Did you catch that last comment regarding my family? That's, I think, an example of what I mean when I say it's a lot easier for me to find something good to say of my family than of the Vienna mission.
Of course the relationship of family members with one another tends to be more complex than that of an individual with an employer, even if that employer is a mission, and as such might reasonably be expected to be on the more demanding end as far as employers go. That being said, I think that missions, in some circumstances, might become sort of surrogate families, as in the case of, say, the Sisters of Mercy or the Bethel DiakonieWerke, where I volunteered for a couple months when studying German at the Goethe Institut in Berlin. You will notice that these are institutions that require vows of chastity, and as such, become ones new family in a very real sense when one joins them. Since there were plenty of biological families (parents and children) amongst the staff at the Vienna mission, the mission couldn't exactly be seen as a surrogate family.
But the fact remains that my relationship with the mission, whether or not that's how they wanted it to be, was rather simplistic, in that I worked for them. That's ultimately what it boils down to and any other relational aspects of that bond between us were built on that one foundation. In that regard, our relationship was pretty simple. And when I ended my employ with the mission our relationship ended.
Families can be like that, too, I suppose, but mine isn't. I come from a family that, for better or for worse, has a sense of commitment to each other. I was struck once in the mid 1980s when I visited the elderly orthodox Jewish woman in the hospital and she expressed some surprise, as she hadn't expected that goys (gentiles) had that kind of family commitment (I guess she saw my visiting her as sort of a family thing to do). That thought stuck with me and I realized that maybe my family wasn't typical in comparison to other goy families, but I think among many committed Christian groups this is pretty common.
As my family (and since I'm not married, I mean my birth family) has aged us "kids" have gone through different experiences, lived in different milieus and come to different understandings about things. And through all this we don't always understand each other as we once did. In this kind of a set up you might be able to see how even with good intentions it might be pretty easy to hurt one another. But I don't think, in general, that that has been the intention, although sometimes being true to our own beliefs has led to what another might view as intentional harm. Still, I think that within our own individually held beliefs and convictions we have each generally wanted the best for the others in the family, and this is quite laudable, I think.
This is not to say that a certain amount of self-interest has also come into play in our relationships. Sometimes it just limits how much we can help others but it's possible that self-interest has also had other influences on our behaviors towards each other.
All this about my family has been to try to answer mom's statement that I don't really like the family. Through all this tiptoeing around our relations there have been times that family members have really hurt me, intentionally or otherwise, for a variety of reasons and in a variety of ways, and some of those things have had a significant impact on my life. So my relationship with my family is not as straight forward as it once was. The issue right now, though, is regarding my relationship with one of my brothers, which I've described already. But it would be unfair for me to not add that others have felt hurt by things I've said or done too.
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We're going to take a look at how symbolic interactionism might help untangle my experience in Vienna. This first quote actually comes farther in the text, but I'm starting with it in case my reader(s) aren't familiar with symbolic interactionsm. The text reference is:
Reichers, Arnon E. (1987) An interactionist perspective on newcomer socialization rates. Acadamy of Management Review, 12(2), 278-287.
"Blumer (1979) is credited with coining the phrase "symbolic interactionism" as the name for a branch of philosophy that is concerned with the genesis and development of meaning and identity. For Mead, Blumer, and other members of this school of thought, meaning arises in the relationship between an act, the response to that act by a second person, and the result of that act-react interaction. Verbal and symbolic interactions between people are the major avenues through which meaning and significance come to be associated with events, practices, and procedures. This approach does not place the meaning of an event within the event itself, but neither does it place meaning purely within the individual. Rather, meaning arises out of the interactions between people, and individuals transform their own perceptions of events in response to the interactions they have with others in a setting. According to this view, reality and meaning are social constructions, and individuals are not strictly separable from their environments. Because individuals contribute to the meaning that arises in a setting, individuals and situations mutually determine each other." (p. 279)
Maybe having a contrast with other major sociological theories will help. Here's one such source that seems fairly clear and succinct.
I can't believe I just spent 45 minutes penning the part of this post having to do with the text! I know it was that long because my stimulator session (like a TENS unit - here's mine). I have to get more done that this, though, so I'd better get a move on...
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"For individuals, a rapid socialization period means a quicker reduction of the anxiety associated with lack of situational identity (Wanous, 1980). For the organization, this reduction in anxiety also is desirable because it means that individuals can begin to focus sooner on job performance (Katz, 1980)." (p. 278)
This sounds reasonable. I guess I came with an expectation that my role at the mission would be as a secretary and I was willing to accept that identity as long as I could have an outside identity that more closely matched how I viewed myself. I think the mission saw me as a secretary pure and simple; what they might have thought about my potential, however, is open for speculation, because that's when we get into the realm of suggestions of this or that possibility that I didn't know how likely any of it was. I think the mission probably thought that they would have more of a role in defining my identity though, and I didn't want to take on the secretary identity any further than I had to. I was conscious before and during my Vienna tenure of wanting to look outside of the mission for fulfillment where the secretarial role fell short, but I couldn't have said it then in the terms this article discusses. I wasn't verses in sociological theory at that time. My current knowledge is mostly from a self-taught basis, although I did have one graduate course in Sociology of Education in 1998.
