The 21 Group has received information from an individual who has recently worked in the HR department of a UK university. The testimony paints a picture of corruption and betrayal of trust.
We are not naming the university. It may be an extreme case, but many aspects of the testimony will ring true to academics at most UK universities.
Amongst the most alarming features is the attitude of the Vice Chancellor who is indifferent to this behaviour. It is the failure of leadership of those at the very top that allows such corruption to flourish.
“I am an HR professional. Until recently, I worked in the HR department of a UK university.
It’s the most corrupt place I have ever worked.
The HR Director openly blusters that she’s untouchable. If the Vice Chancellor or senior management receives a complaint against the HR Director, it is passed to the HR Director to write the response. She exonerates herself. The HR Director’s exculpatory text is sent to the complainant under the VC’s name.
It is usual for letters written by the HR Director or other high-ranking HR personnel to be sent under the names of others. These are other senior academics who are in on the scam like the Heads of School. Or they are well-minded but ineffectual academics who can be easily manipulated and are happy to act as a ‘postbox’ for HR. For example, the HR Director knows that those looking for promotion won’t rock any boats.
It means that the responsibility for many of the misdeeds of the HR department cannot be traced to the perpetrators. The signatures on the letters are those of others.
There’s a charmed circle of senior management and Heads of School. They’re untouchable as well. Don’t bother complaining about behaviour of members of the charmed circle. It is you who will be investigated.
The HR Director doesn’t believe in evidence. She thinks that it’s not needed for an HR investigation into you. Normally, she appoints a patsy or ‘tame academic’ to conduct the investigation. The ‘right conclusion’ is whispered into the patsy’s ear. If the HR Director has really got it in for you, then she has access to a battery of external HR consultants, lawyers and barristers who can respond to a knowing hint. They can ruin your life while reaching the conclusion she wants.
The entire Grievance system is corrupt. The HR Director and other powerful members of the HR department have their favourites who will always be exonerated. And they have a blacklist of those who have crossed them. If you’re on the blacklist, heaven help you.
Where I worked, there was no pretence at following any of our written policies. They were routinely ignored. If anyone kicked up a fuss, we would just ‘revise’ the written policy on the web.
We purposefully do everything slow. It’s not unusual for our HR investigations to take 2 or 3 years. We know it grinds our victims down. Whatever timescale is written in the policies, it’s fantasy.
There was a set time to send the investigation emails out. Friday afternoon between 4.00 to 5.00 pm is the ‘HR hour’. We know it means the victim will stew over an unreasonable email all weekend.
We swagger like gangsters. I mean, who are you going to complain to … HR? That will just get you into more trouble.
I began to think of leaving because the corruption and manipulation was getting me depressed. The salary was good, but I felt dirty. This is not what I went into HR for.
And then, at a forthcoming court case, my ‘witness statement’ was composed for me. It did not represent the facts correctly. It was finally a river that I could not cross.
The 21 Group is happy to receive further reports about bullying, harassment and misconduct at the UK universities. Please use [email protected].
If you went into University HR with good intentions and have witnessed poor practices, we are also keen to hear from you. All communication is in complete confidence. We will not reveal your name or university.
Sounds horribly familiar. Particularly the well-minded but ineffectual academics who can be easily manipulated and are happy to act as a ‘postbox’ for HR.
When your Head of Department starts messaging you that they need to send you an amendment letter to your contract by an impossible deadline, just to bully you into submission, you know they’ve been doing a bit too much cutting and pasting… unless they fancy themselves as an HR specialist.
But while HR happy hour for disturbing messages is still within business hours, an HoD can send you stuff late at night. Sweet dreams!
Wow thank God almighty and thank goodness for that. I have been thinking now for so long was I alone here or perhaps just going bonkers? For believe it or not, plenty of us who go in to HR go in with good intentions. Lots of us have backgrounds in care or mediation, and all of us are human and live within caring families and communities. I’ve always wondered about why more people are not prepared to speak out, because I can tell you, many of us are prepared to share our tales at long long long last.
Hallelujah. You are not alone. We are all in this together, let’s do this.
It is time.
Good point, and well said. I’ve seen it myself—there are decent and compassionate human beings working in HR departments who do genuinely care about students and staff. It’s important to realize that, in many cases, people’s hands are genuinely tied by what they can do.
Personally, I never felt that the HR staff I dealt with were ‘the enemy.’ I think the problem is the system itself, along with training that doesn’t allow for a truly human response and only permits one heavily filtered and constrained by underlying norms and culture of an institution.
♫ Well, there is an office in the university,
They call human resources for faculty,
And it’s been the ruin of many a poor drone,
And God, I know I’m one. ♫
Just kidding. Good on this person for leaving such an abusive environment and for writing such an insightful post. The confession seems to confirm that many of the ‘strategies’ mentioned anecdotally by targets are, in fact, routinely used by some HR departments to silence and harass them, while protecting the perpetrators—even if these tactics aren’t officially sanctioned (plausible deniability being of the utmost importance, of course).
