Penn State reviews

Highly toxic environment for staff. Management is corrupt, and will do anything to protect bureaucracy. Staff are treated like dirt. Management doesn't care about fairness, or keeping employees happy and healthy. No Work-Life balance for staff, only for faculty. Management abuses their power because they know that staff have no choice but to stay at Penn State (largest employer in town). Nepotism everywhere! Managers usually hire their friends, whether or not they're qualified for the position. Staff are penalized for expressing their opinions, even if it's in a respectful manner. If you don't agree with management, they threaten to fire you, or make your life unbearable so you'll quit. Diversity at Penn State is a scam, all a dog & pony show. Management is racist, and does not care at all about diversity students or staff. Most positions at the top are white males, white females. Staff pay is miserable, no raises either!

Lots of legacy management appointments with little to no expertise in dealing with people. Not diverse, but the University is great at hiring mediocre people for middle management. The motto is We Are Penn State but that does not translate to workers. Many people are looking for their big opportunity because they have realized that getting your name in front of a lot of people is the only way to be compensated appropriately and/or move ahead. This creates a culture of people taking credit from colleagues or limiting their potential for recognition or advancement. It also causes some employees to finger point at others instead of taking accountability for their own flaws. The organization is a master class in how to make yourself look big while keeping others down. It has all the negative hallmarks of an extremely conservative organization. Many projects go over budget or under-perform because middle management isn't thinking about the impact on students. There are vendors that are literally double charging the University or doing horrible work and they still have contracts with PSU because they've been there for a long time. The University does not view students as their #1 stakeholder but as a bank account. Look at schools like Rice University that use their endowment to create scholarships, I have no idea how PSU utilizes it's endowment.