Speak up or stay silent?
Q: I’m really struggling with my new manager. He’s not very good at managing our tight-knit marketing team, and we are all suffering. He has instituted new practices to build transparency on team projects but isn’t transparent about his own work or even the company’s initiatives or goals. Team morale is the worst it’s ever been, and none of us feel empowered to do our jobs. There doesn’t seem to be an avenue to escalate the team’s frustrations. Frankly, what’s your opinion on whether HR should be notified of the manager’s impact on the team’s morale and work productivity? My husband says it would be career suicide. Should I just sit back and watch the team dissolve as my colleagues depart? If so, is this really what corporate America has come to? — ANONYMOUS
A: I can’t answer that last question, the one about corporate America, because I haven’t worked in corporate America in some time. Regardless, it seems to me that your real question regards whether a human resources department — or your company’s human resources department — is a force for good. The fact that you worry that consulting HR about your manager’s failings would be “career suicide” suggests that there isn’t much trust between people or departments within your company.
And that, I think, is a lot more damning, and perhaps more demoralizing, than the reality that your manager is falling down on the job. A lack of trust within a company hurts individuals and the company itself, because, as you said, members of a team may leave their jobs.
You appear to have a lot of empathy for your manager. And you diagnose the situation correctly, I suspect, as one that is rooted in his insecurities and feelings of overwhelm. What I don’t know is this: How long has he been in the job? And have you tried talking to him one on one? I think there’s a way to approach him, not from the point of view of a concerned subordinate but as a supportive colleague. You might consider telling him how much you and your co-workers want to be involved in the work your team does and that your offers of assistance might help take a load off his plate.
But back to the issue of whether or not to approach HR. I’ve worked for companies with responsive HR departments, but I’ve also had one or two jobs in which human resources’ primary mission appeared to be to protect employees in upper management from those further down the ladder. In these situations, it wasn’t so much that I thought that going to HR about my concerns would be “career suicide” but that it was unlikely that HR would, or could, do anything to ameliorate the situation. And that, of course, was enough to make me want to leave.
But maybe I am looking at it all wrong.
I contacted an HR expert to get his take. Peter Cappelli is a professor of management at the Wharton School and director for the Center for Human Resources at the University of Pennsylvania. He’s also a co-author of a recent article in the Harvard Business Review titled “HR’s New Role.” In it, Cappelli and his co-author, Ranya Nehmeh, argue that, thanks to the current tight job market, HR departments need to redouble their efforts to support and retain employees. But that doesn’t mean that they need to — or can be expected to — solve an employee’s problem.
Cappelli explained that instead of wishing HR might solve a problem, employees in tough situations turn to HR for help in finding solutions that workers can carry out themselves. In your case, for example, you might want to first ask yourself what it is you want to have happen. Then approach HR to explain the situation and ask for advice on what to do. (Most likely, the HR person is going to turn the question back onto you and ask you whether you’ve approached your boss.) This is always a pretty safe approach, Cappelli said. “You’re probably not going to get into trouble for that because it looks like you’re being responsible, and you’re trying to do something rather than push it off” onto human resources.
In other words, find ways to empower yourself while also managing expectations. As Cappelli put it, HR professionals are not advocates for individual employees. They work for the organization, and if your complaint is somewhat ambiguous — your manager is not managing a team well versus, say, your manager is stealing from the company — they’re not necessarily going to take up your position. “They’re working for the company, and they’re working in the company’s hierarchy, and your boss is above you,” Cappelli said. “So if they had to choose who to believe, they’re going to believe your boss.”
Correct pronunciation
Q: I have a co-worker whose name is frequently mispronounced by others. This co-worker has included the correct pronunciation in their Slack bio, and I’ve heard them say their name, so I’m confident I know how it should be pronounced. Despite this, people across various teams — and even on our own team — often get it wrong. What troubles me is that my co-worker never corrects anyone during meetings or calls, and I can’t help feeling upset on their behalf. I want to address the issue because I believe we should strive to call everyone by the correct name/pronunciation, but I’m unsure if it’s my place to intervene or how to approach this without overstepping. Would it be inappropriate for me to privately reach out to those mispronouncing their name to gently correct them? Or should I let my co-worker decide how to handle it? — NAME-CONSCIOUS COLLEAGUE
A: This is tough. Names can be hard to pronounce for a variety of reasons. The name sounds “foreign” or is uncommon. The name reads as one thing but sounds like another. The name is ambiguous, or pronunciation could go any number of ways.
But continued mispronunciation of someone’s name can say a lot about a person. It suggests a lack of attention to detail. A failure to listen. Faulty memory. Or, at worst, purposeful disrespect.
For some people, mispronunciation of their name is a lifelong irritation. I started a job a few years ago where one of the top execs had a name that “read” as one thing but was actually pronounced slightly differently. When I made the mistake of mispronouncing her name during an introductory meeting, she was quick to correct me. But I understood her position.
But back to your colleague and whether you should intervene. I don’t think you should. Instead, I think you can simply educate others by continuing to show, not tell — that is, by pronouncing your colleague’s name correctly in front of others. Just don’t reach out privately to co-workers; that might make them defensive.