My reflection blog this week will discuss aligning organizational values, identify the three basic components of an ethical community and how they can be applied within my organization. Lastly define any values that may be missing from my organization, and how would I align them with the values of the individuals within the organization.

Values

In an organization there are personal values and organizational values, which can be different or one in the same. There are times when personal values can change to align with corporate values, based on loyalty and commitment. The value of having personal and corporate values aligned it will increase the employee commitment to the company long-term. (Denning, 2011)

The first step in understanding organization values, I elected to take Core Workplace Value Assessment created by Dr. Randall S. Hansen, the founder of Quintessential Careers, to compare my values to those of my workplace. The assessment results, after narrowing them to the top five values, included integrity, truth, loyalty, self-respect and pride in work, and professional development with on-going growth and learning opportunities. (Hansen, 2015)

From a personal standpoint, I do not think my personal values have changed over the years. My twenty years in the military reinforced the values of integrity, loyalty, self-respect and the need for continuous professional development. The value of truth was instilled as a young girl as I was told to never tell a lie, regardless of how much pain is attached to it. My father taught us that a lie never goes away and it ruins your credibility.

Lockheed Martin (LM) has three corporate values: Do What’s Right, Respect Others, and Perform with Excellence (Lockheed Martin, 2016). My personal value of integrity, truth, self-respect and pride in the work, aligns with the LM value of Do What’s Right and Perform with Excellence. I feel my values were transparent in the military and LM, as the business models are somewhat related. With LM building the war fighting aircraft that is used by our military, it was very easy transition to go from one organization to another. I think my personal values and the company values are very much alike, however the company ethical actions can affect my values.

Ethical Community- Trust

The first component of an ethical community is trust. Trust is described as “the general expectation among members that their fellows will behave ethically toward them” (p132). As defined in my personal assessment of values, trust is very important to me.  In my work organization, I trust people to do their jobs, ask questions if required, and lastly treat everyone with respect. (Denning S. , 2011)

Trust in an organization goes even deeper and can be broken if people do not follow through with what they said they would do.  Last week, while I was out for my granddaughters’ funeral, I had to trust that my teammates would step up and help with my tasks. I had so much to do with helping my daughter organize a funeral, host family members, do homework, and grieve myself, I totally forgot about my job. I had confidence that the team would do a superb job, and they did. Wile reading the course material, I had to reflect on the past week and define how strong the trust is within my team. The lesson I learned is, although the team didn’t do the task like I do, the task was accomplished successfully, which is a reinforcement of the strong bond and trust within the team. Three people volunteered and made sure everything I had going on, was taken care of, which I am very grateful.

Ethical Community- Loyalty

The next component of an ethical community is Loyalty. Loyalty is “acceptance of the obligation to refrain from breaching one another’s trust and to fulfill the duties entailed by accepting that trust” (p132-133). In my opinion, loyalty is an organization is a very powerful.  Loyalty and trust value are connected very closely. (Denning S. , 2011)

I have been employed at LM for over twelve years and have endured two corporate downsizing events, including four corporate moves since 2009.  Recently, I witnessed a group of skilled employees, with more than 150 years of combined experience, laid off and their jobs were subcontracted to a cheaper company.  I have personally experienced the removal of a corporate pension plan, and the company later bragged about their end of the year success in profits, was partially due to removing employee benefits.  With the current strategy to merge major aircraft programs and the company requesting over 1,000 employees to voluntarily retire, I felt my loyalty was being tested. Being in the 40’s, I am not old enough to personally retire, but the position level I hold was in the consideration parameter. I feel my company has broken the trust value between the remaining employees by their actions, and loyalty may be jeopardized in the up coming years. Loyalty is hard as an employee, when the company is not loyal to its employees.

Ethical Community- Solidarity

The next component of an ethical community is Solidarity. Solidarity is “caring for other peoples interests and being ready to take action on behalf of others, even if it conflicts with personal interests” (p133) Solidarity is an interesting value, and I think we do this often in my role as a planner. (Denning S. , 2011)

As a planner, I support over 40 Control Account Managers (CAMs). The CAMs interact with organizational managers, cost integrators, planning integrators, and various reporting products, which can be extremely tasking.  CAMs tend to have the biggest struggle with using the various tools and reports, especially in understanding how they are integrated. As a previous CAM Subject Matter Expert (SME), I practice the value of solidarity often. There are times when our cost integrators are just trashing the CAMs unfavorably in meetings. My personal view is the CAMs should do their jobs. However they are engineers first and their CAM duties are almost considered extra-curricular.  Being a CAM in the past, I step in and provide solutions for them. I then train the CAMs to make sure this does not happen again. I am probably partial sensitive to their role as I have lived the day and life of their misery, but I also believe in making things a win-win situation. Even if its not my best interest to take action on their behalf, but it’s the right thing to do.

What’s Missing?

At the LM Corporate level, the values of doing what is right, respecting others, and performing with excellence is accurate. But when it comes to ethics in actions by the company, trust, loyalty and solidarity, those core values could be jeopardized in the future.  I think the actions of the company in the last decade could decrease the loyalty in the newest generation in the workplace, the Millennials. 

In a Recruiter Article, The Truth About Millennials and Job Loyalty, this working generation is loyal to a company as long as their personal interest and career needs are met. They don’t job shop, but they will just quit and rely on the parents for support. (Marks, 2013) A company as big as LM, I would recommend they take the time to re-build or re-introduce the brand of trust and loyalty to all employees, by understanding their different needs.

My ability to re-align these values of trust and loyalty within the organization is being proactive and taking action myself.  In order for others to trust me, I have to be able to trust others.  I would have to admit, I am probably too trustworthy. When it comes to loyalty, I am loyal as I am vested with a pension plan, benefited from the company tuition reimbursement for all my professional education, and they recognize my individual leadership skills. The overall task is relaying the same efforts to the Millennials, when their benefits are not equal.

Conclusion

When it comes to LM Values and my personal values of integrity, truth, loyalty, and self-respect and pride in work, I think we are aligned for the most part. The one area I think the company does a poor job is recognizing professional development with growth and learning opportunities. Being a college student for the last 11 years, there is no recognition of any type for getting a formal education. The company provides tuition reimbursement, but that’s it. 

In the leadership organization I am involved in, it provides Certified Manager (CM) and the Project Management Professional (PMP) training and certification. The company leadership doesn’t recognize this as an accomplishment of their employees, nor does the company provide tuition reimbursement. I think the company could do a better job at recognizing continuous improvement and learning, more than just a monetary commitment. I don’t necessarily think there should be a monetary type of incentive, but at least recognize the accomplishment, as it would aspire others to also continue to learn.

References: 

Denning, S. (2011). The Leaders Guide to Storytelling: Mastering the Art and Discipline of Business Narrative. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.

Hansen, R. (2015). Workplace Values Assessment: Do You Know the Work Values You Most Want in a Job and an Employer — and Does Your Current Employment Reflect Those Values? A Quintessential Careers Quiz. Retrieved April 19, 2016, from Quint Careers: http://www.quintcareers.com/workplace_values.html

Lockheed Martin. (2016, April 20). Our Vision and Values. Retrieved April 20, 2016, from Lockheed Martin: http://www.lockheedmartin.com/us/who-we-are/ethics/our_vision_values.html

Marks, S. (2013, April 9). The Truth About Millennials and Job Loyalty. Retrieved April 19, 2016, from Recruiter: https://www.recruiter.com/i/the-truth-about-millennials-and-job-loyalty/