Hi there

I'm not an HR professional but do take an interest in such thinjgs so thought that here was as good a place as any to ask a coule of questions.  I'll keep them separate posts as they are quite different.

I have a friend who works in Admin Dept of a small software company (about 25 employees in total) - she looks after all the projects administration side of things - her colleague (there are just two of them) is essentially the Office Manager.  As she has been in the same post for many years she is keen for a change and we have talked about how she could easily move from Admin side of things to being a formal Projects Assistant working with the Project Managers and Project Teams.  She has also discussed this with her boss - who also happens to be the Managing Director - and the Head of Projects, but nothing has ever come of it.  It therefore came as a bit of a surprise to her to hear on Monday that a Projects Assistant had been appointed - the job had not been advertised internally and she is very disappointed. 

I suspect that (I now declare my hand) having worked for this company myself until fairly recently and knowing the management what has happened here is that they have decided that they want to take someone on board that they can develop into a Project Manager - my friend is 53.  I also know that, although it would be relatively easy to recruit someone to replace my friend in Admin, her experience and understanding of the company management, projects and accounts systems would be difficult to replace.  Given the fact that there are only two in Admin and my friend's colleague does or knows little on the projects side of things she would find it difficult to pick up the projects tasks.  A new externally recruited Projects Assistant however would find it relatively easy to get up to speeds supporting the PM team and maybe would fit the 'age-profile' the management were thinking of i terms of developing the Projects Assistant into a Projects Manager.

This seems unfair - is what the management have done legal? - or is this just the way things can happen?

Many thanks in advance

Henry

I'm afraid I haven't got anywhere on this since I posted so hopefully someone out there knows and will come to our aid.

Henry

I think you have to be cautious here in seeing discrimination when the reasons may very well be sensible and pragmatic.

Firstly the easy things.. 1. She may want to be a projects assistant but has she a) made this clear and b) done anything to show she is serious - if they are picking up that she only wants more because she is bored/wants more money they may view her as not being serious enough.

Aside from that, perhaps assuming she has given signals and some signs of competancy, she ought, at 53 to be able to take development courses herself - if I was to hear 'admin person wants project job so trained in project management, met with existing project managers and shows competancy in x. methods (whichever methods you use for project planning and management)' my head would turn if 'oh that admin person said that one day she would like to try being a project assistant' I would treat that as slightly useful, but not recruiting information.

I agree that actually her ambition ought to have been managed better but the above example is the reality.  Advertising externally for someone who has the skills your friend could develop given time is acceptable and not discriminatory.

I am of the opinion that longievity isn't enough to show ability.