Travis County Commssioners Court
March 9, 2004
The Closed Caption log for this Commissioners Court agenda item is provided by Travis County Internet Services. Since this file is derived from the Closed Captions created during live cablecasts, there are occasional spelling and grammatical errors. This Closed Caption log is not an official record the Commissioners Court Meeting and cannot be relied on for official purposes. For official records please contact the County Clerk at (512) 854-4722.
Item 6
6. Consider and take appropriate action to release a request for services for the analysis of human resources job titles for year 3 (fy 2004) job analysis project, classification and compensation strategic plan.
>> judge, this can be a really short discussion because it was going to be put on consent. But to be consistent with how I reacted to this during the budget process, I would just like to be able to have the opportunity to -- to register a no vote because I stilt believe it is expenditure of dollars that are premature because during this budget year we do not have any dollars related to compensation issues and so I -- so I wanted this to occur in a year when we actually do have dollars. So I just didn't want work to be done, dollars to be expended that would be premature and would have to be updated at additional cost when we actually do have dollars in our budget. So I'm -- I'm happy to -- for people to move ahead. I just want to be able to be consistent with my vote during the budget. Vote no.
>> the data wouldn't last. It would have to be updated at some point.
>> not necessarily. This is one of 10 job families that we are looking at as a part of your strategic plan that you approved. If indeed this title would not, this job family would not be reviewed, you would have nine others out there that are currently in progress now. We mentioned that the results on the other nine titles and job families would be ready for you in April. That was one of the -- one of the requests that you had made and we are working towards completing that. So if this is not approval for us to move forward with the analysis of this, this would be the only job title out of your fy -- out of your three-year strategic plan that would not have been reviewed as the others were.
>> our goal was to finish all of this work so if there was money for action next year --
>> that's correct.
>> -- work would have been done.
>> yes.
>> can we budget -- we did budget $10,000.
>> yes, it's in the h.r. Budget, we don't exceed that it will exceed the 10,000 that's currently allocated.
>> one thing that I might mention is the request to have this done is consistent with industry standards that an h.r. Department and staff would not examine its own titles. We have also checked with other comparables, ie bexar county, harris county and others, they, too, outsource this work in order to avoid any appearance of impropriety of staff evaluating their own titles.
>> you do it for the rest of the county. But as to hrmd it would be more objective --
>> yes.
>> otherwise you would basically be evaluating your own.
>> mr. Gieselman?
>> I just wanted to speak in favor of the study because this does not affect just the corporate h.r. I have h.r. Titles within t.n.r., As do other departments like the sheriff's department. So it's -- and many of my other positions in the department have been evaluated by the county h.r. Department. They are keeping up with the market in terms of the reclassification and the correct marketing. So I will be in a position if in study is not done of having certain positions within my department that have not even been looked at with regard to the market. I want you to o that it affects not just h.r. Corporate but other departments as well.
>> thank you, joe, for raising that point. I had it in my notes to mention to you there are of course 18 titles in h.r., Tso 11,ture and juvenile court respectively have six, the remainder spread between cscd, pretrial services as well as one other that I don't have in my note here.
>> my issue is strictly timing. I would be voting for this if the timing were different related to compensation because I voted for this in the past. So it's just for me. It's just a timing issue and I -- I fully respect that the court has made decisions during the budget. I just wants to be able to keep my votes consistent. We don't have to drag this out.
>> this will cover all of those dements, though.
>> yes, it would. Departments.
>> any more discussion? Move approval.
>> second.
>> judge, I just wanted to clarify that this will not be a formal request for services. That it will be done informally. We won't be advertising [indiscernible]
>> because of the amount basically.
>> yes. Thanks, cyd.
>> I guess one of the questions that I had, are these folks being evaluated as to their performance, have they gone through that process?
>> [inaudible - no mic]
>> but in the departments, they have all been evaluated.
>> the employees.
>> the employees. Have they all gone through the process or are these some of the folks that have been not evaluated regarding their performance as your previous report --
>> we are really working with two separate h.r. Functions here, performance evaluation on one side and then of course the analysis of the job title on the other. These titles, as all of the other positions would be up for evaluation.
>> I understand that they are separate. But still the previous report that we saw last week showed that some folks were not being evaluated in the performance to begin with. And so -- so have these folks been through the performance evaluations? I wonder?
>> we are crossing two different --
>> I understand what you are saying. [multiple voices] I'm wondering if these folks have gone through the process or just not been evaluated regarding the performance and now we are talking about changing their titles.
>> no, Commissioner, I believe that some clarification if I may separate the two functions.
>> I understand that, I understand that.
>> I'm not sure that I'm understanding.
>> I'm simply asking if they have been evaluated regarding their performance before we address their title change. In my mind that's what I'm asking, I I'm just wanting to know. Wondering.
>> I don't have that specific information available at this time. I would imagine that these title, just as other titles that we have looked at, have complied or addressed the performance appraisal mandate. And I know that you raced that question last week -- raised that question last week when left some impression that perhaps departments were not appraising their employees and I wanted to clarify that we weren't suggesting by what we proposed last week that they -- that departments were not evaluating employees .we weren't suggesting that. It was another approach that we were looking for in terms of a more comprehensive performance management system. This -- this particular analysis is towards the title and not the individual. And that is what we are proposing here. We would still require performance appraisals in accordance with the policy, but for the individuals. But this proposal is on the title and not the individuals.
>> well, i'll go back and read the report again. That was the impression that I got because people were not getting raises due to the economy, that performance appraisals were not taking place.
>> oh, no, no, that was not -- we did not mean to suggest that in the conversation -- and the conversation got a little bit beyond me to go be able to go back --
>> I will go back and read the report again.
>> I think the requirement of an annual evaluation ought to be something that we put in place. Our leverage is whenever we budget a little money, we have a little bit bigger hammer than when we don't. I think our culture ought to be there is an annual evaluation of employee, status report, also to help us -- [multiple voices]
>> right,.
>> I agree.
>> I agree with that.
>> okay. For the elected officials, I think that we ought to think about a strategy that -- that will convince maybe those who have not signed on to the Travis County Commissioner court personnel policy to do so. This is pretty important, really. And I think that if we point to -- to, you know, employee grievances that we've had to settle, significant amounts of money if you look at all of it annually, then we all have a little something at stake here.
>> uh-huh.
>> appointed and elected.
>> so --
>> uh-huh, uh-huh, yeah, right.
>> make sure that we address that.
>> uh-huh.
>> now I did see an e-mail where wurp notifying the -- where we were notifying the manager I guess of the proposal. That will be back on the Commissioners court agenda when.
>> next week, the 16th.
>> by the way the 16th is building up. [laughter]
>> I know.
>> ya think? Any more discussion? All in favor? Show Commissioner Gomez, Daugherty and yours truly voting in favor. Voting against Commissioner Sonleitner.
>> thank you.
>> thank you all very much.
Last Modified: Wednesday, March 9, 2004 6:57 PM