Purgeport II

Good vs. Evil / Culture   ( Happy Halloween)

Photo Courtesy stopdressingthedogs.com.

Chapters 7, 8 and 9 of the Shein text were a lot to digest, but chewing on them was interesting, especially chapter 9 and the discussion of human nature and culture. Are we intrinsically evil or good? I’d like to think we are basically good, but by and large we define good as being that which we are no longer. Well, that is if you believe in evolution. If we assume the theory of evolution is true and that our civility and ‘goodness’ are part of our ‘evolved’ being, then we must inherently be evil, no? Have we simply learned to be ‘good’, through necessity and in order to live harmoniously? If evolution is in fact true, our ancestors were certainly not, good, as we would define it now.

Someone once said that character is defined by our actions when no one else is around to see what we do and hear what we say. Personally, I think we as a nation (I don’t want to speak for us as an entire human race) are struggling to maintain a ‘good’ society while we seem to encourage many values that seem to make these efforts more difficult, such as competition, individuality and a general ‘go out and get yours’ mentality. We each take this with us to our jobs.

I did stumble on one thing that Schein said in chapter 9. In speaking of the concept of ‘Power Distance’, he describes it as the perceived amount of ability to control each others behavior in a hierarchical situation. He says that there is a higher power distance among unskilled or semiskilled workers, vs. professional and managerial workers.  I wonder how this was measured or on what he bases this belief.  It seems to me that there is an espoused belief among professionals and managers that there is less inequality, but that typically an espoused belief is as deep as the feelings go. In practice, I think managers believe there is a great divide between themselves and their subordinates.  Sometimes this goes as far as an underlying assumption, where managers or superiors do not even know they ascribe to this power divide. Would you agree with this?

Chew on that!

Mine, yours, ours, theirs…space, ownership and territory, as Schein points out, are deeply intertwined into culture.  My own work place is steeped with artifacts and even some underlying assumptions in its culture with regard to space and ownership.  It will be interesting to see how our semester project develops and how I will need to filter out my own perspective while assessing my organization’s culture.

As a society, the American culture contributes to, if not creates, a foundation for organizational cultures which have so many issues and characteristics which revolve around space, and ownership.  Each of us carries with us the influence of the democratic and capitalistic principles of our society and all that transcends our national foundation of freedom.  We are each taught to value our freedom and to protect it.   Schein talks of this characteristic within each of us as based in our innate animal instincts to protect what is ours and not be backed into a corner, I think it is more learned.  I believe it is our American culture which drives us to stake our claim and that we carry that expectation into our places of work.  It is only in those organizations which make a concerted effort to have employees ‘unlearn’ these larger cultural assumptions and expectations that we find true egalitarian culture and a work force which does not carry some expectation that seniority and rank equate to privileges.

On a visit to Eastern Europe, I found the same informality as mentioned in the text with regard to personal space in public.   Riding on a bus or waiting in line, one is likely to get bumped or even pushed a bit, without any acknowledgment or polite apologies.  This was very different from our American culture where even the slightest of touches in public seem to at least call for an ‘excuse me’ and ‘sorry’.

I was fascinated by the process and incredibly complex structure of technology teams working on the Hubble Telescope project.  Fascinated may be a poor choice of words, perhaps mind boggling is better.  I could hardly keep up with the different team functions and many varied objectives all focused on this one aspect of such a large project.  It seemed a miracle to me that there were not more problems.  I’ve got three words, Technical Bureaucratic Chaos.

Strangely enough, I toured the Goddard Space Flight Center last summer with a group of teachers who were attending a Summer Science Workshop that my office collaborated on with the Smithsonian Institute.  I had not read about nor did I know much in general about the Hubble project when I visited; however, I recall having some of the same feelings of being overwhelmed by the complexity of it all.   At the time they were rushing to complete the parts that were to be sent up to repair the Hubble scope.  Even in the spotless and very sterile feeling of the building, there was a sense of urgency.  Our guide told us that it was the President’s push to have Hubble repaired prior to the end of his term.  I bring this up in light of our reading and knowing it was this same urgency, combined with the budget problems, that was the root of the original problem.  Unbeknownst to me at the time, I was seeing (well feeling actually) some of the same organizational issues that were present in the seventies and eighties.

The picture is me wearing a ‘space glove’ that was worn during an old Hubble mission.

