Following pressure from members in FHD, HR has run up the white flag and says it will restore cancelled market supplements as well as extend all FHD and FB supplements to June 30, 2023. HR is also now consulting AUFA about its new process for reviewing and renewing supplements. This post provides the most recent information that we have on this topic. Much of the information that follows comes from HR. Member should be cautious about accepting this explanation at face value.
For background, in October, AUFA discovered that AU had not renewed market supplements to many nurses in the Faculty of Health Disciplines (FHD), some with no notice. At least four faculty members received a resultant pay cut. Members in the Faculty of Business (FB) also reported that market supplement were being renewed until the end of March 2022 (instead of the usual five-year term). HR declined to provide any explanation for these changes or take any action to remedy them. Complaints to the Deans received an unhelpful, but ominous indication that the system was changing but that supplements were not guaranteed which only fed into fears.
What HR says it wanted to do
HR says its intention was to set up a new system for market-supplement renewals. Under this new system, all market supplements that expired in a given year would do so on June 30 of that year. Renewals would be based upon fresh market data that AU will receive in March of every year, as opposed to relying on their increasingly stale dated analysis.
In order to move from the current system of market supplements expiring at various dates during each expiry year, HR intended to bridge all supplements from their expiry date to the next June 30th. This was, HR says, intended to standardize the expiry dates, while continuing all existing market supplements.
What HR actually did
HR says that HR staff made a series of cascading clerical and communication errors. These included:
Renewing FB supplements to the wrong date (March 31, 2022), leading FB members to believe they were losing supplements or they would be short-term only.
Not telling payroll to continue FHD supplements until June 30, 2023, resulting in FHD supplements being terminated and pay cut off, sometime without notice.
Not giving any AUFA members who were affected any information about what was going on despite being asked about what was going on this by members.
Not giving Deans a clear message to give to their faculties, leaving them to ominously state “the system is changing, and nothing is guaranteed” which further fed member fear.
Ignoring two efforts by AUFA to flag this issue and failing to inform the Chief Human Resources Officer about AUFA’s concerns.
What will happen next
HR indicates it will take the following steps:
FHD members who saw their pay cut will have their supplements restored, extended to June 30, 2023, and receive back pay.
Ongoing market supplements in all faculties will be renewed until June 30, 2023 to allow the new system plenty of time before it kicks in. Any new supplements awarded before June 30, 2023 will have that date as their expiration date.
HR is in the process of contacting affected AUFA members to sort out fixes.
HR director Charlene Polege will send emails to affected faculties and attend meetings to answer questions.
HR is consulting with AUFA about a new process for reviewing market supplements which will award supplements by group rather than individual
Analysis
This incident tells several things. First, there are very serious questions about the competence of AU’s HR shop. It is almost unfathomable how HR staff could have so comprehensively screwed up the implementation of a straight-forward change. It is also almost impossible to believe that this problem went on for months, was the subject of multiple queries by AUFA members and AUFA, and, somehow, none of the senior HR team were aware of the problem. This speaks to the widespread culture of secrecy prevalent in university administration, and how it led HR staff to believe that a refusal to share useful information with affected members, Deans, payroll, and AU management was normal. In any other organization, terminations would flow from such a major screw up. It is unclear if there will be any consequences.
Second, member pressure works. The reasonably quick and comprehensive resolution that AU is offering was a direct result of AUFA members making their complaints public and pressuring decision makers. A flood of angry emails to the President, Provost, and Chief Human Resources Officer from FHD had a telling effect. Past history suggests that members would not have received a fast and comprehensive remedy if we relied on the grievance process. This has implications for how AUFA will handle problems going forward when HR ignores our initial communications.
Third, this issue is not resolved in two important ways. While HR has offered a resolution, this resolution has not yet been implemented. AUFA will be monitoring implementation and would appreciate hearing about any problems that members encounter. HR has also committed to consulting with AUFA about the new market-supplement renewal system that they are implementing.
AU’s consultation efforts around the 2019 designation policy change illustrate that AU can organize consultation in ways such that consultation is effectively meaningless and results in processes that harm the interests of AUFA members. The best way we can ensure that consultation is meaningful and does not result in harmful policies is a mobilized membership that will not tolerate these outcomes.
Finally, HR’s handling of this process has resulted in lingering damage. Member morale and trust in both HR and AU, which are low, have been further diminished. One member resigned in the wake of this issue, and despite the issue being resolved this was the last straw in terms of longstanding abuses from AU management. Market supplements are an issue rife with equity concerns over who or what is of value to AU. Although AUFA has always stated we would prefer supplements be on base salary, if we are to use this system, there are significant questions about its equity impact on the university and who is valued for what.
This was briefly highlighted when it was apparent the supplements simply vanished for the mostly female Faculty of Health Disciplines, while the mostly male Faculty of Business at least had the courtesy of the short renewals. Although this was unintentional and a result of mistakes made by two different HR Client partners, such is often the way of inequity. While mistakes do happen, the context in which this mistake happened (years of attacks on AUFA members by HR and AU) is important.
AU’s bargaining update last Friday tries to justify AU’s demand for rollbacks as necessary to implement the Imagine plan. Essentially, AU is saying that the Imagine plan requiring harming the interests of AU’s staff. That blunt messaging suggests our victory on market supplements is more about AU blinking in response to member pressure than any sort of meaningful re-evaluation of its broader approach to labour relations.
In solidarity,
Dave Powell, President