Five Ways to Enhance the Effectiveness of HR Design

This fall marks my ninth academic year at UW–Madison. During my time here I’ve experienced our human resources system in many ways—as a new mother seeking a maternity leave (twice), as a temporarily disabled employee in need of a leave, as a frustrated faculty member seeking a raise, and multiple times as the director of a large research project trying to hire and retain qualified classified and academic staff. I know firsthand that the system needs to change in order to realize our campus goals of equity, efficiency, and effectiveness.

That is why I have taken seriously the HR Design team’s request for input from shared governance units, spending significant time studying the plan, and commenting on it in multiple venues. I think further adjustments to the current plan are required, because my own knowledge of higher education reform efforts and the scholarly literature on work and organizations suggests that as currently formulated it will have significant unintended consequences, eroding some of what we value most about our university. Therefore, I am providing five recommendations for revising the plan so that UW–Madison’s approach to the management of human resources continues to reflect an ethos that prioritizes egalitarianism over ego, and recognizes that our greatest resource is our communal passion for and commitment to our work, rather than the competitive yet aimless striving for prestige that has overcome many of our peer institutions.

Recommendation 1:Expand the plan’s current living wage provisions to include workers at businesses receiving university contracts of $5,000 or more and student hourly employees.

The current plan calls for the implementation of a living wage policy that omits two groups: student hourly workers and contracted employees. Including contracted employees would bring the policy in line with the City of Madison’s living wage provisions. Their exclusion creates an incentive for the university to outsource more functions, which may increase efficiency but will also erode job security. In addition, providing a living wage to contractors and students helps ensure at least a modicum of equity among all people working in our community.

           

Recommendation 2: Revise the compensation philosophy guiding the plan to make internal equity and collective performance the primary, rather than secondary, compensation drivers.

The current plan repeatedly emphasizes enhancing “individual potential, opportunity, and achievement,” which, while important, overlooks the critical role played by teamwork in providing high-quality learning experiences and producing innovative research. The 21^st century research university increasingly requires collaboration across disciplines and units, creating work environments where people trained in different disciplines (and who are thus part of different labor markets) work alongside each other. The plan briefly acknowledges this, but the compensation strategies it outlines focus first on the role of market competitiveness (noting that it will be a factor in establishing compensation) and only secondly (and far less frequently) on internal equity. The roles of these factors should be reversed in each section. After all, the compensation work team (which, as an aside, did not include any non-administrator faculty members) recommended that market value be considered in setting wages but said nothing about de-valuing or de-emphasizing equity (although it appears the committee did not consider alternative, equity-focused models of compensation at all). It is reasonable that the committee wanted to add market-based pay to the mix of compensation drivers. However, the extent to which this driver should be emphasized, and how to assess cross-departmental collaborations taking into account diverse disciplinary “markets,” are very complex questions deserving a more careful work.

Recommendation 3: Require mandatory training for all managers tasked with setting employee compensation and/or benefits.

Given the highly decentralized nature of the plan, managers will almost always be faculty members, and yet most would acknowledge that they are not trained for or comfortable with performing human resources functions. The compensation work group noted this among its concerns, stating, “Another concern is that not all faculty and staff supervisors will assume responsibility to fairly, objectively and consistently implement formal performance evaluation processes.” This is too important a role to be left to the untrained, but the efficacy of this plan relies exclusively on their responsible participation in the training. It is especially important to give managers guidance about how to conduct and utilize market analyses in departments and units where scholars from different disciplines work side by side (thus creating much potential for internal inequity), and also to train them in assessing the comparable worth of similar yet unequal tasks. The current plan notes that a lack of training for managers was named as a problem in the listening sessions and mentions the training of hiring managers, but says nothing about rigorously training those who set compensation.

Recommendation 4: Alter the recommendation in the plan associated with shared governance to focus on joint decision making rather than advice and input.