“There was a set time to send the investigation emails out. Friday afternoon, between 4:00 and 5:00 pm, is the ‘HR hour.’ We know it means the victim will stew over an unreasonable email all weekend.”
The classic Friday afternoon ambush—a tried and tested method for breaking down a complainant’s will, often used around this festive time of year in universities across merry old England to sow misery and discord.
Isn’t it odd that a department whose purpose is ostensibly human well-being and promoting functioning organizations uses psychological terror and actually destroys organizational functioning?
“The HR Director doesn’t believe in evidence. She thinks it’s not needed for an HR investigation into you. Normally, she appoints a patsy or ‘tame academic’ to conduct the investigation. The ‘right conclusion’ is whispered into the patsy’s ear.”
The ‘Widow Twankey technique.’ From what I’ve observed, the role of witch-hunter-finder-general can sometimes be delegated to a mediocre academic at the lower end of the pecking order, who uses it as an opportunity to bolster their position in the academic hierarchy and prove their ‘worth’ and ‘loyalty’ to higher-ups.
Thank you for this contribution.
It is a great relief to all of us, whether well-minded HR or victims of HR malevolence, to know that we are not paranoid or losing our minds.
I have the sad privilege of being on my University’s blacklist, and can only confirm that if heaven doesn’t help you, your life, your livelihood, your sanity, your reputation, your career are very seriously at risk of complete and ruthless destruction. The machinery deployed is prodigious. HR have access to all and any information about you they wish to get their hands on, and readily convince others of the need to partake in the forwarding of messages and the gathering of more intelligence. If that is not enough, further information will be created, by means of a grievance or other formal process, into which you will be put regardless of any policy statement. That process will produce a written report about you, rewriting the history of your life and career. The person described is your evil twin. As the confession mentions, “evidence” is not required in the process.
It is institutional defamation. It can terminate your career and ruin your life.
I have been involved in a string of almost seamless HR processes and spent much time over the past few years defending myself against relentless attacks which are continuing to this day and are now affecting my health, much time which could have been spent more productively and more positively doing the work I am employed to do. I suppose it is my belief that education and the pursuit of knowledge are core parts of human endeavour which, more than anything else, motivates me to persist against the corruption of an academic institution, incidentally my alma mater. I suppose that is why I am now on their blacklist.
The ”heaven” which has helped me this far is the invaluable assistance of other similar minded people, of which there must be many more. Most of the academics I know would recoil at the very idea that such levels of corruption and such cruelty towards fellow human beings should be part of the culture of their institution. Their disbelief, or their justified fear of retaliation and blacklisting is sadly what keeps the corruption alive.
We need more communications such as the brave confession of an HR colleague, more testimonies from people who have been affected by corrupt behaviour. It would be helpful too to hear from those who are being cajoled or coerced into unethical behaviour towards others with promises of reward and promotion, and now feel so dirty, ashamed and fearful at their knee-deep involvement, they no longer know what to do, except continue to follow the script.
“The ”heaven” which has helped me this far is the invaluable assistance of other similar minded people, of which there must be many more. Most of the academics I know would recoil at the very idea that such levels of corruption and such cruelty towards fellow human beings should be part of the culture of their institution. Their disbelief, or their justified fear of retaliation and blacklisting is sadly what keeps the corruption alive.”
I agree—it’s fear that keeps corruption alive and solidarity that makes the difference. I think one of the most important developments in recent years has been the growth of advocacy movements and the fact that these issues are now out in the open. It’s become a public conversation now instead of institutional denial and the clandestine whispering of those wronged or concerned.
Whatever happens going forward—and even if institutions continue dragging their feet for years to come—the normalization of discussing these issues is something to take heart from.
“We need more communications such as the brave confession of an HR colleague, more testimonies from people who have been affected by corrupt behaviour. It would be helpful too to hear from those who are being cajoled or coerced into unethical behaviour towards others with promises of reward and promotion, and now feel so dirty, ashamed and fearful at their knee-deep involvement, they no longer know what to do, except continue to follow the script.”
Again, I couldn’t agree more. I hope that more current or former HR personnel will come forward about what goes on behind the scenes in higher education. Transparency is critical, and this information absolutely needs to be made public.
“The machinery deployed is prodigious. HR have access to all and any information about you they wish to get their hands on, and readily convince others of the need to partake in the forwarding of messages and the gathering of more intelligence. If that is not enough, further information will be created, by means of a grievance or other formal process, into which you will be put regardless of any policy statement. That process will produce a written report about you, rewriting the history of your life and career. The person described is your evil twin. As the confession mentions, “evidence” is not required in the process.”
