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Columns::August 20, 2001
UGA receives more than $54 million in new gifts, pledges
Collaborative effort begins
Montana administrator chosen to lead UGA’s international programs
Moving experience
Campus Closeup
New assistant dean named for Tifton ag and environmental sciences
Kudos
Great universities require great faculty leadership
Newsworthy
Campus News
Consultants: Pay and classification system should be revamped
By Larry B. Dendy
ldendy@uga.edu
The university should replace its 30-year-old job classification and pay system for non-faculty employees with a new system
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| Andy Brantley |
that has clearly defined job descriptions, aligns position titles with duties, rewards employees on the basis of performance and ties pay scales to competitive markets.
Those are among recommendations coming out of a year-long study of the pay and classification system conducted by the firm of Deloitte and Touche.
The study recommends reviewing current salary administration guidelines, which it terms “restrictive,” and making salary adjustments in certain critical-skills jobs. It also says the university should quickly take steps to apply money freed through retirements and voluntary resignations to other salary increases and market adjustments.
“UGA does not have a clearly articulated compensation strategy for its staff employees,” the study concludes. “UGA’s salary administration procedures, decision-making process on salary actions and timing of salary actions are not effective practices.”
The report says the current system is flawed by too many salary grades with midpoints that are too close together, and by the existence of so-called “gray area” positions that don’t have clearly defined duties and responsibilities.
The university’s salary structure should be market-driven, and the market is much broader than just Athens or even other Georgia cities, the study says. “Depending on the job, UGA competes with all industries, as well as local, regional, national and international geographic markets,” according to the study.
The findings come as no surprise to Andy Brantley, associate vice president for human resources.
“This report represents a formal documentation of many widely held perceptions, and highlights issues that many have experienced during their work at the university,” says Brantley. “This type of document is essential to moving forward.”
The pay and classification system, which includes some 700 job titles in 23 job families, is basically unchanged from the way it was created in the 1970s. The system covers some 7,000 employees in managerial, administrative, professional, clerical, technical, skilled trades and service positions.
Human Resources launched an in-depth review of the system this past August as a way to modernize it and align it with UGA’s strategic plan, which states that “recruiting, hiring and retaining faculty and staff of the highest quality in an internationally competitive marketplace will be a major priority.”
To gather information, Deloitte and Touche conducted a survey that drew responses from 916 employees, and held a number of focus groups with staff and supervisors. The firm also conducted 25 interviews with senior administrators, and collected market data from other universities in the Southeast on pay levels and compensation practices.
A steering team composed of staff, management and professional employees and human resources employees provided advice and guidance for the study.
The report says UGA needs to change the basic “culture” in which employment and pay decisions are made. It recommends a new “compensation strategy” that would be “more like [pay plans] found in competitive businesses and less like those in government.” The strategy would tie wages to competitive labor markets, determine the university’s position in those markets and update job titles and descriptions, which the report says “do not consistently coincide with actual staff duties and responsibilities.”
The strategy calls for fewer and broader salary ranges, gives greater emphasis to competitive pay, provides for “rigorous job evaluation,” and eliminates the “culture of entitlement” in which pay raises are often based on seniority. “It will become understood that raises will vary among employees based on performance achievement,” the report states. “No annual increase in pay rate will be possible where performance has been unacceptable.”
The study also suggests that UGA provide for such employee benefits and non-compensatory programs as child-care assistance, flexible work schedules, telecommuting, and enhancement of opportunities for advancement for women and minorities.
Brantley says President Adams and his cabinet are now reviewing the proposed compensation strategy.
The university should also develop a detailed plan to put the strategy into place, the report says. The plan must take into account “participation, communications, decision making, stakeholder acceptance and public sentiment” in order to be successful, and must incorporate modern technology for maximum efficiency. Brantley says a plan is being developed and will be ready for review by the senior administration by November.
The report doesn’t suggest a time line for implementing the recommendations, nor does it set a specific cost figure or suggest possible funding sources. All are critical questions that will be addressed, Brantley says.
“The report provides a good starting point for the development of a new structure, but we can’t do everything at once,” Brantley says. “It will have to be broken down into short-term projects we can start right now, and long-term projects that will require considerable time. Full implementation of a new system will take several years to complete.”
Salary adjustments may be justified in many cases, but there is little probability of additional money to fund them, Brantley says. “Any salary increases will have to be supported through existing means, so we must continually examine how to best maximize our existing resources.” |
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