A colleague tells you that someone wants to speak with you privately.
They will not say who. They will not say why.
For the next hour, your mind begins constructing explanations. You replay conversations from earlier in the week. Was it the difficult performance discussion? The holiday request you declined? The coaching session that seemed to end well at the time? Perhaps it is something entirely unrelated. Until you know, every possibility remains plausible.
Psychologists have long recognised that uncertainty is psychologically demanding. When information is incomplete, the human brain rarely waits patiently for the missing pieces. Instead, it begins generating predictions, testing memories and imagining outcomes in an attempt to regain a sense of certainty. From an evolutionary perspective, this makes perfect sense. For our ancestors, failing to anticipate a potential threat carried a far greater cost than briefly assuming danger where none existed.
Now imagine discovering that the meeting concerns a formal grievance.
For the employee raising the complaint, the grievance process represents an opportunity to be heard. It is an important safeguard that allows concerns about bullying, discrimination or unfair treatment to be investigated objectively. Organisations rightly invest considerable effort in encouraging employees to speak up, ensuring that concerns can be raised without fear of retaliation and that complaints are considered fairly.
Yet every grievance involves two people.
Whilst much has been written about the experience of the complainant, comparatively little attention has been given to the psychological experience of the individual against whom the grievance has been raised. This omission is understandable. Organisations naturally seek to protect those who may have experienced poor treatment. Nevertheless, recognising the psychological impact on the respondent does not diminish the importance of supporting the complainant. Fairness is rarely a finite resource. Understanding one person’s experience need not invalidate another’s.
For contact centres, this distinction is particularly relevant.
Managers operate in environments characterised by continual interpersonal decision making. They coach performance, monitor quality, address attendance, allocate shifts, manage annual leave and navigate conversations that are often emotionally charged. Many of these interactions involve disappointment for one party. Declining a flexible working request or challenging poor performance may be entirely reasonable management decisions, yet they can still be experienced negatively by the individual receiving them.
Most of these conversations pass without incident. Occasionally, however, one develops into a formal allegation of bullying or unfair treatment.
At this point, the organisation quite rightly shifts into investigative mode. Policies are followed, evidence is gathered and confidentiality is maintained. Procedural justice becomes the priority. The objective is to establish the facts whilst ensuring that everyone involved is treated consistently and impartially.
The psychology of the situation, however, has already begun to unfold.
When our identity comes under investigation
A grievance is more than an administrative process. For many managers, it represents a challenge to an important aspect of their identity.
Most people do not think of themselves simply as employees. They also hold beliefs about the kind of person they are. A manager may see themselves as supportive, approachable or fair. These identities are reinforced over months or years through positive feedback, successful relationships and professional experience. They become part of how individuals understand themselves.
When someone alleges bullying, those beliefs are suddenly called into question.
Psychologist E. Tory Higgins’ Self-Discrepancy Theory proposes that psychological discomfort emerges when our perception of ourselves conflicts with information that suggests we are different from the person we believe ourselves to be. Similarly, William Swann’s work on Self-Verification Theory argues that individuals seek consistency between their self-concept and the way others perceive them. An allegation of bullying creates precisely this inconsistency. Even before any findings have been reached, the manager is confronted with the possibility that someone has interpreted their behaviour in a way that fundamentally contradicts how they see themselves.
This helps explain why grievances often provoke emotional responses that appear disproportionate to the procedural event itself.
The distress is not simply about the investigation. It concerns what the investigation appears to imply.
Managers frequently begin replaying previous conversations, searching for evidence that they may have unintentionally crossed a line. Others become defensive, convinced that their intentions should be sufficient evidence of appropriate conduct. Both reactions represent attempts to restore psychological consistency. One searches internally for an explanation. The other rejects the inconsistency altogether.
Neither response necessarily reflects guilt.
Instead, both can be understood as natural attempts to protect a coherent sense of identity.
The burden of uncertainty
If identity creates the emotional impact, uncertainty often sustains it.
Research consistently demonstrates that people find uncertainty psychologically aversive. Interestingly, studies have shown that uncertain outcomes can generate greater physiological stress than known negative outcomes because the brain remains engaged in a continual search for information. It continues generating possible futures without being able to settle on any of them.
A grievance investigation creates precisely these conditions.
The respondent rarely knows which conversations have been referenced, who has been interviewed or how particular events have been interpreted. Confidentiality, although essential for protecting the integrity of the investigation, inevitably limits the information that can be shared. The result is an environment in which the individual possesses just enough information to recognise the seriousness of the situation, but rarely enough to predict how it will unfold.
Within organisational psychology, David Rock’s SCARF model identifies certainty as one of five core social needs that influence our responses to workplace situations. When certainty is threatened, cognitive resources become redirected towards monitoring potential risks rather than performing routine tasks. The individual may continue attending meetings, coaching advisers and responding to operational demands, yet a significant proportion of their attention is occupied elsewhere.
Managers often describe this experience as mentally exhausting.
The effort required to continue leading a team whilst simultaneously contemplating possible outcomes places a considerable cognitive burden upon the individual. Over time, this can influence both wellbeing and decision making, particularly within contact centres where managers are already balancing competing operational pressures.
When uncertainty changes behaviour
The psychological effects of a grievance rarely remain confined to the investigation itself. They often influence how managers behave long after the initial meeting with HR has ended.
Behavioural psychologists have long recognised that people adapt their behaviour in response to previous experiences, particularly those associated with perceived threat. If a manager comes to associate routine management activities with the possibility of formal allegations, it becomes understandable that future decisions may be approached with greater caution.
This does not necessarily mean they become less capable. Instead, they may become less willing to accept interpersonal risk.
