Survival of the Savvy

1. Embrace "High-Integrity Politics" for Success

Organizational politics are informal, unofficial, and sometimes behind-the-scenes efforts to sell ideas, influence an organization, increase power, or achieve other targeted objectives.

Redefine politics. For many, "politics" conjures negative images of manipulation and self-serving agendas. However, this book proposes a value-free definition: informal efforts to influence. The crucial distinction lies in whether objectives serve the company's interest or only self-interest, and if influence efforts maintain integrity.

Avoid denial. A narrow, negative view of politics leads to avoidance and denial, making individuals vulnerable. Ignoring the reality of organizational politics can crush well-intentioned professionals and leaders, impacting their influence, career growth, and team credibility. The costly irony is that under-political people become targets for those combining political skill with pure self-interest.

Win-win approach. When political astuteness is combined with strong ethical values, it creates a win-win situation for individuals, teams, and the entire organization. This "high-integrity politics" allows competent people to effectively sell ideas and influence others for the greater good, transforming politics from a dirty word into a virtue and a company asset.

2. Understand the Two Core Political Styles

Learning is acquired by reading books, but the much more necessary learning… is only to be acquired by reading men, and studying all the various editions of them.

Two worldviews. People approach organizational dynamics with two distinct political styles: the "Power of Ideas" (Less Political) and the "Power of Person" (More Political). Each style possesses unique strengths, motivations, and mind-sets, influencing how individuals view power, ambition, and promotion.

Power of Ideas. These individuals derive power from their facts, logic, analysis, intuition, and innovation. They prioritize substantive excellence, seek feedback to "get it right," and are driven by a desire to "do the right thing" for the company. They believe in meritocracy, expecting their work and ideas to speak for themselves.

• Substance Power: Focus on work results, sound business cases.
• Feedback & Learning: Willingness to admit mistakes and learn.
• Do the Right Thing: Prioritize ethics and common good.
• Open Agendas: Value honesty and direct communication.
• Meritocracy: Believe good performance will be rewarded.
• Results Speak: Trust work will earn just rewards.

Power of Person. These individuals focus on hierarchical position power, image, and relationships. They are street-smart, adept at reading political landscapes, and skilled at aligning with powerful people. They prioritize "doing what works" to achieve goals, often through strategic self-promotion and relationship-based decisions.

• Position Power: Focus on hierarchy, who has influence.
• Image & Perception: Aware of reputation, strategize improvements.
• Do What Works: Flexible, pragmatic approach to achieving ends.
• Private Agendas: Prudent with information, strategic timing.
• Relationship-Based: Factor loyalty and alliances into decisions.
• Self-Promotion: Highlight contributions and achievements.

3. Avoid the Pitfalls of Style Extremes

Any virtue carried to the extreme can become a crime.

Strengths become risks. While both political styles offer advantages, pushing either to an extreme creates significant risks. The "Less Political" (LP) can become "Under Political" (UP), and the "More Political" (MP) can become "Overly Political" (OP). These extremes lead to distinct fatal flaws that can harm careers and companies.

Under Political risks. UPs risk losing out to more politically savvy individuals. Their belief that results speak for themselves can lead to being underestimated, overlooked for promotions, and lacking a crucial network. They may be too open with agendas, easily deceived, and sometimes adopt a "holier-than-thou" attitude that hinders compromise and impact.

• Underestimated: Low profile, seen as weak or inconsequential.
• Insufficient Network: Avoids networking, lacks allies.
• Blind Spots about Image: Clueless about reputation, poor executive presence.
• Lack of Verbal Discipline: Too honest, hurts egos, reveals too much.
• False Comfort: Trusts too easily, vulnerable to sabotage.
• Holier-Than-Thou: Rigid, judgmental, unwilling to compromise.
• Missed Opportunities: Adheres strictly to protocol, low impact.

Overly Political risks. OPs risk compromising their ethics and values, driven by naked self-interest. Their pursuit of power can lead to distrust, a fall from grace, and ultimately, self-destruction. They may engage in power trips, hidden agendas, cronyism, and create environments of fear, leading to scandals and organizational atrophy.

• Power Trips: Obsessed with control, intimidating, turf tyrants.
• Fall from Grace: Compromises ethics, driven by pure self-interest.
• Pedestals Can Topple: Vulnerable to exposure, power shifts, mutiny.
• Blindly Obvious Behavior: Arrogance blinds them to their own transparency.
• Cronyism: Promotes unqualified friends, creates "yes-men."
• Disasters Waiting: Reckless, cocky, leads to scandals.
• Lack of Professional Growth: Ego resists feedback, lacks substance.

