Awkward positions
Paul in Cannon Beach
4,703 Posts
Would you go into a situation to talk with an employee about an interaction between that employee and a 2nd employee?
Say Employee A comes to you with a complaint about Employee B. Would you ever go to employee B and say "Employee A told me blah-blah-blah."
I think HR people are put into these situations all the time but I find them very awkward and uncomfortable. What invariably happens is that Employee B responds with new information that Employee A either forgot or intentionally left out.
Then I feel like I need to run back to Employee A and confirm this new information. I call this "ping ponging" and I started refusing to do it a few years ago.
Just curious if anyone else deals with this. Another option is to not confront Employee B unless Employee A is willing to be there as well. There may be some situations where Employee A wants to remain anonymous.
Your thoughts? How do you handle these conversations where you are having to act upon or discuss situations you did not personally observe?
Say Employee A comes to you with a complaint about Employee B. Would you ever go to employee B and say "Employee A told me blah-blah-blah."
I think HR people are put into these situations all the time but I find them very awkward and uncomfortable. What invariably happens is that Employee B responds with new information that Employee A either forgot or intentionally left out.
Then I feel like I need to run back to Employee A and confirm this new information. I call this "ping ponging" and I started refusing to do it a few years ago.
Just curious if anyone else deals with this. Another option is to not confront Employee B unless Employee A is willing to be there as well. There may be some situations where Employee A wants to remain anonymous.
Your thoughts? How do you handle these conversations where you are having to act upon or discuss situations you did not personally observe?
Comments
I refuse to do the "ping-pong" thing too. Often I ask both sides to write down, in detail, their side of the situation so I have something to work with up front, and so I don't have to keep going back and forth gathering information.
I encourage employees to work things out between themselves, but if they really want it, I will sit down with both of them and help them work it out. Sometimes I find it's just a matter of perspective and when people sit down and compare notes about what happened they find that it wasn't intended the way they took it or something got blown all out of proportion.
I remember years ago, two employees were having an issue and one of them (who was a VP) absolutely refused to sit down and discuss it with the other. I offered to sit down with both of them, but the VP wouldn't do it, and I knew that even if I could get her in a room with the other person, she would just clam up and refuse to talk. She would talk to me alone about it but refused to see any position other than she was right and the other person was wrong, and in her eyes that was all there was to say about the matter.
If one employee wants to remain anonymous, that can be a bit stickier. I find that works best if the person they are complaining about is doing something that bothers a larger group of people, then if I have to confront the person I can just tell them that I have had complaints about whatever the issue is, and if they ask who said it, I refuse to tell them. If it's a problem that only one specific co-worker has with them, however, it's pretty difficult to keep it anonymous.
If that doesn't do it, I may sit them both down, or I may just go and get Employee's B side. If A has it right, we can end it right there. If not, then it is a sit down meeting.
Fortunately, we have a small company with employees who value each other and see this as a great place to work so it doesn't happen often.
I usually don’t get just a lot of personality conflicts but actual problems that need dealing with. The personality conflicts seem to resolve if each side has the chance to blow off steam.