Employer is trying to change my role

[Nickwinkle]

I've been invited to a 'private and confidential' meeting on Monday with my employer to 'discuss potential changes to my role'. When I say private and confidential, they've actually invited the entire team which I'm a little bit uneasy about as I don't think it's going to give me the chance to ask any questions without the possibility of upsetting someone.

Within my department there's two different teams - project and service. I'm project, which is the grade above service (or a promotion above, whatever way you want to look at it). About a year and a half ago redundancies were made and a member of service was let go leaving 2 people. Since then another person has left leaving 1. There are only 2 people on my team but, naturally, we've been helping out where we can but we're now struggling because workload has massively ramped up.

There's been talk before about merging us but I'm really unhappy with the idea as;

• I hate service
• I don't want to work in a call centre
• It's a demotion
• I don't want to answer the phone to customers or ring them up

It's a step back in my career path and if I wanted to do a job like that then, simply, I'd have taken a job like that.

I'm guessing the meeting on Monday is to tell us all we're on consultation but;

• How do I politely decline their offer without offending the lady in service
• Can I even say no to it and what happens if I do? Will I have to resign and be jobless or are there some protections in place to stop them forcing this on me?

The other member of my team has exactly the same feelings and has said she will leave. Will this have any impact if two of us are threatening to leave or are we essentially going to have to suck it up until we find something new?

The new job title is going to have a negative effect on my CV when I'm looking for something else as it's essentially stepping back in to administration.

*disclaimer! - please don't think I'm an ahole for posting this and I'm not saying anyone is beneath me for doing those jobs. I've worked my ass off over the last ten years to move up in my career so it's just a bit of a kick in the stomach to have it all be for nothing :( On top of that I'm currently going through fertility treatment and no one is going to hire a (potentially) pregnant woman. I feel like I'm trapped.

Our department was merged with another which was run on totally different lines and our jobs changed. There was nothing we could do about it. We registered our protest but basically we had to get on with it. It doesn’t sound as if you are going to be given a choice although if the conversation gets too personal you could call a halt to the general meeting and say that you want to discuss the issue one to one. We had a general meeting and then one to ones. I feel for you and hope it doesn’t turn out as bad as it looks. You can always indicate on your CV why your job title changed eg forced reorganisation.

Thanks @mdh2020. Not the news I was wanting but kinda what I was expecting! :(

They really backed us in to a corner on this one. We were originally a team of 7 (incl. manager) but over the last 2 years they've strategically brought us down to 3 and it seems like they're trying to find a way to force us out.

Hay op.

Ive managed many consultation periods and contract changes from a management position so heres what I have experienced.

The company will tell you about the proposed change
What I would then do is incentivice you to voluntarily shift- so for example I did this a few months ago with a significant contract change for a team of 50- I presented the change to them and buisness reasons why- the I said its initially voluntarily and if you sign up now you will get a sign up bonus of 1k paid next pay day. Enough people signed up we changed contracts and moved on.

Now if I had gone dowm consultation I would have been forcing this change and what I would have done is
Present the change
Tell people the change is happening in example 3 months.

Hold individual meetings with each person affected
Listen to their concerns or queries- discuss any incentive points that may help (eg change in working hours no drop in pay/salary increase etc) then see if they voluntarily sign up.
If not then we start a 3 month consultation period where ultimately the requirement of their current role are now redundant and we would look to redeploy to any other area of the buisness that is short staffed- but if that area is the service team then its as simple as your current role is redundant we need you in x place or go

Do you have a decent HR dept? Hopefully your manager has sought advice on how best to manage this change

Companies CAN change your contract they just need to follow the correct and legal pathways to do so.

I am also sorry to say that when people say they will leave it doesnt change my mind on the consultation- because there has likely been months and months of conversion on where best to put resource and how to handle a shift in demand.

Now another thing is at one place I worked we gave everyone the same job title eg service executive- wither they answered phones did admin did data reports- all these roles were service execs. And this meant we could redeploy people as and when we needed to move resource without consultation, is your job title and contract the same as the other side of the team?

At the start of covid when that workplace saw a daily shift in demand we moved people from x y z dept at short notice and we didnt need to consult just "upskill" in different apects of a service exec role.

Im sorry you are going through this its shit, Id suggest go to the meeting hear the proposal hear what they suggest (is it a perm change/secondment) and if you are not happy book in a meeting witj your union rep or HR to discuss further

I think you need to wait and see what they say, but it’s hard to call three people two “departments” really.

It’s not really clear what you think they are going to do. If they make the three of you customer service who does the project roles?

Now they could create three new roles that cover both jobs, both service and project.

They are allowed to reorganise as per business need. So they can eliminate roles and they need to try to find another suitable in the business, if they can’t or you reject Ie a new hybrid role or being a customer services person, then it would likely be voluntary redundancy and you’d be entitled to a week for every year there.

@CleanUpTime wow. Lots of info - thanks. Unfortunately, we have a bad HR. I was initially given a disciplinary for being quiet as I was going through a bad time (infertility, abusive husband/divorce, suicide attempts) and suffer from depression. In the end I had to get ACAS involved to get it revoked. I know that doesn't sound like the entire story but yep, it happened.

We've always been a small department - we've needed more staff and we've been begging for help as we couldn't cope as 7 (3 project, 3 service, 1 manager). There's been times I've been working 8am-1am just to try and fit everything in. That's since stopped as it's evident I'm not going to get so much as a 'thank you'. It's all fallen on deaf ears and we're all at breaking point.

Our job title and job description is different to the service role so not interchangeable. We're also a higher grade so probably more like their supervisors (without being... if that makes sense?).

@Rosebuud my thoughts are that they're going to create a role that covers both project and service. Service do not have the skillset to handle project (we've tried to train but they don't have the right mindset for it). Service is really something I have no interest in. The role consists mostly of answering the phone to customers, only being able to give PODs, or ringing customers up to give PODs. It's very call-centre/admin like and really isn't my cup of tea.

If voluntary redundancy is offered I think I'd be inclined to take it :(

I hate this.

Ok well 1st of all definately STOP over working for a company that dont value your input and didnt protect you in a time of severe personal difficulties!!!!!

So in this instance ill bet they try and tell you you are moving to the other role but now you know you need a clear consultation period and companies can get in MAJOR trouble for not following the right guidelines on handling a change of contract. Take lots of notes and dont commit to anything until you can speak to ACAS or similar for guidance.

@CleanUpTime I'm guessing this meeting on Monday is to tell us that we're going through consultation so I guess they're going to follow the guidance... It's just the concern over the rights that I have and what I can do about it.

Either way, we're overworked, overstretched and I think it's time to look for a new job anyway lol!

I was just hoping to hold out until maternity leave and then find something new towards the end of that :(

Do you think the will try and adjust your grading back to the Service grade?

@BeachTree Would that not technically be a demotion? And could they then reduce my salary? I would imagine there would be uproar from Service if we did the same job but got paid significantly more.

I never actually worked on the service desk, I wouldn't have applied for that type of job. I used to be a manager of a department but left for this position as it was much closer to home, although it was a slight step back. The job offered good career prospectives so it was only supposed to be a temporary setback. Now it's looking like a dead end job and my career is over, unless I find something else.