Power and Politics in Project Management
Politics is the conduct of public affairs for private advantage.
Preface
One of the truly fascinating aspects of our business environment is the role that power and political behavior play in organizations. Most of us tend to regard political activity with a sort of repugnance, finding the conduct of politics to be personally distasteful and organizationally damaging. There is an interesting paradox at work here. Experience demonstrates to both practitioners and neutral observers that, for better or for worse, for all our often-expressed personal disdain for the exercise of politics, we readily acknowledge this process is often one of the prime moving forces within any organization.
Political behavior, sometimes defined as any process by which individuals and groups seek, acquire, and maintain power, is pervasive in modern corporations. Examples include activities as significant as negotiating a multimillion-dollar commitment for a new project to as mundane as who will attain a corner office; as predatory as the willful attempt to derail another's career to benign as deciding the location of the annual office party. The underlying feature of each of these examples is that the processes by which we make decisions and seek power, the issues we deem “power laden,” and the steps we take to maintain our position are often an emotionally charged sequence of events with important personal and corporate ramifications.
The field of project management is fraught with political processes for several reasons. In many companies project managers do not have a stable power base, neither high status nor overriding authority. They must learn to cultivate other methods of influence to secure resources from other departments necessary to attain project success. A closely related issue is that projects often exist outside of the traditional structure, relegating project managers to the role of supernumerary. Nearly all resources must be negotiated and bargained for. Finally, many project managers are not given the authority to conduct formal performance evaluations on project team subordinates, denying them an important base of hierarchical power. Without the authority to reward or punish, influence is the only tool available to change subordinate behavior. Consequently, project managers must learn important “human” skills such as bargaining, influence, conflict management, and negotiation.
Successful project managers know the importance of maintaining strong political ties throughout their organizations as a method for achieving project success. It is rare to find senior project managers who are not conversant in and knowledgeable of the importance of politics in effectively performing their jobs. Political behavior can either be a project manager's best friend or most remorseless foe. Whatever decision one comes to regarding the use of politics in the quest for project success, it cannot be ignored: Use politics or risk being used by politics.
The above dictum does not have to make the reader uncomfortable. No one would argue that project managers must become immersed in the brutal, self-serving side of corporate political life. There are many examples of predatory behavior, making most of us leery of being considered “politically adept.” Nevertheless, project management and politics are inextricably linked. Successful project managers intuitively understand their job consists of more than simply being technically and managerially competent.
My research and consulting experience has found many companies will spend thousands of hours to plan and implement multimillion- or even multibillion-dollar investments, develop intricate plans and schedules, and form a cohesive team, only to have the project derailed by political processes. This is a pity, particularly in that the end result is often foreseeable early in the development of the project—usually a result of a project manager's refusal to acknowledge and cultivate political ties, both internal and with the client.
This book, Power and Politics in Project Management, is written to fill an important niche on the manager's bookshelf by presenting a practical discussion of the role of political behavior in project implementation. As the chapter titles indicate, it offers a pragmatic guide to project management politics and the lessons managers need to derive from its practice.
The approach is a combination of theory and practice. The first chapters of the book lay a foundation, using important guiding principles from research on power and political behavior to put project politics in its proper context. We need to be well grounded in some basic theory of politics, understand the goals of projects, and the constraints that project managers face. Once the key decision processes that often influence interdepartmental cooperation and conflict are understood, it's easy to see how pervasive political behavior is and how to take steps to minimize its potentially negative effect on projects. The last chapter of the book examines some specific arenas of politics: negotiation skills, conflict management, and general conclusions that can be drawn from the study of power and politics.
My intention is to help project managers do a better job of running their projects by teaching valuable lessons about the scope and magnitude of political behavior.
This book is the natural result of a series of conversations I have had with project managers and academics over the past years. Max Wideman, Dennis Slevin, and Sam Mantel have all served as terrific sources for ideas and encouragement in both conceptualizing and undertaking this project. Fran Webster, in particular, through his dual role as PMI Editor and a personal friend, has been a tremendous source of enthusiasm and support when this book was no more than a series of vague ideas in the back of my head. His criticisms were always on target and easy to bear (Faithful are the wounds of a friend. Prov. 27:6). I also appreciate the support of Jim Pennypacker and the PMI staff through all phases of this book's development. Lastly, to my wife Mary Beth, I offer, with the sincerest gratitude, another acknowledgment of her love and the fruit it continues to bear in my life.