Organizational Values

In organizational life, values determine what is cherished and important and how an organization is shaped and managed. The human body operates on blood; an organization operates on values, whether good or bad. Ideally these values are thoughtfully conceived and clearly stated in a document that can be read by members of the organization and recipients of the organization’s service. Sometimes the real functioning values of an organization are in conflict with the advertised ones. So the process of getting people to clarify what values are actually operating and what values should be foundational is one of the most important exercises that can be undertaken in organizational life.

The Virtuous Organization

Values should cover the full range of organizational life: how people are treated, especially when being hired or fired, how mistakes are dealt with, how resources are used, how people relate, how decisions are made, how power is handled, how purposes are clarified and how work is performed. A virtuous organization would be shaped by three foundational organizational values from the Bible: faith, hope and love (see Organization). These values can be applied to both persons and structures in organizations that are not overtly Christian but where people in positions of influence can shape the values of the organization. Obviously in a church or parachurch organization faith, hope and love can be applied directly (though they often are not!). But in a secular organization these revealed values must be translated, with loss of some of the original meaning.

Faith is seeing and acting in harmony with God’s will. It is seeing and trusting the invisible as well as the visible potential of every person, situation and structure (compare Hebrews 11:1). Hope is expressing courage and confidence in relational and organizational contexts. It is responding to the gains and losses of the present (with both people and structures) in the confidence of a future worth laboring for and embracing. Love is caring loyalty for people, cultures, structures and values. It is relating unconditionally to people in order to meet their real needs, communicating their worth and value independently of their performance. Love must also be directed to the structures as part of the world that God loves.

These three values are founded on truth about people, situations and ultimate reality. Truth is not abstract but concrete, holistically experienced (mind, body and spirit) in a way that is reliable and stable. We will now develop these values in both personal and organizational terms.

Faith in an Organizational Context

Faith is the response of the whole person to the full revelation of God’s person (Romans 10:14-17) and intentions for the created order (Hebrews 11:3). Faith is a revolt against living on the basis of appearances. It is not merely a belief system but a total life orientation involving trust and action in all kinds of life situations (Hebrews 11:4-16). Faith is better considered as a verb than as a noun. Faith is based on the Word of God, the persuasion of the Spirit and the paradigm of Jesus, but it leads to concrete action. How does this apply in a secular organization?

Personal faith. Faith requires seeing people and situations the way God does and acting in relation to them in view of the potential for change, integration and wholeness that God holds before each person and every human enterprise. While full communion with God is a possibility reserved for those who become children of God through faith (John 1:12), persons of faith working in organizations of various kinds are invited to translate their own communion with God into a form of communion with their neighbors in the workplace. This is not so much possibility thinking or a search for human transcendence as for divine possibilities and capacities for transcendence that God makes available.

Organizational faith. In the same way a person of faith sees and acts upon structures and organizational culture. Normally this results in openness to the possibility of substantial, though limited, change and transformation of an organization. Faith will inspire creative action to make the structures (as well as the people in them) reflect divine values and purposes in a way that is attractive to others.

Hope in an Organizational Context

Hope is resting in the revealed and certain conclusion of the created order to shape our response to the present gains and losses. It involves understanding and living in the present in view of the future, allowing the vision of God’s kingdom to inspire our confidence in the future. Hope equips us with courage to hold essential values in uncertain times and to take appropriate steps to plan for tomorrow. The person who has been “saved by hope” can incorporate hope relationally and structurally in the life of an organization. While there is some loss of meaning in this process, incorporating hope in an organization plants a pregnant hint that there is something more and invites people to move towards it. Of the three virtues, the one most urgently needed today is probably hope, for it is the one that gives people the confidence that the other two are possible.

Personal hope. Hope means never giving up on people (confidence) and helping people deal with the reality of their lives (courage), in terms of both their need for change and the positive fruits that can be appropriated through a realignment of their lives.

