Legal Question in Employment Law in New Jersey
getting set up to be terminated
I believe my employer is setting me up to fire me for not performing the duties of my job. I am a facilities manager at a small pharmaceutical company. The new supervisor and I do not see eye to eye and he has provided me with a list of things he expects to be done in 3 days; 44 items that it would be physically impossible for one person to do (I manage 3 buildings without any other maintenance staff except for some cleaning people who do not speak English). I believe that this supervisor is setting me up to fail so he can say that I can't perform the duties of my position. There are many issues at this company, they operate outside the margin of the law when it comes to OSHA and FDA requirements. They know that I know, if you know what I mean. Do I have any recourse if they fire me for unreasonable expectations of my position? (I work in NJ, but live in Pa)
2 Answers from Attorneys
Re: getting set up to be terminated
You are in a very difficult position. However, if you take action quickly, then you may be able to save your job and/or gain protection under the NJ Whistleblower statute. You should find an employment attorney whom you feel comfortable with and who is knowledgeable with regard to the law. There are many key things which an attorney can help you with right now that you would not normally be thinking about. Also, go online and read up on the NJ Whistleblower law (NJ law applies because that's the state where you work). The law is called the Conscientious Employee Protection Act. If you would like further advice, call my office for a consultation. My phone number is 908.301.9095. Here's a link to a Rutgers site on the law: http://uhr.rutgers.edu/lr/CEPA.htm
Re: getting set up to be terminated
Two can play at that game. You may ultimately not be able to protect your job but you can do something to protect your unemployment compensation.
Since you are a "manager", you are presumably entitled to use resources other than you own labor to accomplish the work. So, contact an outside contract maintenance firm and get an estimate from them on what it would take to do the excess work (that which you can't do in the allotted time). When you have that in hand, you can give it to the supervisor and ask him whether he wants to hire the outside company to get the work done on his schedule. Regardless of the answer, you will have proved your point. That evidence is good in a unemployment hearing because it will (we expect) tend to show that the request was unreasonable and any subsequent termination was the result of an unreasonable work assignement.
See also: http://info.corbettlaw.net/lawguru.htm