Pregnancy Disclosure
One of the areas I struggle with as a manager is a differentiation between supporting my employees, being empathetic, caring, flexible and supporting the business - what helps the bottom line, legal, what HR would do. Because of this, I am stuck in maybe a gray area and just want to double check here before I do the wrong thing.
An employee of mine has disclosed pregnancy, very early, the employee is overwhelmed and still sorting through and processing the news. Obviously, they have made it explicitly clear it is confidential and no one else in the office knows (including their co-workers that they have a good relationship with).
My instincts say - keep my mouth shut, don't pry but leave an open door if they need to talk, be supportive and flexible but let them come to me. Not worry if they are late in the morning or need to be in the bathroom (morning sickness can be rough). And then when they are ready to disclose, be supportive.
(It's too early to even think about staffing and planning)
As a manager - are these instincts right? As a manager, do I have any obligation to the company to disclose the information I have? I do not want to betray my employees confidence or put myself in a situation where my team does not feel they can trust me BUT at the same time, I don't want to put myself in a situation where I find myself in trouble for not handling this situation correctly (by upper management/HR standards).