Organizational hope. Hope means never giving up on situations (confidence) and empowering the structures, values and culture of an organization (courage) to live in harmony with kingdom values and realities, even if in the short haul we appear to be engaging in fruitless activity or experiencing reverses. Hope inspires people in business to see their work as “playing heaven” (as children “play house” as a way of growing up) and “speeding” the day of the Lord (2 Peter 3:12) by bringing our business and organizational ventures into greater correspondence with what will be characteristic of the new heaven and the new earth. In some way beyond our imagination, hope points toward the transfiguration, not the obliteration, of our work and enterprises in this world.

Love in an Organizational Context

In the Old Testament covenant love (hesed) is love plus loyalty or affectionate loyalty. It also includes ahabah, the love that reaches out to incorporate the outsider. Covenant love is more concerned with relationships than commodities. It is not merely a sentiment but involves active caring and creative loyalty. In the New Testament agapē illuminates and extends this further through the sacrificial ministry of Jesus and the generous pouring out of the Spirit that encompasses not only people but the creation itself. This means that material realities and ordered structures in this world are the objects of God’s love and should, therefore, be the object of ours. How does this get translated into organizational life?

Personal love. Though we love in a more limited way than God, our love should reflect that love as we show caring loyalty to employees, members, clients, peers and customers. This involves meeting true needs, going the extra mile in relationships, understanding empathetically the other person’s situation, supporting another’s integrity, remaining faithful to the published values of the organization. Love makes us stay with people even when we find them unpleasant, when they “push our buttons” or when they do not meet our expectations for development. Love means we do not jump to conclusions about the motives of our customers. And even when we must deal with negative reality, we will communicate worth and create an opportunity for people to change and have a second chance.

Organizational love. Love inspires caring loyalty to the structures and values of the organizational system—loving the company systemically, structurally and culturally. As God loved the world, we are called to lay down our selves, not only for people, but for organizations and communities so that they will be humanized and transformed. In the process hopefully some people will embrace Christ as their Lord. A being-redeemed-community can express God’s kindness and so lead people to repentance for sin (Romans 2:4). Gratitude is a good enough reason to return to the seeking Father, and a loving organization should evoke gratitude.

The Value of Values

Several assumptions in this reflection invite further study and discussion: (1) that Christian values are good for everybody; (2) that Christian values are relevant not only to individual persons but to the structural and cultural contexts in which those persons live and work; (3) that people on a spiritual journey may embrace and live at least partly by Christian values—to their benefit and the benefit of their neighbors; (4) that God shows grace even to people who do not ask for it; (5) that values may serve as the law did prior to the coming of Christ—a good gift that may unfortunately become a trap through pointing to impossibly high standards—but nevertheless point us to Christ (Galatians 3:24); (6) that translating Christian values in a secular context means that Christians in the marketplace have a ministry as valuable as pastoral or missionary service; (7) that rediscovering kingdom values in the marketplace may create a learning context for Christians—a theological school in the marketplace. In the end organizational life can become for believers one more context for worship, in spite of all the difficulties.

A ministry to structures desires, but is not dependent on, the hope that other people will become believers. This ministry is worthwhile in itself—a faithful, hopeful and loving ministry of lining ourselves up with the kingdom of God. Our service is goal oriented, but the goal is beyond this life. In biblical revelation the future determines the present. All our life and work in human organizations are a dress rehearsal for the final performance in the new heaven and the new earth, which will be inaugurated when Christ comes again. The end of the human story will involve renewed structures in a new heaven and earth. In the new Jerusalem faith will be realized in sight, hope in fulfillment, but love will be the continuous plot line and experience of life in the heavenly city.

» See also: Organization

» See also: Organizational Culture and Change

» See also: Service, Workplace

» See also: Values

References and Resources

R. Benne, Ordinary Saints: An Introduction to the Christian Life (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1988); P. Block, The Empowered Manager (San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 1987); M. De Pree, Leadership Is an Art (New York: Doubleday, 1992); J. Renesch, ed., New Traditions in Business (San Francisco: New Leaders, 1991); E. H. Schein, Organizational Culture and Leadership: A Dynamic View (San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 1991); G. Tucker, The Faith-Work Connection (Toronto: Anglican Book Centre, 1987).

—R. Paul Stevens