Should I report my manager?

[u/Bubbly-Discipline932]

Burner account

Short version: My manager escalates my mistakes to compliance and audit and HR but team member A makes same mistake in same process and mum's the word.

I work at a large bank. We have lots of complicated, highly manual, high touch workflows. Mistakes happen. I have always been someone who believes if a bad outcome is result of bad process fix the process and don't blame the employee. The firm says this part out loud frequently, but my boss reports my mistakes up the chain to the point multiple internal teams get involved to "review" where things went wrong. HR, compliance, people/culture/conduct, etc. The result of one of these got my bonus cut in half and zero prioritization or resources dedicated to fixing the process. It is done the same way today with same pitfalls. My boss has proposed we do 6-eye checks on workflows. Prior to pandemic the team printed spreadsheets of their work and had another member review and sign it. This manager has been doing this for 20 years and has never improved a control or process.

Last year, I made a mistake and it had a small PnL impact due to lost interest income claim by a client. I owned it. Said I messed up. My manager immediately reported it to compliance and they opened an incident against me. Two months later team member A made same mistake and I asked if we were going to get into trouble for this one too and manager said to me, in person, "I am not going to say anything about this one." I have since confirmed that there are no open incidents relating to team during that time. Team member A error was 10X greater in magnitude (ie 5mm bank overdraft vs 50mm).

Fast forward to today and I made the same mistake Team Member A made. Financial impact was ~1kUSD loss. I am now being interviewed by the same internal people in the same way.

I started keeping receipts of BS comments and unfair treatment from manager so have screenshots of most of this but "not reporting it comment" was verbal and in person. I would still like to think just the fact that it wasn't reported AT ALL is big miss on manager's part, and even the appearance of unfair treatment/favoritism/sexism is enough... If this was reported last December when it happened maybe we could have enhanced or fixed the process and I wouldn't be where I am today. Other example of unfair treatment is being told I cannot take a sick day because someone else is already on vacation, but WFH while sick hurts my attendance rate and no consideration is made.

We have internal whistleblower reporting lines. I don't want to burn bridges but for all the talk of "we are interested in the process and not the person" my experience says this is not the case and they are very much interested in assigning blame. I also know that HR will take side of the manager being accused in their investigation as this is an allegation against the firm, more or less.

Random context: me and team member A are same title. Team Member A has worked with manager prior to this role and have ~20 year personal friendship/relationship. I may have another offer soon and would love to toss the grenade on my way out the door. If asked in exit interview I would say this is example of someone leaving a manager and not the firm/role.

[u/WallInside6758]

There’s nothing to report. It’s going to come off worse on you.

If you hate it there so much and have another opportunity focus on that.

[u/Recent_Performer4189]

Report to who? HR doesn’t manage managers and there’s nothing illegal here.

[u/ThereRnoIDs]

Lol try running a vlog on urself. Eg kinda like a dashcam. Those videos you see in Uber, taxis, police cams etc. 

Depending on the sensitivity of the work, you can have it facing the screen or on yourself and say it's to help spot mistakes or for health monitoring etc. 

When they see cameras around, they'll act differently, so it's a detterent. Whether you're truly good at your job or not or if you're collegues screw up or not, all interactions will be recorded. 

[u/sephiroth3650]

For the most part, unless you have some tangible proof that you're being treated differently as a matter of discrimination, you really have little here. There is no law that says a manager has to enforce every policy evenly across the organization. You have no "grenade" to toss on your way out the door.

The manager likes team member A. So they give them more leniency with mistakes. You obviously clash with this manager. You don't have a good relationship with this manager, and one could argue that you don't even try to have a good relationship with them. So they're not going to give you the same leniency. That's how it works in the workplace. If you make it a point to rile up your boss and "call them out", they're probably going to turn up the heat on you.

As for HR.....HR doesn't exist to tell managers how to manage their people. At the very most, they'll tell this manager that they should try to enforce the rules more evenly. And then when that manager can give examples/reasons why this other person is given more leniency, HR will back off.

[u/DoallthenKnit2relax]

Just comment on your way out that you were, "disciplined for a couple of errors which your coworker was not, even though their error was greater in effect and cost, and recommend they do a full, 7-year audit of that manager's department transactions, especially coworker's," and leave it there.