Career Path Modernization FAQs

The University’s new job structure was developed in close partnership with Mercer, a global human resources consulting firm with expertise across industries including a specialization in health care and higher education. The process included interviews and feedback from leaders and staff across the organization, and an evaluation of University data and job descriptions. It leveraged Mercer’s experience with best practices at peer organizations.

Following thorough internal and external assessments, Mercer brought their extensive knowledge to collaborate with University Human Resources and developed a draft job structure to meet the University’s needs.

Mercer, in partnership with HR, then led a series of workshops with leadership-identified staff members from across the organization who are closely familiar with the variety of jobs that exist here. The workshops generated valuable input on the job structure, supporting tools, and how jobs will be mapped to the structure.

The new job structure was then reviewed by key stakeholder groups (Steering Committee, Advisory Committee, Genesee Staff Council, Faculty Senate Executive Committee) before being shared with leadership (Steering Committee, Senior Leadership Group, and Cabinet) for review and approval.

The new job structure continued to be refined prior to CPM implementation as we validated jobs and then mapped them to the new structure in a second round of workshops with leadership and key department contacts.

The structure is also designed to evolve over time as our jobs change.

Job levels and pay grades are two distinctly different things. In our old structure, they were represented as one and the same, but in the new structure, employees have both job levels and pay ranges.

Job levels are based on the job responsibilities and scope. Each job level takes into consideration a variety of factors such as the level of influence the job is responsible for, the problem-solving requirements, and the decision-making requirements. Pay ranges will reflect how the market compensates jobs with comparable responsibilities.

Pay ranges include an assigned minimum and maximum compensation amount (whether the position is paid hourly, on a salary basis, or otherwise) and are wide enough to accommodate a variety of experience and performance levels. All employees can expect to be paid within the minimum and maximum pay figures associated with the job’s pay range. However, if someone’s pay is currently above the maximum compensation amount of their newly established pay range, their pay will not be decreased as a result of the CPM project.

Through the CPM project, we broke up these job classifications, realigning people to new or alternative job profiles (formerly classifications) that better represent the work they are doing. An example of this may be “Grants Administration,” or “Practice Supervisor”. In the process, each new job profile is aligned to the appropriate job level, job family, and pay range, giving us the opportunity to better assess pay internally as well as against the external market.

A collaborative approach has been utilized to ensure that profiles are based on accurate information, including input from supervisors and staff.

The job classification validation process incorporated evaluation from both employees and managers to ensure job descriptions accurately reflected the work being done and the expectations of responsibilities for the position.

In the future, when new jobs are created, new tools will guide consistency in how jobs are placed in the new job structure. A leveling guide provides common criteria for determining which job level is appropriate based on the job’s responsibilities, scope, and requirements. Similarly, job family group and job family definitions provide clarity on how to organize similar job functions together. These tools have and will be used consistently during each job evaluation, which will lead to consistency in how jobs are placed in the new structure and how staff are classified.

Pay ranges apply to an entire job profile so everyone in a specific job profile has the same pay range. The new structure will also add a separate level for each job, which is an important distinction from the old structure.

We have also put in place a new Compensation Governance Committee, which will help to guide future decisions and shifts in compensation as modifications and changes are needed.

Yes. This project included developing consistent titling guidelines to ensure transparency, consistency, and clarity in identifying a job’s functions, levels, roles, and responsibilities. This work has included developing protocols regarding how titles can be used internally, as well as externally for recruiting purposes.

Yes. The new job structure adds “career streams” to help differentiate between jobs that involve managing people and jobs that involve managing projects. Career streams are a component of the job structure that represent career types within the University, characterized by distinct responsibilities. Some examples of career streams are clinical, associate, and leadership.

The new job structure will provide a clear, consistent, and relevant approach to how jobs are organized. This enables visibility into the jobs and pay ranges at the University so employees can better assess the direction they would like to take their careers. Jobs will be organized by:

• career streams (career types characterized by distinct responsibilities, such as clinical or management)
• job levels (jobs with a similar level of responsibility, such as organizational impact, complexity, and experience)
• job family groups and job families (jobs that are in a similar function)
  • Examples of family groups include:
    • research – with job families such as clinical research and research labs,
    • clinical – with job families such as ambulatory and cardiology;
    • academic & student services – with job families such as academic advising and financial aid; and
    • financial services – with job families such as accounting and financial planning & budgeting.

