MARC's Annual Salary Survey

Effective with the 2013 salary survey, we will use a new web-based survey tool (Compensation Survey System or CSS) that will make the process much easier and give you more information. It will also provide much greater access to salary information anytime throughout the year and will allow you to select those entities that you consider as comparables and generate your own reports.

To participate in the annual salary survey, follow these key steps:

Review information about the new CSS tool (overview, advantages and quick start guide).
Pay service fee, provide subscriber information and request user new login.
Participate in a web-based demonstration in April (45 minutes).
Participate in over-the-phone training (30-45 minutes).
Update your 2013 salary information by May 10.
Select comparable governmental entities and generate your first salary report.

Click on the links below to get more information about the survey tool, the benefits it will provide and how it will be implemented.

Background and Selection Process
Benefits of New Web-based Survey Tool
CSS Overview
CSS Advantages
CSS Quick Start
Want to See a Demonstration of CSS?
Service Fee Schedule
Payment of Service Fees
Login Access Codes
2012 Salary Data is Already Loaded for You
CSS Training Opportunities on the New Web-based Survey Tool
Key Dates for the Survey Process
Fringe Benefits and Other General Information
Request for Support Going Forward

Background and Selection Process

The Mid-America Regional Council has coordinated the annual local government salary and fringe benefits survey since the 1980s. The survey was processed using a custom in-house database application and Excel and Word software. The annual process requires much hands-on processing to prepare the survey forms, review the survey response data, and generate the final report. Also, the final results were not readily accessible by the participants.

A state-of-the-art web-based solution was highly desired and would greatly reduce the work effort and make the data readily accessible and sortable by the local governments. MARC staff met with area local governmental human resources personnel in February 2012 to discuss improvements to the annual survey process to the extent possible and practical. Our goals were:

To work within local government financial constraints.
To meet the needs of local governments’ management and HR staff.
To develop an efficient process for all involved.
To provide up-to-date, high quality data.
To provide easy access to data that can be processed in multiple formats with varying selection criteria.
To reduce the number of surveys circulated among local governments each year.

Over the last few years, MARC staff reached out to the local governments, HR consultants and governmental associations to seek out existing web-based survey tools. Two tools were identified which have been used for approximately ten years and contain a broad base of salary and fringe benefit information. The companies are:

CityTech USA, Inc. at www.citytechusa.com (use PublicSalary.com for trial account)
Technology Net, LLC/Compensation Survey System at www.comp-survey.com

A meeting was held on February 20, 2013 with human resources personnel from the following local governments to participate in demonstrations of both survey tools. After the meeting, the participants were given access information so that they could personally log-in and explore the survey tool as a real participant.

Kansas City, Missouri	Independence
Kansas City, Missouri Police Department	Overland Park
Kansas City Area Transportation Authority	Lenexa
Jackson County	Shawnee
Mid-America Regional Council

Based upon demonstrations and feedback from the participants, MARC selected the Technology Net survey tool. Technology Net will provide unlimited participant assistance on-call, initial individual participant training as requested, annual group web-based training as needed, and agrees to travel to MARC to work with a focus group (one trip per year) if requested.

Benefits of New Web-based Survey Tool

After seeing demonstrations of two survey tools and making the decision to use the Technology Net product, it is much easier to understand the advantages participating organizations will gain with this change, such as:

Immediate access to the survey data anytime during the year to either update or retrieve data.
The ability to generate reports that include only the local governments that you want to include in your comparisons.
The ability to obtain job data from local governments across the country.
An expanded database of jobs (from the current 120 to over 900 benchmarks).
Reduced pay plan consultant fees because local governments will already have access to comprehensive salary data.
Fewer survey requests for salary data circulated among local governments throughout the year since area local governments will have access to Technology Net’s Compensation Survey System (CSS) tool.

Please refer to the following attachments if you would like more information about Technology Net’s CSS services:

Want to See a Demonstration of Compensation Salary Survey (CSS)?

Demonstrations are available on a one-on-one basis. The webcast will last approximately 45 minutes.
Please RSVP to Thressa Allen at tallen@marc.org to let her know several proposed dates and times when you are available for a demonstration. Thressa will contact Technology Net to schedule your demonstration and then email you the specific information so that you can join the online demonstration with a representative from Technology Net.

