This next chapter section in the text is titled: "Organizational Commitment and Turnover." I think this whole post will be from the first section: "Definition of the Problem."
"Etzioni (1961) argues that commitment - and the authority that organizations have over members - is rooted in the nature of employee involvement in the organization. Involvement takes on of three forms, ranging from total commitment to no commitment at all. Moral involvement, based on positive and intense orientation to the organization, results from internalization of the organization's values, goals, and norms. Calculative involvement is less intense and rests on an exchange relationship between the individual and the organization. People become committed to an organization to the extent that they perceive some beneficial or equitable exchange relationship. Alienative involvement is a lack of commitment, occuring when members feel constrained by circumstances to belong to the organization by do not identify with it." (p. 144; bold in original)
Moral involvement is clearly what was demanded by the mission in Vienna, but this isn't surprising. What was surprising to me was that it demanded that you internalize everything about the mission (the norms, etc.) and then applied it to your whole life. In this way you practically became the mission and my impression was that in order to stay above suspicion one had to be very transparent.
With these kinds of demands put on the new recruit, I find it baffling, to say the least, as to how all those other intelligent people managed to accept this situation. I've discussed this before in other contexts, and have suggested possible answers. Another possibility, though, is that others didn't experience this level of demand on them. After all, when you consider that I was the only one, as far as I knew (at least up to when I was there), who ever went through anything like what I did with the mission, then it does open up the possibilities that I was treated differently.
I just had a new idea about this dilemma. It seems to me that in, as much as I was the only one who had ever gone through anything like what I did with the mission, there were three possibilities as to why others were able to be socialized and I wasn't. Here are the options (and I'm not sure they're all mutually exclusive):
1. The problem was in me: everyone else had the same demands put on them but these demands didn't bother them because the demands are basically reasonable.
2. The problem was in the mission and their demands: the mission's demands were really out of line but there was something about the others that made them able to accept the demands, and something about me that made me able to reject the demands. In this case I would be right (in amoral sense) and the others would be wrong (in a moral sense).
3. The problem was that I was treated differently than the others were: In this case I might have been right to withstand the mission and the others might have also been right in going along with it, because we were, essentially, facing quite different demands, where the mission's demands on them were reasonable and the demands placed on me were unreasonable.
I can only think of those 3 possibilities right now, but it's a start, anyway. I can always build on it later if need be. But the variables seem to be taking shape as follows:
1. me
2. the other new recruits
3. the mission's demands
3a. the mission's demands are the same for me as for the others
3b. the mission's demands are different for me as for the others
If the problem was in me, in my character, etc., then this was just a case of a poor fit between me and the mission. Period.
If the problem was in the demands placed on everyone alike being immoral/unethical, then the fault would like in the mission and in the others who went along with it and then became a part of the problem (as socializers of other new recruits).
If the problem was in the demands placed uniquely on me (but not on the others), then the question arises as to why I might have been treated differently than the others. Which, I suspect, would lead back to my father's work.
So if anyone in the mission were to read these things about how I felt the mission's demands on me and thought that I was way out of line in my depictions, at least according to their experiences and what they knew of the mission, then I would highly suspect that the last possibility would be true, namely, that I was treated differently from everyone else because of my father.
And if that is the case, then it opens a whole new can of worms, such as, How did the mission know anything about my father? or Who pressured them to treat me differently and how did that pressure happen in the first place? or What concern was it to the mission who my father was?
***
"Kanter (1968) takes a different view of commitment, arguing that different types of commitment result from different behavioral requirements placed on members by the organization. Again, involvement takes three forms, but here the forms are interrelated. Continuance commitment has to do with a member's dedication to the survival of the organization and results from having people make sacrifices for and investments in the organization. Cohesion commitment is attachment to social relations in an organization; it can be enhanced by having employees publicly renounce previous social ties or engage in ceremonies that enhance group cohesion. Control commitment is a member's attachment to the norms of an organization that shape behavior in desires ways. It exists when employees believe that the organization's norms and values are important guides to their behavior." (p. 144; bold in original)
I think, at least based on my own experience, any kind of commitment you can come up with would be required by the Vienna mission, including all of these. The weakest of these might be the first, however, because it was possible to just serve 2 years, and I think it was usual for people to first sign on for a 2-year term, which could later be extended.
***
This next portion of text seems particularly apropos:
"Another interesting manifestation of commitment is the phenomenon known as whistle-blowing, or publicizing unethical, illegal, or immoral behavior. The topic has gained prominence recently from the revelation of various government procurement and regulation scandals, including defense department contracting, the awarding of HUD contracts, and regulation of generic drugs by the FDA.
