Of all the elements of people management within the federal public service, classification is one of the least widely understood. Despite this, it has some of the most significant and direct impacts on both employees and the employer.
To put some numbers to it, the Treasury Board Secretariat’s very recent Evaluation of the Classification Program points out that the classification process covers more than 405,000 positions, 270,000 employees, 75 organizations and a $25 billion annual payroll. Beyond simple numbers, though, almost every public servant’s sense of how fairly they are treated by their employer is linked in part to the classification decision determining their pay. This can affect employee morale, retention, and the number and quality of candidates attracted to positions within the public service. From an employer’s perspective, correct classification helps to attract the right candidates and avoids overpaying workers or creating skill gaps.
In my experience, classification experts within the public service are only too familiar with the challenges in the system and with the frustrations expressed both by managers and employees. Your question touches on both sets of frustrations: the public servants who feel that their classification does not properly reflect their work, and employers who question whether or not classification “creep” has resulted in the same work receiving progressively higher ratings.
The recent TBS Evaluation speaks to many of these frustrations and opportunities for improvement. It found that better work needs to be done to build complete, accurate and system-wide data. It notes that, absent this data, consistency across departments is both hard to track and less likely to be achieved. It concludes that the policy advice and guidance accepted as being necessary to improve consistency has not been delivered in the ways that it needs to be, and that the pace of change requires attention. It also raises the concern about “upward-trending” in classification — the opposite of the concern that you raise. Apart from this last point, the evaluation echoes many of the concerns that you raise. Given the impact that classification has on the entire public service, it is not a document that should be ignored.
None of these things are likely to be fully addressed in the immediate future, and there are likely very few, if any, classification experts who are not all too familiar with these realities and challenges. My recommendation, despite the concerns that you raise, is to work with them to ensure that you have built the strongest possible case, supported by the best data and evidence possible.
Knowing and ensuring that your case reflects the relevant Job Evaluation Standard is critical. As with any formal evaluative process, the more that you understand how the relevant decision-making panels treat questions and evidence, the better you can shape the outcome. While employees often have strong views about the value of their work, understanding and being able to respond to the employer’s approaches and perspectives is critical. Once you receive a formal classification decision, you will generally have a maximum of 35 days to launch a grievance.
I strongly recommend working with your union, if you have one, as they can provide valuable assistance. They often know what approaches are being taken across departments and can identify inconsistencies, errors, and opportunities to strengthen arguments. Executives can check with the Association of Professional Executives of the Public Service of Canada (APEX).
Whether or not you agree with the ultimate decision, the process used to reach it must have followed the relevant rules. The grievance process exists to handle those cases where a party believes the rules were not followed or misapplied. While you are correct that grievance processes can be lengthy, it may be of some consolation that decisions in favour of an employee often result in retroactive pay that covers some or all of the period that the functions were performed.
— Daniel Quan-Watson, Public Service Confidential