Yesterday I said I'd be starting with the conclusions this time, but I found a couple other sections to comment on.
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This section is in "Environmmental Factors"."...[C]ultural traditions or popular beliefs concerning human nature may predispose people to form or not to form covenantal relationships." (p. 263)
The author goes on to give her own example, but I'm more interested in what this might have to do with the Vienna mission. Whether or not the Evangelical Protestant missionaries came with strong covenantal bents, the mission soon instilled it in the (or coerced them into it if they were too obdurate).
Within "faith missions" covenantal relationship are common. But back home this is not so; rather, individuals are more independependent.
To me the thing that seems like it might have been a difficult barrier of this nature is the professional license that the theologians might have been used to. Submitting to a covenantal relationship of the nature of the Vienna mission would mean giving up a good chunk of that professional license. I wonder if that was something any of them ever grappled with... I don't know the answer to that
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This next quote is from the section "Organizational Factors."
"Prevailing assumptions about basic human nature may create an atmosphere that is either hospitable or hostile to the formation of covenantal relationships in a workplace... In addition, the trustworthiness of management may affect member-citizens' relation tie to an organization." (p. 263)
I think that the second sentence here might refer to external relations, but I'm going to treat it all as internal. The most obvious possible "prevailing assumption" "human nature" would be some along the lines of Arminianism or Calvinism. But beyond those, I think that the administration basicly didn't trust anyone unless you were one of the socialized "in-group." However, there were different levels mistrust. But the thing is that basically, their stance was "You are (to one degree or another) untrustworthy unless proven otherwise."
Looked at in this light, one might think that the mission had a hostile envioronment for the formation of covental relationships. However, the fact that it was a total institution I think allowed it to overcome this apparent dilemma.
As to the trustworthiness of management, I never got any indication that management was questioned at all, and I'm quite sure that that wouldn't have been tolerated.
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This last section for this post is "Personal Factors.""Job satisfaction with supervision and co-workers is plausibly linked with the creation and maintenance of normal Gemeinschaft, but probably not covenantal one unless shared values elevate the values to a higher level.Organizational ...commitment is a more likely predictor of covenantal relations, especially if member-citizens perceive a return commitment from the organization, as shown by job security and trustworthy management." (p. 264)
I most definitively did NOT have job satisfaction with supervision. There is no way in a million years you could say I did. That's looking at the broad picture. Looking at the detailed day to day picture it was a mixed bag. When I wasn't doing what it seemed was more 'on track' for me especially toward the end, such as being the receptionist, I didn't feel like I was monitored and I was given a loose reign. (I felt like I was monitored when my computer, for instance, "had a mind of its own," but in a semi-predictable way so that it seemed there was a human behind it. But it wasn't clear enough to come out and say so because I was sure they'd deny it.
My supervision was manipulative, involved a lot of gamesmanship (as in "Games People Play"), and I never was completely 100% sure what they wanted, so I can only conjecture. Although I feel pretty confident in what I think they ultimately wanted, at the end of the day it's still just conjecture. The thing is that I never reached true insider status because I never completely trusted them, which is what I think they wanted - full, unfettered, complete, abandonment. I couldn't give it to them because I disagreed with them on too many of their modus operandi and relevant values and norms. They knew I was holding back, but they didn't know why or to what extent. For all I knew they just thought I was a flighty ditz - a dumb blonde that didn't "get it." To a certain extent maybe I didn't "get it," but, as I've said before, if they only knew what I was really thinking, the horror I was feeling and the concrete thoughts I was having at the time based on what I knew already about relevant issues, they would have been shocked and responded much more violently, so I laid low, did everything I was asked, and never compleained about anything and even took initiative on some things. I just didn't open up to them.
What they did do to break me was to try to tear me from all my external ties and that has had long lasting effects to this day because some relationships were difficult to pick up again and were lost forever after they made me cut back my prayer letter list. Of course, I could still have written people, but the thing is that there wasn't that much time to write lots of letters so if you couldn't include people on your prayer letter list it would be hard to keep up with them otherwise.
I could go on and on about supervision, but the other thing I could say about my boss, the one I cam to work for in the first place, is that he didn't really supervise me at all. Actually, his boss' secretary did most of the orientation and my boss admitted up front to never having had a secretary before. So I sort of got group supervision there, although I think it might better be termed guidance, rather than supervision.