4. Cultivate the Balanced "Power of Savvy"

Savvy leaders blend integrity, task competence, and political skill.

The vital balance. The "Power of Savvy" style represents the optimal middle ground on the Organizational Savvy Continuum. It combines the best attributes of both Power of Ideas and Power of Person styles, enabling "impact with integrity." Savvy leaders are realistic about human nature, understanding both altruism and self-interest.

Key characteristics. Power of Savvy individuals are professional, willing to engage in the political arena ethically, and adept at reading organizational dynamics. They manage perceptions, build strong networks, promote themselves and their teams with integrity, and exude quiet confidence. They skillfully address hidden agendas and challenge ideas without alienating others.

• Adapts approach to different political styles.
• Reads official and unofficial power networks.
• Strategically plans to reshape perceptions.
• Builds and maintains key networks.
• Promotes self and ideas with integrity.
• Detects deception and ulterior motives.
• Challenges ideas skillfully, without alienating.
• Manages own political stock and team's savvy.
• Models ethics with realism, not self-righteousness.

Significant payoffs. Adopting a Power of Savvy style helps avoid the risks of political extremes, fosters balance, and provides strategic flexibility. It liberates individuals from habitual reactions, allowing them to choose the most effective approach for any situation. This balanced perspective also nurtures respect and collaboration, defusing style-based frictions within the organization.

5. Master Self-Awareness and Manage Your Corporate Buzz

If you don’t shape your image, who will? If you don’t know your buzz, that’s part of your buzz!

Your "jacket." Just as a baseball player's reputation is his "jacket," your corporate buzz—the perceptions others hold of you—significantly impacts your influence and power. These perceptions can become "frozen icebergs" that either block or enhance your career. Ignoring your buzz means letting it manage you, rather than proactively shaping it.

Discover your buzz. Astute leaders actively seek to understand their reputation. This involves asking trusted colleagues, direct reports, cross-organizational contacts, managers, clients, and mentors for candid feedback. Listening for casual comments, observing how you're treated, and engaging in self-assessment tools like 360-degree feedback are crucial for an accurate picture.

• Ask others: Colleagues, reports, contacts, managers, clients, mentors.
• Listen: Pay attention to casual conversation, jokes, veiled annoyance.
• Self-awareness: Use assessments, coaching, workshops, assignments.
• Observe treatment: Analyze assignments, information flow, punctuality.
• Stereotypes: Consider functional, gender, or regional biases.

Manage the airwaves. Once aware of your buzz, you can proactively manage it. This includes broadcasting your desired image, reinventing negative "raps" through changed behavior, and planting "seeds" of new impressions through anecdotes or turns of phrase. A powerful, counter-intuitive tactic is to "blow your cover" by openly admitting you're working on a problematic trait, disarming critics and earning goodwill. If sabotage is imminent, "get there first" to preemptively frame the situation to your boss.

6. Build a Strategic "Safety Network"

Your network gives you a heads-up warning and sticks up for you.

Decent boldness. Networking is not "kissing up" or an imposition; it's a "decent boldness" essential for organizational influence and impact. A strong network acts as a safety net, providing support, protection, and access to vital information. It's about giving as much as receiving, building meaningful connections rather than just collecting business cards.

Payoffs of networking. A robust network offers numerous benefits, acting as insurance during tough times by making you a known quantity. It provides access to people, information, and resources, and feeds you the "real buzz" about your reputation. Crucially, it offers protection against sabotage and endorsement for your ideas, while also broadening your business knowledge and increasing job satisfaction.

• Insurance for bad times: Protects during performance dips.
• Known quantity: Increases chances for advancement.
• Access: Opens doors to people, information, resources.
• Real buzz: Provides accurate feedback on your reputation.
• Protection: Warns against sabotage, allies stick up for you.
• Endorsement: Allies support your ideas.
• Manages airwaves: Spreads positive impressions.
• Business knowledge: Broadens scope, strategic view.
• Job satisfaction: Reduces corporate loneliness.

Networking reminders. Build relationships strategically: "Think NOW" (don't wait for a crisis), "Think HIGH" (connect with powerful allies), "Think WIRED-IN" (meet common associates), "Think WIDE" (network cross-organizationally), "Think OUTSIDE" (join professional affiliations), "Think WHY" (find valid reasons to meet), "Think BIG FUNCTIONS" (leverage events), "Think PAST" (maintain old contacts), and "Think MENTOR" (seek savvy guidance). Remember, every interaction is an opportunity to make a deposit in your "political-favors bank account."

7. Influence with Savvy Communication and Ethical Lobbying

Words create a power image. Words avoid “wounding the king.” Words prevent you from giving ammunition.

