Overview

‘Garden leave’ is a fairly new initiative that HR have introduced (since about early 2011), but it is still little known with very little official documentation around. It can potentially affect research staff, so we, your Ambassadors, have learned something about it and this is our attempt to summarise what we know. Please note that it is not official information, so to confirm any of this or find out more, you should contact the HR manager or assistant for our school (see HR page).

What is ‘garden leave’ and who is

eligible?

Garden leave is essentially 3 months’ continued salary for a research staff member that has reached the end of their contract and has not got another job lined up. The intention is that this time is used to find another job, but you’ll still have an income for that limbo period. Only researchers who have been employed continuously at the university without a break in service for 4 years and who have had at least one contract renewal are eligible.

How do I secure my garden leave?

Technically, HR should enrol you into garden leave automatically when the time comes, but it is important to explicitly request this from them anyway if you can see it coming and want to take advantage of it.

What is the small print?

The money for your salary for this 3 month period comes from the school’s budget. Thus technically, you are working for them and therefore they typically find you something to do. This could be something completely different to what you did previously and is likely to be administrative in nature. You may also get a new line manager. If the school has nothing they want you to do, then technically you can do what you want with that time; however, if they find something at a later date during this period, it is compulsory that you do it (they are paying you to). It is therefore advised that you speak with the school (possibly head of school) in advance of garden leave starting to find out what is available, and if nothing, then to explicitly tell them what it is

you would like to be doing instead. For example, you may wish to spend the time working in another school getting experience if there is the possibility of a position appearing there. Technically, the school paying your salary could recall you, but if you make agreements in advance, you may be able to reach a mutual arrangement. It is important to be proactive about this. During garden leave, if working for the school, you are allowed time off for job interviews if you have them. Garden leave also comes with a zero-notice period for termination of contract; if you secure a job during this time, you can literally inform the school of this the next day and end the garden leave position without the standard notice period. Note that if you find a new job in the university, do not terminate your garden leave too early, leaving you without pay, as this would constitute a break in continuous employment and prevent future garden leaves. When you are on garden leave, you retain access to all standard university facilities (library, swipe card door access, electronic journals, email etc.). However, it is the school’s decision whether you get to keep your previous office space.

What if I don’t find a job during

garden leave?

If after 3 months of garden leave you haven’t found a new job, then you can accept the university’s redundancy package. This is 1 week of (government- capped) pay for every year of service at the university. You can also stay on the university’s redeployment register for a further 2 months (again, make sure you explicitly request this from HR and don’t just assume it will happen). NOTE: If you find a job at the university again through redeployment after accepting redundancy pay, then to retain continuous employment status (thereby securing future garden leaves), you must pay back the redundancy money. Whether this is in one lump sum or in instalments is unclear and you will need to ask HR (if we find out at a later date, we’ll update this—let us know if you find out). Note also that redeployment job positions are announced first and if no applications are received after a week, that job is announced internally. If no further applications are received, then the job is advertised externally. Essentially, the university makes it easier for staff to remain.

Why is it important to try and keep

continuous service?

In principle, you can have as many garden leaves as necessary—one for the end of each contract—providing you meet the criteria (4 years continuous service on more than one contract). Therefore, if you wish to take advantage of garden

leave and other things (see next paragraph), it is in your interests to take steps to retain the continuous service status whenever possible and not break contracts early. In particular, you need to make sure that new contracts in the build-up to the initial 4 years of continuous service are given on redeployment (keeping same pay spine). There should be no early termination of contracts and the associated gap of 1 month (check with HR early to avoid this!). (Apparently, you are not able to be redeployed on a higher pay scale than you were currently on, although apparently you can be redeployed on a lower pay scale.)

What else comes with garden leave?

Being continuously employed at the university as a researcher for 4 years on more than one contract means your status changes to ‘permanent’ and are on an ‘open ended’ contract. Essentially, as far as we understand, this means that the university can only make you redundant if there is genuinely nothing available for you. This status also means that the university allows you to apply as PI on your own research grants; however, apparently not all research councils recognise this and either dismiss it outright, or limit your maximum level to co- investigator. Check with the specific research councils for further details. (If anyone has further information about this, including links to research council websites stating their position, please let us know.)

Anything else?

It should be noted that you do not have to take the garden leave at the end of a contract; instead you can simply chose to accept the redundancy package (inform HR). Note that the jobs listed on the main university job website are only the externally advertised ones. To view all jobs available (those listed internally or for redeployment) then you need to log into staffnet and look at the jobs section there.