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Antiwork

How panicked should I be and what recourse might I have?

I have worked at my job for 20+ years and for one boss almost that entire time. I was hired as an admin but it became very obvious that the department didn't need an admin who managed one desk, we needed someone who got things done across the department. So I took on responsibilities and got various promotions over the years (yes I am being vague). My last promotion and job rewrite happened in 2007. Since that time I have continued to handle all sorts of new responsibilities that are no where represented on my resume. For example, tomorrow I have a meeting with our Networking/IS/Web Dev folks to finalize the major software migration that I have been single-handedly managing for the past 18 months. My long-time boss was dealing with severe cognitive decline and was unwilling and unable to focus long enough on anything other than keeping his job.…


I have worked at my job for 20+ years and for one boss almost that entire time. I was hired as an admin but it became very obvious that the department didn't need an admin who managed one desk, we needed someone who got things done across the department. So I took on responsibilities and got various promotions over the years (yes I am being vague).

My last promotion and job rewrite happened in 2007. Since that time I have continued to handle all sorts of new responsibilities that are no where represented on my resume. For example, tomorrow I have a meeting with our Networking/IS/Web Dev folks to finalize the major software migration that I have been single-handedly managing for the past 18 months.

My long-time boss was dealing with severe cognitive decline and was unwilling and unable to focus long enough on anything other than keeping his job. Certainly he was not interested in working with me to get an accurate pay grade and job description. I went up and down the corporate ladder, from HR to department heads all of whom said, “you're right something needs to be done but it has to come from your director.”

Finally the long-time director steps down (forced out), but the interim person was not allowed the power to make any position changes. Our new director started recently and they acknowledged that my position description was in their words “a dumpster-fire.” I have been researching and providing industry related position descriptions, most all of them show that with my current set of responsibilities I am under compensated by anywhere from $15k to $50k.

Finally today I send an email to the new director saying something like “looking forward to working with you to write a description and finding a set of responsibilities we both agree on.” The response I got was basically “I'll be writing the job description and will share with you when it is done”

So I REALLY don't like the direction this is going…

Can I be forced to take a new job description that I have no hand in crafting? I am assuming that I would be fired if I don't take the new job description? Would I have any recourse?

Any help, because right now I am not in a happy place…

P.S. I have a meeting with HR in 45 minutes just to see what I can find out (I initiated). I am also well aware that HR does not have my best interests in mind

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