The world has all sorts of people in it – business organisations are no difference. There are those who care about you, those who don’t, and then there are those who bear you ill will. Every team consists of cunning people, and to better survive in the world you should learn how to deal with such cunning people. Many times, you come across sly, cunning employees who pose as talented and manipulate you to their advantage.
This leaves you fuming and wishing that you could have been more careful in dealing with them at the start. Given the opportunity, people will deploy numerous tactics to survive in an organisation. New employees who join the organisation will test the culture and practices of the organisation to see if they can live in their comfort zones had the transition being adverse to play tactics.
Any employee joining an organisation will try to navigate the system to their advantage. Being overly charming, lying, controlling, dominating, misleading and ignoring. They are professional gas-lighters and will guilt-trip you all the time. Not only the existing people and such new recruits can upset the whole rhythm of an organisation.
They will try to impose their own culture totally ignoring the broad org culture. Dealing with one cunning person is not an easy task. But what if you have to deal with a group of them? Under these circumstances, it might become very difficult for you to handle the situation. This happens usually in offices, and it is called office politics.
Emotional blackmailing
Cunning people, especially management level employees usually engage in out of the ordinary activities to test the leadership response and to get closer for advantages. This particular trait is more or less used as a rule to satisfy their intense desire to win and feel superior.
Do not permit a cunning person to play emotional games with you. If you appear naive, chances are that a sly person may ask for a favour citing how lucky he is to have you around in such a difficult situation. You know that he or she is trying to make you work against your wishes. In such cases, be assertive.
You must be happy that you fended off his attempt to manipulate you. For this, you must understand your weak traits. If you are self-conscious, naive or short-tempered, present yourself as being none of those. These are the most common traits which cunning people use to their advantage.
Give them the impression that you cannot be emotionally blackmailed. Set strong boundaries which will deflect every attempt to manipulate you. Know that you cannot be trifled with and handle manipulative tactics on a war footing. When they know that they cannot flare you up against others, control you or use you for their personal needs, they will inevitably give up.
Ignorance works best in the case of cunning people who go all out to bother you. Simply ignore the person outright when you meet him. If he cannot be avoided, acknowledge his presence with a smile and go right ahead with your work without waiting for a conversation to begin.
If a conversation does begin, feign ignorance in that subject and excuse yourself for some imaginary task that needs to be done. There is nothing better than constant ignorance to shoo away a cunning person. This will annoy him in the long run. He may even decide to find a new target.
Cultivate true relationships
If you want to survive in a corporate culture, you need to expand your horizon. Knowing only your boss and immediate colleagues is not sufficient. You even have to cultivate relationships with others such as people in other functions and observe how they do things. If you want to deal with office politics, you need to start looking beyond titles.
For instance, most of us believe that people working in HR have no power, however, you’ll be surprised by the fact that they are the key player in making several important decisions on the level of promotions and layoffs. Besides, they are the one who can help you out in case you get in a conflict with someone in the office. Similarly, people in finance are given the responsibility of managing long term budgets and therefore, they have actual knowledge of where the company is headed.
You can also avoid potential conflicts by developing relationships outside your division. For example, you will not face any problem in anticipating the point of view of the people in the manufacturing end, in marketing, or in sales if you know them personally.
Give your attention to only those conflicts which have work-related issue as their source. If the conflict is more of a personal nature than professional, it’s better to let it go. Another important thing regarding conflicts that should always be kept in mind is that you should avoid involving your boss in resolving disputes.
However, if a condition arises where it becomes necessary to have a talk with your boss regarding some dispute with your colleague, avoid trash talking and try to be balanced and calm while defending yourself. No matter how immoral it may sound, it is a fact that your colleagues may steal your work and ideas. ‘Idea theft’ is another negative consequence of office politics. Be careful while discussing important matters with your colleagues, especially with those whom you don’t trust.
Important qualities
You will be considered to be powerful only if you have control over resources, hiring, and firing. However, you are not going to have much power in the early phases of your career. But, this does not stop you from being an influential person, you simply need to be knowledgeable, trustworthy, competent, and dependable.
But, these qualities should not be considered simply as virtues in yourself, instead think about them strategically as qualities which are important for advancing in your career. In other words, you must be someone whose opinion is given importance. Performance and getting good results is not everything in corporate culture, especially when office politics enjoys such an influential role.
You also need to satisfy the people who matter most. This may be hard for many people and may often require making tough choices, but these choices need to be made. Whenever a situation arises where you have to choose between your boss and your colleague, such as in case of a conflict between them, it’s always better to stand by the side of your boss, or you will never advance.
There are no shortcuts in earning respect in an organization other than being a performer. Performers can positively influence a cultural change in an organisation if that does make an organisation stronger.
