Through our HR consultancy work with independent dental practices, we have noticed a clear shift in the way employee concerns are being raised. Increasingly, grievances are arriving not as short emails or informal complaints, but as long, highly structured documents that read more like legal submissions than workplace concerns.
This is not an isolated issue. It is something we are dealing with regularly and, for small practices, it is creating a level of pressure that simply did not exist a few years ago.
Before Artificial Intelligence (AI)
Traditionally, when a member of the dental team had a problem, it would be raised directly with the practice owner or manager. Even where relationships were strained, there was usually an opportunity to talk things through early and resolve matters before they escalated.
What we are seeing now is different. Grievances are often lengthy documents, carefully drafted, and framed around multiple legal arguments. They frequently refer to legislation, discrimination law, and whistleblowing protections, even where the underlying issue may have started as something relatively minor and straightforward.
Instead of opening a conversation, these AI-assisted grievances often feel like the start of a litigation process.
In many cases, it is clear these documents have been assisted by AI. On the one hand, it has helped employees express themselves more clearly and confidently. On the other, it has changed the tone and direction of the process from the outset. Instead of opening a conversation, these AI-assisted grievances often feel like the start of a litigation process.
An immediate escalation
One of the biggest challenges is that AI-drafted grievances tend to leave very little room for resolution. They rarely set out what the employee actually wants to happen or how they would like the matter resolved. Instead, they focus heavily on legal positioning, sometimes combining several allegations into one document without much distinction between them. They can also muddle legal arguments or include inaccurate information, which complicates matters further. For a small dental practice, receiving something like this can feel like an immediate escalation to litigation risk, even where that may not have been the original intention.
The difficulty for employers is that, regardless of how a grievance is presented, they are still required to investigate it properly. That obligation does not change just because the document is lengthy or overly complex. In practice, however, the scale of these grievances makes the process far more time consuming than it would otherwise be.
We regularly see practice owners having to step away from clinical work for days at a time to deal with these matters, rearranging patient schedules and committing significant time to interviews, gathering evidence and report writing. In a small team, where there is a need to keep on top of day-to-day operations, that level of disruption is difficult to absorb.
There is also a human side to this. Allegations, particularly those involving discrimination can be difficult to step away from emotionally, especially when they are directed at practice owners or practice mangers themselves. Alongside this sits the very real risk to the business.
The wider climate
Complex AI grievances are happening at a time when many practices are already under pressure. Rising costs and ongoing patient demand mean there is very little spare capacity. A single complex grievance can take weeks to work through, often requiring external HR support simply to ensure the process is handled correctly.
What we are seeing at practice level reflects a wider trend across the employment landscape. As highlighted at the recent National Employment Tribunal User Group meeting, tribunal claims are now at post-pandemic highs, with a significant increase in complex cases, particularly those involving discrimination and whistleblowing. A large proportion of these are believed to be influenced by AI-assisted drafting. From our perspective, that shift is starting much earlier. By the time matters reach a tribunal, they have often already been framed in legal terms from the moment the grievance was submitted.
In a dental practice setting, this creates particular challenges. Practices depend on close working relationships, trust within the team, and a shared focus on patient care. When issues are presented in a highly formal and legalistic way from the outset, it can quickly affect communication and morale. Practice owners become cautious and process driven, while employees may feel that positions have already been fixed. There is also a growing perception often fuelled by social media that significant compensation is inevitable, which can further entrench grievance positions. The result is that the grievance process itself starts to take over, rather than acting as a route to resolution.
How we help members deal with grievances
In our work with practices, we are trying to bring things back to basics. That means focusing on the substance of what is being raised and unpicking the jargon, rather than being overwhelmed by the way it has been written. We make a conscious effort within the grievance meeting itself to create space for the employee to talk through their concerns in full, in their own words. This often helps move things away from rigid legal framing and back to a more constructive discussion. In many cases, once the key issues are clearly understood and stripped back from the legal language, there are practical ways forward.
AI is clearly here to stay, and it will continue to influence how workplace concerns are expressed. There are benefits to that, particularly in helping employees feel more confident in raising issues. But for small dental practices, the unintended consequence is a level of formality and complexity that can be difficult to manage, and at times, disproportionate to the situation.
From what we are seeing, the challenge now is finding a way to keep grievance processes accessible and fair, without allowing them to become unnecessarily adversarial. For practices already balancing clinical responsibilities with the realities of running a small business, that balance has never been more important.
