Title and Total Compensation Project Becomes Buzz of Senate Staff Meeting

A project that will change the vast majority of job titles and descriptions for all employees of the UW System raised numerous concerns among teachers and other staff members. The Title and Total Compensation project was not the only financial topic of the day.

University-Wisconsin Milwaukee Chancellor Mark Mone kicked off the meeting by stressing that the university’s future budgets need to prioritize planning on the freshwater collaborative between all University-Wisconsin schools headed by UWM, underrepresented minorities, and the talent needs for the state of Wisconsin. He also said the last 6-months set a record for the highest budgetary surplus in the school’s 63-year history.

Before leaving to attend a meeting with Milwaukee Public Schools officials about the partnership with UWM which Mone said helped MPS raise their graduation rates higher than ever in history, Mone and UW-Milwaukee Provost Johannes Britz asked the crowd why they think UWM faces higher student debt numbers than other UW schools.

The crowd responded by saying many students are part-time students and therefore take on more debt per credit taken while only working at their jobs enough to make ends meet. Many of these students still don’t make enough money to pay for their tuition and end up graduating with more debt than full-time students who just took out loans.

They also mentioned that students at UWM have a higher rate of poverty than other UW schools, causing more students to take on larger loans to pay for school and living expenses.

During his presentation, Mone pointed out that a recent UWM fundraiser generated $250,000 from 22,000 donors in the community.

“It’s a statement of faith,” said Mone, referring to the vastly greater number of donors in this most recent fundraiser. “It’s a statement of support from the community in UWM.”

The faith in one’s community Mone referenced earlier in the meeting was absent from many UWM employees when they were presented with an overview of the Title and Total Compensation Project later.

When your job title changes, it usually means you have been promoted at work and thus your pay changes accordingly. However, many UW-Milwaukee faculty and staff members are concerned about their titles and pay changing once the UW System is finished with its Title and Total Compensation project.

The project, run by the UW System Human Resources Department, is intended to go into effect as early as December of this year and the complete updated list of job titles and descriptions for UW System employees will go live in the Spring of 2020.

Many employees of UWM already had the chance to look at what their new job title and description will be and had concerns about the changes.

“What will not change?” asked Associate Vice Chancellor for the Human Resources Department at UWM Tim Danielson. “Individual pay will not change. Job duties and responsibilities employees complete will not change. Who an individual reports to will not change. Where an individual works will not change.”

One disgruntled university employee asked Danielson why the new job titles attached to jobs that require direct interaction with students are all the lowest paid positions for faculty members while administration positions continue to increase in pay. The employee went on to reference what Mone spoke about earlier regarding improving student success on campus.

The employee commented that this system of paying administrators far more than the people who actually help students learn, which is arguably the main objective of a public university, does not help improve student retention or create a strong community at UWM.

Danielson stated that he was unaware of any investigation into this issue.

Despite what Danielson said at the beginning of his presentation, university employees told him that many of the new job descriptions they are destined for do not apply to what they actually do at work.  

Danielson responded by informing them there is an interim period before the project and all of its standard job descriptions are finalized when employees can review their new title and job description with their manager. If both parties feel the description and title do not match the actual job they do, then an appeal can be made to UWM Human Resources. Human Resources will then ask the UW-System Human Resources Department to create a unique job title and description for that position.

“One example is that UW-Madison has a Golf Course Superintendent position because they have a golf course,” said Danielson. “That’s a job title that actually resonates within the golf industry and a job position that UW-Milwaukee doesn’t have because we don’t have a golf course.”

However, Danielson also noted the UW-System Human Resources Department will try to avoid creating unique job titles and descriptions because that would defeat the whole purpose of this project.

“What is changing?” asked Danielson, again referring to his PowerPoint presentation displayed for roughly 50 people. “Job titles, and standard job descriptions.”

The whole purpose of this statewide project is to make it easier to search for and hire new employees by using job titles and descriptions which are more widely accepted within the domain of each position. The project is also designed to make job benefits and pay within the UW System align with benefits and pay of similar jobs in the job market, as well as to create a clearer template for job progress and promotion.

By creating job titles and descriptions that are relevant within the profession of each respective job, the UW System will be able to compare the benefits and pay of its employees with other jobs on the market to make sure they are offering fair compensation. When job titles are so unique that the only person with such a job title works at UWM, it is impossible to come up with comparable benefits and pay structures based on market research.