OGL 481 Pro-Seminar I:

PCA-Symbolic Frame Worksheet

Worksheet Objectives:
1. Describe the symbolic frame
2. Apply the symbolic frame to your personal case situation

Complete the following making sure to support your ideas and cite from the textbook and other
course materials per APA guidelines. After the peer review, you have a chance to update this and
format for your Electronic Portfolio due in Module 6.

1) Briefly restate your situation from Module 1 and your role.

I manage the production of multiple multi-million-dollar engines, while balancing the

talents of the fifty or so members that I supervise to ensure everyone is where they need
to be based off their knowledge and the need to meet deadlines. The situation being
analyzed is the planning, inception, efficiency, and decline of a now-defunct “Dispatch”
section that many of us in the work center saw as unnecessary and wasteful. This section
would accomplish all the responsibi1ities of each section and integrate into any number
of them depending on which one needed the most amount of help. Additionally, this
section would coordinate with other, completely different work centers and assist where
needed. There was no guidance on who to pick for the section, what exactly this new
section’s responsibilities were, and whether they should prioritize other work center
priorities versus our own.

2) Describe how the symbols of the organization influenced the situation.

There are multiple ways that culture and symbolism has affected the before, during, and
after of the Dispatch section. In general, the job that I have, along with many others, is a
thankless job. When you do things right, nobody cares because "that's what you're
supposed to do". When things go wrong, the wrong people want to burn your house
down. They devote all their time to finding out what went wrong and why you are wrong,
not the improper-downright incorrect training aspect, the overload of work, the constant
organic movement from project to project, and the immediate responses to flight
emergencies.

The aspect of "we can do it" regardless of constraints or limiting factors is the driving
force behind a ton of military culture. We don't have leaders who have learned how to say
no because "yes" is the way to success for most. The byproduct is a worn-down
technician trying to tread water, so they don't end up being seen for mental health issues

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 or simply give up. This cycle never ends because pilots must fly. They need training and
we try to provide the aircraft to do so. They have their own pressures to have qualified
personnel, but we feel it the worst because they are our customer, and we provide that
service.

3) Recommend how you would use organizational symbols for an alternative course of
action regarding your case.

Cohesion among airmen requires a common sense of purpose and beliefs that bind
subcultures together, and a loss of that cohesion leads to a wider gap between the
different subcultures. Cohesion is further reduced in times of budget cuts, when
subcultures “circle the wagons” and the divisions between them become even sharper.
Basic assumptions regarding the mission bind together the fractious subcultures so that
they can work together toward the Air Force’s objectives. The greater the ambiguity
about a military force’s mission, the lower its degree of preparedness, so it is better to
maintain an Air Force in which the members have a clear understanding of the mission.

Simply put, the cultural aspect must change, and it is to a certain extent. In Chapter 12 of
Reframing organizations, Deal and Kennedy portray culture as “the way we do things
around here” (Bolman & Deal, 2021). This could not be more accurate to the vicious
cycle that is endured. Everyone expects miracles that we simply cannot produce. Things
must fail to change results. If people continue to band-aid problems by picking and
choosing the right way to do things by way of substituting people and bending rules, we
look like we can keep it up. Until someone stands on their own two feet and does it the
proper way and lets it fail, we will continue to get beaten down because we give the
appearance that we can operate with below-minimal resources. But it will take certain
people who aren't chasing anything to make that happen. Unfortunately, this is where we
lost of the fight regarding the Dispatch section. Our boss that implemented it couldn’t be
promoted anymore, so he did not have anything to really chase. And, instead of focusing
on the people and the care of them, he created the new section despite our thin margins.

4) Reflect on what you would do or not do differently given what you have learned
about this frame.

Revitalizing our culture should start with a recognition of the dynamic, complex
operating environment in which we find ourselves, and the corresponding criticality of
readiness. When imagining a model of effective combat readiness, one could picture it as
a bar stool resting on three legs representing aircrew proficiency, maintainer proficiency,
and weapons system health. Without all three legs in balance, readiness fails.
Maintenance culture is a supporting enabler for the first leg of the stool and the primary
enabler for the latter two. As such, we should not take our responsibility to adapt and
innovate lightly. Maintenance leaders should not be surprised that the threats we face, as

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 outlined in the 2017 National Defense Strategy, are larger and more severe that those we
have faced in the counter-insurgency fight since 2001.

The Air Force maintenance community must revitalize itself while becoming more
responsive and creative with its management of aircraft, personnel and equipment. We
should do this by forging a new mindset that critically examines stale regulations,
outdated analytics, legacy organizational structures, inefficient manpower utilization, and
top-down decision-making structures. This new mindset must also plant the seeds of a
new cultural approach that is dynamic, flexible, exercises disciplined initiative, and
empowers our tactical-level leaders. Unfortunately, I cannot personally impact these
enterprise-level changes. However, of the fifty or so people that I manage, I can affect the
culture that surrounds them by focusing on them as people rather than just bodies that are
used to complete tasks.

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 Reference

Bolman, L. G. & Deal, T. E. (2021). Reframing Organizations: Artistry, choice, and leadership
(7th ed.). Hoboken, NJ: Jossey-Bass