An internal staff survey conducted by Cardiff University, leaked to Gair Rhydd, reveals shockingly low levels of trust in senior leadership. Shared by a disgruntled member of staff, this survey has not been seen by students until now. The survey had 3,263 respondents, almost 70% of who voted negatively to the statement that “change is managed well at Cardiff University”.
This year, Cardiff University is running at a deficit of £33.4m, following a deficit of £31.2m in the previous year. In response to the financial crisis, senior management have introduced staff and student facing ‘Hyb’ systems, new departments across all subjects, and have even phased out courses including Ancient History and some Modern Foreign Languages.
In the survey, participants were able to tick one of three boxes in response to a statement: negative, neutral or positive. “Across all statements pertaining to “Leadership”, over 40% of staff voted negatively, revealing widespread dissatisfaction with senior management”. Additionally, over 25% of staff responded by ticking the “neutral” column, meaning only 30% of staff feel positively towards Leadership at all.
Participants expressed that they felt unable to address or report mismanagement from superiors. When voting on a statement that “I feel I am able to speak up and challenge the way that things are done”, almost 40% of staff responded that they feel negatively.
Alongside this, around 50% of the survey’s 3,263 participants voted that they feel either “medium” or “negative” about a statement regarding whether or not they feel that they are able to report “bullying” or “harassment” without feeling it would “have a negative impact on me”.
Furthermore, for all questions pertaining to “Wellbeing and Balance”, almost 30% of participants consistently voted negatively. Specifically, over 25% of respondents voted against statements questioning whether they are able to “cope with the stresses” of their jobs and whether they receive appropriate support for their physical and mental wellbeing.
This year, senior management have provided staff with an ‘Academic Delivery Model’. Disgruntled lecturers, who would prefer to remain anonymous, have shared with Gair Rhydd that this model takes tasks which lecturers have been performing their entire careers and has minimised the time allocated to complete them.
Consequently, lecturers are working outside of their contracted hours and are reporting extreme stress. In this survey, almost 40% of participants voted negatively to the statement “I am able to manage my workload without regularly working unreasonable hours”.
When asked if they felt that “action would be taken as a result of this survey”, over 50% voted negatively. Even if staff have taken the time to complete this questionnaire, the majority have such little faith in executive management that they don’t see its results going anywhere.
While this 2026 survey suggests staff feel supported by their line managers, colleagues and immediate superiors, it signals a resounding frustration with and distrust of higher management.