UCPath Center Location Announcement

May 3, 2012

UC Riverside has been selected as the location for the new UC shared services center that is being established as part of the UC systemwide UCPath project.  While the Berkeley campus is establishing a separate shared services organization that will handle certain Finance, HR, IT and Research Administration support functions, the UCPath shared services center will process all routine transactions related to payroll, benefits, leave management and workforce administration for UC’s ten campuses and five medical centers. Berkeley leaders and subject matter experts are involved in the UC design teams to ensure that our campus is aligned with the UCPath efforts.

Timing and Governance

The UCPath Center is expected to be operational by July 2013, initially serving five locations:

• UCLA
• UCLA Medical Center
• UC Santa Cruz
• UC Merced
• UC Office of the President

All other campuses and medical centers will make the transition in two subsequent waves, with the transition completed by October 2014. Berkeley will most likely be one of the last campuses to make the transition.

The UCPath Center Executive Director will report to UCPath executive sponsors Nathan Brostrom and Peter Taylor at the UC Office of the President. UC Riverside will provide infrastructure and management support for the facility.

Why UC Riverside?

UC Riverside was chosen to host the new center after careful evaluation of a variety of factors, including: the proximity of a strong pool of UC talent to staff the center; local housing and cost of living considerations; the availability and condition of scalable office space; and the support of local leadership.

It’s believed that UC Riverside’s location provides the best opportunity to attract UC staff, given its proximity to several other UC campuses. Real estate and other costs were also less prohibitive than in some of UC’s more urban locations.

The decision to create a single systemwide shared services center came after months of thoughtful discussion and consideration with numerous stakeholders systemwide, and is intended to maximize cost efficiencies by fully leveraging economies of scale; improve service to UC employees; and ensure consistency in business processes systemwide.

Impact on Campus and Jobs

Many critical HR functions will remain at the campus level, including hiring and retention, performance management, employee and labor relations, and other non-transactional business activities.  

Although the new payroll and HR system is expected to eventually require fewer positions in the core areas of transactional processing and customer support for payroll, HR and academic personnel, campuses and medical centers have only just begun the process of staff impact assessments. Berkeley’s plans for a campus shared services center will continue. Campus leaders in the core functional areas are working with UCPath teams to ensure that our campus operations are aligned with the new UCPath Center, and service expectations of faculty, students, and staff are met.

UC is looking to minimize involuntary layoffs through attrition, re-training and re-alignment of responsibilities. Affected employees will have the option of applying for jobs at the UCPath Center in addition to considering opportunities that may emerge in our campus shared services center. The UCPath center is expected to employ 140–160 employees by July 2013, and will hire more people as campuses and medical centers transition into using its services. When fully deployed, it could employ as many as 500–600 people, depending on system configuration, business process design and other project related decisions.

About two-thirds of staff will work in the operations side, while another third will work in a call center fielding questions and assisting faculty and staff with payroll, benefits and other employment-related matters.

More information about staffing, including roles, job descriptions and staffing levels, will be available in July 2012.

Jobs will be posted and recruitment will begin for jobs in the UCPath Center by fall 2012. At that point, any UC employee may apply. Internal UC applicants will be screened and all qualified internal applicants will be interviewed before external applicants are considered.

If you have any questions, please feel free to contact ucpath@berkeley.edu.