Larry Stauffer, dean of the College of Engineering, said the recent announcement of an additional review process for the classification and compensation system is a good step for the University of Idaho.
“For myself, I just want to make sure that we as leadership of the university do a good job of this process,” Stauffer said. “I think it is a good system. It’s just that when the first results came out, I had some questions about some of the positions — just not understanding why they were what they were.”
The decision to implement this extra step came out of a discussion that took place between UI deans, Human Resources and Interim President Don Burnett during an appeals committee training session that took place last Wednesday. Stauffer was one of many deans who were present.
Vice President of Finance and Administration Ron Smith, said the process of coming to this decision was collaborative.
“(The deans) talked about this being a really big qualitative research project and how it would be really easy to make some mistakes,” Smith said. “They said ‘You know it would be really good to have an additional review.'”
And the president was there and he agreed that it would be a good idea, Smith said.
“When you’re working with 1,500 job descriptions and trying to put them into the right spot in a classification system, that there’s a good chance there will be some mistakes,” Smith said. “So we thought an additional layer of review would certainly help the process and cut down on the number of appeals that went to the committee.”
Greg Walters, executive director of Human Resources said he supports the president’s decision 100 percent.
“I think this is an excellent additional step I think to help address some of the concerns that have been brought forward and to continue the conversation in a broader perspective,” Walters said.
Walters said the initial vetting of the classifications took place last spring. Essentially, they wanted feedback on the relationship between the positions and how they were graded in the different pay scales.
“Really, we needed suggestions from them for positions that were out of whack,” Walters said. “Then we went back and did another level of analysis with their suggestions and ideas.”
The deans had a very short period of time to review the classifications in their colleges, Walters said.
“(An) hour,” Walters said. “And most of them brought somebody from their department who was really familiar with the jobs. Sometimes higher-level administrators are a little bit separated. So they brought some of their experts to these conversations.”
The deans were able to compare positions within their own colleges, but not across campus with other departments, which is one of the concerns that brought about the decision by President Don Burnett to introduce an additional review process. They are looking at having review take place with comparing positions across UI departments.
“The caveat is that the director or dean in one college doesn’t really know what somebody in ITS, what their job is or in a different college,” Walters said. “They really don’t know those jobs, they know their own jobs.”
Stauffer said for him the problem was not having enough information on what he was looking for during the initial vetting process.
“And so to say ‘well these are in the right place and these are not,’ it was a really tough thing to be able to do correctly,” Stauffer said. “So (Walters) gave us a chance to do that and we made some comments. And then to HR’s credit, they went back and relooked at things.”
But, Stauffer added, it probably wasn’t the best feedback that could have been given because he didn’t have any training on how to do the assignments.
Stauffer said a more careful placement could be accomplished by looking more closely at the colleges and across the university at the other colleges.
“So that’s what we decided to do,” Stauffer said.
Stauffer said he believes in what the university is trying to achieve with the new system.
“When you get down to the idea of having amore organized way of looking at the positions in the university, having more predictable grade levels and all that,” Stauffer said. “All that stuff makes a lot of sense. I think it’s just taken awhile to really understand how it’s being done to remove some of that anxiety.”
The appeals committee training meeting was educational and has improved his outlook on the process, Stauffer said.
“Everybody is trying to get this done right and they are concerned that people feel good about how it’s done,” Stauffer said. “I’m actually much more optimistic about it now than I was a week ago.”
Staff have expressed relief that this step is being taken, said Brian Mahoney, chair of staff affairs.
“The general consensus from the emails that I received (from staff) immediately after (this was announced) were a little bit of relief and I also think the general feeling was it’s about time that they listen to us,” Mahoney said. “The deans were able to get across (the message) we had kind of been shooting for — that the process to date really wasn’t working for a lot of staff.”
Mahoney said there’s optimism now, given that the president has listened to the concerns.
“People are at least hoping that now that we can step back and take a look at this and make sure that this actually works and that it’s working for the staff,” Mahoney said.
Kaitlin Moroney can be reached at [email protected]