Not sure if I should raise a grievance

[plg]

I’ve never raised a grievance at work before but a situation has come up where I feel I should / have to. I’ve been in my role almost 15 years, 12 years of which have had a title something along the lines of ‘department leader’. My boss contacted me a few months ago to say there was to be a department restructuring & department leader position was coming up (very similar title to mine).

I was a bit taken aback & told him I’d look at the job description. Upon looking it was abundantly clear I could not do this in job in my current part time hours (21.5hrs per week) after coming back from maternity leave in Oct 24. I didn’t go for the role & told him this wouldn’t work for me on 18hrs, he stated ideally needs to be done full time but thinks we could try & make it work part time. Another member of the team did apply & was successful & is now in the role. My manager contacted me just before I finished up for the Xmas break to say he was sending me a letter from HR to say my title would be changing now to same as the rest of the team (not the new dept leader) & to sign it & return. Advised all T&Cs would be same, salary would be same.

I did not sign & replied asking for copy of both current & new job title descriptions and stated I see this as a demotion, my ‘new’ tile would effectively be same as junior team members some only there a few months. I returned to work on 6th Jan & my title has been changed on internal email signature, org charts etc. manager contacted me a few days later asking me to sign document & return. I said very little in this call as I was so shocked & on the verge of tears.

I’m waiting on a call back from some employment advice but my initial thoughts are this is unfair treatment to a part time employee. When I didn’t go for the job it was also advertised internally as a full time role & even another member of the team commented this seemed a little unfair. My manager has left it he wants me to sign the title change agreement form & last words were your duties are going to be the same nothing is changing really except title & there will be other opportunities for you when you can go back to full time. Also he mentioned even though I held that title originally I never actually had a team as such and it was title only & the new role does.

Should I raise a formal grievance? I’m a sleep deprived breastfeeding mum of 2 & exhausted. I dread the thought of HR meetings & arguing this when so tired.

Surely when the new position was floated, there was more info about a department restructure which should have outlined the full new structure, including yours? If there is no change to pay, your JD and your current contract, I can't see how it's grievance worthy.

Did you not get any information about the roles during the departmental restructure? It should have let you know your role was at risk

Not info provided re a dept restructure apart from the conversation I had with my boss in Sep if I would be interested in applying. & never any mention of my role being at risk simply just loosing title if you don’t go for the job. I’m annoyed to loose the title as it’s through no fault of my own I couldn’t apply for the other role due to going part time.

Unfortunately you could have applied for the other role, you still had protected maternity rights and would have been in a strong position to negotiate on hours. If it's only your title that is changing, because 2 posts named the same would cause confusion, I'm not sure what impact it has on your day to day or what the actual basis of your any grievance would be.

What do you want to happen? Do you want to keep your previous job title or for them to create a new one to differentiate you from the rest of the team? Could you ask them to put "senior" (or similar) in front of the new title?

They said they were advertising an (ideally ft) role for your position. You didn't apply. Someone else got it. So why should you continue to have that job title when it's now someone else?

Your pay is the same and there was a business need for this other person. I can't see what grievance there could be other than hurt pride.

I think @PoundlandColumbo has the best idea - ask if you can have 'Senior' added to your job title to make it clear you are not on a par with the new starters. But you can't have the same job title as someone senior to you, it would cause confusion.

If your working conditions are the same (hours, duties, pay), I can't see you've got much grounds for a grievance I'm afraid.

If I was OPs manager, the decision would be based on what is in everyone's JDs, not time in role. I understand that OP is disappointed, but unless there are actual tasks that differentiate her post from the others, it seems that the organisation is in the right.

Length of service can be reflected in things like additional holiday entitlement and pension, and if your salary is incremental you may be at a higher pay point on a salary scale dependant on service.
Length of service absolutely does not entitle you to seniority though, that's a very outdated notion. If two people are doing the same job on the same pay band (regardless of increment) you are peers, regardless of length of service. I very much doubt you'll be allowed a token title, no decent employer would agree to that.
In terms of your old versus new role, they've restructured (key word), therefore your 'old' role no longer exists.

They can’t just change your role - needs a consultation surely?

I have asked for a copy of both job descriptions. Manager has said they are unable to find mine as the original company I worked for was bought over 5 years ago & now he’s saying they are ‘looking for it’ some good points raised here thanks. It is a mixture of hurt pride, disappointment at not being able to apply etc but I’m also annoyed they changed this without me signing or agreeing or a proper consultation. Communication from my manager has been very poor. He was in the office a few days before he sent me the form to sign & he avoided me all day was so awkward with me, obviously knew the is was coming & didn’t want to just speak to me about it! It was labour relations who suggested I have a grievance due to the part time element of it & that it disadvantages me when I go to move on in terms of my CV. I basically only had to take this job title because I reduced my hours.

You should have applied for the role. You shot yourself in the foot there. I wouldn't be raising a grievance over this but you should get some advice for things going forward.

Yep, I’d have applied for that role too, and pushed your employer to see how it could be made suitable for you.

Essentially, shy bairns get nowt.

Your manager told you to apply. You refused. That's not "not able" to apply. You should have applied, then talked about hours. Not just rule yourself out...

Many people on this thread are missing the point. The fact that the OP chose not to apply for a NEW role is irrelevant.

Her current role and job title should not be affected by that.

If they wanted a proper restructure they should have made her role redundant and as part of the consultation process told her she had the choice to apply for the newly created senior role or a new role at a lower level with a different job title.

Sounds like they made a mess of it.

OP speak to ACAS or citizen advice.

Do you not have a copy of your current job description? I don’t really see why it matters if your title has been changed if your responsibilities haven’t changed.

But she didn’t no her job was at risk, so there was no reason to apply

@growlybear83At the time of replying to my line manager I didn’t have a copy of my job description hence asking him for it. I have now found it & it’s very different to what the title he proposes now.

I’m worried about protecting future pay rises also. In my mind I was being paid a department leader wage, surely they can simply say no pay rises for me ever again on the wage I’m on with the ‘junior’ title.

side story- when I came back from maternity leave I was told I couldn’t have more than 2% pay rise due to the director not thinking it was fair to the rest of the team as I only worked half the year…….really annoyed me at the time, I was on maternity leave!!!! so I feel like they will not be fair at any future pay rises.

Her job is not at risk, her job title is. Unless we're missing a lot of additional info, there is no material change to her role, salary etc.

This is exactly what DH has said.

My job title changes about once every six months. Doesn't mean a change of role.

It sounds like they wanted to reposition your role without bothering to do a formal restructuring. It’s a bit sneaky. If the job title didn’t matter and the only reason for the change was to differentiate you from this new person, why didn’t they just give the new job a slightly different title instead of changing yours? The fact that you didn’t apply for the new post is irrelevant, because it wasn’t a formal redundancy process in which you were being asked to reapply for your own job.

It clearly matters if your title changes, if only from a reputational point of view. Other posters are calling it ‘pride’ but it obviously matters because people will think you’ve been demoted and you’ll be less appealing to a new employer.

I think you should make it clear you object to the change and contact ACAS/your union. Normally there are informal stages before a formal grievance.

@Gjillthank you this is very helpful & laid out clearly. The new job role did have a slightly different title but mine has still changed. I will make it clear to my boss I object to this and contact ACAS I’m not good with this kind of thing & need a lot of help.

@Gjillthank you this is very helpful & laid out clearly. The new job role did have a slightly different title but mine has still changed. I will make it clear to my boss I object to this, I am unable to avail of ACAS as I am in NI. The equivalent is Labour Relations & they have put me into a queue for an employment law solicitor to call me back in the next few days.