The University of Wisconsin-Madison released a revised version of the controversial Human Resources redesign plan Monday, which focuses on changes to enhance employee job security and further commit the university to continue considering campus input as the plan is implemented.
According to Bob Lavigna, redesign project team leader and director of Human Resources, the changes were based on feedback received from extensive campus engagement on the plan, which he said reached over 10,000 individuals since last spring.
Lavigna said the altered plan includes new components to increase job security for classified staff employees, which includes clerical and technical positions. These employees would be renamed “university staff” under the redesign.
These changes include a 30-day period in which classified staff who take a new position can return to a former position without penalty. The plan would also reinstate a policy that requires the university to find laid-off classified staff a similar position within the same division within a year.
Current classified staff member Gary Mitchell said these changes were a “step in the right direction,” but still said the lack of weight given to employee’s seniority rights would be a loss.
Additionally, Lavigna said his team made other small adjustments to the plan to further emphasize the importance of shared governance, especially regarding continued faculty, staff and student input as the implementation of the HR plan moves forward.
One change the plan would now require is that governance bodies be involved in the selection of a vendor to conduct a study that will serve as the basis for a comprehensive restructuring of the titles and compensation levels of employee positions.
“It was really a matter of emphasis to make sure that in all of the aspects of the plan it came through clearly that this would be something that we would implement in collaboration with all of the governance groups,” Lavigna said.
Other additions to the plan include a more formal emphasis that teaching and public service, as well as research, be considered in evaluating faculty compensation.
Sara Goldrick-Rab, sociology and educational policy studies professor and faculty senator, said this change is incredibly important to the plan, as faculty are often rewarded for being “research rockstars” but not “teaching rockstars.”
“I think the students should be very happy that the faculty pushed back and said ‘Hey, we want to be rewarded for teaching well,’” Goldrick-Rab said. “The students should be pushing for that so that more of us will focus on teaching well.”
The Faculty Senate is set to take a formal stand on the plan at its Dec. 3 meeting, before the Board of Regents votes on the plan Dec. 7.
Mitchell said there are plans to bring additional input from campus to the Board’s meeting.
“We don’t want anybody to believe that we think this is the end of the road,” Mitchell said. “We think this is an important part that we’ve gone down here, but we’re not done yet.”
If approved by the Board, the plan will move to the state legislature for final review.
