Political Navigators' Skills
This chapter will explore relationship, communication, conflict resolution, partnership, organizational understanding, and political thinking skills.
There are also useful when resolving conflicts, negotiating, and building relationships and partnerships.
A) RELATIONSHIP SKILLS
Relationship skills allow political navigators to enhance their relationships with other people in the organization. They help you build a positive, comfortable, and nonthreatening communication climate with others—one that encourages people to discuss organizational issues, problems, and other ideas openly and honestly, without fear of reprisal.
Accordingly, the first rule in relationship building with another person is for you to listen, truly hearing what another person is saying, both verbally and nonverbally. This requires listening, observing, and empathizing skills to enable you to really hear what others are saying and to pick up on what is "between the lines" of a message.
Improving relationships requires you to shift your managerial style from authoritarian to participatory. This is done by relinquishing control and dominance over other people and allowing them to participate as equal partners. Thus, recognize and accept that others have a great deal of experience, insight, and expertise that needs to be acknowledged, tapped, and applied. In order to demonstrate the value and importance of others' ideas and thoughts, you become an active participant during political interactions.
Once a participatory managerial style has been established, continue using your interpersonal skills to gather important information from others. Encourage them to share their feelings and provide moments of silence that can help others reflect and reconsider their ideas, thoughts, and positions. These skills serve as road map helping you maneuver and adjust to the ebbs and flows of communication during exchanges with others.
The ultimate outcome of a positive relationship with another person is known as rapport, which is the unconditional positive regard between you and another person. Rapport is more than a superficial relationship; it is a deep concern for the well-being of others. It can be demonstrated when you are as interested in others as you are in the results they produce. Rapport is established through your sincere interest in and acceptance of others.
Rapport is further enhanced when you are emotionally empathetic. This is demonstrated when you are empathically attuned to the emotions and feelings of others. However, successful political navigators understand that most political interactions and engagements are messy, and at times, decidedly emotional, especially for politically unconscious incompetent individuals, who often do not have the same adaptability you do. The emotions of such individuals are normal and inevitable, and therefore cannot be ignored. Practicing emotional empathy raises holistic understanding and engages others, thereby gaining more interpersonal leverage.
Interpersonal Relationship Styles
In the 1960s, Dr. David Merrill identified two clusters of behavior: assertiveness and responsiveness. These two dominions are incredibly helpful in predicting how other people are likely to behave. These key dimensions of behavior combine to form the interpersonal relationship styles model
Interpersonal Relationship Styles Model
Assertiveness. In this model, assertiveness is the degree to which a person is perceived as attempting to influence the thoughts and actions of others. It is helpful to think of a continuum of assertiveness, in which a person's behavior is typically more assertive or less assertive than that of half the population.
Responsiveness. Responsiveness is the other crucial dimension of behavior in this model. Responsiveness is the degree to which a person is perceived as expressing feelings when relating with others. It is helpful to think of a continuum of responsiveness in which a person's behavior is typically more responsive or less responsive than that of half the population.
Four Interpersonal Styles. Each individual's interpersonal style is his or her own unique blend of two dimensions: assertiveness and responsiveness. Nevertheless, most people fall more or less into one or another of the four styles known as analytical, driver, amiable, or expressive. These four styles can be described this way:
? Analytical style is perceived as control-responsive/ask-assertive. Analyticals are task oriented, precise, and thorough. Analyticals like to deal in facts, work methodically, and use standard operating procedures. They are motivated by a need for respect and their specialty is technical.
? Driver style is perceived as control-responsive/tell-assertive. Drivers are goal-oriented, disciplined, determined "bottom-line" thinkers who push for results and accomplishments. Their motivation is power and their specialty is control.
? Amiable style is perceived as emote-responsive/ask-assertive. Amiables are people oriented, friendly, accepting, cooperative, and like to be liked. Amiables are motivated to help others in a team effort. The payoff for them is approval and their specialty is supportive.
? Expressive style is perceived as emote-responsive/tell-assertive. Expressives are idea oriented, vigorous, enthusiastic, and spontaneous. Expressives thrive on recognition. Their specialty is social and they like to initiate relationships and motivate others toward goals.
Improving Interpersonal Relationships with Analyticals. Analyticals value hard work and attention to detail and situations for them must be logical and carefully worked out. When working with analyticals, you can enhance your versatility by:
? sticking to business;
? using action words rather than feeling words;
? providing solid, realistic evidence and support for decision making;
? preparing your "case" in advance;
? approaching them in a straightforward way;
? supporting their principles when possible;
? presenting materials in an organized manner, making certain that you clearly communicate important ideas and facts;
? using a step-by-step timetable, assuring them there won't be surprises when preparing a schedule for implementing action;
? avoiding casual, loud, or informal conversations;
? being precise and organized and not using opinion words (others' or your own) as evidence;
? avoiding guesses and being accurate whenever possible;
? not being disorganized or rushing the decision-making process;
? avoiding leaving things to chance or luck;
? avoiding aggressive behavior, being unrealistic with deadlines, or being vague about what is expected of them and always following through.
Improving Interpersonal Relationships with Drivers. Drivers need information that allows them to make decisions quickly and get tangible results. They also like to know they are in charge. When working with drivers, you can enhance your versatility by:
? being clear, specific, brief, and to the point;
? always dealing with the facts, packaging them for quick decision making;
? using results that support their conclusions and actions;
? sticking to business;
? coming prepared with all requirements, objectives, and support material in a well-organized presentation;
? always presenting the facts logically and planning your presentation efficiently;
? asking specific questions and providing them alternatives and choices for making their own decisions;
? departing graciously after concluding your business;
? avoiding trying to build personal relations and not wasting their time;
? not being inefficient, disorganized, messy, or rambling on;
? avoiding conversations that distract them from the business at hand;
? not asking rhetorical questions;
? not going to a meeting with a ready-made decision;
? never trying to convince them to support an idea through "personal" appeals.
Improving Interpersonal Relationships with Amiables. Amiables want warmth, understanding, friendship, and trust in their communications. Their strength is building personal relationships. When working with amiables, you can enhance your versatility by:
? holding open meetings with a personal comment to break the ice and being casual and nonthreatening;
? providing assurances and guarantees, especially for decision making;
? supporting their relationships and feelings and showing sincere interest in them;
? being candid and open;
? listening carefully to what is being said and being responsive;
? presenting your case softly, in a nonthreatening manner;
? watching carefully for possible areas of early disagreement or dissatisfaction;
? moving casually, informally;
? defining clearly (preferably in writing) individual contributions and assuring them that their actions will diminish risks and benefit them;
? not rushing into the business agenda or forcing them to respond quickly;
? avoiding disagreeable subjects and not sticking coldly or harshly to business;
? avoiding debating facts and figures;
? not being vague (rather, offer them options and probabilities);
? not patronizing or demeaning them by using subtlety;
? not being abrupt or rude.
Improving Interpersonal Relationships with Expressives. Expressives need to know you are with them in spirit and they appreciate information that allows them to move, create, or take action. When working with expressives, you can enhance your versatility by:
? asking for their opinions and ideas and supporting their dreams and intentions;
? always talking about people and their goals;
? giving testimony and incentives for decisions;
? leaving time for relating and socializing;
? asking for their opinions/ideas regarding people;
? allowing plenty of time to be stimulating, fun loving, and active;
? providing testimonials from people they see as important and prominent;
? offering special, immediate, and extra incentives for their willingness to take risks;
? avoiding dealing with too many details or being dogmatic, cold, or tight-lipped;
? never talking down to them, legislating over them, or presenting them with too many facts and figures;
? avoiding being boring;
? not leaving decisions hanging in the air;
? not being too task-oriented or judgmental.
B) COMMUNICATION SKILLS
Communication skills are used to help you improve your exchanges with the people directly and indirectly involved in a political interaction or engagement. Using communication skills helps establish rapport with other people, which leads to more successful political interactions and engagements. These skills can play a critical role in relating successfully with others. Communication skills can be clustered into two categories: following skills and understanding skills
i) Following Skills
There are four skills that help you follow others better during one-on-one conversations. They are: active listening, questioning, encouraging, and silence.
a) Active Listening.
