Tag: staff

  • Deakin University underpaid staff $3m – Campus Review

    Deakin University underpaid staff $3m – Campus Review

    Deakin University has found it underpaid casual staff $2.9 million over the last eight years, adding to the growing list of wage underpayments in the sector.

    Please login below to view content or subscribe now.

    Membership Login

    Source link

  • Canberra finds staff underpaid $1.5m – Campus Review

    Canberra finds staff underpaid $1.5m – Campus Review

    The University of Canberra will review casual academic staff payslips after it found professional employees have been underpaid over $1.5 million over six years.

    Please login below to view content or subscribe now.

    Membership Login

    Source link

  • Staff opinion of using AI – Campus Review

    Staff opinion of using AI – Campus Review

    To continue onto Campus Review, please select your institution.

    Source link

  • Trump Administration Fires Nearly All Staff Overseeing Special Education Programs

    Trump Administration Fires Nearly All Staff Overseeing Special Education Programs

    The U.S. Department of Education has terminated nearly every employee in the Office of Special Education and Rehabilitative Services in a sweeping wave of layoffs that began Friday, according to the union representing agency staff—a move that advocates say will devastate services for millions of students with disabilities.

    While the agency has not provided official numbers, reports from staff and managers indicate that most employees below the leadership level in the division were eliminated, said Rachel Gittleman, president of the American Federation of Government Employees Local 252. Employees in the college access program known as TRIO, housed in a different office, were also let go.

    The union has challenged the firings in court, arguing they “double down on the harm to K-12 students and schools across the country,” Gittleman told USA TODAY.

    Education Department spokespeople did not respond to requests for comment. However, Education Secretary Linda McMahon has previously stated that safeguarding students with disabilities and ensuring their access to legally mandated educational resources is a top priority. “I would like to see even more funding go to the states for that,” she told CNN in March.

    In a Friday court filing, the Justice Department confirmed that more than 460 Education Department employees had been laid off, cutting roughly one-fifth of the agency’s workforce. The terminations, which have affected more than half a dozen federal agencies, are part of a broader Trump administration effort to pressure congressional Democrats to end the ongoing government shutdown. Nearly 90% of the Education Department remains furloughed.

    The agency eliminated nearly every employee responsible for administering funding under the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA)—the primary federal law supporting students with disabilities. The staffer expressed uncertainty about how these programs will continue to function.

    Secretary McMahon has suggested that oversight of IDEA funding might be better positioned within the Department of Health and Human Services rather than at the Education Department, though officially moving it would require congressional action.

    The mass firings have drawn sharp criticism from education equity advocates who warn of dire consequences for vulnerable students.

    “The Trump administration’s attack on public education continued this weekend as students with disabilities are at risk of losing the services, supports, and oversight that protect their civil rights,” said Denise Forte, president and CEO of The Education Trust. 

    “The administration’s unfathomable decision to fire all employees who administer the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) abandons the 7.5 million students with disabilities and their families,” Forte continued. “Roughly 15% of public school students have a disability, and federal enforcement of IDEA is crucial to ensuring that these students receive a free and appropriate public education.”

    Forte said that the layoffs will have particularly significant consequences for students of color with disabilities, who already face greater barriers to accessing services and are subjected to disproportionately harsher discipline.

    “This is a direct assault on all parents of and students with disabilities and all students and families who know that an excellent education system is a diverse and inclusive one,” Forte said. “I call on the Trump administration to reverse these cuts immediately.”

    The firings come amid widespread disruption across the Education Department, which has also experienced problems with financial aid administration following earlier rounds of layoffs.

    Source link

  • What over 5,000 transnational education students and staff told us about their digital experiences

    What over 5,000 transnational education students and staff told us about their digital experiences

    This guest blog was kindly authored by Dr Tabetha Newman, CEO and Senior Researcher at Timmus Research and Elizabeth Newall, Senior Sector Specialist at Jisc.

    Transnational education (TNE) is the delivery of UK higher education qualifications in countries other than the UK, allowing students to study for a UK degree without relocating to the UK. It can take various forms, including distance learning, overseas branch campuses, joint degrees, and partnerships with local institutions.

    In July, we asked a simple but pressing question in a HEPI blog: Who’s listening to the TNE student experience? With rising UK TNE student numbers and an increasingly competitive global education landscape, the quality of the TNE experience is central to the success of UK higher education abroad.

    Over the past three years, Jisc has been listening. Our research has focused on better understanding the digital experience of both international students (those travelling to the UK to study), and TNE students (those who study for a UK Higher Education award overseas), along with the staff who teach them. What we’ve found challenges assumptions and highlights the complexity of delivering equitable learning experiences across digital borders.

    The known challenges

    In July, Jisc published its first TNE report, drawing on HESA’s most recent international and TNE student data, and describing four digital challenges to global education delivery that UK providers and sector leaders already recognise:

    1. Connectivity and access to devices and technology.
    2. Access to digital resources such as online platforms, software, e-books and e-journals.
    3. Cultural differences in how digital is used to support teaching and learning.
    4. The digital skills of students and staff.

    These challenges are not new, but what’s been missing is a deeper understanding of how they present in real life, across different countries, contexts, and modes of delivery.

    Listening to lived experience

    This month Jisc launches its second TNE report, based on the feedback gathered in partnership with 19 UK higher education providers of over 5,000 students and staff in 51 instances of TNE in over 30 countries. Insights were gathered from all forms of teaching delivery, from fully online to classroom-based.

    The report provides the sector with vital detail on lived experiences of students and staff in relation to the four known digital challenges listed above. They reveal not just the presence of digital challenges, but the nuances of how they’re experienced, and how they shape access and engagement. The feedback also identified:

    • Differences in connectivity and access by country and global region.
    • How digital is used to support teaching and learning in different learning course contexts.
    • Digital challenges as identified by fly-in, remote and host country staff, and what additional support and training is required
    • Feedback in relation to themes such as internationalising and localising curricula, assessment, and use of GenAI.

    Rethinking Delivery

    These insights prompt a difficult but necessary question: are global learners accessing UK TNE as intended?

    The answer in many cases is no. UK qualifications retain global recognition, yet Jisc’s findings challenge us to rethink delivery: high-quality education loses impact if TNE students and staff are unable to access or engage with it as planned.

