A lot does indeed depend on the reason for the changes.
Legolas Send a noteboard - 13/01/2014 08:28:23 PM
View original postA bit of context: I work in a small group of 9 people total, run by 3 partners. Over 6 years already. The group is very successful and the partners make quite a bit of money, with 20% annual growth.
View original postThis month, they have instituted the following HR changes:
View original post - everyone must be in the office by 9:00am (used to be much more flexible)
Depends on the work, honestly. For a job that requires contact with customers during business hours, or trading on a stock exchange or other market with limited opening hours, or international contacts with particular time zones, it makes sense that you don't want people working whatever hours they like.
In my job, everyone who is working that (half) day is required to be in the office (or out on work-related things) between, iirc, 9:30 to 11:30 am, and 2 to 4 pm. The rest is up to you, as long as you reach the required amount of hours per day (and the office does have opening and closing hours at 7 am and 8 pm respectively). Which is fair enough as far as hours go - just annoying that in extremely calm periods they don't let us leave earlier.
View original post - cannot take more than 10 consecutive business days for vacation (I've taken 12 before, and it was just fine; group runs smoothly and we cover for each other well)
This is indeed silly - arguably even counterproductive, as people taking very long holidays do saddle their colleagues with lots of extra work, but less than people taking lots of short holidays, since then the colleagues have to do an extra effort to take over the absent person's work every single time, as opposed to making that effort just once and then handling it for four whole weeks. On the other hand, for the kind of work where it really is not feasible or acceptable towards the customer to have a substitute handle it, justifying an absence of more than two weeks of the responsible person does become a little hard.
View original postA bunch of additional little (petty) things were also codified and written up as policy:
View original post - leaving earlier than 2pm will count as a 1/2 vacation day
That does seem normal enough to me... even leaving at 2:30 pm would be rather bizarre unless you had started work unusually early for some reason.
View original post - at least a week's notice is required if to take more than 1 vacation/personal day
This, eh, depends on how strictly the rule is enforced. In my company (which, admittedly, lacks a real HR department despite having over a hundred people in the office), we have similar rules, but they are pretty much ignored except when their violation results in real harm to the company, or real trouble for the colleagues who have to cover.
View original postTo be clear, these are not the rules from the big corporation we are a part of, these are much more restrictive and specific. These rules do not come about as a result of any problem or underperformance, just a preemptive strike.
In that case, yeah, you're justified in being demoralized - regardless of whether the rules themselves are really that harsh or not, it is clearly a tightening of the rules that only makes sense when there is a real need for it.
View original postTo me, this is a major departure from previous policies, and very demoralizing. They also come on top of an (aborted) attempt to cut our salaries - to turn 10% of our fixed salary into a bonus verging on annual performance review. There was a revolt in the ranks, and the partners backed down. But I used up all of my clout fighting that salary change, and have nothing left for the vacation change.
View original postEverything about this is infuriating. It's a massive step backwards; it's punitive and restrictive. The max 10 business days off irks me so damn much. I really want to tell them to eff off. But... am I overreacting?
Not really, but as to whether it's smart to pick a new fight...
View original postThe work itself I really like. It's only gotten more interesting lately, and I have a tremendous opportunity right now there if I stick around and work hard - to move up. But, now I know that this move up won't come with better hours or longer vacations, and honestly, longer vacations is my SOLE motivation for anything.
That sucks. Perhaps you can still negotiate longer holidays if you arrange them long enough in advance? Depends again on how strict enforcement will be, I guess.
Tell me if I'm overreacting or not to these vacation policy changes
- 12/01/2014 04:17:28 PM
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Yes, they are reasonable.
- 12/01/2014 04:42:57 PM
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This stuff made me miss working in a company with an HR department
- 12/01/2014 06:44:22 PM
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I personally find HR departments a waste (but that's another issue).
- 13/01/2014 04:41:29 PM
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They would be reasonable if you were an idiot in a nanny state type job.
- 12/01/2014 07:28:41 PM
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Re: They would be reasonable if you were an idiot in a nanny state type job.
- 13/01/2014 07:54:28 PM
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Yep, pretty restrictive. That just shows once again that money isn't everything
- 13/01/2014 04:27:39 PM
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A lot does indeed depend on the reason for the changes.
- 13/01/2014 08:28:23 PM
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Please correct me if I am incorrect, but don't you work in finance or a related field?
- 14/01/2014 11:45:15 PM
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