Toxic Work Culture, No Accountability - Anonymous employee Seattle Children's Employee Review

1.0
10 Dec 2017
Anonymous employee
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

The children and families, and seeing that any child who needs treatment will receive it despite their ability to pay. Also being part of a mission that is advancing breakthroughs in treating childhood diseases.

Cons

Despite its amazing mission, the reality of working at Seattle Children's is frustrating at best and downright toxic at worst. Leadership likes to talk a big game of "flipping the triangle" and promoting a culture of "bottom up" management. It's all a sham though, and in the last year of my employment I watched as leadership routinely dismissed reports of bullying, harassment, and retaliation by silencing victims and protecting those who repeatedly preyed on peers and subordinates. HR investigations were kept in-house versus being sourced out, leading to inadequate outcomes where victims received payout settlements and the door while predators and enablers were given promotions and bonuses. I also watched as money was spent recklessly on projects that would be abandoned midway, or produce little to no return on investment. If someone would raise concerns over seeing this and offer up alternatives, they were chastised and silenced by leadership and painted as being a difficult employee. Add to this toxic mess, a patriarchal c-level suite that has continued to promote and install friends into leadership positions and then protect them from fall-out when they prove to be inept at their job. It's a culture where you have to scrape and claw your way to the top, and where schmoozing and buzzwords mean more than performance and ethics. Combine all this with extremely low pay for entry level and mid-career professionals, it's no wonder you have rolls and rolls of unfilled positions. There are very few perks in away of fringe benefits. Insane parking costs at the expense of already underpaid employees. A time-off system where you have to accrue holidays along with sick time and vacation into one pot. For new employees this often means forgoing many holidays with family because you only get 9 days of vacation a year when you take out observed holidays (which have to be accrued) and the bare minimum of legally required sick time.

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5.0
29 Jun 2026
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Pros

Good Benefits, overall good working environment

Cons

Limited opportunities for growth at the PhD level

4.0
31 May 2026
Recommend
CEO approval
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Pros

The culture is incredibly welcoming and I feel supported by my support and charge nurses every shift!

Cons

I wish there were more of an incentive to pick up extra shifts. Our unit is regularly short staffed, but time and a half is not enough to make the staff here want to work extra. I have worked at hospitals that offer a $30 premium on top of time and a half which was incentive enough for staff to pick up. I also think double time would be sufficient for staff.

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