The recommendations on shared governance, particularly with respect to development of the compensation pay plan and changes in benefits (leave, insurances, etc.) stress that the shared governance institutions, specifically that of the newly created University Staff, provide advice and input to the administration afterthe plan is developed. This is not indicative of a collaborative or shared governance model. While at many institutions shared governance merely requires the involvement of faculty, staff, and students as listeners and occasional speakers, this is not the historic practice at Madison and shared decision-making responsibilities should not be eroded through changes to language in specific plans like these.

Recommendation 5: Require mandatory performance reporting and accountability metrics for the new HR System.

At minimum, the plan should explain which reports should be produced and what consequences will be associated with performance. For example, public annual reports should assess changes in internal equity (between faculty and staff, among groups with regard to gender and race), faculty and staff turnover, and the absolute and relative number of positions that are university employees versus contractors. These reports should be presented to both the Faculty Senate and the Academic Staff Assembly (and the shared governance body of the University Staff), and the senior leadership council should describe what responses to the plan will take place should inequity, turnover, outsourcing, or other negative unintended consequences of the new HR design emerge or worsen.

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More on the Efforts to Marketize UW-Madison

A few months ago I wrote about the HR Design process at UW-Madison.  Some readers questioned the accuracy of my assertions.  We have new confirmatory information obtained via open records requests.  It seems the Huron Engagement has been expensive, indeed.   In the following memo, the Wisconsin University Union summarizes what we now know. It's a bit long, so I have underlined and bolded key points.


To: Interested campus employees
From: WUU
Date: June 20, 2012
RE: Memos from Huron Consulting Group

As you may know, Wisconsin University Union (WUU) has filed a series of open meeting and open requests to UW administration to gain access to information on the HR Design Project (the Project).  We initiated these requests because we believed that the effects of the Project will likely be far-reaching and long-term and that despite the administration’s attempt to project a gloss of participation and transparency to the process, it was fundamentally top-down and opaque.

When the administration finally complied with our request, we were disappointed, though not surprised, that most of the documents added little if anything to our knowledge base. For example, minutes of meetings described the topics under discussion but gave no account of the discussions themselves. The exception to this lack of transparency were memos from Huron Consulting Group (HCG) to the Project managers. These memos very briefly summarized the week’s events and posed concerns and questions on the future work of the Project.

For this reason, a month ago, we filed a new request for records specifying HCG memos to administration along with a request for their billings to the UW. After a month wait, we received the records this week.

The memos did not disclose a “smoking gun.” Instead, they confirmed much of what we know about the potential effects of the recommendations.  The following are excerpts of the HCG memos:

(5/3/2012) The work teams are proposing a “contemporary” but not radical approach to HR management at a research university. The model puts greater emphasis on performance and employee development and shifts the focus from internal equity to external competiveness.

The implied shifts for HR management implied (sic):
• Greater emphasis on data and analysis (over set rules)
• Greater reliance on the skills of managers/supervisors
• Ongoing development of central HR as a center of excellence

I (from the HCG staff member) don’t have a good sense of the project team’s appetite for this type/level of change. If this does turn out to be the direction you choose to go, substantial pieces of it will be phased in over time. Still, it represents a significant amount of change that will to be championed by OHR and supported through the application of potentially significant resources.


(5/10/12) Compensation, Performance Management and Workplace Flexibility all have suggestions related to boards or committees being involved in appeals of decisions that impact employees. Ongoing governance (small “g”) of HR functions and processes will be a topic that we need to address over the summer. This is an area where I expect that the campus community will want more specificity in the fall.

Understanding our resource requirements for the summer will evolve as our project plan evolves. At the same time, I would suggest that adding resources is an opportunity to start to build the long-term capabilities of OHR in areas such as compensation.

*****

These excerpts confirm a few of the central objections we have made in prior analyses:
• Salary equity will be abandoned in favor of labor market “competitiveness.”

• Compensation based on labor market analysis will require a substantial on-going investment to build capacity. It is difficult to estimate the cost for new HR staff members or more likely, consultants, to conduct wage and benefit analyses for hundreds of job titles.