    Key issues identified include:

    • Connectivity and availability of equipment: TNE students’ ability to study online is shaped, not just by when they want to learn, but when they can connect. Access to a reliable electricity supply; availability of free Wi-Fi; small versus large screen device use; and reliance on cellular data (at personal cost) varies significantly between countries and global areas.
    • Access to digital resources and learning materials: Global digital resource access is heavily influenced by publisher and software licensing restrictions, national regulations and infrastructure gaps which vary from country to country.  Students frequently cite difficulties using online resources, and express frustration with time-limited access and high data costs.
    • Cultural differences in digital educational practice: Teaching practice differs between countries and cultures, notably in relation to expectations of independent study, feedback and collaboration. Students’ prior experience and expectations related to digital learning can vary as a result.  
    • Digital skills and capabilities: Confidence in digital skills varies by learning mode, with online or distance learners receiving the least guidance. Unclear or conflicting guidance around the use of digital tools such as AI is identified as a concern for both students and staff.

    What needs to change?

    The report doesn’t just give voice to lived experiences, it provides practical recommendations for HE providers and policymakers. These are broken into topics including:

    • Digital resource planning with global access in mind.
    • Curriculum design and delivery for diverse learning contexts.
    • Communicating clearly with TNE students.
    • Staff training and support.
    • Digital capabilities development across all modes of delivery.

    Importantly, the report responds to recent calls for greater transparency in TNE student experience data by providing a publicly accessible source of student voice – inviting the sector to engage, reflect, and act.

    Sector voices

    The response from sector leaders has been enthusiastic and deeply thoughtful.

    Griff Ryan, Head of TNE at Universities UK International, welcomed the report, commenting:

    Recent years have seen significant progress in understanding the experiences of TNE students, and this report continues that trend… With findings broken down by global region and mode of delivery, the report offers valuable guidance for universities and policymakers alike… This report is a timely and practical resource for institutions looking to strengthen their TNE offer. I’d like to thank Jisc and the 19 contributing universities for their work, and I look forward to the conversations and actions it will help to shape.

    Professor Dibyesh Anand, Deputy Vice-Chancellor (Global Engagement and Employability), University of Westminster reminds us that:

    Transnational education is meant to spread the benefits and cultures of internationalised education, and to an extent, ‘democratise’ it, around the world. Yet, this important report is a sobering reminder that inequities prevent a uniform experience with TNE. Therefore, universities need to be mindful about having understanding, resources, and processes to challenge inequities, provide consistency while accepting healthy differences, and encourage an inclusive education.

    Professor David Carter, Dean of Teaching and Leaning at the University of Reading, and author of the November 2024 HEPI report The student experience of transnational education, highlights the importance of challenging our assumptions:

    This is one of the largest and most comprehensive pieces of research into the student experience of UK transnational education. Behind the responses and the insights lies a huge variety of student and staff experience. The report brings several issues into much sharper focus. For UK providers, often the biggest challenge comes with our own assumptions. Things that we take for granted in the UK can be points of difference when it comes to TNE students. This includes everything, from how students access higher education to their attitudes to learning. A core skill for academic and professional staff who work in transnational education, therefore, is adaptability combined with respect for cultural differences. The recommendations in this report provide a useful toolkit for providers to use as they seek to expand TNE provision. It shows that there are clear gains to be made if UK providers work together to address common challenges.

    What’s next?

    Jisc’s TNE digital experience research is ongoing. We’ll continue working with providers to support more equitable digital learning and teaching, and we invite you to be part of that journey.

    To stay informed, sign up to the mailing list: ji.sc/stay-informed-isdx

    Source link

  • ED Put Political Out-of-Office Reply on Staff Emails

    ED Put Political Out-of-Office Reply on Staff Emails

    The department is largely closed due to the government shutdown. In the meantime, the Trump administration is using furloughed workers’ emails to make a political statement.   

    Photo illustration by Justin Morrison/Inside Higher Ed | Tierney L. Cross/Getty Images | nevodka/iStock/Getty Images

    Wednesday morning, as the government shutdown began, chief officers at the Department of Education distributed a standard out-of-the-office statement to all furloughed staff members and instructed them to copy and paste it into their email. So that’s what they did.

    But just hours later, those same nonpartisan staffers began to hear that the message they’d pasted into their email account was not the message being received by the public.

    “On Wednesday evening, my supervisor reached out to me on my personal equipment and said, ‘You’re going to want to log in and change your out-of-office status,’” one department staffer told Inside Higher Ed on the condition of anonymity out of fear of losing her job.

    When she followed her supervisor’s direction and logged in, the automatic message she saw was not the one she had saved earlier that morning.

    Rather than the original note, which had said, “There is a temporary shutdown … due to a lapse in appropriations,” the new message said, “Unfortunately, Democrat Senators are blocking passage of [a bill] … which has led to a lapse in appropriations.”

    This is one of the more than 10 emails Inside Higher Ed received as automatic responses including the same political message. Although Keast was appointed by Trump, most of the staffers we contacted were not.

    The outgoing message had been changed internally without her consent. And this staffer was not alone. Inside Higher Ed emailed 10 separate Education Department staffers Thursday, all of whom had been placed on furlough, and each one bounced back with identical responses. One senior leader from the department, who also spoke anonymously, said that to his knowledge the politically charged message was set as the out-of-office notification for all furloughed employees.

    (The Department of Education did not immediately provide comment. In fact, the emails sent to both deputy press secretary Ellen Keast and the general press team account were met with the same automatic response.)

    The first staffer said that while she was caught off guard by the override at first, it made sense the more she thought about it. Similar messages blaming Democratic senators for the shutdown had already been put at the top of HUD.gov, the landing page for all things Department of Housing and Urban Development, and other federal websites.

    As of Thursday evening, the HUD website noted, “The Radical Left in Congress shut down the government. HUD will use available resources to help Americans in need.”

    Republicans control the White House, the House and the Senate. In the Senate, they need the votes of at least seven Democratic senators to reach the 60-vote threshold necessary to overcome a filibuster.

    “I was really surprised, because we had gotten such explicit instructions on what to use for our out-of-office message,” the staffer said. But “when I saw that message from my supervisor, I assumed it had been changed to something more political than the original neutral one.”

    She has already logged back in multiple times to change the automatic response back to the neutral language. But each time, within hours, the department has overridden her changes.

    “It’s what [is being sent] to people who contact me, and they could reasonably misunderstand it as coming from me, and I don’t feel comfortable as a federal employee communicating a political message like that,” she said.

    A second staffer told Inside Higher Ed that he has worked through multiple shutdowns prior but not experienced anything like this.

