General Orientation

Orientation takes two forms: formal orientation conducted by Human Resources, and on-the-job orientation by the hiring department.  Human Resources will send an invitation to a half-day general orientation program for all new classified employees.  This will include  a campus tour.

Departmental orientation should include information specific to your unit.  See http://odt.uoregon.edu/neo/ for ideas about orienting your new employee. 

Give a copy of the position description to your new employee and make sure that he or she understands the duties and responsibilities of the position.  Both the you and employee should sign the description and you are responsible for sending the signed position description to HR. 

Benefit Orientation

The new employee, eligible for benefits, needs to register to attend a Benefit Orientation within the first 30 days of employment.

Benefit Orientation Registration

Trial service

Trial service (probationary period) is an extension of the selection process and, as such, provides an opportunity to assess whether an employee's performance warrants regular status. The initial trial service period is the employee's first six months in a classified position; promotional trial service is the first six months after promotion from a UO or OUS position (movement to a job in a higher salary range).  For part-time employees who are less than .5 FTE, trial service is 9 months.  There is no trial service period for employees who transfer from UO or OUS positions in the same salary range or demote from a higher salary range.

You should give frequent feedback to new employees about performance. It is the University's expectation that supervisors will take a progressive approach in their attempt to correct less than satisfactory performance.  Call the Employee and Labor Relations Manager at x6-2965 or the Employment Manager at x6-2963 for assistance with this process.  The action to remove an employee from trial service is taken by the Associate Vice President for Human Resources.

A flexible work schedule is one where the hours of work may vary in a day (but not necessarily each day) and the days of week may vary according to work assignments. Employees who work a flexible work schedule shall receive overtime pay or compensatory hours for hours that exceed 40 in a week. For positions in salary range 24 and below, shift differential shall be paid for hours worked between 6:00 p.m. and 6:00 a.m. and for any time worked on Saturday and Sunday.

Management may change an employee's flexible work schedule without an employee's consent where such a change is needed in the regular course of business and where the employee has been initially hired by management or initially placed on a flexible work schedule as a condition of employment.

The undersigned employee and supervisor agree to a flexible work schedule in accordance with Article 55 of the UO/SEIU Collective Bargaining Agreement.

Department of Records retains original and submits photocopy to Human Resources.

• Trial service (probationary period) is an extension of the selection process and, as such, provides an opportunity to assess whether an employee's performance warrants regular status. Trial service is six (6) full months for employees at .50 FTE or greater and nine (9) months for part-time employees at less than .50 FTE. The trial service period for all employees may be extended up to three (3) months by mutual agreement between the local Union president and the University. GCIU employees serve a 12 month trial service period. SEIU employees also serve a promotional trial service period after promoting into a position in a higher salary range; this period is 6 months for full-time employees and 1040 hours for part-time. There is no trial service period for employees who transfer from UO or OUS positions in the same salary range or demote from a higher salary range.
• Employees may be removed from trial service when the employee is unable or unwilling to perform satisfactorily. This action may only be taken by the Appointing Authority.
• Supervisor responsibility Supervisors should give frequent feedback to new employees about performance. It is the University's expectation that supervisors will take a progressive approach in their attempt to correct less than satisfactory performance. Contact uoelr@uoregon.edu for assistance with this process.
• Trial service may be extended in instances where a trial service employee has been on cumulative leave without pay 15 days or more and then only by the number of days they were on leave.
• When in the judgment of the university Appointing Authority performance has been adequate to clearly demonstrate the competence and fitness of the trial service employee, the university Appointing Authority may at any time appoint the employee to regular status.

SEIU Trial Service Article 34

• Classified employees at UO have layoff rights under their respective collective bargaining agreements. Generally a layoff occurs because of a position elimination due to budget reduction or departmental reorganization. SEIU employees also have layoff rights if their position should change between part-time and full-time, or change between academic year, 12 month, seasonal, or intermittent status. Both agreements allow for bumping, or displacement, of less senior employees by the person being laid off. See Article 48 Layoff.
• Because moving employees into vacant positions is much less disruptive for the campus community than bumping, it is University policy to make every effort to transfer affected employee(s) to vacant positions for which they qualify prior to taking action under the layoff article of the collective bargaining agreement. For that reason department heads contemplating actions which may trigger a layoff should give as much advance notice as possible to OHR so that appropriate vacant positions can be identified and employees can be transferred.

Limited Duration appointments are outlined in Article 36 of the SEIU Collective Bargaining Agreement:

Persons may be hired either:

(1) for special studies, projects, or purposes of uncertain or limited duration which are funded by grants, contracts, awards, student fees, or legislative funding for a specific project OR

(2) to replace a regular employee on leave of absence when it is known at the time of hire that the leave of absence will last for at least six (6) months.

Limited duration is a type of classified employee, and classified employees are recruited for via our talent management system, MyTrack.

Key items to note:

• Limited duration appointments cannot exceed two years.
• Limited duration appointments can expire earlier upon the earlier termination of the special study, project, or purposes of leave.
• All of the rights and privileges of other classified employees are granted with one exception: those not formerly classified OUS employees are not entitled to layoff rights.
• Appointments of at least half-time are eligible for vacation, sick leave, personal leave, employee-paid health and dental insurance, staff rates, and retirement contributions if the appointment is expected to last at least 90 days.
• At the point of hire, the limited duration appointment memo must be completed, signed by the employee and forwarded to Human Resources to be included in the new employee packet.