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"[S]ymbolic interactions occur more frequently and socialization rates are accelerated when both newcomers and insiders proact on each other and seek out interactions. Proaction is defined as any behavior that involves actively seeking out interaction opportunities." (p. 281)
It's not that I shunned interactions with mission staff so much as I was more active in seeking out other opportunities on my off-time. The whole time I was there I didn't see any reason to get over involved in secretarial duties because they were very easy, especially the tasks I was given, and didn't involve a whole lot of thought, although I did try to take initiative in setting things up or organizing the position or information related to it. But it wasn't the kind of thing that would send me groveling at someone's feet begging to help me figure something out. And to put too much focus on just the position would put me in a sort of stereotypical single female secretarial role which would affect virtually all my relationships in the mission.
According to this text then, the mission was perhaps interested in speeding up my socialization by increasing my "symbolic interactions" with relevant others, but they had made that role so way out of proportion (in my perspective) all-consuming that it was distasteful. Maybe it's like saying I like liver and onions and I even know they're good for me, but I don't want them every day or only liver and onions. And I felt like I was being offered only liver and onions, all the time.
So the mission, apparently, wanted to socialize me quickly and all-encompassingly into this role and image they had prepared in advance for me and I had problems with the "all-encompassingly" part, especially.
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On page 282 Reichers presents a 4 quadrant conceptual map. The vertical (y axis) is "Insider Proaction", while the horizontal (x axis) is labeled "Newcomer Proaction." The top row and right column are "high", and the bottom row and left column are labeled low. Cell 1 is top left, cell 2 is top right, cell 3 is bottom left, and cell 4 is bottom right. He begins the discussion of this graphic on page 281, but I'm going to pick it up on page 282.
"In contrast to Cell #2, Cell #3 represents a condition that is characterized by low levels of proaction on the part of newcomers and insiders. Here, interactions are infrequent and socialization rates are the slowest. Newcomers in this situation are isolated from insiders and, consequently, may remain anxious for longer periods. This isolation and infrequent interaction may produce feelings of alienation in newcomers." (p. 282)
This isn't how things started out for me in Vienna, but there were periods where things were pretty close to this, especially before I was sent to Dallas and before I left for good. During the first of these times I was losing trust in the mission and the feeling was probably mutual. However, I am not sure exactly why they backed off. My stress levels were definitely rising during that time, but I'd have to go back and look at my calendar and the like to try and recreate the details of what was happening to try and better make sense of it. I'll do that in the chronology and try to keep this text in mind.
As far as the couple months or so before I left for good I was completely devastated at the thought of my dream career washing away. At that point I thought it was the end of everything I'd prepared for and I didn't see a way out of it because the mission and I had been at such a standstill so much of the time I'd been there. Of course, by that time the socialization should have been long finished, but I don't think it ever really happened, despite my taking a few teaching trips to the East (which would seem to indicate a certain level of trust in me by the mission). It's possible that the mission thought my socialization had been completed at some point before I took those trips, in which case their socialization efforts more or less stopped after that. I'm not sure. In any case, my work positions in the office continued to be unstable. Although I certainly made efforts during my stay in Vienna to initiate social contact, I don't think I ever did so with socialization in mind. It's not like I had a strategy to figure out the inner workings of my new work environment.
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"Frustration may characterize newcomers (insiders) in cells #1 and 4 as they meet with little response from nonproactive insiders (newcomers). When repeated attempts at interaction by one party are not reciprocated by the other party, such attempts may decrease in frequency.... [C]onditions where only one party is proactive may tend to evolve into conditions where neither party is proactive" (p. 282)
Cell #1 (high insider proaction / low newcomer proaction) probably describes my first months in Vienna. I appreciated some of these efforts at outreach, but I don't think I responded as they wished, which is why I ended out having more and greater stress. I don't think I took initiative to have proactive interactions, but I was observing them and trying to figure things out. I probably didn't give them enough cues to understand what I was thinking and how I was responding to them and to what was going on. So my lack of proaction (or even of understandable reaction) may have put them on guard and resulted in the crisis the fifth month I was with them. This is one possible take on what happened and may help explain at least some of it. Again, I need to look at this more in detail in the chronology.
