When HR Gets It Wrong
- karen8437
- Nov 28
- 3 min read
In every organisation, HR is supposed to be the safe zone — the place employees can turn to when something goes wrong. But what happens when HR gets it wrong?
And just for the record, this isn’t about “bad HR” as a profession. Most HR people care deeply and do incredibly difficult work under pressure. But even good HR teams can make mistakes, and when they do, the consequences for employees and employers alike can be significant.
I recently managed such a case, and the legal, ethical, and reputational risks were real.
___________________________________________________________________________________________
A Public Reminder of Accountability
We’ve all seen how public missteps can play out. When the CEO and HR Director of tech company Astronomer were caught on a stadium kiss cam, a seemingly light-hearted moment turned into internal fallout, public criticism, and eventually both leaving the business.
Why? Because HR and leadership are held to a higher standard. When trust, impartiality, and professional boundaries are compromised — or even appear to be — it shakes confidence in the whole system.
In my client’s case, there were no stadiums or kiss cams. But behind closed doors, the breach of trust was just as serious.
What Went Wrong?
The employee was a capable, mid level HR professional who raised legitimate concerns about bullying, exclusion, and unprofessional conduct within her own team. She also disclosed a recent ADHD diagnosis and was proactively managing her mental health.
Her direct manager, a senior HR leader, was among those she had raised concerns about. Allegations of a personal relationship between that leader and another HR team member added to the complexity and her sense that that the process wouldn’t be fair.
She was correct. What followed wasn’t best practice. She was:
Excluded from team activities,
Yelled at and spoken down to,
Told by her manager that “I’m not your therapist”,
Called into a “disciplinary” meeting with no support person, no warning and no investigation.
The same person she’d complained about was the one who conducted the meeting! That’s not a difficult situation - it’s a clear conflict of interest.
When it Escalated
By the time I became involved, trust had completely broken down. She was on the verge of breakdown, and not without reason.
I advised her to seek a medical certificate for psychological stress related to workplace bullying and harassment. The certificate clearly stated she was unfit for duties but fit to attend meetings provided the individual associated with her injury was not present.
Under Australian law, ADHD is a recognised disability, and employers have a legal obligation to:
Provide a psychologically safe workplace, and
Make reasonable adjustments (under the Disability Discrimination Act 1992) to ensure employees are not exposed to harm — emotionally or physically.
These obligations extend to who the employee must report to, interact with, or be managed by. Failure to consider such adjustments may amount to discrimination.
The Risk to the Employer
In this situation, both leadership and HR exposed the business to serious risk through a lack of oversight and procedural fairness:
No independent review of the complaint,
No escalation pathway beyond the conflicted manager,
No recognition of disability-related obligations, and
No procedural fairness.
Had it continued, the company could have faced:
An adverse action claim under Fair Work Act,
A disability discrimination claim under the DDA,
A constructive dismissal case, and
A workers compensation claim for psychological injury.
How Was it Resolved?
With guidance, the employee:
Obtained appropriate medical documentation,
Set clear boundaries to protect her mental health,
Made a formal, structured complaint,
And negotiated a respectful exit — with compensation, a Deed of Release, and a clean break.
No lawyers. No commission hearing. No media scandal. Just a professional, low-noise outcome for both sides.
Lessons for Employers and HR Leaders
This case isn’t about blaming HR — it’s about reminding all of us in the profession that our actions carry weight. HR has enormous influence over culture, fairness, and trust. When we get it wrong, the fallout can be severe.
Leaders should:
Ensure HR has independent oversight and reporting lines,
Remove conflicts from complaint handling,
Prioritise psychological safety in both policy and practice, and
Model the ethical behaviour they expect of others.
Because even if no one’s watching you on a Kiss Cam, your people are watching how you lead. And if they lose trust in HR, they lose trust in the organisation itself.
How Karen’s HR can help?
Karen’s HR can support both HR teams and leadership to build robust, ethical, and compliant systems — the kind that prevent situations like this from happening.
Our services include:
HR leadership coaching and mentoring,
Culture and risk audits,
Exit-strategy consulting, and
Practical support in complex employee-relations matters.
We’re here to strengthen HR, not criticise it — because when HR works well, everyone is protected.
Comments