The definition of loyalty is getting a workout these days. We’ve been talking about it frequently as the hearings on the auto industry bailout take place. The disconnect is so troubling. The executive level appears to finally have had a long overdue reality check, yet it’s the rank and file who will be drastically effected by any outcome.
Wisconsin Historical Society
It used to be you worked for the same company for pretty much your entire working life. You exchanged your loyalty for a pre-set tenure. In the auto industry, it was “30 and out.” You worked in the plant for 30 years, like many of my relatives, and then you collected your pension and other retirement benefits.
It has been difficult to watch the working men and women awaiting the congressional decision that will seal their fate. Any one of them could be my father or my cousin. “As GM goes, so goes the nation.” The bargain made with the companies by so many depends upon reciprocal loyalty. What is owed to them who worked for so long in good faith? It’s a tough question in the light of devastating corporate financial liabilities.
Loyalty comes in many guises. Loyalty is woven into venues where relationships are paramount. Fred Reichheld, who wrote The Loyalty Effect, established an economic case for loyalty, with metrics illustrating how a relationship is strengthened when an investment or personal sacrifice is made. To simmer and cook well, loyalty needs trust as an ingredient. Its mutation or lack altogether is at the crux of breakdown.
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In business, customer and employee loyalty is the key to longevity in the marketplace. There is good business in assessing and cultivating stronger relationships by using tactics such as rewards programs and contact strategies. Relationship managers are springing up in companies that formerly relied upon salespeople or customer service representatives. Does it really have to be this deliberate? Couldn’t or shouldn’t this interaction be a little more natural?
It’s tempting to mistake long term relationships for loyalty when other factors, such as inertia or competition, might be at play. We’ve wondered about political relationships, too. In the Bush administration, loyalty played a key, and sometimes detrimental, role. Scott McClellan, Scooter Libby, and former FEMA Head Michael Brown come to mind.
Jacob Weisberg, writing in Slate Magazine, recently asserted that loyalty is the most overrated virtue in politics. (Is there any virtue in politics, we wondered?) Weisberg believes loyalty is “a relic from the age of patronage, when political appointments were tied to the delivery of votes for a sponsor.” Thinking back upon the days where an employee spent his entire career with one company, an aspect of subservience seems present there: Our parents, coming out of the Great Depression, felt lucky to have a job, and did everything they were asked and could do to retain it. The employer held their fate, much in the way the overlord held the serf’s.
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A commenter on Weisberg’s article wrote “Loyalty when used in politics, is transient in nature, and usually to a particular cause or principle, rather than a person or even a party.” Some politicians may have valued loyalty over competence. Truman’s Loyalty Oath of 1947 provided for an investigation conducted by the Civil Service and the FBI. There was a Loyalty Review Board and even a Master Index that referenced the inquiries into the backgrounds of government employees.
Is “loyal opposition” an oxymoron? In Truman’s day, in the midst of the Cold War, it would have appeared to have been so. “Blind loyalty” appears to be more feared in our time. Weisberg admires those who can generate loyalty without seeming to care much about it, citing Bill Clinton, who as “famously untrue to everyone,” had an adaptability that ensured his political longevity.
Weisberg looks to Reagan, Roosevelt and even Herbert Hoover, as further examples, believing if you’re confident in your vision, you don’t need the insularity that surrounding yourself with loyalists brings. However, one of our most isolated Presidents, Lyndon Johnson, might belie this theory. LBJ famously kept J. Edgar Hoover in his job saying, “It’s probably better to have him inside the tent pissing out, than outside the tent pissing in.” Does pragmatism trump loyalty in keeping your enemies closer?
What triggers disloyalty? Greed, mistrust, an entire host of catalysts. Many are the multi-million dollar tell-all book deals made when loyalty is abandoned. A disappointment in someone’s character triggered mine. Years ago I worked for a personal injury lawyer who attempted to re-negotiate his fee for a higher payout when a case settled for millions of dollars more than he anticipated. During a meeting with the client, I quietly shook my head when she looked at me questioningly when he floated the idea. I left his employ shortly after, and I have never regretted it.
