PERSONAL STATEMENT OF PHILOSOPHY AND VALUES Personal Statement of Philosophy and Values Stephen Anthony Eckard Public Administration 550, McDaniel College
Personal Statement of Philosophy and Values Introduction My personal philosophy and values have been years in the making. Experiences shape values. In order to communicate my philosophy and values I feel it is important to provide some context along with the statement of philosophy and values. Early Influences Obviously one s family and home environment have a significant influence on how a person s values develop. Growing up in a traditional American family in the sixties and attending Catholic school certainly laid the groundwork for the values I hold today. Values are taught by the family in the home. Within the structure of my family I learned acceptance, a sense of belonging, the importance of family, trust and respect. For me, however, more values were added and these existing values reinforced growing up in a small-town family business. Such a business is not based on volume; it is based on building relationships. Building (business) relationships is based on fair dealing, by providing dependable service, accurate advice and quality products. In a small town these are necessary to assure that customers will return. As we know, customers are the life of a business as clients are the life of any organization, profit or non-profit, but for a small-town business to survive, customers needed to be repeat customers. Community values of trust, fairness, honesty and respect established and perpetuated one s reputation. The business s reputation was sacred. My father instilled those values in me by his example. He started the business in 1947. I was born in 1956. By 1966, I was experiencing aspects of the business as a child and the importance of doing things right and in the right way. Although we were private enterprise, profit driven, we were not cut-throat.
Customer relationships were vital. Customers were more than revenue totals and units sold, they were or became acquaintances, neighbors, fellow church members, friends and family. Often you were their customer, too, as a student, or patient. Customers included your doctor, grocer, mechanic and pharmacist. Customers were the children and grandchildren of customers. As a business we supported local churches, of all faiths, fire companies, and school groups. The support was appreciated and the support was returned. The business relationship in this model was by its nature a personal relationship. That was the life of a small-town family business owner. It was a wonderful way of life. It may be corny to say that we live by the golden rule, but there was a fundamental truth to it. These values were part of your identity in the community. Undergraduate and Business With that foundation as I entered college, I was not easily swayed in the development of my personal philosophy. I measured new ideas against my experience. At college, my increasing exposure to the liberal arts, often confirmed my values (from work experience), but not without broadening me and challenging me. I appreciated more, understood more and knew more. My values evolved through my college years, through the influence of professors and academic reading. My understanding of work and work ethic were validated. Books such as Adam Smith s Wealth of Nations, and reading the works of Milton Friedman and others from the University of Chicago School of Economics confirmed what by this time of my life I firmly believed; that economic activity guided by individual decisions made in a free market were the engine for a rising standard of living for everyone. Upon graduation at the age of 23, I thought I would work my entire career in the family business and that it would provide for me as it had provided for my father. Under this formula I may never be rich, but I would be successful and content as a respected member of the community I was a part of. This was a way of life to be
guarded and preserved. I was proud to be in business, to contribute to the economic activity of our town, community and nation. The principle that economic freedom ensured political freedom, and that the concentration of economic power was a threat to our freedom were both powerful ideas that I embraced. Assuring a free market, a competitive market, free from governmental intrusion and manipulation were important to me. I was suspicious of governmental and political intervention in the market. I was suspicious of those in positions of political power who thought they knew better and who believed they knew what was best for someone else. I believed this because I believed in the market, in its ways. I believed in business, business driven to satisfy customer needs and wants. Transition After 47 years in business, involving three generations, once my nephew began working in 1978, the business closed in 1994. The reasons were many, but trends were underway moving society and our town in ways that disrupted the traditional small-town model. For some time at this critical period in my life, I held the belief that the status quo should be preserved, saved. A poignant line in Charles Dickens A Christmas Carol from Mr. Fezziwig, It is to preserve a way of life that one knew and loved has always resonated with me. The values of honesty, respect and customer service while still stated by society as important were more of an ideal, and much more removed from the fabric of my experiences. As our community grew from an established small-town community into a bedroom community to a larger growing community, volume and marketing began to overshadow the familiar business model. How you treated people was not enough. Individual relationships were replaced by target marketing. When offered an opportunity to be associated with the Texas Roadhouse when it came to Westminster, once the
city demographics had reached the critical mass to support such an operation, I recall thinking to myself if you can t beat em, join em. From 1995 over the course of the next fifteen years, I would transition from the private sector to local government to the governmental agency/non-profit world of Carroll County Public Library. In this period, I began to understand more thoroughly the role of government. During that same period, I saw the impact brought about by new technology. But it has been in the last five years where I have seen my values revived, restored and refined. I see change now as the opportunity, not as the threat. I see leadership as the mechanism to embrace change. Three years ago, when my son was a junior in college a new basketball coach came to his university. From October through March, my son worked with the coach on an almost daily basis. To improve the team s culture, the coach taught leadership to the players. My son shared some of the principals he learned. Model the Way and Challenge the Process were the prominent themes. I did not realize at the time that these ideas are from Kouzes and Posner who wrote an excellent essay on the leadership experience titled The Five Practices of Exemplary Leadership, a reading assigned early in my graduate studies at McDaniel. The impact of these concepts on my son was so profound, I read the essay eagerly. The five practices of exemplary leadership are: Model the Way Inspire a Shared Vision Challenge the Process Enable Others to Act Encourage the Heart I have read and reread this work and others by Kouzes and Posner. In my graduate work I have
studied and adopted this philosophy of leadership to the point where I welcome change as the opportunity for growth and innovation in an organization. The Library Carroll County Public Library is the only library I have ever worked for. It is not unlike many public libraries across the nation. It is a progressive organization in an industry dealing with vast change brought on by new technologies and the internet. Public libraries have a natural appeal by virtue of the very nature of open access to information and knowledge. Between 1883 and 1929, philanthropist and industrialist Andrew Carnegie provided funding for 2,509 libraries. When asked why, he said: I think it fruitful in the extreme, because the library gives nothing for nothing, because it helps only those that help themselves, because it does not sap the foundation of independence, because it stretches a hand to the aspiring and places a ladder upon which they can only ascend by doing the climbing themselves. This is not a charity, this is not philanthropy, it is the people themselves helping themselves by taxing themselves. I have worked at Carroll County Public Library since 2001 and serve on its management team. In 2012 the library formally adopted a set of core values articulated by our staff and approved by the board of trustees. They serve as a guide for daily work and long range planning. They are values to which each member of the library staff continually strives: We are risk-takers and leaders. We meet each other with humor and kindness. We treat everyone equally and with respect. We embrace challenges and learn from mistakes. We inspire curiosity. We build community.
Summary and Conclusion Therein in lies the paradox that is now me, conservative, but open minded, blue collar values in white collar pursuits, pro-business with an appreciation that government and non-profit activities are also partners in economic growth. My values are somewhat traditional, but not restricted by the status quo, appreciative of what has come before, but open to change, realizing that change is the opportunity. This is what I stand for now. The most recent stage of my life particularly through my current enrollment in graduate school has invigorated my commitment to my work as I more clearly see the opportunity that my involvement in public administration can have to build community and honor the values that I held and appreciated early in my life. As I move forward in my career in public administration I feel confident and assured that the values that I feel strongly about, working as a team, creating a family atmosphere, providing leadership through example, inspiring others to act, and providing others with the tools to succeed are fundamental to a successful life of service in public administration.
Bibliography Jossey-Bass Reader on Non-Profit and Public Leadership. Perry, James (Editor). San Francisco. Wiley Imprint (2010).