I experience some of the same budget and time pressures in my own job.  More to the point, I believe there had been (yet to see what the future holds) a strong tendency of reporting that which was positive and downplaying the negative and that this part of my organization’s culture was systemic and in response to a previous leader.  This was an unspoken fear that I observed in many people, a refusal to disappoint.  Is bureaucracy and bureaucratic chaos built into the climate at some organizations as a means to some end?  Is each part of these types of organizations trying to ground its own feet and justify its worth by creating layers of control?  Someone please remind me to talk about the federal I-9 form in class and the incredible amount of control built around this one form and the organization that now audits and controls it… the Department of Homeland Security.

This all takes me back to organizational culture again and how to influence that from the middle so to speak, without putting oneself in a pickle when that culture might be inconsistent with the larger organizational culture.  Schein (sp?)…I’m hoping you are going to help me out later this semester.

Just think… no time clocks, no leave reporting and a travel budget!  I found myself wanting to work for Chaparrel Steel as I read about the company’s practices.  But more so, I was thinking, this trust is the root of employee satisfaction and ‘buy in’.

This is something I struggle with at my own job.  I regularly hire part time employees in long term positions, but rarely does someone stay long.  I’d like to blame it on the part time status of the job, but I’ve had people leave without full time jobs to move on to (yes, I ended a sentence with a preposition – call it bloggers privilege).  While in these positions, I often hear from their immediate supervisor how the part time employee seems ‘un-invested’ in his/her work.  How they just don’t connect with the larger goals and mission of the office.  I think perhaps more than the job status, it’s the organizational culture and how it treats part timers, not the lack of benefits etc that come with the full time position.  Don’t get me wrong, I know they want those things, but I don’t think those things ‘make’ the position.  It’s as Dixon points out, a mindset or philosophy of the organization that values employees and encourages them to learn and grow with the organization.   A value that I feel is absent in many aspects from the culture of my own organization.  However, my desire to continually question the status quo gives me hope.

photo credit to www.istockphoto.com

So… can a person, in a middle management position, bring about cultural changes at an organization that is extremely diverse and VERY large?  My thought is that it would require the development a ‘sub-culture’ within the smaller office, division or section within the larger organization.  Or, perhaps another idea would be to work at highlighting the positive aspects of the larger organizational culture and downplaying the negative parts.  There must be some effective solution.  As economic resources get tighter and tighter, the flexibility we have to use rewards and recognition as incentives continues to diminish.  I do try to create an environment of trust and encourage creativity and open questioning of existing policies and programs procedures in my office.  I guess that eliminates one other possible pitfall.   I do hope we get deeper into these topics as we progress into the semester and I’m glad this course has so much to offer.  It is all very applicable and relevant which makes it very palatable.

Another semester and two more classes.  This fall I’m taking Educational Evaluation and Organizational Learning.  I sat down with my texts to start the reading for Organizational Learning with the skepticism that I always have for texts and treatises.  I’m a slow reader and thus the time it takes me to get through a chapter rich with intellectual verbiage and verse exceeds that which takes most. Thus, the feeling I have when I open the cover of a text for the first time is one of being overwhelmed at what is ahead.  This semester, I had  a very pleasant surprise, Nancy Dixon’s book, Organizational Learning Cycle; How We can Learn Collectively.  I know…sounds corny that I’m praising a text book, but so far, this one is truly an exception to my text trepidation.   It is intellectual, yet completely accessible!  Compared to my normal pace of reading texts, I feel like I’m speed reading Dixon’s words and not having to back up.  YAY!!!

Chapter three “The Hallways of Learning” stuck a cord with me relating to the concept of fostering collective meaning and how it is accomplished.  With each concept she introduced, I though, ‘this is something we need to do at work’.  Currently my office meets formally about two times a year in our Division wide meeting.  We each do a bit of a dog and pony show about our programs and then we discuss items like the upcoming blood drive, the access problem at the front door, or how we need to each be considerate of each other and keep the break area clean.  The intention to foster collective learning and knowledge sharing does not exist.  We each, in the minutia of our respective programs, are myopic in our vision.  I’m excited to be learning concepts of knowledge sharing and meaning making and meaningful ways to foster or actualize those concepts.

In the more literal sense, the physical structure of my office does not foster hallways of learning.  I was struck by the theory I’d seen but not recognized in other organizations.  For example, Capital One.  I’ve been in their building and dismissed their short walls and hanging signs indicating the functional grouping of individuals into certain areas…the round tables in the quarter floor centers.. and the colorful and open break areas.  I dismissed these things as being ‘corporate’ and ‘institutional’.  Wow.. there was real purpose behind the madness and real symmetry between culture and physical space.   Who knew!   My office is an old row house turned office space… beautiful offices with doors, tall ceilings and shotgun hallways.  The one communal space is a conference room on the first floor that collects dust and discarded equipment waiting to be recycling.  Ok, that is a little exaggerated but true for the most part.

