JOB ARCHITECTURE

To further enhance the professional development of Villanova staff, Human Resources collaborated with college and administrative leadership teams to develop a job architecture to help staff understand how their position relates to other positions at the University and to enable clearer career pathways within the University.

Detailed information about where your individual role is within the new job architecture will be shared in early 2027. We want to use this fall to build awareness of what a job architecture is -- and what it isn't.

Overview of Villanova's Staff Job Architecture

A job architecture is a structured framework that defines roles and organizes jobs, categorizing them within career functions and sub-functions based on the type and level of work performed in the job. It is meant to work alongside the staff competency model to support opportunities for career growth.

Villanova's Job Architecture is designed to:

Ensure that there is consistent, clear, and standardized language regarding career levels - no matter the job title or career function
Provide a tool for staff to navigate and discover the many ways that they can grow at the university, based on interests, skills and qualifications
Act as a springboard for career conversations, supported by HR

Through a uniform job architecture, Villanova has made a commitment to:

Employee growth within the University as a whole, instead of limiting employee growth within a school/division or department
Purposeful, not incremental, career growth, and the ability to progress both as an individual contributor and as a manager

Villanova's Job Architecture does not:

Create new jobs
Set staff with a predetermined career path; this remains individualized and flexible
Attempt to standardize job titles across the University
Tie directly to compensation. Salary grades are a separate structure.