my final presentation

2. The Political Frame
• When you consider the word politics, what images come to
mind? Are any of them positive or helpful? The answer is
probably no.
• In organizations, phrases like “they’re playing politics” or “it
was all political” are invariably terms of disapproval.
• In her last interview, only days before she was assassinated in
December 2007, Benazir Bhutto was asked if she liked power.
Her response captured the mixed feelings many of us harbor:
“Power has made me suffer too much. In reality I’ m
ambivalent about it. It interests me because it makes it
possible to change things. But it’s left me with a bitter taste”

3. Power, Conflict, and Coalition
• It is disturbing to see political agendas corrupting technical
decisions, particularly when lives are at stake. We might be
tempted to explain Challenger by blaming individual
selfishness and questionable motives.
• The political frame does not blame politics on individual
characteristics such as selfishness, myopia, or incompetence.
Instead, it proposes that interdependence, divergent interests,
scarcity, and power relations inevitably spawn political
activity.
• It is naive and romantic to hope organizational politics can be
eliminated, regardless of individual players.

4. Political Assumption
• The political frame views organizations as roiling arenas
hosting ongoing contests of individual and group interests.
Five propositions summarize the perspective:
• 1. Organizations are coalitions of assorted individuals and
interest groups.
2. Coalition members have enduring differences in values,
beliefs, information, interests, and perceptions of reality.
3. Most important decisions involve allocating scarce
resources who gets what.
4. Scarce resources and enduring differences put conflict at
the center of day - to - day dynamics and make power the
most important asset.
5. Goals and decisions emerge from bargaining and
negotiation among competing stakeholders jockeying for
their own interests.

5. Political Propositions and the Challenger
Organizations are coalitions. NASA did not run the space shuttle
program in isolation. The agency was part of a complex coalition of
contractors, Congress, the White House, the military, the media even
the American public.
Important decisions involve allocating scarce resources. Time and
money were both in short supply. Delay carried a high price — not
just dollars, but also further erosion of support from key
constituents.
Scarce resources and enduring differences make conflict central and
power the most important asset.
Goals and decisions emerge from bargaining, negotiation, and
jockeying for position among competing stakeholders.

6. Implications of the Political Propositions
• The assumptions of the political frame also explain why
organizations are inevitably political. A coalition forms
because of interconnections among its members; they need
one another, even though their interests may only partly
overlap.
• Power in organizations is basically the capacity to make
things happen. “The potential ability to influence behavior, to
change the course of events, to overcome resistance, and to
get people to do things they would not otherwise do”
• The final proposition of the political frame emphasizes that
goals are not set by edict at the top but evolve through an
ongoing process of negotiation and bargaining.

7. Organization as Coalitions
• Academics and managers alike have assumed that
organizations have, or ought to have, clear and consistent
goals set at the apex of authority.
• The confusion arises because ultimately it makes only slightly
more sense to say that the goal of a business enterprise is to
maximize profit than to say that its goal is to maximize the
salary of Sam Smith, assistant to the janitor.
• If political pressures on goals are visible in the private sector,
they are blatant in the public arena.

8. Sources of Power
Position power (authority). Positions confer certain levels of
legitimate authority. Control of rewards. The ability to deliver
jobs, money, political support, or other rewards brings power.
Coercive power. Coercive power rests on the ability to constrain,
block, interfere, or punish.
Information and expertise. Power flows to those with the
information and know - how to solve important problems.
Reputation. Reputation builds on expertise.
Personal power. Individuals who are attractive and socially
adept — because of charisma, energy, stamina, political smarts,
gift of gab, vision, or some other characteristic are imbued with
power independent of other sources.
Alliances and networks. Getting things done in an organization
involves working through a complex network of individuals and
groups. Friends and allies make things a lot easier.
Access and control of agendas. A by - product of networks and
alliances is access to decision arenas.

