Boss tells workers his employee is pregnant without her permission

There are certain things you should do when an employee tells you they're pregnant.

Congratulate them. Ask them when they'll be planning on taking maternity leave. Bring them lots of food always. There's one thing you should never do when your employee tells you that they're pregnant... and that's announce it to other workers without her permission. Especially when she's only nine weeks along. One mum-to-be was subjected to such a display when her boss told her colleagues she was expecting before she'd even told her own family. She took to parenting forum Mumsnet to share her frustrations. She wrote:

"I'm nine weeks pregnant with my second and on maternity leave still with my first (due back next month). I had a meeting with my boss last week about my return to work and informed him I was pregnant as it would impact what I would be doing when I returned. "We agreed he would tell one other person plus someone from HR as they needed to know for people planning purposes. "I have just found out via my husband that a large proportion of my regional team know I am pregnant (my husband plays football with a junior member of the regional team who is a mutual friend and he congratulated him - clearly not even knowing it was supposed to be a secret). "I'm furious - what should I do?"

Understandably, just like the mum-to-be, Mumsnet users were less than impressed with the boss's actions. "That's awful," said one person. "Can you make a complaint to HR?" "Bring it up with HR and say you want to know who’s spread gossip about you because that’s what it is - really unacceptable," said another. Some, however, didn't think that what had happened was such a big deal and they questioned whether the mum-to-be could even prove it was her boss who spread the news. "Was it actually your boss tho? How do you know it wasn't one of the other 2 people who had to know?" quizzed one user. "I don't see the point in making a complaint. I don't think it will help your work relationships and you'll probably come off badly, to be honest," said another. The mum-to-be has since updated her story to say that she spoke to her boss and he admitted it was him that told the others. "He didn't apologise or attempt to excuse why he had done it. If anything I'm even more annoyed now," she said.