Secrets to Winning at Office Politics: How to Achieve Your Goals and Increase Your Influence at Work by McIntyre Ph.D. Marie G

Author:McIntyre Ph.D., Marie G.
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub, pdf
Publisher: St. Martin's Press
Published: 2005-07-01T00:00:00+00:00

POLITICAL PLASTIC SURGERY

Forestalling career annihilation may not be easy, but it is possible. If you sense that you have become The Problem, then you need a political makeover—that is, your image must be quickly and drastically restructured. Consider the plight of Randall, a manager on the brink of being demoted. The high turnover rate in Randall’s district office had attracted the attention of his boss, who was becoming extremely concerned. Based on conversations and observations, she concluded that Randall was the cause of this turnover problem. She was right. Randall closely monitored his employees, obsessed about irrelevant details, got involved in the smallest decisions, and offered criticism much more frequently than praise. He was a classic micromanager whose behavior created serious morale problems. To save himself, Randall had to change. But altering ingrained habits is not nearly as simple as people think.

The acronym AMISH sums up the five steps required to accomplish any personal behavior change: Awareness, Motivation, Identification, Substitution, and Habit Replacement. Even though this process has nothing to do with religious communities in Pennsylvania, perhaps the label will help you remember the steps.

• Awareness: If you don’t know that a problem exists, how can you change? Without feedback to the contrary, most of us believe that we’re doing just fine. Many managers drop subtle hints about their concerns, so you need to be alert. “Seems like a lot of your salespeople have left for other jobs this year,” Randall’s boss might say. A politically obtuse Randall would reply, “Yeah, the company just doesn’t pay these people enough. You need to look into that.” But a politically intelligent Randall, recognizing this comment as a tiny little warning sign, would say, “I’ve been concerned about that, too. Do you think that our district office is different from the others somehow?” When you sense political trouble, you must find out what people are thinking, even if it’s painful. Unfortunately, some bosses practice “psychic management”: they think and think and think about an employee problem, but never share their thoughts with the offending party—thereby allowing the poor soul to become The Problem without ever being told. If your manager never comments on your job performance, soliciting feedback occasionally is a good idea.

• Motivation: The fact that someone else has issues with your behavior doesn’t necessarily mean that you agree. If you don’t think you have a problem, you certainly won’t be motivated to change anything. Randall never saw himself as a micromanager. From his point of view, he was thorough and careful and concerned about quality. Can you see an attribution error developing here? But Randall will never resurrect himself politically if he maintains this denial. When someone indicates that your behavior is a problem, don’t automatically reject that possibility. Instead, try to understand how your actions may be affecting other people. Then perhaps you will be motivated to try some new approaches.

• Identification: Even if Randall comes to accept that he is indeed a micromanager, he still must identify exactly which behaviors need to change.

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