Definitions
Staff Equal Employment Opportunity (EEO) Complaince Office
staffeeo@berkeley.edu
- Affirmative Action
- Affirmative action is one aspect of the federal government's efforts to ensure equal employment opportunity. Executive Order 11246 prohibits federal contractors from discriminating against employees on the basis of race, sex, religion, color, or national origin, and requires contractors to implement affirmative action plans to increase the participation of minorities and women in the workplace. Pursuant to federal regulations, affirmative action plans must consist of an equal opportunity policy statement, an analysis of the current work force, identification of problem areas, the establishment of goals and timetables for increasing employment opportunities, specific action-oriented programs to address problem areas, support for community action programs, and the establishment of an internal audit and reporting system.
- Availability
- Availability is an estimate of the percentage of minorities and women in the relevant labor market who are qualified and interested in positions on the Berkeley campus during the term of the affirmative action program. Using a process that considers eight factors, statistics from outside labor markets and the internal campus work force are used to determine availability percentages for each job group.
- Compliance
- The University is a federal contractor and is obligated to comply with federal laws and regulations regarding affirmative action. These obligations include ensuring diverse pools of applicants for campus positions; developing and maintaining affirmative action plans which identify areas of underutilization of minorities and women; and demonstrating good faith efforts to eliminate underutilization.
- Diversity
- Generally, diversity refers to "human qualities that are different from our own and those of groups to which we belong; but that are manifested in other individuals and groups. Dimensions of diversity include but are not limited to: age, ethnicity, gender, physical abilities or qualities, race, sexual orientation, educational background, geographic location, income, marital or partner status, military experience, parental status, religious beliefs, work experience, and job classification." (Adapted from Marilyn Loden and Judy Rosener, Workforce America! Managing Employee Diversity as a Vital Resource, Illinois: Business One Irwin, 1991, p. 18.) In this context, diversity represents a comprehensive organizational and managerial process for developing an environment that maximizes the potential of all employees by valuing difference.
- Eight-Factor Analysis
- Current government regulations require that, in performing availability analyses, an organization must "consider" at least eight designated factors. Referred to as the "8-Factor Analysis," they include the following for minorities:
- the minority population of the labor area surrounding the facility;
- the size of the minority unemployment force in the labor area surrounding the facility;
- the percentage of the minority work force as compared with the total work force in the immediate labor area;
- the general availability of minorities having requisite skills in the immediate labor area;
- the availability of minorities having the requisite skills in an area in which the contractor (e.g., UC) can reasonably recruit;
- the availability of promotable and transferable minorities within the contractor's organization;
- the existence of training institutions capable of training persons in the requisite skills; and,
- the degree of training which the contractor is reasonably able to undertake as a means of making all job classes available to minorities.
The above factors for women are identical to those for minorities except that the availability of "women seeking employment in the labor or recruitment area" is substituted for "the minority population in the labor area surrounding the facility" in Factor 1. Availability is determined for each job group by weighting each of the above factors in accordance with each factor's significance to that job group.
- Employees
- Refers to non-academic career, contract, or partial-year career employees at the University of California, Berkeley.
- Equal Employment Opportunity (EEO)
- A term used by the federal government to refer to employment practices that ensure nondiscrimination on the basis of race, sex, religion, color, national origin, physical or mental ability, medical condition, ancestry, or age. The principle behind EEO is that everyone should have the same access to opportunities.
- Ethnic References
- The following terms for race and ethnic groups are used to maintain consistency with systemwide and federal reporting requirements even though they may not reflect current popular usage:
- American Indians - Persons having origins in any of the original American Indian peoples of North America (including Eskimos and Aleuts), or who maintain cultural identification through tribal affiliations or community recognition.
- Asian - This definition encompasses:
- Chinese/Chinese-American: Persons having origins in any of the original peoples of China;
- Japanese/Japanese-American: Persons having origins in any of the original peoples of Japan; Korean/Korean-American: Persons having origins in any of the original peoples of Korea;
- Filipino/Pilipino: Persons having origins in any of the original peoples of the Philippine Islands;
- Pakistani/East Indian: Persons having origins in any of the original peoples of the Indian sub-continent;
- Pacific Islanders (including Samoa) or
- other Asian persons having origins in any of the original peoples of Southeast Asia and the Far East not included in any of the Asian categories listed above.
