Demand from manager - for total silence?

Pete111

CFC wrote: »

I thought the OP said he was the new Unit manager.

Pete, failure to obey a reasonable instruction can easily go as GM. Obviously this manager is a miserable so and so, and certainly sounds as if he has gone too far with the the dress code for my taste, but that still doesn't mean that it's OK to ignore a direct instruction from a superior. I'm curious as to why you believe that this wouldn't be construed as failure to follow a reasonable instruction. On the face of the poster's OP, the noise levels are high as a result of the team make up - normal work related talk does not need to involve high noise levels. Any potential GM is not for talking, it is for failing to follow a reasonable direct instruction. We do not know the full facts; it may even be that talking about cases is usual practice but is not actually necessary.

Failure to follow a direct instruction on the basis of a poster on t'internetz is a dangerous game to play....

I'm afraid I disagree on a number of levels. Not least because you assume that the order not to talk about work whilst at work is a reasonable one. Tribunals place a lot of emphasis on the concept of reasonableness and many, many people would say this was not the case here

Any tribunal panel that upheld an instant, first time GM dismissal for disobeying a strange and (in my view) unreasonable edict banning 'work related talking' would be out on a limb to say the least. Not to mention setting a bizzarly 'soft' precedent on the definition of what can and should constitute gross misconduct.

Just my opinion obviously but I stand by it. From the posts by the OP it is the temporary manager who is playing a dangerous game here - mostly by causing the team to miss targets!!

OP - any update?

Tygermoth

Sorry for the delay in update everyone's been so busy and I have not had a spare second to drop you a line. We are working very hard to play catch up re to the lost works time due to the now famous dictat. We also have lost a member of staff who walked out after being spoken to like they were scum (her words) by the new manager.

In the end the meeting ended in a kind of standoff.

We were told the new manager has no right to issue ultimatums to us or make changes to our working procedures and should he attempt to do so again we are to nod, smile then report it to our line manager. He is not to shout across the office when he feels the noise it to much but inform our manager who will monitor the reason/duration/business requirement so it can be logged to show the need or if a work round can be utilised.

However we were advised he is still a prominent manager and we have to try and quieten down to 'keep the peace' and we are to acced to his reasonable requests (which caused furore as he thinks he is the lord of all he surveys and we are his skivvies, cleaners & tea ladies)

So we are back to exactly how it was in the beginning he still shouts, we still ignore.

DVardysShadow

Sounds like they tried to broker a compromise by speaking only to one side.

LittleVoice

Am I the only one to feel a grain (not much more) of sympathy for the manager who asked for quiet (probably "silence" was not the first stage) from a team which wants to conduct itself at such a volume that it affects another employee's equilibrium.