I’m Incompetent Apparently!

[Selfishlazyme]

Last week I came across an email all about me (legit came across, no sneaky snooping).
It was from a Manager in my team (Not my Line Manager), to Upper Management listing all my apparent failings, and the impact it was having on her (already failing) service.

Nobody has ever brought these allegations of incompetency to my attention. I work hard for her dept.

Im obviously angry, but more so deeply hurt by this. I feel I’ve not been given any opportunity to defend myself, and I’m so embarrassed that UM will now believe this of me, plus any other colleagues who may have read it.

Any advice before I curl up and die of shame ?

I’ve continued working and haven’t contacted HR or put a SARS in.
Ive contacted my union who advised me to submit a formal grievance with evidence disproving each point she has made.

This. You need to look at her calendar presumably when you arrange a meeting with her, to check availability?

That doesn't involve opening up calendar invites that are nothing to do with you and then opening the attachments to them.

Just because the information happened to be accessible to you, doesn't mean you had the right to access it.

Consider as well if your manager has taken the meeting, found her complaints to be baseless, told her this, and has decided not to address this with you in order to maintain a relationship between you & the other department ?

Grievance is the last step after all the normal processes have been followed and you aren’t happy with the outcome

have you actually had a meeting yet to discuss this

Im not surprised a union suggested that. While you can put a grievance in, what would it be about at this stage? All you have so far from what I can see is evidence of an email that you may or may not have had a legitimate reason to open, and may or may not have implications for you.

For all you know, and what they could say if you go formal at this point, is the outcome of that meeting was "thanks for the feedback but we have no problems with Selfish". But another outcome might be they review their access arrangements.

Normally in the grievance process you're asked what outcome you'd like - I assume you'd want the outcome to be a discussion about why this person feels this way and what evidence they have. If they have anything about them they'd say that's what they were going to do anyway.

Did the invite or the attachment file name indicate anything at all that might suggest it wasn't an invite you would have needed to fully access? E.g. would it be routine for you to literally open every single invite to check any attachments? Does the sending manager know you have access? Was the actual email marked private?

Honestly at this stage I think you should handle it one professional to another and go in with "I have reason to believe XXX is unhappy with me, can we discuss?" And then if unhappy or you feel fobbed off consider a grievance, as then you'd probably be in a position where the relationship isn't great anyway from your side.

Sounds good

But talk to your manager and hr first and find out what’s going on

The incompetent person here is the manager that sent it by accident.

Nobody has ever brought these allegations of incompetency to my attention. I work hard for her dept. ... I’ve been doing this job for 10 years and I’ve never had anything but positive feedback.

It's difficult to comment without knowing the details of these allegations. You work hard and have been doing this job for 10 years. Feedback has been positive.

Have you been promoted at all during this time? Or given suggestions for further development? How positive have your appraisal and performance reviews actually been?

I'm just wondering whether you might be seen as someone who does just enough to get the work done, but without initiative? Treading water rather than being proactive?

What is your grievance? That the email shouldn't have been written or that it shouldn't have been made available to you? What is the outcome you're seeking?

I need a friend like you

This sounds intentional

No one sent anything by accident to OP. I have added stock Microsoft images to help you visualise. Screenshot 1 is what a calendar looks like, screenshot 2 is what it looks like if you click on one of the bookings.

Manager sent a meeting invitation to Upper Manager. The meeting invitation was set out to discuss a HR matter and an email was attached to the meeting invitation. This attachment laid out the concerns about OP. This allow people to prepare for meetings beforehand and to ensure relevant information is in one place. (Everyone has the right to raise concerns btw, including managers to their managers).

OP has access to Upper Manager’s calendar, so opened up their calendar, clicked on the HR meeting and rooted through the attachments. OP would have clicked on a meeting that wasn’t intended for her, read the description and opened all the attachments.

Whether this amounts to snooping or not is in question, there’s no need to click on confidential meetings when you’re acting as someone’s aide. OP didn’t have a business need to check this meeting invite, as managers are allowed to have meetings with each other to discuss HR so presumably some things are off bounds for aides

All of my colleagues have access to my calendar. I don't assume that they're going to snoop into meetings that they aren't invited to. And it would be a breach of policy if they did look at information they don't actually need to access for work purposes - which is what OP has done.

Totally agree - I think a lot of people are responding without realising that the OP has overstepped here.

[Edited - I checked and it appears to be a stock image. As you were!]

That depends un some cases it can be part of the diary managers job to open emails and brief the person on the content of the meeting or even in some cases print it out.
The person who sent it should have made it private so OP couldn't open or see it

The OP hasn't said she's this person's diary manager.

Open calendar access is the norm in many organisations, but it doesn't mean you would be justified in rooting through calendar items that don't concern you.

People are assuming that OP wasn't entitled to open the email, but there is no reason to make that assumption. There are plenty of cases where it would be expected that the person with access to the calendar would read attachments to meeting invitations, e.g. because they also have to draw up the agenda and the attachment may be about the agenda. OP says it's legit, so it's pretty pointless trying to second-guess her on that - she knows the parameters of her own job a hell of a lot better than a load of strangers on MN do.

No, the OP hasn't said it's legit. She said she has access for availability (i.e. scheduling a call) and looking up location (see when they can do F2F) purposes.

I could say that about all of my colleagues' diaries. It's bog standard. It doesn't mean you are within your rights to go through their calendars looking at meetings you're not invited to.

Yeah I think you need to be really careful here op, should you have been opening meeting invites and reading the contents of the email and clicking on attachments? I think you could get into trouble about this so if I were you I'd carry on as normal and presumably if the manager takes it further you'll be contacted shortly and be able to put your points across.

Definitely no issue with the manner in which I came across info. I’m not worried about any comeback from that.

Why did you access the document within the email. It does suggest snooping and for you to be doing that you must have been suspicious of something.
They will surely ask this ?
It was very incompetent of the person to attach something without marking it private though as they shouod have been more careful.

Don't worry..... people on MumsNet will still suggest you are snooping:... rolls eyes

It does read as snooping - I’m not surprised posters are concerned about comeback.

In what circumstance does a junior member of staff require full access to the HR meetings their manager’s manager is invited to? I doubt the spirit of OP being given calendar access of her big boss is to monitor absolutely all content including private items. Ultimately there’s 2 tiers of management between them and presumably difference in job duties and salary - there will be a line somewhere