Good listening is the foundation of the empathetic behavior previously discussed and is an important bridge to understanding others. Accordingly, a key to effective communications is to become a better listener. In fact, approximately 70 percent of a manager's day is spent in communication and over half of that time involves listening. Feedback is a critical element in effective communication and can be made accurate through good listening.
The difference between inactive and active listening is the difference between just hearing and listening. The act of listening requires energy, effort, and concentration. Listening readily captures content and intended meaning that others are attempting to convey. Further, active listening conveys respect. When people are listened to attentively, they will believe that their point of view is taken more seriously. They will also state their feelings and thinking more clearly. They will provide feedback that demonstrates respect and listen to others more carefully when they speak. Additionally, they will become less quarrelsome and more receptive to different points of view.
In order to develop better listening skills, concentrate all your physical and mental energies on listening, demonstrate interest and alertness, and seek an area of agreement with others. When possible, search for meaning and avoid getting hung up on specific words, avoid interrupting the speaker, and demonstrate patience (people can "listen faster" than others can speak). Provide clear and unambiguous feedback to others, repress the tendency to respond emotionally to what is said, and ask questions when you do not understand something. Finally, withhold evaluation of the message until the other person is finished and you are sure you understand the message.
b) Questioning.
Questions are used to direct the conversation into more constructive and informative channels. Questions may be directed at an entire group or a specific person. Questioning is a powerful tool with which to guide the flow and direction of conversation, facilitate group discussion, and help you obtain specific information. Basically, two types of questions are useful: closed- and open-ended.
Closed-ended questions have specific responses and can be answered in relatively few words. They are important for guiding the conversation and gathering essential information quickly. Examples of a closed-ended question might be, "How long have you been in your current position?" or "Is this a problem you would like to solve?" This type of question is concerned with gathering needed information rather than with the effectiveness of the response or the feelings of others.
In contrast, open-ended questions generally encourage another person to expand the conversation in several different directions and require more than a few words to answer. They also help people to prepare to consider divergent points of view or widen their perceptual field. Open-ended questions open the doors to developing a good rapport and positive relationship. An open-ended question allows people to convey their point of view and is less threatening to others. An example might be, "How do you feel about the effectiveness of the new marketing program?" People answering this type of question may take several different approaches.
c) Encouraging.
Encouraging enables people to continue to elaborate on their thoughts and feeling. Supportive remarks by you such as "I understand," "It's OK to feel that way," "That's interesting, tell me more," or "I hear you" are useful in countering feelings of inadequacy. They also prompt action by encouraging people to continue the discussion. Another effective skill is an "umm-hum" or a nod of the head to let others know you are listening. This serves to strengthen a person's response and his or her efforts to continue speaking.
d) Silence.
The use of silence is a somewhat difficult skill to master but enables the person speaking to provide additional information or explanation, if appropriate or needed, and think through what has transpired. However, even experienced political navigators are initially uncomfortable with silence as a technique. However, with practice, it becomes obvious that intentional silence provides people the opportunity to explore their feelings more deeply and provide them with additional time to think about what they are going to say. Additionally, it may provide the less articulate people with a feeling of worth. Sometimes, silence can be overdone; more than a minute of silence, for example, often causes discomfort. Therefore, avoid extensive periods of silence as they may be misinterpreted and perceived as unresponsiveness. Silence is most beneficial when used in combination with other skills, such as active listening and encouraging.
ii) Understanding Skills
Political navigators use skills that help them interpret the thoughts and ideas of others. To accomplish this, use skills that allow others to elaborate, expand, and provide clarity regarding their thoughts and ideas. Six skills help you better understand others during the one-on-one conversations common during political interactions. They are: interpreting, clarifying, reflecting, summarizing, paraphrasing, and tentative analysis.
a) Interpreting.
Interpreting is used to explain cause-and-effect relationships and clarify implications. This approach generally results in a greater awareness of what is involved and enables people to understand the full ramifications of what another person is saying. Interpreting requires you to draw a conclusion about another person's perception of a situation or event and provides a basis for publicly testing any assumptions made during a conversation. Thus, it allows you the opportunity to verify your own point of view and acknowledge the correctness of your interpretation. Common statements such as "What I hear you saying ..." and "Based upon what you have said..." can be used to introduce your interpretations.
b) Clarifying.
When political navigators ask another person to elaborate on a particular point or statement or provide an example or illustration to make the meaning more clearly understood, they are using the clarifying technique. Additionally, sometimes it is helpful to make clarifying statements in an attempt to place another person's feeling and attitudes in a clear, more recognizable form and thereby identify the cause of his or her problem. Do not use clarifying to interpret another person's feelings but, rather, to "test" understanding. Using this skill involves asking questions such as "Are you angry at not being selected to participate in the restructuring project?"
c) Reflecting.
Reflecting allows you to bring to the surface the substantive content and emotions of another person's words. It is used to illustrate that you understand correctly what others are in experiencing, thinking, or feeling. Reflecting helps you bring out into the open feelings and hidden agendas and to guide the conversation. This is critical because deeply repressed feelings can affect virtually every thought or behavior of other people. Such feelings often negatively affect the political interaction process. Therefore, they need to be brought to the surface to be dealt with effectively, which helps develop open and honest communication. An example of a summarizing statement would be, "So you are looking for a training program to help you develop interpersonal skills to improve your effectiveness as a supervisor?"
d) Summarizing.
Summarizing communicates to others the essence of what has been said throughout a political interaction. To make certain that both sides are understood, you may wish to ask another person to agree or disagree with your summary. An example of a summarizing statement is, "Let me take a moment to summarize our conversation...." This technique is used to summarize several concepts, ideas, and thoughts and help you to identify the most important of them. Alternatively, you may wish to have another person summarize the discussion as a way of checking for accuracy and understanding. Summarizing differs from paraphrasing in that it is used at the end of a discussion with another person.
e) Paraphrasing.
The primary purpose of paraphrasing is to restate, in your own words, another person's basic message. Paraphrasing is used primarily to test your understanding of what has been said. It is used to communicate to another person that you are trying to understand the basic message and, if successful, that you have been following what a person has said. An example of paraphrasing would be: "You seem to be saying that his overbearing personality makes it difficult to accomplish the project."
f) Tentative Analysis.
A tentative analysis is usually stated in the form of a question because it is a "hunch" type of interpretation that is usually narrow in scope. Thus, it is a form of short summarization. Because it generally deals with one thought or concept instead of several, it stops short of being comprehensive. Its principal advantage is that it communicates that you are attempting to test publicly your understanding of another person's message. Doing this one step at a time, you demonstrate respect for another person's viewpoint and patience with them. An example of tentative analysis would be, "I have a feeling you are not very satisfied with the quality of the sales training program."
Questions Helpful in Improving Your Own Communication Effectiveness
To improve your communications effectiveness, use the following questions as a guide when preparing for a political interaction:
? To what degree does my personal history affect this conversation?
? To what degree is my self-concept at risk?
? How threatened do I feel?
? Did I hear the other person correctly?
? Do I really understand what the other person is saying?
? Given my knowledge of the other person, to what degree might that person be distorting the interaction? In what probable direction?
? How threatened might the other person be at this moment?
? How might I reduce defensiveness?
? Have I made any unjustified assumptions about this interaction or its meaning?
? Does my attitude toward the other person distort my perceptions?
? What is the other person's interpersonal style? How does it match with my own?
? What adjustments might I have to make in order to accommodate this person's interpersonal style?
C) CONFLICT RESOLUTION SKILLS
During political interactions and engagements, it is difficult to maintain positive interpersonal relationships because people have different agendas, values, beliefs, and interpersonal communication styles. This can take a great toll on all parties personally and produce significant amounts of stress. Therefore, conflict resolution skills are absolutely critical to your success as a political navigator.