    “It’s just wild to see your name attached to a message that you had nothing to do with,” he said. “It feels like a violation … You know that you don’t have any expectation of privacy when you’re working for the federal government. But it’s a different thing to say that you don’t have autonomy over your own words.”

    The second staffer noted that in his view, not only did this seem to be a violation of his personal rights, but also a violation of federal law.

    The Hatch Act, passed in 1939, was intended to ensure that nonpartisan federal workers who worked across administrations remained just that—nonpartisan. And according to documents from the Office of Special Counsel website, the Hatch Act “limits certain political activities of federal employees,” like using official authority for political purposes, soliciting political donations, wearing partisan political gear at work and posting or sharing partisan content on government systems.

    “It’s crazy to see the law violated on your behalf,” the second staffer said.

    None of the department employees Inside Higher Ed spoke with intended to file an individual lawsuit, nor had they heard anything from their union about a collective legal response. But one shared that Democracy Forward, a nonprofit legal organization that has sued the Trump administration several times this year, will be going to court over the matter as soon as Friday.

    Source link

  • Academic Staff Need Academic Freedom, Too (opinion)

    Academic Staff Need Academic Freedom, Too (opinion)

    Late last spring, something disturbing happened in my classroom. For the first time in 15 years of teaching, I opened by telling my students I wasn’t sure if I was allowed to speak. The class was an introduction to the philosophy of education, and months earlier I’d scheduled this day for our opening discussion on critical pedagogy. But in light of charged campus climates and broader legal threats facing institutions nationwide, I realized that as an academic staff member who engages in teaching and research, I was particularly vulnerable.

    What followed was one of the more important classes I’ve taught, though not about the subject I’d planned. We spent the hour investigating our institution’s academic freedom policies, asking questions of whom those policies included and excluded. We discovered the troubling reality: Although I was expected to facilitate complex educational discussions, I lacked clear protections to do so safely.

    My situation reflects a growing crisis in higher education that has received little attention. While much has been written about the vulnerabilities of contingent faculty, there has been almost no discussion of the academic freedom needs of one of higher education’s most rapidly growing workforces: third-space professionals.

    The Rise of the Third Space

    Over the past two decades, universities have dramatically expanded what researcher Celia Whitchurch terms “third-space” professionals: staff who blend academic and administrative functions but operate in the ambiguous territory between traditional faculty and staff roles.

    These roles aren’t new or unprecedented. The American Association of University Professors has long recognized that librarians, despite often holding staff status, require academic freedom protections given their integral role in teaching and research. What’s new is the scale and diversity of academic work now performed by nonfaculty academic professionals.

    This growth represents the contemporary evolution of a workforce shift that began in the 1970s, when academic support roles developed in response to diverse students entering colleges through open admissions policies. The 1990s brought expansion into new fields like faculty development and community-based learning, as colleges recognized these roles could enhance teaching practices institutionwide. Most recently, colleges have seen explosive growth in data-driven student success and enrollment management roles.

    What unites these professionals is their expertise in designing and delivering on the academic mission of the university, with special emphasis on student success. They lead pedagogical and curricular initiatives, make decisions about learning interventions, analyze data that reveals uncomfortable truths about institutional performance, and advocate for evidence-based policy revisions. They also regularly teach college courses, write and receive major grants, and publish in peer-reviewed journals. In essence, they do academic work, but without academic protections.

    Why Academic Freedom Matters for Third-Space Work

    The problem is easy to name but difficult to address. Institutions have radically restructured how academic work gets done based on the shifting needs of students and priorities of institutions, without a reciprocal restructuring of how academic work gets supported or protected. Third-space professionals need academic freedom protections for four key reasons.

    1. Educational decision-making: These professionals make pedagogical and curricular choices about student learning interventions, program design and educational strategies. Without academic freedom, they face pressure to implement approaches based on administrative convenience, pressure from faculty or donor preferences, rather than evidence-based best practices. What happens, for instance, when a faculty member feels the writing center’s approach to writing pedagogy conflicts with their own vision for writing in their classroom?
    2. Data interpretation and reporting: Student success professionals analyze retention, graduation and achievement data that may reveal uncomfortable truths about institutional performance or equity gaps. They need protection when their findings challenge institutional narratives or suggest costly reforms. What happens when an institutional researcher’s analysis shows that a flagship retention program isn’t working, but the administration has just featured it in a major donor presentation?
    3. Policy advocacy: Their direct work with students gives them insights into institutional policies and processes that harm student success. They should be able to advocate for necessary changes without fear of retaliation, even when those changes conflict with administrative priorities or departmental preferences. What happens when an academic adviser discovers that the prerequisite structure in a major is creating unnecessary barriers for students, but changing it would require difficult conversations with powerful department heads?
    1. Research and assessment: Many third-space professionals conduct and publish research on student success interventions, learning outcomes and institutional effectiveness. This scholarship requires the same protections as traditional academic research. What happens when assessment reveals the ineffectiveness of first-year seminar teaching, but presenting findings could damage relationships with faculty colleagues?

    The Problem of Selective Recognition

    Universities have already recognized that faculty work has diversified and requires differentiated policy structures. Many institutions now distinguish between research professors (focused on scholarship and grant acquisition), teaching professors (emphasizing teaching practice) and professors of practice (bringing professional expertise into academic settings). Each category receives tailored policies for promotion, performance evaluation and professional development that align with their distinct contributions.

    Yet on the staff side, institutions continue to operate as if all nonfaculty work is identical. A writing center director publishing on linguistic justice, an assistant dean of students developing crisis-intervention protocols for student mental health emergencies and a facilities director managing building maintenance are all governed by the same generic “staff” policies. This isn’t just administratively awkward: It’s a fundamental misalignment between how work actually happens and how institutions recognize and protect that work.

    Applying Consistent Logic

    The way forward isn’t revolutionary, but simply the application of the same logic that most universities already use for faculty. Rather than the outdated single “staff” category, colleges and universities need at least three distinct categories that reflect how staff work actually happens.

    1. Academic staff: Professionals engaged in teaching, research, curriculum design and educational assessment, including learning center directors, faculty developers, institutional researchers, professional academic advisers and academic program directors. These roles require academic freedom protections, scholarly review processes and governance representation.
    2. Student life staff: Professionals focused on co-curricular support, belonging and student life, including residence life coordinators, activities directors and counseling staff. These roles need specialized professional development and advancement pathways that recognize and support their expertise in student development.
    3. Operational staff: Professionals handling business functions, facilities and administrative operations. These roles can continue with traditional staff policies and support structures.

