I came to my organization just over two years ago, fresh out of college. The organization has about 25 full-time staff + interns. Shortly after starting, I noticed there was tension between several colleagues due to personality clashes and conflict over projects and what department they actually fit into. It was rather disheartening, as I expected a small organization to not have as much office politics and that we should more so work together as a team and support one another. I spoke with a colleague on this who felt that much of this environment is due to poor management at a higher level, which made sense to me. We never have staff meetings where we openly discuss what is going on each department. In fact, I am not even fully certain what some other departments do. The only time we come together are for office-wide related events or parties. If the CEO fostered more departmental dialogue, maybe this could cut back on tension and competition between departments. Personality clashes may always be a challenge, but we shouldn't feel competiton over whose project should be whose.
- Monica
Office politics happen at everywhere regardless of the size of the company. I had an impression that non-profit organizations should have less office politics than private companies before. But I can truly see that I am wrong after working at the non-for profit organizations. No one likes office politics and we all thinks office politics are harmful. Interestedly, I remember one manage told me sometimes office politics can create motivation. I could not believe my ear at that time. He explained to me that he has noticed there are office politics going on at his department, but at the other hand, he also has noticed there is something change in his staffs too. Two of his staffs decide to go back to school to obtain better degrees at the same time, and some of other staffs work more effective than before. That is why he decides not to do anything about it. Sometimes people has get used to do their routine work, but when they see there is completion going on and they know they need to do something about it to protect themselves. Isn’t that interesting??
ReplyDeleteYu Mei Wu
Actually I would have to agree with the manager that told you "sometimes office politics create motivation." When we consider locus of control an internal locus might consider office politics as something to be defensive in response to, but an external locus of control might view office politics as a way to do something to make situations work. In my opinion we all haver t o deal with challenging situations, and politics at work are a given, but when one asks why is this happening to me you get no action, but if you change the question to what can I do to make this situation better then you get progress, and you just might look better in the eyes of management if you do that.
ReplyDelete-Ken