Transcript: Office politics — how to play the game

This is an audio transcript of the Working It podcast episode: ‘Office politics: how to play the game’

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Isabel Berwick
Hello and welcome to Working It from the Financial Times. I’m Isabel Berwick. If the phrase “office politics” makes you feel queasy, you’re not alone. Most of us want to do our work without worrying too much about making the right connections or pleasing the right people. But is that really possible? Or is playing the game an unfortunate obligation of office life? To find out, I’m joined by Dr John Curran.

John Curran
Hello.

Isabel Berwick
John is the CEO and founder of JC & Associates, an organisational development consultancy and coaching firm. He’s also a professor of practice at UCL Anthropology. I’m also joined by the FT’s own Miranda Green. Miranda, hello.

Miranda Green
Hello, Isabel.

Isabel Berwick
Miranda is the FT’s deputy opinion editor and has written recently about the unfortunate necessity of workplace politicking. Miranda also used to work for the Liberal Democrats in the House of Commons, so she knows a thing or two about political workplaces.

What do we mean when we say office politics? For the purposes of this episode, we’re talking about all the power games people play — who they cosy up to, where they sit, what they tell people and what they omit. Now we know what office politics is, let’s get started. John, why do people engage in office politics? What’s at the root of it?

John Curran
I think that there’re kind of two overall purposes of office politics. The first is to get something, and the second is to preserve something, and they probably work in tandem a little bit. So it works as kind of giving out cultural codes around how we do things around here, how we should do things around here, and also as kind of defence mechanisms against anxieties.

Isabel Berwick
Miranda, you’ve done some work on this and you’ve also worked in a lot of offices. Why do people dodge office politics? Why do they check out? That was sort of the starting point for your column recently that we’ll put in the show notes.

Miranda Green
So I took a good look at it, and I found this fascinating book called the 7 Rules of Power by Professor Jeffrey Pfeffer, who’s something of an authority on the whole topic of power. He is very big on those without the power need to get good at this. Otherwise, you are gonna be left out. You’re never gonna gain status. You’re never gonna gain importantly, recognition, proper financial reward, all of the things that make it worthwhile getting to work every day. And so I thought it was really an interesting kind of call to arms to those who find office politics difficult or even repellent and just sort of say, look, you’ve got to be realistic about this. If you’re not in the game, you can’t win it. And also you can’t, as John said, protect your own position and fight for what you need, even if what you need is to be left alone to get on with your job, which is kind of my attitude as a journalist.

Isabel Berwick
I’ve met a lot of people in my career who claim not to be interested in office politics, but what Miranda’s just said suggests that’s a bad strategy.

John Curran
I don’t think anyone is interested in office politics. I think the reality is you are part of the office politics. If you’re part of an office or work culture, the politics is part of that, so you can’t really stand behind it. So you kind of are part of it, but you also do need to be part of it for strategic reasons like how do I progress, how do I make something land? You know, a strategy in these areas.

Miranda Green
Do you not also think there’s a kind of introvert-extrovert thing going on in that not everyone is gregarious and sociable, and those people who get their kind of rewards from work, of doing a project and doing it well actually do kind of deeply resent the fact that their work doesn’t speak for itself? I mean, there is a kind of injustice that people are resenting, though.

John Curran
I was thinking about that. Someone who’s doing good work, who’s driven, who’s committed, who’s bright, usually will be seen. The work itself will stand out. However, those people within the office or within the team culture will maybe have feelings of resentment towards that. And there will be ways that gossip and other kind of social mechanisms will come into play. So although you will see yourself outside of office politics or don’t want to be part of it, other people will bring you into it because of your success, and it’s how you manage and navigate that.

Miranda Green
Isabel, I mean, do you think John’s right? Good work will speak for itself. I’m not totally convinced.

Isabel Berwick
I think that good work speaks for itself up to a certain point, but I think no one really notices you in the office. You do have to shout a little bit about yourself, partly because we’re all totally self-obsessed. John, you talk about rituals and tribalism. What are some of those rituals that, for example, managers could implement to, you know, maintain their power? And what does rituals mean in terms of the workplace?

John Curran
Ritual kind of works to kind of preserve power and authority. Those at the bottom might use certain types of rituals as a means of disrupting power and authority that they’re disagreeing with, or preserving against change that might come in. For example, turning up late. It’s a very good way, especially a group ritual, of trying to assert power. I remember once at a big global architects firm, I’d sit in on certain meetings, but the head would always come in about two minutes late and sit at the same chair and sit in a certain way, so the body’s used in a certain way, and that was pure power and authority. I don’t have to be here on time. I can come in whenever I need to come in. And it’s those kind of ways of creating a certain kind of sense of boundary. So as an anthropologist I’m looking at the ritualisation of cultural artefacts in the office — how doors are used, how desks, how seating is arranged. And these things give us all cultural codes that tell us what’s actually going on.