Absolutely. You’re not being paranoid about that at all; it does get very totalitarian-esque in some institutions. There’s usually a normalization of very weird and creepy cult-like behavior to ‘gather intelligence,’ ranging from cyber-stalking to unauthorized access to emails. As you mentioned, it’s often a concerted attempt to smear the target into silence and discredit them, and it takes a brutal toll on a person.
There needs to be far greater transparency about the institutions and HR departments where this occurs— I’d hazard a guess that it’s likely an unofficial practice in many UK universities, with some persistent offenders—along with lawsuits, independent investigations and media coverage. The more these practices, as well as the institutions and individuals involved, can be publicly exposed, the greater the likelihood of meaningful change across the sector. The public deserves to know what goes on behind the scenes in these institutions and under whose watch.
The University is unnamed. Perhaps this is universal among UK universities?
Anyhow my University (Cambridge) behaves in a similar manner
There are enormous delays, poor investigations and a grotesque lack of concern & responsibility by the VC, the pro-VCs and others
It needs root and branch reform
This is one of the main reasons why Cambridge is sinking down the ranking tables.
>>>> This is one of the main reasons why Cambridge is sinking down the ranking tables.
YES. Finally someone who is prepared to state the obvious, and state it loud. I have been in so many effing meeting this year to talk about our research decline. It is shocking how no one had the ballast to state the obvious…. How the f are we supposed to maintain a top research score – when in the past five years alone, we have bullied our very best professors to seek refuge in New York, Canada and beyond, destroyed endowments and deliberately gutted our most promising grant initiatives?
We had everything we needed to succeed. Top talent, top projects, top donors and proposals.
And then…. we went and we f-ed ourselves. So frankly, we are getting the failure that we deserve.
“….very best professors to seek refuge in New York, Canada and beyond …”
If possible, send details of these incidents to [email protected]
“How the f are we supposed to maintain a top research score – when in the past five years alone, we have bullied our very best professors to seek refuge in New York, Canada and beyond…”
I fully agree. When you add to that picture the protection of plagiarists who steal the work and ideas of their students, presumably because they’ve run out of their own, and then add further the disappearance, in the past few years, of so many efficient administrators supportive of their academic colleagues and experienced in the policies and procedures of their institution… the outlook is grim.
This is a “people organisation” slowly gutting itself out of its own excellence, out of its own values, out of its own purpose.
“It is shocking how no one had the ballast to state the obvious….”
Sadly, we now know what may happen to those who speak up without a cloak of anonymity…
I always thought there were lots of us in HR following this blog, and the replies to this post sort of confirm it. Which I find bloody reassuring. I think in HR we are not the 21 per cent group but actually the 51 per cent group.
Thank you for this brave post, Drain the Fens
seems the other 49 percent are the ones in charge tho!! How to get rid of them? 🙂
They are never there anyway, just spend their time on the boards of private companies to rake in the dosh, while slashing our own university to the bone
How can we find out more about this?
not hard just google them by full name its literally the only thing that comes up
I find it kind of sad that this is literally true. Most human beings you search for online and find their writings, photos, charitable run events or whatever. With these people, literally the only digital presence they have, is one of grafting and profiteering.
Gave this a go by searching up the people I work with and know personally in university HR. Down here in the trenches, at least, we are reassuringly normal human beings. I can see my colleagues doing fun runs, signed up to choir groups, members of their PTA and so on.
But none of that is true for the people in charge, they only seem to exist in company accounts and consultancy gigs. It is really weird when you think about it. So why?
Having seen how things have changed in my 30 years in UK HE, my hot take is this: Higher education (including HR) is sadly run by people with “identities” instead of “communities”.
For whatever reason, leadership was given to careerists who successfully leveraged “identity politics” to climb the ladder and acquire big salaries and power – but who in their own lives, have never actually “given back” to a real world community (not even an abstract “identity” community either).
And that now is the personality which reflects in how our university is behaving, by shamelessly abusing others.
So instead of being run by people who can prove they are good citizens ready to serve and give something back to people less fortunate than themselves, we got a bunch of sociopaths who could only prove their ability to push out others and promote themselves.
Dear Sally, thank you for your contribution. I suspect we may disagree politically as I have always considered myself a socialist of the “old” Labour tradition, and I strongly support our allies in the movement for women’s empowerment and sexual minority rights (the latter of which I have openly supported all the way back to the early 1980s – when it was not, as a rule, a very popular disposition or widely accepted in society as a whole or even our university).