For the individual, whistle-blowing may be the last resort, the only step left open; for the organization it is extremely threatening when negative information reaches the press. Whistle-blowing may occur because the whistle-blower feels tremendously committed to the organization; it is, after all, borne of an impulse to reform an evil, and few people are willing to risk punishment to reform what they do not value." (p. 145; bold in original)
There are certain people who I hope get to read this particular blog if only to read those 2 paragraphs. I would like to make a correction to something I said earlier: this is one kind of commitment that would not be required by the Vienna mission. Au contraire, mon ami, c'étais un péché très grave.
I would like to take this opportunity to draw everyone's attention to my ongoing, heart-felt commitment to the mission I wasted 2 of the best years of my life at. And it seems that there is professional theoretical literature out there to substantiate my claim (and you will note that here it is applied correctly, which is in direct and complete contrast to the use of a certain "culture shock" article by an unnamed h.r. director; please note the difference in professional ethics).
In all earnestness, I'm not sure if my revealing these things about the mission (which are my experiences and observations, and I can't vouch for others as to what they would say) is out of a commitment to the mission, to my faith and Christianity, or even a commitment to myself. I think that in as much as I am concerned about Christian and spiritual things there is a certain amount of commitment that way. It's too much to expect that anything much might come of my revealing these things, especially now so many years later. But if it causes some people to think in a new light about some of the issues I raise, maybe some good might come of it. I really hope that there would be some response like that, even if it was just among some individuals and didn't go beyond that. However, in as much as the mission has grown since I left (and therefore undoubtedly also grown in prestige and credibility in the Evangelical Christian community) but has remained focused on closed countries, I think I would face a double-thick protective wall around the mission (an apt illustration for an organization so engrossed in security issues): 1) those willing to vie for the mission and try to repudiate me, and 2) the likely continuance of using the same types of methods I experienced (although I'm sure these methods have been modified over the years and adapted to new geographical contexts). The fact that the mission is still probably using those same general types of methods means they would be less open to changing them and the fact that a lot more people are behind the mission means that they wouldn't have to because of all that backing against me a pipsqueak whistle-blower from another era.
Returning to our text, I would like to point out another issue of great importance: "For the individual, whistle-blowing may be the last resort, the only step left open..." I submit that there was never any other step I could take. The choices were: do nothing, talk to anyone (e.g., my boss, the h.r. director, my sending mission's E. European director - who is now, I see, in a position with the Vienna mission) and be sent home, or become a whistle-blower. There were no grievance procedures, at least none working any better than the right to study German (as a new recruit upon arrival in Austria) or take time off to escort visiting supporters.
So, after all these years, my commitment comes back to haunt the mission. Only this time it's not a matter of lack of commitment. But let's not stop here; there's more fun still awaiting us.
***
"Most of the work on whistle-blowing is descriptive and philosophical. Organizations are probably more apt to retaliate against whistle-blowers they value, perhaps because of their potential threat. They may also retaliate against those who are vulnerable because they lack public support. People often fail to blow the whistle when organizational conditions suggest they should. This hesitance undoubtedly results from fear of reprisal and skepticism that their organizations will take ameliorative steps." (p. 146)
Since I'm no longer a worker with the mission, I'm sure the mission doesn't value me any more (or maybe never really did - maybe they valued some straw woman they'd invented of me in their minds and valued her, but they didn't really value me - the real me, I don't think) but might also have less options for retaliation, if they were so inclined. If I were with them when I wrote this, you can bet your life they'd retaliate and I'd be gone under the worst conditions they could conjure up.
That, of course, is exactly why I didn't whistle-blow at the time I was with them. But that's not the only reason either. I also knew these people were smart and I was having trouble making sense of these things I was experiencing (and still didn't understand them several years later, which is why I did the research that resulted in me having these articles). So I wasn't exactly sure what I would protest against and how to even phrase and argue such a whistle-blowing effort. There was also the fact that I knew they could make me leave (one way or another) and my career was on the line, so I felt between a rock and a hard place where the only possible resolution (from my perspective) that might be a happy one was if they gave in to my demand to reserve the right to make my own judgment about individual aspects of the mission's operations as to whether they were right, moral, ethical, or biblical. This, of course, would mean not totally committing myself, which they couldn't stomach, so we resolved our differences unhappily - with me leaving under less than optimal circumstances, but having served out my full 2 years. The other issue (from my perspective of what a "happy resolution" would include), which wasn't specifically about commitment, was that the mission would have had to come to see me as more than a secretary and to break me out of that constraining mold they'd set for me and which I would not accept, especially since that mold determined practically my whole existence with the mission.
