Reports of the Workforce Development Subcommittee

Subcommittee Members

Marcus Lucas (co-chair): Senior Director of Facilities Maintenance and Operations
Melvin Williams Jr. (co-chair): Former Associate Dean, School of Engineering
Kirk McLean: Associate Vice President for Public Safety and Emergency Management
Matthew McNally: Senior Associate Vice President for Administration
Scott Rembold: Vice President for University Advancement
Jordan Tibbs: Alumnus, B.S. 2021

The Workforce Development Subcommittee was charged with examining, assessing, and making recommendations to measure and improve the University’s efforts in the areas of recruitment, training, and retention of its staff and faculty, as the decisions relate to race, culture, and faith.

The subcommittee reviewed the University’s strategic goals and policies related to this charge, obtained feedback from more than 25 percent of the University’s full-time workforce, reviewed employee demographic and retention data, and conducted in-depth meetings with 28 administrators, faculty, and staff.

The current University workforce is 51 percent white, 17 percent Black, nine percent Hispanic/Latino, and eight percent Asian. About 78 percent of tenured and tenure-track professors are white. Seventy percent of Hispanic/Latino employees and 57 percent of Black employees are in blue-collar positions. The subcommittee noted the University offers limited professional development and growth opportunities for staff and has a decentralized hiring process, which may affect efforts to surface a diverse pool of candidates.

Upon reviewing employee survey results, the subcommittee found the responses to the commitment of University leadership to racial diversity to be somewhat divided on a scale of 1–5. One survey question asked if the leadership at �� encourages racial diversity, and 34 percent of the responses were favorable, 24 percent were neutral, and 42 percent were not favorable. Respondents were strongly positive regarding their own supervisor’s commitment to racial diversity and most indicated they understood the procedures to report incidents of discrimination and/or bias in the workplace.

Recommendation 1

Execute the University’s strategic goals and policies and maintain leadership accountability, with the University’s Staff Leadership Council to track and record the accomplishment status of the strategic goals.

Strategic Goal 1. Ensure that every aspect of the University is clearly and distinctively grounded in our Catholic identity.
Strategic Goal 2. Aim for the highest standards of academic and professional excellence.
Strategic Goal 3. Provide a vibrant, challenging, and uplifting collegiate experience.
Strategic Goal 4. Offer a demanding, efficient, productive, and rewarding work environment.
Strategic Goal 5. Use our distinctive identity as a basis for securing the resources needed to fund this Strategic Plan.

Recommendation 2

Establish a University statement that covers diversity, equity, and inclusion, and includes definitions and why this is important to mission performance.

Recommendation 3

Diversify the composition of the Staff Leadership Council, appointing racial minority members.

Recommendation 4

Proactively recruit racial minority students, faculty, and staff via leveraging the diocesan system locally, nationally, and globally.

Recommendation 5

Establish and implement a voluntary “This Is Who We Are” program, with weekly voluntary presentations from staff, faculty, and students about the person’s role at the University, personal story/family background, culture, etc., followed by Q&A to increase community and understanding.

Recommendation 6

Create a written policy that the composition of members of the Staff Leadership Council is more representative of the University’s demographic population.

Recommendation 7

Diversify the composition of the Board of Trustees’ lay members to achieve greater diversity and inclusion.

Recommendation 8

Investigate how to address, via policy and action, the racial stratification situation within the workforce, and the salary disparity by race and gender, make recommendations, and implement.

Recommendation 9

Improve efforts to recruit and retain a more diverse workforce and student population by establishing and leveraging an internal network of mentors and advocates that may be able to connect— via personal relationships — with prospective and current faculty, staff, and students.

Recommendation 10

Standardize staff hiring practices via the establishment of a standardized policy and practice for hiring new staff, to include forming a diverse ad hoc committee, including the chief diversity officer (or chief performance officer) and a representative with experience in the skill area of the position to be filled.

Recommendation 11

Establish a team to define the content and budget needs of a centralized human resources training and professional development program to improve retention and professional development. This might include professional development course listings available to full-time employees at no-cost.

Recommendation 12

Improve efforts to recruit, hire, and retain a more diverse workforce by creating one new human resource staff position/member in support of diversity and inclusion in University hiring practices.

Recommendation 13

Improve mission performance with diversity and inclusion as a priority by hiring and/or appointing a chief diversity officer (or a chief performance officer). This could be a part-time position from within the faculty with the possibility of a full-time endowed position in the future. The individual should focus on execution of University strategic goals, serve on the Staff Leadership Council, and work closely with the President’s chief of staff.

Recommendation 14

Provide centralized human resources budget for marketing job postings to reach a broader pool of candidates.

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