What's Da Buzz?

It seems to be a universal thing no matter what country you are in or what company you are working for but office politics is one of the ugly sides of having a job. (Hence why I feel self-employment or running a business is better.)

For those who have not been graced of experiencing office politics in a Western company, I’ll explain it briefly. Office politics is not based on who is performing better or frustration with dealing with someone not pulling their share of the workload. Instead office politics is when you are judged based on whether or not you associate with the “in crowd.” Basically, those who often are not good at doing a job go back to forming the groups like they did in elementary and high school instead of being mature and working to get the job done.

Individuals in the “in crowd” may take exception to your not participating in their group or honoring their group and try and find flaws in your work to get you fired. These childish antics of those who are insecure are unfortunately common. The nastiness is getting worse as morality in the USA declines.

So if you are a Filipina here in the USA or other Westernized company, how do you get past the office politics without sacrificing your own identity (harming your home life in the process because of changing for the worse)?

The answer lies in the core of what a Filipino is. We are respectful, very hard working, polite and kind as a general culture. That is how you beat the office politics in-crowd. You stay kind and polite at all times always giving the proper respect to those who are in authority while asking for clarification on work issues. Do not engage in gossip or anything the in-crowd focuses on. Do your job better than anyone else in the company without giving the desire to “climb the corporate ladder.” By performing better than the rest because of our hard work ethic while remaining humble, you remove the threat to their job unless they are paranoid about you taking their job because you are outperforming them.

Work hard, do your best to remain error-free, accept constructive criticism as it relates to the job while letting them know you respect a person’s knowledge, experience, and title but you are equals when it comes to being a human being. Or as the phrase goes “Kill’em with kindness.”

Live well,

Anah

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