    This framework enables differentiated policy environments and support structures across multiple areas. Critically, academic freedom policies can be tailored to protect inquiry for staff who engage in this kind of work, while recognizing that other staff have different professional needs.

    The expansion of third-space/academic staff roles represents higher education’s recognition that effective student success requires diverse forms of expertise working collaboratively. But without policy frameworks that acknowledge and protect this academic work, institutions risk undermining the very innovations they’ve created. When the professionals responsible for student success cannot engage in free inquiry, challenge ineffective practices or advocate for evidence-based approaches, everyone loses—especially students.

    Aaron Stoller is associate vice president for student success and a lecturer in education at Colorado College.

    Source link

  • The Wonkhe HE staff survey – how good is work in higher education?

    The Wonkhe HE staff survey – how good is work in higher education?

    As financial pressures continue to bear down on higher education institutions across the UK, there is a visible impact on higher education staff, as resources shrink, portfolios are rationalised, and redundancy programmes are implemented. These are definitively tough times for the sector and its people.

    One way this plays out is in the industrial relations landscape, with unions balloting for industrial action, as well as, on some specific issues, advancing joint work with employers.

    But there is a wider, arguably more nuanced, lens to bring to bear, about how the current circumstances are reshaping staff experiences of working in higher education, and what options are available to those with responsibility for leading and supporting higher education staff.

    When the Wonkhe team came up with the idea of running a national survey for higher education staff we knew from the outset that we would not be able to produce definitive statements about “the HE staff experience” derived from a representative sample of responses. There is no consensus over how you would define such a sample in any case.

    The best national dataset that exists is probably found in UCEA publications that combine institutional staff experience survey datasets at scale – one published in 2024 titled “What’s it really like to work in HE?” and one in May this year diving into some of the reported differences between academic and professional staff, “A tale of two perspectives: bridging the gap in HE EX.”

    Instead we wanted to, firstly, ask some of the questions that might not get asked in institutional staff surveys – things like, how staff feel about their institution’s capacity to handle change, or the relative importance of different potential motivating factors for working in HE, or, baldly, how institutional cost-cutting is affecting individuals. And secondly, as best we can, to draw out some insight that’s focused on supporting constructive conversations within institutions about sustaining the higher education community during challenging times.

    We’ll be reporting on three key areas:

    1. “Quality of work” – discussed further below
    2. Professional motivations, the relative importance of different motivators for our sample group, and the gap between the level of importance afforded key motivators and the extent to which respondents believe they actually get to experience these in their roles – DK has tackled that subject and you can read about his findings here
    3. Views on institutional change capability – coming soon!

    We’ve not covered absolutely everything in this tranche of reporting – partly because of time pressures, and partly because of format constraints. We have a fair bit of qualitative data to dive into, as well as the third area of investigation on institutional change capability all still to come – watch this space.

    The methodology and demographics bit

    We promoted the survey via our mailing list (around 60,000 subscribers) during July and August 2025, yielding a total of 4,757 responses. We asked a whole range of questions that we hoped could help us make meaningful comparisons within our sample – including on things like nationality, and type and location of institutions – but only some of those questions netted enough positive responses to allow us to compare two or more good-sized groups.

    Our working assumption is that if there was a group of around 500 or more who share a particular characteristic it is reasonable to compare their responses to the group of respondents who did not have that particular characteristic. We have conducted analysis of the following subgroups:

    • Career stage: Early career (n=686), mid career (n=1,304), and late career (n=2,703)
    • Those with an academic contract (n=1,110) and those with a non-academic contract (n=3,394) – excluding some other kinds of roles/contracts
    • Time in higher education: five years or fewer (n=908); 6-10 years (n=981); 11-20 years (n=1,517) and more than 20 years (n=1,333)
    • Working arrangements: on-site (n=988); working from home or remotely (n=475); and flexible/hybrid (n=3,268)
    • Leadership role: respondents who said they have formal management or leadership responsibility in their current role for projects, programmes, resources, or people (n=3,506), and those who did not (n=1,214)

    And we also looked at the following identity characteristics:

    • Gender: men (n=1,386) and women (n=3,271)
    • Sexuality: those who identified as gay, lesbian, bisexual or queer (n=654) and those who did not (n=4,093)
    • Ethnicity: those who identified as being of a minoritised ethnicity (n=247) and those who did not (n=4,444)
    • Disability: those who identified as being disabled (n=478) and those who did not (n=4,269)

    In one case – that of respondents who identified as being of a minoritised ethnicity – our sample didn’t meet the threshold for wholly robust analysis, but we found some differences in reported experience, which we think is worth reporting given what we already know about this group of staff, and would caution that these findings should be viewed as indicative rather than definitive.

    In some cases we have combined subgroups to make larger groups – for example we’ve grouped various academic roles together to compare with roles on other kinds of contracts. In others we’ve ignored some very small (usually n=3 and below) groups to make for a more readable chart; for this reason we don’t often show all responses. And although our response rates are high you don’t have to refine things much to get some pretty low numbers, so we’ve not looked at intersections between groups.

    We have reported where we found what we considered to be a meaningful difference in response – a minimum of four percentage points difference.

    The financial context

    88 per cent of respondents said their institution has taken material steps to reduce costs in the last 12 months, offering a background context for answers to the wider survey and the assurance that the thing we are looking at is definitely staff views against a backdrop of change.

    51.6 per cent said they personally had been negatively affected by cost reduction measures, while 41.9 per cent said the personal impact was neutral. This suggests that while cost reduction may be widely viewed as negative, that experience or the views that arise from it may not be universal.

    Of those that said they had been negatively affected we found no meaningful differences among our various comparator groups. Leaders and those later in their career, were as likely to report negative impacts as those without leadership responsibilities or earlier in their career, suggesting that there is little mileage in making assumptions about who is more likely to be negatively impacted – though of course we did not try to measure the scale of the impact, and we’re mindful we were talking to people who had not lost their jobs as a result of cost-saving measures.

    The one exception was between those on academic contracts, of whom nearly two third (65.3 per cent) reported negative impacts, and those on non-academic contracts, of whom the number reporting negative impact was closer to half (47.4 per cent). This difference gives important context for the wider findings, in which those on academic contracts are consistently more likely to offer a negative perspective than those on non-academic contracts across a range of questions. This tallies to some degree with the national picture explored in UCEA’s “Bridging the gap” report in which academics were more likely to report challenges with workload, work-life balance, and reward and recognition, than professional staff – though higher levels of work satisfaction.