***
That ends this post, and this sub-section of the text.
"Etzioni (1961) argues that commitment - and the authority that organizations have over members - is rooted in the nature of employee involvement in the organization. Involvement takes on of three forms, ranging from total commitment to no commitment at all. Moral involvement, based on positive and intense orientation to the organization, results from internalization of the organization's values, goals, and norms. Calculative involvement is less intense and rests on an exchange relationship between the individual and the organization. People become committed to an organization to the extent that they perceive some beneficial or equitable exchange relationship. Alienative involvement is a lack of commitment, occuring when members feel constrained by circumstances to belong to the organization by do not identify with it." (p. 144; bold in original)
Moral involvement is clearly what was demanded by the mission in Vienna, but this isn't surprising. What was surprising to me was that it demanded that you internalize everything about the mission (the norms, etc.) and then applied it to your whole life. In this way you practically became the mission and my impression was that in order to stay above suspicion one had to be very transparent.
With these kinds of demands put on the new recruit, I find it baffling, to say the least, as to how all those other intelligent people managed to accept this situation. I've discussed this before in other contexts, and have suggested possible answers. Another possibility, though, is that others didn't experience this level of demand on them. After all, when you consider that I was the only one, as far as I knew (at least up to when I was there), who ever went through anything like what I did with the mission, then it does open up the possibilities that I was treated differently.
I just had a new idea about this dilemma. It seems to me that in, as much as I was the only one who had ever gone through anything like what I did with the mission, there were three possibilities as to why others were able to be socialized and I wasn't. Here are the options (and I'm not sure they're all mutually exclusive):
1. The problem was in me: everyone else had the same demands put on them but these demands didn't bother them because the demands are basically reasonable.
2. The problem was in the mission and their demands: the mission's demands were really out of line but there was something about the others that made them able to accept the demands, and something about me that made me able to reject the demands. In this case I would be right (in amoral sense) and the others would be wrong (in a moral sense).
3. The problem was that I was treated differently than the others were: In this case I might have been right to withstand the mission and the others might have also been right in going along with it, because we were, essentially, facing quite different demands, where the mission's demands on them were reasonable and the demands placed on me were unreasonable.
I can only think of those 3 possibilities right now, but it's a start, anyway. I can always build on it later if need be. But the variables seem to be taking shape as follows:
1. me
2. the other new recruits
3. the mission's demands
3a. the mission's demands are the same for me as for the others
3b. the mission's demands are different for me as for the others
If the problem was in me, in my character, etc., then this was just a case of a poor fit between me and the mission. Period.
If the problem was in the demands placed on everyone alike being immoral/unethical, then the fault would like in the mission and in the others who went along with it and then became a part of the problem (as socializers of other new recruits).
If the problem was in the demands placed uniquely on me (but not on the others), then the question arises as to why I might have been treated differently than the others. Which, I suspect, would lead back to my father's work.
So if anyone in the mission were to read these things about how I felt the mission's demands on me and thought that I was way out of line in my depictions, at least according to their experiences and what they knew of the mission, then I would highly suspect that the last possibility would be true, namely, that I was treated differently from everyone else because of my father.
And if that is the case, then it opens a whole new can of worms, such as, How did the mission know anything about my father? or Who pressured them to treat me differently and how did that pressure happen in the first place? or What concern was it to the mission who my father was?
***
"Kanter (1968) takes a different view of commitment, arguing that different types of commitment result from different behavioral requirements placed on members by the organization. Again, involvement takes three forms, but here the forms are interrelated. Continuance commitment has to do with a member's dedication to the survival of the organization and results from having people make sacrifices for and investments in the organization. Cohesion commitment is attachment to social relations in an organization; it can be enhanced by having employees publicly renounce previous social ties or engage in ceremonies that enhance group cohesion. Control commitment is a member's attachment to the norms of an organization that shape behavior in desires ways. It exists when employees believe that the organization's norms and values are important guides to their behavior." (p. 144; bold in original)
I think, at least based on my own experience, any kind of commitment you can come up with would be required by the Vienna mission, including all of these. The weakest of these might be the first, however, because it was possible to just serve 2 years, and I think it was usual for people to first sign on for a 2-year term, which could later be extended.
***
This next portion of text seems particularly apropos:
"Another interesting manifestation of commitment is the phenomenon known as whistle-blowing, or publicizing unethical, illegal, or immoral behavior. The topic has gained prominence recently from the revelation of various government procurement and regulation scandals, including defense department contracting, the awarding of HUD contracts, and regulation of generic drugs by the FDA.
