Making an Offer

Full-Time Faculty Hiring Workflow (February 2019)

Part-Time Faculty Hiring Workflow (February 2019)

Offer Letters and Notes on “Informal” Offers

It is important that members of the university speak with one voice when making an offer of a faculty position. So-called “informal” or “unofficial” offers, or term sheets, sometimes lead to mixed messages and confusion. Lawsuits have resulted when candidates treat as a binding contract something that was intended as part of a negotiation, and resign a job elsewhere or sell a house, on the basis of what they assume they have been offered.

One person, often the chair or institute director, should handle the negotiation. The actual offer must be made only in a letter signed by the dean or the Provost. Often, co-signatures are added, such as chair, division chief, Institute Director, Hospital CEO. But no offer should ever be made by a chair or chief, etc., without the dean’s signature.

It is bad practice to issue so-called “informal” or “unofficial” offers, because the recipient may misinterpret them as binding contracts. If you send a term sheet or other negotiating document, whether in email or hard copy, please include the disclaimer set out below. If you are negotiating orally, you can make the same point in your conversations.

Please do not add additional terms in side letters. All commitments should be included in the offer signed by the dean, and those should be the only commitments.

The following wording is suggested for all letters or emails about terms:

University Disclaimer: To avoid any misunderstanding, this letter and other messages and conversations between you and me (and my other USC counterparts) are not the actual offer. They are attempts to explore what are the points on which we may come to agreement. If the process leads to mutual consensus, you may receive an offer making an appointment in a letter that is signed by the dean. (And any grant of tenure also requires provost approval after a committee process.) Only the terms set forth in such a letter will constitute the offer and of course will supplant any previous correspondence and discussions.

Process to Issuing Offer Letters - Tenure/Tenure-Track Faculty

1. When the department is ready to initiate offers to candidates, department chairs must discuss the proposed hires with the Dean and the Vice Dean for Faculty Affairs. Once approval is given, specific instructions on default parameters will be provided.
2. The department chair uses the default parameters as a guide for discussion with the candidate. They are not shared with the candidate.
3. Regarding start-up funds: While there is flexibility with the default parameters, only what is actually necessary for the candidate to start-up his/her research should be provided, not a wish list. The Vice Dean for Faculty Affairs is available for consultation and discussion on negotiations. Note: Shared equipment already purchased or funds allocated from prior new-hire offer packages should be leveraged as much as possible.
4. Department chairs are encouraged to nominate eligible candidates for the WiSE Gabilan Assistant Professorship. The nomination letter (i.e. ~1.5 page department chair letter) and the candidate's application (including CV, statements, and reference letters) should be sent to the Director of WiSE with a cc to the Vice Dean for Faculty Affairs.
5. Once all of the parties involved have agreed upon the terms, the department chair or department administrator submits Viterbi's Terms of Offer Form to the Senior Faculty Affairs Coordinator who will use the information and supporting documentation to draft an offer letter.
6. Once all relevant parties sign the offer letter, the Senior Faculty Affairs Coordinator will mail the offer letter, agreement to arbitrate claims form, and eAccess form to the candidate by mail and email with a cc: to the department chair and other relevant parties.
7. Once the signed offer letter is returned, the Senior Faculty Affairs Coordinator will notify the department chair and other relevant parties.
8. The normal onboarding process can then begin.

Making an Offer - Part-Time Faculty

Pay and Benefits:

• • • Part-time instructional faculty are subject to annual merit review, and their compensation was adjusted in spring and approved as part of our merit review process with the Provost. This adjusts per-unit compensation, and as a result, hourly rates. Each department receives a default part-time salary rate with the final Provost-Approved salaries in summer.
    • For this cohort, any assignments that are not teaching related (i.e., service, research, course development) require advanced notice and approval by the Office of the Dean. These assignments must be hourly and added to their Workday academic appointment.
    • There are no overloads for part-time faculty.
    • FTE and Percent of Effort is calculated as the total number of expected hours per week of all assignments, divided by a 40 hour work week.
    • Semesters and assignments begin on August 16 and January 1, and semesters and assignments end on December 31 and May 15. (Per the USC Faculty Handbook, 3-B (5) Periods of Service)
    • Academic year contracts are also encouraged. If a part-time faculty member teaches three 3 or 4-unit courses over an academic year, they are benefits eligible for that academic year. Part-time faculty members teaching in excess of two 3-unit courses in a single semester are benefits eligible. (Please see: Loads and Profiles)
    • If a faculty member is not on payroll, they must be furloughed. After three consecutive semesters of furlough, the department is encouraged to review the faculty’s continuing engagement with the department, according to the evaluation and (non-)reappointment process in VSoE Guidelines 1.3i.

Titles and Job Codes:

• • Unless the instructor has a voted faculty title (according to the process outlined in the VSoE Guidelines, sections 1.3 and 3.1), the business card title for their contracts and directory is Part-Time Lecturer of [discipline], regardless of the job code they are hired into in Workday.
  • A regular review of part-time instructors’ status is highly encouraged. According to the policy document “Faculty Teaching Less than Full Time”, attached, if the faculty has “a primary profession, or career elsewhere” that amounts to a “full-time position or career” outside the university, the faculty is most often classified under Adjunct - Teaching in Workday. If the faculty does not fit this classification, then they are classified under a Part-Time - Teaching in Workday. This may change if the instructor’s employment status changes.
  • A standard load for an Adjunct Lecturer job code is *one 3 or 4-unit course per semester, and a standard load for a Part-Time Lecturer job code is *two 3 or 4-unit courses per semester (depending on whether your curriculum is based on 3- or 4-units). Any load above this requires advanced notice and approval by the Office of the Provost.
  • Unless the part-time faculty falls under one of the 5 teaching exemptions in the “Faculty Teaching Less than Full Time” policy document, a brief one-to-two sentence statement of special expertise must be on file for each instructor. All faculty should have a recent CV on file, often collected either at time of hire or during the AFR process.
  • If you do choose to engage a part-time faculty member from another department, please coordinate with the primary department to ensure the course assignments do not interfere with any assignment(s) in their primary department, and do not exceed the expected load profile outlined above.