Please respond to the all-staff 'consultation' on the grading process

We invite you to contribute to the all-staff, anonymous 'consultation' on the grading process launched by UCL on 8 June 2017 (closes 5pm 23 June).

See The Week@UCL and the UCL Staff News website article.

We are proposing that colleagues respond to the consultation and when doing so score the Likert scale questions 1 -  6 as 'N/A' and add a comment that expresses:

• concerns about the timing (end of term), two-week duration (Academic Board are still discussing the Promotions Framework) and methodology of the 'consultation' process (leading questions) - this is too important to be rushed;
• support for the direct route to HERA panel re-grading (which has important equalities implications) and for the HERA grading of new roles;
• further concerns about the intersection of this 'consultation' with the reorganisations that are very likely to arise from the TOPS programme.

We believe that the consultation has been launched now to enable future reorganisations arising from the TOPS change programme.

Representatives from campus trade unions were first approached by UCL to discuss the grading process in December 2014. UCL proposals were discussed at working group meetings in April and June 2015 and via several email exchanges since. Importantly no agreement has been reached and the Joint Consultation and Negotiation Group, which met the day before the 'consultation' was launched, has not seen the proposal now being put to staff. Representatives from campus trade unions have written to UCL asking that the 'consultation' be halted pending further discussions but UCL has refused.

We know that TOPS is a two-stage process, that the second phase will implement the findings of the first and there will be a separate tender exercise to select the consultancy firm that will implement phase two.

Any reorganisation process arising from TOPS will be on a scale hitherto unknown at UCL. No private sector consultancy firm will want to work with the current HERA grading process (see Appendix 1 below) for both practical and ideological reasons.

Prior to phase two of TOPS UCL is helpfully proposing to bury the HERA panel grading process under several layers of management assertion.  New roles will be graded by managers and change consultants simply asserting a grade and doing so in a financial environment that strives to create a surplus (profit) to pay for UCL's speculative expansion into UCL East.

Members are invited to compare and contrast what is being proposed with the current grading process.

Moreover, regrading is the only recognised route to promotion for Professional Services staff at UCL. Though one of the three ostensible aims of TOPS is to provide staff with 'more fulfilling careers' consider the following section in the grading process document linked to from the consultation site under the heading 'Grading professional services jobs at UCL' (our emphasis):

"In all cases below, where the grading check results in a higher grade being allocated to an agreed job description, the post itself may not be re-graded as a result.  The line manager can decide that some higher level duties should be removed or re-allocated to ensure no member of staff is being asked to take on responsibilities above their current grade.  This might happen, for instance, if the budget available would not cover the additional costs of a regrading."

Perhaps UCL does not consider promotion of Professional Services staff as part of providing staff with 'more fulfilling careers'?

We do recognise that colleagues have concerns about the current grading process, especially those involved in recruitment. Staff turnover has undermined continuity of expertise though this has been exacerbated by the recent reorganisation in Human Resources that saw many long-serving colleagues leave.

Colleagues are encouraged to forward this email and to raise these issues in conversation.

Appendix 1 - what is HERA (Higher Education Role Analysis) role analysis?
Role analysis (also known as job evaluation) is a systematic approach used to determine the relative value (or size) of roles within an organisation by measuring the demands and responsibilities of the role (but not the performance of the individual undertaking the role). The analysis is undertaken by a panel of three trained specialists and the process can be appealed. Since the conclusion of the Pay Framework agreement in 2005/6 UCL, in common with other universities, has used HERA to facilitate the role analysis process.

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