assistant professor

restaurant manager

executive chef

director

assistant director

University of Denver

This review is my personal experience working in the academic division of the institution, therefore I cannot speak for others in different divisions. Here is a lengthy review on my experience.

I had been used to working at centralized institutions, where departments and people, wanted to work together, get to know you, and work efficiently together. This is not something that I was aware of when I first applied to DU. For those seeking to apply here, the institution is completely decentralized, meaning each college and school operates independently of each other. Like any other organization, each office has their own set of guidelines, rules, and culture... however, it's drastically different in each place. 

My office, in particular, works through lunch. No one takes short walks. I would say 95% of the people couldn't tell me where to eat on-campus because they had never been there. It was an odd introduction to the office, once again, coming from a very centralized traditional University where staff always went out to lunch on-campus. 

Since the day I first started in academic affairs (pre-COVID) communication with other staff and faculty are done mostly through email. Very different from a centralized school that meets in-person with others. Each internal meeting and interaction includes constant arguing and blaming each department for the way they do things, or "Why can't they figure it out?" I've never even worked in an organization even outside of higher education that points fingers at each other internally this way. I can't begin to tell you how many e-mails I've received where I kindly ask a question or want to clarify a process, and actual staff of departments have said things like, "STOP sending these" or "Don't contact OUR students" or "I have so much on my plate, your office needs to stop". How do you expect any employee to handle this every day? But that's the culture. And no one does anything about it. It's really daunting to know that you need to communicate with other departments and they treat you this way.

The University as a whole doesn't really have a unified culture. You'll see this branded on their social media posts that they are "One" or you'll get the million e-mails from the head office that we are "one" DU. I have never felt that way, though. As their mascot is highly problematic, for many reasons and if you don't know why, please be educated... they don't really have school spirit. So, if you're used to working at a traditional institution with school spirit, this also isn't for you. And school spirit is a huge factor if you're someone who has been invested in athletics and enjoy that piece when working at an institution.

In regards to my supervision, they don't train their supervisors to be supervisors or manage. They promote without any training on how to supervise employees. I have never been invited to meet 1:1 with my supervisor. I have been here for almost a year and still have my supervisors read and review my e-mails, then send me a message on how I should have replied to someone. Everything I do, I have to get double checked. I didn't sign up for a position where I would still be in training almost after ONE YEAR. It's really frustrating to do my work without autonomy. I have been trying to review internal opportunities, but my supervisors talk about how much they need help. It makes me feel pressured to even leave the office to work in another one at DU, what if my experience is also the same?

The workload is beyond what was expected. We don't get much funding, therefore we can't hire more people. With my pay being extremely low (which I took because I thought I would be happy here), the workload makes no sense. It's too much. I know they say that the benefits outweigh the salary, but the insurance premiums are still high and the workload is so much, how could I possibly take a course while working full-time and having a personal life?

The processes here are very traditional, and when I say, they still use paper, Excel spreadsheets, and inputting it all into a online drop box to document highly sensitive and extremely important items. Other Universities have already adapted to investing money to create internal portals, etc. to better serve their organization. You'll spend hours just reviewing a student's drop box to find an e-mail to confirm a department's communication regarding a student. 

In regards to Diversity and Inclusion for staff, forget it. They will send you e-mails on e-mails on e-mails about their new initiatives, but there's not really action put into place for staff POC's or those who hold other identities. There's no allies, no where to go to. There's a staff of color committee, but I had to hear about that from fellow co-workers. There's no education for employees in regards to diversity; the majority of employees still use language that is ancient and not inclusive. I'm out here like, "Did they just say that?" For an institution that brands itself on diversity and inclusion to the public, they don't live it.

When I started, three people had left and one was laid off with a week's notice in my office, and four people had left in the department we work closely with. Three others left in other departments. And 9/10 were benefited employees. This was pre-COVID. Let that sink in.

I just needed to be honest. It was my dream to work at this University. Now I achieved that dream and don't want it anymore. 

Declining Quality of Education:
DU has continued to decline over time. Students pay significant tuition fees expecting quality education, yet many faculty members are hired straight out of their PhD programs with little to no teaching experience. Instead of engaging students with real-world insights, some simply read directly from PowerPoint slides every session. This appears to be a cost-saving strategy to avoid hiring experienced faculty, ultimately lowering the quality of education.

