Equality and Human Rights Commission

C.1 When jobs are evaluated or re-evaluated, do you involve jobholders in completing a job questionnaire or an equivalent job information document?

Jobholders know more about the demands of their jobs than anyone else, although they may need help in explaining them.

Completion of job questionnaires by line managers or human resource staff, without jobholder involvement, can result in job demands being omitted or understated. See job analysis for more information.

C.2 Do you use trained job analysts to assist jobholders to complete job questionnaires or equivalent job information documents?

It is good job evaluation practice to use trained job analysts to assist jobholders to provide the information required by the scheme and to a consistently high standard, as this helps to prevent inconsistent and potentially biased evaluations. See job analysis for more information.

C.3 Have the job analysts been trained in equality issues and the avoidance of sex bias?

Job analysts should understand how sex bias can occur in the information collection process and be trained to avoid it. See training for more information.

C.4 Does the job questionnaire or equivalent job information document follow the job evaluation scheme factor plan? That is, does it use all of the same headings?

Job information documents, which follow the job evaluation scheme factors, are easier to evaluate and help evaluators avoid making assumptions about job demands, which can result in them being omitted or undervalued in the evaluation process. See job information for more detail.

C.5 Are jobs evaluated or re-evaluated by a job evaluation panel or committee?

Evaluation by only 1 or 2 people (e.g. line manager, personnel officer) can result in biased outcomes. This risk is reduced through evaluation by a panel with broad knowledge of jobs across the organisation. See steering groups and project boards for more information.

C.6 Are job evaluation panel members representative of the main areas of work and composition of the workgroups being evaluated in terms of gender, ethnicity, disability and age?

The more representative the evaluators are the greater should be their combined understanding of job demands across the workgroup. Although it may not be possible to make every panel representative in every desired respect, efforts should be made to ensure that the pool of evaluators, from which panels are drawn, is as representative as possible. See representation for more details.

C.7 Are panel members trained in equality issues and the avoidance of sex and other prohibited forms of bias?

Training in the avoidance of sex and other prohibited forms of bias in the evaluation process helps to prevent it occurring and to ensure that the exercise is seen as fair. For further information see training.

C.8 Are evaluation rationales or records, including the reason for each factor assessment, maintained for each job evaluated or re-evaluated?

It is good job evaluation practice to maintain detailed evaluation records, for a number of reasons.

Evaluation records:

• allow evaluators to check back on their decision making process and thus help ensure consistent evaluations
• allow the reasons for evaluations to be explained to jobholders, for example, those considering appealing
• provide information to appeal panel members on what information was taken into account in the initial evaluation
• provide contemporary evidence for any evaluations that may subsequently be subject to legal challenge
• help to meet the legal requirement for transparency of pay determination

For more information see communication and record keeping.

C.9 Have all distinct jobs within the relevant employee group been analysed and evaluated?

In legal terms, jobs that have not been analysed and evaluated fall outside the scope of the job evaluation study.

A jobholder whose job has not been analysed and evaluated (or whose job has changed to the extent that the original evaluation no longer applies) could take an equal pay claim and the job evaluation scheme would not provide you with a defence. See legal background for more information on this.

However, it is not necessary for every employee to have their job separately evaluated. Many employees will do the same job. In that case a single job description and evaluation will be appropriate to those ‘composite jobs’. The same approach may apply to groups of jobs which differ only in minor respects.

The right of appeal for job holders on the grounds that their jobs are different and need to be separately evaluated should be built into your arrangements.