Words have impact. Your choice of words profoundly influences how others perceive you and your ideas. Weak vocabulary can diminish respect, while harsh language can alienate and trigger defensive reactions, especially from ego-sensitive superiors. Savvy leaders use "firm language" – either "invitation" (provisional, respectful) or "conviction" (bolder, authoritative) – to convey confidence without being arrogant or timid.

Balanced Response. When challenging ideas, especially those from superiors, use the "Balanced Response" technique. This involves:

1. Listen Empathically: Paraphrase to show understanding.
2. Focus on Merits: Sincerely highlight positive aspects.
3. Surface Concerns: Firmly, but tactfully, raise issues.
4. Avoid "But" and "Problem": Use alternative linking words and terms like "challenge" or "concern."
   This approach allows you to reality-test ideas and provide critical input without triggering ego defenses or creating negative repercussions.

Ethical lobbying. Lobbying is about pre-selling ideas and gaining support through formal and informal avenues, ethically. It's not about manipulation, but about building alliances and leveraging your "political-favors bank account." Analyze the political landscape—stakeholders' power, style, agendas, and your own influence—to devise a tailored game plan. Blend your ideas with others' objectives, be willing to compromise, and even share credit to gain acceptance. This strategic approach ensures your ideas gain traction and successfully navigate organizational hurdles.

8. Detect Deception and Expose "Private Power Pockets"

A good rule of thumb for CEOs and leaders is to expect deception.

Expect deception. Leaders, especially CEOs, are prime targets for deception due to the immense pressure to perform, the allure of financial rewards, and the natural human tendency for self-preservation. Overly Political (OP) individuals are skilled at manipulating information, managing impressions, and exploiting executive blind spots like "CEO disease" (hubris and isolation).

Screen information. To counter deception, leaders must become walking "informal detection systems." Screen information critically, questioning motives, historical accuracy, and the speaker's integrity. Periodically "test people" by asking for their stance before revealing your own, and decode vague, inferential language by demanding specifics. Reverse the reward/punishment paradigm by publicly thanking those who bring bad news and challenging those who play it safe.

• Motives and Integrity: What's in it for them?
• Buzz Goals: What impressions are they trying to create?
• History: What's their track record for accuracy?
• Speaking Truth to Power: Do they ever challenge you?
• Substantive Grounding: Is their knowledge deep or superficial?
• Accommodating Behavior: Are they too eager to agree?
• Sense of Trust: Is their communication open or guarded?

Expose private power pockets. The most damaging form of deception is a "private power pocket"—an insulated team ruled by a tyrannical boss with unethical, self-serving agendas. These pockets restrict information, foster fear, and lead to poor morale and significant financial losses. Leaders must implement indirect preventive measures like input tools (360s, climate surveys), forums, and visitations, as well as direct measures like corporate governance and confidential interviews. Once detected, swift action is crucial to protect employees, the company, and yourself from further damage.

9. Lead Your Team and Culture Towards Savvy and Integrity

Be the change you want to see.

Stewardship of culture. As a leader, you are a steward of your organization's political health. Individual and team-level changes won't last unless the broader culture supports ethical politics. This requires setting a clear "high-integrity politics vision" and weaving savvy and integrity into the organizational fabric through staffing, training, performance management, and communication.

Build team savvy. Assess your team's political health and style balance. Educate your team on political styles and constructive behaviors, encouraging them to minimize risks and maximize strengths. Help them understand formal and informal power dynamics, manage their image, and engage in ethical lobbying. Foster a "learner attitude" by responding non-punitively to mistakes, appreciating honesty, and focusing on future learning.

• Substance Power: Demand technical excellence.
• Position Power: Stress studying formal/informal power.
• Feedback & Learning: Cultivate a feedback-rich environment.
• Image & Perception: Know and manage team's reputation.
• Do the Right Thing: Encourage company-first sacrifices.
• Do What Works: Promote ethical problem-solving.
• Open Agendas: Champion transparency.
• Private Agendas: Strategize what information to share.
• Meritocracy: Advocate for performance-based rewards.
• Relationships: Balance with appropriate relationship-based decisions.
• Results Speak: Avoid excessive self-promotion.
• Self-Promotion: Encourage visibility and recognition.

Walk the talk. The most critical step is for leaders to model the desired behavior. Your personal moral compass must be unwavering, preventing your own overly political actions from undermining culture change efforts. Be aware of the "slippery slope of integrity," where pressure, power, and temptation can gradually erode values. Periodically audit your own behaviors and rationalizing thoughts. By embodying the change you wish to see, you inspire trust and create a resilient, high-integrity political culture that stands the "soccer game test" of company pride.