Feeling hard done by in my job

LegacyUser

(Very, very petty in comparison to most other PIs, but a PI for me nonetheless)

I work in a stressful, stressful job and have been here for two years - freelance, but treated like staff. Five days a week, 9 to 5, only 20 days holidays, would have to give a month's notice if I were to leave...basically treated like staff, but with no contract.

Now, a staff colleague is leaving, and the company has just advertised for a new position, the one I am currently in, but with contract. I spoke to my boss and I will have to 'throw my hat in the ring' so to speak to get this job, but I am feeling a massive amount of bitterness and 'hard-done-by' ness that I am effectively interviewing for a job that I have been doing for the last 2+ years, without any difference in pay, conditions etc, just that if I am successful I will now have a contract.

Another colleague who is here less time than me will also have to interview, and I just feel so ambiguous about the whole thing. It is a small team, as I said I am treated like staff, I have worked my back a**e off, including a hell of a lot of overtime and a very very modest wage since I've been here and this is why I was kept on full time in the first place. Why do I have to go through the ring roll of the formal interview process, with a load of other applicants who have never even been in the building (and there will be a load...a job in high demand) to prove myself, yet again, when I've been doing it on a daily basis for the last 27 months?

I probably need a dose of realism about this but I can't seem to get rid of these feelings...I just need to cop myself the hell on and play ball, right?

Kernel32

This is probably going to sound a little harsh but there is a similar situation unfolding in my office, the difference being I run the office.

We recently reorganized our resource structure and created a second tier of management with 4 open positions, two of which would report to me. This reflects the fact we are growing. We presented this to the team and we explained that those positions will be filled either internally or externally and we will make that determination. Part of the strategy is to create some healthy competition as well. This was accepted well on the surface.

One employee has been here the longest. He came to me as his manager and explained that he wants to be considered for one of the positions and also basically said he doesn't understand why he isn't just being slid into that role. This conversation happened after a working session with him in which I had to explain how to do something that he should know already if he even is to be considered for the job. He is completely oblivious to the fact that he is the one person not being considered for any kind of move up.

So my point is how you see your role and your position can be very different to how your managers do. You may very well put in long hours and work hard but there could just be something missing in your skills that training can't fix and so they are looking outside. It's not easy to hear but strategically management has an obligation to do what's best for the company, for investors, owners, shareholders etc.

Salome

Kernel32, you're going to have your work cut out for you when telling that employee what he hasn't got the skillsets to get that job he thinks he's entitled to!

I think that companies have to be seen to be fair to all employees by having an open competition - if they were to slide their first choice in without any competition, the disgruntled employees might have a grievance.

Kipperhell

I think you should look at your actual situation and see what it is. What you described is not freelance, fixed term contract or contracting. It sounds like you are an employee without a contract unless you have some contract you would by law be considered an employee AFAIK.
As described above management can often not consider moral and think the competition is better for the company than loyalty. Them's the breaks and complaining about it to them is pointless.
From my experience the moral suffers greatly, it increases resentment and can destroy team work. I would take it as weak management not being direct with you but you could probably take it they would rather somebody else or think the current market means they will get a genius for peanuts.

BumbleB

In my last job I and many others went for positions that were already filled by outside applicants ,in fact this is commonplace in industry.

StormWarrior

As far as you not automatically getting the job, perhaps the previous poster is right and you don't have the skills the management want.

But what I think is totally unfair for you is the way you're being treated like an employee but without the contract. I was in the same position for about 2 years. I worked in a gym. Only about half of the workers (those who had been there for at least about 5 years) had contracts, the rest of us didn't even though some had been there for 4 or so years. We had to do all of the same work as those with contracts. To get out of giving us contracts the gym classed us as "casual" workers, even though many of us were working full-time with the same set shifts every week! This way they got the benefit of full-time regular workers but didn't have to give us any holiday pay and didn't have any legal obligations to us. When business started going a little badly for the gym and they were getting less customers and wanted to downsize, they fired a load of the non-contracted workers, including me, with no warning and no redundancy pay. DEMAND A CONTRACT!

Btw if you have no contract why do you have to give a month's notice if you want to leave? Even my awful employers didn't demand that. How are they going to stop you leaving without notice?

TaxiManMartin

StormWarrior wrote: »

As far as you not automatically getting the job, perhaps the previous poster is right and you don't have the skills the management want.

But what I think is totally unfair for you is the way you're being treated like an employee but without the contract. I was in the same position for about 2 years. I worked in a gym. Only about half of the workers (those who had been there for at least about 5 years) had contracts, the rest of us didn't even though some had been there for 4 or so years. We had to do all of the same work as those with contracts. To get out of giving us contracts the gym classed us as "casual" workers, even though many of us were working full-time with the same set shifts every week! This way they got the benefit of full-time regular workers but didn't have to give us any holiday pay and didn't have any legal obligations to us. When business started going a little badly for the gym and they were getting less customers and wanted to downsize, they fired a load of the non-contracted workers, including me, with no warning and no redundancy pay. DEMAND A CONTRACT!

Btw if you have no contract why do you have to give a month's notice if you want to leave? Even my awful employers didn't demand that. How are they going to stop you leaving without notice?

I believe there are employment laws on this.
You'll have to look it up. But if you are working as a full time employee whether contracted or not, for a certain length of time you are entitled to the same rights as full time permanent staff. I think the time may be 6 months or a year.

StormWarrior

My sitautio happened in the UK so it may be different, I don't know. But without a contract you must have some less rights, otherwise why bother having a contract?

TaxiManMartin

StormWarrior wrote: »

My sitautio happened in the UK so it may be different, I don't know. But without a contract you must have some less rights, otherwise why bother having a contract?

Thats the very reason it was brought in. To stop abuse of people.

LegacyUser

Thanks guys for the advice, I've been needing a bit of perspective on this.

Just to clarify, my position is quite ambiguous as it stands, as a previous poster mentioned, essentially being treated like a full time employee but without a contract. There are only a set number of contracts and the company I work for relies heavily on freelance workers, it is also non-union so I'd imagine that's how they get away with it.

Having spoken to a few colleagues since I posted, I've learned that interviewing to get the contract is the norm, it has happened before me and generally it's two or more colleagues within the same department competing to get contracted, while those who don't get it remain freelance.

The differences between the two are sparse - there's only a slight change for the better salary wise and having the contract means the company will pay into my pension, plus I'll get paid holidays, and that's it. For me though, it's purely a motivational thing and I feel somewhat discouraged that I'm there two years, am a vital part of the team, am treated like an employee, and only now is the matter of being made staff cropping up...not only that, but I have to go through the interview process for what ultimately amounts to a slip of paper, hardly a promotion.

I'm trying to look at it as good interview experience, an opportunity for self promotion and to get my interests known to senior management, but I'm just grappling with these feelings of being undervalued and interviewing for a job that has been mine for two years, merely to validate my existence within the company.

Plus competing with a colleague I trained up a year ago is no fun. And my abilities are not the problem, I'm passionate, skilled and meticulous in my work and there has never been any question about this. It's a media job and I'd have lost it long ago if the situation was any other way.

Anyway this is even getting confusing to me at this point, but thanks to all for the insight!