyway, she is now my manager, and whilst she can be very nice most of the time face to face, in her emails and in appraisals, she keeps bringing up petty things or making me uncomfortable.
Examples include:
sending emails that have sections in BOLD or underlined. Admittedly this has decreased since she became manager but it still looks 'shouty'
promising things but not delivering, such as additional responsibilities
Telling me "K, P, F...whatever more senior manager....has highlighted to me that you do...xyz really petty thing like talking too loudly on the phone, not taking notes, clicking your pen all the time..." I wonder if the issue is really my manager and she's using all those people as a cover?
She has asked why there are days when my diary is empty. I am not the only person in my team with days or mornings that are empty. I just don't block out my diary with 'admin' or anything like that. I am uncomfortable with her level of scrutiny and wonder if anyone else in the team is being scrutinised in such a way. I suspect not! As I say, I've been in this organisation 15 years, more than the rest of the team, and I've always had blank days and it's always been accepted that these are admin times and as I said, there are loads in the organisation with blank calendars. It doesn't mean we are not working.
I've been told I produce less work than the rest of the team, with June singled out as a particular month. They are putting me through a qualification that the rest of the team are not doing so I have these additional things to do and June was exam time, so my focus was on those exams rather than that months targets (which were still met btw). The following month I was on leave, and this month I have a lot of work / achievements to report because I have the time now. I just feel my manager is being unfair.
My manager's manager now sits next to me and I don't know if it's because I'm under observation or if my manager has simply made me paranoid. I'm trying to work from other locations now because I feel uncomfortable.
Am I being silly or should I say something? And how should I word it and approach it?