The Complaint Landed on Your Desk. What Happens Next Matters More Than You Think

You’ve just been told there’s a complaint.

Maybe it’s an email from HR. Maybe someone walked into your office and closed the door. Whatever form it takes, the decisions you make in the next 48 hours will shape everything that follows.

Often, the first call I get isn’t “Can you investigate this?” It’s “We’ve received a complaint and we’re not quite sure what to do with it.”

And that’s actually the right question to be asking. Because the first decision isn’t who is right or wrong. It’s what process this situation needs.

Here’s what I wish every decision-maker knew.

Don’t React. Respond.

The instinct when a complaint lands is to do something immediately. Call the person complained about. Get “both sides.” Have a quiet word. Try to resolve it before it becomes a thing.

That instinct is understandable. It’s also the most common mistake I see.

The moment you start making informal enquiries before you’ve thought about what the complaint actually requires, you’ve already compromised the process. You may have tipped off the respondent. You may have influenced witnesses. You may have signalled to the complainant that their concerns aren’t being taken seriously.

What to do instead: Acknowledge the complaint. Thank the person for raising it. Tell them you’ll come back to them within 48 hours with next steps. Then stop. Assess what you’re dealing with before you decide how to deal with it.

Diagnose Before You Prescribe

Not every complaint needs the same response. The biggest mistake organisations make is defaulting to one approach regardless of what’s in front of them.

Are there specific, serious or contested allegations where the organisation needs to determine what happened? A formal investigation may be required.

Is this a relationship breakdown? Two people who can’t work together but no allegation requiring formal findings? Mediation might be the right starting point.

Is the whole team affected? If the complaint is a symptom of broader dysfunction, facilitation is often more effective than pulling two people into a room.

Is this a performance issue dressed up as a complaint? Be careful here. Sometimes it is. But more often, I see the opposite: a legitimate complaint that the employer reframes as a performance issue because that feels more manageable. In a recent FWC decision, a CEO turned a bullying complaint into a performance improvement plan. The Commission found the employee had been forced to resign, even though there was no evidence the CEO intended that outcome.

The pattern I see most often: organisations deciding on the process before they’ve properly diagnosed the problem.

Sometimes I’m contacted to conduct an investigation and, after looking at what’s actually going on, I don’t think an investigation is the best starting point. I’ll say so.

An investigation is appropriate when facts need to be established and findings made. But if the real problem is a fractured relationship, mediation may achieve far more. If the complaint is one manifestation of a dysfunctional team, facilitation may be what the organisation actually needs.

My job isn’t to sell an investigation. It’s to help the organisation choose the intervention that’s most likely to solve the problem.

Keep the Complaint and the Performance Issue Apart

This deserves its own section because it goes wrong so often.

When you investigate a complaint, new information sometimes surfaces about the complainant’s own conduct or performance. That’s normal. It doesn’t mean you should fold it into the same process.

The moment a complaint investigation becomes a vehicle for performance management, you’ve sent a message to the complainant and to everyone watching: raising concerns in this organisation comes with risk. That’s how you create a culture where nobody speaks up.

If genuine performance concerns emerge, deal with them separately. Different process. Proper notice. A clearly defined decision-making process. And ideally, not the same person handling both.

Separate the Roles

Where practicable, separate the investigator from the ultimate decision-maker.

I see this go wrong constantly. A manager receives a complaint, looks into it themselves, forms a view, and decides what to do. It might feel efficient. It’s also a procedural fairness risk.

Where possible, engage someone independent to investigate and keep the investigation separate from the ultimate disciplinary decision. That separation helps protect both actual and perceived fairness in the process.

The Investigation Is Only Step One

Many of the cases that end up before the FWC don’t fail at the investigation stage. They fail at what happens afterwards.

The investigation might be thorough and fair. But then the findings letter misstates what was found. Or the sanction is decided before the employee has a chance to respond. Or the internal appeal is a rubber stamp.

Each of those is a separate failure. And each one can turn a well-run investigation into a liability.

Report findings accurately. Give the employee a genuine opportunity to respond to the findings and any proposed sanction before you decide. If there’s an appeal process, make it real.

Don’t Forget About Everyone Else

When a complaint lands, the focus goes to the complainant and the respondent. But there’s usually a team around them.

They know something is going on. They’re reading the body language, noticing the closed-door meetings, watching who’s suddenly absent. If nobody tells them anything, they’ll fill the silence with speculation.

You can’t share the details. But you can communicate that an issue is being addressed and that there’s a process in place. Silence doesn’t protect confidentiality. It erodes trust.

And once the investigation is over, think about what the team needs to move forward. An investigation establishes facts. It doesn’t rebuild relationships.

When to Bring in Someone External

Not every complaint needs an external investigator. But consider it when:

• The complaint involves a senior leader. Internal HR may feel compromised.
• The complaint is complex or contested. Multiple parties, conflicting accounts, legal risk.
• There’s a genuine risk of perceived bias. Even a fair internal process can lose credibility if the circumstances give rise to reasonable concerns about independence.
• You’re not sure what you’re dealing with. Sometimes the most valuable conversation is the one that helps you work out whether you need an investigation, a mediation, or something else entirely.

I’m often brought in because the organisation could technically manage the matter internally, but recognises that independence matters. Sometimes it’s the seniority of the people involved. Sometimes the history is complicated. Sometimes HR is simply too close to the people or events to investigate without questions being raised about impartiality.

Bringing someone external in isn’t an admission that HR can’t handle the matter. Sometimes it’s precisely what allows HR to step out of the conflict and manage the organisation through it.

The first decision is the one that matters most.

Many workplace disputes that eventually become serious started much earlier, with a complaint landing on someone’s desk and a decision about how to respond.

The organisations that handle complaints well aren’t the ones that never receive them. They’re the ones that take those first decisions seriously. They separate the roles where appropriate. They match the process to the problem. They communicate. And when they need help, they ask for it early rather than late.

If a complaint has landed on your desk and you’re not sure what should happen next, you don’t need to have the answer before you call me.

Often, a short confidential conversation is enough to work out whether you’re looking at an investigation, mediation, facilitation or something that can appropriately be managed internally.

The earlier we have that conversation, the more options you usually have.

Saranne Segal

Director, Segal Conflict Solutions