University Business - May 2012 - (Page 17)

faculty code contains provisions that faculty members receiving a second unsatisfactory review can be terminated. While no process is perfect, she says the approach has produced teacher scholars, strong retention, and a tremendous amount of collaboration within and across schools within the university. She says faculty go about their work in collaborative ways instead of comparing notes on whether someone else’s piece of the pie is smaller or bigger. “The evaluation process provides feedback early on so if someone sees this isn’t the place for them, they get a good signal about that and that’s fair,” says Bartanen. “If the process is clear and ongoing, that deep investment really brings significant, positive results for students, and that’s what we’re here for.” • McMurry University (Texas) Like at many institutions, employee salaries at McMurry have remained flat since 2008, when the economy began its downward spiral. Back then, the university’s president sent an email to all staff stating, “We’re not looking for excuses to get rid of people, we’re looking for reasons to keep people,” recalls Lecia Hughes, director of HR at the institution, which supports 265 employees and faculty. “That totally shifted the mindset [of employees]. ... His message was that we’re not in a position to offer salary increases or give raises, but we’re not letting anybody go, either.” During a time when everybody was being asked to assume more tasks, HR began revamping its lengthy evaluation process for nonfaculty, turning it more into a conversation between supervisors and employees. The former evaluation process was cumbersome, shares Hughes. It required employees to identify not only their job responsibilities and established department standards for accomplishing those tasks, but also offer examples of how they’re meeting those standards. As did former evaluations, the new process identifies areas that employees excel in and areas needing improvement. The difference now is that employees are universitybusiness.com also being asked how the school can help them better perform their jobs. Training was among their top responses. So far, the school has implemented a leadership development series for supervisors and Microsoft Outlook training for clerical support staff. “We’re trying to take performance evaluation from, ‘These are all the things you’re not doing well,’ to where they take ownership of their performance,” Hughes says. “If we’re not talking to our employees about how their job duties are changing and how they’re reacting to those changes, then we’ve got jobs that aren’t getting done. We’ve got to have that engagement, that two-way street conversation to make sure we’re getting the best product out of our people.” ‘We’re not looking for excuses to get rid of people, we’re looking for reasons to keep people.’ —Lecia Hughes, McMurry University • The University of Toledo (Ohio) In the past, the university didn’t link employee evaluations to employee salaries. Employee evaluations were generic. Job descriptions and goals were reviewed. Supervisors offered suggestions for goal attainment and rated employees either satisfactory or not. Employees wrote a self-evaluation. Supervisors signed off on the evaluation. But it’s all changing, says Kevin West, the senior HR officer who co-leads UT’s HR and talent development department. “As HR looked across the institution at these evaluations, one of the things we found was there was not much disparity,” says West, adding that the school employs 7,000 staff and faculty on its three campuses, including its teaching hospital, Toledo Medical Center. “Managers and supervisors were spreading the peanut butter equally. Everybody was real vanilla. Everybody was the same.” Since only serious job deficiencies sur- faced in evaluations, HR introduced a way to distinguish between people’s job performance. Employees would be rated in five areas, referred to as pillars: Core responsibility; nimble and responsive; customer service excellence; professionalism and respect; and communication effectiveness. Supervisors would provide a detailed narrative about why any employee was rated high. And, if most of the staff in a department got a similar rating, HR would send back the evaluations to be redone. Reductions in state funding prevented UT from handing out across-the-board raises or cost-of-living allowances, so HR developed a rewards and recognition program that was tied to employee evaluations. Managers who wanted specific employees to be rewarded or recognized ensured their evaluations were detailed and accurate. Employees with high ratings received a one-time bonus, reflecting 4- to 7-percent of their salary. Those with low scores received a bonus that was less than 1 percent of their salary. Meanwhile, HR is focusing on different ways to solicit feedback regarding employee performance from other sources, such as students and hospital patients. For example, maybe patients can complete a survey about their hospital experience. Their response about a nurse’s or admissions clerk’s customer service efforts would then become part of their personnel file and available to their supervisor during the evaluation process. “The trap that HR falls into is that you’ve got a process you thought worked and was utilized by every unit,” West says. “But the process got stale. Sometimes supervisors need something new and exciting, a way to highlight great employees.” Do your evaluations differentiate between good and mediocre employees? Or, does everyone get the same raise regardless of performance? If the latter, maybe it’s time for a change. Carol Patton is a Las Vegas-based freelance writer who specializes in covering HR topics. May 2012 | 17 http://www.universitybusiness.com

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of University Business - May 2012

University Business - May 2012
Contents
Editor's Note
College Index
Ad Index
Behind the News
Human Resources
Education Gateways
Big Ideas
Reaching Higher
Admissions Goes Social
Learning Disabled Students Welcome
Who Goes There?
Computing Trends, Today and Tomorrow
Money Matters
End Note

University Business - May 2012