    Regretting and recommending HE

    We asked whether, taking into account what is known about other available career paths, whether respondents feel that choosing to work in HE was the right decision for them – two thirds said yes (66.9 per cent) while 23.8 per cent were unsure. Only 9 per cent said no.

    Those approaching the end of their career were more likely to agree (74.3 per cent) compared to those mid-career (65 per cent) or early career (61.2 per cent). Those with leadership responsibilities were also slightly more likely to agree, at 68.2 per cent, compared to 62.3 per cent for those without leadership responsibilities.

    Those on academic contracts were slightly less likely to agree, at 60.8 per cent compared to 68.9 per cent for those on non-academic contracts.

    However, the real divide opens up when we looked at responses to our follow up question: whether respondents would recommend a career in higher education to someone they cared about who was seeking their advice. A much smaller proportion of our sample agreed they would recommend a career in HE (42.2 per cent), with much higher rates of “unsure” (32.1 per cent) and “no” (24.5 per cent) – most likely reflecting the impact of current challenges as compared to people’s longer-term lived experience.

    For the recommend question, the career-stage trend reverses, with those approaching the end of their careers less likely to say they would recommend a career in HE (39.2 per cent) compared to 41.6 per cent for those mid-career and 50.4 per cent for early career respondents.

    There was a substantial difference by role: only 25.7 per cent of those on academic contracts would recommend a career in HE, compared to 46.9 per cent of those on non-academic contracts.

    We did not find any differences by gender, ethnicity, disability, or sexuality on either confidence in the decision to work in HE or willingness to recommend it as a career.

    Quality of work

    One of the great things about higher education as an employment sector is that there are lots of ways to be employed in it and lots of different types of jobs. What one person values about their role might be quite different from what another person appreciates – and the same for the perceived downsides of any given role.

    So rather than trying to drill down into people’s reported experiences based on our own probably biased views about what “good work” looks and feels like, we turned to the idea of “quality of work” as a guiding framework to look at respondents’ experiences and perceptions. We asked 16 questions in total derived from this 2018 Carnegie UK-RSA initiative on measuring job quality in the UK which proposes seven distinct dimensions of work quality, including pay and conditions, safety and wellbeing, job design, social support, voice, and work-life balance.

    We also kept in mind that, while support, safety and wellbeing at work are foundational conditions for success, so is effective performance management and the opportunity to apply your skills. In the spirit of Maslow’s hierarchy of needs we clustered our questions broadly into four areas: safety, security, and pay/conditions; the balance between support and challenge; relationships with colleagues; and “self-actualisation” incorporating things like autonomy and meaningfulness.

    For each question, respondents were offered a choice of Strongly disagree, Disagree, Agree, and Strongly agree. Here we report overall levels of agreement (ie Agree and Strongly Agree)

    You can see the full findings for all our comparator groups in the visualisation below.

    [Full screen]

    Headlines on quality of work and interaction with willingness to recommend

    You can see all the workings out below where I’ve gone through the results line by line and reported all the variations we could see, but the TL;DR version is that the quality dimensions that jump out as being experienced comparatively positively are physical safety, good working relationships with colleagues, and meaningfulness of work. Two key areas that emerge as being experienced comparatively negatively are feeling the organisation takes your wellbeing seriously, and opportunities for progression – the level of agreement is startlingly low for the latter.

    We compared the various quality dimensions against whether people would recommend a career in higher education for the whole sample and found that across every question there was a direct correlation between a positive response and likelihood to recommend a career in HE – and the inverse for negative responses. We think that means we’re asking meaningful questions – though we’ve not been able to build a regression model to test which quality questions are making the largest contribution to the recommend question (which makes us sad).

    [Full screen]

    Going through the various comparator groups for the quality of work questions we find that there are three core “at risk” groups – one of which is respondents of a minorised ethnicity, which comes with caveats regarding sample size. Another is those on academic contracts, and the third is disabled respondents. These groups did not consistently respond more negatively to every question on quality of work, but we did find enough differentiation to make it worth raising a flag.

    So to try to see whether we could find some core drivers for these “at risk” groups, we plotted the response to the “recommend” question against the responses to the quality questions just for these groups. At this point the samples for disabled and minoritised ethnic responses become just too small to draw conclusions – for example, under 100 respondents who identified as being of a minoritised ethnicity said they would not recommend a career in HE.

    However, over 400 of those on academic contracts said they would not recommend a career in HE, so we compared the answers of that group to those of respondents on non-academic contracts who also would not recommend a career in HE (just shy of 700 respondents). Interestingly for a number of the quality questions there was no differentiation in response between the groups, but there was noticeable difference for “reasonable level of control over work-life balance”, “able to access support with my work when I need it”, and “opportunities to share my opinion” – in the sense that among the group that would not recommend HE the academic cohort were more likely to give negative responses to these questions, giving a modest indication of possible priority areas for intervention.

    We also found that those who had worked in higher education for five years or fewer were frequently more likely to report agreement with our various propositions about quality work. While there’s clearly some overlap with those early in their career they are not entirely the same group – some may have entered HE from other sectors or industries – though early career respondents do also seem to emerge as having a slightly more positive view as well, including on areas like emotional safety, and wellbeing.

    Safety, security and pay and conditions

    The four statements we proposed on this theme were:

    • I feel reasonably secure in my job
    • I am satisfied with the pay and any additional benefits I receive
    • I feel physically safe at work
    • I feel emotionally safe at work

    On job security, overall two thirds (66.3 per cent) of our sample agreed or strongly agreed that they feel reasonably secure in their job. Those on academic contracts reported lower levels of agreement (57.8 per cent). Those who said they had been employed in higher education for five years or fewer reported higher levels of agreement (71.4 per cent). Respondents who identified as disabled reported slightly lower levels of agreement (61.9 per cent).

    On satisfaction with pay, conditions and additional benefits, overall 63.8 per cent of respondents agreed or strongly agreed that they were satisfied. Those on academic contracts reported lower levels of agreement (56.3 per cent). Those who identified as having a minoritised ethnicity had the lowest levels of agreement of all our various comparators (53.1 per cent), and were twice as likely to strongly disagree that they were satisfied with pay and benefits than those from non-minoritised ethnicities (15.2 per cent compared to 7.9 per cent). Those who identified as disabled had lower levels of agreement (54.6 per cent agreement) compared to those who did not consider themselves disabled (64.9 per cent agreement)

    On physical safety, the vast majority of respondents (95.8 per cent) agreed or strongly agreed they feel physically safe at work with very little variation across our comparator groups. While the overall agreement was similar between men and women, notably men were more likely to register strong agreement (66.3 per cent) than women (51.9 per cent).

