The University of Tennessee Employee Relations Committee INSTITUTE OF AGRICULTURE Wednesday, January 8, 2014 Room 102, Morgan Hall MINUTES

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1 The University of Tennessee Employee Relations Committee INSTITUTE OF AGRICULTURE Wednesday, January 8, 2014 Room 102, Morgan Hall MINUTES Attending: Herb Byrd, Mike Herbstritt, Betty Mullins, Micki Heatherly, Derick Hopkins, Deb Welch, Kaye Avrit, Cam Philbeck, Misty Bailey, Danielle Browning, Rebekah Jones, Diane Trent. By phone: Jenny Yeary, Jenny Jessup, Susie Nicholson. Old Business Merit Raises Several questions have been raised about merit raises. An employee asked if those raises were mandated by the state, or who made the decision on how they were given. Dr. Byrd responded to questions by but thought it was important to share with the group as a reminder of how the process works. Merit raises were not from funds provided by the State of Tennessee. We put together a 1.5% pool of money for the merit increases. Then at the Department Head/Director level and Dean s Office level those decisions were made on how those merit raises should be given. Merit raises should be based upon performance appraisals. Funds for merit raises came from existing sources and were not provided or mandated by the state. UTK had a little different schedule and they were able to put together more money for merit raises. They have tuition coming in where most departments on the Ag Campus do not. Vending Opportunities on Ag Campus We have received multiple s and communications about the availability (or lack of) and the quality (or lack of) offerings in the vending machines on the Ag campus. This has been an ongoing issue. Joe Cagle has met with providers and their supervisors before. Rebekah Jones represented the ERC and Vet Med at a meeting with Joe Cagle and two representatives from the Tennessee Business Enterprise, the company providing vending on the Ag Campus. The vendors were alerted to everything going on in the buildings on the Ag Campus. They were not aware of how the vending machines were being maintained. They plan to go over what was discussed and get back with us within a week with a plan and a course of action they will take. The providers were alerted to the fact that there are other events that take place on the Ag Campus outside 1

2 of regular operating hours especially at the Vet School. They promised to get everything under control. Joe requested contact information be posted on all of the vending machines to indicate who to call if there was a problem. Should there be a problem with one of the machines we could let them know and keep the communication going with the providers. It was also pointed out that it would be very helpful if the Much Box would post current operating hours and send out a communication if those hours change. Tennessee Business Enterprise has a legal contract with UT and the Munch Box has a sub-contract with them. New Business Mike Herbstritt gave the committee some HR updates. January 1, 2014 UT minimum wage went to $9.00 an hour for regular employees. Any employee making less than $9.00 an hour was raised to that amount. Custodial Services anticipate taking over services for the Institute of Agriculture on April 1, These services will be handled by UT instead of being contracted. At that point we will have somewhere around 250 to 300 employees joining Custodial Services on the Knoxville Campus. These employees will start at minimum of $9.00, however second shifts will have a 50 cent differential and third shifts get a one dollar differential. We are recruiting right now. Those interested in applying would need to apply online in Taleo. If anyone has a problem applying they can come by the recruiting office and someone will be glad to help them fill out the application. UT adjusted salary schedules July 1, 2013; it will do this again July There are some other things that can help with the salary compression. We had a practice for the last three years instead of getting the percent across the board increase, employees under a certain salary level have gotten a dollar amount. A couple of years ago it was $1000 minimum and last year it was $600 minimum. This helps make up some of the difference over time. Promotion paths have helped with some of that compression. If we can get the career ladders in place for some of our titles (where people stay in that title for a long time without a promotion path) that will also help. We do not have all the answers right now but the administration is aware of the problem and is looking at ways to solve it. The question was asked if we will get new insurance cards in If you changed your insurance coverage you will probably get a new card. If everything stayed the same you will not. It was also noted that some employees discarded their flexible benefits cards. If you threw away your card you will have to request a new one. These cards have been reloaded. The phone number to call is The member number is your personnel number (without preceding zeroes). 2

