Is It Possible to Have a Company with No Office Politics?(daedtech.com)
daedtech.com
Is It Possible to Have a Company with No Office Politics?
https://daedtech.com/company-no-office-politics/
62 comments
It's impossible to have anything involving people that doesn't have some kind of 'politics'.
Indeed. Plato's definition of politics is "the relationship between three or more people".
That definition has served me well to remember over the years.
That definition has served me well to remember over the years.
Interesting. Obvious question is, why is that two people is excluded?
Because with two people it's just the two of you together. There can be no subgroups. With three there is the possibility of two aligning against one. With more than three you can get even more subgroups and different alliances that can form.
>Because with two people it's just the two of you together.
>There can be no subgroups.
Groups of one is a thing. The two people can be against each other. Common.
See also: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18666445
Groups of one is a thing. The two people can be against each other. Common.
See also: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18666445
Right, but if there's two of you and you don't get along, you just separate. There's no backroom conniving that can go on to get the upper hand on the other person, because you'd need other people to connive with. You either come to an agreement or move along.
We're talking about groups of people. Not the mathematical definition of a group.
We're talking about groups of people. Not the mathematical definition of a group.
>Right, but if there's two of you and you don't get along, you just separate.
Not all pairs may be able to separate (immediately or even later). Real life stuff.
>There's no backroom conniving that can go on to get the upper hand on the other person, because you'd need other people to connive with. You either come to an agreement or move along.
Sure, about the conniving. But scheming against the other person is quite possible (and done plenty) for a single person against another single person. Real life again.
>We're talking about groups of people. Not the mathematical definition of a group.
I did not say or imply otherwise. I meant it in the real life sense.
Not all pairs may be able to separate (immediately or even later). Real life stuff.
>There's no backroom conniving that can go on to get the upper hand on the other person, because you'd need other people to connive with. You either come to an agreement or move along.
Sure, about the conniving. But scheming against the other person is quite possible (and done plenty) for a single person against another single person. Real life again.
>We're talking about groups of people. Not the mathematical definition of a group.
I did not say or imply otherwise. I meant it in the real life sense.
Two people can be against each other sure, but that's just adversaries. There's no politics because politics implies wrangling other people to your side against a different side. Politics is about building coalitions and alliances.
If there's only two of you and you're working against each other, there's nobody for you to build an alliance with. You can't be an alliance of one. You don't have to convince yourself to do what you want to do because by definition you already want to do it.
If there's only two of you and you're working against each other, there's nobody for you to build an alliance with. You can't be an alliance of one. You don't have to convince yourself to do what you want to do because by definition you already want to do it.
You could be right, for some definition of politics. Maybe we were thinking of different meanings of it. It's an overloaded word.
Because politics requires coalitions and you can't make a coalition with only two people.
Well, the relationship between three or more is really the complex of pairwise relationships and how they are aligned with and against. I.e. forming alliances to gang up on another part of the group.
If you have a complex of pairwise relationships with just two people, I think we tend to look at that as pathological or abusive...
If you have a complex of pairwise relationships with just two people, I think we tend to look at that as pathological or abusive...
I must simply assume that Plato was never married.
A marriage is more than just two people.
A marriage necessarily involves at least one ather person, the one vested with the power to marry others.
Or, marriage is a social contract.
Therefore, it could be argued, marriage is fundamentally political.
Edit: fixed speeling and gramar
A marriage necessarily involves at least one ather person, the one vested with the power to marry others.
Or, marriage is a social contract.
Therefore, it could be argued, marriage is fundamentally political.
Edit: fixed speeling and gramar
"With two people, you either have consensus or stalemate in all cases, so there is no systematic means of making decisions (absent unequal distribution of votes)."
It's not quite true, but pretty close.
It's not quite true, but pretty close.
It removes the 'talk behind your back' and ganging up.
Can't make alliances against each other I'd suppose
Replace “no office politics” with “functional office politics”, the answer is yes.
