Savvy is a critical leadership skill and becoming politically savvy is not difficult. The only requirement is a willingness to step outside your comfort zone and confront fears that may be deeply entrenched (or hidden) and no longer recognized for what they are.
Scholars understand organizations as political systems and frames. Legitimate, factual and positive politics are critical components of organizational life. Everybody inside a company is part and parcel of a politically-organized community and each person’s role and behaviour depends on how he or she interprets the situation.
Your present paradigm
“What are you reading and carrying into the situation?” Baddeley and James, two expert researchers on organizational politics, ask this question of their clients to challenge their thinking about politics.
Reading refers to your ability to perceive and interpret the unwritten rules or the less-obvious elements of organizational life. Reading removes the (organizational) veil helping you to recognize what is really happening at work. Admittedly, your present paradigm depends on your attitude about politics: negative or positive. Your current attitude comes from your prior experience with office politics.
Carrying refers to what you take with you as an organizational leader. To determine this, you must reflect on your thoughts and feelings.
Sound complicated? It’s not. It’s simply about putting on a different lens to view the organization. Take off the rose-coloured glasses, leave behind negative thoughts, and start seeing organizational life in a new way.
Action Plan
Reading and carrying are dynamic skills. Every situation demands a new lens. Every context differs. This new insight will require that you overcome any present bias you may have about “why things are the way they” are or how they “should” be different.
Moving into a new leadership role requires you to view your organization anew when it comes to people, tasks, and teams. You must also remember what you’re bringing to each situation. What are your experiences or biases telling you?
You have a strong intuitive sense; you’ll have a strong bias for action. But your new skill will lie in paying attention to events as they unfold and then reflecting on your reactions to them: same or different?
