Universities are probably one of the most inefficiently run institutions that you could imagine.
You would think that all your fees would amount to a streamlined, well run institution which can easily adapt to changes.
Nope. Instead, you’ll be presented with an institution where there are constant overlaps in job roles, useless meetings which accomplish little and departments battling each other rather than working collectively. It’s great if you work in this environment since you’ll be well remunerated (Thank god there’s HEW bands in salaries) and will most likely be bludging for most of your week. The mid-high level jobs relating to the running of a university are awesome, since you’re job will be about appearances: You must appear to be busy, you must appear to be exerting yourself, you must show your face to the 13 weekly meetings and appear to care. It’s comparable to working in Government roles I would imagine. So it’s little surprise when there’s staff cuts and redundancies.
Overall, the quality of education is probably only slightly affected, since the academic side of a University will probably have only a marginal affect from the Administration aspect of it, but if you’re ever looking at starting an education related business that you eventually wish to go large, the last thing you would want to model it on is a university, unless you get decent funding from the government and have vast overseas cash flow rolling in.
P.S. I won’t be surprised if some University employee working a random admin gig sends me a hate-filled e-mail.
Inside The University of Melbourne 