A clear example of this is a 2-credit-hour course for non-majors that only meets for 30 minutes per week. This raises serious concerns about the value students receive for the money they invest in their education. Instead of being given the opportunity to learn and engage, they are left with a bare-minimum approach that fails to justify the tuition costs.

Even more concerning, some faculty have resorted to telling students to use ChatGPT for everything. Instead of teaching or guiding students, they dismiss questions by responding, "Go ask ChatGPT." This not only diminishes the role of faculty but also devalues the learning experience, making it clear that the university prioritizes cutting costs over providing a meaningful education.

Management:
A significant portion of management lacks the necessary knowledge or experience but still gets promoted. Their lack of expertise often results in poor decision-making, and rather than addressing their knowledge gaps, they carry an inflated sense of authority. This makes it difficult for employees to perform their jobs effectively and creates an environment of inefficiency.

Workplace Culture:
The workplace functions on a one-way communication model where employees' voices are disregarded, and meaningful feedback is rarely considered. HR primarily exists to support management rather than advocate for employees, leaving little room for real change. Additionally, diversity efforts feel superficial, as representation within the Asian demographic is overwhelmingly limited to individuals from one specific background, rather than reflecting broader diversity.

The Hardest Part of the Job:
One of the most frustrating aspects is dealing with management that lacks fundamental knowledge of what they oversee. Instead of striving to learn or improve, they exhibit arrogance, making it difficult for employees who actually understand the work to function efficiently. This leads to unnecessary challenges and workplace inefficiencies.

I had a fabulous job at DU, digital archiving (scanning, with a 7 point indexing system) of past and current legal and construction documents. I reduced a storage room of paper to one 4 inch thick 3 ring binder with over 200 cd's (One per project). I wrote po's, tracked payments, kept office equipment stocked and functioning, I was a Currier of documents as well. I worked with 3 wonderful professional project managers. My bosses boss was equally great. I had mountains of paperwork to face, and mountains coming in, but was allowed to focus on my job, rather that being pulled in too many directions and micro managed. I worked 10 hour days. I created a very comfortable space, where all seemed to look forward to coming in, fresh coffee, flowers, air, music. I even planted a little garden out back, flowers and mint.. We felt like a work family. As one spends so much of ones life at work, I believed it should be a place people enjoyed coming to. My job was very rewarding. When completed, we could find any document with in seconds. The flow was amazing. One touch accessibility of so much paperwork. My job ended due to completion, there were no hard feelings.
The low rating comes from the shift in upper administration towards the end of my time there, focusing on $$$ rather than the contributions of the amazing individuals working there. If you do not recognize your most valuable assets (your employees), you will lose it all. When I first began, the focus was on pride and productivity, but it began to shift, and the well being of the individual was replaced with squeezing pennies. I understand that comes with economic times, but in this case, the administrators seemed to be thriving, creating positions for themselves, getting raises, still getting benefits like cars and additional bonuses, but those in the positions of doing the most critical work, were not getting raises or recognition.. Even professors were grumbling..(What would a university be with out a professor?) Souls matter first. We are not lego blocks

The work environment was good, and the retirement benefits were great. However, I continually an into difficulties when I attempted to offer improvements to the safety of the campus. The week before the Virginia Tech shootings, I had prepared a brief for the administration highlighting the vulnerabilities of the DU campus for just such an attack. The administration told me I was being alarmist and stated that large universities were not likely targets for such violence. After the shooting, they buried the brief, never to see the light of day again.

I became aware that they feel that their Department of Campus Safety only existed for insurance reasons. They wanted us to be seen and not heard. I caught a serial sex assault suspect, and was admonished for doing so. They stated that now they would have to report the arrest on the Clery Report. They artificially keep their crime statistics low by not taking actions to address the crime on campus. This is done purely for marketing reasons

As an example, there is a large problem with alcohol abuse and alcohol related crime on the campus. We had proposed that we hire off duty Denver Officers to perform DUI patrols on the campus. The response from the administration was that not only would they not bring in the Denver Officers, but they were baring their own officers from enforcing alcohol related offenses as well. Don't get me wrong, the men and women in the Department of Campus Safety are good people ad do what they can within their restraints. This is an organizational issue from the administration of the university itself.

All an all, it was not worth the good retirement.