Miranda Green
One of the things that comes out in Jeff Pfeffer’s book is that the people who aren’t doing the office politics very well in their own interests tend to be people who are overvaluing what he calls the pro-social elements of their work, which is the teamwork, the camaraderie, the sense of all for one and one for all. And actually, some of the rituals I’m thinking of our own office — you know, the tea run. It’s very communal and these things kind of cement the idea that we’re all in this together, we’re in the trenches daily.

But actually, he points out that the groups that don’t do that well in terms of discrimination and not getting ahead — this includes ethnic minorities and women — overvalue that pro-social stuff at a cost of progressing your own career, ie shouting about your own achievements, making sure you get recognition and get what you want. So that’s so interesting, the idea that even the kind of daily rituals might be reinforcing our office politics disabilities in a way.

Isabel Berwick
So to bring it back to our listeners, if someone’s new to a company, how should they go about getting the lie of the land? Is it with Miranda’s pro-social tea-making or taking a step back and assessing where the power lies?

John Curran
I would go with Miranda’s point as a means of being able to assess the political landscape. You’re only gonna be able to really read it if you’re in the social group. That would be the kind of strongest point. Fundamentally, when you’re starting in the new workplace, it’s not about progression. It’s about how do I become part of this identity while holding on to a sense of myself?

Miranda Green
I think John’s right. I kind of buy the idea that politicking is necessary up to a point. It’s really important to hold on to your own ethics, because you have to look at yourself in the mirror every night when you get back from work, and so you don’t want to get sucked into the idea that we all have to be Gordon Gekko to get on, you know, and, you know, wrestle not with monsters lest she become a monster also, I would say.

Isabel Berwick
I would have thought that in politics, there’s a fairly nakedly transactional aspect to it. Was that obvious at the time or is it clouded in networking?

Miranda Green
So all of the tensions that John’s been talking about are present all the time in politics. And actually, I have to say, a lot of people in politics are lovely and help each other and are very benign. And maybe sometimes in supposedly benign workplaces, we’re surprised in the other direction as to how nakedly ruthless people can be.

How ruthless are people at work? Is it that we’re hiding behind that corporate veneer, which allows us to do things that we wouldn’t do ethically in the rest of our lives? Is that still a thing?

John Curran
I think so, but by and large it is. But it’s also, how do we want to kind of frame what it is to be ruthless? If it’s my way or the highway kind of ruthless, that can be quite daunting nowadays, I think. But it doesn’t just have to be top-down. It could be bottom-up and, you know, I’ll give you an example. If you are having to give a presentation to the board or to your seniors, often you might be thinking, well, I better make this good or I don’t want to look bad. But actually, if you spend some time strategising about who’s around the table — and I know so-and-so is a bit ruthless and just wants to hear the value, so I need to put that in. And you are playing the politics. You’re reading the room, as you said, and that can really work in your favour. It can create a little bit of resentment amongst those who are at the same level as you because you’ve done a good job, you’ve nailed it. And then people feel a sense of that they kind of want to transfer back on to you, this feeling, why didn’t I do this? So, you know, so the politics, any success you have, be aware there will be some sting in the tail. It won’t come from up top, but it’ll be from either your level or below.

Isabel Berwick
Let’s say you’ve done something like that. You’ve attracted resentment, spoken or unspoken, from colleagues. How can we navigate that, Miranda?

Miranda Green
This is so interesting because in the Jeff Pfeffer book, and I’m sorry if I’m treating this as a kind of tablet of Moses, but I found it so interesting. You know, his seven tasks are quite good to sort of work through. His number one is get out of your own way. And that is all about our instinctive resentment of others who we see playing the game and doing it well and succeeding. What is so interesting is he’s taught this course about power in the office, power at work at Stanford Business School for a long time now, and he has the most incredible level of resistance from his students, resistance from people he also coaches, because people do not like to confront the idea that they’re gonna have to become a bit ruthless themselves, rather than just criticising others for doing it. So absolutely fascinating! He says, look at those people and learn from them. Don’t resent them.

Isabel Berwick
One of the things that interest me is when, you know, we have friendships at work, when those are compromised by one person’s promotion or resentments, as you’re talking about. Is a work friendship fundamentally a fragile thing, or can they be real friendships in the outside world?

Miranda Green
I’ve never had a problem with that kind of work friendship going wrong. I’ve seen it with other people, though, particularly in small companies actually, where there are then takeovers, gobbled up by a bigger company. Then there’s some sort of boardroom coup, and yeah, friendships end. I’ve seen that a lot with, you know, with my contemporaries.

