Restructuring and redundancy while on maternity leave

[Bitofasurpise]

name changed for this...

I am very senior at my company (board director) and have worked at the same company for 8+ years.

I have been on maternity leave for 5 months and it's now becoming obvious that my large dept is being split up and my role looks redundant.

I had a meeting with my boss this week where he said he was willing to talk about voluntary redundancy and they now want me to come in next week to discuss how I think (rather how they think!) my department should be restructured. I have the distinct impression they have already made up their minds.

I just feel gutted and am very sure that the changes that are being proposed are only being mooted because I have not been in the business to fight my corner.

It's a pretty cut-throat, male dominated and sexist business, but I have always managed to cope with that. Can't believe that I go away for 5 months and become the ultimate cliche/statistic.

Not sure if anyone can give me any advice on what to do and where I stand legally in negotiating with them, but just wanted to say ahhhhhhhhh fucking fucking bastards!

And breathe. And then say fucking fucking wankers.

If there is a role available for you to do then you should be offered it as your on ML but unless they create another board level role then its unlikely to be the case.

At eight years in your level I'd be pushing for a years salary plus bonus as a voluntary redundancy package esp as your on ML. Now they've not broken any laws as far as I can see but you should try to push for the full 12 months severance.

Thanks grevling I will. It just really pisses me off annoys me that this happens when I am on maternity leave.

I am 100% sure they would not be doing this if I had not had a baby.

Grr

Just to add to Grevling's comment, if there is a suitable role available within the business they must offer it to you even if there are other employees who are better suited for the role.

If the decision to restructure is taken on business grounds they are doing nothing wrong. It would be a different matter if you could show that the motivation for the decision is to make you redundant due to your maternity leave.

I hope it turns out you are wrong and they do want to have a genuine discussion about how you think your department should be restructured.

prh47bridge there is an element of karma here as I have initiated restructures before, and know that at the point you start "discussing" it with people, the major decisions have largely been made.

There are some things that were said to me before I left "oh, well, you'll change now and probably go off and have another one" that make me fairly cynical about the likely outcome.

Oh well.