Political management is a broad and ever evolving field encompassing a substantial number of activities in professional politics. The field includes campaign management and consulting, advertisement creation/purchasing, grassroots politics, opposition research, issue advocacy, lobbying, fundraising, and polling. Some consider political management to be an applied form of political science.
Why work politics are inevitable:
- Some people have more power than others, either through hierarchy or some other basis of influence.
- For many people, gaining promotion is important, and this can create competition between individuals, or misalignment between the team’s objectives and those of individuals within it.
- Most people care passionately about decisions at work and this encourages political behavior as they seek to get their way.
- Decisions at work are impacted by both work-related goals and personal factors, so there is further scope for goal conflict.
- People and teams within organizations often have to compete for limited resources; this can lead to a kind of “tribal conflict” where teams compete to satisfy their needs and objectives, even when this is against the greater good.