That said, I have noticed this same change in our hiring and management. Back then, when the powers that be (or were) would “sound out” people for senior roles there was a strong emphasis on sort of “core values” (“character”). Even as a lowly lecturer my views were consulted, in the first case I recall (regarding a professor long since deceased) being asked ahead of his administrative transfer: Is this fellow a “decent chap”, someone who puts others first? Has he been fair to students and kind to staff? When conflicts arise, is this the “hands on” type who will mediate and fix problems early? Is he going to be fair and hear people out, or “cut corners” then leave a mess for the next head to sort out?
Then at some point around twenty years ago, I noticed this changed. It began to be a matter of “box ticking” such that this sort of qualitative knowledge did not matter any more. Instead of focusing on people’s “inner” qualities it did become a question of “outer” image – do we have the right number of x and y, do they have “professional degrees”, and so on. The “identities to communities” thing you mention is probably a part of that, though let me say I think it is wrong to blame everything on the culture shift. This is more a story of how commercialisation of higher education undermined fundamental values around our duties to students, staff, and our wider community and society.
Dear Anonymous, I thank you too for your contribution. You are right that we may disagree on matters of party politics, but I am glad we can be somewhat in agreement on this issue.
In JBS we have alums every year who wax about finding the perfect job – one that pays them while they sleep – so I think it absolutely fabulous that we made such opportunities within our university administration as well
To be fair, I feel like the main issue here was not their use of affiliation to profit as HR or legal consultant to all these private companies, but simply their failure to actually do the jobs for which we paid executive compensation. They were part time at best.
What about former chairs of influential universities who then go on to become chairs of a national Nursing and Midwifery Council, only to face a whistleblowing crisis caused by a toxic culture and the tragic suicides of sixteen nurses—each under investigation by HR, over which they had personal oversight?
The toxicity is never just limited to the university; it becomes an externality, much like water companies dumping sewage into rivers and the sea…
tbh feels like we are at the endgame at this point
who among us has not seen the latest set of transcripts
“Eternity is a very long time, especially toward the end”
So true. Literally every scandal that came out this year, I thought, ok, this has got to be the one that takes them down. And still they are still there, wtf.
“If you have to control people, you have to have an administrative force that does it. So in U.S. industry, even more than elsewhere, there’s layer after layer of management – a kind of economic waste, but useful for control and domination. And the same is true in universities.”
Are all of these Cambridge or other universities too? And is there anyone already “out” as a whistleblower who would be able to speak on the record?
It seems you’re a journalist seeking sources for a story on the inexorable decline of higher education in the UK.
I think you’ll be hard-pressed to find any whistleblower—whether former HR, students, or staff—willing to go on the record about these issues, as the risk of retaliation by institutions and perpetrators is far too high. Even with the anonymity, challenging the ‘culture of silence’ and speaking to the media still carries a lot of risk.
You clearly already know this, but you’d need to find someone so badly burned by retaliation—and who has already experienced that kind of ‘social death’—that they have nothing left to lose. I imagine there are quite a few of those out there, though.
A strong enemy is not a problem, because the powerful, negotiate.
By contrast the one enemy you must never make is a person who feels they now have nothing left to lose.
And yet, that’s precisely what universities and their administrations have achieved over the past decade and more through this style of ‘management’ and the practices surrounding these issues.
Ad infinitum, they’ve made countless enemies out of ordinary people who just wanted to get their degrees, do their jobs, conduct their research in peace, or felt compelled to speak their minds about shady practices or institutional cultures.
Still, I’d strongly caution anyone currently considering going on the record about their experiences to think very carefully before making a decision. The consequences of speaking out can be brutal, and the worst of these institutions have absolutely no moral compass; they will retaliate without hesitation, and it won’t be an investigative journalist who pays these costs…
@Lubix
Or one fifth of your entire staff
Surely more like a third
….”She exonerates herself”….(from the opening paragraphs above). Sounds rather like the judiciary doesn’t it? “Marking one’s own homework”. Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?
You bet.
Sounds like Durham University, I used to work there before my bottom got too big to fit on a chair, HR provided guidance on how to get rid of people we didn’t like, I quite fancied one of the HR men actually.
You got my name wrong!
And so did I!
The OP provides a very interesting inside account. This core-rotting corruption is not limited to UK. How about Uni HR collaborating with Heads to attempt police-enforceable campus exclusions against faculty they do not like….with zero grounds under law? And falsifying testimony from other faculty to manufacture totally fictitious “risk”! Then hiding the records! Watch one case in real time!
https://x.com/RenegadeAcademe/status/1991895824226484582
“We swagger like gangsters. I mean, who are you going to complain to … HR? That will just get you into more trouble.” Given that they will inevitably find against you and are out to destroy you, would it not be better to use violence? Socio-economic postion and job title don’t bestow physical invulnerability…
There are examples of “independent” Cambridge witness statements which are verbatim identical, even down to the typos and spelling mistakes. It makes a mockery of the British justice system.