Desk and office given away

[Proseccoprincess33]

I am due to return to work following maternity leave next month. I am anxious about going back but this has been further intensified by the fact my office has been given away during my time off. This has been my office for 5 years. Not only has it been given away permanently but I have not been allocated another office or even a desk. I only became aware of this because some colleagues alerted me to it and I then contacted my manager to discuss it.

She is off site and very hands off so we rarely see her if at all. In fact I have never met her. So had I not been given this heads up by my colleagues I would have been coming into work to see my office and desk occupied and no place for me to sit on my first day back.

I am part of a multidisciplinary team and I manage one of the departments. Therefore having my own desk and office is so important to supervise staff and the nature of our work is very sensitive so privacy is a vital. But at this stage I'd settle for a desk of my own.

I am having a meeting with my manager about this very soon and have found out she has invited 2 very senior managers along also which is intimidating and not helpful to the anxiety I am experiencing. I think she fears I will be very unhappy and so has her reinforcements ready to tell me tough sh1t.

Her solution so far has been that they'll slot me into a desk somewhere when other staff are off....ie hot desking.

AIBU that I am so upset about this and want to fight for a resolution? Any advice from anyone who has been in a similar situation would be much appreciated.

Thank you 😊

And write everything down on paper so you're calm and confident- all the points you made here and ask her to address them especially why she's been emailing your personal account. Use the meeting in your favour.

Pretty sure this is unlawful discrimination under the equality act

‘If your work could be covered without replacing you when you were on mat leave it is an indication your unit/service is overstaffed. Rather shocking if all we hear about lack of resources and workloads in the NHS is true’

Ha, this made me laugh. I know from plenty of your other posts that you despise the NHS. But when people go on maternity leave there is often no cover because they simply cannot find people to do the cover as has happened to one of our posts recently. It is often impossible to recruit suitable staff. And sometimes they also use the opportunity to save money for any weeks they can. Don’t assume that it is overstaffed! The cover may have been minimal.

Honestly op. Clearly desks and offices are at a premium , it was never likely that your desk would sit there idly waiting for your return .
I think raising concerns is fine but I don't think you have a leg to stand out demanding a specific desk and office as no one is any organisation is entitled to that that.

This. If the place and computers are set for hot desking no problem, but if you have to set up the desk and computer every morning depending on who is off, your mental health will suffer with the every morning frustration of sorting up the computer, make space in the desk and feeling like invading other person’s space. Your productivity will plummet.

Hope the meeting is ok but I would be considering getting legal advice as you may being penalised for going in maternity leave and that is discrimination.

@Proseccoprincess33

I would hate having to hotdesk. Can you speak to the manager of the person who is in your office? Sorry but if it's been your work space for 5 years then it's reasonable to expect it to stay that way for you, your job share & your team.

I would be suspicious about the fact that there was nobody taken on to cover your maternity & now you have no office & no desk. Where are they expecting you to sit?

If there is a bookabie space then just book it every time you're in so that you have a place to work.

So glad you're in a union. Too often in cases like this people suddenly realise they need support.

If you are the only one hot desking and everyone else has a set desk then this does sound like discrimination, although I am no expert. I've been in a situation where I was one of a handful of people expected to hot desk when all others had a fixed desk - it had an unexpectedly significant impact on my well-being, and although it was a decade ago I still remember the frustration and feeling of not belonging properly to the team. When everyone is hot desking it's a completely different feeling.

not the point but how does the verticals keyboard work?

@Proseccoprincess33 id be asking why you’re the only one expected to hit desk and whether you’ll have a desk assessment at whoever’s desk you’re sat at. You’d need to know who was in and out so you can make sure you’ve actually got somewhere to work. What if all staff are in on the same day -

dhs work recently moved into a new office. With desk capacity for 60% of staff. Over 80% of stuff were in the other day. Caused absolute chaos.

If one of the other team members is on maternity leave too, I wonder if they are aware she is wanting to return part time and thinking you can share a space?

Space is a massive premium in hospitals these days... I honestly wouldn't jump the gun. I often find managers are bit last minute as there are so many acute competing priorities in the NHS and it is likely they would sort this for you but it wouldn't happen until just before your return.

It's also quite unusual to have a job share that you work the same day as? Does that mean one day a week there is no manager? I wonder if that is an issue for the senior team too that they might want to discuss?

I am afraid I have to disagree that if you hadn't gone on maternity leave the desk would still be yours. You say that the office and desk has been given to an entirely different department. It was adjudged that they needed that space.

