“Vi kallar det för The Foundation” : – En kvalitativ intervjustudie om värderingsstyrning

Sammanfattning: In today's work life, values and their importance for organizations are a central and debated issue. Most organizations have a values foundation consisting of a number of specific values that are considered important guidelines for desirable behavior and common goals. This study aims to investigate more closely how the management can make value-based management work by analyzing an organization that works with value-based management, using Etzioni's (1975) compliance theory. The empirical basis of the study rests on eight qualitative semi-structured interviews with managers and employees within the organization. The result indicates that the management has involved the employees in the process of developing the values. The management has different strategies to implement the values: they have clarified the meaning and the scope of use of the values, the values are used as the first assessment within an internal career framework, and they conduct regular feedback conversations regarding the values. Using the compliance theory, these strategies can be understood as normative exercise of power, but with elements of rewarding exercise of power in that the values are used in the career framework. The result further shows that the values land with the employees. The employees are positive about the values and perceive them as important which, using the compliance theory, can be understood as moral commitment. However, a tendency identified in the results is skepticism towards the values being used for evaluation purposes as a first step before they are given the opportunity for promotion through the organization's career framework. The skeptical approach is interpreted as being due to the management exercising normative power and rewarding power at the same time. In general, the results of the study show that the management's value-based management works. Based on Etzioni's (1975) compliance theory, this means that the relationship between the management's strategies for implementing the values and how they resonate with the employees are congruent. The management's normative exercise of power is reflected by the employees' moral commitment. An important result of the study, however, is that value-based management has less effect when two different types of power are combined. This means that a prerequisite for value-based management to work is that the management exercises one type of power, and that it corresponds to the commitment of the employees.