Legal Question in Employment Law in Massachusetts

Hello,

Currently, I am a temp at a non-profit in Cambridge, MA, with hopes of becoming a permanent employee in the coming weeks. Earlier today, the HR Director, who will be one of two people interviewing me next week, called me into his office and said several things to me. He stated that, in order for the organization to hire me, it has to pay the temp agency a fee. This is not new news to me. The new news followed, though. He then revealed that the fee is about one-third of what my potential salary is. He stated that this will be factored into whether the organization will hire me. Almost word-for-word, he explained that I need to have a strong interview because I need to be a much stronger candidate for the position than others interviewed. If I am of the same caliber as other candidates, the organization will choose to hire one of them instead, because of the fee. He also revealed that he has 50% of the hiring power and can basically veto hiring decisions made by others involved in the process.

Another concern I have is regarding the work itself that I've been doing for the organization thus far. I have taken on the responsibility of administrator of their new grants management system and, as this, have been identifying items that the staff needs to be trained on, and then organizing and leading trainings. This responsibility will be necessary for at least the next few months. My current title is Temporary Administrative Assistant to the Associate Director. The responsibility I just described was that of the Associate Director, but she quit in December and I've been doing it ever since. I'm much less concerned about fair compensation for the hard work I've put into being the lead on the grants management system implementation than I am about how its absence from the job description will play a role in: 1) the interview process, since questions for the candidates would be based off of the job description and 2) compensation moving forward, since the current job description is associated with a pay grade below what it should be if this lead role is an expectation of whoever is hired permanently as administrative assistant. I should mention that permanent employees are unionized.

Apologies for the long explanations, but I thought them necessary to set the scene for what I'm experiencing. The people I work directly with are fantastic and I really do want this job and, in many ways, am more than qualified for the position. Please let me know your thoughts on these inquiries when possible.

Thanks very much.

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