9. Conflict in Organization
• Conflict is normal and inevitable. It’s a natural by product of
collective life. The political prism puts more emphasis on
strategy and tactics than on resolution of conflict. Conflict
has benefits as well as costs.
• Badly managed conflict leads to the infighting and destructive
power struggle revealed in the Challenger and Columbia
cases. But well handled conflict can stimulate creativity and
innovation that make an organization a livelier, more
adaptive, and more effective place Conflict is particularly
likely to occur at boundaries, or interfaces, between groups
and units. Cultural conflict crops up between groups with
differing values, traditions, beliefs, and lifestyles.

10. The Manager as Politician
• Many believe that the antidote is to get politics out of
management. But this is unrealistic so long as politics is
inseparable from social life. Enduring differences lead to multiple
interpretations of what’s true and what’s important.
• “Organizational excellence . . . demands a sophisticated type of
social skill: a leadership skill that can mobilize people and
accomplish important objectives despite dozens of obstacles; a
skill that can pull people together for meaningful purposes despite
the thousands of forces that push us apart; a skill that can keep
our corporations and public institutions from descending into a
mediocrity characterized by bureaucratic infighting, parochial
politics, and vicious power struggles”

11. Agenda Setting
• An agenda is a statement of interests and a scenario for getting
the goods. The effective leader creates an “ agenda for change ”
with two major elements: a vision balancing the long term
interests of key parties, and a strategy for achieving the vision
while recognizing competing internal and external forces.
• A vision without a strategy remains an illusion. A strategy has to
recognize major forces working for and against the agenda.
The effectiveness of the presidency and the capacity of any
president to lead depend on focusing the nation’s political
attention and its energies on two or three top priorities.
• Reagan began with a vision but without a strategy. Reagan's staff
painstakingly studied the first hundred days of four predecessors.
They concluded that it was essential to move with speed and
focus.
Political Skills

12. Mapping the Political Terrain
• four steps for developing a political map:
• 1. Determine channels of informal communication.
2. Identify principal agents of political influence.
3. Analyze possibilities for mobilizing internal and external
players.
4. Anticipate counterstrategies that others are likely to
employ.
• A simple way to develop a political map for any situation is to
create a two dimensional diagram mapping players (who is in
the game), power (how much clout each player is likely to
exercise), and interests (what each player wants).

13. Networking and Building Coalitions
• Managers often fail to get things done because they rely too
much on reason and too little on relationships. Four basic
steps for exercising political influence:
• 1. Identify relevant relationships. (Figure out which players
you need to influence.)
2. Assess who might resist, why, and how strongly. (Determine
where the leadership challenges will be.)
3. Develop, wherever possible, links with potential opponents
to facilitate communication, education, or negotiation. (Hold
your enemies close.)
4. If step three fails, carefully select and implement either
more subtle or more forceful methods.

14. Bargaining and Negotiation
• We often associate bargaining with commercial, legal, and
labor relations transactions. From a political perspective,
though, bargaining is central to decision making.
• A fundamental dilemma in negotiations is choosing between
“creating value” and “claiming value” (Lax and Sebenius,
1986). Value creators believe that successful negotiators must
be inventive and cooperative in searching for a win – win
solution.

15. Principled bargaining
• The first strategy is to separate people from the problem. The
stress and tension of negotiations can easily escalate into
anger and personal attack. The result is that a negotiator
sometimes wants to defeat or hurt the other party at almost
any cost.
• The second strategy is to focus on interests, not positions. If
you get locked into a particular position, you might overlook
better ways to achieve your goal. An example is the 1978
Camp David treaty between Israel and Egypt. Resolution
became possible only when they looked at underlying
interests. Israel was concerned about security. Egypt was
concerned about sovereignty.
More options increase the chance of a better outcome.

