28F. Work in a hospital. Bullying by the senior charge nurse. I’m not a nurse, I’m a different medical profession.
Been going on for 6 months now. She’s very close with some other nurses and they talk and probably gossip and they whisper to her ears about stuff on the ward.
for months now, whenever there is a minor error or something she doesn’t like (not necessarily wrong), she complains to my boss in writing either behind my back or to me with the wider team cc’d in. strong and strange tone and attitude. Exclaimatiob points, some bold statements and She normally would ‘teach me a lesson’ in these emails in front of others (other recipients) to make me look bad. Several times, these errors she pointed were not me. Signatures were not mine but cc’d to the team with wordings like ‘concerns’. Themes are: giving false statements about me (behind my back, or in front of people), openly sharing these false statements to others, have a higher standard compared to others staff of same level as me, lower threshold of error, first to report to my boss when there might be an error whereas if it was my colleague then it’s fine, no reporting. Occasionally when I speak to her: I’m invisible, doesn’t look at me, her back facing me when I’m talking to her.
these false statements slowly but gradually discredits my position in the team and people respects me less.
my colleague is white. I’m of a protected characteristic: race.
another staff has also reported something similar (different medical specialty) but they are of the same race as me.
I don’t wanna label it as racist. But definitely sensing some prejudice and bias against me. My colleague sense this and told me it’s obvious. My line manager told me she feels it too. The other staff who reported it feels it too.
so the boss of my line manager says she “supports me” whatever I do: information mediation or formal complaint (formal HR would step in and investigate, there’s be a case file. Informal: some vague documentation, supportive conversations)
my line manager has raised this false accusations several times (in a nice professional way) but fruitless. Big boss and line manager met with the individual- line manager told me: individual was sorry but not sorry, said some generic comments about everyone should be treated the same but pretended she didn’t participate in this bullying/ discrimination.
big boss: pretends to be supportive, happy if I went informal or formal. But vibe I’m getting from him: don’t care, informal, less paperwork, less hassle, less work for her. feel like big boss not on my side, looking out for his own interest, protecting senior management level.
line manager: supportive, supports me to go formal as more documentation and said HR is better to step in. Less consideration about senior management level.
my question is: should I go informal (vague documentation by my big boss, some degree of bias in these meetings summary with an aim to make it go away quick) or formal investigation ( lengthy, HR step in, investigation, taking witness statements, review evidence)?