The problem isn’t politics itself. It’s dysfunction, aka “dark patterns” aka antisocial behavior. The other problem is headlines like this one which, as other commenters have already pointed out, create confusion around an otherwise worthwhile topic.
The problem isn’t politics itself. It’s dysfunction, aka “dark patterns” aka antisocial behavior. The other problem is headlines like this one which, as other commenters have already pointed out, create confusion around an otherwise worthwhile topic.
Even non-antisocial dynamics lead to organizational dysfunction. Looking out for your friends, preferring to associate with people like yourself, and being rewarded for loyalty are all natural dynamics in human relationships, but are often at cross purposes with an organization's mission.
The solution: good process and good-faith transparency, which takes work.
The solution: good process and good-faith transparency, which takes work.
I see what you’re getting at, but you are conflating some genuinely pro-social behaviors (loyalty and looking out for friends) with others which are more like human social defaults (preferring people like yourself). Also, if loyalty and ethics puts you at odds with an organization’s mission, #1, welcome to the real world, aka why I work for myself, and #2, probably a sign that that particular organization is dysfunctional. As opposed to all organizations.
I agree with process and translarency. Although again in dysfunctional organizations these are the first to be gamed.
I agree with process and translarency. Although again in dysfunctional organizations these are the first to be gamed.
[deleted]
> The problem isn’t politics itself. It’s dysfunction, aka “dark patterns” aka antisocial behavior.
One thing I commonly see and wouldn't consider antisocial behavior is the competition for promotions. In smaller companies this may be multiple people who want to become managers/leads of a team. In larger companies, this could be members of the same team both wanting the more impactful or difficult projects.
I'm not really sure what you can do about that though. This just seems like a consequence of judging people based on their past work as opposed to their potential or ability. I'm not sure one could actually find a means to measure ability without looking at past work, especially for something as abstract as managing or programming.
One thing I commonly see and wouldn't consider antisocial behavior is the competition for promotions. In smaller companies this may be multiple people who want to become managers/leads of a team. In larger companies, this could be members of the same team both wanting the more impactful or difficult projects.
I'm not really sure what you can do about that though. This just seems like a consequence of judging people based on their past work as opposed to their potential or ability. I'm not sure one could actually find a means to measure ability without looking at past work, especially for something as abstract as managing or programming.
I think healthy, fair competition is not antisocial or dysfunctional at all. Where it gets dysfunctional is people doing all the lying cheating and backstabbing to get the prize. But this is inevitable when you have people of different levels fighting for a rare resource. It takes a strong company culture to keep things functional.
The other challenge here is that many times star performers are coddled and given leeway to act in antisocial ways, out of fear of losing them to a competitor. This leads to their behavior being viewed as normal and emulated by others. Left unchecked eventually the whole thing devolves into, well, most of corporate America and an increasing percentage of startup offices.
The other challenge here is that many times star performers are coddled and given leeway to act in antisocial ways, out of fear of losing them to a competitor. This leads to their behavior being viewed as normal and emulated by others. Left unchecked eventually the whole thing devolves into, well, most of corporate America and an increasing percentage of startup offices.
Exactly. Whenever you have more than people there will be politics. Question is how dysfunctional they are. It will never be prefect.
Doubtful, but office politics can be reduced by correctly aligning incentives. For example, when everyone had the same incentives (e.g., increase profits) then there were fewer misalignments because you could at least try to point everyone in the direction of greater profits. I've seen a lot of organizations do silly things like make promotions purely dependent on how many direct reports you have (rather than impact/output/production)-- this creates a bad incentive -- people hire more and reduce profits however, increase their personal profits.
(Obviously there is another set of politics of how those profits are split, but that is a separate topic.)
(Obviously there is another set of politics of how those profits are split, but that is a separate topic.)
Feels a bit weird saying this, but the "problem" (I use the term loosely) is how lots of people don't care about money. As companies like Google are currently learning. When you have thousands of employees who don't give a damn about their salary, their title, or the health of the company they work for, you have to do things the hard way. It's not always a bad thing, mind you.
