At UC Riverside, failing upwards has evolved into standard operating procedure. The institution essentially functions as a sanctuary for bad management, sustained by an administration so terrified of litigation that firing underperformers is virtually off the table. Instead of addressing staggering incompetence, the preferred strategy is to play musical chairs with the dead weight, shuffling the worst offenders into newly invented roles under the guise of "reorganization."
This creates a fascinating dynamic where staff and leadership fundamentally do not know how to execute basic, day-to-day operations. Everything is handled purely in theory. Committees will spend weeks philosophizing over conceptual frameworks and best practices, while the most fundamental, ground-level workplace tasks completely collapse in reality.
Naturally, the fallout from this environment is directed to Human Resources. The prevalent, yet misguided, belief among staff is that HR exists to salvage morale or fix broken departments. In reality, HR functions strictly as the university's legal meat shield. Their primary objective is not to protect employees from toxic leadership, but to calculate exactly how much institutional dysfunction can be legally harbored without triggering a lawsuit or a compliance violation.
The annual "anonymous" climate surveys remain a staple, of course - providing the perfect illusion of progress while changing absolutely nothing.