Buffalo Grove holds off on merit pay plan for village workers

The Buffalo Grove village board is giving a new meaning to the term “deferred compensation,” holding off last week on adopting a pay-for-performance plan for employees, until they hear more details about the proposal.

The matter had been discussed at a prior committee-of-the-whole meeting, with trustees raising many of the same reservations to Human Resources Director Art Malinowski as they did at last Monday’s village board meeting.

Malinowski outlined a policy for nonunion employees under which advancement through pay ranges would depend on performance.

As originally proposed in September, the policy calls for a system of formally evaluating the performance of employees based on the attainment of specific priorities, moving employees through their respective pay ranges based on the level of their individual performance, rewarding employees who perform at the “exceeds expectations” or “far exceeds expectations” level by providing a faster means to progress in their salary range and improving the performance of underperforming employees.

Trustees declined to act on the plan until village staff could offer more details. One said she was already opposed to it.

“I have been opposed to this plan of merit pay or pay for performance since it was first brought up at committee-of-the-whole meetings many years ago, and I haven’t changed my opinion yet,” Trustee Beverly Sussman said, suggesting the proposal would give employees additional compensation for simply doing the job they’re already paid to do.

“I just don’t feel this is the time to discuss merit pay or pay for performance,” she added.

Trustee Jeffrey Berman said he understands the point of the plan, which is to “ensure that we have properly addressed and incentivized the most efficient performance for employees,” nor with the idea of added compensation in certain limited circumstances. Such incentives are not uncommon in the private sector.

“The difference there is in the private sector there is a profit element to the business and essentially you are rewarding high performing employees with a dividend on the profitability that they bring to the business,” Berman said. “That’s something that is difficult to translate into a government environment.”

Trustee Michael Terson said he sees the key as rewarding employees who go “above and beyond.”

“While it might not show up in a balance sheet or a profit statement, when we have people who go far above and beyond and do things more efficiently, it does save us money, and if we can find a way to reward that kind of work and benefit as a community and as an organization financially, I think it is in our best interests to look at that,” he said.

Discussions are likely to continue at an upcoming committee-of-the-whole meeting.