Rapid Relationality: Staff Influence Over Line Members for Soldier Mental Healthcare

• In Event: 369 - Section on Organizations, Occupations, and Work. Making Organizational Compliance Real

Abstract

Organizations often hire professionals for their expertise and legitimacy to accomplish important organizational goals. Yet these professionals are typically part of the “staff” function of the organization and lack formal authority over “line” members associated with the organization’s core. Given this power imbalance, line members may resist staff efforts to elicit cooperation from them with relative impunity. This can prevent organizations from benefiting from staff expertise and lead to failed organizational goals and change efforts. When and how can lower-power staff members elicit cooperation from higher-power line members? In this paper, I analyze data from a 30-month qualitative field study of staff members, in this case U.S. Army mental health professionals, and the line members over whom they lacked authority, in this case the direct commanders of the soldiers they treated. Even though the U.S. Army invested significant resources in improving mental health services for soldiers, I found that soldiers could not fully benefit from these extensive services when their commanders overrode the recommendations made by their mental health providers. Despite these barriers, many providers were able to achieve high levels of influence in which commanders regularly complied with their recommendations. I identify a three-stage process that describes how these mental health professionals elicited regular cooperation from these commanders despite lacking formal authority over them. My analysis suggests it is not only what staff do to elicit compliance from line members, but also when and how quickly they do it that matters.

Author

• Julia DiBenigno, Yale University