At Tuesday’s Faculty Senate meeting, the University of Idaho’s Compensation Task Force presented a plan to create a tool to bring staff salaries up to market value.
“According to our current system, there is no problem. Everything is fine,” said Brian Foisy, Vice President of Finance. “Clearly it’s not. So we’re going to need a new tool.”
Foisy said the current system reports that UI staff members are paid 102 percent of average market value. Foisy said that is because some staff positions are placed in inequitable classifications. This was the main reason staff turnover rose to 18 percent, he said.
“That reclassification was one of the most harmful things we’ve done for staff morale,” said Faculty Senate Chair Liz Brandt. “The task force was created in response to that.”
Foisy said the task force’s work is part of UI President Chuck Staben’s promise to bring the average of staff values up to market value.
“If you ask someone what they should be paid, they don’t have an answer in their head,” Foisy said. “They look around and see what other people doing their job are paid. It’s an inherent behavior.”
Director of Human Resources Wes Matthews said the market values will be used according to federal government surveys and surveys conducted by the College and University Professional Association. Hopefully, the plan will bring an increase to most staff salaries, but Matthews said it may not be as quick or as much as people want.
“We’re certainly not going to take anything away from anyone’s salary,” Matthews said. “But some may not see as much of an increase over time.”
Matthews said market values would be set according to UI’s comparable markets, geographically and by institution type. He said they would look at Idaho’s neighboring states as well as Colorado.
Foisy said September will be full of forums for various staff groups and colleges to comment on the matter. Most are set to take place in the Idaho Commons.
Foisy said he hopes to get sufficient staff input and finish their work in time to submit their proposal for a policy change for the October meeting of the State Board of Education (SBOE). If the staff input they receive is important enough they will wait to present the proposal in December, he said.
Even then, he said, SBOE would approve concepts, not specifics, so there would still be room for adjustments if staff had more concerns.
Any policy that may come out of this process would only apply to staff, not faculty. Foisy said their work would likely be applied to faculty if Faculty Senate chooses to convert to that system as well.
Matthews said the current goal is to ensure that no staff member gets paid less than 80 percent of the average market value.
Foisy said a benefit of using market value is that inequity issues will be resolved. He said there would have to be a strong argument for someone to get paid anything other than the market value.
Matthews said though they are not finished calculating market values for every position, with the progress they have made, he is certain that on average, UI staff are paid less than market value. To make up that difference, the university needs more money. Foisy said there are a variety of ways to do this, such as increasing enrollment.
There is also some degree of wiggle room in UI’s budget. About $120 million of the budget, although already allocated, is available to move, he said.
“We’ve got the resources to fix this,” Foisy said. “So that won’t be an excuse not to.”
Nishant Mohan
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