16. The bargaining process:
• Bargaining is a mixed motive game. Both parties want an
agreement but have differing interests and preferences, so that what
seems valuable to one is insignificant to the other.
• Bargaining is a process of interdependent decisions. What each
party does affects the other.
• Bargaining involves judicious use of threats rather than sanctions.
Players may threaten to use force, go on strike, or break off
negotiations. In most cases, they prefer not to bear the costs of
carrying out the threat.
• Making a threat credible is crucial. A threat works only if your
opponent believes it. Non credible threats weaken your bargaining
position and confuse the process
• Calculation of the appropriate level of threat is also critical. If I
under threaten, you may think I’ m weak. If I over threaten, you may
not believe me, may break off the negotiations, or may escalate your
own threats.

17. Morality and Politics
• “The process of organizational politics as we know it works
against people taking responsibility. We empower ourselves by
discovering a positive way of being political.
• It is usually ineffective to pressure them; a better strategy is to
“let go of them.” He offers four steps for letting go: (1) tell them
your vision, (2) state your best understanding of their position, (3)
identify your contribution to the problem, and (4) tell them what
you plan to do without making demands.
• “If leaders are to be effective in helping to mobilize and elevate
their constituencies, leaders must be whole persons, persons with
full functioning capacities for thinking and feeling.

18. Four principles reduce ethical risks
Mutuality. Are all parties to a relationship operating under the same
understanding about the rules of the game?
Generality. Does a specific action follow a principle of moral
conduct applicable to comparable situations?
Openness. Are we willing to make our thinking and decisions public
and confortable?
Caring. Does this action show concern for the legitimate interests
and feelings of others?

19. Political Dimensions of Organizational
Processes
• As arenas, organizations house contests and set parameters
for the players, as well as the stakes and the rules of the
game. In this light, every organizational process has a
political dimension. “Since
organizations are coalitions, and the different participants
have varying interests and preferences, the critical question
becomes not how organizations should be designed to
maximize effectiveness, but rather, whose preferences and
interests are to be served by the organization. . . . What is
effective for students may be ineffective for administrators . .
. Effectiveness as defined by consumers may be
ineffectiveness as defined by stockholders”.

20. A typical scenario for these projects included
these phases:
1. The central administration learned of the opportunity to obtain a
sizable chunk of government funding.
2. A small group of administrators met to develop a proposal for
improving some aspect of the educational program.
3. When funding was approved, the administration announced with
pride and enthusiasm that in a national competition, the district had
won an award that would bring substantial funds to support an
exciting new project to improve instruction.
4. Teachers were dismayed to learn that the administration had
committed to new teaching approaches without faculty input.
Administrators were startled and perplexed when teachers greeted
the news with resistance, criticism, and anger.
5. Caught in the middle between teachers and the funding agency,
administrators interpreted teacher resistance as a sign of
defensiveness and unwillingness to change.

21. Public Policy Ecosystems
• Education is another illustration of a complex policy ecosystem.
Everyone thinks good schools are important. Families want their
children to acquire the ingredients for success. Businesses need well
trained, literate graduates. Economists and policy analysts stress the
importance of human capital. Teachers want better pay and working
conditions. Taxpayers want to cut frills and keep costs down. There is
little agreement about how to make schools better. One popular
remedy, is the law in the “No Child Left Behind” . Measure how well
schools are doing, reward the winners, and penalize the losers. But
many teachers and parents argue that overemphasis on metrics and
sanctions is crippling teachers and driving out essential learning
opportunities. Another cure for educational illness is granting parents
more choice about which schools their children attend.

22. Important references and sites
• Bolman, L. G., & Deal, T. E. (1991). Reframing organizations:
Artistry, choice and leadership (1st ed.). San Francisco:
Jossey-Bass.
• https://prezi.com/w4xarovp-ape/reframing-organizations-the-
political-frame/
• https://www.slideshare.net/opus57/4-frames?qid=bdfb7111-
413b-43a0-a508-aa5fa7128382&v=&b=&from_search=42
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b-BDPH8losU&t=180s
• https://prezi.com/6iauu8oy4uyq/political-frame/#
• https://prezi.com/2l0ukqlaqurf/political-frame/#