The survey, undertaken in October last year, shows that not only do the majority of employees lack faith in university leadership but more than two thirds do not support the change management regime implemented across the institution over recent years.

In what is a resounding rejection of outgoing Vice-Chancellor Ian Young's vision for the ANU – which included budget and staff cuts and unpopular reforms to the School of Music – the staff survey shows a downturn in favourable responses in 28 out of 39 response categories. Only three categories received improved scores – while eight remain unchanged.

The Voice Project survey was last undertaken at the ANU in 2011 – the year Professor Young was appointed Vice-Chancellor. He is leaving in January after completing a single term, to be replaced by Nobel Prize winning astrophysicist Brian Schmidt.

A spokesman for the ANU was an internal working document only – not meant for public release – but the university would focus on areas for improvement.

The 2014 responses show significant downturns in favourable responses from staff across almost all areas of university operation.

Most glaring was a 45 per cent favourability rating for leadership – down 5 per cent on the 2011 survey. This is a 3 per cent drop on other university results in similar staff surveys over the same period and a 16 per cent drop on general industry standards, according to the survey.

The biggest overall drops in staff satisfaction at the ANU occurred in "Organisation Objectives" and "Organisational Direction" both of which recorded a 17 per cent drop on the 2011 rating – down to a 60 per cent favourability rating each.

The lowest favourability rating was for cross-unit cooperation, which received just 27 per cent (down by 3 per cent on the 2011 survey result).

Change and Innovation received a 31 per cent favourability rating – down 9 per cent on the 2011 results, down 10 per cent on other universities and 24 per cent down on other industry standards.

The other concerning or "red" highlighted scores were for workload – which received a 42 per cent favourability rating (down 6 per cent on 2011), career opportunities, which received a 43 per cent favourability rating (down 4 per cent on 2011), university processes, which received a 39 per cent favourability rating (down 4 per cent on 2011), and entrepreneurship, which received a 36 per cent favourability rating (down 3 per cent on 2011).

Despite the negative ratings, it did seem clear there was considerable staff loyalty and affection for the institution. The ANU maintained received an 83 per cent favourability rating for overall job satisfaction (down 1 per cent on the 2011 results), an 83 per cent favourability rating for mission and values (down 6 per cent on 2011), an 87 per cent favourability rating for teamwork (the same as 2011) and an 85 per cent rating for role clarity (no change).

It improved its scores in safety, facilities, and community engagement and rated higher than other universities in organisational commitment, job satisfaction and intention to stay.

The spokesman for the ANU said the survey was "an internal working document of the university, designed to help steer internal policies. It has not been released publicly and will remain an internal-only document."

However, the university provided staff with the following overview of the survey.

"The 2014 ANU staff engagement survey achieved a response rate of 62 per cent, with the key outcome measure – Staff Engagement – unchanged at around 77 per cent, which is considerably considerably higher than the average for the Higher Education sector."

The 77 per cent is a slight 1 per cent drop on the 2011 results.

The spokesman said "Significant advancements are reflected in the survey results for our facilities and grounds, work health and safety practices and knowledge, as well as engagement with the community, including engagement with our Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander staff.

"Our staff strongly believe in the university's mission and values and are proud to work at the University. We have also achieved very good results for practices related to the management of talent, role clarity, teamwork and the prevention of harassment and discrimination."

"Areas requiring further focus to drive improvements relate to the university's capacity to adapt to change and innovation, technology and processes as well as cross-unit co-operation and involvement," he said.

In light of these findings, the ANU would continue its business transformation program and the Human Resources Division would "continue to work with college deans and service division directors and their teams to further analyse survey results and to agree on focus areas for improvement relevant to each unit."