Civil Service Rule 4, Section 2, provides for job evaluation questionnaires

Effective: December 2007

In the event that a Civil Service employee is dissatisfied with the results of a JEQ/JRQ evaluation process, Civil Service Rule 4, Section 2, provides the opportunity for the affected employee to appeal the job evaluation questionnaire results. It states that:

“The appropriate human resources office’s decision [on the requested reclassification] may be appealed by the employee within 45 calendar days after receiving the decision. Appeals must be made in writing to the Civil Service Committee.”

The Civil Service Committee’s guiding principles for the appeals process are:

* Reasonable consideration of internal consistency and equity

* Adequate and accurate information to support the judgments made

* A fair, straightforward, professional, and prompt appeal process

This process will be followed when a civil service employee makes a JEQ/JRQ appeal.

1. Office of Human Resources (OHR): To provide the employee notification of the right to appeal the JEQ/JRQ result, the letter from OHR documenting the reclassification decision will include the following language as its closing paragraph:

“You have the right to appeal this decision under Civil Service Rule 4, Section 2. If you wish to appeal this decision, you must contact the Civil Service Committee within 45 calendar days of the date of this letter. You must include your name and the following JEQ/JRQ number __________. Contact information for the Civil Service Committee via email at UM-USCS@lists.umn.edu. The current email addresses can be found at the committees’ web site http://www1.umn.edu/csc/.”

2. Civil Service Employee Appealing JEQ/JRQ: The employee must appeal to the Civil Service Committee either by email or in writing within 45 calendar days of the receipt of the letter from OHR. The appellant must include his or her name and the JEQ/JRQ number. Contact information for the Civil Service Committee via email at UM-USCS@lists.umn.edu.

3. Civil Service Chair: Upon notification of the employee’s intent to appeal, the Civil Service Chair will send an acknowledgement to the appellant and will request a scored copy of the JEQ or a copy of the JRQ form and the OHR written JRQ decision, the departmental organizational chart, supporting materials, and the job descriptions for the current and proposed position from the Compensation Director.

Upon receipt of the requested documents, the Civil Service Chair or designee will contact all who signed the JEQ/JRQ and the Compensation Director to set up an informal meeting to discuss the questions in dispute and will send copies of the related information to all parties. It is probable that not all who signed the JEQ/JRQ will need to be present at this meeting. The appellant may request that an additional member of the Civil Service Committee attend the meeting.

4. Compensation Director: Within 5 days of the informal meeting, the Compensation Director or designee will send notification to the Civil Service Chair and all meeting participants as to the outcome of the meeting.

5. Civil Service Chair: If the discussion and rescoring of the JEQ or the discussion of the JRQ results in an agreement regarding the classification decision, the Civil Service Chair will consider the matter closed.

If the discussion led to agreement on all disputed questions, but the rescoring of the JEQ or discussion of the JRQ still did not result in a change to the reclassification decision, the Civil Service Chair will consider the matter closed.

If there is still disagreement on the disputed questions and the reclassification decision, the Civil Service Chair will contact the employee to determine if the employee wishes to continue with the appeal process. If the employee wishes to continue, the Chair will then appoint a 3-member JEQ/JRQ appeal panel drawn from present and past CSC members to whom the JEQ/JRQ and related materials will be forwarded, and will designate one person as the coordinator. The appeal panel members will have been trained in the JEQ/JRQ procedures and job classification at the university prior to the appeal hearing initiation.

6. JEQ/JRQ Appeal Panel Coordinator: Within 5 working days of appointment, the JEQ/JRQ appeal coordinator will work to schedule a two to three-hour JEQ/JRQ appeal hearing with the participants of the informal meeting and the two other appeal panel members.

At the appeal hearing:

* All appropriate parties are present. The hearing is closed to the public.

* The appeal panel can only review the JEQ/JRQ questions being disputed. Other issues will not be deliberated.

* The appellant presents first and may take up to 30 minutes. The human resource representative presents second and may take up to 30 minutes.

* After the opening statements, the panel members may ask questions of the participants.

* As time allows and at the panel’s discretion, the participants are encouraged to present a summary at the end of the hearing before it adjourns.

7. JEQ/JRQ Appeal Panel Coordinator: Within 5 working days of the appeal hearing, the JEQ/JRQ appeal coordinator will respond in writing to the appeal participants, listing the questions in dispute and stating the panel’s decision with respect to each. In making its decision, the JEQ/JRQ appeal panel may choose an answer that differs from those discussed at the hearing. The JEQ/JRQ will be referred back to OHR for rescoring consistent with the decisions of the panel.

8. Compensation Director: Within 5 working days of the JEQ/JRQ appeal panel decision letter, the Compensation Director or designee will notify the participants of the final score and its impact on the appellant’s reclassification.