National Library News November 1999 Vol. 31, no. 11

The Public Service of Canada Universal Classification Standard

Responsibility Factor: measures accountability in the work for people, ideas and things.

Elements:

• Information for the Use of Others measures the extent and impact of accountability for information that is used by others.
• Well-being of Individuals measures direct accountability for supporting the health and development of individuals.
• Leadership of Human Resources measures accountability for leading people in working toward achieving the goals of the Public Service of Canada.
• Money measures the responsibility in the work for the stewardship and comptrollership of financial resources.
• Physical Assets and Products measures direct accountability for the custody, use, production, maintenance, repair and protection of physical assets used, and products created, in doing the work.
• Ensuring Compliance measures the responsibility in the work for decisions on the compliance with government-accepted standards, guidelines, regulations and legislation and for taking appropriate action to foster and enforce such compliance.

Skill Factor: measures what employees need to know about, or to be able to do, in order to perform the assigned work.

Elements:

• Job Content Knowledge Application measures the depth and breadth of the knowledge required to perform the work.
• Contextual Knowledge measures how much the work requires knowledge of people, organizations, external circumstances, and legislation and regulations.
• Communication measures the skills required by the work to convey and receive messages.
• Motor and Sensory Skills measures the proficiency that the work requires in order to control body movements and use the senses to make distinctions.

Effort Factor: measures the mental and physical exertion required by the work.

Elements:

• Intellectual Effort measures the mental exertion associated with problem solving in the work.
• Sustained Attention measures the effort required by the work to focus one or more of the senses.
• Psychological / Emotional Effort measures the mental exertion required to cope with psychologically demanding work.
• Physical Effort measures the amount of physical exertion required by the work.

Working Conditions Factor: measures the physical and psychological conditions under which the work is performed, and their potential effects on the health of employees.

Elements:

• Work Environment measures the exposure to disagreeable psychological and physical work environments.
• Risk to Health measures the exposure to unavoidable mental and/or physical risks or hazards to health resulting directly from the performance of work.

Taken from: The Standard in a Nutshell. Treasury Board of Canada, 1999, <http://www.tbs-sct.gc.ca/ucs-ngc/english/comm_e.html>.