Another fun way to suppress office politics is to light proverbial (or literal!) fires that require cooperation to fix.
This obviously has the negative property of not at all feeding and watering anyone involved, which leads to people burning out, quitting, imploding, exploding, etc., but if your sole goal is to squash office politics, continually having your team jump from fire to fire will do the trick!
This obviously has the negative property of not at all feeding and watering anyone involved, which leads to people burning out, quitting, imploding, exploding, etc., but if your sole goal is to squash office politics, continually having your team jump from fire to fire will do the trick!
> Another fun way to suppress office politics is to light proverbial (or literal!) fires that require cooperation to fix
Strategic thinkers will use the fires to throw others under the bus. This negative behaviour will likely surface as management deliberately torturing employees drives the good apples away.
You see this, too, at a national level. A single, meaningful crisis brings people together (think: Pearl Harbor.) A single, meaningless crisis makes people cynical (think: Vietnam). Repeated crises, regardless of meaning, inevitably tear societies apart.
Strategic thinkers will use the fires to throw others under the bus. This negative behaviour will likely surface as management deliberately torturing employees drives the good apples away.
You see this, too, at a national level. A single, meaningful crisis brings people together (think: Pearl Harbor.) A single, meaningless crisis makes people cynical (think: Vietnam). Repeated crises, regardless of meaning, inevitably tear societies apart.
Good point! I wrote my comment to try and illustrate that politics, while often seen as evil, is critically important to a sustainably functioning team.
Society, offices, all groups of people need politics.
Society, offices, all groups of people need politics.
Politics is being given a bad rap but in reality politics is probably one of the best inventions of mankind. It enabled humans to organize large groups to the benefit of all involved.
What you mean with "Office Politics" is dysfunctional politics. They exist everywhere but to a different degree. I would be really scared of a company that claims to have no office politics.
What you mean with "Office Politics" is dysfunctional politics. They exist everywhere but to a different degree. I would be really scared of a company that claims to have no office politics.
I once heard that you could judge a company by the number of Dilbert cartoons you found. Obviously having a lot is a bad sign, but having none is just as bad - it probably means there's an official policy that doesn't allow them.
Most everyone's job, at pretty much every company, is to make life easier for their coworkers.
Let's say you're asked to build a signup-with-facebook button.
The task is not to build a signup-with-facebook button. The task is to make it easier for people to sign up. Presumably the signup-with-facebook button is a good way of doing that. At least some people in the company think it is.
But the task isn't to get more signups either - it's to gain an audience - potential sources of revenue.
Your company wants to gain the revenue because, well that's what companies do. Companies aren't people. Doesn't matter what the company wants.
But your co-workers want to gain revenue because either it will make their work lives easier (less pressure. Possible promotions) or their personal lives easier (bonuses. Raises. More PTO. Less stress at work).
The Facebook button was never the job. The job was to make your co-workers lives easier.
If you keep your head in the weeds and view the sign up button as "the job" - you'll be surprised if you build it, it underperforms and you don't get recognition or rewards.
But if you view "the job" as making lives easier for those around you - and optimize to do that well - then you'll be surprised much less often by the results of your work. Even if there are some surprises
Higher powers might still make decisions that throw you under the bus. Though this is essentially outside of your control. Regardless of how good at your job you are.
This has one exception - If you are at a non-profit organization full of selfless people. Then the actual job might be to make the biggest impact regardless of the well being of your coworkers
Let's say you're asked to build a signup-with-facebook button.
The task is not to build a signup-with-facebook button. The task is to make it easier for people to sign up. Presumably the signup-with-facebook button is a good way of doing that. At least some people in the company think it is.
But the task isn't to get more signups either - it's to gain an audience - potential sources of revenue.
Your company wants to gain the revenue because, well that's what companies do. Companies aren't people. Doesn't matter what the company wants.