Further part of your complaint is that you weren't informed. Perhaps they were working up to a solution for your return before your colleagues decided for some reason to come to you to tell you.

Perhaps the reason they have asked other managers to be there is so that there are witnesses to whatever conversation there is.

It seems to me they haven't even had the chance to put forward what the new working method and desk situation will be before you have gone steaming in. You simply don't know yet that you won't have your own desk yet or space because you aren't back and perhaps it will be one of your other colleagues giving up space. I would question the motives of the colleague who tipped you off. Perhaps they were worried their space was going to go to you so are stirring so that it is you that kicks off?

You have over a month until you go back so this may not have been something they had thought lf or addressee until you were about to return.. However now your colleague has wound you up and you have gone in full pelt they are probably expecting you to cry discrimination before they even had thought to find a solution. No wonder others are being brought to the meeting.

@RosesAndHellebores glad you’re in HR-maybe you should read the OPs posts as she answered most of your questions there.
I hope you and your family never need the care of the OP and her team who do such a difficult job supporting people and their families as they are dying. This is the NHS-I can assure you they are not overstaffed-patients just won’t be getting the service they need and OPs staff weren’t supported whilst she was off.

Hot-desking in a shared job role would be normal, but it would be you and the other person in your role sharing the desk (you're on it your three days a week, they use it the rest). The desk therefore pertains to the job, and not the person, and it keeps things consistent. You can have a calendar of thing relevant to the role on the desk to be accessible to both without needing to synchronise your Google calendar, anything that needs to be handed in to your department goes in an in-tray on that desk for whichever of you to read, ect.

It doesn't sound like they really planned for you coming back. They could haveplayed musical desks if you were present/ on sick leave if there was a need (I.e an office was uninhabitable due to a burst pipe so people shuffled around depending on how much that impacted their work) but it just seems like your company manager doesn't have much forward planning or ability to see consequences.

Also, I'm curious how much paid leave your company gets if they seem to think you will always be able to jump on a free desk when you arrive at work. Is there never a time when all employees (with desks) are in the office at the same time? That seems highly unlikely.

This is where my thinking goes. It's based on a previous work-role as a manager of a large group (40+) people in three teams line-managed by first line managers.

I found returns from any sort of leave were often difficult. Mostly because people on leave tend to believe the world should stop until they are ready to climb aboard once again.

Return to work events were often difficult even although KIT days were regular and informative. Even when people had been provided with up-to-date/ accurate information regarding changes in their absence, they would strop when presented with the reality of those changes.

Here, I'm stealing a phrase I picked up from an article linked on another thread about employment law where the claimant lost - people tend to look at their value / importance to an organisation through 'a very linear lens of your (their) own perspective.'

I believe that is what is happening here with OP. Particularly in regards to the constant references to 'my' - my desk, my room, my team, my importance (as a p/t) manager of two staff, my importance in providing this uber-confidential service within an already confidential service etc. etc.

I believe posters egging her on with support for claims of discrimination etc. are doing her a disservice.

Like other wiser heads, I'd suggest she go along and find out what the actual situation is for her rather than basing it entirely off rumour and innuendo from colleagues.

No new advice but I hope you get the outcome you need, which is a perfectly reasonable one.

Yes this happened to me too..except I actually turned up after maternity leave to find someone who had joined a month ago sitting at my desk. And all my work during maternity still sitting there ! The stress. This is the reality of the NHS for those who don't work in it. I really understand how anxious this can make you. Could your job share colleague come to this meeting?. Or someone from your team ? I think I would avoid talking about 'my desk' but rather argue for a protected space to be able to deliver your role as a team. As for the time back as well..or do you want any KIT days. Would these help the transition back to work? Also maximise any opportunity to wfh. Good luck.

I’m just shocked that you have a line manager you have never even met - for five years! Is this the norm in the nhs ?

Maternity leave cover is often not provided in the NHS. I have worked in 3 different trusts and in multiple teams and seen probably dozens of people go on maternity leave. I have only ever known cover to be arranged once. The cover was locum staff, unfortunately the agency failed to find anyone appropriately qualified so there was no cover. What the OP says has been happening here is that things haven't been done in her absence. The team is not overstaffed, more likely that training has had to slip, supervision hasn't been completed, patients are waiting longer for treatment, admission criteria has been tightened etc etc. Unfortunately it's attitudes like yours that mean services are cut because they're seen as not necessary and then someone decides that people will die anyway with or without Palliative care so why bother providing it at all.