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How detrimental would disloyalty be to someone who doesn’t spend a lot of time worrying about it? Jacob Weisberg seems to think Obama pays attention to other things than how loyal his appointments and staffers are. I tend to disagree with that assessment.
It’s hard not to believe Obama is just as concerned with loyalty as his immediate predecessor has been. After all, there’s that 60+ page questionnaire that’s floating around. It’s paramount to present a united front in a new Administration that could be under criticism for lack of experience in its Chief Executive. And, it’s only a matter of time before someone decides to cash in on proximity to the Office of the President.
When the potential for disloyalty in any relationship is high, do we assess the risk?
What part does the potential for loyalty play in today’s Human Resource function?
How loyal do we expect our employees, friends and family to be?
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Peter and Betsy Wuebker are location-independent professionals who share what they know about travel, simplicity and integrating work with life. 
I believe loyalty results in many directions which can include intense questioning and testing each and every decision. I had a student in one of my ethic’s classes who belittled, questioned, mocked nearly every word that I uttered in lecture and seminar. I just kept coming home and working, and working on what he was trying to do or why he was trying to prove I was incompetent….or stupid or a dumb female….then I changed my mind…and embraced the enemy…..for the second 2/3rds of the semester I could hardly wait to arrive at class and see what this guy would come up with…..When the class was over the students in the class rated it as one of the most profound learning experiences they had every had and I received so many great words and praise….this young man should have gotten more credit, many still saw him as an enemy….I am still very good friends 27 years later and when life seems way too tough…..he always brings me back to the present….he is a Union Organizer and has some fabulous ideas about taking care of people for their lives/living and the auto bailout…I am sure you will hear from him as he is a very public figure.
I give him great credit for teaching me how to teach and how to believe and how to truly understand all those theories and concepts…
Blind loyalty – is a cesspool – a despair usually….loyalty that is active and acute is a flowing stream and puts meaning to the word Love.
Patricia´s last blog post..Beautiful
Hi Patricia – That’s a fascinating story. I believe questioning and dialogue is strengthening as well.
I hope that evasion and non-answers will be called out more frequently now that the election is over. If someone can’t even admit whether or not they’re a smoker, for trite example, how will other questions be (non-)answered?
It’s easy for us all to let ego get caught up in interactions, as your example beautifully portrays. Instead, you were willing to let go of it and new heights were scaled by everyone. It’s a powerful example. Thank you for sharing it!
Betsy,
Positively BRILLIANT !!! Brilliant post!!!
“It’s tempting to mistake long term relationships for loyalty”
That will stay with me for quite a while!!!
Kathy – Virtual Impax´s last blog post..Why this is a GREAT time to start your own small business!
Hi Kathy – Thanks! Isn’t it true, though? We take things for granted with our oldest, most loyal customers, or tried and true family members. Employers can completely miss the boat when it comes to how long-term employees feel. We have to look at what binds the relationship and ensure its maintenance is kept up – something you write about on your blog regularly.
Hi Betsy – I was raised with that “loyalty ethic” and when I did change jobs, I often felt guilty. When I saw what an employer spends on training employees and what their overhead is (over and above the hourly wage), I realized there’s more to a job than the hourly wage alone. Unfortunately two way conversation doesn’t happen often enough between employers and employees, so when a “greener pasture” presents itself to an employee, they’re apt to jump ship.
Barbara Swafford – Blogging Without A Blog´s last blog post..NBOTW – I Think I Can, I Think I Can
Hi Barbara – I think there is the impression of less loyalty from the employer side that contributes to the frequency of job changing as well. If an employee feels powerless, or that they serve at the whim of the employer, there’s not a lot of incentive for loyalty. Thanks.