My colleague has started the grievance procedure against her Manager. There has been the initial fact finding interview (one with her and another where HR met with her Manager). The notes from the meeting were typed up by HR and sent to her for checking.
However, the notes were not a true representation of the discussion at all. There were questions in there that she hadn't even been asked, and also slight alterations made, which, although slight, would have made a huge difference to the situation. Such as saying "I feel angry" rather than "I feel HE is angry"!
It actually looks as though HR have amalgamated her notes with the notes from her manager's meeting… The language used sounds like him… I wonder if HR are trying to make their job easier by trying to 'write off' some of the more difficult accusations of bullying and engineer a situation that is easier to resolve….
She corrected these (basically re-wrote them) and sent them back,
My questions are:
Will HR accept the changes (or will they say their notes were correct! BTW, she did not have a witness with her – just the HR head and an independent investigating officer)
Do any of you know of an HR dept using tactics like this… Or are we being paranoid?
She has her next meeting with HR next week and I strongly suspect they will try to suggest this is merely a 'clash of personalities' or a 'misunderstanding' and I'd value some thoughts on how best to handle that….
Thanks in advance!