3 Update on Communication Survey Dr. Byrd distributed a handout showing the response rates to the Communication Survey that was distributed to UTIA employees. If you did the survey you were asked to identify your primary unit, UTIA Administration, Ag Research, CASNR, CVM or Extension. The table shows the number of responses for each unit. The highest responses were from UTIA Administration (which includes Sponsored Programs, Marketing and Communications, IT and Dr. Arrington s office), UT Extension and CASNR. The UTIA Overall response rate was 29.6%. The committee discussed how to improve communication with the other units that had a lower response to the survey. Some employees with Ag Research off campus do not have access to computers or share computers and did not complete the survey. Paper forms will be available for these employees to complete and return. s will be sent from the deans to encourage all employees to participate. ERC members were also asked to send an to their represented groups to stress the importance of taking part in the survey. Dr. Byrd will send them a draft message with the link to the survey to help them. Employees need to know all responses are anonymous. Updates on UTIA New Employee Orientation Committee members were given a Draft Agenda for the UTIA New Employee Orientation scheduled for February 19, In the draft was a list of what we hope to cover that day. It will be a Career Fair type of set up with different units coming in and setting up booths. This will be available for folks on campus. There will be cameras at each booth filming brief videos that will be sent to people in remote locations across the state. Hopefully we can have interactive questions going back and forth. Dr. Byrd asked for feedback from the group about a video that we are putting together to give everyone a sense of what the physical presence in the counties and camps looks like as well as the programs offered through these unites across the state. Originally the video was planned to run about 30 minutes. Herb asked for other ideas or topics they would like to see added to an open minute time slot. Suggestions included IT Security, Social Media Guidelines, HR Benefits and Policy, Recruitment (ask employees how their overall recruitment experience was). We will have a remote location in Jackson and Nashville. An invitation will go out to all regular employees identified as new hires in 2013 to the present. Supervisors will have the opportunity to invite others they feel would benefit from the orientation. 3

4 Changes in HR Policy Dr. Byrd distributed two handouts, Summary of 2013 Human Resource Policy and Changes to Staff Performance Reviews Target Consistency and Accountability (see attachments). Some of the HR policy changes folks may not be aware of are: 1. We are changing the term category to temporary category. The pool for leave will no longer be based on categories but will be strictly based on percent of time for existing employees. 2. New Employees with less than 75% time will not accrue annual and sick leave as of February 1, Everyone will get funeral leave. 3. Current part-time employees (hired before February 1, 2014) will still be able to accrue. 4. Administrative closings, funeral and bereavement leave, holidays and personal leave accruals or compensation will be pro rata to the planned working time in IRIS. 5. Effective January 1, 2015, the maximum annual leave hours that may be carried forward from one calendar year to the next is pro rata to the percentage of effort as recorded in IRIS. 6. The maximum accrual carry-over will not become effective for current parttime employees until 2015, which gives them a year to use their annual leave balances and not lose accumulated time with this change in policy. There will be some big changes and some employees may be upset. When part time employees start work supervisors need to make sure they know they do not receive annual or sick leave. There was an sent out about this. Handout covering Performance Appraisal Policy Changes included: Review Period Alternate Performance Review Forms Multiple Reviewers Unsatisfactory Performance Ineligibility for Pay Increases Required Signatures Required Performance Improvement Plan. We are working across the state to be consistent on staff performance appraisals. Some of these changes will affect UTIA and some will not. Most of us are evaluated on performance from January 1 through December 31 on our campus. However that is a 4

5 big change for some campuses. One thing we have had a problem with for several years is some have been doing two performance review documents. One form we developed and a second one is made for system HR. We should not have to do this anymore as long as we have consistent ratings. An went out to extension folks from Dr. Byrd that talked about how that change is going to work. There has been discussion about what is unsatisfactory performance. It has been made explicit now that if you have an overall rating score of 9 or lower, your performance is unsatisfactory. That would require a performance improvement plan to be implemented. Anyone with an unsatisfactory rating overall is not eligible for the across the board salary increases until they have changed that. Signatures are required on all performance appraisals. Forms will not be accepted without required signatures. They will be sent back. Mike Herbstritt said it had been brought to their attention that some employees were not receiving a copy of their performance reviews. We are encouraging all supervisors to give the employee a copy of their review when they meet. Employees have the right to get a copy. All supervisors will have an opportunity to participate in training sessions regarding performance reviews. We will be rolling out hopefully in the next few days a three part compensation training for all supervisors. Part one will talk about; Compensation philosophies, policies related to compensation, briefly mention the link between pay and performance and compensation guidelines. Part two expected to roll out at the end of the month or shortly after the first of February will be based on performance appraisals and linking pay and performance. Part three expected to roll out around the end of March, goes into more detail on policy and process. All supervisory staff with the Institute of Agriculture will be required to take the training online. We hope the training will be completed in time for some of the appraisals. Election of ERC Members There are currently two vacancies on the Employee Relations Committee. An election will be held to fill these. Virginia Bleazey with Vet Med retried and this position will be filled. Leslie Harrington representing Central Region Program Assistants is no longer with UT and this position will also be filled. Betty Mullins is working with Dr. John Toman 5

6 to send out the election ballots within the next week. We hope to have these representatives on board for the next ERC meeting. To improve the communication between the ERC and their represented groups the Minutes for each meeting will be posted in the same week as the meeting. Minutes will be posted to ERC website. Representatives may send any issues to Dr. Byrd or Betty Mullins when they are received. This will help us to possibly address issues sooner. Tentative Schedule for 2014 ERC Meetings (Meetings are held quarterly in room 102 Morgan Hall beginning at 3:00 p.m. EST. Notice is sent out prior to meetings for submission of agenda items.) January 8, 2014 April 9, 2014 July 9, 2014 October 8, 2014 Meeting Adjourned 6