International Cooperative Administrative Support Services MINUTES INTERAGENCY WORKING GROUP MEETING Service Center Wednesday, September 10, 2014 10:00 a.m. Introduction of IWG Members and Attendees The minutes of the July 9, 2014, IWG Meeting were accepted with the inclusion of the Forward Planning presentation. Joint ICASS HR/OE Working Group Session – Speaker: Michael Tulley, Director, Office of Overseas Employment, Bureau of Human Resources, Department of State FY 2014 in Retrospect (minutes provided by HR/OE): The first year out of the three year wage freeze (that ended on January 1, 2014) has resulted in salary increases for 71 missions that had fallen below the 50th percentile in their respective labor markets while Payroll in Charleston and Bangkok have been facilitating the increases smoothly. Mike reminded agency representatives that the wage freeze was an extraordinary event, the first ever, and something that requires more time than one year to recover from. In 2014, HR/OE ranked all 177 posts by a consensual agreement that prioritized need based on attrition data and posts’ labor market positions. Initially 76 were identified for increases in 2014. Three posts have not yet responded to the HR/OE record e-mails and HR/OE is working with them individually to address pending issues. Five posts were ultimately not authorized for an increase, bringing the total to 71. HR/OE found that salary increase estimates provided for budgeting purposes pertaining to the 76 posts were, in fact, quite close to the final authorized increases. The overall average increase estimate was 18.4% whereas the overall average authorized was 18.9%. When estimates varied significantly from the final authorized increases, we usually found a reason for apparent anomalies on further exploration: a vendor may have been dropped due to a lack of adequate survey data; some outlying positions may have been removed from the analysis because their salaries were much higher or lower than the average; or OE may have found a post allowance included in error when estimating the increase, which was then removed in the final analysis. Last year and in 2015, our estimates sometimes were and will be imperfect due to various factors. Some posts (8) had no comparator surveys available and HR/OE conducted these surveys. We hope to have the analyses for these posts completed in the next month or two. If any of these
International Cooperative Administrative Support Services MINUTES INTERAGENCY WORKING GROUP MEETING Service Center Wednesday, September 10, 2014 10:00 a.m. Introduction of IWG Members and Attendees The minutes of the July 9, 2014, IWG Meeting were accepted with the inclusion of the Forward Planning presentation. Joint ICASS – HR/OE Working Group Session Speaker: Michael Tulley, Director, Office of Overseas Employment, Bureau of Human Resources, Department of State FY 2014 in Retrospect (minutes provided by HR/OE): The first year out of the three year wage freeze (that ended on January 1, 2014) has resulted in salary increases for 71 missions that had fallen below the 50th percentile in their respective labor markets while Payroll in Charleston and Bangkok have been facilitating the increases smoothly. Mike reminded agency representatives that the wage freeze was an extraordinary event, the first ever, and something that requires more time than one year to recover from. In 2014, HR/OE ranked all 177 posts by a consensual agreement that prioritized need based on attrition data and posts’ labor market positions. Initially 76 were identified for increases in 2014. Three posts have not yet responded to the HR/OE record e-mails and HR/OE is working with them individually to address pending issues. Five posts were ultimately not authorized for an increase, bringing the total to 71. HR/OE found that salary increase estimates provided for budgeting purposes pertaining to the 76 posts were, in fact, quite close to the final authorized increases. The overall average increase estimate was 18.4% whereas the overall average authorized was 18.9%. When estimates varied significantly from the final authorized increases, we usually found a reason for apparent anomalies on further exploration: a vendor may have been dropped due to a lack of adequate survey data; some outlying positions may have been removed from the analysis because their salaries were much higher or lower than the average; or OE may have found a post allowance included in error when estimating the increase, which was then removed in the final analysis. Last year and in 2015, our estimates sometimes were and will be imperfect due to various factors. Some posts (8) had no comparator surveys available and HR/OE conducted these surveys. We hope to have the analyses for these posts completed in the next month or two. If any of these