Stayed too long. - Anonymous employee St. Olaf Employee Review

3.0
Nov 20, 2013
Anonymous employee
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

If you can work with the students, you are so lucky. This school attracts truly wonderful souls for an education. Excellent colleagues - a lot of really smart people work here and I miss working with them.

Cons

The administration is just plain odd and very insular. Communication is weird; a lot of management is fear-based. If you didn't graduate from here, you will not be able to advance and if you are quirky, you'll be bullied and/or eliminated. Top talent is expected to work non-stop and for below-scale pay. One person is running 3 departments, so the college is saving a lot of money by not hiring 2 professionals. They do not have a cash flow problem, so this stinginess is puzzling. The cost to top-performers is high in terms of health issues. They are very slow to adopt new ideas, like distance learning, which will have serious consequences in the long run.

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5.0
Sep 30, 2025
Anonymous employee
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

The environment at St Olaf is very Supportive, positive, and friendly.

Cons

The cons of working as a student is high competition for the on-campus positions since most of the Oles are very active

1.0
Jul 3, 2025
Anonymous employee
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

Northfield is a cute little Christmas town.

Cons

Unless you were a alumni from St. Olaf College you are always going to be treated like an outsider. Management tends to promote alumni before qualified individuals. HR will try their best to help you but you will realize that they are also at the whims of this strange insider club. When you ask for help you won't get it. There's a wink wink work culture here that you are expected to be working 24/7.

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