In addition, consistent titling practices were developed to increase transparency and align titles with the function and work being done. This provides staff with accurate information to assist with career planning. Titles consistent to industry standards are important to properly benchmark to external markets and allows potential candidates to better understand the position for which they are applying.

Through the CPM project, a job library was developed that will allow employees to access job profiles (including the core responsibilities and qualifications of a job) for jobs across the University. This will provide a clearer understanding of what is required for a given job – a foundational aspect of career development.

Jobs were assessed against our new job leveling guides to determine which level the job fell in within our new structure. Titles are associated with job levels so that if a job is posted, for example, a “director” position, a staff member will know what level that job is without even having to look it up.

Education is a contributing factor in how jobs are leveled. However, it is not a factor in determining which level of a job a staff member is aligned to. Leveling is based off the responsibilities and scope of a position rather than the qualifications of the individual. Having a structure aimed at identifying opportunities for professional growth is meant to empower staff with advanced degrees to take on roles that meet their personal and professional objectives.

The CPM project website will continue to provide updates on a more aggressive timeline as we move closer to implementation in January 2024. Once the project is no longer a “project” (in other words, once it is through its initial implementation phase), education, job elements, pay range tables, the pay administration guidelines, and the new Compensation Philosophy will all live more permanently on the Compensation page of the Human Resources website. 

Job descriptions will be viewable via a link on those same webpages (The new people management system). myURHR will eventually add enhanced visibility and access to many of these elements right from your personal employee dashboard. In the meantime, your pay range and job elements will be available in HRMS in January 2024.

Career streams organize, at a high level, jobs with distinct similarities in the nature of work performed. There are five career streams. Refer to our Job Structure webpage to learn more about career streams. 

An employee in the Professional career stream may lead or organize the work of other employees or manage processes and programs and have up to two people reporting to them, whereas an employee in the Leadership career stream has three or more reports. It’s a commonly accepted practice that someone with three or more reports is primarily focused on managing others, while someone who manages one or two people typically spends a significant amount of time on individual contributor work. Students are not included as reports. Anyone in the reporting chain rolling up to you is considered your report. For example, if you have one direct report who has two direct reports, you have three reports and are, therefore, in the Leader career stream.  

The new job structure has 12 job levels that represent the hierarchy of jobs. A job level reflects the job’s responsibilities. Job levels are common to the entire organization, while job levels within career streams are specific to a particular career stream—Clinical, Associate, Professional, Leadership, and Senior Leadership.

Job levels are determined by five factors: organizational impact, communication and influence, innovation and complexity, leadership and talent management, and knowledge and experience. There are specific guidelines for each factor at each job level to drive consistency in how jobs are leveled across the organization. It’s important to note that job leveling factors describe the foundational attributes of the job—not the performance of the individual in the job.

If you believe your job may need a business title, share your perspective with your manager. Your manager, and your department designee and Compensation as appropriate, will consider the situation in accordance with the University Staff Titling Guidelines and determine whether a business title is applicable. Please see the Business Title Request Process for details.

You are not required to get a new badge, but as always, you are able to do so when your job title changes. Please follow the standard process for obtaining a new badge. There is no department charge for new badges due to a change in job title. 

It is important that jobs reflect commonly used titles in the external market for two major reasons. One is that the job should be identifiable for job seekers. We have received consistent feedback over the years from job seekers that our titles don’t reflect the external market, so it can be hard to identify opportunities at the University that align with individual skills and experience. Secondly, job titles should reflect job responsibilities. This is important when identifying the proper market data to guide pay.

A new Compensation Philosophy defines the University’s guiding principles on compensation and acts as a framework for consistent pay decisions. The Compensation Philosophy is administered and maintained by the Compensation Governance Committee, comprised of senior leadership from across the University to ensure it aligns with the needs of the organization both now and in the future. It is published on the CPM website and available to staff.

Our new job structure utilizes a market-based pay alignment methodology. Jobs are aligned based on the level, scope, and requirements of the roles and evaluated against their defined markets regularly, to ensure competitive pay.

The CPM project has also established new Pay Administration Guidelines to implement best practices that align with our Compensation Philosophy, new job structure and new pay structure.