Service Fee Schedule

The fees for 2013, 2014 and 2015 are shown below. The fees are structured to cover the Technology Net service fees along with MARC’s expenses for the private sector salary data and report printing.

The new fees replace the $100 fee paid to MARC in past years but we believe that the added advantages of the web-based survey tool far outweigh the increase in fees.

Payment of Service Fees

Please follow the steps below to take advantage of the Compensation Survey System (CSS):

Step 1:	Click here for an Invoice and Subscriber Form, and fill out the Word form electronically. The form requests certain subscriber information. This information will be used to set-up your governmental entity and let us know who the users will be.
Step 2:	Email the form to Thressa Allen at tallen@marc.org.
Step 3:	If you would like to pay the service fee by credit card, please select the appropriate fee in the drop-down box below. Otherwise, you can mail a check to Mid-America Regional Council, 600 Broadway, Suite 200, Kansas City, Mo. 64105-1659.

After we receive your payment, we will work with Technology Net, LLC to add your governmental entity to CSS and approve the “Request New Login” requests when submitted by your users.

Login Access Codes

After you have emailed the Invoice and Subscriber Form and paid the annual service fees, you will have access to Compensation Salary Survey (CSS). To obtain your login access codes, please follow these steps:

From your web browser, go to www.comp-survey.com.
In the main menu at the left of the screen, click on “Request New Login.”
Review user terms and click on the “agree to terms” check box
Complete the popup information screen with your contact information.
Click on “Save Request.”
Within approximately 24 hours you will receive a welcome message from ETS containing your login and password.
A 2nd welcome message will be delivered from Technology Net, LLC inviting you to contact them to set up a training session, over-the-phone, at your convenience (a 30-45 minute exercise).

2012 Salary Data is Already Loaded for You

If you were a participant in the 2012 survey, your 2012 salary data has already been loaded into Compensation Survey System (CSS) to facilitate the transition process. You simply need to update the salary information for 2013.

CSS contains 900 job positions (or benchmarks). The MARC survey only has 139 job positions. Please review how your job positions were matched with the job positions in CSS. You may find that some of your job positions are a better match with different jobs included in the CSS database. You can add and delete job data as necessary to obtain the best match and comparable data for your governmental entity.

If you like, you can also try to match any of other your job positions not already loaded into CSS with the 900 benchmarks available. This will make the database more valuable with comparable job data.

Compensation Survey System (CSS) Training Opportunities on the New Web-based Survey Tool

We encourage all interested governmental entities to first participate in one of the six web-cast demonstrations scheduled in April, if possible.

After you receive your login and password information, you will have the opportunity to set up a training session, over-the-phone, at your convenience (a 30-45 minute exercise) with a representative from TechNet. Because CSS is fairly easy to learn and navigate, this training session generally gets everyone well trained on how to enter and retrieve data. CSS also offers unlimited participant assistance on-call throughout the year. Finally, CSS has a built-in user manual that is always available.

Key Dates for the Survey Process

Each year, we try to have the salary survey results by mid-May because many local governments are beginning their annual budget process. We have a late start this year because of the decision to transition to a web-based survey tool. The month of April will be an important time for the participants to learn how to use Compensation Survey System (CSS) and update their 2013 salary data. We appreciate everyone’s work effort to have their salary data updated as soon as you can.

Fringe Benefits and Other General Information

Compensation Salary Survey (CSS) contains fringe benefits and other general information about the entity. We asked that you update the salary information first. More information about the fringe benefits and other general information will follow in May.

Request for Support Going Forward

There are two ways you can help with the survey process in the future. First, encourage your peers at other local governments to participate. The data you will pull out for your own job comparisons will be more comprehensive with more local cities and counties in the database.

Second, participate in the HR Focus Group. You, as the users of the survey tool, will be the ones that know best how to take full advantage of the software and where enhancements and changes should be made.

600 Broadway, Suite 200
Kansas City, MO 64105-1659
816/474-4240
Fax: 816/421-7758

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