THE UNIVERSITY OF TENNESSE AT CHATTANOGA
Exempt Staff Council Meeting
Lupton Library, Room 208
Members Attending: Debra Anderson, Debbie Bell, Allison Cardwell, Jean Dake, Tonya Pace, Lindsay Pardue, Charles Scott, and Cynthia Wood. Doug Silver attended representing Tom Ellis.
Others in attendance: Dan Webb, Director, Personnel Services; Melanie Sadler, Administrative Secretary, Personnel Services.
Call to Order: Ms. Anderson called the meeting to order.
Minutes: Motion was made and seconded to accept the minutes of the January 21, 2003 meeting.
Guest Speaker: Dr. Richard Gruetzemacher, Director, Planning, Evaluation & Institutional Research
Dr. Gruetzemacher serves on the Faculty/Staff Retention Task Force, which was formed to recommend a strategy to retain highly valued faculty and staff. He presented members with a draft of a survey, which will be distributed in late March or April to all faculty and staff in the UT System. Employees will be asked to answer questions regarding motivation for employment along with rating compensation with regards to internal and external equity and the importance and satisfaction with fringe benefits.
The Task Force will analyze the results viewing how issues differ from exempt to non-exempt, across job families, and across campuses. When asked if the survey would become an annual or bi-annual occurrence, Dr. Gruetzemacher responded that the commitment of Sylvia Davis and the Task Force is there to develop more than just a survey.
Members were asked to direct comments to Dr. Gruetzemacher by February 25. He will inform Ms. Anderson of the date the survey will be distributed and results will be disseminated from Ms. Davis to groups, such as the ESC and ERC, which offered input.
New Business:
§ Budget Hearings
Dr. Stacy has announced that cuts for 2003-04 could be from 7.5% to 8.8%. Departments in the College of Health & Human Services will be reassigned to other colleges in an effort to reduce costs and Mr. Silver stated the warm temperature in the Library was due to no additional utility monies in the budget. Ms. Anderson urged members to attend the Budget Hearing on April 5 from 3 – 5 p.m. when the Exempt Staff Council will present compensation issues.
§ Exempt Staff Compensation
Mr. Webb stated that in the past equity has been based on market value, current salaries, and an employee’s length of service with the University. The limiting factor is the money available for compensation; to bring average salaries of exempt staff 100% of market would cost approximately $1.2 million. Ms. Anderson added that Plan B of the 2003-2004 budget proposal contains $150,000 to use toward additional compensation for exempt staff.
Two references used by Mr. Webb to determine market share are the Administrative Compensation Survey and Mid-Level Administrative/Professional Survey published by CUPA-HR, College and Universities Professional Association for Human Resources. Institutions with budgets of $54 – 102 million are used to determine median salary. Mr. Webb stated that it is easier to compare available salary data on faculty than to compare staff
salaries. It is relatively easy to find a match in a survey for an assistant professor in English, since faculty surveys are organized by rank and discipline. It is much more difficult to match our staff positions with those listed in surveys, since many of our jobs do not have a clearly defined counterpart in other Universities. Local survey data is used to compare salaries for non-exempt employees because most non-exempt employees are hired from the local market and also leave the University for local employment.
About 100 of our 227 exempt positions at UTC match fairly well with positions in the CUPA-HR surveys. Market value for positions for which we don’t have good salary data is estimated by correlating Hay points (measure of relative job size) and a trend formula based on the association of Hay points and salaries for positions for which we do have a good match. The Hay system is used for evaluating all exempt and non-exempt positions based on information in the position’s PDQ. An Audit Committee, comprised of representatives from all UT campuses, reviewed PDQs throughout the UT system about a year ago.
§ Extra Service Pay
The Provost has informed exempt staff that teaching classes not directly related to their job, between 8 a.m. and 5:30 p.m., will require the use of annual leave. This will impact the Freshman Seminar classes that are mainly taught by exempt staff. Since exempt staff are paid to complete their work regardless of how many hours are spent, some questioned why they were being asked to “punch a time clock” during the day but teaching after 5:30 p.m. would not require use of annual leave. Ms. Anderson will send a memo to members after speaking to Dr. Stacy.
Old Business:
§ Merit Pay
Ms. Anderson is serving on a committee to view rewarding staff and faculty who receive a distinguished service rating. The current proposal was to provide a one-time payment of $1,000 but due to budget constraints, will probably not occur this year. Mr. Webb stated the need for a credible body to evaluate merit pay awards to enhance the perception of employees that awards are made fairly, equitably, and with reasonable documentation of merit.
§ Exempt Staff Groups
Gwen Williams, representative of Group 3, has moved from an exempt to faculty position. Group 3, comprised of grant-funded programs under Dean Tanner, will be combined with Group 6, represented by Cynthia Wood. Ms. Sadler will contact Angela Crosby to represent Group 8, previously represented by Carter Cardwell.
A list of exempt employees hired since November, 2002 was distributed. Members volunteered to make contact with them.
§ ESC Compensation Committee
Committee members Lindsay Pardue (Chair), Tom Ellis, Ellen Neufeldt, and Charles Scott will meet with Mr. Webb at a date to be determined.
§ ESC/ERC Retreat
The Exempt Staff will invite the Employee Relations Committee to join them for breakfast and ½ day session at UTC Place on Wednesday, March 26. The Chancellor’s Office is provided funding for the Retreat. Ms. Anderson will contact Ms. Cronin, Chair of the ERC, to develop an agenda.
§ Next Meeting is Tuesday, March 18 at 11:00 a.m. in Lupton Library, Room 208.
The meeting was adjourned.
Respectfully Submitted,
Melanie Sadler
Administrative Secretary
Personnel Services