Understanding and Dealing with Political Resistance
When political conflict occurs, people resist alternatives, solutions, and options used to resolve the conflict. However, many managers are shocked when it occurs and wish that it would never happen or would just go away. The only solution for dealing with political resistance is to understand its underlying reasons and learn how to address them.
As a political navigator, you understand that political resistance is a very positive opportunity. It allows you to confirm support for your political solutions, as well as to address peoples' fears and vulnerabilities.
Resistance is simply the fear of losing one's current state. In fact, resistance is predictable, natural, and a necessary part of learning about another person or implementing a political solution. It is a natural response for people to become defensive. They push back when they feel they are being pushed. One solution might be to present only those alternatives that do not cause them to become defensive, but is this realistic? By addressing political resistance and taking advantage of the opportunities it offers, you improve your credibility and influence and enhance your status in the organization.
Regardless of how people express resistance, it is important to identify the many reasons for political resistance. Here are the most common reasons:
? The purpose of a political solution is not made clear.
? Employees affected by a political solution are not involved in the planning.
? An appeal for a political solution is based on personal reasons.
? There is a fear of failure.
? The cost (personal or organizational) is too high or the rewards inadequate.
? These is a perceived lose of control.
? The vested interest of the individual or subunit of the organization is involved.
? There is a lack of respect and trust in the initiator.
? There is satisfaction with the status quo.
? Past experience with political conflict is negative.
? There is an honest difference of opinion.
? There is a lack of management support for a political solution.
Conflict over resources, conflict over recognition and rewards, lack of commitment to a political solution, lack of an agreed-upon solution, differing organizational values, lack of trust and credibility, and differing realities are other circumstances that can produce resistance.
Political Resistance Resolution Method
During a political conflict, the root cause of resistance is fear. People fear losing control, power, status, authority, or position. People also fear becoming vulnerable. However, most people are too proud to admit it. They often rationalize their behavior or blame others for creating the situation. In the face of change, they resist positive political solutions because they fear the outcomes.
When political resistance occurs, you should not take it personally and become defensive. Political resistance is simply the result of differing perspectives and the fear of losing the status quo. Political navigators who maintain an objective viewpoint will be better able to deal with people's resistance to their ideas, alternatives, and suggestions. You can minimize resistance by presenting political solutions in a timely and orderly fashion. Additionally, you will compromise your integrity by endorsing solutions that, however, popular, do not adequately solve the organization's problems.
Political navigators can address these differing perspectives by using the political resistance resolution method. This method can be thought of as a set of skills to govern conflict. It is a constructive process for handling emotion-laden disagreements between you and other people. Its purpose is to bring to the surface underlying fears that cause resistance, so others can understand and accept the proposed solution, change, or alternative being proposed. This method encourages assertive communications and the sharing of feelings but does not permit the typical free-for-all that blocks creative resolution. Quite simply, it is an effective tool for addressing differing perspectives of people. The method consists of four steps: (1) acknowledging political resistance, (2) clarifying political resistance, (3) problem solving, and (4) confirming the answer.
i) Acknowledging Political Resistance.
The political resistance resolution method begins with acknowledging resistance. In other words, identify it. Acknowledging political resistance helps with controlling the emotions associated with differences of opinion, which is critical because arguing and fighting over differences of opinion will accomplish little.
Acknowledging political resistance consists of two activities: listening and sharing. First, you should listen carefully to another person's messages to determine their meaning. Most critical and emotion-laden statements are made to verbalize excess tension or fear. In fact, the very process of listening helps convert tension into words that serve to reduce anxiety, even if the words themselves do not actually reveal the nature of the tension or the reason for it.
The second activity involves sharing of feelings with another person. When you demonstrate your understanding of another person's feelings and are not surprised or upset by negative statements, it illustrates your support, which helps reduce tension. Quite simply, sharing is a form of support. To be successful in this stage, remain calm and neutral, saying and doing nothing that will increase the other person's tensions or fears.
b) Clarifying Political Resistance.
Few people are ready or willing to reveal the reasons for their behavior, even when they understand what they are. They learn to cover up the plausible reasons, justifications, and explanations in an effort to prove that they're acting in a well thought out and logical manner. There is a word that explains this thinking process: rationalization. Therefore, the second step in resolving conflict is to clarify what another person is thinking so they will be prepared to receive new and logical information.
During this phase, the challenge facing you is to make statements lose force without causing people to lose face. Clarifying involves asking non-threatening questions so that people are allowed to express their thoughts more freely, which clarifies their resistance. By encouraging people to give examples and illustrations, you are helping them grasp their own meaning more clearly. This will help you better understand others' negative statements.
c) Problem Solving.
Once you have clarified a negative statement, you are ready to help people identify solutions to their problems. The problem-solving process typically consists of six steps:
1. Problem identification
2. Political solution identification
3. Political solution analysis
4. Political solution selection
5. Political solution implementation
6. Political solution evaluation
Problem identification involves analyzing the situation to identify expectations and determine the current situation. The discrepancy between these two positions is the problem. Therefore, the focus of the problem-solving process is finding the "best" political solution to the problem(s).
Identifying political solutions involves generating as many ideas as possible to identify a solution. This activity is conducted without evaluating or examining the ideas. The goal is to come upon with as many possible solutions as possible.
Analyzing political solutions is the process of critically examining each of the possible solutions. Set up criteria to serve as a standard or benchmark by which to filter each idea. Ideas that meet most of the criteria are grouped together for further analysis. The ideas that do not meet the established criteria are filed for future consideration.
Selecting political solutions involves testing the solutions that meet the criteria to decide their practicality and ease of application. Identify the cost and potential results of each solution, which will help you decide the best possible political solution from a cost/benefit perspective.
Another critical part of this phase is to name possible obstacles or barriers that may prevent applying a political solution. As these barriers are identified, look at them and decide the possible effects they have on various solutions. You should identify actions to overcome obstacles or barriers, examining financial, human, and emotional costs. This information will help you decide the best political solution. The outcome of this phase of the problem-solving process is that you have identified the best alternative(s).
d) Confirming the Answer.
When an acceptable political solution has been identified, all parties must make a commitment—typically some kind of immediate action—that reinforces their willingness to accept the remedy. At this time, feedback is essential in evaluating the continuing viability of the solution and of the relationship in general. Finally, the last two phase of the traditional problem-solving process are applicable during this part of the resistance to political resolution process: solution implementation and solution evaluation.
Implementing political solutions is the process of applying the political solution to determine its results. When doing this, you should choose opportunities or situations where the political solution has the highest degree of success. This strategy allows you to integrate the solution under the best possible conditions before they apply it to the entire department, division, or organization.
D) PARTNERSHIP SKILLS
Gaining credibility as a political navigator requires demonstrating the knowledge, skills, and abilities that the organization values. It is absolutely prerequisite to solving problems, creating opportunities, capitalizing on strategic opportunities, and leveraging organizational strengths. Partnership skills are essential for you to become proficient in political interactions and engagements. These skills are used to manage political interactions and engagements, deal with political resistance, create interpersonal environments that are conducive to sharing of information, and enlist the support and cooperation of others involved in political interaction and engagements.
Partnership skills are the most eclectic skill sets of a political navigator because they are an integration of the three previously discussed skills (relationship, communication, and conflict resolution). Partnership skills rely on your ability to build and maintain positive synergistic relationships, communicate effectively and clearly, and resolve conflict in a constructive and productive manner. However, you must develop an understanding of partnerships to execute the skills effectively.
By design, a partnership is a long-term, collaborative activity that focuses on achieving results through mutually beneficial relationships used in helping the organization successfully achieve its goals and objectives. These relationships assist you in acquiring a responsive attitude necessary for you to become more people oriented and thereby better understand and anticipate their needs. Partnerships help you decide which political interactions and engagements provide the highest value and have the greatest impact on the organization. They also promote establishment of working relationships based on shared values, aligned purpose and vision, and mutual support. Furthermore, partnerships are based on the business and performance needs of people, not a political navigator's career aspirations or professional success.