Dixon will have a big impact on my office, of this I’m sure.  I’m actually looking forward to continuing to read.  Thanks Nancy Dixon!

Paradox of Disclosure – Insightful (ADLT 612)

Among other things discussed last night in the two team presentations was the concept of the paradox of disclosure within group dynamics. This turned out to be a very insightful topic for me. I learned quite a bit about myself last night, not only new things, but things for which I believed the opposite to be true of myself.

When given the example from the text for the paradox of disclosure I became withdrawn from the information. Everyday, in every group interaction I have, my sexuality is in the back of my mind and I wonder how would this information affect the group dynamic, the treatment of ‘me’ by the ‘others’. I see myself as well adjusted, socially adept and conscientious. I value that I’ve come to embrace my being gay as only a single factor of myself as a complex individual. However, whenever I know the topic might come up in a group, I find myself tense and withdrawn. Whether it’s work, school, or a mixed social group within which there are people I’ve not met before, when I know the topic of being gay might come up… I withdraw. Last night as we examined the paradox of disclosure, I began to wonder why. Why?, do I withdraw. Is it fear? Do I really care what anyone thinks if they find out? I think I do, which is contrary to what I would have told you before last night.

So, after class I was consumed by this question and although I had to be up by 6 a.m. for a 7:30 a.m. meeting, I stayed up till 1 a.m. and trying to think through this perplexing paradoxical point of pondering. I don’t know that I came up with any solid answers, except that I obviously care about what others think, and this was news to me. However I did think through a few other issues about the paradox that I’d like to share.

At first, I thought… people don’t share out of fear and some fear is well founded. I re-called hearing people in our very class using the word gay in a derogatory fashion to explain things that they found offensive, silly or otherwise not worth their time. For example: “That such and such is gay!”… yes.. I have heard this sort of thing and not just once. Or, laughing and joking while watching Remember the Titans during the scenes when ‘Sunshine’ was assumed to be gay by his teammates. The taken aback gasps when Sunshine kissed Bertier to make his point. So…what is my point? Sure, by stepping forward and coming out as gay, I could be calling people out on their comments, and or their reactions to things in the movie and this might make me more of a risk taker… and by doing so I might be helping to educate others… But…does that make it the better or right thing to do? I don’t know.

Should I have to fight the fight, so to speak? In my mind, I think NO. I think, you didn’t hear me snicker when Bertier kissed his girlfriend, you don’t hear me say “this assignment is so hetero”, and you certainly would never hear me snicker at the idea that a person might be straight. Perhaps this is taking a backseat to the “cause” that is gay rights. Am I a social loafer by being gay but not being an active agent for change all the time?

Part of my not being the advocate in the classroom has to do with the potential for disrupting the class. I know myself enough to know that if I bring the issue up, it will likely become a very passionate and lengthy discussion, one which may overshadow the purpose of the evening. The other part of my not being an advocate in the classroom has to do with the feeling that this should be the one place, which I don’t have to. This group, above almost all others, should be enlightened enough that I don’t have to defend myself or all other GLBT people.

But, this I know. Part of it is fear, my own. That which I didn’t realize I had.

This spring semester stands out already as a period of growth for me as an adult learner, in many ways. Not only in how I perceive the value of continued learning, but in where that learning comes from. In addition, my own method of learning is being challenged.

The Groups and Teams class is proving to be challenging due to its format and the nature of learning and working in teams. This has been compounded by our ‘snow day’ and thus losing one of our meetings. Thus far, this course seems to have a pronounced ebb and flow of work, with longer periods building up to assignments, and then a flurry of collaborative work. The group assignments, for which my team has five contributors, are difficult to coordinate due to the very varied schedules of our team members and due to the very compressed time frame for completion. Typically two weeks.

I’m typically methodical, predictive, and I tend to get things done early. This semester, that is just not possible and I have had to step back, take a breath and approach my learning differently, with more patience, and attempt to not let these changes cause stress. Some of my most constructive professional criticism over the years has been to learn to let go of control and trust in others. This has always been difficult for me. This semester… so far so good, although I have been letting it stress me out and it has taken a conscious effort to ‘let go’.

I do wish that the films watched, in both classes I’m currently taking, would be assigned as part of our out of class work. This would allow us, especially in the groups and teams course, to use more class time during the ‘flurry’ periods to work together during class when we know we can all make it. After next week, I will have watched 5 films during class time already this term, at approximately 2 hrs per film…food for thought.