For the individual, whistle-blowing may be the last resort, the only step left open; for the organization it is extremely threatening when negative information reaches the press. Whistle-blowing may occur because the whistle-blower feels tremendously committed to the organization; it is, after all, borne of an impulse to reform an evil, and few people are willing to risk punishment to reform what they do not value." (p. 145; bold in original)
There are certain people who I hope get to read this particular blog if only to read those 2 paragraphs. I would like to make a correction to something I said earlier: this is one kind of commitment that would not be required by the Vienna mission. Au contraire, mon ami, c'étais un péché très grave.
I would like to take this opportunity to draw everyone's attention to my ongoing, heart-felt commitment to the mission I wasted 2 of the best years of my life at. And it seems that there is professional theoretical literature out there to substantiate my claim (and you will note that here it is applied correctly, which is in direct and complete contrast to the use of a certain "culture shock" article by an unnamed h.r. director; please note the difference in professional ethics).
In all earnestness, I'm not sure if my revealing these things about the mission (which are my experiences and observations, and I can't vouch for others as to what they would say) is out of a commitment to the mission, to my faith and Christianity, or even a commitment to myself. I think that in as much as I am concerned about Christian and spiritual things there is a certain amount of commitment that way. It's too much to expect that anything much might come of my revealing these things, especially now so many years later. But if it causes some people to think in a new light about some of the issues I raise, maybe some good might come of it. I really hope that there would be some response like that, even if it was just among some individuals and didn't go beyond that. However, in as much as the mission has grown since I left (and therefore undoubtedly also grown in prestige and credibility in the Evangelical Christian community) but has remained focused on closed countries, I think I would face a double-thick protective wall around the mission (an apt illustration for an organization so engrossed in security issues): 1) those willing to vie for the mission and try to repudiate me, and 2) the likely continuance of using the same types of methods I experienced (although I'm sure these methods have been modified over the years and adapted to new geographical contexts). The fact that the mission is still probably using those same general types of methods means they would be less open to changing them and the fact that a lot more people are behind the mission means that they wouldn't have to because of all that backing against me a pipsqueak whistle-blower from another era.
Returning to our text, I would like to point out another issue of great importance: "For the individual, whistle-blowing may be the last resort, the only step left open..." I submit that there was never any other step I could take. The choices were: do nothing, talk to anyone (e.g., my boss, the h.r. director, my sending mission's E. European director - who is now, I see, in a position with the Vienna mission) and be sent home, or become a whistle-blower. There were no grievance procedures, at least none working any better than the right to study German (as a new recruit upon arrival in Austria) or take time off to escort visiting supporters.
So, after all these years, my commitment comes back to haunt the mission. Only this time it's not a matter of lack of commitment. But let's not stop here; there's more fun still awaiting us.
***
"Most of the work on whistle-blowing is descriptive and philosophical. Organizations are probably more apt to retaliate against whistle-blowers they value, perhaps because of their potential threat. They may also retaliate against those who are vulnerable because they lack public support. People often fail to blow the whistle when organizational conditions suggest they should. This hesitance undoubtedly results from fear of reprisal and skepticism that their organizations will take ameliorative steps." (p. 146)
Since I'm no longer a worker with the mission, I'm sure the mission doesn't value me any more (or maybe never really did - maybe they valued some straw woman they'd invented of me in their minds and valued her, but they didn't really value me - the real me, I don't think) but might also have less options for retaliation, if they were so inclined. If I were with them when I wrote this, you can bet your life they'd retaliate and I'd be gone under the worst conditions they could conjure up.
That, of course, is exactly why I didn't whistle-blow at the time I was with them. But that's not the only reason either. I also knew these people were smart and I was having trouble making sense of these things I was experiencing (and still didn't understand them several years later, which is why I did the research that resulted in me having these articles). So I wasn't exactly sure what I would protest against and how to even phrase and argue such a whistle-blowing effort. There was also the fact that I knew they could make me leave (one way or another) and my career was on the line, so I felt between a rock and a hard place where the only possible resolution (from my perspective) that might be a happy one was if they gave in to my demand to reserve the right to make my own judgment about individual aspects of the mission's operations as to whether they were right, moral, ethical, or biblical. This, of course, would mean not totally committing myself, which they couldn't stomach, so we resolved our differences unhappily - with me leaving under less than optimal circumstances, but having served out my full 2 years. The other issue (from my perspective of what a "happy resolution" would include), which wasn't specifically about commitment, was that the mission would have had to come to see me as more than a secretary and to break me out of that constraining mold they'd set for me and which I would not accept, especially since that mold determined practically my whole existence with the mission.
***
That ends this post, and this sub-section of the text.