Foundations for Partnership Skills
There are two primary elements of partnership skills: purpose and partnering. Purpose brings people together and provides a focus and direction for the partnership, the result of which is clarifying roles and focus. It also embraces underlying assumptions, trust and risk, shared values, and expectations. Purpose defines "why" a partnership is needed. Simply, purpose helps describe what you intend to achieve as a result of a partnership.
Partnering exemplifies the observable dynamics between you and other people engaging in a partnership. It incorporates the common values, beliefs, assumptions, and expectations of all parties in a partnership. Unfortunately, much that is important to partnering often goes unexpressed. Partnering occurs when you and other people pursue a common purpose together. Those who attend to purpose but neglect partnering often fail in their work altogether.
E) ORGANIZATIONAL UNDERSTANDING SKILLS
Political navigators rely on their organizational understanding skills when identifying the needs of all key clients (decision makers, stakeholders, influencers, and scouts) in the organization. Additionally, these skills enable you to identify the issues that ultimately contribute to political conflict in the organization.
Organizational understanding skills can be best demonstrated when you reflect on how organizations work. Simply stated, it is essential for you to think like the people you serve. This understanding requires knowledge of how things get done inside an organization as well as how decisions are made there. Business understanding requires you to have knowledge of business fundamentals, systems theory, organizational culture, and politics. By developing business understanding, you will be better able to facilitate political engagements that help in identifying political solutions that improve organizational effectiveness.
Organizational understanding skills require you to ascertain the readiness and commitment of people to political solutions. The following questions can be used as a guide in this process:
? How willing are the members of the organization to implement political solutions?
? Is upper-level management willing to support political engagements?
? What types of information do members of the organization readily accept or resist?
? What are the members' attitudes toward political solutions?
? What are the executives' attitudes toward political solutions?
Organizational understanding skills also require you to intentionally prioritize the contributions, involvement, and loyalty of people above the organizational system. This is known as organizational subordination. Thus, you demonstrate organizational subordination by eliminating policies and procedures and organizational structures that interfere with, prevent, or discourage the implementation of political solutions.
Organizational understanding skills require you to have the ability to be completely committed to identifying appropriate political solutions. Further, you have the ability to ask others in the organization about their perspective of the organization, its financial and competitive position, strengths and weaknesses, management structure, management capacity, technological state, relationship to competitors, reward and compensation systems used to motivate others, performance appraisal and review systems, performance management system, and management's attitude toward human resources within the organization. These critical areas of inquiry help you acquire an understanding of the organization and the nature of its business and demonstrate your understanding of business fundamentals.
Next, your ability to manage projects (political engagements) is critical. Thus, political navigators possess project management skills that enable them to plan and identify objectives and activities that produce a desired result (political solution), organize people to get the job done and direct them by keeping them focused on achieving the results, and measure the project team's progress and give them feedback to keep the project moving ahead, while constantly monitoring progress toward, and deviation from, the project's goals.
The final organizational understanding skill is systems thinking, which involves viewing and understanding an organization as an open system. Such thinking requires you to have detailed knowledge of the inputs, throughputs, and outputs of the organization, as well as the critical connections and disconnections that exist therein. These characteristics form a framework for appraising an organization's internal environment, isolating political problems, and identifying relationships critical to implementing political engagements.
S.W.O.T. analysis is useful in identifying a wealth of information that will guide you throughout the political engagement process.
i) Internal Environment. Examination of the internal environment allows for identification of the organization's strengths and weaknesses. This environment obviously affects execution of its mission. A number of areas must be considered when examining the internal environment. Several questions should be asked to determine the strengths and weaknesses of an organization:
1. What is the financial condition of the organization?
2. What are the aptitudes and abilities of managers and employees?
3. What is the current condition of facilities?
4. What is the current state and quality of technology?
5. What is the quantity and quality of material resources?
6. What is the quantity and quality of human resources?
7. What are the current images of various departments and their visions?
8. How is the organization structured?
9. What is the organization's culture?
10. What is the work climate within the organization?
11. What are the policies and procedures that improve or impede organizational performance and effectiveness?
12. What are the managerial practices within the organization?
13. What is the quality of organizational leadership?
14. What are the strengths and weaknesses of the organizational leaders?
15. What are the strengths and weaknesses of the organizational culture?
16. What is the organization's mission and strategy?
17. Does the organization have a formal learning system?
18. What is the compensation and reward system?
19. What is the quality of the performance appraisal process?
20. Is performance coaching used within the organization?
Once these areas have been examined, describe each relationship in terms of its strengths and weaknesses. It is recommended that several data collection methods be used when conducting such an analysis (e. g., interviews, observations, questionnaires, and focus groups). Combining methodologies is an excellent way of ensuring a more accurate picture of the internal state of the organization.
An analysis of the collected data can be used to help you to make recommendations for the improved allocation of material, financial, and human resources in the execution of an organization's goals, objectives, and mission. In so doing, you demonstrate that you have the expertise to analyze the health of your organization, provide recommendations, and provide leadership and guidance that will improve overall effectiveness and efficiency.
ii) External Environment. The long-term conditions facing the organization can be uncovered through an external environmental analysis. Such an analysis identifies and encompasses several important variables, including: resource availability; current economic condition; social and cultural values; the legal and political environment; the organization's competitive rank; performance and organizational gaps, and image in the marketplace.
In order to remain viable in the marketplace, many organizations maintain aggressive research and development programs. An external environmental analysis helps identify the opportunities and threats facing an organization in a given industry, vis-Ã -vis the amount, type, and quality of technology needed to remain competitive. With the continued escalation of technology, such an analysis will be extremely important to the long-term competitiveness of most organizations and, ultimately, their long-term success. There are a number of questions that are useful in determining the external environment facing an organization:
1. What are the economic conditions of the nation, region, and local community?
2. What social and cultural values predominate within the industry and its geographic locations?
3. What quantity and quality of technology does the organization employ to achieve its business results?
4. What external financial, material, and human resources are available?
5. What is the organization's image in the marketplace?
6. What is the company's competitive rank within the industry?
7. What performance gaps exist within the organization?
8. What organizational effectiveness gaps exist?
This information reveals the economic health of an organization, its values, political climate, use of technology and resources, competitive rank within its industry, overall image, and areas requiring improvement.
F) POLITICAL THINKING SKILLS
During any political interaction or engagement, your primary job is to consider what possibilities, circumstances, events, and conditions are creating resistance. You have an obligation to determine why certain political solutions are being fought. Obviously, some political solutions are more appropriate than others; however, you must make certain of this before recommending and implementing them. To that end, you take the time to observe others; identify other people's needs, interests, expectations, and opinions; examine historical documents reflect on past political interactions; interview interested parties; solicit input from others; and identify a list of questions to be asked before participating in political interactions and engagements. The ultimate purpose of gathering this type of information is to have meaning and purposeful conversations, garner support, make informed decisions, and provide acceptable recommendations. In short, the solution is to think politically, continually asking others about themselves, their opinions, ideas, suggestions, and recommendations. When this approached is used, political navigators are using political thinking skills.
Political thinking skills can include a number of behaviors:
? thinking before reacting
? listening carefully and selectively to others' requests during political interactions
? filtering suggestions and recommendations through a defined philosophy of interpersonal relationships
? understanding one's role during political interactions and engagements
? possessing the courage to encourage political solutions that are appropriate but not popular
? analyzing all requests as requests rather than as commands
? maintaining consistent guiding principles to ensure credibility
By constantly exploring and asking questions, you are not focusing on the status quo, but are continuously looking for new and improved ways of enhancing your relationships with other people and the effectiveness of the organization. Consequently, political thinking is as much a state of mind as it is a series of techniques and processes. Political navigators who are continually examining the state of others and the organization and comparing it with an ideal vision are constantly in touch with the problems and issues facing the people and the organization.
