AIBU to think university executives should not be paid so much that the uni can't afford lecturers

The are running multi million pound institutions. You aren’t going to get people with the skills and experience to do that if you can salaries at £120k.

very naive to suggest it

Yes we have no automatic progression. Not even coming off probation is automatic, we have full panels and many get pushed back onto probation for 3+ more years.

Our SL posts are also being filled by candidates with cvs that rival professors. Most coming from China. All our PhD students are Chinese too. I do think the UK has given up somewhat with HE.

@Minasama Academics don’t run universities and haven’t for decades. The VCs were academics but crossed over to management. Maybe think about what their role actually is because academic staff aren’t going to do it!

Automatic progression is rare these days. I had a fight to get it and that was 10 years ago. New colleagues are doing everything I do with no chance of progression. I get 38 days leave. Many universities are trying to switch pension schemes to halve their contributions. There are many disputes rumbling on. Even the TPS and USS aren't what they were and benefits have reduced for new entrants.

Yes, this is disgusting in my book. Since when did universities need highly paid execs? The academics should be the highly paid ones.

What subject area are you in @HelmholtzWatson?

I'm sorry that is your experience, and that must be very demotivating. There is a huge amount of variability between how well universities have coped with shrinkage, and I believe our has coped better than average.

I'd like to come and work wherever you are - at my place promotions have been frozen for 5 years and national pay rises of circa 2% withheld. It’s so dire that people in our department are returning to the NHS for a better work life balance and pay.

This has to be a joke remark.

Without Humanities a society wouldn't understand itself so it would be massively weaker and make worse decisions.

Philosophy underpins law, medical ethics, ethics in warfare, political policy etc etc.

History underpins political policy making.

Literature, creative arts - the value of these to human beings is enormous.

Agree OP. Just another sector with the highly paid people in charge protecting themselves at all costs.
Id be interested to know the historical change in ratios of pay for different university roles. Is it similar to other industries where top pay has soared away from the bulk of the employees?
Universities have done well from the ridiculous push to get half of the young people through their doors and selling UK residency to overseas students. None of that has been good for the country. Hard times ahead.

SL is virtually automatic at our institution. I think the only contingency is you get your PG cert, which is generously workloaded for. You maybe have to get a 3 (out of 5) in your appraisal, which everyone gets by default. It's a running joke that the only way to get a 2 is punching a student.

It's so true I have it written in a contract.

I get 54, at least I think so. 35 statutory, 10 days closure at Xmas, then bank holidays and usually the day after. Whatever that comes to.

Do you ever read a book, watch a tv show, attend the theatre, visit a museum or gallery, consume news in any form…? All industries with heavy input from the humanities. And that’s just off the top of my head.

If you are really interested, this is a good explanation. Stefan Collini is a recognised authority on the subject of universities and higher education systems. His earlier book, "What Are Universities For?" is excellent.

https://www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v48/n10/stefan-collini/squadrons-of-pigs

Or you can keep taking pointless pot shots at "management".

What do the humanities do for the rest of us unlike STEM studies?

Hahaha love the understatement of this (as someone who's seen several VCs and execs come and go!)

Maybe but some of them do exceptionally well despite not coming from a commercial background e.g Malcolm Press at Manchester Met- what a fantastic VC. It does need someone with strong knowledge of and experience within academia too.

In that case universities would be better off bringing someone in with a strong commercial background, paying them 4x what they pay their non-commercial VCs and treating running a university like the business it is

English degrees aren’t really an issue… English graduates are hired across the board from law to journalism to accounting and marketing. It’s a really versatile degree especially in today’s world where half of the STEM grads don’t seem able to write a functioning email.

VC’s earn at least twice this, some 3
or even 4x as much.

£120k is a pretty low salary for someone so senior. It’s hardly crazy money.

Because once upon a time, like maybe 5 years ago even, they had a world class English course with a phenomenal selection of academics (honestly a couple were among the best nationally). When student numbers started to decline, in part thanks to student cap, their first choice was to start axing those lecturers. Now they have 2 remaining. 2 bloody good academics but only 2. It’s incredibly sad to watch what it once was decline as it has.

Also students at Huddersfield tend to be local, from impoverished backgrounds in Kirklees, a lot of first gen students, mature students etc. They study there for all kinds of reasons. Do you think those students don’t deserve humanities courses or something?