Constructive challenge becomes more tentative. Performance conversations become carefully qualified. Feedback that might previously have been delivered confidently is softened or postponed altogether. Some managers become reluctant to address inappropriate behaviour until problems have become impossible to ignore, whilst others begin documenting every conversation in exhaustive detail, not because it improves performance management, but because it offers reassurance should another complaint arise.
From a psychological perspective, these behaviours resemble defensive decision making. The objective subtly shifts from making the best management decision to making the least personally risky one.
Within contact centres, where managers routinely navigate emotionally demanding conversations, this shift can have unintended organisational consequences. Teams often benefit from timely coaching, honest feedback and consistent accountability. If managers begin avoiding those conversations through fear of future allegations, organisational performance may gradually suffer, even though every grievance has been managed correctly from a procedural standpoint.
This presents an uncomfortable paradox. A process designed to protect fairness may inadvertently influence the confidence with which future leadership is exercised.
The invisible audience
Another aspect of grievance investigations receives surprisingly little attention: Confidentiality.
Confidentiality protects the integrity of the investigation, but it does not eliminate social psychology.
Humans are remarkably sensitive to their reputation within groups. Our standing amongst colleagues influences trust, belonging and professional identity. Evolutionary psychologists argue that maintaining one’s social reputation has long been critical to survival because exclusion from a group historically carried profound consequences.
Modern workplaces are no different.
Even where nobody knows the details of an investigation, people notice changes. Meetings appear unexpectedly in diaries. Managers seem distracted. HR becomes more visible. Teams begin filling gaps in information with assumptions.
This tendency reflects what psychologists describe as Attribution Theory. When information is incomplete, people naturally generate explanations for observed behaviour, often with greater confidence than the available evidence warrants.
The respondent frequently finds themselves in an impossible position. They cannot discuss the investigation because confidentiality protects everyone involved. Equally, they cannot easily challenge assumptions that may emerge amongst colleagues.
For many individuals, this loss of narrative control becomes almost as psychologically demanding as the investigation itself. Reputation begins to feel uncertain, yet there is little opportunity to influence how others interpret events until the investigation has concluded.
The challenge of psychological fairness
None of this suggests that grievance procedures should become less rigorous.
If anything, robust grievance processes are fundamental to healthy organisational cultures. Employees must feel able to raise concerns without fear of dismissal or retaliation. A workplace in which people remain silent about bullying or inappropriate behaviour is neither safe nor effective.
The question is not whether grievance procedures should exist. It is whether organisations recognise that the psychological experience of participating in those procedures extends beyond the complainant alone.
This distinction mirrors an important concept within organisational psychology, where researchers have long argued that perceptions of fairness are shaped not only by the outcome of a process, but also by the quality of interpersonal treatment experienced throughout it.
Organisational Justice Theory distinguishes between procedural justice, informational justice and interactional justice. Whilst procedures determine whether an investigation is objectively fair, interactional justice concerns whether individuals feel respected, informed and treated with dignity throughout the process.
These dimensions are related, but they are not interchangeable.
An investigation may be procedurally impeccable whilst still leaving both parties feeling isolated, confused or psychologically unsupported.
Recognising this does not require compromising impartiality. Rather, it encourages organisations to separate two different responsibilities.
The first is to discover the facts. The second is to care for the people whilst those facts remain unknown.
So what does this mean for contact centres?
For operational leaders and HR professionals, the implications are surprisingly practical.
First, recognise that uncertainty itself is a psychological stressor. Whilst confidentiality will always limit what can be shared, regular communication about timescales, process and next steps can reduce unnecessary ambiguity. People generally cope better with difficult situations than with unexplained ones.
Second, remember that support should not be viewed as an indication of innocence or guilt. Providing access to wellbeing resources, encouraging reflective supervision or simply acknowledging that an investigation can be emotionally demanding does not prejudice its outcome. It demonstrates that the organisation understands the difference between supporting an individual and endorsing their behaviour.
Third, help managers understand the psychology behind their own reactions. It is entirely understandable that someone who has experienced a grievance becomes more cautious afterwards. Left unexamined, however, that caution can evolve into avoidance.
Behavioural psychology suggests that experiences associated with psychological discomfort naturally shape future behaviour. If a difficult coaching conversation is followed by months of investigation and uncertainty, the brain begins associating assertive management with social threat. The result is not necessarily poorer managers, but managers who unconsciously begin avoiding situations that resemble those which previously resulted in distress.
Coaching managers to distinguish between thoughtful leadership and defensive leadership reduces the likelihood that one difficult experience reshapes every future management conversation.
Finally, consider how your organisation defines fairness.
Most grievance procedures have been carefully designed to ensure that the eventual outcome can withstand scrutiny. That is essential. Yet employees rarely experience policies directly. They experience conversations, waiting, uncertainty, communication and relationships.
These are psychological experiences as much as procedural ones.
Organisations often think of grievance procedures as mechanisms for determining whether someone’s behaviour has fallen below an acceptable standard. Psychologically, however, they also become moments in which trust, identity and belonging are tested. The outcome matters enormously, but so too does the experience of reaching it.
A grievance process should always seek the truth. But it should also seek to preserve the dignity of everyone involved whilst that truth is still being established.
Yet whilst that truth remains unknown, two people are often carrying a considerable psychological burden. One is wondering whether they will be believed. The other is wondering whether they will still be recognised as the person they believe themselves to be.
After all, investigations are designed to determine whether inappropriate behaviour has occurred. The process itself should never become an unnecessary source of it.
Good grievance procedures uncover the facts.
Great organisations remember the people.
References
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