For more Information
* Political Skill, People Skill, People Management Skills, Communication Skills, *
This chapter will explore relationship, communication, conflict resolution, partnership, organizational understanding, and political thinking skills.
There are also useful when resolving conflicts, negotiating, and building relationships and partnerships.
A) RELATIONSHIP SKILLS
Relationship skills allow political navigators to enhance their relationships with other people in the organization. They help you build a positive, comfortable, and nonthreatening communication climate with others—one that encourages people to discuss organizational issues, problems, and other ideas openly and honestly, without fear of reprisal.
Accordingly, the first rule in relationship building with another person is for you to listen, truly hearing what another person is saying, both verbally and nonverbally. This requires listening, observing, and empathizing skills to enable you to really hear what others are saying and to pick up on what is "between the lines" of a message.
Improving relationships requires you to shift your managerial style from authoritarian to participatory. This is done by relinquishing control and dominance over other people and allowing them to participate as equal partners. Thus, recognize and accept that others have a great deal of experience, insight, and expertise that needs to be acknowledged, tapped, and applied. In order to demonstrate the value and importance of others' ideas and thoughts, you become an active participant during political interactions.
Once a participatory managerial style has been established, continue using your interpersonal skills to gather important information from others. Encourage them to share their feelings and provide moments of silence that can help others reflect and reconsider their ideas, thoughts, and positions. These skills serve as road map helping you maneuver and adjust to the ebbs and flows of communication during exchanges with others.
The ultimate outcome of a positive relationship with another person is known as rapport, which is the unconditional positive regard between you and another person. Rapport is more than a superficial relationship; it is a deep concern for the well-being of others. It can be demonstrated when you are as interested in others as you are in the results they produce. Rapport is established through your sincere interest in and acceptance of others.
Rapport is further enhanced when you are emotionally empathetic. This is demonstrated when you are empathically attuned to the emotions and feelings of others. However, successful political navigators understand that most political interactions and engagements are messy, and at times, decidedly emotional, especially for politically unconscious incompetent individuals, who often do not have the same adaptability you do. The emotions of such individuals are normal and inevitable, and therefore cannot be ignored. Practicing emotional empathy raises holistic understanding and engages others, thereby gaining more interpersonal leverage.
Interpersonal Relationship Styles
In the 1960s, Dr. David Merrill identified two clusters of behavior: assertiveness and responsiveness. These two dominions are incredibly helpful in predicting how other people are likely to behave. These key dimensions of behavior combine to form the interpersonal relationship styles model
Interpersonal Relationship Styles Model
Assertiveness. In this model, assertiveness is the degree to which a person is perceived as attempting to influence the thoughts and actions of others. It is helpful to think of a continuum of assertiveness, in which a person's behavior is typically more assertive or less assertive than that of half the population.
Responsiveness. Responsiveness is the other crucial dimension of behavior in this model. Responsiveness is the degree to which a person is perceived as expressing feelings when relating with others. It is helpful to think of a continuum of responsiveness in which a person's behavior is typically more responsive or less responsive than that of half the population.
Four Interpersonal Styles. Each individual's interpersonal style is his or her own unique blend of two dimensions: assertiveness and responsiveness. Nevertheless, most people fall more or less into one or another of the four styles known as analytical, driver, amiable, or expressive. These four styles can be described this way:
? Analytical style is perceived as control-responsive/ask-assertive. Analyticals are task oriented, precise, and thorough. Analyticals like to deal in facts, work methodically, and use standard operating procedures. They are motivated by a need for respect and their specialty is technical.
? Driver style is perceived as control-responsive/tell-assertive. Drivers are goal-oriented, disciplined, determined "bottom-line" thinkers who push for results and accomplishments. Their motivation is power and their specialty is control.
? Amiable style is perceived as emote-responsive/ask-assertive. Amiables are people oriented, friendly, accepting, cooperative, and like to be liked. Amiables are motivated to help others in a team effort. The payoff for them is approval and their specialty is supportive.
? Expressive style is perceived as emote-responsive/tell-assertive. Expressives are idea oriented, vigorous, enthusiastic, and spontaneous. Expressives thrive on recognition. Their specialty is social and they like to initiate relationships and motivate others toward goals.
Improving Interpersonal Relationships with Analyticals. Analyticals value hard work and attention to detail and situations for them must be logical and carefully worked out. When working with analyticals, you can enhance your versatility by:
? sticking to business;
? using action words rather than feeling words;
? providing solid, realistic evidence and support for decision making;
? preparing your "case" in advance;
? approaching them in a straightforward way;
? supporting their principles when possible;
? presenting materials in an organized manner, making certain that you clearly communicate important ideas and facts;
? using a step-by-step timetable, assuring them there won't be surprises when preparing a schedule for implementing action;
? avoiding casual, loud, or informal conversations;
? being precise and organized and not using opinion words (others' or your own) as evidence;
? avoiding guesses and being accurate whenever possible;
? not being disorganized or rushing the decision-making process;
? avoiding leaving things to chance or luck;
? avoiding aggressive behavior, being unrealistic with deadlines, or being vague about what is expected of them and always following through.
Improving Interpersonal Relationships with Drivers. Drivers need information that allows them to make decisions quickly and get tangible results. They also like to know they are in charge. When working with drivers, you can enhance your versatility by:
? being clear, specific, brief, and to the point;
? always dealing with the facts, packaging them for quick decision making;
? using results that support their conclusions and actions;
? sticking to business;
? coming prepared with all requirements, objectives, and support material in a well-organized presentation;
? always presenting the facts logically and planning your presentation efficiently;
? asking specific questions and providing them alternatives and choices for making their own decisions;
? departing graciously after concluding your business;
? avoiding trying to build personal relations and not wasting their time;
? not being inefficient, disorganized, messy, or rambling on;
? avoiding conversations that distract them from the business at hand;
? not asking rhetorical questions;
? not going to a meeting with a ready-made decision;
? never trying to convince them to support an idea through "personal" appeals.
Improving Interpersonal Relationships with Amiables. Amiables want warmth, understanding, friendship, and trust in their communications. Their strength is building personal relationships. When working with amiables, you can enhance your versatility by:
? holding open meetings with a personal comment to break the ice and being casual and nonthreatening;
? providing assurances and guarantees, especially for decision making;
? supporting their relationships and feelings and showing sincere interest in them;
? being candid and open;
? listening carefully to what is being said and being responsive;
? presenting your case softly, in a nonthreatening manner;
? watching carefully for possible areas of early disagreement or dissatisfaction;
? moving casually, informally;
? defining clearly (preferably in writing) individual contributions and assuring them that their actions will diminish risks and benefit them;
? not rushing into the business agenda or forcing them to respond quickly;
? avoiding disagreeable subjects and not sticking coldly or harshly to business;
? avoiding debating facts and figures;
? not being vague (rather, offer them options and probabilities);
? not patronizing or demeaning them by using subtlety;
? not being abrupt or rude.
Improving Interpersonal Relationships with Expressives. Expressives need to know you are with them in spirit and they appreciate information that allows them to move, create, or take action. When working with expressives, you can enhance your versatility by:
? asking for their opinions and ideas and supporting their dreams and intentions;
? always talking about people and their goals;
? giving testimony and incentives for decisions;
? leaving time for relating and socializing;
? asking for their opinions/ideas regarding people;
? allowing plenty of time to be stimulating, fun loving, and active;
? providing testimonials from people they see as important and prominent;
? offering special, immediate, and extra incentives for their willingness to take risks;
? avoiding dealing with too many details or being dogmatic, cold, or tight-lipped;
? never talking down to them, legislating over them, or presenting them with too many facts and figures;
? avoiding being boring;
? not leaving decisions hanging in the air;
? not being too task-oriented or judgmental.
B) COMMUNICATION SKILLS
Communication skills are used to help you improve your exchanges with the people directly and indirectly involved in a political interaction or engagement. Using communication skills helps establish rapport with other people, which leads to more successful political interactions and engagements. These skills can play a critical role in relating successfully with others. Communication skills can be clustered into two categories: following skills and understanding skills
i) Following Skills
There are four skills that help you follow others better during one-on-one conversations. They are: active listening, questioning, encouraging, and silence.
a) Active Listening.