The OPs situation is not unusual and this could not sound more like the NHS if it tried. The confidentiality thing is accepted for patients but for staff it's not appropriate for them to be having to share their own struggles and support needs in front of colleagues. And if it's anything like my office building there are no free breakout spaces/meeting rooms. Our team has to pay to book any meeting rooms in our own building. This often needs to be booked in advance via admin who are the only people who can view availability. Room occupancy is monitored using movement sensors in the room so they know if we haven't paid for it. And we have a finite budget so we don't book rooms. We have confidential conversations in the corridor and the kitchen and its crap for staff morale. So they leave. And then the rest of the team have to struggle on with an increased workload while people make unhelpful comments about how the team must have been overstaffed before.

I think you're right to question it OP, I went back after my first maternity leave years ago to find my classroom had been given away and was told there was no room in the school for me to have a desk. I was head of two departments (no office) so had no classroom or space to work. Wasn't even allowed a desk in the shared planning room as it wouldn't be fair to other staff, ie the ones who had their own offices and classrooms already. In the end the SENCO took pity on me and made space in their room for me to have a base.

Do keep us updated, I'd love to know the outcome.

Christ almighty…the ergonomics of hot decking is bad enough and this photo shows workstations that would be suitable for just an hour at the very most

This is the issue being overlooked by most posters, and a major issue with hot desking. Many people need good ergonomic chairs for desk working, and ideally height adjustable desks. A good ergonomic chair has around 5 to 6 settings and to change all of those each time you get to your desk is a complete waste of time and frustrating . It can work, of people are given it as a time allowance and management ram on about taking time to ensure you are seated ergonomically. Otherwise, hot desking is a recipe for severe ergonomic issues in the future.
im retired. Even with excellent ergo chairs I’ve persistent back issues from year and years of mainly arse based working, much at it during the years before we got ergo chairs and sit /stand desks. Those initiative came too late for my back- the initiative helped me get through more days of sitting on my arse mostly, but damage had been done by then which I’m still seeing physios for on regular basis

collab desks are for a single meeting. Those chairs are crap. I’d struggle to even sit in them for 45 mins without being in pain when I stand agian.

Your hands are thumbs up, little fingers down, whilst you type.

I'm a CEO and I hot desk ( as well as working at home a lot). I have a lot of politically sensitive conversations. I think it's reasonable for circumstances to change whilst someone is on mat leave - rather than leaving an office empty for a year or however long.

They just need to discuss the new desk arrangements and find a suitable new location mindful of the confidential needs of the role. But in a previous organisation I ran we had an information and advice team having confidential conversations in an open plan office as when we analysed it confidential data was not discernible from one side of a conversation. So they just need to find a reasonable solution.

I would advise against going in all guns blazing - the desks and offices we use do not belong to us. They belong to the organisation and it's up to them to make best use of the organisations resources at any given time. They just need to support your return to work appropriately and ensure the whole team can work effectively,

@Trez1510

Return to work events were often difficult even although KIT days were regular and informative. Even when people had been provided with up-to-date/ accurate information regarding changes in their absence, they would strop when presented with the reality of those changes.

Thanks for your insight.🤦🏻‍♀️

It’s a shame you either couldn’t be bothered to read all the OP’s posts or deliberately chose to ignore the fact that none of your anecdotal stories fit these circumstances.

In this case, no maternity cover was arranged to cover OP’s role to manage the existing team so they were left to cope as best they could. From your perspective, staff supporting people who are dying don’t ‘add value’ to the NHS so let’s just ignore them.

Important information was sent via an email address that the OP has no access to during her maternity leave but other more generic information was emailed to the OP’s home email. Why do you think the manager chose to do this?

Reading some of these unpleasant and arrogant replies to the OP effectively telling her to pipe down and accept whatever management decides, reminds me of the high handed way the PO treated their staff and handled the Horizon disaster. We all know how well that turned out…!

I would ask what their solutions were for the work? Have you been covered whilst on mat leave.. what's been happening whilst you've been off? With these patients/families..

You may have valid points but its coming across as you stropping about loosing your desk/office...
And not wanting to change...

I would suggest you have a list of the issues from an confidentiality/patient point of view ..to explore the options with ... Going in all guns blazing type approach is not going to get you anywhere. .

However many organisations nhs/LA are shrinking space to save money so it maybe a done deal .. so work out what you think would work for you....
Re lack of info/discussion whilst you've been off is poor and sees odd no kit days/conversations... Would raise that with manager/union/hr.. as that should be on record