1. Introduction
In the working plans of academic staff, the staff member and their supervisor agree upon the employee's tasks and work time allocation. The working plan is compiled for at least a year but not longer than the assessment period (mostly five years). It can be used as the basis for conducting performance interviews with employees and assessing their work results. The obligation of comprising work plans is laid down by clause 9 of the Job Descriptions of Academic Staff, these regulations should be followed when establishing work plans.
The workflow can be entered via this address: https://www.is.ut.ee/is/eesmargid/index.zul.
You can enter the workflow with your University of Tartu username, ID-card or mobile-ID.
2. Adding new working plans
You can add a new working plan using the "My working plans" tab. One employee can have several working plans if they have many valid job contracts for their academic positions at the University of Tartu.
First choose the position you want to write a working plan for from the drop-down menu. Only academic positions are shown in the menu. If an employee has additional tasks (e.g., a professor is also a head of institute, an academic, a programme director), then these tasks should be described in the appropriate subsection of the working plan.
To add a new working plan, click the button "Add a new working plan". Then choose the working plan validity period. The plan can stay valid for anywhere between one year and 5 years (the assessment period). Comprising shorter-term working plans is recommended, since this allows you to establish more specific tasks and be more precise when allocating work time and reduces the need to make changes throughout the period. The validity period of a working plan could potentially be a calendar year or an academic year. By way of exception, right now working plans can be comprised for periods that have already passed (retrospectively), this enables you to incorporate the current semester in the plan.
According to the Job Descriptions of Academic Staff, the tasks of academic staff fall into four main categories. Tasks are added to the working plan separately by category. The percentage of the employee's workload dedicated to each category of tasks is added to the working plan as a total of that particular category (box "Expected workload“).
To add a task, click the button "Add new task". This will open a text field to add the task to the list of tasks in this category. Please choose from the drop-down menu above the text field the type of a of task.
You can save working plans or quit adding them by using the corresponding buttons at the bottom of the page.
You can continue comprising an in progress working plan by opening that working plan in the "My working plans" tab and clicking on the category that needs changing (button "View"). A list of tasks in that category will be displayed. To change a task, click on the "Edit" button at the end of the row. You can delete a task by clicking on the red cross. Tasks can be added using the button "Add tasks" under the table.
Once the working plan is ready, it must be approved. After approval, the working plan is sent to the supervisor of the employee to be reviewed and approved.
A supervisor or a person authorised by them can also comprise new working plans for employees. For that, the supervisor must find the right employee from the employee tab and click on their name. The rest of the adding process goes as described above.
3. Changing an existing and approved working plan.
An approved working plan can be opened for editing by the employee and their supervisor as well as a person authorised by the supervisor. To do that, the supervisor or the authorised person must firstly find the working plan of the relevant employee from the employees tab. The employee can find their working plan from the tab "My working plans". To open the working plan for editing click on "Open working plan for revision". The working plan can be revised by following the instructions for comprising an in progress working plan (see above). If you want or need to add comments, it is possible to explain the revisions made to each task.
Once the working plan has been revised, you can exit the editing view by clicking on the button "Back". The revised working plan must be approved again.
The employee whose working plan was opened for editing or the supervisor (authorised person) whose employee opened the working plan to review it will receive an automatic notice from the workflow which states that there is a changed working plan that needs reviewing and approving.
The previous approved revisions and changes that await approval are summarised and can be viewed in the tab "Revision history". You must confirm that revisions have been accepted by clicking the button "Accepted" at the end of the row describing the revision. Once all revisions have been accepted, the working plan must be approved again. If any of the revisions are not agreed upon by one party, the corresponding tasks can be revised or deleted. In that case, the working plan will be sent to other party to again accept and approve the revisions. The revised working plan can finally be approved if both the employee and their supervisor have accepted the changes (i.e. neither has unaccepted revisions).
4. Delegating the rights of the head of the structural unit
According to the Job Descriptions of Academic Staff, the head of a structural unit can delegate the negotiating and approval of working plans to the immediate supervisor of the employee. Additionally, the rights of creating, changing and viewing working plans can be appointed to people who need them according to the head of the structural unit.
The head of the structural unit can delegate rights in the tab "Delegating" where a list of people who have already been appointed rights is displayed.
To appoint rights to a new person, click on the button "Appoint new rights". Rights are delegated by subunits, i.e. the person who is given the right to, for example, view certain working plans or create new ones will have these rights with respect to all subunit's employees.
To delegate rights, you should first choose the structural unit you want to appoint rights to. The person who is appointed new rights should be searched in the box "Appointee". You should then establish the period for which the rights are valid, and then the appointed rights. The head of the structural unit can appoint the rights of viewing working plans, creating new plans, revising, and approving them. The right of approving working plans can only be appointed to the immediate supervisor of the employee. The system will confirm whether the appointee is employed by the same structural unit that is concerned in the delegation process. The entered rights must be saved. Already appointed rights can be revised by using the "Change" button in the overall delegation table. You can use the cross at the end of the same row of the table to revoke rights.
5. Searching an employee's working plan
The head of the structural unit and authorised employees will be displayed the tab "Employees" upon entering the working plan workflow. This tab allows you to search employees by their name, structural unit and position. Employees can also be searched based on the status of their working plan. The statuses of working plans can be: in progress (the working plan is being comprised and it has not been approved), awaits approval of your supervisor (the employee has approved the working plan), awaits approval of the employee (the supervisor has approved the working plan), approved (both parties have approved the working plan and it is valid), revoked, absent, archived.
After adding the desired search criteria, you must press the button "Filter" to start the search.
Once you have found the employee, their working plan can be viewed by clicking on their name. All working plans of the particular employee are displayed in a new tab. Each employee will have one valid working plan per academic position.