Good listening is the foundation of the empathetic behavior previously discussed and is an important bridge to understanding others. Accordingly, a key to effective communications is to become a better listener. In fact, approximately 70 percent of a manager's day is spent in communication and over half of that time involves listening. Feedback is a critical element in effective communication and can be made accurate through good listening.
The difference between inactive and active listening is the difference between just hearing and listening. The act of listening requires energy, effort, and concentration. Listening readily captures content and intended meaning that others are attempting to convey. Further, active listening conveys respect. When people are listened to attentively, they will believe that their point of view is taken more seriously. They will also state their feelings and thinking more clearly. They will provide feedback that demonstrates respect and listen to others more carefully when they speak. Additionally, they will become less quarrelsome and more receptive to different points of view.
In order to develop better listening skills, concentrate all your physical and mental energies on listening, demonstrate interest and alertness, and seek an area of agreement with others. When possible, search for meaning and avoid getting hung up on specific words, avoid interrupting the speaker, and demonstrate patience (people can "listen faster" than others can speak). Provide clear and unambiguous feedback to others, repress the tendency to respond emotionally to what is said, and ask questions when you do not understand something. Finally, withhold evaluation of the message until the other person is finished and you are sure you understand the message.
b) Questioning.
Questions are used to direct the conversation into more constructive and informative channels. Questions may be directed at an entire group or a specific person. Questioning is a powerful tool with which to guide the flow and direction of conversation, facilitate group discussion, and help you obtain specific information. Basically, two types of questions are useful: closed- and open-ended.
Closed-ended questions have specific responses and can be answered in relatively few words. They are important for guiding the conversation and gathering essential information quickly. Examples of a closed-ended question might be, "How long have you been in your current position?" or "Is this a problem you would like to solve?" This type of question is concerned with gathering needed information rather than with the effectiveness of the response or the feelings of others.
In contrast, open-ended questions generally encourage another person to expand the conversation in several different directions and require more than a few words to answer. They also help people to prepare to consider divergent points of view or widen their perceptual field. Open-ended questions open the doors to developing a good rapport and positive relationship. An open-ended question allows people to convey their point of view and is less threatening to others. An example might be, "How do you feel about the effectiveness of the new marketing program?" People answering this type of question may take several different approaches.
c) Encouraging.
Encouraging enables people to continue to elaborate on their thoughts and feeling. Supportive remarks by you such as "I understand," "It's OK to feel that way," "That's interesting, tell me more," or "I hear you" are useful in countering feelings of inadequacy. They also prompt action by encouraging people to continue the discussion. Another effective skill is an "umm-hum" or a nod of the head to let others know you are listening. This serves to strengthen a person's response and his or her efforts to continue speaking.
d) Silence.
The use of silence is a somewhat difficult skill to master but enables the person speaking to provide additional information or explanation, if appropriate or needed, and think through what has transpired. However, even experienced political navigators are initially uncomfortable with silence as a technique. However, with practice, it becomes obvious that intentional silence provides people the opportunity to explore their feelings more deeply and provide them with additional time to think about what they are going to say. Additionally, it may provide the less articulate people with a feeling of worth. Sometimes, silence can be overdone; more than a minute of silence, for example, often causes discomfort. Therefore, avoid extensive periods of silence as they may be misinterpreted and perceived as unresponsiveness. Silence is most beneficial when used in combination with other skills, such as active listening and encouraging.
ii) Understanding Skills
Political navigators use skills that help them interpret the thoughts and ideas of others. To accomplish this, use skills that allow others to elaborate, expand, and provide clarity regarding their thoughts and ideas. Six skills help you better understand others during the one-on-one conversations common during political interactions. They are: interpreting, clarifying, reflecting, summarizing, paraphrasing, and tentative analysis.
a) Interpreting.
Interpreting is used to explain cause-and-effect relationships and clarify implications. This approach generally results in a greater awareness of what is involved and enables people to understand the full ramifications of what another person is saying. Interpreting requires you to draw a conclusion about another person's perception of a situation or event and provides a basis for publicly testing any assumptions made during a conversation. Thus, it allows you the opportunity to verify your own point of view and acknowledge the correctness of your interpretation. Common statements such as "What I hear you saying ..." and "Based upon what you have said..." can be used to introduce your interpretations.
b) Clarifying.
When political navigators ask another person to elaborate on a particular point or statement or provide an example or illustration to make the meaning more clearly understood, they are using the clarifying technique. Additionally, sometimes it is helpful to make clarifying statements in an attempt to place another person's feeling and attitudes in a clear, more recognizable form and thereby identify the cause of his or her problem. Do not use clarifying to interpret another person's feelings but, rather, to "test" understanding. Using this skill involves asking questions such as "Are you angry at not being selected to participate in the restructuring project?"
c) Reflecting.
Reflecting allows you to bring to the surface the substantive content and emotions of another person's words. It is used to illustrate that you understand correctly what others are in experiencing, thinking, or feeling. Reflecting helps you bring out into the open feelings and hidden agendas and to guide the conversation. This is critical because deeply repressed feelings can affect virtually every thought or behavior of other people. Such feelings often negatively affect the political interaction process. Therefore, they need to be brought to the surface to be dealt with effectively, which helps develop open and honest communication. An example of a summarizing statement would be, "So you are looking for a training program to help you develop interpersonal skills to improve your effectiveness as a supervisor?"
d) Summarizing.
Summarizing communicates to others the essence of what has been said throughout a political interaction. To make certain that both sides are understood, you may wish to ask another person to agree or disagree with your summary. An example of a summarizing statement is, "Let me take a moment to summarize our conversation...." This technique is used to summarize several concepts, ideas, and thoughts and help you to identify the most important of them. Alternatively, you may wish to have another person summarize the discussion as a way of checking for accuracy and understanding. Summarizing differs from paraphrasing in that it is used at the end of a discussion with another person.
e) Paraphrasing.
The primary purpose of paraphrasing is to restate, in your own words, another person's basic message. Paraphrasing is used primarily to test your understanding of what has been said. It is used to communicate to another person that you are trying to understand the basic message and, if successful, that you have been following what a person has said. An example of paraphrasing would be: "You seem to be saying that his overbearing personality makes it difficult to accomplish the project."
f) Tentative Analysis.
A tentative analysis is usually stated in the form of a question because it is a "hunch" type of interpretation that is usually narrow in scope. Thus, it is a form of short summarization. Because it generally deals with one thought or concept instead of several, it stops short of being comprehensive. Its principal advantage is that it communicates that you are attempting to test publicly your understanding of another person's message. Doing this one step at a time, you demonstrate respect for another person's viewpoint and patience with them. An example of tentative analysis would be, "I have a feeling you are not very satisfied with the quality of the sales training program."
Questions Helpful in Improving Your Own Communication Effectiveness
To improve your communications effectiveness, use the following questions as a guide when preparing for a political interaction:
? To what degree does my personal history affect this conversation?
? To what degree is my self-concept at risk?
? How threatened do I feel?
? Did I hear the other person correctly?
? Do I really understand what the other person is saying?
? Given my knowledge of the other person, to what degree might that person be distorting the interaction? In what probable direction?
? How threatened might the other person be at this moment?
? How might I reduce defensiveness?
? Have I made any unjustified assumptions about this interaction or its meaning?
? Does my attitude toward the other person distort my perceptions?
? What is the other person's interpersonal style? How does it match with my own?
? What adjustments might I have to make in order to accommodate this person's interpersonal style?
C) CONFLICT RESOLUTION SKILLS
During political interactions and engagements, it is difficult to maintain positive interpersonal relationships because people have different agendas, values, beliefs, and interpersonal communication styles. This can take a great toll on all parties personally and produce significant amounts of stress. Therefore, conflict resolution skills are absolutely critical to your success as a political navigator.
