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*Apologies for cross-posting*
Dear colleagues,
Many of you are by now aware of the ARA Pay Review Group (PRG) revised salary recommendations which were officially launched on 16 August 2018. If you weren’t, or haven’t looked in detail, here’s a summary -
Banded salary recommendations
ARA's previous recommended minimum salary for archivists, records managers and conservators of £22,443 per annum no longer appears in ARC Recruitment; the new minimum recommended salary is in the range of £27,000-£32,000 or €30,000-€35,000 for a recently-qualified (graduate/post-graduate) professional. It is additionally important to note that the new recommendations are not confined to a basic minimum range, but are divided into five separate bands to take account of different levels of skills and experience across a career, from what can be loosely described as para-professional to senior professional.
We adopted this banding in part because we recognised early on in our research the trend for recently-graduated professionals in particular to move from job to job, gaining valuable experience and skills, but who also ended up starting at or near the minimum recommended level with each new position. We also recognised that employers in some sectors might need time to adjust to these new bands.
The salary recommendations are available on the ARA website, together with our summary report, at this link: https://www.archives.org.uk/publications/ara-pay-review-2018.html
Freelancers supported
The PRG has also produced a guidance document for freelancers, and those working from contract to contract, in response to a clear demand for such guidance from members. While not covering every single eventuality, this document is also intended to assist in situations where jobs are advertised without a salary and is available on the ARA website, at this link: https://www.archives.org.uk/images/Pay_Review_/20180816_Pay_Review_Group_-_freelancer_guide_-_final_Board_approved_-_rev_for_publication.pdf
Summary of changes
We would encourage everyone to use these recommendations when negotiating better starting salaries and/or pay increases with employers, and to assist in this please find attached a one-page summary document of the salary recommendations and the rationale behind them. Do feel free to circulate this as widely as possible in your network and among your colleagues, e.g. line managers and those working in human resources, when discussions about pay and recruitment/retention take place. We’ll send out a further, more detailed note on ‘what you can do’ to promote the revised recommendations in a few weeks.
Next steps for PRG
The ARA Board is committed to talking to employers, raising the profile of the recommended salary guidelines and encouraging employers to adopt the new pay scales. To achieve this, the PRG will be working behind the scenes with large employers, recruitment agencies, HR professionals and trade unions over the next few months, as well as compiling evidence of advertised vacancies to see if employers are beginning to adjust. The ARA is unable to enforce minimum pay grades (as a professional body, we are a charity and, e.g., legally different from a trade union). But we do have the means, reach and credibility to campaign and promote fair pay in our sector.
And on the subject of employers, the PRG saw with dismay the job advertised via the NRA-listserv for a full-time project archivist at St George’s School, Weybridge at a rate of £16,000 per annum. Many of you registered your annoyance on the listserv and directly with the school, and the PRG has also contacted the school to query the rate and inform them of ARA’s salary recommendations. Please alert us when you see such examples: we will continue to approach individual employers directly when it is appropriate to do so. We are mostly volunteers, so your continued membership subscriptions help us secure the modest resources we need to do this work. Our sincere thanks for your support.
Contact us
Do please feel free to contact us via email: [log in to unmask] or @ARAPayReviewGroup with any comments or queries you might have. If you are interested in joining the PRG you are also very welcome to contact us at the above email address.
ARA Pay Review Group