Hi,
There's a reasonable amount of background to this, but essentially it boils down to this. I believe I have most likely been dismissed via redundancy because I had been pursuing a flexible working arrangement that my employer did not want to provide.
I had been working for my employer in IT support for almost 2 years and since mid-2022, had been attempting to request additional flexibility in terms of WFH arrangements (my proposal was 2.5 days per week - specifically 2 in one week and 3 in the other week, only fortnightly rotation) so that I could maintain parenting/caring commitments (school/daycare pickups etc). I had been given 1 day per week and was told that it was the maximum I would be given. When I first made the request for additional flexibility, I mentioned my understanding of the Fair Work Act that provided employees of 12+ months the right to request flexibility for certain things like parenting, and that my understanding was that the request should be made in writing. My manager effectively told me that formalising the request in writing would be seen as a legal challenge and that because of the current situation in the team, they could not accommodate it as one of my colleagues was on long term leave (overseas holiday for 4-6 months) and we were effectively a man down. I was told to try to manage with the existing arrangements for the time being and we might be able to revisit the request when my colleague returned from leave.
I brought this situation to my company's HR representative (who I was on reasonably friendly terms with), and she essentially said that she tried to stay out of such requests and left the decision in the hands of the managers based on their team's operational requirements, but recommended I discussed it with my manager again.
When my colleague returned from leave, I asked again and was told that essentially nothing had changed from their point of view and that I would not be given more than my current 1 day per week WFH. I also mentioned the fact that I felt that there was an entitlement for flexibility under the Fair Work Act and that the guidelines suggested it should be approved unless there was a legitimate, significant cost to the business in doing so. I was effectively given a veiled threat from my manager when I raised this. He said words to the effect of "you don't want to go down the legal route, other previous employees have tried that and it didn't end well for them, they're no longer with us".
I again brought this issue of flexibility back to the HR representative and tried to seek her understanding of the legislation with regard to requests for flexibility, specifically the fact that, according to what I had read, the employer should only be able to reject the request for flexibility if they could demonstrate that it would have a 'significant' effect on the business (staffing, financially, logistically etc). My opinion (and I accept it is simply that - an opinion) is that my manager would not have been able to easily justify that my request for flexibility would have had any significant effect on the team or business. Their argument had been that my position is an 'on site position' providing IT support, and they need us to be able to attend to an issue physically if remote support was not possible. However, I was working in a team of 4 or 5 and realistically 80-90% of our work could be and usually was done remotely (remote control or phone support mainly). If there was an urgent for someone need on site, our team was more than capable of helping each other out and therefore me working an extra day or two from home would cause no major reduction in service levels to clients.
So what it seemed to come down to was that my manager 'wanted' me on site and therefore defined the job as that, but realistically on a day to day basis it wasn't required to do the majority of my work, and therefore the stalemate seemed to be about whether an employer is justified in making demands about HOW an employee is to do their work - ie insisting on them being available on site even when it is rarely needed, and where the team would typically be able to handle such situations.
Anyway, despite my attempts to discuss this and get some clarification about what my company's position was on this stalemate and how to interpret the legislation, she seemed to be too busy to maintain a conversation by email or Teams messages (which is how we had been communicating, primarily), and weeks/months went by without any resolution.
A few weeks ago, I brought it up again with her and asked if we could have a catch up to discuss the matter again. She finally agreed on meeting me on Thursday 2nd March. Then, about half an hour prior to the arranged time, she casually dropped into conversation that my manager would be attending the meeting too. I said that I was really hoping to meet with her as my manager had already twice rejected my request and I felt it would put me under pressure and I wasn't prepared to have a discussion that seemed to have escalated with my manager being present too. I asked to have it rescheduled, and asked if my manager had to be present. She responded to say that she believed it would be best that we were all present.
I decided to sit on it for a little while, but when I came into work one week later on Thursday 9th March, I was intercepted as soon as the lifts opened and I started to walk in the direction of my desk. My manager asked me to come with him to a meeting. The HR rep was there too, and they told me I had been made redundant as they no longer had a need for my role and that they had tried but been unable to find any other role or position that I could do to keep me employed. My role was 'technically' a "senior" one, as I had about a year filled in as an interim team leader and when I eventually returned to my normal role, they asked if I could retain some of the responsibilities I had done, like handling escalations, mentoring etc. But other than that, I was doing exactly the same job as the 3 others in my team, including someone that they had only hired 2 months ago. I therefore disputed the fact that my 'senior' title meant I had a different role in any meaningful way and said that I felt that the redundancy was about me rocking the boat and pursuing flexibility. They of course denied it and said they just no longer needed anyone in that senior role and there was no other reason for the redundancy. Their apparent justification, as they explained at the time, for hiring a colleague 2 months ago was that it was not a senior role. There had not been any discussion at all about downsizing the team, nor any consultation about roles prior to my redundancy. It seems crystal clear to me that the only reason I was made redundant was that they were worried about the flexibility request, possibly the fact that if I were able to justify flexibility on the basis of entitlement under the Fair Work Act, then others in the company may realise they could do the same. Unfortunately the hard part is proving that link. I never actually formalised my flexibility request in writing as seems to be the recommended method for pursuing a request, but this is because I was effectively threatened that if I did, it would 'not go well for me'
Your thoughts, brains trust?
