I see that my last post has garnered some attention. Hopefully I'll be able to eventually pull all these posts together in a form (or forms) more digestable as was that article. At least you have an idea as to what I'm capable of.
***
I just lost my whole post, so I have to try to re-create it now. (Grrr).
We're still in the "Organizational Turnover and Commitment" section, but we're moving on to the "Antecedents to Organizational Commitment" sub-section.
***
"Higher education is associated with lower commitment, perhaps because educated people have expectations the organization cannot meet or are more committed to professions (their occupational community) than to organizations." (p. 147)
On the face of it, this would argue for the pastor/theologian/chaplain/instructor class of missionaries with the Vienna missions having less commitment to the mission that I should have had (because I had less education, not having reached the Master's degree level). However, there are some other intervening variables that might account for this not being the case in that context.
A big chunk of the problem was that the mission's very purpose for existence could be seen as an extension of those other professionals' profession, in which case there might not be a lot of difference between professional and organizational commitment.
Another factor, however, would come from my end, namely, that although I had less education than those others, my education was such that it wasn't an extension of my "profession" or area of expertise. Rather, my specialty would probably better be seen as potentially playing a support role for the mission of the organization (at least the European Studies aspect of my professional identity should, I think, be viewed this way). So, in the long haul, I did have more commitment to my professional identity than I did to the mission, in as much as my professional identity gave me a different way of thinking and viewing things and also provided me with a different, I think, set of values than those others had.
***
"A variety of personal attitudes are related to commitment, among them work-oriented life interests, achievement motivation, and a sense of competence." (p. 147)
I will take the specific examples one by one, and then go back and consider other possible "personal attitudes" at play in the Vienna mission context.
Regarding "work-oriented life interests," in as much as the mission was an biblical and theological educational organization by way of primary mission, such interests would mesh well with the organization, as described above regarding educational background of the pastors/theologians/chaplains/instructors on staff. However, although I did have a similar (if lesser) aspect to my education, the other part, the European studies part, would only have meshed in so far as the mission's philosophy didn't contradict what I had learned and come to believe in that area. And since it wasn't a criteria to have European studies training at all (let alone what kind of European studies education or related belief and knowledge structure) to be a part of the mission. In contrast, there were pretty specific theological criteria in place. So all the theology specialists would have had to have meshed with the mission in their area of specialty, but there was no guaranty, on the other hand, that my European studies values and knowledge structure would mesh that of the mission. And my expertise wouldn't have been valued as much, either, for several reasons, including the fact that I was a secretary, which was not a very influential position from which to hope to wield any change if any such hope existed at all (which I don't think it did, at least not as far as the mission was concerned).
As to "achievement motivation," this would be closely tied with some of the other things just discussed, but it isn't exactly the same, either, so it's worth discussing a bit. I understand "achievement motivation" to be something akin to career goals, which goals would serve as motivation (in trying to reach the goals). In this I think the pastor/theologian/chaplain/instructor missionaries also had an advantage over me, because the mission valued what they had to offer and it was dependent on them using the skills that would be in keeping with such staff members' career goals. However, again, (and I didn't expect this) the mission ended out NOT valuing my European studies background nor my career goals in this area. Part of that, I think was that I am female and was a secretary, which combined served to discredit me, I think, in the eyes of the mission. Also, not having an advanced degree didn't help either, but if I'd had an advanced degree in European studies or Russian or Slavic studies, I'm not sure that would have been valued any more than the educational background I did have. In fact, it's possible that in my educational uniqueness I could have appeared as a threat to the mission, who demanded total conformity (to the point of apparently wanting all secretaries to fit into one mold, for example); plus I doubt that there would have been a place for a woman having influence like that in anything other than women's ministry. I didn't anticipate the cookie cutter secretary mold at all, let alone that it would define my whole existence with the mission, and neither did I foresee how their norms, culture and modus operandi would conflict with my European studies-related values and knowledge. But since those conflicting issues that I didn't anticipate prior to my arrival in Vienna did in fact exist in the mission, the mission was contrary to my achievement motivation. I don't know that they even acknowledged that I had any achievement aspirations, because it didn't really matter that much if I had any or not; all that seemed to matter to them was that I submitted, which would deny a lot of my achievement aspirations.
My "sense of competence" differed from the pastor/theologian/chaplain/instructor missionaries, because of our specialties, as discussed above. But their area of competence (theological instruction and/or textbook writing) was highly valued by the mission, whereas mine was not; in fact it was discouraged because my area of competence made me too independent and able to function without the mission in many ways. Also, my area of competence was a threat to them because it allowed me to come to my own conclusions on issues that were part and parcel of what everyone was supposed to accept in order to be properly socialized - assuming, of course, everyone's socialization was more or less similar to mine. In other words, the mission was supposed to be the Grand Poobah of the mission in regards to Eastern Europe knowledge and expertise as well as missions strategy... and then I came along...
Now backtracking a bit to the general "personal attitude" antecedent to commitment, I would like to suggest a way that this might have played out as to how I could not be socialized into the Vienna mission, while those other professionals at the mission could... I'm going to go on the assumption here that "socialization" was the intent of the mission in relation to me and that my experience was otherwise similar to that of those others, knowing full well that these assumptions may or may not be true and the following discussion would probably be irrelevant if their experience was found to be significantly dissimilar to mine.
There were several general attitudinal criteria that, taken all together, inhibited my socialization into the mission, and these might be viewed within the following schemata:
***
This is a shorter version of the first post, but maybe re-writing it just helped me be more concise.
I have to run to get to physical therapy now...