Yes, new pay ranges were developed in Phase 4 of the CPM project. After the new job structure was created and jobs were mapped to it, we compared our jobs to the external market and created a new pay structure – including pay ranges that better reflect the market.

Yes. The new job and pay structures enable a much greater degree of transparency. The pay ranges are published on job postings, in HRMS, and on the compensation website to create transparency and support career planning. Staff, and the general public, have the ability to see pay ranges, levels, and job descriptions for all in-scope staff jobs.

Pay at the structural level has changed in two fundamental ways:

1. Every job has been assigned a new pay range based on a comprehensive review of the market for that job.
2. Pay range minimums and maximums were shared for each job with the individuals in those jobs and on job postings starting in September 2023. Effective January 2024, we have posted and shared the new full pay range table with ranges developed through the CPM project for all staff roles.

Staff should not expect their pay to change with the implementation of the CPM project. We will continue to review pay rates based on internal continuity, placement within the range, job market, and University feasibility.

We are constantly assessing pay, even under the current pay structure. Throughout the year, we participate in salary surveys through national and local vendors to better benchmark the University’s pay against that of other institutions. Pay is and will continue to be adjusted based on market position, recruitment trends, and affordability.

This new structure ensures we are aligning jobs to market demands and will support the annual budget planning process so that we can plan for growth proactively where and when needed.

Having a structure that allows us to assess each job in our structure against its individual pay market, combined with having assurance that staff are sitting in the job that best represents the nature of their work, allows us to analyze and plan accordingly.

With pay ranges moving in alignment with their respective markets, the University may provide a lump sum payment, instead of a base payment increase in the amount of the merit earned where individual compensation exceeds the top of the range by 20% or more. This is to ensure that the University maintains a fair and market aligned pay structure while still rewarding employees for their contributions throughout the year.

Pay range transparency is when an employer provides specific information about the range of pay for a job within the organization. Generally, this is the minimum and maximum amount the organization will pay for a job.

The University feels that it is important to provide pay transparency in order to support fair, equitable and consistent compensation practices and to support staff career planning. The Career Path Modernization (CPM) project enabled pay transparency at the University.

A pay range establishes the minimum and maximum rate of pay for jobs aligned to that pay range. Pay ranges are based on market data and movement of the ranges take into account not only the market data for a job but also the University’s financial ability to increase ranges.

The compensation program’s salary ranges are wide enough to accommodate a variety of experience and performance levels, and all employees can expect to be paid no less than the range minimum for their job. The University will continue to review and adjust market benchmarks for jobs on an annual basis and may make changes to pay ranges and staff wages as a result.

A job’s pay range may have changed when the Career Path Modernization (CPM) project launched in January 2024, as the team continued to refine how jobs were aligned in the new job and pay structures. Additionally, as some staff members were moved to new job profiles, the range they were aligned to may have changed as well.

A staff member’s salary will not be reduced as a result of Pay Range Transparency or the Career Path Modernization project.

Two jobs with the same job level could have different salary ranges because the external market for each role assigns different pay ranges to the two jobs.

When an individual’s compensation exceeds the top of the range by 20% or more, the University may provide a lump sum payment, instead of a base payment increase as part of the annual merit program. This ensures that the University maintains an equitable and market-guided pay structure while still recognizing employees’ contributions throughout the year. As the ranges move over time, an individual may once again fall within the range and become eligible for base pay increases.

The University’s merit practices will not change as a result of CPM. The University’s merit program is outlined in the pay administration guidelines.

You can access your job profile information in HRMS by following these steps:  

1. Log into HRMS
2. Click Main Menu on the upper toolbar
3. Select Self Service 
4. Select Job Structure Alignment

If the access path isn’t working for you, you can access your job information directly by clicking here. You can also clear your web browser cache, close and re-open your web browser, and then follow the access path again.

Updates to job summaries and required knowledge and experience are underway and will be added to the Job Catalog in March 2024.

Updates to the essential duties of jobs are underway and will be included in the Job Catalog in Fall 2024.

Job profiles (job classifications) have been reviewed with input from subject matter experts, designees, managers, and HR to ensure proper placement for each staff member. However, in some instances, a staff member and their manager may believe that a different job profile (job classification) better matches the essential duties and responsibilities of their job. 

