'Employee Culture and Concerns' take on the University of Phoenix
University of Phoenix - Should you Actually Work There?
Image provided by (Stone, 2023)
By: Kasey Ellis
The University of Phoenix is an accredited online university in Phoenix, AZ. This university was opened in 1976 and has been marketed to adult learners who may also have a busy lifestyle (University of Phoenix, n.d.). The classes that are offered here are perfect for individuals with full-time jobs, families to take care of, and other priorities outside of higher education. In this article, we will bring to light some of the experiences with the work environment, culture, and any perks an employee who works here deems to be worth the job.Meet Kasey Ellis, she began working for the University of Phoenix in January of 2024. Prior to this, she worked in a customer service industry position for about 5 years. She sought out a position with higher education, wanting to help adults with their pursuit of a degree.
Positive Work Environment
A positive work environment this certainly is! Something that I will mention in more detail below is the willingness and genuine desire of the senior employees to help others. This has made a huge impact on my mindset of the position as I gain more and more knowledge. At first, I was having a hard time getting adjusted to this role just due to the emotional nature of the position. That is not to say this job is bad in the slightest, because it is not, I just struggle sometimes with emotional connections which can exhaust me. When I was having a bad day and needed space to turn my camera off in some of the meetings, I was able to without having to explain myself.
Some of the key aspects to having a positive work environment are where the employee:
- FEELS VALUED
- FEELS SUPPORTED
- FEELS COMFORTABLE / SAFE
- HAS WORK-LIFE BALANCE
(WorkLife Office, 2023)
I can say that these things are true at Phoenix. Feeling valued comes from the conversations we can have with our managers at any time. If I need to talk about something or set a new growth goal, I can send a message to my manager and have a meeting or conversation with them. The managers here are more than happy to prioritize you especially when it comes to a growth mindset. This doubles with support, I know that not only will the managers (of any college or department) be willing to help, but also legitimately ALL my peers are ready to jump in to help when a tough or weird situation arises. Knowing that there is value and support here for myself and my peers, I feel very comfortable and safe with my ability to perform.
Work-life balance is a huge component to feeling all three; valued, supported, and safe. Something that is highly promoted here is getting off work on time. It is something that everyone I have spoken to has commented on. If we are in a call and it is the end of our shift, at whatever time that may be, we can connect the student with another counselor to take over that call. Now, there are times when we are helping a student and can't just transfer the call due to the situation, but for the most part we can. This promotes 'work when you're scheduled and enjoy your night'.
Company Culture
I may have a biased option, but the company culture is amazing! There are so many opportunities for networking here and allowable time for personal growth as well. Something that the university likes to do is have a weekly meeting called a 'Director Download', where a large group of employees will meet with the director of the academic department for about 30 minutes. There are multiple sessions for this scheduled throughout the day, so everyone has a chance to attend and that way the students are still attended to. These meetings are not only for networking, but the director shares news that is happening in the department, we get to sit and chat about things that are going on and de-stress for that time. I find it to be very entertaining and have made a lot of friends from those meetings.
Outside of meetings, because we all know there can be a ton, there are newsletters that go around which are called 'spotlights'. These are to highlight employees that are nominated by peers recognizing their efforts and work that week / month. This goes out to everyone and even shows the blurb that was written about them to showcase why they were nominated and how they have positively impacted others! I think these letters are amazing, it allows for the employees who deserve recognition to shine and allows for their peers to show them how well they are doing!
The other amazing cultural change I had to get used to (a total culture shock) was the number of people willing to help and genuinely wanting to support you. I know I work in the academic department and our jobs are literally to support our students, but this is a whole different level of support. When I was training and still fresh to the information, I was able to message my mentor, onboarding and permanent managers, other counselors in other colleges and so many more people. Everyone would respond in a few minutes with the guidance I needed to succeed in this role. I am so thankful for that part of the company culture, not many companies have that genuine desire to help their new employees or consumer base.
Other Perks Offered
The perks weren't the selling point for me, but they are a BONUS in working for the university. A few of my favorites are the tuition benefits and the vacation time. Firstly, I would like to say that the tuition benefits were something that I was looking for when seeking a new job and was very excited when I saw this! If you are working in a position that offers you tuition reimbursement, full coverage, or partial coverage, you should absolutely take it! With this, I didn't have to wait to start a program, this benefit was offered from the start. However nice that was, I chose to wait a few months before I cashed in on that opportunity. I began working in January and began my first class of my master's program in April (I needed the time to adjust to the position first before I added school back to the mix). This is offered to ALL employees of the university, and I know quite a few counselors and other representatives that are actively using this.
The vacation and sick time benefits are great! As a brand-new employee, you will start off with a certain number of vacation and sick days. Each state varies by laws and regulations, so please check with the university policies on vacation time if you are a new employee. But I can speak to Arizona and how these paid times work. For vacation time, in most states it is accrued, but in Arizona it is front-loaded. This means that once you are eligible to get this time (for new hires you need to wait 90 days (about 3 months) - which is so nice to not have to wait 6 months), the time will be added to your 'bank'. The time added will depend on what part of the fiscal year you are in, for example, I stated in January and the fiscal year ends August 30th, so I was front-loaded the pro-rated hours from January through August. Once September 1st comes around, I will get the remainder of the time. The other really nice thing is that both the vacation and sick time are paid, the latter is accrued but it adds up really quick!
There are an overabundance of perks and benefits to working with the University of Phoenix, these are the two that I found to be extra nice and makes the job that much better!
Thanks for reading! If you are interested in looking at careers at the University of Phoenix, visit: https://jobs.phoenix.edu/.
For any additional questions on the content of this article, please comment below this article.
- Employee Culture and Concerns Team (Kasey Ellis)
References:
University of Phoenix. (n.d.). About University of Phoenix. Retrieved April 29, 2024, from
https://www.phoenix.edu/about.html#:~:text=Founded%20in%201976%2C%20University%20of,and%20money%20on%20your%20degree
WorkLife Office. (2023, June 29). The characteristics of a positive work environment. WorkLife. Retrieved April 29, 2024, from https://worklife.msu.edu/article/the-characteristics-of-a-positive-work-environment/
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