    On emotional safety the picture is more varied. Overall 72 per cent agreed or strongly agreed they feel emotionally safe at work. Those who reported being earlier in their career reported higher levels of agreement (78.6 per cent), as did those who reported having worked in the HE sector for five years or fewer (78.6 per cent). Those with academic contracts reported lower levels of agreement (61.62). Those who identified as having a minoritised ethnicity had lower levels of agreement (62.7 per cent) and were more than twice as likely to strongly disagree they feel emotionally safe at work than those who are not minoritised (14.2 per cent compared to 6.1 per cent).

    Balance, challenge, and performance

    The four statements we proposed on this theme were:

    • The work I do makes appropriate use of my skills and knowledge
    • I have a reasonable level of control over my work-life balance
    • My organisation demonstrates that it takes my wellbeing seriously
    • My organisation demonstrates that it takes my performance seriously

    On using skills and knowledge 79.2 per cent of our sample agreed or strongly agreed that their work makes appropriate use of their skills and knowledge. There was very little variation between comparator groups – the one group that showed a modest difference was those who reported being disabled, whose agreement levels were slightly lower at 75.3 per cent.

    On control over work-life balance, 80.7 per cent of our sample agreed or strongly agreed they have a “reasonable” level of control. Those who had worked in higher education for five years or fewer were more likely to agree (87.2 per cent). 86.5 per cent of those who work from home agreed, compared to 74.4 per cent of those who work on campus or onsite, and 81.7 per cent of those who have hybrid or flexible working arrangements. Those who reported having leadership responsibilities had lower levels of agreement (78.9 per cent) compared to those who did not (85.9 per cent).

    The biggest difference was between those on academic contracts (66 per cent agreement) and those on non-academic contracts (85.3 per cent agreement). There were also slightly lower scores for disabled respondents (74.7 per cent compared to 81.2 per cent for non-disabled respondents) and for minoritised ethnicities (76.6 per cent compared to 81 per cent for non-minoritised ethnicities).

    On wellbeing, 57.8 per cent of our sample agreed or strongly agreed that their organisation demonstrates that it takes their wellbeing seriously. This was higher for early-career respondents – 60 per cent agreement compared to 57.9 per cent for those in mid-career, and 55.5 per cent for those approaching the end of their career. Agreement was higher for those with five years or fewer in higher education at 68.4 per cent agreement, compared with 54.5 per cent for those with more than 20 years’ experience.

    Those on academic contracts were substantially less likely to agree with only 39.7 per cent agreement that their organisation demonstrates that it takes their wellbeing seriously. Disabled respondents were also much less likely to agree than non-disabled respondents, at 47.7 per cent and 59 per cent respectively. Those working from home reported slightly lower levels of agreement, at 52.6 per cent.

    On performance, 63.1 per cent of our sample reported that their organisation demonstrates that it takes their performance seriously. This was slightly higher for those who had five years or fewer in higher education, at 69.6 per cent. Again, there was a difference between those on academic contracts with 57.8 per cent agreement and those on non-academic contracts, with 64 per cent agreement. Disabled respondents were slightly less likely to agree (58 per cent agreement) than non-disabled (63.8 per cent agreement).

    Relationships with colleagues

    The four statements we proposed on this theme were:

    • I am able to access support with my work when I need it
    • I am given sufficient opportunities to share my opinion on matters that affect my work
    • For the most part I have a good working relationship with my colleagues
    • I generally trust that the people who work here are doing the right things

    On accessing support, 76.2 per cent of our sample agreed they are able to access support when they need it. There was higher agreement among those early in their career at 81.3 per cent, and similarly among those who had worked five years or fewer in HE, at 82.8 per cent. There was lower agreement among those on academic contracts: 62.3 per cent agreement versus 80.5 per cent for those on non-academic contracts. Those from a minoritised ethnicity had lower agreement at 70.6 per cent, as did disabled respondents at 67.4 per cent.

    On opportunities to share opinion, 70.4 per cent of our sample agreed or strongly agreed they were given sufficient opportunities to share their opinion on matters that affect their work. There was a small difference between those who held a leadership role and those who did not, at 71.9 per cent and 66 per cent agreement respectively. Again, those on academic contracts had lower levels of agreement, at 58.2 per cent compared to 73.9 per cent for those on non-academic contracts. Disabled staff also had lower agreement at 60.9 per cent.

    On working relationships, cheeringly, 96.1 per cent of our sample agreed or strongly agreed they have good working relationships with their colleagues. While this held true overall across all our comparator groups regardless of leadership roles, working location, personal characteristics or any other factor, notably those of a minoritised ethnicity strongly agreed at a lower rate than those who did not identity as being from a minoritised ethnicity (39.6 per cent strong agreement compared to 48.3 per cent).

    On trust, 70.8 per cent of our sample agreed or strongly agreed that they generally trust the people they work with are doing the right things. This was very slightly lower among those who work from home or remotely, at 65.9 per cent. Agreement was lower among those on an academic contract, at 61.6 per cent, compared to 73.4 per cent of those on a non-academic contract. Agreement was also lower among disabled respondents, at 63.8 per cent.

    “Self-actualisation”

    The four statements we proposed on this theme were:

    • My current job fits with my future career plans and aspirations
    • I am comfortable with the level of autonomy I have in my job
    • There are sufficient opportunities for progression from this job
    • The work I do in my job is meaningful

    On career plans, 76.1 per cent of our sample agreed or strongly agreed that their current job fits with their future career plans and aspirations. Those who said they work from home or remotely had slightly lower levels of agreement at 69.3 per cent. Those who said they do not have any kind of leadership role had slightly lower levels of agreement at 69.4 per cent.

    On autonomy, 82.5 per cent of our sample agreed or strongly agreed they were comfortable with the level of autonomy they have in their job. Those with an academic contract had very slightly lower levels of agreement at 77.9, compared to 83.8 per cent agreement among those on non-academic contracts. Those of a minoritised ethnicity had lower levels of agreement at 73.9 per cent, as did disabled respondents, at 75.9 per cent agreement.

