Secrets to Winning at Office Politics Quotes

“Typically, we use the term “playing politics” only to describe our colleagues’ behavior—never our own. They are sucking up, scheming, and manipulating, but we are building relationships, developing strategies, and opening communication channels.”
― Marie G. McIntyre, Secrets to Winning at Office Politics: How to Achieve Your Goals and Increase Your Influence at Work

“Many people feel that playing the political game involves devious plotting or blatant self-promotion. But in reality, “politics” is what naturally happens whenever people with different goals, interests, and personalities try to work together.”
― Marie G. McIntyre, Secrets to Winning at Office Politics: How to Achieve Your Goals and Increase Your Influence at Work

“Low-leverage people tend to waste a lot of energy on complaining, worrying, blaming, gossiping, scheming, and whining. High-leverage people focus their energy on producing results and building relationships. They concentrate on positive goals and things they can control.”
― Marie G. McIntyre, Secrets to Winning at Office Politics: How to Achieve Your Goals and Increase Your Influence at Work

“If you’re not sure where you’re going, you’ll probably end up somewhere else.”
― Marie G. McIntyre, Secrets to Winning at Office Politics: How to Achieve Your Goals and Increase Your Influence at Work

“A frequent power problem in all male groups is that the pre-occupation with dominance often impedes collaboration. Each member may feel that others have no right to interfere in their territory, so everyone limits conflict by operating autonomously.
If you never collaborate, then you automatically avoid situations where you might have to give up some of your power.

In all female groups, problems are more likely to result from entanglement in relationship issues. Who's friendly or unfriendly, who's gossipping too much, who's getting more attention, who's being too critical and so on. These matters are often put aside when someone has a personal problem.”
― Marie G. McIntyre, Secrets to Winning at Office Politics

“(paraphrasing from chapter 8)
you must adjust to the culture established by the power
[..]
contrast between flexibility & ingenuity compared to structure & consistency.

the former is about exploring new ideas and changing plans, the latter is about delivering on time(structured timelines, due dates) and in budget”
― Marie G. McIntyre, Secrets to Winning at Office Politics

“People aren't too different from lab rats.

We seek out rewarding experiences and steer clear of punishing ones. If interaction with you is a disagreeable event, people will avoid it.

(from chapter 12)

tl;dr people aren't too different from lab rats”
― Marie G. McIntyre, Secrets to Winning at Office Politics

“championing”
― Marie G. McIntyre, Secrets to Winning at Office Politics: How to Achieve Your Goals and Increase Your Influence at Work