Ladders and snakes

Monday, 8 November 2010 06:31 - - {{hitsCtrl.values.hits}}

This is a corporate game. Those trying to climb the greasy (and sometimes imaginary) ‘Corporate Ladders’ at any cost and the ‘Corporate Snakes’ spending all their energies on stinging them down. Organisational politics is destroying significant economic and shareholder value. It is still common place to blame trade unions as the architects of organisational politics, when in fact the real issue lies with white collar jobs, particularly at middle management level.

Some business organisations and associations have become more ‘political’ than political parties! If you dare to measure the financial impact of organisational politics in your organisation (as has been done in several recent US studies), it can be very revealing. Unfortunately, organisational politics needs to be managed, it cannot be eliminated! Rational Performance Management is one way to minimise the unhealthy impact of organisational politics.