If you believe the job profile is correct but a business title may be warranted, please share your perspective with your manager. If further review is warranted, your manager, department designee, Compensation, and/or the Job Profile Appeals Committee will review when appropriate to determine whether an adjustment to your job profile (job classification) is required. Please see the Job Profile Appeals Process for details. 

The job classification (job profile) assigned to you will remain in place until your appeal has been resolved.

This indicates a legacy job code. Legacy job codes are used in HRMS to ensure benefits are not negatively impacted as a result of CPM. Legacy job codes share all other attributes with their non-legacy job code counterparts.

Learn more on the Resource Library page and by reviewing the questions in the Job Classification Validation section of the CPM FAQs.

All jobs that are part of the CPM project will be reviewed to ensure the classifications accurately reflect the nature of the work. Then all in-scope jobs will go through the process of being aligned to new job and pay structures.

Since the CPM project kickoff, the Project Team has been working in partnership with leaders, staff, and key stakeholders to review job descriptions to ensure they accurately reflect the work staff is doing.

An additional MyPath job classification validation exercise was utilized for jobs where there may be some degree of variability. The intent of this exercise was to ensure that staff members are in a job classification that best represents the work they do.

For example, the “Administrator” classification is known to include a number of different types of jobs. Several hundred job classifications went through the MyPath job classification validation process.

The success of the new job structure depends on jobs being classified in a way that accurately reflects the work being done, and on staff being placed in the correct job classification. The MyPath process utilized to validate that staff are in the correct job classification for CPM is outlined below:

1. Supervisors provide key information on positions that are in-scope. This includes information such as primary job responsibilities and supervisory requirements.
2. Each staff member in the position has an opportunity to review the key position information and to share any feedback with their supervisor.
3. Supervisors consider staff’s perspective and, if the supervisor agrees updates are needed to accurately reflect the key position information, they will update the form before submitting it.
4. Department-level reviews occur. The department leader(s), department designee that is assisting in the job validation process, and the HRBP determine the review process within the department. If it’s determined that adjustments to the key position information are appropriate, that will be discussed with the supervisor.
5. Following the department review, the University’s Compensation team (“Compensation”) reviews the information to validate the job classification.
   • First, Compensation groups similar jobs together to ensure alignment across the institution.
   • Compensation then compares the key position information to the current job classification.
   • If the current classification is not the most suitable match, Compensation compares the key position information to other existing jobs.
   • If a job classification doesn’t currently exist that accurately reflects the work being done, a new job classification will be created.

Compensation experts perform a multi-step review to ensure each position is classified correctly. For more details on the review process, please see Step 5 in the question above on the process for ensuring jobs and staff are classified correctly.

This exercise is focused on ensuring employees are assigned to the proper job classification or profile and will help to inform how a given position may evolve within the new job structure created by the CPM project how the new job structure evolves throughout CPM. Mapping of jobs to the new structural elements such as job families, career streams, and job levels will occur later in the project.

It is critical that we understand the work being done and accurately classify positions and staff members. Thousands of positions were submitted for review, and many need additional work to ensure a comprehensive understanding of the jobs. We are also allowing for time to thoroughly review positions that exist in various areas across the organization to ensure consistency in how jobs are classified. While the reviews take quite a bit of time, we believe this is one of the most important and inclusive steps in the CPM project.

Yes. We understand that over time, employees are asked to take on new responsibilities or change certain elements of their jobs. This is one of the reasons we will be asking supervisors and staff to help us validate the work being done so we can ensure accurate job information is documented and positions are classified correctly.

When the key position information is documented in MyPath, staff has the opportunity to review the information prior to its submittal and provide input on whether they believe anything significant is missing or misrepresented. Because the supervisor is responsible for determining work assignments on the team, they make the determination of whether updates are appropriate. If a staff member and/or supervisor needs support when working towards a shared understanding of the key position information, they utilize the department designee and/or the HR Business Partner for assistance.

An appeals process is available after positions are classified and communicated. A staff member will have the opportunity to submit specific reasons for the appeal.

No. No staff member will have to reapply for their current position as a result of the CPM project.

Positions that were not reviewed individually during the job validation exercise are being reviewed at the job level, and similar calibration, reviews, and input are being collected to ensure every job is accurately mapped to the right job elements such as level, pay range, title, career stream, and job family.

If staff in those jobs feel that their work has evolved beyond the job they are in, they should discuss with their managers so that the University can reassess where necessary.