Job evaluation: decide if it鈥檚 right for you
What to consider and how it works
If you think you鈥檙e not being paid fairly for the job you do, you can review and update your job description and ask for it to be evaluated.
Before you start, it鈥檚 helpful to understand what makes a person a good candidate for job evaluation and to broadly understand the process.
When to consider a job evaluation
You might consider job evaluation if, since you started your role, you have:
- Taken on additional duties and responsibilities not in your job description.
- Taken courses, study days, or self-directed learning opportunities to gain knowledge that helps you in your role.
- Achieved additional specialist academic qualifications relevant to your role.
- Developed new skills and competencies through your experience.
These are just some examples. You may have other strong reasons for why you believe your job should be evaluated.
For more information on the importance of job evaluation, watch our video.
How job evaluation works
The NHS Job Evaluation Scheme is used to determine the pay bands for all roles under Agenda for Change contracts. That includes new roles and those that have significantly changed since they were last updated.
The job evaluation scheme measures the skills, responsibilities and effort that a role requires across 16 specific factors. It then allocates that role to a pay band. This can happen in two ways.
Across the country, employers and trade unions have agreed many job profiles for commonly occurring jobs. The profiles are scored and pay grades or ‘bands’ are determined.
Job matching is the process of matching job descriptions to one of these national profiles to determine pay banding.
Nearly all NHS jobs match a profile.
Ideally, matching should be carried out by a panel of four members, including two management members and two staff representative members.
Job descriptions can also be evaluated locally using a Job Analysis Questionnaire (JAQ).
This occurs where a role is unique or highly individualised and so won’t match a national profile.
What happens next?
Decisions from both job matching and job evaluating must go through consistency checking. This happens in partnership with trained employee and staff representatives.
Consistency checkers can agree with the matching or evaluation decision or, if they have any concerns, ask the panel to review the decision. Once they have checked for consistency, they let the role holder know the outcome.
If a role holder is dissatisfied with the outcome of matching or evaluating, they can request a review within 3 months of the decision. This means a new job evaluation panel will follow the matching or evaluating process above with more information to support the review request. The review panel’s decision is final.
This is the last stage of appeal. A separate local grievance procedure kicks in if the role holder raises issues with the way the process was carried out.
Remember, if you’ve submitted a request for a job evaluation, you may not hear back from your employer with the outcome for several months or longer.
When are jobs put through job evaluation?
1. New jobs
All new roles that have been created and do not yet have a post holder should automatically go through the job evaluation process.
2. Jobs affected by service redesign or organisational change
All jobs affected by restructures must have the correct banding applied to ensure pay equality. Local policies dictate how this is carried out – job evaluation should be a key part of this.
3. Jobs that have changed significantly
If there are significant differences between the job you were employed to do and the job you do today, you can ask for your job to be evaluated. Use our step-by-step guidance to help. Sign up below.
Remember, if you don't work for the NHS, you could still benefit from the principles and process of job evaluation. Check whether you have a job evaluation policy at your employer.