But your co-workers want to gain revenue because either it will make their work lives easier (less pressure. Possible promotions) or their personal lives easier (bonuses. Raises. More PTO. Less stress at work).
The Facebook button was never the job. The job was to make your co-workers lives easier.
If you keep your head in the weeds and view the sign up button as "the job" - you'll be surprised if you build it, it underperforms and you don't get recognition or rewards.
But if you view "the job" as making lives easier for those around you - and optimize to do that well - then you'll be surprised much less often by the results of your work. Even if there are some surprises
Higher powers might still make decisions that throw you under the bus. Though this is essentially outside of your control. Regardless of how good at your job you are.
This has one exception - If you are at a non-profit organization full of selfless people. Then the actual job might be to make the biggest impact regardless of the well being of your coworkers
No. I used to work at a company with an alleged meritocracy, rather than office politics. They claimed to value opinions based on the quality of the opinion, not who it came from or how senior you were. Somehow the senior people always ended up having the "best" ideas, and because this was a "meritocracy" it obviously meant those who were higher up were there on their merits, not for political reasons. I left for other reasons, but the constant need to pretend that what would be described as office politics in any other organization was a result of this company's superior culture was frustrating.
That was, I believe, the original meaning of the word "meritocracy."
I'm pretty sure Office Politics is like bugs in code.
The only way to not have a bug is to not have any code.
"Politics" are simply an expression of differing world views. Unless your startup is a cult, you will have drastically differing world views.
The only way to not have a bug is to not have any code.
"Politics" are simply an expression of differing world views. Unless your startup is a cult, you will have drastically differing world views.
No. Not if humans work there.
There will always be politics, and what's more, they will be significantly impacted by factors seemingly as trivial as location and geometry.
For example, if you have a large open workspace with square cubicles, flanked on either side by balconies with longer and narrower rectangular cubicles, you may find that the balcony employees will affect an air of cliquish superiority over the floor employees, and will furthermore form a rivalry pitting left balcony against right balcony.
Then, whatever mad scheme it is that forms organically out of the workspace geography, it will be propagated via the personnel, even after you move to a new office. There will always be something that subtly influences all the decisions not having a direct impact on the work. Whenever you try to extinguish one that has been allowed to grow toxic or rotten, another may creep up behind you to supplant it.
The dangerous thing is when a player consciously influences the natural politics to gain power over the workplace beyond that granted by the organizational hierarchy, or to secure a promotion. The probability of such an individual joining your group and upsetting the previous homeostasis during a given interval increases with the size of the company. If it is possible for someone to transfer in, cause chaos, and get promoted up or out, then that pattern will eventually be exploited.
There will always be politics, and what's more, they will be significantly impacted by factors seemingly as trivial as location and geometry.
For example, if you have a large open workspace with square cubicles, flanked on either side by balconies with longer and narrower rectangular cubicles, you may find that the balcony employees will affect an air of cliquish superiority over the floor employees, and will furthermore form a rivalry pitting left balcony against right balcony.
Then, whatever mad scheme it is that forms organically out of the workspace geography, it will be propagated via the personnel, even after you move to a new office. There will always be something that subtly influences all the decisions not having a direct impact on the work. Whenever you try to extinguish one that has been allowed to grow toxic or rotten, another may creep up behind you to supplant it.
The dangerous thing is when a player consciously influences the natural politics to gain power over the workplace beyond that granted by the organizational hierarchy, or to secure a promotion. The probability of such an individual joining your group and upsetting the previous homeostasis during a given interval increases with the size of the company. If it is possible for someone to transfer in, cause chaos, and get promoted up or out, then that pattern will eventually be exploited.
There's always some kind of politics, but the worst kind happens when you have technical frauds.
I'm of course talking about firms with a lot of technical staff, that are providing some sort of expert service.
What is a technical fraud? A person who on paper has technical chops, but in fact does not. I used to work with a guy who had a Phd but didn't know what Kuhn-Tucker conditions were, or the rank of a matrix, or version control.
