‘Academic career development should not be a source of fear and frustration’

For many academics at TU Delft, promotion has become a source of stress rather than achievement or pride. What should be a moment of professional recognition is increasingly experienced as an opaque, unpredictable and exhausting ordeal. The Delft Young Academy’s 2025 campus-wide survey leaves little room for doubt: dissatisfaction with the promotion system is widespread, deep-rooted and damaging.

Only about 20% of respondents were satisfied with the promotion procedures. As one academic stated, ‘It often feels like a black box. You do everything asked of you and still get nowhere’. This frustration is not an isolated grievance. It reflects a systemic problem that undermines trust and motivation.

A moving target

One of the strongest themes in the survey is the lack of clear, stable promotion criteria. Many staff describe the process as ‘a moving target’ and feel that ‘the goalposts keep moving’. One assistant professor explained that the required metrics and terms changed every year, making it hard to understand what was required.

Academics reported spending years building strong publication records, teaching portfolios, or leadership profiles, only to find that expectations had shifted without notice. This chronic uncertainty creates anxiety, weakens motivation, and erodes confidence in the system.

Most respondents rated the clarity of promotion expectations poorly, suggesting that career development feels more like a gamble than a planned trajectory. This uncertainty is compounded by a culture of secrecy around promotion decisions.

Perhaps most troubling is the inconsistency of criteria across faculties

Respondents described decisions as opaque and badly explained, leaving academics unsure why some people are promoted before the end of a five-year term  while others are not. As one staff member wrote, ‘I know the official policy … but what I was unaware of is the things managers and MTs come up with themselves to withhold or delay promotions’.

Eight universities in one

Perhaps most troubling is the inconsistency of criteria across faculties. While TU Delft is one institution, promotion practices often resemble eight separate systems. Some faculties emphasise research output almost exclusively, despite official claims that teaching is valued. In others, staff are told that educational innovation matters more than publications. Timelines, expectations and informal norms vary widely between departments. The result is a patchwork of standards that fuels perceptions of unfairness. Career prospects should not depend in which faculty you happen to work in.

Burnout as a career strategy

Another disturbing finding is the extent to which promotion is associated with overwork. To be competitive, staff feel pressured to excel in teaching, research, grants, leadership and outreach/valorisation simultaneously. One respondent observed that ‘TU Delft runs on overtime […]. That’s not a solution to a structural problem’.

The survey shows that a significant proportion of academics feel permanently overworked, with promotion uncertainty acting as a major driver of burnout. Nights, weekends and cancelled holidays have become the norm for those trying to ‘tick all the boxes’. A system that implicitly rewards overwork is neither healthy nor sustainable. It risks alienating talented academics from their work and job.

A step forward, but not enough

In December 2025, TU Delft launched the Academic Development Guide, a framework defining four result areas: education, research, societal impact & innovation, and leadership & organisation. On paper, this is a major improvement. It offers a shared vocabulary for academic impact and addresses long-standing complaints about vague criteria. Furthermore, it has a process for tailor-made career pathways for each academic staff member so that they do not have to tick all the boxes.

But a guide alone will not fix a broken system. The survey makes it clear that the problem is not only the absence of policy, but the gap between formal rules and informal practice. Without uniform implementation, transparency and accountability, the same patterns of local reinterpretation and discretionary decision-making will persist.

One university, one standard

The message from TU Delft’s early career community is very clear: the promotion system needs urgent reform. The Academic Development Guide must be an operational standard, not just a conceptual one.

This means standardised promotion timelines across all faculties; uniform interpretation of criteria; transparent evaluation procedures; central governance; and, proper training for managers and committee members. Promotion should be a fair and predictable process of individual growth, not a source of fear and frustration.