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Staff Compensation System - Pay philosophy

 

Guiding principles

The Western Michigan University Staff Compensation System must:

• Reflect and support WMU's mission.
  
• Be simple to administer and understand.
• Pay competitively with the relevant external labor market.
• Take internal equity into account, reflecting employee contribution and accountability.
• Focus on results.
• Support the shift, over time, to a performance-based system.
• Be flexible to meet the unique needs that may exist within the University, now and in the future.
• Be openly communicated to employees.

Internal equity and external competitiveness

WMU believes that it is important to consider both internal and external factors as pay decisions are made. Internally, importance should be placed on equity in relation to others in like jobs, as well as individuals' skills, knowledge, performance and job-related experience. Externally, the relevant labor market will be monitored to determine market movement, keeping in mind its effect on employees and their respective pay. The external market consists of other academic institutions and general industry employers with whom we compete for employees with relative skills and experience.

Labor market tracking

Human Resource Services will watch the job market closely. We track the market by participating in annual salary surveys and, wherever possible, obtaining salary information on "industry standard" positions, typically referred to as benchmark jobs, i.e., those jobs that are typical in higher education and other industries and are easily matched and compared to jobs at WMU. Surveys used for market pricing benchmarked positions must meet the following criteria:

• Includes data for relevant labor markets.
• Includes job descriptions—not just job titles—for each position.
• Sample size—reports data for a sufficient number of organizations and incumbents.
• Survey availability—survey conducted at regular intervals to ensure consistent data availability.
• Includes data based on median (50^th percentile) salary.

Results of salary surveys give us the range of pay found in the market for jobs similar to ours. On the basis of these data, Human Resource Services will review salary levels and ranges on a periodic basis to determine whether there is a need to adjust them, and will review jobs within specific job families to determine whether we are paying "at market."