Hand hold about meeting tomorrow please

[freakinthespreadsheets]

On Friday morning my manager's manager (head of department) put a meeting in for first thing tomorrow morning with me, her and my immediate manager, labelled only as "Catchup". No other context, this sort of random catchup NEVER happens in the team "just because" (not with that specific line of people anyway, it would either be a general whole-team wellbeing catchup with all 6 of us or just me and line manager). the fact it is first thing in the morning after a BH weekend makes it seem urgent - after I've been on AL all week, has had me worrying ALL weekend that something terrible is going to happen. Ive convinced myself im being sacked, seconded somewhere else, someone has died and everything in between! That'll teach me to check my emails when I'm off!!!
Please can someone handhold as I'm too nervous to sleep now and am physically shaking with worry 😫

NB. I was on AL last week but tend to check emails periodically, and just mark irrelevant stuff as "read" or accept meeting invites, if I'm not actually on holiday to stop things piling up. Please dont have a go at me for this i know its not ideal! I suspect I have ADHD and it makes me feel a lot less anxious and overwhelmed about going back after AL so it's my choice to do this and actually helps me with "switching off" the rest of the time. A few others in the team do the same. Just this time it's really backfired!

I can understand why you're worried but really try not to be. There's nothing you can do to change it now. It could be all sorts of things, both positive and not so positive. But if you have a decent night's sleep it will help you handle it, no matter what. Lots of luck and I hope it's something good.

There's no way if knowing OP. It could be good news or bad.

Just go in, head held high, and deal with whatever it is as it comes.

I was sacked once. Thank goodness, it was a toxic place!

But perhaps it's about something else entirely.

Good luck!

You poor thing, I end up a nervous wreck at work whenever someone says 'can I have a word' . Do you think you may have done something wrong or could it be good news and you're being promoted? Is there a chance that there's a reshuffle and they're moving you to a different team?

You are catastrophising. I do it all the time. It's your brains way of trying to feel in control and cover all eventualities that may happen. What I will say is that, nine times out of ten, there will be a very innocuous reason for the catch up. Is there anyone from HR on the call too? That's the only thing that would get my spidey senses going. Have there been any big organisational changes happening recently?

Oh bless you. I hope it’s nothing to worry about, but it needn’t be. There are many reasons why this meeting might have been called.

I think it could be all 3 of those things! Generally everyone is really happy with my performance but there's always the chance I've made some grave mistake I don't know about and messed something up. Maybe I'm being promoted. Maybe I'm being moved. I don't know 😕

This is such a shame. It's spoilt your AL with worrying. I'm giving you a friendly finger wag to say from now on, when you are on AL, do not do any work things! Carry that forward! You're not paid for that.

As for the meeting, go in with a smile, head up. It may be a promotion, it may be asking you about conduct of another colleague, it may be about the Men In Black asking about your UFO sighting 😊

You've absolutely got this. Go in feeling annoyed that they've spoilt your break. Put on a grrrrrrrrrrrr face. Go get 'em! You've got this!!

Nope just the 3 of us, nature of the work being v business sensitive and minimising risk of word getting out, means we only find out about organisational changes at the very time we need to act on them so I could eg. Be being moved into a different team as of tomorrow.

Thank you everyone for your kind words, there's nothing I can do to change it now, trying to push the worrying to the back of my mind!

If it's a disciplinary meeting they have to give you two days notice and the right to be accompanied ( unless it's gross misconduct) so nothings going to happen tomorrow.

If it’s Outlook, can you see other team members diaries to see if any of them have had similar meetings put in?

This is actually v reassuring thank you

They can't spring misconduct meetings on you in this way. Well, they can I suppose but it would be terrible practice

I'll put money on it that it's some sort of reshuffle of the team. You indicate that this is something that happens often

Nope just me 😪I checked last week's too in case they were mainly done while I was off

So in other words, you should never be going into any meeting for a bollocking or disciplinary that you have no clue about

Unless of course, they've discovered you've emptied the bank account or called them a bunch of wankers all over your local community page etc etc

Thanks @AirBandUseless. I'm hoping that means it's good/neutral news then.
Actually restructuring/shuffling the team isn't something that happens often (never in the time I've been here) but we do get pulled off onto secret side projects/secondments a lot.. however it's never announced like this! Always an email followed by invite to project briefing meeting and adding to new Teams space etc.

Could it be that something has happened involving someone else and they want to speak to you about what you know? This happened to me once, bloody terrifying!

It could be I suppose but i really doubt it, we have a very low drama workplace and we all WFH
I only speak to the immediate team on weekly wellbeing catchups and like 2 other people when it's to do with work that overlaps!

This was my first thought too. Something has happened while you are off, maybe somebody is pregnant, someone has been sacked, someone is on long term sick.

I hope it goes okay, at least you will know tomorrow.

I’d be freaking out too. In jobs I’ve had though those kind of meetings have been things like: other staff/managers being suspended, a death or serious illness of a colleague. The fact it’s first thing might tend to suggest it’s something they want to tell you before you hear from other people

I had one of these with my old boss (same company) and I was panicking thinking I’d done something wrong, or they were disciplining me for something. Was just in the afternoon though put in in the morning. Turns out they were just upping my performance rating 🤣 try not to panic. I totally would be / have done the same though!

Op maybe nothing- a decent work place you would have clues if it was negative performance however a toxic one doesn't tend to care about you worrying.

What's your workplace like ?

If it's bad news of any type it's poor form to put it in when you are in AL to worry about it.

I would be the same op - got a terrible habit of catastrophising.
Please let us know how you got on - will be thinking of you x

This was along the lines I was thinking - needs to be in early so they can tell me themselves, hence the meeting invite, but can't be anymore specific with the details upfront like they usually would