Central Staff Committee of the European Patent Office (EPO) Reports Growing Secrecy at the EPO
THE EPO's Central Staff Committee (CSC) is circulating a message sent to António Campinos last Friday. The representation says: "The recent change in the rewards exercise, from a single annual event, to three rewards events during the year, has seen a change toward the negative. The announcement for the awards for the first round and second round of strategic bonuses of 2023, and the first bonus round of 2024 have been notably missing any statistics at all. This is of concern, because without sharing this data, staff are left to make their own assumptions about the distribution and fairness."
Here is the full publication they've circulated among staff:
European Patent Office | 80298 MUNICH | GERMANYEuropean Patent Office
80298 Munich
GermanyCentral Staff Committee
Comité central du personnel
Zentraler PersonalausschussTel. +49 -89- 2399 - 2120
+49 -170- 2251 - 7271
centralSTCOM@epo.org
Reference: sc24049cl
Date: 26.07.2024
M. António Campinos
President of the EPO
ISAR – R.1080
OPEN LETTER
No “transparency” in the rewards exercise anymore?
No way to know if the bonuses are being rewarded fairly across specific groups of staff.
Dear Mr. President,
Since 2018, an annual announcement has been made on the intranet regarding the outcome of the rewards exercise. Included in the announcement is a document providing the detailed statistics related to the distribution of the rewards among various groupings of staff, including DG, job group, gender, colleagues on maternity leave, part-timers, newcomers, etc. The staff representation repeatedly asked for more granularity than DG level in the rewards statistics. However, the administration argued that this was not possible for data protection reasons. At a time when Directorates have reached around 200 members in DG1 and Teams are growing, data protection should not be an issue anymore.
The practice of publishing detailed statistics was initiated by you, Mr Campinos, and contrasted with the policy of your predecessor who had systematically refused to provide any data. More transparency in the distribution of rewards is always welcome and can contribute to creating a culture of trust. When the Office openly illustrates where improvements can be made to improve the fairness of the system, and works on closing gaps between groups of staff, an impact on engagement, motivation, and trust can be achieved. The statistics suggest improvements in the rewarding of women on maternity leave, and some progress on the gender gap, for example.
The recent change in the rewards exercise, from a single annual event, to three rewards events during the year, has seen a change toward the negative. The announcement for the awards for the first round and second round of strategic bonuses of 2023, and the first bonus round of 2024 have been notably missing any statistics at all. This is of concern, because without sharing this data, staff are left to make their own assumptions about the distribution and fairness.
In addition, for the bonuses that have, until now, been rewarded at the same time as the pensionable rewards, we have seen a concerning trend over the last two years for a gap opening between the rewarding of men and women, and a continued and increasing gap between rewarding of full- and part-time staff. We bring these significant issues of potential discrimination to the attention of the administration for the purposes of assisting the calibration and harmonisation of rewards processes, with the hope that it will be addressed before the next exercise.
One aspect that has been missing from the statistics thus far is the average value of the bonus for the disaggregated groups of staff. While there is now an upper and lower limit to the combined value of bonuses that may be rewarded to an individual, the data related to the average value per DG (Directorate and Team), job group, gender, part-timers, newcomers, etc would also be valuable in assessing the fairness of the distribution.
In light of the above, we have three requests:
1 – That the detailed statistics continue to be published on the intranet, including for the new bonus reward rounds, past and future
2 – That the average value of the bonus is included for the disaggregated data
3 – That more granularity at Directorate and Team level is provided
We hope that this is an area in which we can continue to collaborate, working towards the goals of the SP2028 in improving staff engagement and building trust. We look forward to your reply.
Yours sincerely,
Derek Kelly
Chairman of the Central Staff Committee
"In this open letter to the President," they say, "we have three requests: 1. That the detailed statistics continue to be published on the intranet, including for the new bonus reward rounds, past and future. 2. That the average value of the bonus is included for the disaggregated data. 3. That more granularity at Directorate and Team level is provided."
There's lots more above. It's part of a decade (or longer) long trend. █