- Black - (not of Hispanic origin) - Persons having origins in any of the Black racial groups of Africa.
- Hispanic - (including Black individuals whose origins are Hispanic) - This definition encompasses:
- Mexican/Mexican-American/Chicano: Persons of Mexican culture or origins, regardless of race;
- Latin-American/Latino: Persons of Latin American culture or origins (including persons having origins from Central America, South America, Cuba, Puerto Rico, and the Dominican Republic), regardless of race;
- Spanish/ Spanish-American: Persons of Spanish culture or origin not included in any of the Hispanic categories listed above.
- Caucasian - Persons having origins in any of the original peoples of Europe, North Africa, or the Middle East (not of Hispanic origin).
- Goal
- According to federal affirmative action regulations, an employer must set goals for hiring women and minorities in job groups where the employer has identified underutilization. The goal is a percentage that matches the rate of availability. For example, in a job group where women are underutilized and the availability rate for women in that job group is 25%, the goal would be for 25% of the hires for that year in that job group to be women. There is no requirement for the employer to meet the goals. Rather, the goals are targets that employers may use to measure the overall effectiveness of their affirmative action program.
- Good Faith Efforts
- Specific actions taken by an employer to meet affirmative action goals or deliver a successful affirmative action program.
- Job Group
- Job groups are the basic building blocks for developing availability proportions and conducting the utilization analysis. Each job title is grouped with other titles, using such criteria as similar job content, wage rates, and opportunities for advancement. There are a total of 34 job groups at the University.
- Minorities
- The term "minorities" as used in affirmative action refers to four historically underrepresented ethnic groups: American Indians, Asians, Blacks, and Hispanics.
- Placement Goal
- See "Goal."
- Snapshot
- Because the work force numbers fluctuate, a snapshot of the work force is taken at one particular point in time, e.g., as of a particular day, and used as the basis for analysis. The snapshot used for utilization analysis of the work force is March 31 of each year.
- Targeted Recruitment
- Efforts in recruitment specifically targeted to attract qualified applicants from identified underutilized groups, such as mailings to minority organizations.
- The Regents' Resolution SP-2
- The Regents' Resolution SP-2, effective January 1, 1996, states that the University of California shall not use race, religion, sex, color, ethnicity or national origin as criteria in its employment practices, except where "strictly necessary" to maintain eligibility for federal funding. The University is required to comply with federal affirmative action requirements in order to remain eligible for funding as a federal contractor. Under federal guidelines, the use of race or gender as a "plus" factor in making employment decisions is permitted, but not required. Therefore, effective January 1, 1996, the use of race or gender as a "plus" factor is no longer a part of the University's affirmative action plan. However, federal enforcement agencies have determined that race and gender targeted recruitment efforts are "strictly necessary" components of an effective affirmative action plan. Therefore, the University continues to conduct targeted recruitment and outreach in job groups where there is underutilization.
- Underutilization
- Underutilization occurs when the percentage of employees in a protected group (women or minorities) is less than the availability percentage for that protected group. Underutilization is calculated for employees in each job group. The declaration of underutilization does not amount to an admission of impermissible conduct. It is neither a finding of discrimination nor a finding of a lack of good faith affirmative action efforts. Rather, underutilization is a technical targeting term used exclusively by affirmative action planners who seek to apply good faith efforts to increase in the future the percentage of utilization of minorities and women in a work force.
- Utilization Analysis
- A comparison of the percentage of minority or women employees actually in a job group with the percentage of minorities and women in the relevant labor market.
- Work Force
- The number of non-academic career, contract and partial-year career employees at the University of California, Berkeley. The numbers can also be disaggregated to look at control unit or departmental work force profiles. Work force profiles count numbers of employees, not FTE (full-time equivalents).