Employer Hiring For My Job

moombamike

I'm in a difficult situation at the moment in that one year ago I got promoted from intern to do maternity cover for a coordinator role. This meant that I was given a 12 month fixed term contract to be in this role (contract ends October).

However, since then the lady who is on maternity leave has said she is not coming back and therefore the role is being made permanent. I've been told by my employer that they are going to advertise the role externally for applicants and intend to hire someone in August. I was told I should apply for the permanent position and to give in my CV to my manager (without going through the formal online application). Then I was told that should I not get the role I would be able to carry on in my previous (lower-paid) intern role from August.

Is this legally allowed? Can they advertise my role before my contract is up with a view to hiring someone and replacing me 2 months before my contract ends? I would not accept being demoted to the intern role as it is lower paid and would also look bad on my CV in terms of progression. Surely they are, in effect, making me redundant in August and replacing me with someone else? I've never under-performed in this role so I see no grounds for dismissal before my contract is up.

Thanks for your help.

ohreally

moombamike wrote: »

Surely they are, in effect, making me redundant in August and replacing me with someone else?

A post is made redundant not the post holder, this is not a redundancy situation.

You state you won't accept demotion, what do you plan to do?

Reads you were on secondment, which is now about to come to an end.

ali-t

I don't see how your position will end 2 months early.

If they advertise now (mid July), the vacany should stay open until the end of July. This would then lead to short leeting and invites to interview going out (early to mid Aug) with a view to giving candidates a couple of weeks notice of interview so interveiws would be held end of August.

Depending on the level of the job, the chosen candidate is likely to have to give 4-12 weeks notice at their current job which would take to end of September at earliest and this takes you to October.

The liklihood is that they want a seamless transition rather than having the post sitting vacant. Good luck with your application.

marybelle01

It isn't your role and it never was. It was the role of the person on maternity leave. You never obtained any rights to it. If you don't get the job then you can return to the role you do have rights to, or you can resign. I'd suggest that "resigned in a picque and ended up unemployed " will look a lot worse on your CV.

HTAFC112

12 month fixed term contract to be in this role (contract ends October)

That pretty much sums up the situation, nicely.

You cannot question the legal integrity of your employer's actions when your fixed contract is up. You may well have been a model employee in the interim role, but if a role becomes permanent then proper protocol is to advertise the vacancy, even if they have someone in mind.

mandragora_2

They've suggested you apply for it - and we all know an internal candidate already doing the job well enough to be invited to apply is a tough one to beat. So apply. Then do everything you can to get it - and that job interview starts first thing Monday morning - be effective, efficient and impressive. If you then get invited to the actual interview, knock 'em dead. Make them wonder what on earth they did without you before you came along, and realise that they don't want to let you go. And be nice to the other candidtaes, while doing everything you can to make sure they don't take 'your' job away from you! You've got nothing to lose, everything to gain, and are in a strong position, as long as you go at it with a positive attitude.

DVardysShadow

moombamike wrote: »

I would not accept being demoted to the intern role as it is lower paid and would also look bad on my CV in terms of progression.

That attitude will be more of a hindrance to you than going back to your previous role. If you do go back, then on your cv, you give your role as the intern for the whole period, but state that you provided maternity cover for whatever period. This will extract most advantage from fulfilling the temporary secondment.

Kynthia

The Co-ordinator role isn't yours and you are only filling it temporarily. Therefore going back to your substantive role isn't a demotion, it's always been your position. You put on your CV that you were an intern, however for a year you obtained a temporary promotion as a co-ordinator which gave you great experience and taught you new skills.

The job belonged to the person on maternity leave up until they decided not to return and gave their notice. Companies often fill a temporary vacancy with an unformal or less stringent criteria. However now role is vacant and is to be filled permanatly they need to go full the full recruitment process to ensure it's fair and that they employ the best person for the job.

cashbackproblems

The same thing has happened to me in the past after temping for 7/8 months, but they wanted someone with more experience in another area of the business which they also support and i didnt have it so didnt get the job, however they told me months in advance and gave me a good review to HR. So i went away and did another related temp role at their competitors and kept in touch with HR, 5 months down the line another position came up in a different team and I got the perm job ! This was as i always worked hard, got on well with everyone, and left professionally even though i was effectively being made redundant (but not legally)

You are lucky you still will be offered the intern position, you CV does not have state you were demoted just moved into a different role and large companies do generally not mention your duties in reference requests.