    On progression, a startling 29.5 per cent agreed or strongly agreed that there are sufficient opportunities for progression from their current position. There was a modest difference between those with leadership roles, 31.1 per cent of whom agreed, compared to 25 per cent of those without a leadership role. Those on academic contracts had higher levels of agreement at 38.5 per cent, compared to 26.8 per cent of those on non-academic contracts.

    On meaningful work, 86.1 per cent of our sample agreed or strongly agreed that the work they do in their job is meaningful. Those who work from home or remotely had very slightly lower levels of agreement at 77.9 per cent but otherwise this held true across all our comparator groups.

    Aspiration to lead and preparedness to lead

    We asked about whether respondents aspire to take on or further develop a leadership role in higher education, and if so, whether they are confident they know what a path to leadership in higher education involves in terms of support and professional development. These questions are particularly relevant given the generally negative view about opportunities to progress held by our survey respondents.

    [Full screen]

    Overall, 44.5 per cent of our sample said they aspire to take on or further develop a leadership role. Curiously, this was only slightly higher for those who already have some level of leadership responsibility, at 48.3 per cent. This can be explained to some degree by differentiation by career stage: 58.8 per cent of early career respondents aspired to take on or develop leadership roles, as did 50.9 per cent of mid-career respondents.

    Aspiration to lead was higher among those identifying as lesbian, gay, or bisexual at 52.6 per cent compared to 43.2 per cent for those who did not. Aspirations were also higher among respondents of a minoritised ethnicity, at 54.5 per cent, compared to 43.8 per cent among those not of a minoritised ethnicity.

    We also asked respondents whether they are confident they know what a path to leadership involves in terms of support and professional development, where we found some important variations. Confidence about pathways to leadership was lower among early career respondents, at 22.8 per cent agreement, and even mid-career respondents confidence was lower than the numbers reporting they aspire to leadership, at 36.6 per cent.

    While there was no difference in aspiration between respondents on academic contracts and those on non-academic contracts, those on academic contracts were more likely to say they are confident they know what a path to leadership involves, at 50.3 per cent compared to 34.8 per cent.

    While there was no difference in aspiration between men and women respondents, women were slightly less likely than men to report confidence in knowing about the path to leadership, at 37.5 per cent compared to 42 per cent. Those who identify as lesbian, gay or bisexual, those of a minoritised ethnicity, and disabled respondents were also slightly less likely than their comparator groups to express confidence, despite having expressed aspiration to lead at a higher rate.

    These findings around demographic difference suggest that there remains some work to be done to make leadership pathways visible and inclusive to all.

    We’ll be picking up the conversation about sustaining higher education community during tough times at The Festival of Higher Education in November. It’s not too late to get your ticket – find out more here.

    Source link

  • UOW to backpay $6.6m to underpaid staff – Campus Review

    UOW to backpay $6.6m to underpaid staff – Campus Review

    The University of Wollongong is set to backpay more than $6.6 million to thousands of underpaid staff.

    Please login below to view content or subscribe now.

    Membership Login

    Source link

  • Exploring the motivation and satisfaction of higher education staff

    Exploring the motivation and satisfaction of higher education staff

    For all the criticisms leveled at the sector as a group of employers, the number of staff working in higher education keeps on growing.

    Understanding why they choose to work in higher education, what they value about their work, and how well the organisation they work for lives up to their expectations can help inform questions about what matters the most when resources are tight – pay and conditions are obviously important but people work in HE for a whole range of reasons, and not all of those expectations require resource to meet.

    In our summer staff survey we gathered nearly 5,000 responses on these topics from people who currently work in or around the sector. We don’t make any claims that this is a representative sample – we can’t say with certainty what the sector as a whole feels but comparing similar groups of staff (for example by contract type) with each other yields fascinating insights and points the way towards understanding this fundamental issue.

    For our motivation question bank we presented a range of possible motivations as follows:

    • Working in an organisation whose values I share
    • Opportunities for learning, development and professional growth
    • Working alongside and collaborating with like-minded colleagues
    • The generosity of the pay and benefits package
    • Having the autonomy to focus on the work that is important to me
    • Having a level of flexibility about where and when I work
    • My physical working environment and the resources I have access to within it
    • Receiving recognition for my hard work and contribution
    • Knowing the work I do makes a positive impact – on students, on the advancement of knowledge, on my community
    • Working in an organisation that I am confident is generally well run, and achieving its objectives
    • Having opportunities to engage in activities that enhance community connection eg networks, clubs and groups, volunteering, public lectures etc

    Then we asked people whether they felt each was an “important” motivation, and whether they were “happy” with their organisation’s performance against each one. A “yes” answer means that someone was happy, or agreed something was important.

    We’re not running any fancy statistics here, but our working assumption is that a difference of more than four percentage points between different groups is interesting and notable enough to report on. This would vary by the size of the groups in question.

    Two sectors?

    We don’t know for sure (it isn’t data that we collect via HESA for the population) but there’s as many professional and support services staff as there are academics. And the former are far more likely to have experience working outside higher education – from the responses to our staff survey we see that around 80 per cent of our professional and support staff had worked outside the sector, compared to 64 per cent of academics, though those numbers might be lower in both instances had we specifically excluded casual work such as temporary work while studying.

    The cliché of the unworldly professor in an ivory tower is clearly being left in the past – but the kinds of roles done by professional services staff are in demand right across the economy. On the face of it is far easier for them to find work elsewhere, and given the state of the sector, you’d assume this might be better paid.

    Given this, it was surprising to see that while 68.8 per cent of academic respondents cited pay and benefits packages as something that was important to them, nearly three quarters of professional and support staff found this area of the working experience important.

    In asking these kinds of questions you almost don’t expect people to say they are happy with their pay and benefits – so more than 40 per cent of our professional services respondents doing so is notable. After all, we hear enough from the various sector professional associations about the difficulty of recruiting and retaining skilled staff in a variety of key roles.

    [Full screen]

    Relative importance

    Of all the suggested motivations for working in higher education, only two were not selected as important by more than 80 per cent of respondents: pay and conditions (73.5 per cent) and having opportunities to engage in activities that enhance community connection (41.4 per cent) – the latter scoring significantly lower than every other suggestion.

    The three most important motivations selected were “knowing the work I do makes a positive impact” (87.5 per cent), “Working alongside and collaborating with like-minded colleagues” (86.9 per cent) and “Working in an organisation I am confident is generally well run” (84.5 per cent).

