You missed the memo and you complain to HR about
your boss, and they told your boss about it
naturally your boss's pissed. What are you going
to do now? Well, that's exactly what we're getting
into today.
Hello, my friend. I'm so glad that you're hanging
out with me today. And if you're new here,
welcome. My name is Jennifer Brick, and I'm your
new career bestie. Around here we talk about
career success, navigating obstacles that work and
toxic work environments. If you're like, Yes, I
need more of that in my life, tap the subscription
button and the notification belt, I release two
new videos each week. Also, I hang out pretty much
every day on LinkedIn as well as Instagram. So if
you want to go follow me over there, I'll leave
the links in the description bar down below. If
you've seen my video, HR is not your friend. And
especially if you've scrolled through the
comments, you know that this is a mistake that a
lot of people make, they have an issue with a bad
boss, and they call HR about it. Now, if you've
made that mistake, and you were ready to figure
out how to deal tap the like button, and let's
just jump straight into it.
Well, first of all, you're probably thinking, why
is this a big deal? Here's the thing, if you have
a normal well adjusted manager who is able to
receive constructive feedback, and you know, take
appropriate action with the growth opportunity,
this is no big deal at all. In fact, I'm not even
sure why you're watching this video, because it's
really just a blip on the radar, it probably
hasn't even come up in conversation. But you're
probably not here watching this video, because
your boss really didn't mind that you complain to
HR about the fact that they're a bad manager,
you're probably here because your boss is not
happy about it. Now, when your boss is not happy
with you, obviously this can have a lot of impact
on your career from a day to day perspective in
terms of how they treat you how they communicate
with you, the projects that they assign you to the
accounts they assign you to and whatnot. But also
you need to remember this is the person who's
writing your performance review and has to say in
your pay increase as well as promotions. So if you
have made the mistake of complaining to HR about
your manager, and you're still having to work with
that manager, you need to take the next step real
quick, I want to know if you are in the situation
of you did complain to HR about your bad manager,
and they're a little bit angsty about it, let me
know in the comments down below. But then what we
need to do is we need to take action because this
person ultimately has say, in your performance
reviews, your promotions, and your pay increases.
So we need to fix the situation up as long as
you're reporting to this manager on that next step
to take in order to repair the relationship. If
you have complained to HR about your boss, and
your boss's mad about it, is you need to
acknowledge the reason why they're mad. And
there's a few reasons why this is probably
bothersome to them. First of all, it makes them
look bad, obviously, like if you're going to HR to
talk about what a bad manager because you don't
even feel like you can have the conversation
directly with them. It really says something about
their leadership skills. Also, when you go to HR,
this is a formal complaint that you put in about
your manager saying that they're a bad manager.
And there is this problem that needs to be
addressed. So as much as this can have an impact
on your career, because the way that they're going
to treat you, this actually has a negative
consequence on their career as well. Or at least a
can when HR is doing their job and you have good
leadership above the bad boss, for example, your
bad manager might have been reprimanded at work,
this can show up in their performance review. And
maybe it interrupted their own pay increase and
performance pathway. You don't know what happened
behind the scenes. But what we don't want to
happen is something that can happen in this
instance, and that's where the bad boss takes
things out on you, I know that someone's gonna
come into the comments like retribution is illegal
that can't happen. Let me tell you just because
something is illegal doesn't mean it doesn't
happen. Discrimination is illegal sexual
harassment is illegal. There's all sorts of
illegal things that happen every single day in
workplaces across the country. Which brings us to
the next step of what do you do when you have
complained about your manager to HR and they're
not happy about it, another factory figuring out
what you want to do. Now, there's actually a few
different options for you to proceed with. And the
first is that you own it unapologetically. For
example, maybe before you complained about your
boss, you address your concerns with them one
time, two times 10 times, and absolutely nothing
happened as a result of the conversations and you
raising your concerns to your manager, perhaps
they just provide zero psychological safety so
that it wasn't an option to have a direct
conversation, you needed human resources to be the
intermediary. And that's why you went to HR, which
I still don't really recommend, but that's
probably a totally different video, or perhaps
this bad manager and the behavior that you were
complaining about when you called HR is actually
creating a toxic work environment and you have
already created your toxic job exit plan. You're
on your way out, you have an offer. You're getting
close to an offer. In any event, you're going to
be leaving soon, so you're really just don't jF
I'll put it that way, even if you're intending to
leave the organization. escape this toxic boss or
bad manager that you have, I never recommend
burning bridges. You never know how someone can
help you in your career down the road from
references to giving opportunities and referrals.
