Northwestern University reviews

Archaic management styles and working arrangements. No ability to rate, grade or review your supervisor(s) or offer them any kind of feedback in a formal way. Divisive, reactive culture with ongoing issues between different functional areas of the department and constant last-minute planning/execution. Non-traditional work arrangements are rare and frowned upon even though this is touted as a major benefit of working at NU. Very uneven organizational structure with little opportunity for advancement. No focus on hiring from within and developing internal talent. Interview process is too long, drawn out and does not allow for candidates to do more than answer the same outdated questions multiple times and to different groups of people. Distant, unapproachable HR and recruiting team. Very little incentive to perform well aside from fear of poor performance evaluation ratings and reduction in annual pay-increase which is already laughably low. Long-term planning does not involve lower-level staff who are ultimately affected most by departmental change. This is not a fun or rewarding job. I feel that I have to conform to outdated standards in order to fit in and receive no appreciation for my work.

My biggest complaint is that the university puts some (poorly performing) faculty in administrative jobs they are not suited to do. They should be doing academic work not managing people. There is always some type of review of the departments going on. Everyone is on pins and needles worrying that they are going to cut jobs and outsource. Janitorial, maintenance, and repair jobs are almost all outsourced. Quality is low. This spreads out to all jobs at NU. Departments are merged and people are let go. And, we have to pay for parking. Morale is so low -- wake up Morty!