John Curran
I think it’s very interesting about the size of the organisation. I’ve done work in the past with design agencies or, you know, marketing agencies. And I think what we’re finding now is if you are a smallish agency, you can pull talent from around the UK or from around the world. So the hybrid or not even hybrid, but working from home, it’ll be interesting to track how do friendships redefine themselves in the workplace and how do they become political or not when we’re not as face to face as much.

Isabel Berwick
Yes. So what is the early evidence on how hybrid or remote working is affecting office politics?

John Curran
The early evidence shows that it looks slightly different, but the tenets are the same, and I think that there’s maybe two or three key points, one of which, which I’ve certainly been experiencing in the work I’m doing, young people want to be seen physically when they know the boss is gonna be in the office. And that’s not just to be seen, ’cause I’m here and I’m working, and maybe I get an informal chat with you over a cup of tea, but it’s also if I can learn from you. So this desire for learning is really important, but it’s associated with being face-to-face. The other one is I’ve noticed there’s a lot of informal WhatsApp groups that will happen whilst meetings are taking place online.

Isabel Berwick
Oh, I don’t know what you’re talking about.

John Curran
(Laughter) There you go. So instead of us being able to kind of read each other’s body politics around the table, and I can kind of look at Miranda in a certain way and she knows that I’m giving her a sign there. I can’t really do that on screen, but if you’ve got the WhatsApp next to you that you can’t see, it’s amazing the conversations that take place. The third one, really from a kind of anthropological point of view, is the backdrops we use. So at the time of lockdown, you know, having a Zoom background of the Alps or somewhere was all novice and fun. Now it’s really trying to give a sense of who I am. Firstly, I don’t want you to see my life behind me, number one, but number two is I’m going to curate Danish mid-century furniture backdrop behind to try and portray a sense of who I am.

Isabel Berwick
I was just about to ask whether there were new forms of recognition-seeking or bragging that have come because of the pandemic and homeworking, so that would be one of them. Are there any other sort of tactics that didn’t exist before?

John Curran
Keeping it in that space of technology, and this is, I think, a big area around new office politics, is who can use technology well and who can’t. And that’s especially around meetings, online meetings. So things like whiteboards or people not being able to share a screen or having trouble, and these are becoming a currency. Those that can do it in a kind of, well, smooth way seem to be kind of getting much more kind of recognition about that.

Isabel Berwick
Do you have any advice for anybody who finds themselves in a sort of toxic work environment? Can one person change that? Should you stay or should you go? Miranda, what would you do?

Miranda Green
I think it’s a bad idea to think you can ever cure other people or cure an environment through your own efforts however many cups of tea you make for the group, and sometimes you do have to think about your own survival. So I would caution people to think that they can go in and clean up a mess.

John Curran
For managers and also leaders, they need to have that ability to observe and listen to self-reflect. If they’re observing office politics, how’s it making them feel? Because often if they don’t reflect on that, that will impact on how they’re gonna respond. And they need to have the ability to address and confront certain elements of politics if they do become slightly toxic and not be fearful of that.

Miranda Green
Isabel, what do you think about this? Do you think that the kind of office politics culture is set from the top, and so you’re kind of stuck with where you are and how you navigate that, or do you think that people can make their own microclimate?

Isabel Berwick
I think you can make your own microclimate to a certain extent, but I think the role of the manager is consistently underthought about. I think your office culture or your workplace culture or the politics of your workplace are only as good as your line manager.

John Curran
I totally agree, and Gallup have said that there’s many cultures in the organisation as there are managers.

Isabel Berwick
Exactly that. So it is a microclimate, but you know it’s set from the top. So if you don’t like the purpose or the drive of the organisation, that’s probably not a good fit for you anyway. Miranda, if you had one tip for the listeners on office politics from your long and very successful career as a political animal, what would it be?

Miranda Green
Think about what you enjoy doing every day and make sure you defend your right to do that as much as possible from the depredations of being sucked into the obligations towards your colleagues or the failure to make your right to do that recognised by your superiors.

Isabel Berwick
Perfect. John?

John Curran
Develop a strategy that will protect you, but in a proactive way for why you are there in the first place. 

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Isabel Berwick
Well, there’s a lot to think about there. Office politics is one of my favourite topics. I’ve been very bad at it in the past, but I’m trying my best and I’ve got lots of good tips from John and Miranda. I am gonna still make tea, but I’m also going to notice who sits where and who arrives late in the meeting. So thank you so much to John Curran and Miranda Green.

Miranda Green
It’s been a delight.

John Curran
Thank you so much.

Isabel Berwick
This episode of Working It was produced by Mischa Frankl-Duval and mixed by Simon Panayi. The executive producer was Manuela Saragosa, and Cheryl Brumley is the FT’s global head of audio. Thanks for listening. 

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