So I'm not a huge fan of that. But ultimately, I'm
not the boss of you, you're the boss of you. So
you're going to make this decision for yourself.
The second option is to apologize to your manager.
I know a lot of you when you called HR to make
that complaint about your boss for doing so
because you thought Human Resources was there to
help you and that they were going to coach you and
give you advice on that it wasn't a formal track
that was going to set someone up for failure as a
direct result. Because hrs job is to protect the
company, it's not to protect you. And because you
didn't know that you went to HR, things were sad,
and they had unintended consequences. And if this
is the case, you might actually feel really bad.
And you might want to apologize for the way that
it went down. And maybe you learned a lot through
that process. So if it is authentic, it is an
option to apologize and make sure that you're
opening up lines of communication with this
manager. So the next time that there is an issue,
you don't feel like you have to go to HR or to
someone else that you can actually have that
conversation directly with them. Or the next
option is necessary if this person is going to
continue being your manager and you're remaining
at that company, and that is saving for you. And
for them with a sprinkling of saving the
relationship on the side. As long as this person
is your boss, as long as they're your manager, you
need to be able to work with them. And if they
have a problem with you, that is a huge problem.
Because as we already discussed, this person has a
say in your performance reviews, your annual pay
increases as well as any promotions or job
transitions that you're making within the company.
So having a positive and productive relationship
with them is absolutely crucial. And as you can
imagine, if you've gone behind their back and
complained to HR about them, they're probably not
feeling too happy. And they're probably not
feeling too trusting of you. And quite honestly,
from a manager's perspective, if a team member
complained about me without having a direct
conversation to me, without going through these
formal channels, I would question their
professional maturity. And I'm not one for holding
grudges, but other people might be. And in that
case, my first recommendation in repairing their
relationship and rebuilding trust with your
manager is to be so good that they cannot hold a
grudge against you. Now one of the first ways that
you're going to do that is to make sure that you
are abundantly clear on your unique awesomeness
quotient, you're UAQ, and you're going to flex it
because not only is this going to make you
unrecognizably awesome in your organization. But
ideally, you're going to do this in a way that
helps them look good as well. So for the
reputation harm that you cause to your boss, when
you complain to HR, you want to build it up a
little bit right now, assuming they're not an
awful toxic boss that you just need to get away
from. Of course, now if you don't know your UAQ
yet, follow the link that's in the description to
get your free UAQ Starter Kit so that you can get
clear on it, and use it to salvage a relationship
with your manager. In addition to this, it is
important in order to rebuild trust in that
relationship to have transparent communications
going forward. They don't want to be afraid that
if they say or do the wrong thing, that you're
going to go and report them to human resources.
Now I want to make sure again, that I'm clear that
I'm not talking about illegal and nefarious
things, and discrimination and abuse and things
like that, I'm just talking about interpersonal
issues that you have with this manager that you're
complaining about. So maybe you don't like the way
that they said something, maybe they're not giving
clear directions. And in cases like that, you want
to have a clear discussion with them. If you have
a one on one use that time. If you don't ask for a
meeting, use your email, however you communicate
with them, make sure that you are communicating
and that you are demonstrating to them that any
concerns that you have, you're going to bring
directly to them because you're a professional
adult, and you can take care of your own business
will doing these things make you into your boss's
favorite team member, probably not. But they will
help you rebuild that positive and productive
working relationship with your boss. However, they
might be grudge holders and they might not like
you because you complained about them to HR. And
if they're very grumpy if they are not actually
taking action about the things that you complained
about and trying to improve their leadership. And
to go from being a bad boss into being a good
manager, it just might be that they're not a good
boss, or that they're a toxic boss. And if that's
the case that they're holding a grudge if they're
taking out their anger and their reprimand on you,
then you need to know if you're dealing with a bad
boss or a toxic boss. So in that situation, what I
want you to do is go and watch this video so that
you can differentiate the two because what you're
going to do next is going to depend on who you
were up against. If this video helped you please
do give it a thumbs up it really helps my channel
it makes you my favorite career bestie as always,
my friend thank you so much for watching. I will
see you in the next video. Bye for now.