Understanding and Dealing with Political Resistance
When political conflict occurs, people resist alternatives, solutions, and options used to resolve the conflict. However, many managers are shocked when it occurs and wish that it would never happen or would just go away. The only solution for dealing with political resistance is to understand its underlying reasons and learn how to address them.
As a political navigator, you understand that political resistance is a very positive opportunity. It allows you to confirm support for your political solutions, as well as to address peoples' fears and vulnerabilities.
Resistance is simply the fear of losing one's current state. In fact, resistance is predictable, natural, and a necessary part of learning about another person or implementing a political solution. It is a natural response for people to become defensive. They push back when they feel they are being pushed. One solution might be to present only those alternatives that do not cause them to become defensive, but is this realistic? By addressing political resistance and taking advantage of the opportunities it offers, you improve your credibility and influence and enhance your status in the organization.
Regardless of how people express resistance, it is important to identify the many reasons for political resistance. Here are the most common reasons:
? The purpose of a political solution is not made clear.
? Employees affected by a political solution are not involved in the planning.
? An appeal for a political solution is based on personal reasons.
? There is a fear of failure.
? The cost (personal or organizational) is too high or the rewards inadequate.
? These is a perceived lose of control.
? The vested interest of the individual or subunit of the organization is involved.
? There is a lack of respect and trust in the initiator.
? There is satisfaction with the status quo.
? Past experience with political conflict is negative.
? There is an honest difference of opinion.
? There is a lack of management support for a political solution.
Conflict over resources, conflict over recognition and rewards, lack of commitment to a political solution, lack of an agreed-upon solution, differing organizational values, lack of trust and credibility, and differing realities are other circumstances that can produce resistance.
Political Resistance Resolution Method
During a political conflict, the root cause of resistance is fear. People fear losing control, power, status, authority, or position. People also fear becoming vulnerable. However, most people are too proud to admit it. They often rationalize their behavior or blame others for creating the situation. In the face of change, they resist positive political solutions because they fear the outcomes.
When political resistance occurs, you should not take it personally and become defensive. Political resistance is simply the result of differing perspectives and the fear of losing the status quo. Political navigators who maintain an objective viewpoint will be better able to deal with people's resistance to their ideas, alternatives, and suggestions. You can minimize resistance by presenting political solutions in a timely and orderly fashion. Additionally, you will compromise your integrity by endorsing solutions that, however, popular, do not adequately solve the organization's problems.
Political navigators can address these differing perspectives by using the political resistance resolution method. This method can be thought of as a set of skills to govern conflict. It is a constructive process for handling emotion-laden disagreements between you and other people. Its purpose is to bring to the surface underlying fears that cause resistance, so others can understand and accept the proposed solution, change, or alternative being proposed. This method encourages assertive communications and the sharing of feelings but does not permit the typical free-for-all that blocks creative resolution. Quite simply, it is an effective tool for addressing differing perspectives of people. The method consists of four steps: (1) acknowledging political resistance, (2) clarifying political resistance, (3) problem solving, and (4) confirming the answer.
i) Acknowledging Political Resistance.
The political resistance resolution method begins with acknowledging resistance. In other words, identify it. Acknowledging political resistance helps with controlling the emotions associated with differences of opinion, which is critical because arguing and fighting over differences of opinion will accomplish little.
Acknowledging political resistance consists of two activities: listening and sharing. First, you should listen carefully to another person's messages to determine their meaning. Most critical and emotion-laden statements are made to verbalize excess tension or fear. In fact, the very process of listening helps convert tension into words that serve to reduce anxiety, even if the words themselves do not actually reveal the nature of the tension or the reason for it.
The second activity involves sharing of feelings with another person. When you demonstrate your understanding of another person's feelings and are not surprised or upset by negative statements, it illustrates your support, which helps reduce tension. Quite simply, sharing is a form of support. To be successful in this stage, remain calm and neutral, saying and doing nothing that will increase the other person's tensions or fears.
b) Clarifying Political Resistance.
Few people are ready or willing to reveal the reasons for their behavior, even when they understand what they are. They learn to cover up the plausible reasons, justifications, and explanations in an effort to prove that they're acting in a well thought out and logical manner. There is a word that explains this thinking process: rationalization. Therefore, the second step in resolving conflict is to clarify what another person is thinking so they will be prepared to receive new and logical information.
During this phase, the challenge facing you is to make statements lose force without causing people to lose face. Clarifying involves asking non-threatening questions so that people are allowed to express their thoughts more freely, which clarifies their resistance. By encouraging people to give examples and illustrations, you are helping them grasp their own meaning more clearly. This will help you better understand others' negative statements.
c) Problem Solving.
Once you have clarified a negative statement, you are ready to help people identify solutions to their problems. The problem-solving process typically consists of six steps:
1. Problem identification
2. Political solution identification
3. Political solution analysis
4. Political solution selection
5. Political solution implementation
6. Political solution evaluation
Problem identification involves analyzing the situation to identify expectations and determine the current situation. The discrepancy between these two positions is the problem. Therefore, the focus of the problem-solving process is finding the "best" political solution to the problem(s).
Identifying political solutions involves generating as many ideas as possible to identify a solution. This activity is conducted without evaluating or examining the ideas. The goal is to come upon with as many possible solutions as possible.
Analyzing political solutions is the process of critically examining each of the possible solutions. Set up criteria to serve as a standard or benchmark by which to filter each idea. Ideas that meet most of the criteria are grouped together for further analysis. The ideas that do not meet the established criteria are filed for future consideration.
Selecting political solutions involves testing the solutions that meet the criteria to decide their practicality and ease of application. Identify the cost and potential results of each solution, which will help you decide the best possible political solution from a cost/benefit perspective.
Another critical part of this phase is to name possible obstacles or barriers that may prevent applying a political solution. As these barriers are identified, look at them and decide the possible effects they have on various solutions. You should identify actions to overcome obstacles or barriers, examining financial, human, and emotional costs. This information will help you decide the best political solution. The outcome of this phase of the problem-solving process is that you have identified the best alternative(s).
d) Confirming the Answer.
When an acceptable political solution has been identified, all parties must make a commitment—typically some kind of immediate action—that reinforces their willingness to accept the remedy. At this time, feedback is essential in evaluating the continuing viability of the solution and of the relationship in general. Finally, the last two phase of the traditional problem-solving process are applicable during this part of the resistance to political resolution process: solution implementation and solution evaluation.
Implementing political solutions is the process of applying the political solution to determine its results. When doing this, you should choose opportunities or situations where the political solution has the highest degree of success. This strategy allows you to integrate the solution under the best possible conditions before they apply it to the entire department, division, or organization.
D) PARTNERSHIP SKILLS
Gaining credibility as a political navigator requires demonstrating the knowledge, skills, and abilities that the organization values. It is absolutely prerequisite to solving problems, creating opportunities, capitalizing on strategic opportunities, and leveraging organizational strengths. Partnership skills are essential for you to become proficient in political interactions and engagements. These skills are used to manage political interactions and engagements, deal with political resistance, create interpersonal environments that are conducive to sharing of information, and enlist the support and cooperation of others involved in political interaction and engagements.
Partnership skills are the most eclectic skill sets of a political navigator because they are an integration of the three previously discussed skills (relationship, communication, and conflict resolution). Partnership skills rely on your ability to build and maintain positive synergistic relationships, communicate effectively and clearly, and resolve conflict in a constructive and productive manner. However, you must develop an understanding of partnerships to execute the skills effectively.
By design, a partnership is a long-term, collaborative activity that focuses on achieving results through mutually beneficial relationships used in helping the organization successfully achieve its goals and objectives. These relationships assist you in acquiring a responsive attitude necessary for you to become more people oriented and thereby better understand and anticipate their needs. Partnerships help you decide which political interactions and engagements provide the highest value and have the greatest impact on the organization. They also promote establishment of working relationships based on shared values, aligned purpose and vision, and mutual support. Furthermore, partnerships are based on the business and performance needs of people, not a political navigator's career aspirations or professional success.
