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Working part-time to be with baby, yet needing to travel to clientsite
Aula wrote:
"Ericka Kammerer" wrote in message . .. I think the problem is that she's effectively salaried part time, but doing something that is normally a part of her normally full-time job. I think the most salient question is whether there's some significant problem if she only works one other morning that week. If they need her to work more than one other morning, then can they figure out how to pay her for the additional time? A great deal depends on where in the world she is. For some reason I think she's in England, but I could be having a serious brain strain on that. My understanding of laws in the US, as a member of management, is that she falls under different rules than when she is working full time. She is, essentially, [if in the US] returning to work on what amounts to light duty after an absence under what would probably be FMLA. In any company I've worked for that would have included a period of sit down negotiation with the employer, prior to first day back on the job, to discuss exact expectations regarding hours, pay, and exceptions. Her company, for example, knows that she is returning to work after the birth of a child and is taking it in stages. But, they have chosen to assign her a task that takes her away from her new baby and family for a period of virtually two days. That suggests to me a blatant disregard of the reason for her return as a p/t employee and a very good reason for her to immediately set a firm foot down as to what she is willing to do, and what she is not willing to do, as well as her expectations of them. It looks, from this pov with what is granted less than the full picture, like she is being taken advantage of by an employer who will continue to pull similar stunts unless shut down fast and professionally. Surely there are other staff who are not so recently returned to *light duty* who could cover this task? If I was her boss and I valued her as an employee I would not be disregarding her needs by sending her off like this before she is ready for f/t work. I'd be helping her make as smooth a transition back into the work force as possible so that she'd be most likely to successfully complete the transition into full time work for me again. Something about this whole situation does not feel right from here. Eh, I don't think the world is always so neat. Obviously, I don't know what her particular situation is and only she can comment on that. Still, I think all of it has to be considered in the context of the job as a whole. I'm p/t because I am unwilling to spend more time away from family. That said, there are times when my job requires more hours. That's just the nature of the work. I could put my foot down and say that I won't ever do more than 20 hours/week, but if I did, I'd be looking for another job. They can't afford to have me in this position and unable/unwilling to cover these things. They're not exploiting me. They're accommodating my unwillingness to work full time, and this is part of what I do to enable them to be able to do that. It's a win-win on the whole for both of us. To me, the situation does not at all sound like a situation where an employer is being unreasonable or exploitative. Everyone's just trying to get the work done. For some accounting reason she's basically salaried instead of hourly. I think it's perfectly fair and right that she should be paid for the hours she works, and that whatever the company policies are for charging hours during travel are what should apply for her. Of course, that could be challenging to figure out--if she's salaried, do the salaried rules apply or the hourly rules? Because the salaried rules probably don't have any provision for charging "overtime" during travel. Things aren't always so simple--and sometimes these complications arise when companies go outside the box to accommodate situations like women coming back part-time to transition after maternity leave. The last thing any of us want to do is make them regret having been flexible. Does that mean she should roll over and work lots of uncompensated time? Of course not. She should be fairly compensated for her time, either by not having to work the other mornings or by getting paid for the additional work hours. And if there's some crunch that prevents not working the remaining mornings that week, perhaps she can get comp time to be used later. There are many possible solutions. But getting feathers all ruffled or getting very rigid over things like this often doesn't lead to a desirable end result. If you want flexibility from them, it's usually wise to give a little flexibility in return. Best wishes, Ericka |
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