MSS Winter 2022-2023 Pre-season Newsletter

WELCOME

Welcome to the 2022-23 winter season!

At the close of each winter, the MSS management and supervisor team spend time reflecting on the season and working to set our strategic priorities for the following winter. We then work throughout the spring and summer to refine and implement those strategic initiatives. This summer was busy and productive. One of our top priorities has been to improve our communication to you, and we are pleased to be able to share this important information with you prior to sending your job offer.

TOWN HALLS

We will host a virtual town hall meeting at 4:00PM on Monday September 12, 2022. As usual, please submit questions ahead of time to mssjobs@jacksonhole.com. The link for the event is HERE. We will also host small group meetings on Thursday Sept 15th at 4:00 pm and Friday September 16th, at 1:00 pm. These meetings will be held in the Olympic Conference Room. We may schedule additional small group discussion sessions throughout the fall.

INSTRUCTOR WAGES

In response to last season's decision to increase our minimum wage to $18/hr., MSS management sought and received feedback from our staff on wages. It was a healthy process, and will help us to be able to communicate with more transparency about wages moving forward.

After receiving your feedback, we created and analyzed about ten wage increase options for the 2022-2023 season. Our priorities were to make the largest impact for the largest number of our staff, and to re-align the points wage system. After analyzing our options, we made the decision to focus our wage increase initiatives on base wages. We decided to specifically target the middle and upper pay groups. We also decided to focus on realigning our private lesson incentives to support the premium positioning of our private lesson and backcountry guide products.

Please see a summary of base wage and private lesson incentive increases below. You can see the full approved points wage system for 2022-2023 HERE.

Instructor Pay Groups Winter 2022-2023

Private Lesson Incentives Winter 2022-2023

These increases to our pay system demonstrate the enduring commitment of the Kemmerer family, the Board of directors, the Senior Team, and MSS management to prioritizing instructor/guide wages and to recognize the value each one of you brings to the Jackson Hole Mountain Resort.

STATUS

Last season, we updated status to a simpler system that aligns with the rest of JHMR. This winter, we have continued to evolve our status system by replacing minimum work hours requirements in favor of weekly availability expectations.

Our goals with this change are to create clear expectations of commitment at each status level, allow supervisors and managers to schedule more consistently throughout the season, and to meet our business needs more efficiently. As in the past, your supervisor will manage scheduling based on business volumes and individual staff scheduling requests. Please see updated status requirements and benefits below.

Please note that peak period dates will be included in key dates for all employees. Status will be reviewed mid-season and any recommended changes will be made at that time. Instructor benefits, schedule, and priority will be based on committed status.

VOUCHERS

Comp benefit vouchers are back! Please see the voucher program for this winter below. Your vouchers will only be distributed to you after you successfully complete your online orientation for the season.

Please note vouchers are blacked out on the same dates as by-pass products. Please follow this link for full details on employee vouchers.

PRIORITY

Last season, priority groups were based on points accrued from the previous season’s total hours, students taught, and request hours. These points, combined with points for primary certification and children’s specialist accreditation, designated your priority group. These points are re-calculated before each season.

For the upcoming season, we have decided to include points for the status you commit to for the season. This will help ensure instructors and guides who have higher levels of commitment are prioritized appropriately for work.

Those points will be awarded as follows:

We understand that this is a lot of information to digest. Please take the time to read through this.

We will utilize the virtual Town Hall on Monday September 12th at 4PM to go through these topics with you in more detail. The question portal is open (email mssjobs@jacksonhole.com)to ensure that we can address your thoughts. Please send in your thoughts.

The link to join the Town Hall is HERE.

As always, feel free to reach out to any of us with questions or concerns via email or phone or to set up a one-on-one conversation. We hope you are enjoying your summer and are looking forward to a great fall!

- MSS Senior Management Team