What's so bad about them compared to other staff? Most people are going to know that your sales guy who studied philosophy is not an authority on technical matters. He knows it too. So when it comes to influencing decisions, he doesn't pretend he has authority over such matters. He says stuff that you generally don't need anything other than common business knowledge to think about.
Your technical fraud tricks sales guy and other non technical staff into believing him. Things he say need to be carefully disassembled to be argued against, eating up time and effort. He seems confident because it's easy to seem like you've thought things through. It's like inverse proof-of-work: it's easy to say things like "we can guarantee ordering and once-only delivery". It's hard to deconstruct it, and it will certainly wear out the non technical decision makers.
I'm of course talking about firms with a lot of technical staff, that are providing some sort of expert service.
What is a technical fraud? A person who on paper has technical chops, but in fact does not. I used to work with a guy who had a Phd but didn't know what Kuhn-Tucker conditions were, or the rank of a matrix, or version control.
What's so bad about them compared to other staff? Most people are going to know that your sales guy who studied philosophy is not an authority on technical matters. He knows it too. So when it comes to influencing decisions, he doesn't pretend he has authority over such matters. He says stuff that you generally don't need anything other than common business knowledge to think about.
Your technical fraud tricks sales guy and other non technical staff into believing him. Things he say need to be carefully disassembled to be argued against, eating up time and effort. He seems confident because it's easy to seem like you've thought things through. It's like inverse proof-of-work: it's easy to say things like "we can guarantee ordering and once-only delivery". It's hard to deconstruct it, and it will certainly wear out the non technical decision makers.
I have two issues with this article:
"As companies scale, they begin an inevitable process of selling out their initial principles and sacrificing quality and purity."
This assumes small companies have "initial principles" and believe in "quality and purity". I've known some that focused on quality and purity, and they've almost universally spent a lot of money to no particular result. "Initial principles" tend to go out of the window as soon as you have a company.
It's possible in a small company to seem to have no unhealthy politics, by virtue of all agreeing on the same goals and values, in turn by virtue of sharing a "culture". The downside is that anyone who is not a "good cultural fit", who didn't go to the same schools and have the same life experiences and what-not, is most definitely not welcome. And, on the other hand, it's entirely possible to have healthy office politics and a drastically toxic culture.
"But knowledge work requires something different. It goes best when the people closest to the work make decisions."
The extreme extension of this is everyone doing their own thing. If you've ever worked in an environment where everyone does their own thing---usually because they don't want to get into the politics---, well, I believe you come to the conclusion that it isn't pretty.
Most people don't care who makes decisions, as long as those decisions are what they agree with; likewise, if they disagree with a decision, it doesn't matter who made it.
"As companies scale, they begin an inevitable process of selling out their initial principles and sacrificing quality and purity."
This assumes small companies have "initial principles" and believe in "quality and purity". I've known some that focused on quality and purity, and they've almost universally spent a lot of money to no particular result. "Initial principles" tend to go out of the window as soon as you have a company.
It's possible in a small company to seem to have no unhealthy politics, by virtue of all agreeing on the same goals and values, in turn by virtue of sharing a "culture". The downside is that anyone who is not a "good cultural fit", who didn't go to the same schools and have the same life experiences and what-not, is most definitely not welcome. And, on the other hand, it's entirely possible to have healthy office politics and a drastically toxic culture.
"But knowledge work requires something different. It goes best when the people closest to the work make decisions."
The extreme extension of this is everyone doing their own thing. If you've ever worked in an environment where everyone does their own thing---usually because they don't want to get into the politics---, well, I believe you come to the conclusion that it isn't pretty.
Most people don't care who makes decisions, as long as those decisions are what they agree with; likewise, if they disagree with a decision, it doesn't matter who made it.
Yes, it's called a sole proprietorship.
You can still have a sole proprietorship but have employees. Sole proprietorship means that you are the sole owner.
