• Section 1 - Principles
• Section 2 - Criteria and Eligibility for Vice-Chancellor’s Performance Fund Awards
• Section 3 - Awards
• Section 4 - Review Process
• Section 5 - Reporting

Section 1 - Principles

(1) The Vice-Chancellor's Performance Fund aims to acknowledge and reward the outstanding achievement of academic and professional staff by providing performance awards. The Vice-Chancellor’s Performance Fund enables recognition of staff who have made a superior contribution in a particular area of activity.

(2) Vice-Chancellor’s Performance Fund awards are offered annually, with funds provided by the Vice-Chancellor and President and deployed to faculties and divisions based on the number of full-time equivalent staff employed. An advisory committee within each faculty and division considers nominations and makes recommendations to the Executive Dean of faculty/Head of Division. An open call for nominations will occur mid-year once the recipients of the Vice-Chancellor’s Awards for Excellence have been announced at the annual ceremony. The timetable for consideration of nominations is to be advertised in each faculty or division. Further information on the award, process and reward is available in the Digital Workplace - Rewards and Recognition.

(3) Unless otherwise approved by the Vice-Chancellor and President, at least 50% of the Vice-Chancellor’s Performance Fund will be directed to the recognition of outstanding frontline teaching and learning, or the direct support thereof.

Section 2 - Criteria and Eligibility for Vice-Chancellor’s Performance Fund Awards

(4) Vice-Chancellor's Performance Fund awards recognise outstanding achievement by staff over a specified review period or over the past twelve months. All staff and affiliates of the University awarded a Distinguished or Honorary Title are eligible to receive a performance award. Teams are eligible to be nominated for a Performance Fund award. Self-nomination is not permitted.

(5) Senior staff (i.e. staff classified at Senior Staff Group (SSG) levels SSGA to SSGE inclusive) are not eligible to receive a Vice-Chancellor's Performance Fund award.

(6) The Vice-Chancellor's Performance Fund award is not conditional on Performance Planning and Review (PPR) outcomes (refer to the University’s performance, promotion and probation policies). However the staff member or team must have made a significant and superior contribution or innovation in a specific area of activity.

(7) Staff are ineligible to be considered for a Vice-Chancellor’s Performance Fund award if they were a recipient of a Vice-Chancellor’s Award for Excellence in the same year. A recipient of an individual Vice-Chancellor's Performance Fund Award would normally only be eligible for renomination after two years and on the basis of new supporting evidence.

Section 3 - Awards

(8) The Vice-Chancellor's Performance Fund awards are administered by the relevant Executive Dean of faculty/Head of Division. Both individual and team awards are available. Recipients of an award will receive an award certificate, and a one-off monetary payment. The Vice-Chancellor and President will determine annually the amount for individual and team awards. Relevant taxation will apply to any award payment. Staff must have been an employee of QUT within the 12 month period to which the nomination applies. Staff who are nominated more than once for a Performance Fund award in any given year will receive only one award that year.

(9) The award money may be paid to eligible staff as a one-off non-superannuable salary payment or may be used solely by the recipient for work-related purposes (for example for equipment purchases or to offset costs of participation in conferences, seminars and training courses). If the award money is placed in a project account for future use, it cannot be transferred or ‘donated’ to another project, or used to pay salaries for other staff (for example research assistants).

(10) Any equipment purchased by the University with award monies remains the property of the University, subject to University policy. Any expenditure of award monies for work-related purposes should conform appropriately with the University's Expenditure of University Funds Policy.

Section 4 - Review Process

(11) Executive Leadership Team and Assurance and Audit are responsible for reviewing the processes and practices associated with the Vice-Chancellor's Performance Fund awards. The performance awards will be reviewed periodically by the Vice-Chancellor and President to ensure the maintenance of value and relativity with the Vice-Chancellor's Awards for Excellence.

Section 5 - Reporting

(12) Executive Deans of faculty/Heads of Division report annually to the Vice-Chancellor and President, through Executive Leadership Team, on the Vice-Chancellor’s Performance Fund awards and funding decisions.