So I work for a nonprofit/government type organization, not the usual for-profit company. I’m part of a very small team, but it’s one of the organization’s primary divisions. We’re currently at a staff that’s less than 40% of what we should be at, so everyone in our team needs to pull double or triple duty to get the work done.
While everyone except our manager (who works even more hours than us) is hourly with OT, we pull non-exempt hours. Recently, HR has demanded we stop using OT unless absolutely necessary, and they keep shutting my manager down when he tries to push back. He’s also been trying to hire people to fill our open slots, but HR takes so long to hire that the candidates inevitably take new jobs.
The biggest problem is that the work we do really should be classified as exempt work, and we’re getting paid only about 60-70% of what would be a competitive rate for what we do. Leadership seems to think we’re replaceable and expendable, and that they can just save money by making us work for cheap and replacing us with consultants if we leave.
Only thing is, even though our team was setup to fail, we succeeded in a big way that no one in high leadership positions expected we would.
The only reason all of us are sticking around is because the work we do is important to an entire ethnic minority. If we don’t do our jobs, people will quite literally be further oppressed, suffer, and die.
The only thing really keeping me where I am is the overwhelming guilt I would feel if I abandoned a community that needs me to fight for them, and that the team in part of is a truly great team to work with.