I would be very grateful for any views or help anyone can give me on this.
I'm currently on maternity leave and due to return to work (after a year) in the summer. They are making redundancies at work including some of jobs at my level in my area.
I recently had to attend a meeting at work and to tell them what job I wished to return to. I asked them how they will deal with the competition for posts and me whilst I'm on maternity leave. HR advised that they will make everyone currently at work compete for the remaining posts and rank them all.
If I don't wish to compete whilst I'm on maternity leave I can't be made to and they will keep a post open for me to return to. They will appoint the person who comes bottom in the competition between the colleagues remaining at work to my hours and when I return to work myself and that colleague will then compete for the post.
I appreciate that I am lucky to be away from work at this very stressful time for everyone there and in some ways only competing with the person who is ranked the weakest amongst the remaining team members is perhaps better odds for me than competing against the whole team.
On the other hand I will be competing for this job having been off work for over a year, having missed out on the interview training offered and not having undertaken any other training in the year (it is a technical area I work in) and will be competing head to head with one of my friends and colleagues who I have worked with for many years in a small team who will have been working really hard covering for me whilst I've been off which will make it very personal and potentially unpleasant.
It is spoiling my maternity leave now because I'm feeling so stressed out about it all.
Any views on whether this is a legitimate way of dealing with this or not?
TIA