While there were periods and instances in a micro-supervision way that my supervision was okay, looked at in a macro say over the full of my two year term, it was a disaster, and I think supervision might have been lucky to result in Gemeinschaft, let alone covenantal relationship. (I'm sorry, but I don't want to get side-tracked here into these "supervision disasters" but I mention throughout this blog instances where the mission management treat me poorly, and the management would usually include supervision.)
My co-workers could only do so much towards giving me job satisfaction and, ultimately, affecting the type of relationship I might have with the mission. Since everyone was, in one sense, sort of a puppet of what the top management wanted, they just confirmed whatever my boss and others above me wanted. It might sound harsh to say they were puppets, but the socialization process involved such a strong identity with the mission and the mission being a total institution that I really think they were to a large extent like puppets while they were in Vienna. Dissent wasn't allowed, and things like what I went through where I seemed to have my own agenda which was just having an Austrian ministry in my off hours, led to a lot of pressures to change.
This text is right, I think that job satisfaction with typical supervision and co-workers alone couldn't lead to couldn't lead to covenantal relationships unless shared norms indicate otherwise. In the Vienna mission work and every day life relationships (24/7) were all bundled up in a total institution normative framework. This person that was that was your supervisor was also someone you knew socially outside of the office walls and you knew his family, and you all hobnobbed together to a certain extent also.
I think that while individuals were made to feel like their part in the picture was important, everyone also felt a keen sense of being on the cutting edge of something. That is, people in general apart from their own individual job felt like just being part of this ground breaking work was quite significant in itself, apart from the particular job the individual was doing. That's not to say that individual work wasn't also valued, but the work of the mission was also very cutting edge. and strategic.
I think people come to missions (at least Protestant faith missions) generally expect - to one extent or another - a coventantal relationship with their colleagues on staff, but in the Vienna mission this was heightened by the security issue. Since I didn't agree with the extremes they took in the name of security, I also didn't have a basis for having a stronger covenantal relationship with the mission and it's people.
According to this text, "organizational commitment is a more likely predictor of covenental relations, especially if member-citizens perceive a return commitment from the organization, as shown by job security and trustworthy management." I did not have job security and not really any reason to trust management. Management kept tossing me around like a ball from position to position. They never really seemed to trust me, and they gave me no reason to trust me. They lied to me and treated me horribly. There's no way I could have imagined seeing a "return commitment" from the Vienna mission. So my "organizational commitment" was inversely related to my perception of lack of both job security and trustworthiness of the management. However, that is not the only reason for my failing organizational commitment.. I'm not going to go into that here, though.
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I think this is all I'm going to use in this text, so next time we'll start a new text.
It took longer than usual to write this post because of my schedule and what was going on in my life. Yesterday I finally got the Botox for my migraine and I learned that it could take up to 3 weeks to have the full effet of it. Right away in physical therapy we could see in some things that my balance was better that day, though. I still have a ways to go, but it feels like the edge is off now. So that's goodl
My second bookcase came back today So now I have booth of them, so I got them both set up. I still have to organize m my books by subject, but at least they're not stacked bouble deep now.
Tomorrow I do my taxes. It's been sort of a headache because he had a problem with one cashed Roth IRA that my tax consultant was saying ont thing and everyone else wasy saying somehing else so then my financial advisor wanted me to see his CPA, but then eventually my consultant got the info she needed and everyone things was okay. Still, it was a bit of a heacache.
I must admit I am getting a bit concerned about my neurological system. my legs are taking major exercise efforts to keep them functional, but my midsection is also, and I see the g.i. doctor on the 24th. I feel like my whole g.i. system is acting up. So the thing is that in 2008 I had a diskectomy & fusion at T11-L1 and in 2011 I had the same a C4-7 and currently we're looking at virtually my whole lumbar having "mild to moderate stenosis." I think I had MRIs of my upper spine too recently. Anyway, this is the pits, let me tell you. Basically, I'm fighting against becoming paralyzed and I can't afford to slack off.
But that doesn't mean I can't sleep. And since it's midnight, I thinkg that's just what I'm going to do.
