Group manager threw me under the bus to save her friend

Question

I am at a bit of a loss as to what to do.

Back story: I was put on a project that was far behind and was very low developer quality adhering to no set of standards or practices. The project was not following the company's Standard Operating Procedures even the most essential like code reviews. I had begun communicating that in our messaging application to the team and kept trying to push for change in a positive way. Sadly, the team manager refused to listen was actively combative and would do the opposite or disagree for the sake of disagreeing with me, it was a rough scenario. I persevered and made changes to the standard where I could and the other developers came to rely on me and I was able to help them finish their sprint goals and aid them in their coding while doing my own and the improvements when time permitted. Later on another developer came onto the project as an architect and was able to tell the team manager to implement the changes I proposed.

Flash forward to yesterday. I have a review with our group manager, the team managers long time friend. I am told that my communication was distracting the other team members and I am responsible for sprint delays despite having a mountain of evidence to the contrary and the project being further when I joined. She, the group manager, had proceeded to tell me she had told this to upper management. When asked how my core job capacity was I was told everything was fine. When asked if she could point to a message that was distracting or non-constructive she would not. I was then told that all of the changes that I was able to get implemented thanks to the architect were all the architects credit. She was also unable to provide any means of improvement for my core job capacity.

Now I fully intend to tender my resignation, but I do not want to leave with upper management thinking that I was incompetent or the cause of them losing a few hundred thousand dollars. I have all the messages and I even have proof that the two managers were lying to upper management on the reason why some features were just ignore.

I do not know if I should go to HR with this first or email the department manager with examples show casing everyplace he has been lied to along with examples of my supposed negative communication. There's also a possibility of letting it go but that would leave a bad taste in my mouth along with a stain on my professional career which I am proud of.

Answer 1

I do not know if I should go to HR

First of all, that is not going to help in your case, HR is not your friend.

What you should do is to

• Collect whatever proof you have or you can for the suggestions you made and were rejected earlier (before the architect joined in).
• Collect all the incidents where you helped the team to achieve their goals.
• Request for a formal meeting (in writing), again, with your group manager and team manager, for a follow up on the review discussion and present all the evidences you have gathered. then ask them the same question again:

"I was told that my communication was distracting the other team members and I am responsible for sprint delays - Can you help me understand it in detail? Can you supply me with example events / scenarios where I went wrong and how can I improve myself?"

There is a high possibility that the situation will improve. However, if they insist on their version, without providing any information to support their "claim" - they probably don't have a valid reason. In that case, you need to bring this to the notice of the higher management.

In a way, this is indirect bullying - which has no place in a healthy workplace.

Create a MoM (Minutes of Meeting), and circulate the summary in writing. Based on the situation mentioned above, you may need to include the appropriate higher authority in the email loop.

Answer 2

You didn`t mention your location, so my comment can be a bit out.

In my experience almost all of he places with more than one level of bureaucracy have favoritism. Unless you have a "pull" in the chain of command, there is a chance you will be scapegoated, especially if you outspoken, sad i know, but that`s the way it is.

This kind of place can be treasure for some and extremely toxic to others In these places, HR is your way of making your voice heard, not much of the influence thou.

As i see it , you have only one choice:

Document everything locally on your home machine and personal phone. I cannot emphasize it enough, corporate resources are not in your control and can / will be changed according to whatever needed.

Line up your next position,shield yourself as much is possible from any misconduct accusations and report to HR inappropriate behavior.

I am sure in company directory you have several level of authority accessible to you, use them all in BCC or even CC fashion, also CC you personal email to show that material is going to be stored off property as well.

And Good luck, toxic places need to be left as soon as possible to avoid the mental strain

Answer 3

Once you have your new position lined up, then hand in your resignation and see the senior manager on the same day giving the evidence and explaining why.

They may or may not require you to work the notice period, but in many cases they take you to the door and pay you out.

Do make sure that your positive achievements are shown with proof.

Answer 4

I think what you're looking for here is a reference from your current employer. What you want to get out of this is, "I'm going to look for another job anyway, but when my future employer asks my current employer about my performance, I want a good review".

Given that you've tagged the question united-states, I presume this company is in the US. I am neither a lawyer nor American, but my understanding is that there are various laws in place in the US which would prevent your employer from giving a review of your work to a potential future employer at all, positive or negative; by law the only thing they are allowed to say is whether or not you actually worked there and had the job title you say you did for the dates you say you did on your resume, and that's all. So they're not going to badmouth you to prospective future employers, that's not how it works. Nor will they praise you, not even if you are able to convince them that you did all these great and wonderful things.

What you should do is drop it. You know what you did, they know what you did (even if they won't admit it). You are doing the right thing by getting out of there as quickly as you can. Just keep doing what you're doing, because you're on the right track.

If you want recommendations to present to future employers, you should get those from your coworkers on an individual basis, not writ-large from "the company". Perhaps before you leave, perhaps after, or if you can figure out a way to get recommendations from your coworkers without telling them you're leaving (or maybe with telling them, maybe you don't care), contact coworkers you know who will have a good impression of you and ask them, one-on-one, for a recommendation. That will give you the results you are looking for.

Answer 5

Why would you go against the team manager in the first place? There's a way to promote positive changes in the place you're working in, and essentially if you encounter resistance from your higher-ups, you should reconsider what you're doing (it might not be such good changes after all).

Anyways, what's done is done. Find yourself a new position elsewhere, and hopefully use a more subtle attitude next time - remember, you might not always see the bigger picture, when facing your senior managers in such manner.

As for the point being - why do you find it so important for the department manager to know what you perceive to be the truth about what really happened? You are aware of the fact that he might know the truth (or sees the situation in an entirely different way), and "showing" him your side might even make things worse? If you're feeling so strongly about it, I think it'd be better to have a little chat with him just before you leave and carefully and politely explain him your point of view.

I don't think that sending him a "bag of facts" would do any good, it might picture you as a trouble-maker, gathering materials about your co-workers or managers for your own purposes.

I don't know where you're from, but in my country we tend to say that the industry (software development) is not that big and you might face that guy again sometime in the future, and he might remember what you did and think badly on you.

Posting such "revenge" emails is primarily good for movie scenes, not for real life - just suck it up, and take this as an opportunity to find a better place to work in, this time try to pick a place which suites you better in terms of operating procedures.