Aside from this learning adaptation and growth, I find I’m learning from other sources more than I would typically recognize. Again, having turned 40 last week, perhaps I’m being a little melodramatic or perhaps I’m experiencing a period of reorientation, mid life crisis or a 40 year transition?, all so apropos given that I’m in adult development this term. Regardless, I feel like many of life’s lessons are being gifted to me and I’m hoping I can make the most of them.

For the past three weeks, I’ve found myself not looking forward to my Adult Development class. In fact, I’ve been experiencing stress about going to the class. Before we met last night, the feelings were strong. Being the reflective learner that I’ve become, I made a point to pay particular attention in class and track my feelings so that I might be able to find a trend… and I did.

Communicating these trends comes only after much self debate. Will I sound like a whiner? Will I be further labeling myself and thus potentially alienating myself? One might further think this sense of alienation has to do with my fast approaching 40^th birthday and being in the midst of one of life’s transitions, and although these things are a reality, I do not attribute these feelings to those factors. I will thus risk further alienating myself, and I say further because the feeling of alienation is one of the co-contributing feelings that is the impetus of this reflection. As a GLBT person, I feel alienated by the curriculum being delivered in the course.

The field of adult development is a relatively young field and progress in GLBT rights and the GLBT ‘movement’ is also relatively young. Thus, I do understand why there may be a gap in the theories and amount of research of adult development to account for how the development of adult GLBT persons differs from that of adultheterosexual persons. I say ‘may be a gap’ because I am not a scholar in this field, nor do I purport to know how much researched exists, but I do know that some does and I do however know what is and is not being taught to me and how the gap in that information is leaving me feeling alienated.

Life cycles, life transitions, stressors, the effect of losing a ‘spouse’ or child, ‘normal relationship patterns and growth’, marriage, the U shape curve of a normal marriage as is relates the development of relationships, honeymoons, traditional rights of passage, career development, societal hurdles to development, religion, social roles, social norms.. regardless of the factor, the differences are pervasive in the path of Adult Development for a GLBT person.

Having met for the second time in our groups, but not yet having read chapters 2 and 3 in the Levi text, it was interesting to reflect back on our dynamics while reading. The social bonding was a strong component of our functioning as we worked together to draft our team Charter. We laughed, we played and we enjoyed pondering the end of semester celebration that we planned for our group.

As we move forward, assume our team tasks and develop roles and goals to accomplish these tasks, although I certainly have my reservations I anticipate a good experience. I also wonder what challenges we will have; will we have a social loafer in our group, will we struggle with decision making, or will we just struggle to keep on track in light of our playful nature. Only time will tell, but I do hope we find our way quickly as I know tonight we will receive our first group assignment, a paper reflecting on the movie, Twelve Angry Men.

There is no “I” in team.
We’ve all heard this expression.
Certainly there is more to know about teamwork than “two heads are
better then one” or “the collective sum is greater than the sum of the parts”. In fact, group dynamics and team dynamics is
a large very large field of study.

ADLT 612 should be an interesting and at times very
challenging course. As team members we
all bring something different to the table with regard to skills, strengths,
weaknesses and personal perspective. As
members of a randomly chosen team, I wondered what the team learning curve
would look like as we work to integrate our life perspectives and approaches to
problem solving.

My own background is one of self reliance. My time in the
military taught me how to function well with a team, but our goals and mission
were always clear and defined for us. Aside from this military experience, I have
limited experience working in a team. I’ve
spend most of my life learning to not rely on others and looking out for number
one.

In our first ADLT 612 course…I recall being in an EMS/EMT
course years ago. During the second or third
week of class we had to pick a course partner.
Our instructor stressed to us the importance of this choice… how we
would work with and rely on our class partners through the course and during
state testing after the course was completed.
How our success would be affected by this choice and that we needed to
take it seriously. I remember looking around
the room, paying attention to who was paying attention, watching to see who was
listening and listening to see who was hearing what was being said. I chose a partner and we spent the next 13
weeks, two times a week, four hours per meeting, working together. One week before the final exam, the
instructor reassigned us all to different partners. She felt that we might learn best with those
who we chose to partner with, but as a class, as a team, we must all be able to
work together, regardless of what baggage we carry, perspective we bring or
worries we have. As I went to through the
testing with this new partner we bonded very quickly and succeeded in the
testing. As a team, the class celebrated
our victory over the state practicals.

My memory from the EMT course helped me to embrace team
YellowBirds with enthusiasm and knowing that we, as a team, will succeed in our
endeavors.

Cheers to a new semester.