***
I just lost my whole post, so I have to try to re-create it now. (Grrr).
We're still in the "Organizational Turnover and Commitment" section, but we're moving on to the "Antecedents to Organizational Commitment" sub-section.
***
"Higher education is associated with lower commitment, perhaps because educated people have expectations the organization cannot meet or are more committed to professions (their occupational community) than to organizations." (p. 147)
On the face of it, this would argue for the pastor/theologian/chaplain/instructor class of missionaries with the Vienna missions having less commitment to the mission that I should have had (because I had less education, not having reached the Master's degree level). However, there are some other intervening variables that might account for this not being the case in that context.
A big chunk of the problem was that the mission's very purpose for existence could be seen as an extension of those other professionals' profession, in which case there might not be a lot of difference between professional and organizational commitment.
Another factor, however, would come from my end, namely, that although I had less education than those others, my education was such that it wasn't an extension of my "profession" or area of expertise. Rather, my specialty would probably better be seen as potentially playing a support role for the mission of the organization (at least the European Studies aspect of my professional identity should, I think, be viewed this way). So, in the long haul, I did have more commitment to my professional identity than I did to the mission, in as much as my professional identity gave me a different way of thinking and viewing things and also provided me with a different, I think, set of values than those others had.
***
"A variety of personal attitudes are related to commitment, among them work-oriented life interests, achievement motivation, and a sense of competence." (p. 147)
I will take the specific examples one by one, and then go back and consider other possible "personal attitudes" at play in the Vienna mission context.
Regarding "work-oriented life interests," in as much as the mission was an biblical and theological educational organization by way of primary mission, such interests would mesh well with the organization, as described above regarding educational background of the pastors/theologians/chaplains/instructors on staff. However, although I did have a similar (if lesser) aspect to my education, the other part, the European studies part, would only have meshed in so far as the mission's philosophy didn't contradict what I had learned and come to believe in that area. And since it wasn't a criteria to have European studies training at all (let alone what kind of European studies education or related belief and knowledge structure) to be a part of the mission. In contrast, there were pretty specific theological criteria in place. So all the theology specialists would have had to have meshed with the mission in their area of specialty, but there was no guaranty, on the other hand, that my European studies values and knowledge structure would mesh that of the mission. And my expertise wouldn't have been valued as much, either, for several reasons, including the fact that I was a secretary, which was not a very influential position from which to hope to wield any change if any such hope existed at all (which I don't think it did, at least not as far as the mission was concerned).
As to "achievement motivation," this would be closely tied with some of the other things just discussed, but it isn't exactly the same, either, so it's worth discussing a bit. I understand "achievement motivation" to be something akin to career goals, which goals would serve as motivation (in trying to reach the goals). In this I think the pastor/theologian/chaplain/instructor missionaries also had an advantage over me, because the mission valued what they had to offer and it was dependent on them using the skills that would be in keeping with such staff members' career goals. However, again, (and I didn't expect this) the mission ended out NOT valuing my European studies background nor my career goals in this area. Part of that, I think was that I am female and was a secretary, which combined served to discredit me, I think, in the eyes of the mission. Also, not having an advanced degree didn't help either, but if I'd had an advanced degree in European studies or Russian or Slavic studies, I'm not sure that would have been valued any more than the educational background I did have. In fact, it's possible that in my educational uniqueness I could have appeared as a threat to the mission, who demanded total conformity (to the point of apparently wanting all secretaries to fit into one mold, for example); plus I doubt that there would have been a place for a woman having influence like that in anything other than women's ministry. I didn't anticipate the cookie cutter secretary mold at all, let alone that it would define my whole existence with the mission, and neither did I foresee how their norms, culture and modus operandi would conflict with my European studies-related values and knowledge. But since those conflicting issues that I didn't anticipate prior to my arrival in Vienna did in fact exist in the mission, the mission was contrary to my achievement motivation. I don't know that they even acknowledged that I had any achievement aspirations, because it didn't really matter that much if I had any or not; all that seemed to matter to them was that I submitted, which would deny a lot of my achievement aspirations.
My "sense of competence" differed from the pastor/theologian/chaplain/instructor missionaries, because of our specialties, as discussed above. But their area of competence (theological instruction and/or textbook writing) was highly valued by the mission, whereas mine was not; in fact it was discouraged because my area of competence made me too independent and able to function without the mission in many ways. Also, my area of competence was a threat to them because it allowed me to come to my own conclusions on issues that were part and parcel of what everyone was supposed to accept in order to be properly socialized - assuming, of course, everyone's socialization was more or less similar to mine. In other words, the mission was supposed to be the Grand Poobah of the mission in regards to Eastern Europe knowledge and expertise as well as missions strategy... and then I came along...
Now backtracking a bit to the general "personal attitude" antecedent to commitment, I would like to suggest a way that this might have played out as to how I could not be socialized into the Vienna mission, while those other professionals at the mission could... I'm going to go on the assumption here that "socialization" was the intent of the mission in relation to me and that my experience was otherwise similar to that of those others, knowing full well that these assumptions may or may not be true and the following discussion would probably be irrelevant if their experience was found to be significantly dissimilar to mine.
There were several general attitudinal criteria that, taken all together, inhibited my socialization into the mission, and these might be viewed within the following schemata:
- I had to have clear, conscious values that clashed with those of the mission [conscious convictions], and
- those values had to be strongly held [strong convictions] and
- well thought out [reasoned convictions], and
- these values had to take precedence over other values that might push for socialization. [priority over other convictions]
***
This is a shorter version of the first post, but maybe re-writing it just helped me be more concise.
I have to run to get to physical therapy now...
