Many UU employees have experienced or witnessed inappropriate behaviours

Thirty-two percent of respondents have witnessed colleagues being victimised by inappropriate or abusive behaviours, such as gossip (22 percent), power abuse (13 percent), and bullying (10 percent). Two years ago, 28 percent of respondents said the same.

Almost one in five respondents (18 percent) have experienced such behaviour themselves. That's also a slight increase compared to 2023, when 16 percent of employees surveyed had been victims.

Both percentages are also above the averages for other universities, according to the results of the employee survey, which have just been published on the Intranet (only accessible to people with a Solis ID, Ed.).

Further investigation needed
In total, half of the nearly 9,000 UU employees who were contacted completed the biennial survey on work experience and job satisfaction. The turnout was a little bit lower than two years ago.

According to UU, the results regarding inappropriate behaviour “clearly require attention”. The number of complaints about gossip and bullying has increased and is higher than at other universities. Further investigation is needed to clarify the underlying reasons.

At the same time, UU has noticed that the percentage of employees who have taken action to report undesirable behaviour has increased. This is seen as a positive development. In recent years, the university has taken several initiatives to raise awareness of inappropriate and abusive behaviours and to make it clearer to employees who they can turn to if they become victims of such behaviour. 

Positive feedback
In general, UU employees are positive about their work environment. Working at UU is rated 7.8 out of 10, while UU gets 7.5 as an employer. 

Non-academic staff give UU a higher rating than academic staff. As in previous surveys, employees in the Corporate Offices are the most satisfied, while those in the Faculty of Humanities are the least satisfied.

Compared to other universities, UU staff are very positive about their managers, who show recognition and promote mutual trust. UU staff are also generally positive about their development opportunities and cooperation with colleagues.

Little has changed in terms of workload, which remains at the same level as last time and is particularly high among academic staff. The perceived workload is also higher than what employees themselves consider acceptable, although it has decreased slightly. It should be noted that, at almost all other universities, employees have even more work to do than what they consider acceptable.

The university staff were also asked about their enthusiasm (slightly decreased) and hybrid working (people are still positive about their work-life balance).

Finally, almost a third of staff members are feeling the negative effects of austerity measures in higher education, ranging from slightly negative (almost 25 percent) to very negative (4 percent).

The university points out that results can vary considerably between departments. They hope the employee monitor will spark conversations about working conditions at UU. Employees can find the scores for their department in a dashboard that can be accessed with a Solis ID.