Strange accusations and complaints

[Blueberry010]

This week two unusual situations have taken place at work which I'm struggling to understand.

I manage a small team, one of whom (employee A) has severe mental health issues and has received weekly counselling since childhood, which we have been very supportive of her attending. She loves being centre of attention and sometimes says her foot hurts so she can't walk far to get sympathy and minutes later runs around the office pretending to be an aeroplane.

My line manager called me and one of the other team managers in to her office, very vexed stating that employee A has accused us of talking about her after leaving the office. We don't, we have better things to discuss!. My line manager has taking the accusation very seriously and spoken with HR and used the words that this is a warning! I find this extremely bizarre, and have told my line manager I don't appreciate being wrongly accused of something that hasn't happened and asked for evidence . There is no evidence and so I really don't underestamd why employee A would make up such an accusation, knowing we work in the same office and then why my line manager has taken it so seriously knowing employees A past behaviour, mental health and that there's no evidence to support it. This has annoyed me and the other team manager, and affected our trust in the team.

Am I right to be annoyed and have lost trust in them. Why would a manager take it so serious when there is no evidence, and she's fully aware of employee A's issues.

The other situation was that employee A was having difficulty fully engaging in team meetings whilst sat at her desk in front of her computer, so we agreed to utilise the spare floor space to fit a meeting desk. This meant we had to move employee B's desk approx 3 inches but she still had loads of room all around it. The team has been prepared for the change and asked to submit their own ideas for a layout or let me know if they didn't like my suggestion. They didn't and so the move went ahead, all 3 inches of it without any impact on employee B as she went to lunch whilst estates moved it and bought in the meeting desk. Now we have been told that employee B has complaint to HR about us moving her desk and my line manager has made us move it back, but when we went to put it back to how it was, employee B wouldnt let us. So what was the point in her complaining?

Am I wrong to find these complaints about myself and the other line manager odd?

Fgs they all sound exhausting. If this is remotely usual I’d find other people to work with!

How are these people employed?

Your line manager needs to develop a backbone- fine line between accommodating & being taken advantage of.

but they sound like hard work, are they busy with work to do.

Firstly, how would A know that anyone was talking about her when she's left the office, and secondly, you and the other person are both team managers, so it wouldn't be unreasonable for you to discuss work matters regarding A when she's not there. Finally, what is it that you are alleged to have said about her?

Regarding B - I know that I absolutely loathe anyone messing with my workstation. Even if I'm told it needs to be done, I still hate it with a passion. Then once it has been moved, it would really annoy me to suffer the disruption of it all being moved back again. But I'm ND so stuff like that bothers me a lot more than it would NT people.Perhaps B reacted in a similar way.

Darn it. sorry didn't mean to quote the entire post.

The whole thing is so absurd that it doesn't seem real! What do you plan to do, OP? How are you overall in this job? Would it be doable for you to start searching for other jobs?

How unwell is this woman that she's running around like an aeroplane?

Complaints are usually investigated.
She can’t give a warning without following a process.
Does she mean informal.
Sounds like you Line Manager is scared of these staff rather than address the situation.
Who is managing who ? They sound like school children.

Sounds like you may work for a local authority with all the pandering to employee A?
Are you in a union? Hopefully solo, and I would definitely be in touch with them re the 'this is a warning' comment!

They don’t manage employee A so she takes the pis and meanwhile decent employees get shafted. Poor management and hr

Do you get the impression your LM can't be bothered to investigate/deal with employee A's accusations and it's just easier for them to blame you and the other team leader?
I'd put on a united front with other team leader and suggest that it's best for employee A to be managed by your LM as neither you or other team leader feel you are able to manage her. You are concerned about unfounded accusations affecting the team. Put the problem in your LMs lap.

Well for a start it would be perfectly reasonable and expected for you and the other line managers to be discussing Employee A as long as that discussion was professional, for a specific work related purpose and was done in a sufficiently private way so as to exclude anyone who didn’t need to be part of it.

If however she has raised it as a formal complaint/grievance then you do need to accept that your manager needs to investigate it and provide a response to that complaint. The response could well be that any discussion was reasonable and within the remit of your role and as such the complaint is not upheld.

with regard Employee B, people get oddly territorial about desks, if you hadn’t told her you’d be moving it 3 inches she probably wouldn’t have even noticed. Brush it off, she’s decided not to proceed by refusing to allow you to change it back, make sure that is noted and HR anre aware that you tried and she wouldn’t let you.