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Houston Public Library

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Houston Public Library Reviews

2.9

31% would recommend to a friend

(41 total reviews)
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Rhea Lawson

8% approve of CEO

30% positive business outlook

Houston Public Library has an employee rating of 2.9 out of 5 stars, based on 41 company reviews on Glassdoor which indicates that most employees have an average working experience there. The Houston Public Library employee rating is 22% below average for employers within the Media and communication industry (3.7 stars).

Reviews by job title

41 reviews
1.0
23 Jan 2023
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

Serving the community is a noble and rewarding profession.

Cons

Unfortunately the city is understaffed and their solution is to make it as hard for staff to request days off as possible. I was told by my manager to cancel my flight to a funeral upon my second month at HPL. This is the only job I've had where you're not allowed to request time off without pay. For example: if you need to see a doctor and don't have accrued leave they MIGHT allow it but it's marked as AWOL (abandoned work without leave) and there are multiple meetings and performance marks used against you in performance reviews. It's an incredibly high standard that no person can meet. Our manager called a meeting before I left to inform us that we're no longer allowed to request sick days without over 24 hours notice. We told our manager that's impossible and illegal and she just insisted policies must be followed. Two days later she apologized because she'd misread her email and there was no such policy. The blind unbending management style of the few people left at HPL make it very hard to not experience QUICK burnout.

1.0
31 Aug 2022

Terrible place to work

Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

It’s one of the largest library systems in the country.

Cons

Leadership is a joke! Executive Leadership is out of touch with operations. Turnover is at an all time high because employees are run into the ground. The good performing employees are not valued or promoted fairly just expected to do the work of 2-3 people because of all the vacancies. Employees remaining are too afraid to speak out for fear of retaliation. The environment is like working for dumb and dumber. There is no way city employees should have to be at the whim of whatever chaos is dreamt up at night and expects done the next day. You forget this is a library and the expectation to always be available, even after hours, during non emergencies is absolutely absurd.

3.0
3 Jul 2022

Not the best but not the worst

Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

Creative, diverse staff; work is rewarding in intangible ways; good benefits.

Cons

Upper management is absolutely out of touch with staff. There is no loyalty shown to staff members who have given literal decades to the organization. Advancement is next to impossible. Many good people have left in recent years.

Viewing 1 - 3 of 41 Reviews

Glassdoor has 45 Houston Public Library reviews submitted anonymously by Houston Public Library employees. Read employee reviews and ratings on Glassdoor to decide if Houston Public Library is right for you.