Does politics in the workplace sound familiar? It does and I am sure none of us can claim total immunity. Mostly we are either a victim or participant of some kind. It impacts our ability to perform/contribute and causes huge stress and anxiety. Why do people play politics in the workplace? Mainly to ensure a lion’s share of the rewards and remunerations — which in a limited “overall pie” can only be accomplished by pulling others down. Why is the “overall pie” limited? Either due to poor organisational performance or due to shrinking market size. But, the poor performance of the organisation is a direct outcome of excessive politics. As it prevents employee’s ability to contribute and add value. Hence, managing politics in the workplace is extremely critical.
But How? We live in a society which fundamentally very competitive. The intensity of competitiveness has been fueled by the modern educational system. The system has been primarily designed to reward the individual performers with a very little focus on the contributions of individuals in facilitating performance of others. Most managers and workers are the product of this system. So it is reasonable to expect that the individual hired based on his academic excellence find it hard to work efficiently in a team. Why? As his brain has been programmed by the educational system to enhance his own performance even at the cost of others.
Hence, containing politics in the workplace is both a responsibility of the organisation and that of the individual. The organisation has to set up reward system which encourages the individuals to work in teams. The performance appraisal of the individual should not be based only on the perception of his supervisor but the feedback of his peer members (360-degree feedback) should be given serious consideration. This will motivate the individual to collaborate, as any negative feedback (substantiated by facts) from his team members will impact his remuneration and opportunities. The supervisor must be perceived as fair, and transparent, and must promote open communication and constructive feedback between the team members and across hierarchies.
The individual must learn to work as teams. The most important skill is “the art giving constructive feedback”. Feedback should not be judgmental about the individual’s capabilities to perform. For example, you are a fool; you are an idiot; you are not doing your job properly; you come late; you do not respond to emails etc. As any such feedback will make the individual defensive, and will defeat the overall purpose. The feedback should be specific and based on facts and must describe how the team or the individual (feedback giver) has been constrained in adding value due to an individual’s specific action. For example, since you (the individual) did not respond to that (specific) email on time, and hence I (the feedback giver) have not been able to complete the required task (specific), thereby impacting the performance of the overall team. This is more constructive and enables the individual to make corrections to his behavior than vague generic feedback.
The team members should trust each other. The trust is broken if the members of the team suspect individuals taking unreasonable credit of tasks contributed by others. The battle for credit is driven by the satisfaction of one’s ego than due to higher remunerations. Lack of trust breaks relationships and prevents not only the individual’s ability to contribute but the team’s ability to perform. Hence, taking care of other’s interest when working in a team is critical if an organization has to successful.
The organization’s ability to reward employees is dependent upon its profits. The profits are linking to the team’s ability to perform and meet the organizational objectives. Organizations which do not promote individuals to work in teams are highly inefficient (due to politics in play between employees) compared to those which encourages folks to collaborate. James Surowiecki in his book “The Wisdom of Crowds” has proved that the output of average people working in teams is much sharper and accurate than many talented folks working individually. Hence, the winning organizations are not always made up of the best talent, but on average talent collaborating and working in teams and taking care of each other’s interests.
