Academic Staff
submitted by Mat Gunshor
The HR design project has taken a giant leap forward from the 155 recommendations of the work teams and all of the feedback from around campus to a more focused plan that can be implemented on 01 July 2013. Darrell Bazzell (Vice Chancellor for Administration), Steve Lund, and Bob Lavigna came to a special session of the Academic Staff Assembly on 24 September to present an overview of the plan. The presentation slides can be viewed here: http://hrdesign.wisc.edu/wp-content/uploads/2012/09/120926HR_Design_presentation.pdf
While we do not know all of the details of the plan yet, it seems to be a fairly solid effort of having gathered a lot of information and narrowed it down to a few actionable items that can be implemented in the next state fiscal year. Some of the more important things to handle right away are the issues dealing with current classified staff.
Assuming Act 10 is still the law of the land on 01 July 2013, the university will need personnel policies in place at that time because university employees can no longer be part of the state classified system at that time. The plan as it was explained to us seems to be a fair balance between not forcing people out of their unions and not forcing people into the academic staff, while hopefully addressing some of the issues that staff have with what has been described as a caste system of employee classes at the university. "Classified Staff" as a term will be going away and most of those employees will become "University Staff" - then they want University Staff to be given governance rights through the Board of Regents.
Much of the work of the work teams and recommendations are being put off until later. For example, the fact that the UW-Madison has around 1700 working titles is something that will be tackled in a future year. They hope to perform a study on titles and compensation to address this later. Some of the facts about the HR Design:
- All UW employees will continue to be state employees
- Ability to create our own personnel system results from Act 32, not Act 10
- Employee categories currently entitled to just cause and due process will continue to have these protections
- Base wages will not decrease
- Cost‐of‐living/general wage increases will still be used
- New system will pay staff at least a living wage
- Pay adjustments will reflect a broad range of factors (e.g., market, equity, performance) within defined guidelines
- Not prescribing performance criteria for compensation decisions.
- Right to collectively bargain will be maintained and not involuntarily taken away from current employees
- Governance rights will not be diminished – they will be expanded
- Hiring will be based on civil service principles (i.e., merit‐based hiring)
- We will adopt a personnel system that meets the needs of our educational mission and culture
- HR Design work team members represented all stakeholder groups, including HR
- Permanent increases in OHR staffing levels to support the new personnel structure will be minimal.
- New UW‐Madison personnel system
- Statutory changes
- New employee category definitions
- University staff governance established
- University staff appeal process
- Transitional compensation structure
- New university staff recruitment and selection process and applicant tracking system
- Tuesday, 02 October: Union South, 1:30-3 p.m., with live-streaming to campus and video capture for future posting. (Spanish translation available)
- Tuesday, 02 October: Memorial Union, 11 p.m.-12:30 a.m., with participants urged to park in lots 6, 8, 9 or the Lake Street Ramp. The session is scheduled to accommodate third-shift employees. (Spanish translation available)
- Thursday, 04 October:Health Sciences Learning Center, 11 p.m.-12:30 a.m., with participants urged to park in lots 82 or 95. The session is scheduled to accommodate third-shift employees. (Hmong and Tibetan translation available)
- A pair of web chats have also been scheduled to provide more information. They will be held on Friday, 28 September, from 11 a.m.-12:30 p.m. and on Wednesday, 10 October, from 1:30-3 p.m. The link for the chats will be posted in coming days.
We have not run into anything in this plan to object to so far, but we're not all-knowing. If you read or hear anything that you think could have a negative impact on your work or the work environment, please let us know. The Academic Staff Assembly reps and alternates in SSEC are:
Mat Gunshor
Denny Hackel
Wayne Feltz
Dave Tobin
Mark Mulligan
Jean Phillips
Mark Werner
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Academic staff are encouraged to submit proposals for the Academic Staff Professional Development Grants.
Important dates to remember for this program are:
October 2 or October 5:
Attend a Brown Bag Lunch about how to write a successful proposal:
Tuesday, October 2, 2012 - 12:00 p.m., Bascom Hall Conference Room #67
Friday, October 5, 2012 - 12:00 p.m. Mechanical Engineering, Room #1101
October 22, 2012 - Applications due to Department Chair/Unit Head/Director
October 29, 2012 - Applications due to Dean or Equivalent
November 12, 2012 - Completed electronic packets due from Dean or equivalent to the Secretary of the Academic Staff.
Details about the Academic Staff Professional Development Grant program are available at http://acstaff.wisc.edu/academic-staff-professional-development-grants.htm
Questions? Contact Mary Johansen, Office of the Secretary of the Academic Staff, 263-2985, acstaff_gov@lists.wisc.edu
