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Saturday, August 26, 2006 UNM consultants evaluate county jobs and salariesProviding fair and equitable raises is one of the Valencia County Commission's goals. To do so, the commission is establishing a pay scale that ranks positions into 20 categories. During a workshop on Saturday, Aug. 12, the commissioners were informed of the progress on the process of developing job descriptions for each county position. Consultants Ed Baker and Rita Critchfield of University of New Mexico Continuing Education have interviewed each county employee to determine exactly what they do. Job descriptions are being written from the information. "We are nearly three-fourths completed," Baker said. "Once we have written the descriptions, we will send them back to the department manager for review." The description includes a list of duties for the positions plus the minimum training requirements and necessary licenses to do the job. Jacque Chavira, county human resources director, has helped with the interviews of the 230 county employees. Baker, Critchfield and Chavira have also ranked each of the 92 positions regarding its level of importance in the operation of the county. "Keeping in mind that we are ranking the job, not the person, we have asked eight questions to determine how jobs compare to each other," Baker said. The criteria being used in what is called a forced-pairs decision making process are:
As each position is compared to another position, points are awarded: one point for being evenly ranked with the criteria, two points if ranked higher, or zero points if ranked less than the other. "Once we have a job compared to every other position in the county, we total the points to determine its ranking overall, thus establishing a hierarchy of jobs," Baker said. "This is the standard format for establishing salary plans." The ranking was then used to develop 20 salary grades. In the next step of the process, each pay grade is given a pay range which is of greater value as the grades move from categories one to 20. "When we are finished, the commission will be able to assign salary ranges for each category," Baker said. "Pay will be equitable because the ranking is in regards to the job responsibilities and not connected to who is doing the job." Baker and Critchfield also compared the salaries of other counties of similar size to those paid to Valencia County employees. "We found Valencia County on the average to be lower on a position-to-position basis," Baker said of the comparisons with Chavez, Colfax, Curry, Eddy, Lea, Lincoln, McKinley, Otero, Rio Arriba, Sandoval, San Miguel, Taos and Grant counties. The final report from the consultants will be presented to the county commission in late September. From there, the commission will determine how to administer a pay raise for this year.
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