This top Sydney uni has a $500 million surplus. Now there’s talk of job cuts

3 weeks ago 11

An internal University of Sydney report has eviscerated the institution over multiple levels of middle management, poor student support services and bureaucratic inefficiencies.

Staff fear the discussion paper released last week marks the first step to make the case for job cuts, a move numerous cash-strapped NSW universities have taken this year.

Sydney University staff have questioned the number of managers.

While other universities have suffered an enrolment downturn, Sydney University has admitted an extra 10,000 international students since 2019, who each pay up to $50,000 per year to study. It posted a $545 million surplus last year.

The report said professional staff at the university had grown by 30 per cent to 5961 people between 2019 and 2024, outpacing the growth in students and academics over the same period.

“This increased investment has not, however, led to improvements in student or staff satisfaction with our professional service experience,” it said.

The discussion paper reminded staff that the institution was among the worst in the country for student experience and placed last for student support services.

“Why are there so many managers?” one staff member asked in feedback collected as part of the report. Another said: “It takes weeks to get a simple decision.”

The report said half of all people who were “supervisors” oversaw four direct reports or fewer, while 19 per cent of supervisors had two or fewer direct reports.

Staff at the institution have been given “thought starters” and asked to respond to the issues raised in the report, which also says “it is possible we will find adjustments to our staffing levels will be required”.

Other issues include multiple layers of approvals required to make decisions, while there is a complex web of 17 systems and more than 70 steps for staff who wished to update a single unit of study.

“There is confusion about who is responsible for what,” it said.

National Tertiary Education Union Sydney University branch president Peter Chen said after UTS, Macquarie and Western Sydney University had moved to axe staff this year, Sydney University employees were afraid they would lose their jobs.

“Framing the discussion document as about service improvement is undermined by the focus of it in presenting staffing numbers as too high,” he said.

“Management has recognised that overwork is a major issue at the university, and cuts to staffing will not address that problem. Improving services and processes for students should be the core focus of the university, but this feels to many like a pre-determined cost-cutting exercise.”

The report’s author, vice president (operations) Nicole Gower, said the university faced complex and historical challenges that were frustrating for students, academics and professional staff.

“The focus is not on job cuts – we’re in the early stages of this program and we’re consulting staff to understand the challenges and issues we need to address,” she said.

Academic and teaching staff are not part of the services review.

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