Interactive demonstration · illustrative data

How we test every career ladder Attachment A exposes

The RFP's objectives ask for comparable classification of comparable work (Objective B), clearly defined career pathways (Objective C), and correction of existing anomalies (Objective D). This module demonstrates the ladder analysis on an illustrative parks-maintenance progression shaped like the one in Attachment A. Adjust the sliders and watch differentials, overlap, and the recommendation logic respond.

Illustrative career ladder: Parks Maintenance series

Synthetic ranges loosely shaped like a Bay Area town maintenance progression. No Town of Los Gatos salary data appears anywhere on this page; the real analysis runs on the validated range and incumbent data the Town provides at project initiation.

The tests we run on every ladder

  • Promotional differential: is the range-max step between each level at or above the agency's policy threshold (commonly 5 to 10 percent)?
  • Supervisor-subordinate compression: can a supervisor's range max fall below a led classification's max plus longevity and special pays?
  • Range overlap: what share of each range is overlapped by the level below, and is overlap consistent within the family?
  • Cross-group equity: do parallel titles in different groups (Office Assistant CONF vs TEA, Administrative Assistant CONF vs TEA) hold consistent relationships?
  • Level integrity: does each titled level reflect genuinely different work, or has a level become a longevity step in disguise?

Why this matters in Los Gatos specifically

Attachment A is dense with exactly the structures where ladder problems live: Parks Maintenance Worker Trainee through Lead with a supervisor above, Assistant through Supervising Equipment Mechanic, Police Records Specialist through Lead, Communication Dispatcher through Lead, Engineering Technician through Senior, and sworn Police Trainee through Sergeant. Five employee groups mean differentials also carry MOU history, so every recommendation we make ships with the rationale and fiscal context a bargaining table requires.

Four classifications are already flagged by the Town's own list as missing a spec, in progress, or folding into Division Manager. Anomalies like that rarely travel alone; finding the rest is Objective D, and this is the machinery that finds them.