The Department of Stanford Efficiency
Stanford University stands at a crossroads. Once a beacon of innovation and academic excellence, it is now suffocating under the weight of its own bloated bureaucracy. Administrative growth has spiraled out of control, alienating students, frustrating faculty, and diverting resources from the university’s true mission.
Over the past two decades, administrative staff have tripled, ballooning to nearly 17,000 employees—almost outnumbering students. Yet this explosion of bureaucracy has made the university less functional, less innovative, and less aligned with its core mission.
Former Provost John Etchemendy, in an interview with the Review, has been candid in his assessment of the university’s bloat. “When I first came to Stanford, I just felt that if you had a good idea, you could do it at Stanford—anything was possible,” Etchemendy said. “And now people will say that Stanford is a no-can-do university.” Faculty and students alike are drowning in a sea of red tape. Processes that should take minutes, such as the procurement of services for campus events, now drag on for weeks, weighed down by unnecessary layers of approvals and oversight.
As one university insider put it, “Its [administrative size] has grown too much. And it's actually hampering the mission of the university.” These layers of inefficiency don’t enhance the university—they actively harm it.
For faculty, simple tasks like securing research funding or hiring staff for labs have become ordeals. Each step involves multiple levels of approval, requiring sign-offs from finance, compliance, and legal departments. One administrator who wished to stay anonymous shared an experience where a straightforward grant reimbursement was delayed for weeks, bouncing back multiple times for minor clarifications, only to be approved in the end without any changes.
The behavior of a single bad actor will often lead to more burdensome regulations that harm all of Stanford. Such heavy-handed rule-making is not indicative of what Stanford should be—a thriving academic community where faculty, students, and administration trust one another.
For students, the burden is equally stifling. Administrative offices that should exist to support them have become regulatory mazes that punish them instead. Bob Ottilie, an alum who has long defended students in disciplinary cases with the Office of Community Standards (OCS), highlighted the absurdity of Stanford’s processes: “Instead of hiring a bunch of people to help educate students on risk...they [OCS] hire a bunch of people to prosecute you for offenses associated with the risk that they never spent any time trying to help you avoid.”
A prime example of this is the coffee-throwing incident and the ensuing OCS investigation that now deceased Stanford soccer star Katie Meyer was subject to. Processes that could once be resolved with a quick conversation between students and an RA or dean now require extensive paperwork, hearings, and follow-ups.
Stanford’s mission is clear: to teach, to research, and to advance clinical care. Anything beyond this is a dereliction of duty. Yet Stanford has veered dangerously off course, funneling resources into dubious projects that add little value to students or society. Nowhere is this more evident than in the proliferation of centers on campus. With nearly 300 centers, many operate as vanity projects for donors that employ expensive non-teaching, non-research staff. One former administrator offered an explanation: “You get rich donors who create the Center for this, the Center for that. And those create headcount.” Such vanity projects often stray from the positive intentions donors endowed them with.
The Stanford Internet Observatory is a case study in such mismanagement. Meant to study online disinformation, it instead embroiled the university in political controversies and has “cost Stanford millions of dollars in legal fees”. Centers like the Stanford Internet Observatory have become political advocacy arms–they do no teaching, no research, and cost the university millions in lawsuits. Rather than advancing knowledge, these centers serve as liabilities, draining resources and tarnishing Stanford’s reputation in the process.
Stanford is no stranger to shedding inefficiencies when necessary. The Stanford Research Institute (SRI), which once existed as part of the university, was spun off in 1970 as an independent entity. This allowed Stanford to focus on its core academic and research mission while enabling SRI to thrive as a standalone organization. The same logic should apply to today’s bloated centers and non-core activities. Centers that cannot justify their existence through meaningful teaching or research should be spun off or shut down entirely.
Stanford’s sprawling bureaucracy doesn’t just waste time—it drains money and resources on a staggering scale. Take the faculty hiring process for example. According to a faculty member who wished to remain unnamed, it can take months to fill even routine roles due to excessive approvals and duplicative processes. These inefficiencies directly harm Stanford’s ability to attract top talent and remain competitive--potential faculty have already spurned Stanford in the past due to the sluggish hiring practices. Despite being a university, Stanford appears more committed to growing its administrative ranks than its academic ones.
Housing offers another glaring example of administrative bloat taking over campus life. Former student residences have been converted into administrative offices, depriving students of much-needed housing options. The Bechtel International Center, for example, occupies what was once a lively student residence. While its function is valuable, the fact that administrators are displacing students in the most literal, physical sense is emblematic of misplaced priorities. The result is a campus where administrators seem to outnumber students, creating an environment that feels more like a corporate office park than a vibrant academic community.
Most egregious is that no one seems to have a clear picture of where all these resources are going. Every attempt to look into who is being hired and why is an entrance into a seemingly unknowable labyrinth of bureaucracy. Some explanations include an increase in medical and research staff, but those numbers can only go so high. How has this cancerous growth been allowed to happen at one of the world’s premier institutions? It’s simple: no one has had the courage to stop it.
The consequences of this unchecked growth are devastating. Faculty feel stifled, students feel unsupported, and Stanford’s reputation as a world leader is at risk. This isn’t just inefficient; it’s corrosive. The more Stanford expands its bureaucracy, the further it alienates the very people it exists to serve.
This must stop. Stanford’s trustees, donors, and alumni must demand a return to efficiency at Stanford. Donors, in particular, hold immense power. Instead of funding new centers that perpetuate administrative bloat, donors ought to direct their contributions to scholarships, tenure-track positions, and groundbreaking research. I personally recommend the NIL fund as a responsible user of donations. Trustees must push for a transparent breakdown of administrative roles, asking pointed questions about who is doing what—and why.
Stanford was once the epitome of a can-do institution: a place where innovation thrived and where barriers to progress were few. Today, it feels like a university that distrusts its own students and faculty, where good ideas are bogged down in bureaucracy and where administrative sprawl stifles the very creativity that made Stanford great. It is time to trim the fat, streamline the processes, and refocus on what truly matters. The trustees and donors have a responsibility to act decisively. The stakes are too high, and the cost of inaction is too great. Stanford’s future depends on it.