Unitarian Universalist Service Committee Reviews

There are just so, so, so many cons to this place as it is under current leadership (although looking at previous reviews, it seems many of these dynamics have continued through multiple sets of management). This place is an ultra-hypocritical, church-affiliated, "social justice" nightmare. Toxic. Abusive. Dysfunctional. Unstructured. Directionless. Mean-spirited and horrible people lurk like snakes in the grass, obsessed with their own power in this do-nothing organization, and will bully you in various forms to show that they have power and you don’t. Extremely bad things happened during my time at this place, including a colleague who had worked there for a year getting violently deported because UUSC wouldn’t sponsor their visa. A good chunk of people, probably 20% of the organization, left a year or so into the pandemic, but whether the significant financial and structural costs of turnover registered at the top remains to be seen. Like the former President of the USA that UUSC constantly critiqued, these managers seem like they would rather the whole org be dismantled and collapsed around them, because then they have less people to deal with, while somehow magically holding onto their power and huge salaries. HR is a total disaster and the union can't help you, because the union are just regular employees trying to pick up the pieces from HR and management’s terrible decisions. The board absolutely does not care about anything important, like making sure the inner workings of UUSC don’t go completely off the rails, or that a good amount of the fundraised money is actually reaching people in need instead of going to white-collar professionals (including the expensive consultants that are constantly employed to do management's job for them). It’s definitely a place that runs on manipulation, favoritism, and board connections, rather than merit or actual personality, qualifications, skills or talent. Gaslighting, psychologically abusive behavior and retaliation are prevalent here. Staff are siloed and silenced so we couldn’t compare our poor treatment at the hand of our managers and other colleagues. The org itself is intensely siloed and basically each team is at odds with the others, despite this being a "social justice" org that is supposed to be working together for the same goals. Despite the handful of good staff and decent projects, the few good outings and hopefully helping a few people in need, ultimately working here was one of the most miserable professional experiences of my life, featuring some of the absolute worst people I've ever had to deal with in my entire life, and it severely impacted my mental health. If you’re fortunate to live and work in the greater Boston area, there are a million better options than this dead-end place. Save your sanity and save yourself.

I would like to echo the other review on here regarding great colleagues and poor management. UUSC hires dedicated, talented people, but those people are continually hamstrung in doing their jobs by poor management and a ridiculous amount of bureaucracy for such a small organization. UUSC's management definitely does not live up to the organization's ideals in ways that you would not expect from a human rights nonprofit that lists promoting economic justice among its core program areas. In my short time there I saw employees let go at the whim of management, having their employment and health insurance canceled with no explanation. Underpaid temps and overpaid consultants were used to fill jobs while regular staff were forced out or sat idle. The workplace is unionized (a part of walking the talk), but management is so hostile to the union that the last two stewards were laid off after years of service, and expressing interest in union leadership will wreck your chance to advance in your job or possibly get you fired.