I was a graduate student in the Natural Sciences department of DU. There was no standardized expectations between labs. Some graduate students would only work 1 day a week and graduate with their PhD. in 4 years, others would be expected to work a minimum of 50 hours a week, and aren't allowed to graduate in less than 6 years. Your PhD. is always on the line and your adviser can knock you down to a MS any time they feel. Some students have taken 4-5 years to get their MS alone. The building is outdated and equipment constantly breaks and can be left for weeks or months without repair. The pay hasn't increased in several years despite cost of living and rent sky rocketing. The only benefit given is health insurance which is great for check ups, but as soon as you need and MRI or surgery the insurance is terrible. The department is poorly run and the recruiting is deplorable. The stock room for the teaching labs is a joke, the person who runs them clearly doesn't care and has freshmen with no training or chemistry experience running it. DU was a terrible experience and I wouldn't recommend it to anyone.

- I worked at another institution in a like position before coming to DU and make around $10 less an hour here.
- Great atmosphere and coworkers are wonderful, but little to no advancement opportunities.
- You have to pay for parking but do get a free RTD pass.

- University has a focus on "inclusive excellence" meaning they try and craft policies to be more inclusive of minorities and other oppressed groups, but the execution often has the opposite effect, creating dissention and tension between groups. Examples of this are "Boone the Pioneer mascot" being banned from campus for to being offensive to native populations but disregarding the alumni that had this mascot when they were here, or the "free speech wall" where anyone could paint their views on any particular subject now being  regulated by a "free speech committee" because people were offended by subject matter that antithesis to the school's held beliefs on certain subjects.

What is the best part of working at the company?
The tuition benefit was the best part of working here. 

What is the most stressful part about working at the company?
Ineffective leadership and a deep divide between faculty roles and staff roles made  the experience working at DU very stressful. Faculty are steeped in privilege and staff are seen as less than. Administrative policies for operations are decentralized which results in a lot of inequity - such has hybrid work schedules. There’s very little room to grow professionally or personally as the organization does not grow and promote talent from within. 

What is the work environment and culture like at the company?
Fractured and decentralized work culture. Very little trust of leadership. 

What is a typical day like for you at the company?
You are either untethered and struggling to find direction and answers to move work forward or micromanaged and treated like you don’t have anything to contribute.

Meeting with Supervisor in the morning to discuss projects and status of existing projects. Travel the campus to check on projects and complete installations or assist co-workers with problem resolution. 

I learned everything about the first computers and software during the late 80's when MSDOS, Windows and the "internet" were just starting to become standards for the world.

Management was efficient and worked as a team to acheive successful completion of projects.

I had a great relationships with all of my co-workers and we werea great team.

The hardest part of the job was meeting critcial deadlines when equipment would fail and we had to obtain different solutions quickly to avoid loss of income to the University.

I believe learning all the latest programs and launching projects were the best aspects of this job.

I was very excited to start my Staff position at the University of Denver, and I was aware that the salary offered was low for the position. Management guaranteed me that the position was part time, so I accepted the offer with the hope that raises and bonuses would help make up the difference.  A few weeks into the first quarter I quickly realized the job had been totally misrepresented.  The position quickly became 40+ hours a week, and several weekends a month.  I was asked/expected to teach classes without compensation by the faculty in addition to the already long list of responsibilities that came with my position.  I did receive a small raise the second year, but also increased job duties and responsibilities.  I completed the second year, but will not be returning.  I think DU is great if you are a faculty member, but staff members are not valued.  

In my current role there is very little opportunity for advancement. The culture has shifted greatly since I started from collaboration and new possibilities to one that is very divided and restricted. An entirely new IT management structure was put in place recently and very hard lines of communication and responsibilities were implemented. Now everything is micromanaged by all levels, which has lead to workflows moving very slowly. It has also lead to many items falling through the cracks. Meetings are now set based on your title, not your involvement in the project. Requests and emails regularly go unanswered and update meetings have been shelved. While there are absolutely some good people there and some really good perks, upper management has recently put a big damper on the culture.

Top Job Titles	Average Salary
Assistant professor 6 salaries reported	$70,750 per year
Restaurant manager 13 salaries reported	$61,197 per year
Executive chef 22 salaries reported	$87,000 per year
Director 5 salaries reported	$96,394 per year
Assistant director 3 salaries reported	$83,635 per year

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