I think what you meant is 1 person company with the owner being the only person working for the company... Agree with you on this point.
I think what you meant is 1 person company with the owner being the only person working for the company... Agree with you on this point.
Yes, but you understood that I clearly meant a single employee company, didn't you? Communication successful.
Best answer I've seen on HN in a month or two, at the very least. In tune with reality. Was going to say something along the lines of "mumble human nature mumble" as a top level comment on this thread, but I think this suffices.
Edit: My comment was about companies like the one in todipa's sibling comment:
>I think what you meant is 1 person company with the owner being the only person working for the company
Edit: My comment was about companies like the one in todipa's sibling comment:
>I think what you meant is 1 person company with the owner being the only person working for the company
Arguably, given politics is how we reconcile diverging interests, it is what you get when people are not aligned to the same principles. When you have peers without clear principles, you have politics.
Poor leadership causes people to reach for whatever tools they can find to ensure their personal interests prevail. In a startup if you have politics, it is because you don't have direction and you are basically burning cash while everyone re-negotiates how they relate to one another at each new interaction.
If you are in a company that is political without being profitable, I suspect they're already dead and would use it as a platform to get your next gig and split. If it is profitable and political, I would opt to take cash, as their stock will have more downside than upside because they are optimizing for survival not growth. No politics and no profit? Probably a cult. Profitable with no politics? Sell everything you own to buy options.
In a large company, you are basically the minder of capital or assets, with survival and continuity prioritized over growth. When it stops growing at a sufficient rate, it's going to stop producing value and growth and enter a cycle of pathological optimization. Setting people against one another in this fixed resource environment is economical when you have a stable business that needs optimization. Fittest survive, etc. But for growth, that misalignment just creates massive opportunity cost.
Where you have managers sitting on a pile of capital with no sense of how to grow it, they end up operating a death spiral as they switch from the growth strategy they were not equipped for, to more familiar optimization strategies.
Management anti-patterns are the effect of incentives, and clear leadership (vision, direction, alignment) has the ability to resolve those. Leadership obviates politics, and in places where it's good, people know what is expected of them and others, and where they fit in.
For this reason, I think professional managers often don't belong in startup environments because they are trained to optimize for fitness and not growth.
Poor leadership causes people to reach for whatever tools they can find to ensure their personal interests prevail. In a startup if you have politics, it is because you don't have direction and you are basically burning cash while everyone re-negotiates how they relate to one another at each new interaction.
If you are in a company that is political without being profitable, I suspect they're already dead and would use it as a platform to get your next gig and split. If it is profitable and political, I would opt to take cash, as their stock will have more downside than upside because they are optimizing for survival not growth. No politics and no profit? Probably a cult. Profitable with no politics? Sell everything you own to buy options.
In a large company, you are basically the minder of capital or assets, with survival and continuity prioritized over growth. When it stops growing at a sufficient rate, it's going to stop producing value and growth and enter a cycle of pathological optimization. Setting people against one another in this fixed resource environment is economical when you have a stable business that needs optimization. Fittest survive, etc. But for growth, that misalignment just creates massive opportunity cost.
Where you have managers sitting on a pile of capital with no sense of how to grow it, they end up operating a death spiral as they switch from the growth strategy they were not equipped for, to more familiar optimization strategies.
Management anti-patterns are the effect of incentives, and clear leadership (vision, direction, alignment) has the ability to resolve those. Leadership obviates politics, and in places where it's good, people know what is expected of them and others, and where they fit in.
For this reason, I think professional managers often don't belong in startup environments because they are trained to optimize for fitness and not growth.
The better question is: is it possible for people to be diplomatic? (with empathy and care towards each other and the environment).
You have more then two people their is politics.
Work, home, school, government, church you name it.
Work, home, school, government, church you name it.
Is it possible to suppress human nature in my office full of humans?
Surprisingly, no.
Surprisingly, no.
[deleted]
With a sole proprietorship, certainly.
With a partnership, maybe.
Anything bigger, unfortunately not.
