The Office Politic

I think I got myself into an office politics campaign today. My new mega-group got together today to discuss our on-going projects. It was just the scientists. Our new manager and the more senior members of the group were not present. After an uneasy 15 to 20 minutes of laying out our current project related responsibilities, we started talking about potential directions for the group. I have been planning on sharing my ideas with our manager in his office, just the two of us, but my passions got the better of me in the meeting. I contributed far more to the discussion than I planned.

After a lively exchange of ideas, suggestions, and opinions, the group member who organized the meeting said that he would take the suggestions to our manager. He closed his book and said a few comments that signal the end of a meeting. Hey now, I thought, just what is he going to say happened in this meeting? I know this guy pretty well so I had no trouble asking him if he could go over what he had written down so we could all agree that he had captured the spirit of the group. He complied, we added a few things that he had missed, and proposed different ways to get this information to The Big Cheese (I can't keep writing "our new manager"). This time the meeting came to a close.

After the meeting, a couple people told me that they were glad that I had asked to have the group's suggestions to be read back. I would like to say that my motives were pure, that I was just making sure that The Big Cheese got the best info possible, but I was trying to mess up this guy's power play. He was in The Big Cheese's group prior to the reorg so he has a solid relationship with The Big Cheese. He also has a bit of a reputation as a gamer. You know the type, the kind of guy that works harder at positioning himself to benefit from the work of others than actually working himself. I was not about to let him take the group's ideas and spin it to his advantage. I don't want to play a politcal game with him to see who can have a greater influence of The Big Cheese. I'm also not going to passively observe the growth of the new group when the opportunity to help shape it is just sitting there waiting for somebody to act.

My career is at a critical juncture. I do not want to be stuck in a muddle of a group that struggles to deliver basic and routine data. I need to be in a group that will give me the opportunity to demostrate my ability to handle complex tasks and solve difficult problems. I need to be in a group that defines itself rather than waiting to be defined by other groups. I need to be in a group that uses its extra capacity to improve our methods or investigate long standing problems rather than asking other groups for projects. I want to be in the group that the company points to when they talk about how they want things to get done.

I have expressed my views and ideas about how I would like to see the new group function. I get the impression that I am saying things that other people think too but do not have the courage to express. This is a new place for me. I have never been reluctant to speak up about technical issues, but this is the first time that I have taken a firm position on an organizational/leadership issue. I am taking a risk, but I feel like this is the right place to shift into a vocal role about the direction of the group. I would have preferred to do this without the complication of manuevering around The Mini-Cheese, but if that's the way things are meant to play out, so be it.