University Human Resources (UHR) has partnered with Mercer, an external human resources consultant firm that specializes in workforce, careers, compensation and benefit program design. Mercer has worked with many other universities on similar initiatives and will serve as a critical partner providing knowledge across industries, expertise in compensation programs, career pathways and market competitiveness.

Feedback from all staff is critical to the success of this initiative. As part of the planning and discovery phase, Mercer conducted multiple interviews with over 90 key stakeholders, including the Executive Committee and members of the President’s Staff Advisory Council and Diversity and Inclusion Oversight Board. Additionally, all staff members had an opportunity to participate in digital focus groups. A total of 1,878 staff participated in the month of August 2024. The insights and information collected from these interviews and focus groups will inform the new compensation structure.

Career advancement is a critical component of what the project is working to accomplish. We want staff to understand the many career opportunities across Brown. Having a consistent and transparent structure will illustrate career pathways and advancement opportunities so staff can map out long-term opportunities for growth and development.

Market-based pay is a compensation method that leverages market salaries, or the going rates of pay for jobs in the market, to inform pay decisions. This is achieved by market pricing, which is a technique that requires the collection and interpretation of market data external to the organization. Jobs are “matched” to comparable roles in salary surveys that are published by third-party vendors to identify market prevalent rates.

Staff will not see a reduction in their pay, or a general or automatic increase in pay, as a result of this initiative. One of the outcomes of this initiative is to create a structure that will allow for fair and transparent compensation decisions, including pay ranges that better represent our internal pay practices and market benchmarks. Another outcome will be new compensation levels and pay grades, as well as titling guidelines to create consistencies across Brown. This is critical to support transparency and foster greater understanding about career pathways.

Roles and responsibilities will not be reviewed or modified as a part of this initiative. Therefore, individual job descriptions will not change as a result of this initiative. Standard job descriptions may be developed and shared as appropriate to help departments quickly write job descriptions for common roles. As a reminder, managers and employees should review job descriptions on an annual basis and update as appropriate.