With a partnership, maybe.
Anything bigger, unfortunately not.
I would hope so. My employer fucking blows.
Really good article!
I think the one point is really valuable. Decision making and who does it.
Practically every software engineer will debate SVN vs git; but when someone up the chain decides clear case, that's politics.
Also makes me think, "The Pheonix Project" book. The underlying thing they never really discuss was who made the decisions. I wonder if that's really the root cause.
I think the one point is really valuable. Decision making and who does it.
Practically every software engineer will debate SVN vs git; but when someone up the chain decides clear case, that's politics.
Also makes me think, "The Pheonix Project" book. The underlying thing they never really discuss was who made the decisions. I wonder if that's really the root cause.
As someone who has worked on geographically distributed remote teams, I can assure that politics can be just as ugly as in the physical office. In one place I'd say politics was even worse, everything in Slack was as performative as a Twitter exchange on a controversial topic.
Wrong. Who's on which email thread, who's on the conference calls... those can be political choices, and they don't go away just because everyone's working from home. And from those choices flow who has more say in the direction of the company, who's "in" and who's "out", who gets promoted...
The only way to have a company with no politics is probably to have no humans.
The only way to have a company with no politics is probably to have no humans.
Is it possible to have a group of people interact for a lengthy period of time with no politics? Even family units have politics, and no bond is greater than the ones established by blood.
A more relevant question for me is whether it is possible to provide 80 % of your time to 'actual work' and yet have a fulfilling and successful career. Especially if you are introvert, not able to sell yourself, not using fancy jargon.
Depends on how you define “actual work”. In any professional field, keeping people informed and convincing them you’re right is a core job responsibility, even though it largely intersects with office politics.
To certain kinds of managers, spending 80% of your time on actual work is a plus, not a minus.
I'm extremely skeptical if my anecdote has any value since I'm very young and only worked in a couple companies. But in the current company I'm working (which I've been working the last 7 months) we really don't have office politics. So, I suppose the answer to title is yes?
Did you catch the definition for "politics" that the article uses?
> Politics is the process of making decisions that apply to members of a group.
So if you have a group of people, and that people makes decisions using some process, then you have politics.
My general experience with mentoring young employees relatively new to the workforce (say, 5 years or less) is that many of these employees think that they can just do good work and keep their head out of office politics. But in a very real sense, the only reason that this can possibly work is because someone else on the team is actively looking out for these people, and if you ignore politics indefinitely, you will eventually be in a position of seniority where it is your job to look out for the new employees.
If you believe that your office doesn't really have office politics, my prediction is that if you end in any kind of leadership position, you will have either changed your mind by that point about whether you have politics, or you will suffer from some avoidable failures.
> Politics is the process of making decisions that apply to members of a group.
So if you have a group of people, and that people makes decisions using some process, then you have politics.
My general experience with mentoring young employees relatively new to the workforce (say, 5 years or less) is that many of these employees think that they can just do good work and keep their head out of office politics. But in a very real sense, the only reason that this can possibly work is because someone else on the team is actively looking out for these people, and if you ignore politics indefinitely, you will eventually be in a position of seniority where it is your job to look out for the new employees.
If you believe that your office doesn't really have office politics, my prediction is that if you end in any kind of leadership position, you will have either changed your mind by that point about whether you have politics, or you will suffer from some avoidable failures.
But the articles definition is any time a decision is made that applies to a group is politics. So unless every individual is working entirely independently and never talking to anyone else, there’s politics. Now in your case these sound like healthy politics - everyone respects everyone, and there’s none of the negative connotation. But being able to convince someone else your design is right is still politics.
Politics you agree with are often invisible, politics you don't agree with have a way of being very in your face.
It's 100% guaranteed that there is office politics happening in your company. Either you don't see it or things are working for your benefit so you don't define them as "politics".
Hold off concluding that until you have a situation where you think you absolutely know the right answer and someone else also thinks they have the right answer, and your answers don't match.