COMPENSATION PERSPECTIVES

2005 Pay Increases

The General Assembly and Governor have recommended the following increases for employees with satisfactory performance:

• 3% salary increase for state classified employees on November 25, 2005;
• 4.4 % increase for agency heads on November 25, 2005, and for state-supported local employees on December 1, 2005; and
• An increase of $50 per year of service for state employees with 5 or more years of continuous service.

The 2005 Budget will be finalized and published in April or early May. Once the budget is approved, DHRM will prepare and distribute implementation guidelines to agency Human Resource Directors.

Workforce Planning

SOC Query Available in PMIS

Many HR staff have requested an inquiry to display the agencies that have positions or employees in a specified Standard Occupational Classification Code (SOC). That query now exists. PSC995, SOC Scroll, works like the PSC997, Role Scroll, query. In PSC995 the SOC code is entered into the provided field without the hyphen. That is, as 123456, not as12-3456.

Like the Role Scroll query, the SOC Scroll Query offers several options:

1. List All Positions in an Agency/SOC
2. List All Employees in an Agency/SOC
3. List Number of Positions in Each Agency for a SOC
4. List Number of Employees in Each Agency for a SOC
5. List All Positions in a SOC
6. List All Employees in a SOC

Because of the time required to process these queries, any SOC inquiry that involves more than 3,000 positions cannot be processed. Fortunately, this limit applies to only 5 SOCs. They are:

29-2053 Psychiatric Technicians
33-3012 Correctional Officers and Jailers
43-9061 Office Clerks, General
43-9199 Office and Administrative Support Workers, All Other
47-4051 Highway Maintenance Workers

This new feature improves the efficiency of the job evaluation process and the reliability of classification and salary data collected across agencies.

Improved SOC Coding for Office Worker Positions

What are Office Clerks, General? What does Office and Administrative Support Workers, All Others mean? Many agencies utilize these Standard Occupational Classifications (SOCs) to designate clerical positions, but they may not be the best SOC titles for all of the positions that bear them.

The SOC system has many office worker classifications that might be better assignments for office worker positions. They include:

43-2011 Switchboard Operators
43-3051 Payroll and Timekeeping Clerks
43-3061 Procurement Clerks
43-4071 File Clerks
43-4161 Human Resource Assistants
43-4171 Receptionists and Information Clerks
43-9021 Data Entry Keyers
43-9051 Mail Clerks and Mail Machine Operators

Agencies that have positions assigned to the 43-9061 (Office Clerks, General) or 43-9199 (Office and Administrative Support Workers, All Other) should review them to see if one of the above SOCs is a more appropriate and distinctive designation. If so, use the PSP160 Position Field Change transaction to change the SOC code for a position in PMIS.

Classifying positions according to the SOCs requires comparing the positions' duties with SOC definitions and deciding which SOC best describes them. SOC definitions are available at several places on the Web, but the most relevant source is DHRM's Web site, because the listing there includes Virginia's extensions to the SOC system. This list is available at http://web1.dhrm.virginia.gov/itech/files/VASOC070703.xls

Questions about assigning SOC codes should be directed to your assigned AHRS consultant.

Maintaining PMIS Fields

DHRM is committed to providing accurate and reliable workforce planning and employee pay data. Maintaining the integrity of data entered into PMIS is a critical element in the partnership between agencies and DHRM. Agencies are reminded of the importance of maintaining PMIS fields, such as veterans' status, telecommuting, military status, Economic Interest, education, and sensitive position.

Agencies may request DHRM assistance in batch loading updates. For more information on batch loading, contact Belchior Mira at belchior.mira@dhrm.virginia.gov .

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