Richard Jernigan -> RE: Status-mongering, or Who wants to play the Status Game? (Jan. 22 2020 1:09:36)
|
quote:
ORIGINAL: kitarist Interesting 'public philosophy' article by Agnes Callard. I see a lot of "status-mongering" at work. https://thepointmag.com/examined-life/who-wants-to-play-the-status-game-agnes-callard/ Callard's article certainly deserves some thought. Your comment prompts the observation that when a task requires a fairly large number of people to carry it out, humans almost always organize (or are organized) into a hierarchy. As a manager of up to 250 people with a variety of different skills, and different levels of competence within a given skill, the organization that I inherited had three official status levels. I had a half dozen subordinate managers, and they each had subordinate managers and employees. But within a given organizational level, there were of course differences in status. My chief responsibility was to see that our tasks were carried out reliably and efficiently. One of my governing beliefs was that to do so required that individuals be satisfied with their rank within the hierarchy, both the one on paper, and the one implicit in daily interactions. There was an ethical responsibility as well, to see that this was true. I felt I had received a compliment when my boss told me, during his first performance evaluation of me, that "Everybody who works at XXX is treated with respect." But I soon became aware of a different hierarchy. The job was on a large high tech military base on a remote island in the Central Pacific. I and my employees were civilians, ranging from people with engineering PhDs from Stanford and M.I.T. to semi-literate mechanical helpers. Employees derived their overall social status largely from work. The wives of relatively high status married engineers and technicians had a different criterion. Few, if any, of the wives had much knowledge of their husbands' work. But houses were assigned in blocks by the military, then in detail by the company. The houses varied in size, age and location. Their status was well defined and highly visible. For example, a house on the beach was better than one that was exactly the same, except for being on the next street inland. Some wives placed more value on the housing hierarchy, some less. But I never encountered a case where it was of no importance at all. It took up a fair amount of my time to negotiate dissonances between a husband's work status and a wife's aspirations, or perceptions of where they ought to be in the house status game. Husbands soon found they could discuss the situation freely with me. I scrupulously avoided the subject with wives. It was the husband's job to adjust her housing status. It not mine even to acknowledge it existed, or could be an issue between spouses. If organizational goals are well defined and clearly measurable, status is important at work. General concerns about status seem inevitable in societies of any appreciable size. When I left teaching at a state university after a few years a friend asked my why. I told him I found industry more congenial. Academia, at least for sizable universities, generally sees itself as socially superior to industry. I told my friend that in industry, if you mistreated your employees you either demoralized them and they let you down, or they would organize and stab you in the back. In a few years in academia I saw people who had been crapping on graduate students for 20 years, and nothing bad had happened to them yet. (I suppose there may be academic institutions which are exceptions to this generalization.) In some contexts status is not only unimportant, it is inappropriate. Larisa and I were invited to dinner on Christmas Eve in Florida, by people whom I didn't know. When I asked, she told me ten or twelve other guests would be there. I only knew one of them, not very well. Though I felt some reluctance, I kept quiet, because she was clearly enthusiastic. We were among the last to arrive. We were greeted by the hosts, given a pre-dinner drink, and left to navigate the full gathering. I was the oldest person there, probably the best off financially, and probably had the most prestigious degree. But none of this made any difference. i lucked out. The first person I began to speak to was one of the youngest, in his twenties. He was a bit shy, and made his living as a teacher at a music store. He went to a local college I had never heard of. But he was enthusiastic and knowledgeable about music in general, and clearly loved his job teaching young people. The fifteen or twenty minutes I spent with him was the most fun I had, for what turned out to be a very pleasant evening. Shared interests and mutual respect were what made it so pleasant. Any negotiation of status was not just unimportant, it was off limits. RNJ
|
|
|
|