George FreemanThought Leader | Author | Architect| Florida, United States
I’ve written multiple articles over the years that delved into corporate politics, and I find it interesting that project managers are weary of sharing their experiences and lessons learned on this subject.
In part, I do not believe we have a clear definition of what corporate politics is and the purpose it serves. Although I recognize that not everyone will agree, let me propose the following:
- Corporate politics exists to achieve “change” within an organization. It is stated as a positive when the change (and/or action) benefits the organization, and as a negative when the change (and/or action) is implemented for the benefit of an individual or group without regard to the organization.
Most folks associate the term with its “negative” connotation and reject its “positive” form. However, for me, rejecting its positive form represents a constraint on the project manager’s ability to leverage the “positively-formed corporate politic” to benefit their project. Whether in response to an individual or group wielding a negatively-formed corporate politic or simply a project manager navigating their project to objective success.
So, my questions are the following: [1] Do you agree with the definition of corporate politics stated above? [2] What do you believe is the role of the project manager in the negative and positive forms? [3] What has been your experience, and what have you learned from those experiences? Saving Changes...
The negative reputation of “corporate politics” is understandable and well-deserved. For most of my career, I have viewed it as the project manager’s distant arch-enemy who was not to be engaged on the project battlefield, as it was “above my pay grade.”
However, all that changed one day when corporate politics became my 24/7 antagonist on an international project. I managed the US team; however, the PMO and most sponsors were in different countries. Hence, I was traveling most of the time and had to switch my hours in the US to have significant overlap with the other project managers and teams.
In this dynamic, isolated environment where cultural differences, especially those related to risk tolerance, ruled the day, I had no choice but to examine and study the political landscape and then operate and advocate in those channels as I was essentially in a stand-alone outlier position.
Although this venture was challenging, it started me on a path of reconciling and fine-tuning my role as a project manager in future projects. In other words, I started visualizing the “corporate political landscape” as a tangible network of roads with freeways, highways, tollways, drawbridges, washed-out roads, and the like.
Indulge me for a moment:
- The freeways are great to navigate as you can travel at high speeds without hitting a stop light, so as long as you avoid the unrestricted parts of the autobahn, you are not likely to crash and burn.
- The highways, however, take longer to traverse, but if you understand the timing of the lights (i.e., the executive waypoints), you can still make good progress.
- Unfortunately, tollways require frequent stops and plenty of “political currency” to make it from one end to the other.
- And then there is the dreaded drawbridge that literally “puts up a wall of cement” in front of you and sometimes gets stuck, blocking passage due to mechanical problems; however, applying a little grease to those bearings will generally get things moving again.
- Although I would prefer not to mention the “washed-out roads,” they occasionally appear, even when there is no weather in the area. How can that be? If you check, you may find someone sabotaged the dam upstream, creating a “political wave” that washed out your navigatable path.
Although having some fun with this metaphor, the point should be clear: Corporate politics exist in positive and negative forms. Understanding this and embracing it allows a project manager to traverse the domains that will bring their project to objective success. Calling it by another name, although possible, doesn’t “challenge the project manager” to embrace the difficulties and face them for the benefit of their project.
Bottom Line: I’m “calling a spade a spade” to challenge others to rethink their position on this complex subject.
George,
setting aside terminology for a moment, what is our ultimate goal here? Perhaps adding guidance on how to navigate enterprise environmental factors to PMBOK? Sharing knowledge of general interest, such as alliance-building and networking - if that is what the road system metaphor is aiming for - could certainly prove beneficial.
As unfair as it might be towards those engaging in (workplace) politics, my observation remains that the term is often used interchangeably with self-serving behaviors like strategic positioning or leveraging informal power structures. Convincing the community to see politics neutral is an unnecessary uphill battle. Saving Changes...
Call it what you want to, the need for influence & persuasion does not change. However, if a PM has to reference what they are engaging in with a stakeholder, why use a "charged" term when there is alternative phrasing available.
It comes down to what hill you wish to die on and/or how much you enjoy tilting at windmills ;-)
Kiron Saving Changes...
George FreemanThought Leader | Author | Architect| Florida, United States
One of the goals of this platform is to support career-long learning and development. For my part, I try to focus on those elements that tangibly impact project professionals and for which the PMBOK does not necessarily address from a “good practice” perspective. As these areas are often difficult to understand or work with, I sometimes use metaphors (some better than others) to assist in that goal.
Project managers have little direction on how they should participate in and leverage the positive side of corporate politics to “influence positive outcomes” for their projects when standard “good practices” (e.g., PMBOK) render a less-than-desirable outcome. The same is true for the negative side of this beast; that is, there is little direction on how to manage or adapt to those negative influences.
Not all project professionals face “politically leaning” challenges in their practice as corporate environmental, cultural, and project maturity elements play into that equation. However, when confronted with negative politics, I have seen PMs individually [A-fight], i.e., do something inappropriate, [B-flee], i.e., personally escape the situation by unplugging themselves from the project, and [C-freeze], i.e., do nothing and/or ignore the event.
The A,B, and C above typically occur because an individual fears corporate politics and the management thereof. And fear has no place in our field.
Summary: Although I agree that influence and persuasion are vital in managing this beast, I want to “depower this charged term” by challenging others to contextually recognize its positive purpose and harmful abuse—as corporate politics are not going away. Saving Changes...
Yes, the definition of corporate politics as efforts to achieve change, either positively or negatively impacting the organization, is a reasonable one.
The project manager's role is to navigate and leverage corporate politics to align stakeholders, mitigate risks and drive project success while balancing organizational goals with individual interests.
From my experience, understanding the motivations behind stakeholders' actions is crucial. I've learned that effectively managing both positive and negative politics can significantly influence project outcomes by fostering collaboration and preemptively addressing conflicts. Saving Changes...
"When one door closes another door opens; but we often look so long and so regretfully upon the closed door that we do not see the ones which open for us."
