Brooklyn Botanic Garden Reviews

The members of executive leadership and heads of the development department here are in some weird 8-way power struggle. The VP gate-kept donor relationships for nearly a decade before she gave someone access to her knowledge - which is all in her head. Get ready to get thrown under the bus in meetings big and small. Forget bringing up concerns, these folks are allergic to accountability. Every process is as cumbersome as possible, checked in triplicate even for senior staff, and yet donor notes in the CRM are treated as an afterthought. It’s all paper and in the heads of executive leadership. Any attempt to innovate is taken as an insult. My supervisor couldn’t let go of any of the tasks I was supposed to take on from her in my newly created role, so I mostly spent my time on professional development for my reports, shielding them from her demeaning comments, and meeting with new donors for dedications. I dreaded interactions with finance and the President’s office, where anything I said was met with a baseline level of contempt typically experienced at the DMV. Also, if you’re a working parent, run, don’t walk, away from this workplace. The leadership and HR are inflexible and lacking in basic human empathy to a degree I have not witnessed before or since.

Senior management seems to almost have disdain for Blue Collar divisions. For example, in all-staff meetings, Blue Collar division are not invited to present while all other departments do. This conveys to half the staff that their ideas and experiences are not important. The other half of the staff misses out on learning about sustainability developments happening in Operations, changes to the plant collection and stewardship happening in Horticulture, etc. Staff grudgingly refer to the institution as a "horticultural event space" rather than a garden. Decisions that impact the collection are often made with little to no input from Horticulture. Security is poorly paid with rigid rules and schedules. Management continues to accrue raises and new titles. The Board gets its information from the C-suite, so long-standing, serious issues appear to remain largely unknown to them. Staff and other stakeholders do not have even non-voting seats on the Board, so effective oversight and accountability are nearly impossible. Departments that tend to attract people with great enthusiasm - Education, Horticulture, etc., - are filled with passionate and completely heartbroken staff. Anyone in Hort will tell you that stewardship of the collection is not taken seriously. Non-union members have reportedly had benefits cut by way of an email late on a Friday.