• Supervisors and managers will have substantial new powers due to the major shift in compensation responsibility along with new discretionary authority in promotion, hiring, etc. This will require a major investment in training and, one would hope, oversight and supervision of the supervisors. What will be the safeguards against favoritism, discrimination and other adverse effects?

• HCG advises that, that because these new offices will be “substantial”, HR should build its new “empire” slowly and incrementally so as not to call attention to its long-term costs.

• Committees acknowledged that some form of dispute resolution methods will be necessary but have either not specified how this might occur or recommend that the dispute process be overseen by HR. The HCG seems to recognize that employees will likely want better answers.

Consultant Costs:
Billings to UW from HCG:
Nov. 2011: $32,751
Dec. 2011: $154,738
Jan. 2012: $61,714
Feb. 2012: $93,798
Mar. 2012: $89,976
Total:     $432,977

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The Continued Marketization of UW-Madison

Last year, I wrote extensively about efforts led by former Chancellor Biddy Martin and her administration, donors, and alumni to privatize (or at least semi-privatize) the University of Wisconsin-Madison.  That effort was partially successful, for while Martin and colleagues failed to separate Madison from the rest of the UW System, or gain authority over tuition setting, they did succeed in getting Madison the authority to redesign its human resources system.  This new "flexibility" was praised by many on campus, including staff, faculty, and students, who recognize that the current bureaucracy is not working, especially for those outside of administration.

So, this year the Human Resource Design Project has been advertised as a tremendous opportunity, hard won, and far better than the alternative -- the status quo.  Perhaps.  But few reforms are without consequence, and the recommendations recently offered by the working teams in HR Design suggest this case is no exception.  In fact, the potential long-term effects of this redesign process may result in an very different university culture, one that is far less progressive than Madison has historically been known for.  Instead, the recommendations will likely aggressively speed-up Madison's transformation (I'd say descent) into a market-driven institution focused first and foremost on serving its paying customers.

Some specifics of the recommendations have been discussed over at Sifting and Winnowing and so I direct you to read the details there.  For example, the recommendations include combining the currently unionized classified staff and academic staff into one.  As severals members of the HR working teams point out, this has significant implications for the protections held by unionized workers: "If the state legislature does not amend these statutes, the combining formerly classified staff–the custodians, the office secretaries, financial specialists–into the employee category academic staff will take away the few remaining collective bargaining rights that they have fought and bargained for about 50 years."  Both the classified staff and the academic staff object to this recommendation.

Another recommendation focuses on the distribution of employee pay based on labor market analyses. As members of the Wisconsin University Union point out, this can mean many things-- some resulting in even lower pay for UW-Madison workers.  "There is no standard labor market for any group or individual occupations (with the exception of building trades). There are often valid arguments to be made for or against choosing one group over another. However, choice of a particular labor market as the standard will frequently determine the result."  Crucially, the current recommendations say nothing about providing cost of living increases to all employees, nor is there any consideration of years of experience with good performance.

Furthermore, the proper implementation of these recommendations will likely grow the size of central administration -- not reduce it.  National studies indicate that growth in central administrations are the source of much of the increasing costs of college attendance, so we need to pay special attention here.  According to Joel Rogers, professor of Sociology, “Done properly, the task of specifying the real human capital requirements of hundreds of UW job titles; identifying jobs with the same requirements in external labor markets; collecting all relevant data on their compensation from private employers; and doing all this continuously enough to capture relevant changes, job titles, compensation practices, and labor market boundaries and participants is a massive amount of work."

Finally, despite promises to the contrary, these recommendations involve cuts to employee compensation.  Specifically, academic staff will see their vacation benefits reduced.  As ASEC has pointed out, "newly employed academic staff will lose nearly 52 hours of vacation/personal time under this proposal. Children attending MMSD have 16 days of vacation that do not coincide with the UW’s current holiday schedule, which means a single parent would have four days of vacation left (after caring for her/his child when local schools are not in session)."  And yet UW claims that employees will not move backwards under the new Design?

