An employee has raised a grievance about me. How do I handle it when I’m the boss?

The answer Just Ask, HR gives

Supportive Sara — Warm and practical — people first, process close behind.

First, the human bit, because it's real: a grievance about your own conduct lands like a punch, especially in a business you built. Feel that privately — and then park it, because how you respond in the next fortnight will either resolve this or become Exhibit B.

The cardinal rule: you cannot be the judge of a complaint about yourself. Natural justice, and the ACAS Code's expectation of an unbiased decision-maker, both point the same way. In a small business your options are:

• Another director or senior person genuinely uninvolved in the events;
• An external HR consultant engaged to investigate and hear the grievance — for owner-manager businesses this is usually the answer, costs a few hundred pounds, and buys something priceless: a process no tribunal can call rigged;
• A trusted professional adviser (some accountancy/legal firms offer this) as a last resort.

What the process then looks like: acknowledge the grievance in writing quickly (a simple, neutral "received, being arranged, no detriment will follow from raising it"); the independent person investigates — which will include interviewing you; a grievance meeting with the employee (right to be accompanied); a written outcome; an appeal route (a second independent person if you can possibly arrange one).

Your own conduct during it — the part that decides everything:

• Keep managing them normally. No frostiness, no exclusion from meetings, no suddenly-harsher standards — any worsening of their treatment risks a victimisation claim that outlives the grievance itself.
• Don't investigate informally yourself, don't quiz colleagues about them, don't build a defence file.
• Engage honestly with the investigator, including with the uncomfortable parts. "Aggressive and undermining" sometimes describes a communication style you can genuinely soften — an outcome of "some substance, style adjusted" handled graciously often strengthens your standing with the wider team.

Handled this way, whatever the outcome, you emerge as an owner who follows their own rules. That reputation is worth more than winning.