    Looking at the areas where there was the largest gap between those who said something was important to them and those that agreed they are happy with the extent they get to experience it in their working lives, by far the largest gap relates to confidence the organisation is run well and is achieving its objectives, only 31.7 per cent saying they are happy with this, a gap of 52.8 percentage points.

    The next highest gap relates to recognition: whereas 80.4 per cent of respondents said receiving recognition for their hard work and contribution was important, only 33.3 per cent said they were happy with this – a gap of 47.1 percentage points.

    The third highest gap was in opportunities for learning, development and professional growth: whereas 83 per cent of respondents said this was important, only 44.3 per cent said they were happy with this, a gap of 38.7 percentage points.

    Free as in freedom

    Academic respondents were far more likely to cite autonomy to focus on the work that is important to them as a key motivating factor (86.7 per cent), but the number is still high for other staff (79.6 per cent), whereas professional services staff (83.5 per cent) were slightly more likely than academics (79.9 per cent) to cite flexibility in when and where they work.

    Staff of all kinds are reasonably happy (c.65 per cent) with the levels of flexibility on offer. Clearly the experiences of Covid-19, and perhaps the drive for providers to rationalise estates – swapping offices for desks, or regular desks for hot desks – is also having an impact. You might expect that women would be more likely to value flexibility in working and you would be right – 84.8 per cent of women in our sample said this was important to them, compared to 76.5 per cent of men. However, similar proportions of men and women (around 65 per cent) reported being happy with the amount of flexibility on offer.

    In terms of autonomy – the ability that a member of staff has to focus on work that is important to them – a little under half of both academic and professional staff were happy with what was on offer. It is worth bearing in mind that autonomy is always limited in some way in any role; for example, marking and exam boards pretty much need to happen when they do.

    Value judgement

    Despite frequent accusations of cultural relativism, a strength of universities is their values. Intriguingly, 60 per cent of professional services staff by just 45 per cent of academics were happy with the way that this manifests – despite similar levels of importance (85.8 per cent for academics, 82.7 per cent for professional) being placed on sharing the values of the organisation one works for.

    If we think back to the idea that professional services staff would be more likely to work in other sectors, this does make sense. Values, and the sense of having a positive impact (86 per cent said this was important to them), are clearly going to be key motivations to work in a sector where perhaps pay and conditions don’t stack up.

    An amazing 90 per cent of academic staff said that knowing that the work they did has a positive impact (on students, the advancement of knowledge, and/or on their community) was important to them. But just 53 per cent of academics and of professional staff saw this in practice. To be fair, this was one of the best performing motivations in our survey – but it is interesting that staff are no longer seeing the good that higher education does, especially when it is becoming so important to make this case culturally and with the government.

    Recommend to others

    It’s easy to get disheartened when you think about the staffing needs of higher education providers and how they are met. Although academics are clamouring to work in the UK sector, it feels like the terms and conditions are worsening and newer staff – in particular – are getting a raw deal. With professional staff, the fact that many specialisms can get better paid work elsewhere has some wondering about the quality of the staff we are able to recruit.

    We asked all of our respondents whether they would recommend working in the sector to someone they cared about – and perhaps surprisingly three-quarters said “yes” or “maybe”. And there was very little difference between those making “yes”, “no”, or “maybe” on any of the motivation axes we discuss above (those who said “yes” were very marginally less likely to say pay and benefits were important to them).

    However those that were more likely to recommend the sector to others were significantly happier with every aspect we examined. In contrast more than 80 per cent of those who would not recommend working in the sector were not happy with the amount of recognition they got for their hard work and contribution, and more than 85 per cent felt that their organisation was not run well. Recommendation is generally considered a good proxy for job satisfaction, and this survey seems to bear that out.

    What people want to change

    We asked respondents to say more where they had identified a gap between something they consider to be important, but the degree to which they are happy with the extent they actually experience that.

    There were comments on workload and wellbeing, small-scale or systemic failures to offer recognition for achievement and, particularly from those in professional services, a desire for greater recognition, and development and/or progression opportunities. Some commented that the economic environment makes these asks more difficult.

    But in terms of messages for leaders there is a lot about communication and consultation – a sense that the people who work in the sector understand the financial problems the university faces but want to be told the truth about them and be constructive in helping to solve them.

    Clearer lines of communication and wider consultation on significant changes.

    Greater dialogue with leaders when major decisions are made which impact the way in which I can carry out my role and an opportunity to demonstrate my expertise to build trust in my decision making.

    Clear, transparent and timely sharing of strategy and the impact of the changes to come from the changes.

    Another challenge is on the perceived values driving strategy and tactics – there’s a sense that management decisions are perceived as being short term, and that it is financial expediency rather than an underlying (and shared) purpose that is informing decisions.

    There’s also commentary on issues around execution of strategy – the sense that while plans are spoken about they are not always put into practice or cascaded down the institution, or become snarled in bureaucracy.

    Greater consistency, both between faculties and also on strategic planning. At the moment there are so many different initiatives that, while we talk about working smarter, the opposite is actually the case.

    We need a clear strategy as to how we are going to get through the next couple of years which needs to be properly communicated. At the moment it feels like we are stuck in a vortex of chaos, with school level projects being put on hold whilst we wait for university level decisions, but the months go by and no meaningful direction or plan seems to be in place.

    Better delegation and direction from above, more collaboration across the institution as a whole but also with core departments where the work intercepts with others work, creating a network of colleagues in those core teams.

    A key takeaway is that the kind of organisational complexity in decision-making that has long been tolerated in higher education may not serve staff well when resources are stretched and bandwidth is low. Complexity may serve various legitimate organisational purposes but it can also cut staff off from understanding what’s happening, and what they personally need to do about it. It also creates a lack of consistency as multiple messages emerge from different quarters.

    But also, while we were specifically focused on areas for improvement, it’s worth adding that a good few comments gave a general thumbs up – their working environment was clearly motivating them in the right ways – and that shows that it can be done.

    The biggest risk of an exercise like this one is to suggest that where there is discontent or concern, that it is attributable to the wider environment, and not something that can be addressed or mitigated. While there’s clearly very little scope in most institutions to roll out shiny new initiatives, most comments suggest that some attention to hygiene factors – praise, involvement, honesty – could make a difference in sustaining staff motivation during these trying times.

    We’ll be picking up the conversation about sustaining higher education community during tough times at The Festival of Higher Education in November. It’s not too late to get your ticket – find out more here.

    Source link