Staff speak up over divided campus
Tensions have been building at Victoria University as staff feel increasingly under pressure, under appreciated and unheard. Trust in the leadership is at a low. Laura Wiltshire looks at the controversies that have kept the university in the headlines.
Nestled in the hills of Kelburn, Wellington’s Victoria University has a history spanning more than 120 years.
Eleven of its subjectswere ranked in the top 100 in the QS World University Rankings for 2020, and two made the top 50. It is considered New Zealand’s top research university, based on the Performance-Based Research Fund.
But despite the calibre of the institution, for several years it has been better known for one thing: Controversy.
The Vice-Chancellor, Grant Guilford, told Stuff the university has a great working relationship with themajority of the 3500 staff who work there. But a recent survey by the Tertiary Education Union found 88 per cent of staff did not trust the senior leadership team to lead a restructure. Another internal survey by the university itself found more than half of staff were suffering from fatigue and anxiety.
Tensions came to a head at a meeting of the University Council on August 31, when council member Brigitte Bonisch-Brednich admonished Guilford for a controversial restructure proposal, and listed a litany of errors from the senior leadership team.
Professor Lydia Wevers retired from her position as the director of the Stout Research Centre at Victoria in 2017. But she has not really left, continuing to lecture, research and supervise students.
She cares about Victoria University, and wants it to be thriving, productive, successful and happy.
‘‘I think the problems, which have been quite powerfully demonstrated in the past few weeks, have been building up since the name change project, which attracted a lot of antagonism both within and out of the university.
‘‘When it was vetoed by the minister [Education Minister Chris Hipkins], the vice-chancellor didn’t drop that project.’’
What became known as the name change by stealth (a branding changewhich saw the word Victoria shrink and the word Wellington enlarged on the logo), left staff feeling disillusioned about the transparency of the university.
The Whiria Project, a controversial restructure the senior leadership team attempted to push through this year despite the added pressure staff were facing because of Covid-19, was the proverbial straw that broke the camel’s back.
She said it felt as if the university was at a crossroads, ‘‘brought to a head partly by Covid, and partly by this increasing and demonstrable sense the staff have that they don’t trust the senior leadership’’.
‘‘One of the truisms about workplaces is they are muchmore efficient and productive if people feel happy and safe at work. When you have 88 per cent of the staff not trusting the leadership, then the conclusion you have to draw is they don’t feel happy and safe at work.’’
She said it was a shame, as not every project run by Guilford had been bad. For example, work done during his tenure centralising the Treaty of Waitangi in the kaupapa of the university had been important. ‘‘But outside that very important initiative there has been a general failure to communicate well with staff.’’
While the vice-chancellor of any institution was not going to get ‘‘wholly good press’’, the current morale was at a different scale to the usual grumblings.
One comparison she had heard was with ex-vice chancellor Michael Irving in the late 1990s, a time when the university became characterised by dysfunction, with staff strikes, student protests and a vote of no-confidence by the union after the relationship between academics and senior leadership broke down in the university’s centennial year.
Tertiary Education Union (TEU) branch co-president Dougal McNeill has been active in the branch for nine years. Formost of that time, it had been a relatively contented place.
‘‘There has been a marked and really troubling deterioration across the last two years, and this year in particular.’’
Fatigue among staff had been building because of a perceived lack of listening from the upper echelons of the university.
‘‘When this latest round of restructuring was announced, and this document with all of these changes appeared with nowarning, no context, no sense that staff had actually been involved in that process, it came into an environment where trust had already been damaged, and just snapped it.’’
The union wanted to work with the senior leadership to rebuild the relationship, but recently that had become difficult. McNeill said the vice-chancellor had cancelled all meetingswith the union for the rest of 2020. ‘‘Which is disappointing.’’
Guilford told Stuff quarterly meetingswith the TEU had not been cancelled, and were scheduled for 2021.
But Stuff has seen evidence that further, fortnightlymeetings, were scheduled between the vicechancellor and the union, and
which have since been cancelled.
Guilford said he has told the director of human resources to attend any meetings with the TEU above and beyond the quarterly meetings.
Other staff members have also come out against the leadership, although feared retribution if their names were on record.
One staffmember, who Stuff agreed not to name, said mistrust between staff and the senior leadership team had built to an unsustainable level.
He was unsure trust could be rebuilt, and said something had to change at the highest levels of leadership in the university.
It sometimes felt as if the
leadershipwas looking for projects just for something to do, rather than actually looking at what was needed around the institution, he said.
Another staff member, who also did not want to be named, said trust was so eroded hewas concerned staff would not trust the senior leadership team when legitimate projects arose.
‘‘Our chancellor, in themedia, has had what I would call meltdowns about the university’s finances, in away that I think other vice-chancellors haven’t ... even though they must all be in the same position.’’
But Guilford denied the claims, saying the university enjoyed a positive relationship with the majority of its staff.
‘‘It is, however, currently a very difficult time for us all as a result of the high workload and anxiety generated by the Covid-19 epidemic and the serious financial challenges resulting from the loss of international students.’’
When askedwhat the senior leadership team was doing to
rebuild a positive working relationship with staff, he said all senior leaders deeply valued their staff, and enjoyed a positive and supportive relationship with the majority.
‘‘It is due to living by our university values, insisting on participatory leadership throughout the institution, and by being prepared to step up andmake difficult decisions in the best interests of the public we serve.’’
He said the situation in 2020 was incomparable with Irving’s tenure in the 1990s, as the latter issues were internal, with the former being because of a pandemic.
The university’s chancellor, Neil Paviour-Smith, who chairs the university council, said he recognised therewas tension between staff and management, because of the latter having to sustain an ‘‘academicmission’’ while also managing a deficit in the millions caused by Covid-19.
The Whiria Project had not helped matters, but he said it had been put to bed, and it was time to move on.
When asked whether he trusted the senior leadership team, he said yes. It was management’s role to do its job effectively, and it was council’s role tomake sure that happened. Hewanted to acknowledge the pressure staff had been under this year because of Covid19.
Education Minister Chris Hipkins (a former Victoria University student and president of the students’ association), said in a statement that universitieswere independent of government and make their own staffing decisions.
‘‘AsMinister of Education, I take a close interest in what is happening in universities and receive regular updates.’’
He said tertiary institutions were under pressure because of Covid-19 and, as a result, were looking at their staffing and structure to ensure continued viability.
‘‘My expectation is that institutions act as good employers, and ensure that staff and students are consulted before any final decisions are made.’’