Now, to UW's credit, this has been a somewhat transparent process.  Many public forums have been held, and there are many ways to provide input.  The 11 working groups on this effort involved many people-- however, a closer look indicates that the vast majority (perhaps 2/3rds) are people currently in HR in the administration--in other words there were not many faculty or union-represented workers involved.  Furthermore, participation among those on the work groups has been reportedly hampered by meeting times occurring early in the morning (e.g. before childcare begins) and during work hours.

Moreover, there has also been a continuation of last spring's approach in communicating with campus members-- administrators tell us what's "important" and "smart" without providing hard facts about the evidence on why.  Where does this proposed structure of titles come from? Where is the data regarding the effects of this sort of market-driven approach versus alternatives?  There is very little data given anywhere to back up the contentions in the recommendations, despite the very expensive contributions made by the Huron Consulting firm, hired under Martin to assist with this work.  The rhetorical approach is led by Robert Lavigna, who speaks about the importance of ensuring that the new system can attract and retain "the best talent."  He utilizes the language of "flexibility", "efficiency," and "effective."  He promises a "greater connection between compensation and performance."  In other words he talks a lot like Biddy Martin, and others like her who are bringing business practices to education.

Thus, one key thing that the new HR Design highlights is that the neoliberal politics embodied in Biddy Martin were not hers alone, and that her efforts were indicative of a broader market-driven culture amongst those who surrounded and hired her, which continues to prevail in today's UW-Madison (and indeed globally).  These recommendations were issued, and are being systematically advanced, despite her departure.  That is something we all must pay close attention to, as these political maneuverings will likely continue to shape the next stages in Madison's development- especially the upcoming chancellor search.  Who will be in charge there? What "facts" will we be provided? What role will faculty, staff, and students play, relative to the roles played by WARF, donors, alumni, and administrators?

A thoughtful approach to considering the desirability of the marketization of Madison requires our entire community think about (1) What are the full set of alternative options under consideration? (2) What evidence is being presented about the likely intended and unintended consequences of each option? and (3) Who exactly stands to benefit, and in what ways, from each option?

Notably, these are not the kinds of questions Huron (our highly-paid consultant) is known for asking and answering. Instead, Huron emphasizes a one-directional model in which administration directs the activities of faculty and staff.  Laura Yaeger, VP at Huron, has said that "universities are getting a better understanding of what activities add value to students and stakeholders while  providing clearer guidelines for staff and faculty about which programs and activities should be supported."   Does that sound like shared governance to you?  Who are those stakeholders?

We are repeatedly being told that our backs are against the wall, and this is our only choice.  Don't listen to talk like that-- you are too smart.  This new Design is neoliberalism at its finest, justifying marketization as a form of self-defense, redefining all interactions within the educational institution as essentially business relationships. We, the faculty and staff and our traditional protections, are being identified as the obstacle to market-based efficiencies.  The ultimate goal is to make UW-Madison less dependent on us.  This gives private investors greater opportunities to profit from state expenditures, while influencing the form and content of education. And it makes business and university administrators the main partnership, redefining student-professor relations.

It is imperative that educators and students across UW-Madison begin to understand and draw attention to how funding priorities, public-private partnerships, tuition and fees, cost-benefit analysis, performance indicators, curriculum changes, and new technologies change the content of academic work and learning, and how they collectively arise from global efforts to discipline academic labor for capital. The changes to Madison's human resources system, and to its operations more broadly, are intimately linked to employment opportunities in Dane County and elsewhere, and to the kinds of education and services we deliver to the state.  If we are going to be market-driven in how we educate and serve Wisconsin, what we provide will be undoubtedly more unequally distributed.  Everyone should have something to say about that. As Lavigna has said "This system will affect everyone on this campus."  He's serious. You need to pay attention.

PLEASE: Send your feedback on HR Design to hrdesign@news.wisc.edu

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