A year ago, I began working as the Human Resource Director at a drug and alcohol
inpatient rehabilitation center, Hope House. After a few months of getting acclimated, I started to
identify the culture of the organization and realized that its values did not permeate into the
staff’s every day behavior with each other, as well as with the patients. Our mission and values
reflect unconditional kindness and are supported by the Executive Director who preaches to the
staff and patients on a monthly basis, in person, that our goals are to be person-centered, to treat
each other with utmost respect, and to strive to provide evidence-based practice in treating drug
and alcohol addiction. When taking an organizational behavior approach to identify the issues at
hand, various factors are identified that play a role in the organization’s misalignment of values
with its employees. A misalignment in values led to increased job dissatisfaction.
Kinicki and Fugate (2002) identify attitudes as how we feel about a person, place, or
thing. Our attitudes have a direct impact on how we behave and if an employee’s values do not
align with the organizational values, then the disconnect leads to dissatisfaction and a lack of
motivation to meet the goals of the organization. Hope House requires a change that will
promote organizational commitment, which allows an employee to identify with an organization
resulting in commitment to its goals. Increasing organizational commitment tends to correlate
with longevity of employment and motivation to work diligently in commitment to the goals of
the organization (p. 50-57). I worked on increasing the employee’s commitment to our goals
several ways during my time in Human Resources. I started by formulating interview questions
to promote conversation about what the prospect values in their personal life and work
environment. I looked for an alignment in their personal attitudes and values with that of the
company. Asking scenario-based questions seemed to elicit natural answers and eliminate
fabrication or false answers. Additionally, I implemented various positive reinforcement systems
to capture specific behavior that reflected the values of the company. Reinforcing desired
behavior led to an increasing trend in that behavior. The more an individual engaged in the
desired behavior, such as treating patients with kindness, the more they were rewarded. The
more the employees were rewarded, the stronger the psychological contract became.
A psychological contract is much like the covenant that we’ve made with God. Scripture
stated,
Behold, the days are coming, declares the LORD, when I will make a new covenant with
the house of Israel and the house of Judah, not like the covenant that I made with their
fathers on the day when I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt,
my covenant that they broke, though I was their husband, declares the LORD. But this is
the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, declares the LORD:
