Wednesday, December 31, 2008

‘P’ for Professionalism; ‘P’ for Politics

Just like there are 4Ps for marketing (Product, place, price and promotion), these are 2Ps which prescribe the success formula for any organization.

I often think why do some organizations succeed while others don’t and what is it that differentiates these types of organizations.
And then I realize that there is a stark similarity amongst the successful ones. These organizations follow a culture of ‘Professionalism’ to the core. They don’t do it for the sake of doing it…

Then comes the next question.

Why doesn’t every organization aspire to be a truly professional organization??

It is not all that easy for that idea to percolate within each and every employee. The vision of the top management should drive the employees into ethical and professional practices at work which would take them longer in the long run. There is always dilution of information as it passes up and down the hierarchy and horizontally across departments. The extent of this dilution decides the amount of effort to be put in to align everything to a common goal.

Now, you might be wondering what I mean by ‘politics’ in this case. Politics here refers to everything from regionalism to bias based on religion to favoring a specific employee irrespective of his/her performance. These are small things, but make a huge difference when you look at it from an organization’s perspective.

This makes me remember a quote by Hillary Clinton “The challenge is to practice politics as the art of making what appears to be impossible, possible.”

It is upto each individual to decide which ‘P’ he/she wants to take. And if the vision of the top management is strong enough, it ensures that every one who is a part of the organization is aligned with the common vision. Unfortunately, this doesn’t happen in 99% of the cases.

All said, a work environment that is driven by professionalism is the best motivator for employees and makes them give their best performance every time.

It certainly is a challenge, but not all that difficult to achieve; if all employees share the same vision for the organization and have a sense of responsibility and accountability.

Hillary Clinton Quote Reference: http://www.woopidoo.com/business_quotes/company-quotes.htm; All other thoughts are original.

2 comments:

Rahul Rathi said...

Well said..but I think in every Indian company we will find Politics...esp. regionalism casteism and favouritism

Bhuvan said...

Agree with 2 Ps. The third p=perfection should also there to be professional is what you do, once a company recognises perfection and professionalism demonstrated without any bias they can get away from politics BUT saying that is amongst the bunch there is one wicked element present in disguise the politics will brew.