Husband being bullied?

[K2608]

Hi everyone

So my husband started a new job two months ago as a senior for a new brand (his first time in this role), he has a manager above him, another senior alongside and then an area manager. He has 6 employees who he is partially in charge of.

The other senior has left and this position has not been filled. His manager has handed his notice in ( this role hasn't been filled either) and is currently on holiday.His area manager is also on holiday. So there is no one for him to contact and my husband is in charge and doing several peoples jobs.
5 weeks ago he lost his mother so that has been tough on him but he went straight back to work after 3 days off.

The rest of his team- a new guy in particular started after my husband by a couple of weeks. He has previously been a manager for 20 years but isn't currentlyss. Since this guy started he has been undermining my husband at every chance and the other staff are now making my husband job very difficult at every Chance when they hadn't before this guy started. For example, one member of staff had Drs app yesterday, she disappeared without telling my husband. She didn't come back to work but overheard the other saying she won't be back she is ill and has been sent to hospital. No one relayed this info instead kept telling my husband to do his job and find out if she will be back to work. My husband text her to make sure she is ok and got a very sarcastic text back to say obviously not as she has .... wrong with her.

He is quite upset about it all and isn't quite sure where to go with it. Any advice?

I could have written this post for your husband (and just started a not entirely unrelated thread myself in chat).

Personally, I'm doing many jobs in one owing to staff leaving.

I'd take a very firm line with regard to the behaviours your husband has advised of. Do so in conjunction with HR and I would send an email to all staff reminding them of their obligations.

Should the behaviour persist, straight to performance review. No exceptions.

I know it's really not easy. But consistency is key here and they're trying to walk all over him and bark loudest. Your husband is the manager and can use the opportunity to lead by example.

Some people need to remember they're in paid employment!

He needs to speak to them all. When the I'll member of staff is back in, he needs to take her aside, ask if everything is okay and if she needs support - and then explain that is she has future appointments, he needs to know in advance. Being absent without leave could lead to disciplinary action, whereas if he knows what is going on, he can make sure she receives any support she needs. There are also health & safety reasons for wanting to know who has left the office - if there was a fire evacuation, for example.

Then he also needs to talk to the whole team. To do his job properly, he needs their cooperation. He is not psychic, and if they know something like Jane has gone to the doctor when he is asking about her, they should say so.

Were the rest of the team okay before the new ex-manager started? It sounds like they were. I would also have a 1:1 with him to review how things are going. I don't know exactly what I would say, it would depend partly on the existing relationship. But ideally, he needs to get him onside. Does he know the history of why he's now not in a non-managerial role, when he was previously? Was it that he was made redundant and this is the only job he found so far, or was he sacked for some sort of misconduct or something? From the little you say, it sounds like he's resentful and bitter about his loss of position, but I could be making wrong assumptions based on lack of information. But the background might affect what angle the discussion takes.

Is there an HR department there? He should go to themy and say he's struggling a bit with the workload with all the other managers out, and at least try to find out when he can hand some of it back. Does he company know he's been recently bereaved? Grief after the death of a parent can hit really hard, and may not be instant, if being so busy means he hasn't has time to process it all. If he's an executor for her will, that's a whole load of extra work on top of the day job, unless it's a really simple estate with no property. It can also mean he might struggle to deal with difficult situations at work which he normally would just take in his stride, but if his team is playing up, then he can't have their support by delegating some tasks to them. I hope he has support.