How do you deal with office politics?

Some symptoms of office politics include, people having closed-door meetings–where they are talking about other people on the team–and people with cynical attitudes who gossip in a high-school way.

Here are four tips for you to rise above office politics as a leader:

1. Avoid taking part.

This is difficult especially if politics are really embedded within your organization.

When somebody wants to keep gossiping with you about another person behind closed doors, say, “You know what, I think it would be better if we just brought this up in a meeting so that we could resolve it.”

Take part actively in not taking part.

2. Surface issues.

It takes a lot of confidence to do this, but you can bring things up during meetings and discussions so that they get resolved, as opposed to having underlying issues.

Be a leader who can tactfully raise and surface issues. This will help open up the conversation and diminish office politics.

3. Get to the root cause.

Find the root cause of the politics within your team. Is communication on your team good? Do people trust each other?

Finding the root cause will allow you to eliminate it and strengthen your team in the process.

4. Set an ambitious goal or challenge.

Sometimes politics arise because nobody has a clear mandate or mission that they are pursuing.

If you do not have ambitious goals that you and your team are focused on, it is easy to get caught up in office politics and conversations that have nothing to do with helping the organization move forward.

Once you have come to grips with how you can avoid being part of office politics, you may be ready to work on some of your other leadership attributes. You can do this by taking part in one of our courses that we deliver on-site in person, or through our virtual training studio.