Talking Stick - November/December 2016 - 58

CONVERSATIONS
assistant directors up to the minimum
$47,000 threshold would cause some
serious compression issues. When
factoring in housing, they would
be making more than some of the
mid-level live-off staff. If we keep
them hourly, they are likely to reach
close to the minimum threshold pay
once overtime is factored in. Yet with
this increased demand on resources,
there is not a high chance that the
university will adjust the salaries of
those above the threshold to satisfy the
compression concerns. It just feels so
unfair to those employees, especially
since some have been working for
the department for 14-16 years. As a
small staff, we have no choice but to
do the work, and there aren't enough
people on staff to move around
responsibilities.

Schneller: I believe this is an
opportunity for us to examine how we
organize our work and see how we can
best serve our students in addition to
meeting current federal regulations.
We are going to take the lead from
our central human resources as to
the institutional guidelines. There
will be flexibility with office hours,
and we have discussed how and when
compensatory time will be utilized
within the academic year.

Whitten: I have to laugh. I am actually
in a webinar on this topic right now.
The USC system has decided to go
ahead and make changes (moving
exempt staff to non-exempt) on
October 16. I thought about moving
up our assistant directors but I think
Heidi's points are valid. Our housing
operations coordinator definitely needs
to be paid more. But I also think that
moving staff up to simply not deal
with or pay overtime seems to defeat
the spirit behind the change. We've got
to talk about work-life balance and put
some mechanisms in place to help our
staff find that balance.
Honestly, my staff busts their butts
in August. I am happy that I will be
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TALKING STICK

able to pay them overtime. I did the
calculation on how much comp time
they would earn, and, collectively, it
would be more than 600 hours. I
don't know how other schools handle
it, but at my institution, it can be really
hard to give a bonus. Granted, they
definitely work the hours to get paid
the overtime, but it will be nice to see
them get paid. Currently, all exempt
staff are given comp time, but it's as
a one-for-one basis. Most have said
they are totally fine with a little bigger
check.

Lauer: I love how Heather describes
the opportunity for us regarding FLSA!
This is one of the best opportunities in
my 25 plus years in the profession to
truly examine how we have staffed our
campuses and, as we make decisions,
to be bold in seeking strategies
that help create flexibility, balance,
and healthy work environments
while focusing on getting the most
important work done by the right
positions.
We are taking a very holistic view
of how we do the work in support
of students across the college and
our student life division specifically.
We are leaning towards converting
the majority of affected positions
to hourly and taking a hard look at
our staffing ratios and the work of
various positions in the division and
looking for that balance of fair and
competitive compensation with a work
schedule that promotes a healthy life
for our staff. We expect to learn a lot
in this transition year. The team is
worried about being competitive in
our recruitment of staff if the majority
of positions start to pay close to $50K
with housing.

Shaikh: Our major challenge is
likely the same as other operations,
big or small. We had to make a
fiscal decision today that would impact
the way we do business well into
the future because you can't just
reverse field and say, "Oh well, let's

try Plan B" if your approach turns
out to be ill conceived. We have
made a recommendation to raise
our residence hall directors' salaries
to the minimum threshold due to
several factors. Thankfully, the current
salary for our live-in staff is pretty
close to the exempt threshold and will
not create an undue fiscal hardship
on our campus. After analyzing
the overall responsibilities of our
residence hall director staff, including
work, professional development
expectations, and on-call expectations,
as well as anticipating the work load
that would result from tracking
professional staff work hours, meeting
the exempt threshold is more cost
effective in our circumstance.
TS: I am also going to assume that
most, if not all of you, do not operate
as an auxiliary. What challenges and
opportunities does that arrangement
afford you?

Anderson-Isaacson: The money our
department generates goes directly
into the university operating funds,
so we are not able to freely make
updates or changes to the residence
halls without officially requesting
funds through our university capital
request process that happens once a
year. We are up against all of the other
departments on campus for the same
pool of capital money, and, more often
than not, we are prioritized towards
the bottom of the list just because so
many other deferred maintenance
issues elevate to the top.
The benefit is that another
department is responsible for the work
and the staff of the facilities aspect of
our halls, so there are fewer people
and issues to manage. The downside
of that is sometimes work on other
parts of the campus is a higher priority
and the work we need to get done
takes a bit longer.

Shaikh: Not being an auxiliary
allows us to focus on creating a robust
Talking Stick - November/December 2016

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