"Solving things in private" actually means that the power-brokers will have private "off-record" discussions to determine the fates of people who have no say in the discussion and don't even know the discussion happened.
It's a quaint principle though. Something for graduate students to aspire to while they're grinding away in the lab at 3am.
It’s a very scary thing to live in the real world.
Problem is obviously that in any institution like a university faculty the line between reasonable issue and unreasonable complaint is really blurry.
for a few thousand years we've been debating how to design institutions, if it was just 1. be reasonable, 2. don't be unreasonable, 3. don't be offended we'd have fewer problems than we do
Ironically, the post is not a command, and edict, or an enforced policy. It's an informal request. If you have an issue that you don't think fits, you are free to disregard it. That is the power of the RPP.
The RPP sounds more like a clause in a corporate mission statement. Trite, insincere and, I'm sure, broken regularly and with glee by everyone who matters in the organization.
I’m sure abusive organisations exist and all I can say is if at all possible, and it’s almost always possible, please leave for your own sake. There are better places to live and work. I do not recognise the world you describe.
I can't see the writing. We're learning OpenCV, but I never learned Python. I think my paper was graded incorrectly. My dad passed away, so my coursework is suffering. I should've been in the acknowledgements in my lab's paper. One of my group members is useless. My lab partner smells... like, a LOT. So-and-so keeps taking our oscilloscope. Our workspace is too cold. The professor always calls on women (or Indians or the front row). Why do all groups need to bring a vegetarian option to their presentation but the group with the vegetarian doesn't need to bring meat? The Greek groups all share old exams with each other but not with anyone else. Why does the department need to find a minority instead of just hiring the most qualified applicant? Why can't people just let personal insults roll of their back if their research work can stand on its own?
People from a ton of cultures and backgrounds are jammed into one institution. Of course there will be friction, and it shouldn't be the job of the university president to tell a chronically offending student to only take one slice of pizza at the Friday research talks and go back in line for getting seconds. Also, everyone has a different opinion of what "a big deal" is. Thus, for the sake of everybody and everybody's academic and social development... just be cool. Be reasonable.
Is'nt this the case for pretty much any relationship?
A father-son relation or even a spouse relationship in many cases?
The formal process should always be available, but more like a last stop. It can document what informal steps were taken, (they likely failed - thats why they are doing it). Now both parties are sort of shamed if there were steps missed?
Is there harm in trying out a private meeting, knowing one can always have formal channels available at their disposal?
Possible negative outcomes:
1) The senior person is sufficiently abusive and skilled as to shut down discussion and convince you that formal channels would be fruitless (or even actively harmful to you)
2) The senior person now thinks less of the junior and will subtly sabotage them (especially harsh/pedantic grading, a lack of mentorship and support, etc.)
3) The junior person no longer trusts the senior person, and this will sabotage the junior (refusing mentorship and support, ignoring genuinely useful feedback)
4) A lot of issues are "twenty people all have this minor complaint" - the senior can gaslight all twenty people that no one ELSE has ever made this complaint so clearly they're too sensitive, and no one else ever realizes there's more than one victim so they write it off
5) Twenty people ALL have issue with the same one comment the senior made, and he's now getting mobbed - and once people realize it's twenty-on-one, mob justice mentality kicks in and they feel emboldened to say that the senior DEFINITELY needs to be cancelled
6) Twenty people all have DIFFERENT issues with the same one comment, and the situation is now a 50-page-long flame war before an administrator finds out and locks the thread.
7) People assume that the policy should be interpreted as "we don't care, please don't bother us" and just fail to bring up issues at all
8) People with anxiety feel like they need to do the big scary personal confrontation first, and thus fail to bring up the issue at all
(These are not just hypotheticals - I've either been in the situation or seen friends in that situation.)
More awareness and resources provided to the victim? There can be a 3rd party org, a private arbitration that is sworn to privacy that can guide the victim so that he does not suffer from the above weaknesses?
Knowing that the issue is being watched even though privately should cause the more powerful person from abusing the situation?
a Reasonable Person would understand the principle is a guideline for behavior within a community, and your judgement as a person is still required.
Abusive behavior is different from a disagreement between paths forward on a research project, for example, where working it out with peers is better than escalating it up the chain. During disagreements assume the other party is also a Reasonable Person vs. assuming ill will until proven otherwise.
There may be power dynamics, and this doesn't change those. A person in power can be a bad actor with or without these guidelines. Taking the extreme that this helps those in power be bad actors requires more evidence, as it assumes people will blindly follow this even when the other party is obviously not a Reasonable Person.
Friendly reminder: in several states it’s illegal to record the interaction if both parties haven’t consented so you should record yourself asking the other person for consent and their agreement if either one of you are in one of those states.
The reason the term gained popularity overnight is that it fills a hole in the (informal) English language.
There's only the option for "full bureaucratic hell" as the 3rd party involvement?
Most attempts to work together are just complaints about misunderstanings?
Nothing about this seems right. I've experienced nothing but middle grounds for each of your extreme positions. For example, going to your direct supervisor to mediate is not bureaucratic hell, nor is it "full karen". Asking the mediation team for $workplace to help out isn't usually a bureaucratic hell, nor is it "involving an authority" in the way you suggest, since they usually do not have termination powers (or police powers or whatever else you're imagining), its the step before going to those authorities.
Also, you seem to completely ignore the basic truth that sometimes when people have hard feelings towards each other a third party can serve as a catalyst for productive communication.
I fail to see how the other party having power over you has any bearing on how the situation (beyond setting the norms of how you'd approach them about it or potentially limiting your communication channels to them, which would apply to any topic you approach them about regardless of if you've been wronged).
Not only have you given your boss a chance to compromise your position but you won't have the rapport with their boss that they do. You are just a complaint and until there is a trend of these complaints they most likely will be handwaved away.
Maybe you haven't been through the circlejerk enough but the politics of a place totally shoot down your argument.
Oh, you know throwaway0a5e, they are a troublemaker. I have been trying to deal with some of their performance issues off the book to keep their record clean but you know don't like that and are now calling me out for whatever. You trust me, right boss?
In my opinion, this depends a lot on the severity of the issue anyway. If we're talking about workload assignment or some comments, talking directly will be the best solution. If the issue is serious (sexual harassment, academic fraud etc), directly escalating is warranted.
The only way I can see justifying the "narc first, negotiate later" approach is if I don't expect the "negotiate later" part to ever happen and am simply seeking to be a vindictive jerk and want to cause problems for them.
And it should be obvious, to you, if you do engage in good faith, that the "simply seeking to be a vindictive jerk" is not the reason anyone would have to make this argument.
I actually think that is a really, really bad thing to do in a university. That is because unversities are full of seniority and dependency relationships, and in an unequal relationship informal conflict resolution puts the weaker party at a disadvantage.
Solving things in private is appropriate in a group of peers, say a small company among friends, or a family, but whenever there is an inequality in power, teacher/student, manager/employee, it is important to not handle things in private. It's one of the reasons universities tend to be so scandal ridden, and why you have these stories of say, sexually abusive teachers who somehow are able to brush it under the carpet for decades.
It's also the reason why the military tends to be hyper-formal when it comes to complaints, because it is so hierarchical. Solving things privately when one party exercises authority over the other will inevitably produce some very screwed up results.