Foundations for Partnership Skills
There are two primary elements of partnership skills: purpose and partnering. Purpose brings people together and provides a focus and direction for the partnership, the result of which is clarifying roles and focus. It also embraces underlying assumptions, trust and risk, shared values, and expectations. Purpose defines "why" a partnership is needed. Simply, purpose helps describe what you intend to achieve as a result of a partnership.
Partnering exemplifies the observable dynamics between you and other people engaging in a partnership. It incorporates the common values, beliefs, assumptions, and expectations of all parties in a partnership. Unfortunately, much that is important to partnering often goes unexpressed. Partnering occurs when you and other people pursue a common purpose together. Those who attend to purpose but neglect partnering often fail in their work altogether.
E) ORGANIZATIONAL UNDERSTANDING SKILLS
Political navigators rely on their organizational understanding skills when identifying the needs of all key clients (decision makers, stakeholders, influencers, and scouts) in the organization. Additionally, these skills enable you to identify the issues that ultimately contribute to political conflict in the organization.
Organizational understanding skills can be best demonstrated when you reflect on how organizations work. Simply stated, it is essential for you to think like the people you serve. This understanding requires knowledge of how things get done inside an organization as well as how decisions are made there. Business understanding requires you to have knowledge of business fundamentals, systems theory, organizational culture, and politics. By developing business understanding, you will be better able to facilitate political engagements that help in identifying political solutions that improve organizational effectiveness.
Organizational understanding skills require you to ascertain the readiness and commitment of people to political solutions. The following questions can be used as a guide in this process:
? How willing are the members of the organization to implement political solutions?
? Is upper-level management willing to support political engagements?
? What types of information do members of the organization readily accept or resist?
? What are the members' attitudes toward political solutions?
? What are the executives' attitudes toward political solutions?
Organizational understanding skills also require you to intentionally prioritize the contributions, involvement, and loyalty of people above the organizational system. This is known as organizational subordination. Thus, you demonstrate organizational subordination by eliminating policies and procedures and organizational structures that interfere with, prevent, or discourage the implementation of political solutions.
Organizational understanding skills require you to have the ability to be completely committed to identifying appropriate political solutions. Further, you have the ability to ask others in the organization about their perspective of the organization, its financial and competitive position, strengths and weaknesses, management structure, management capacity, technological state, relationship to competitors, reward and compensation systems used to motivate others, performance appraisal and review systems, performance management system, and management's attitude toward human resources within the organization. These critical areas of inquiry help you acquire an understanding of the organization and the nature of its business and demonstrate your understanding of business fundamentals.
Next, your ability to manage projects (political engagements) is critical. Thus, political navigators possess project management skills that enable them to plan and identify objectives and activities that produce a desired result (political solution), organize people to get the job done and direct them by keeping them focused on achieving the results, and measure the project team's progress and give them feedback to keep the project moving ahead, while constantly monitoring progress toward, and deviation from, the project's goals.
The final organizational understanding skill is systems thinking, which involves viewing and understanding an organization as an open system. Such thinking requires you to have detailed knowledge of the inputs, throughputs, and outputs of the organization, as well as the critical connections and disconnections that exist therein. These characteristics form a framework for appraising an organization's internal environment, isolating political problems, and identifying relationships critical to implementing political engagements.
S.W.O.T. analysis is useful in identifying a wealth of information that will guide you throughout the political engagement process.
i) Internal Environment. Examination of the internal environment allows for identification of the organization's strengths and weaknesses. This environment obviously affects execution of its mission. A number of areas must be considered when examining the internal environment. Several questions should be asked to determine the strengths and weaknesses of an organization:
1. What is the financial condition of the organization?
2. What are the aptitudes and abilities of managers and employees?
3. What is the current condition of facilities?
4. What is the current state and quality of technology?
5. What is the quantity and quality of material resources?
6. What is the quantity and quality of human resources?
7. What are the current images of various departments and their visions?
8. How is the organization structured?
9. What is the organization's culture?
10. What is the work climate within the organization?
11. What are the policies and procedures that improve or impede organizational performance and effectiveness?
12. What are the managerial practices within the organization?
13. What is the quality of organizational leadership?
14. What are the strengths and weaknesses of the organizational leaders?
15. What are the strengths and weaknesses of the organizational culture?
16. What is the organization's mission and strategy?
17. Does the organization have a formal learning system?
18. What is the compensation and reward system?
19. What is the quality of the performance appraisal process?
20. Is performance coaching used within the organization?
Once these areas have been examined, describe each relationship in terms of its strengths and weaknesses. It is recommended that several data collection methods be used when conducting such an analysis (e. g., interviews, observations, questionnaires, and focus groups). Combining methodologies is an excellent way of ensuring a more accurate picture of the internal state of the organization.
An analysis of the collected data can be used to help you to make recommendations for the improved allocation of material, financial, and human resources in the execution of an organization's goals, objectives, and mission. In so doing, you demonstrate that you have the expertise to analyze the health of your organization, provide recommendations, and provide leadership and guidance that will improve overall effectiveness and efficiency.
ii) External Environment. The long-term conditions facing the organization can be uncovered through an external environmental analysis. Such an analysis identifies and encompasses several important variables, including: resource availability; current economic condition; social and cultural values; the legal and political environment; the organization's competitive rank; performance and organizational gaps, and image in the marketplace.
In order to remain viable in the marketplace, many organizations maintain aggressive research and development programs. An external environmental analysis helps identify the opportunities and threats facing an organization in a given industry, vis-Ã -vis the amount, type, and quality of technology needed to remain competitive. With the continued escalation of technology, such an analysis will be extremely important to the long-term competitiveness of most organizations and, ultimately, their long-term success. There are a number of questions that are useful in determining the external environment facing an organization:
1. What are the economic conditions of the nation, region, and local community?
2. What social and cultural values predominate within the industry and its geographic locations?
3. What quantity and quality of technology does the organization employ to achieve its business results?
4. What external financial, material, and human resources are available?
5. What is the organization's image in the marketplace?
6. What is the company's competitive rank within the industry?
7. What performance gaps exist within the organization?
8. What organizational effectiveness gaps exist?
This information reveals the economic health of an organization, its values, political climate, use of technology and resources, competitive rank within its industry, overall image, and areas requiring improvement.
F) POLITICAL THINKING SKILLS
During any political interaction or engagement, your primary job is to consider what possibilities, circumstances, events, and conditions are creating resistance. You have an obligation to determine why certain political solutions are being fought. Obviously, some political solutions are more appropriate than others; however, you must make certain of this before recommending and implementing them. To that end, you take the time to observe others; identify other people's needs, interests, expectations, and opinions; examine historical documents reflect on past political interactions; interview interested parties; solicit input from others; and identify a list of questions to be asked before participating in political interactions and engagements. The ultimate purpose of gathering this type of information is to have meaning and purposeful conversations, garner support, make informed decisions, and provide acceptable recommendations. In short, the solution is to think politically, continually asking others about themselves, their opinions, ideas, suggestions, and recommendations. When this approached is used, political navigators are using political thinking skills.
Political thinking skills can include a number of behaviors:
? thinking before reacting
? listening carefully and selectively to others' requests during political interactions
? filtering suggestions and recommendations through a defined philosophy of interpersonal relationships
? understanding one's role during political interactions and engagements
? possessing the courage to encourage political solutions that are appropriate but not popular
? analyzing all requests as requests rather than as commands
? maintaining consistent guiding principles to ensure credibility
By constantly exploring and asking questions, you are not focusing on the status quo, but are continuously looking for new and improved ways of enhancing your relationships with other people and the effectiveness of the organization. Consequently, political thinking is as much a state of mind as it is a series of techniques and processes. Political navigators who are continually examining the state of others and the organization and comparing it with an ideal vision are constantly in touch with the problems and issues facing the people and the organization.
For more Information
* Political Skill, People Skill, People Management Skills, Communication Skills, *
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