There's a reasonable amount of background to this, but essentially it boils down to this. I believe I have most likely been dismissed via redundancy because I had been pursuing a flexible working arrangement that my employer did not want to provide.
I had been working for my employer in IT support for almost 2 years and since mid-2022, had been attempting to request additional flexibility in terms of WFH arrangements (my proposal was 2.5 days per week - specifically 2 in one week and 3 in the other week, only fortnightly rotation) so that I could maintain parenting/caring commitments (school/daycare pickups etc). I had been given 1 day per week and was told that it was the maximum I would be given. When I first made the request for additional flexibility, I mentioned my understanding of the Fair Work Act that provided employees of 12+ months the right to request flexibility for certain things like parenting, and that my understanding was that the request should be made in writing. My manager effectively told me that formalising the request in writing would be seen as a legal challenge and that because of the current situation in the team, they could not accommodate it as one of my colleagues was on long term leave (overseas holiday for 4-6 months) and we were effectively a man down. I was told to try to manage with the existing arrangements for the time being and we might be able to revisit the request when my colleague returned from leave.
I brought this situation to my company's HR representative (who I was on reasonably friendly terms with), and she essentially said that she tried to stay out of such requests and left the decision in the hands of the managers based on their team's operational requirements, but recommended I discussed it with my manager again.
When my colleague returned from leave, I asked again and was told that essentially nothing had changed from their point of view and that I would not be given more than my current 1 day per week WFH. I also mentioned the fact that I felt that there was an entitlement for flexibility under the Fair Work Act and that the guidelines suggested it should be approved unless there was a legitimate, significant cost to the business in doing so. I was effectively given a veiled threat from my manager when I raised this. He said words to the effect of "you don't want to go down the legal route, other previous employees have tried that and it didn't end well for them, they're no longer with us".
I again brought this issue of flexibility back to the HR representative and tried to seek her understanding of the legislation with regard to requests for flexibility, specifically the fact that, according to what I had read, the employer should only be able to reject the request for flexibility if they could demonstrate that it would have a 'significant' effect on the business (staffing, financially, logistically etc). My opinion (and I accept it is simply that - an opinion) is that my manager would not have been able to easily justify that my request for flexibility would have had any significant effect on the team or business. Their argument had been that my position is an 'on site position' providing IT support, and they need us to be able to attend to an issue physically if remote support was not possible. However, I was working in a team of 4 or 5 and realistically 80-90% of our work could be and usually was done remotely (remote control or phone support mainly). If there was an urgent for someone need on site, our team was more than capable of helping each other out and therefore me working an extra day or two from home would cause no major reduction in service levels to clients.
So what it seemed to come down to was that my manager 'wanted' me on site and therefore defined the job as that, but realistically on a day to day basis it wasn't required to do the majority of my work, and therefore the stalemate seemed to be about whether an employer is justified in making demands about HOW an employee is to do their work - ie insisting on them being available on site even when it is rarely needed, and where the team would typically be able to handle such situations.
Anyway, despite my attempts to discuss this and get some clarification about what my company's position was on this stalemate and how to interpret the legislation, she seemed to be too busy to maintain a conversation by email or Teams messages (which is how we had been communicating, primarily), and weeks/months went by without any resolution.
A few weeks ago, I brought it up again with her and asked if we could have a catch up to discuss the matter again. She finally agreed on meeting me on Thursday 2nd March. Then, about half an hour prior to the arranged time, she casually dropped into conversation that my manager would be attending the meeting too. I said that I was really hoping to meet with her as my manager had already twice rejected my request and I felt it would put me under pressure and I wasn't prepared to have a discussion that seemed to have escalated with my manager being present too. I asked to have it rescheduled, and asked if my manager had to be present. She responded to say that she believed it would be best that we were all present.
I decided to sit on it for a little while, but when I came into work one week later on Thursday 9th March, I was intercepted as soon as the lifts opened and I started to walk in the direction of my desk. My manager asked me to come with him to a meeting. The HR rep was there too, and they told me I had been made redundant as they no longer had a need for my role and that they had tried but been unable to find any other role or position that I could do to keep me employed. My role was 'technically' a "senior" one, as I had about a year filled in as an interim team leader and when I eventually returned to my normal role, they asked if I could retain some of the responsibilities I had done, like handling escalations, mentoring etc. But other than that, I was doing exactly the same job as the 3 others in my team, including someone that they had only hired 2 months ago. I therefore disputed the fact that my 'senior' title meant I had a different role in any meaningful way and said that I felt that the redundancy was about me rocking the boat and pursuing flexibility. They of course denied it and said they just no longer needed anyone in that senior role and there was no other reason for the redundancy. Their apparent justification, as they explained at the time, for hiring a colleague 2 months ago was that it was not a senior role. There had not been any discussion at all about downsizing the team, nor any consultation about roles prior to my redundancy. It seems crystal clear to me that the only reason I was made redundant was that they were worried about the flexibility request, possibly the fact that if I were able to justify flexibility on the basis of entitlement under the Fair Work Act, then others in the company may realise they could do the same. Unfortunately the hard part is proving that link. I never actually formalised my flexibility request in writing as seems to be the recommended method for pursuing a request, but this is because I was effectively threatened that if I did, it would 'not go well for me'
Your thoughts, brains trust?
