The plurality of comments (44.9%) pertained to human resources and personnel actions; 29.3% were specific to staff HR and 15.6% to academic personnel. The subgroup addressing staff HR reviewed the survey feedback and recommendations and then met with leaders in People & Culture and Berkeley Regional Services to discuss the recommendations regarding staff recruitment and hiring. In the meetings with P&C and BRS, efforts and planned improvements by the Hiring Improvement Process task force were shared. There was some overlap between existing plans and presentations and the “pain points” identified by the survey respondents and summarized by the task force; however, a comprehensive and well-defined process improvement strategy to resolve the issues has not yet been laid out.
The following challenges and recommended paths forward were identified:
Challenges
- Inadequate degree of transparency and lack of accurate timelines on the full end-to-end staff recruitment and hiring process.
- Lack of clarity on the ownership of and accountability for the efficacy and efficiency of the recruitment and hiring processes since multiple units are involved.
- Insufficient opportunities for users to share feedback on human resource processes and procedures, and insufficient action taken by relevant units in response to feedback they receive.
Recommended paths forward
- P&C and BRS to prioritize improving the process of staff recruitment and hiring. This could be done either through the Hiring Improvement Process task force, if they were empowered to do so, or via other initiatives led by P&C and BRS focused on specific challenges identified in the process. Either way, we strongly encourage greater involvement of campus unit stakeholders in any streamlining efforts to ensure that key pain points are addressed and the end-user experience is improved.
- P&C and BRS are currently addressing some of the recommendations:
- Update the P&C recruitment website, including clarifying process ownership and realistic timelines for which P&C is accountable to increase transparency around the hiring process;
- Develop additional resource documents to offer more support to supervisors with onboarding new employees;
- Publish transparent visa timelines for our campus; and
- Partner with UCPath to share current efforts and pilots to transfer UCPath entry to locations.
A separate subgroup worked specifically on the recommendations regarding the Achieve Together program. P&C has led various focus groups and shared communications with campus networks to continue their improvements to the Achieve Together program. It is anticipated that P&C will share improvements to the form and process before the August 2023 Achieve Together cycle commences.