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"This figure is not meant to suggest that interaction frequency is the only determinant of socialization rates. Job complexity or the type of profession a newcomer is entering, for example, also might affect how quickly the encounter stage is negotiated." (p. 283)
... Or, in my case, job fit would be the issue. I understood before I got there that the job wasn't a perfect fit for me, but I didn't know it would practically define my whole life and all my relationships with the mission. The definitely affected the progression of my socialization (or lack thereof).
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Figure 2 is more complex and I'll just try to briefly describe the gist of it. It shows how (on the left) the characteristics of the individual, the insiders and the organizational structure form a basis for the mediating factors of proaction and interaction frequency which leads to 5 aspects of socialization, denoted by 5 boxes. Then the diagram indicates how the encounter socialization rate affects the individual's future with the organization.
"As shown in Figure 2, three individual difference variables (field dependence, tolerance for ambiguity, and needs for affiliation) are suggested here as representative of a larger class of variables that characterize proactive newcomers who seek out interaction with others in the workplace. It is believed that the three discussed here are some of the most powerful contributors to proactive behavior on the part of newcomers because they provide both the motivation and the ability to seek out interactions with others. Field dependence (Witkin & Goodenough, 1977) provides newcomers with both the motivation (reliance upon the field as a referent) and the ability (interpersonal skills) to initiate the interactions that facilitate the adaptation of newcomers. By definition, field dependent people tend to rely upon the context in which behavior occurs in order to attach meaning to behavior." (p. 283).
For further discussion on field dependence and field independence, here's a helpful summary from an education professor at Miami-Dade Community College. Can you guess on which side of the equation I fall? This whole blog is practically a study in field independence!
I came to Vienna with my own ideas, beliefs and values, mostly pretty well thought out and reasoned through, and that's generally how I like to change my view, which I do do sometimes, but only that way. It seems, however, that the Vienna mission was used to using a more relational / interactive to get their ideas across. If they'd sat me down with a newcomer's orientation, complete with white board and PowerPoint slides (perhaps with some small group discussions thrown in for good measure), my socialization might have gone a lot smoother.
However, that upfront in-your-face direct method of presenting things wasn't going to happen because that's not how they operated. Besides, that would have opened the door to discussions about things that weren't really up for discussion, and it wouldn't be helpful in instilling a proper understanding of power use and distribution within the organization.
In general I wouldn't say that field dependence is a bad thing in socialization settings, but in Vienna it took on a whole new blown-out-of proportion life of its own (in my opinion). When the informal organization, informal power structure and/or informal communication are out of whack and disproportionately greater than the more formal side of the organization, I think that opens the door for manipulation. My first boss here, where I am now, hedged on the question I asked in one of my in-person interview (they flew me down here for a couple days of meetings and interview sessions), and sure enough I ignored my hunch about that and it was indeed a problem. And that was in a small way involving one person compared to the Vienna mission that was run that way almost in its entirety... for security purposes, I assume.
The Vienna mission wasn't entirely run as an informal organization, however, and those who had formal power in the organization, in my observations, held a close reign on informal power as well, so there was almost a 1:1 relationship between who held formal power and who held informal power. But the details of how they operate was more akin to informal organization, and even if those in positions of formal power seemed to prefer to operate a lot in the informal power realm or informal organization. Again, I think this was intentional, largely (but not only) for security reasons. Sometimes it felt contrived even.
But the point here is that I think informal spheres are a lot more open to manipulation, and I sensed that pretty early on, although I didn't have the background I do now to discuss it in these terms. In any event, though, my field independent personality and other aspects of my background combined to make me a likely candidate for slow entry socialization, especially socialization into an organization like the Vienna mission that put such stock in the informal aspects of the organization.
Other reasons I might not have been field dependent in that particular situation, though include my German language knowledge (which allowed me to get around without much help, even at the very beginning) and the secretary position not being an end-all for me.
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"Newcomers with high, unmet relatedness needs would be motivated to seek out interpersonal interactions in the workplace that might gratify these needs." (p. 283)
I didn't have "unmet relatedness needs". That is, I looked forward to relationships with people in the mission, but I didn't see it as a great need per se. I had lots of other friends, and one even brought a bunch of junior high kids to visit (on their German-speaking tour) the first summer I was there. So my reaching out to others, really the whole time I was in Vienna, was not out of need, but just to be social, or sometimes to befriend newcomers even. I think that my not having a felt need for relationships, however, meant that this wasn't a tool that would have so much effect on me in their efforts to try to convert me to their ways. (I use that word because I did sometimes feel like they were trying to convert me, maybe like to secret society or something.) Right or wrong, that's how I sometimes felt, and this sentiment was clearly a barrier to socialization.
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That's all for this very useful little article, and it's time for me to go to bed again. Good night!
~ Meg
