PURPOSE OF STUDY

Politics or more specifically corporate politics is an essential part of every organization.

Whenever the word “Corporate politics” comes in our mind, most of us perceive it as
negative phenomenon. And in most situations corporate politics poses a negative view in
our minds but it is not always like this every time. Our perception is true to some extent
but not ultimate. Corporate politics is inevitable in every organization, its negative impact
can be reduced or it can be used positively to increase the profitability and productivity
of an organization.
The purpose of conducting this research is to analyze the impact of corporate politics on
the performance of the organization and ultimately profitability of organization. The
research will give an insight into the reality that how much corporate governance is
influential in an organization.
Corporate politics is inevitable, it exists in two forms. One is Inter-organization corporate
politics or market politics and the second one is Intra-organization corporate politics or
office politics. Inter-organization corporate politics is the one which is played by the
organizations to sustain and develop their positions in market, and the intra-organization
corporate politics is the one that is played within organization by the individuals and
groups to get power and influence others in order to increase their benefits.
Our research will be descriptive in nature and we will try to throw light on both forms of
corporate politics but more specifically we will emphasize on Intra-organization or Office
politics.
Dynamic changes are taking place everywhere likewise the markets are also affected by
the ever-changing conditions in the general environment as well as internal and external
environment. To sustain in the market, business firms should be ready to adapt otherwise
it is difficult to oppose failure. The inter-organization or market politics seems
challenging for the business firms but there is no way out other than to find ways to resist
its negative impacts and enhance its positive impacts. In Pakistan, lots of dynamic
changes have taken place in market in the past 10 years due to considerable increase in
foreign and private investments. Let’s take example of the most grown sector that is the
Telecom sector of Pakistan. From 1994 to 2001, there was only one GSM cellular

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company in Pakistan that was Mobilink, Pakistan. Mobilink was the sole provider or
monopolists as far as GSM services are concerned in Pakistan, it exploited the cellular
users here in Pakistan and made billion of revenues from Pakistan. Paktel was there in
Pakistan Telecom market for more than 10 years providing the Aims services, when it
observed that its sales are declining at an alarming rate, it decided to start GSM services
in Pakistan in order to remain and give some breaks to its sales. Why Paktel started its
GSM services? Some of us might think its objective was to facilitate the cellular users…
but no it was not like this the answer to question is this that they wanted to survive and
govern the market. Although the action was right but it was not taken at the right time.
The study attempts to analyze such policies that are used by the organizations and how
these policies affect organizational performance. The impact of brand goodwill in market
will also be discussed through this study. The factors involved in compelling one to
follow a political behavior will also be discussed. Our Study will specifically emphasize
on Pakistani business companies and organizations.
One of other major aspect our study will cover is the analysis of the internal, intra-
organization or office politics. Office Politics is also very influential factor in the
performance of an organization. Our study will try to find out what leads individuals
(employees) and groups to follow political behaviors in organizations.
Although the focus of the study is broad yet we will try to explain how managers or
high/senior management can better utilize their skills and resources to remove the
negative impact of office politics on the behaviors of employees and ultimate impact on
organizational performance. Efforts have been done to explain the scenario, but more in-
depth study is needed to be done. Our study will be an effort to explain the scenario in
context of Pakistani Business firms.

PROBLEM DEFINITION

Engaging in negative political behavior or corporate politics within the organization is a

crime which leads to different undesirable and uncontrollable situations. Political
behavior negatively affects the profitability of the organization. Employees involved in
political behavior may not know this or would be trying to avoid the reality that it has

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negative impacts. It would hurt the employees that are not involved in such activities and
it would decrease satisfaction that would lead to high turnover and in turn if they have to
survive they would also continue to engage in such activities. It may also increase
recruitment costs and it would generate a negative image of the firm. Politics have no
rules and when an employee tastes it, there are least chances that he or she will be able to
forget its taste. Such behavior will surely affect organization in destructive way.

HYPOTHESIS FORMULATION

This study is an effort to analyze the internal dimensions of corporate politics within the
organizations. Our hypotheses underline the major effects of corporate politics on the
organization performance and more specifically on profitability.

Hypothesis: The political behavior of employees within organizations has negative

impact on the performance/profitability of the organization.

Here we will discuss the negatives of office politics or corporate politics. We cannot
avoid or eradicate political behavior completely in an organization because it is inevitable
but we can surely change the rules to minimize the negative impacts. The heart of all
corporate politics is competition within a highly complex social system. The main
problem with political behavior or you can call it a fact is that the competition is a game
without any rules and everything is fair in competition.

Now the different variables involved in the study will be discussed. These variables are
independent, dependent and intervening/moderating variables.

Variables Involved

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 Dependent Variables
The dependent variable in this case is Organizational productivity/ Performance. The
organizational productivity is dependent on certain independent variable that is
organizational strategies/policies.

 Independent Variables
Independent variable in this case is organizational policies or strategies.

 Intervening Variables
Organizational policies are affected by some intervening variables organizations, goals,
compensation and benefits systems, management expertise, tax, market environment, and
motivation techniques.

Goals

Compensation
and Benefits
Independent Dependent
Market
Environment
Corporate Organization
Politics Performance
Motivation
Techniques

Tax

Management
Expertise

MAJOR QUESTIONS

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During our curse of study many questions arouse, some of the questions we
will try to answer are following
 Why political behavior exists and what is its origin?
 What cause employees to involve in political behavior?
 What kinds of employees are engaged in corporate politics?
 How we can minimize the negative impact of corporate politics?
 Besides having negative impacts are there any positive influences of
political behavior on organizational performance?
 Possible negative influences and techniques to solve them?
 Is senior management aware of the situation, then why they are not doing
anything to remedy this?

METHODOLOGY AND TECHNIQUES

 Type of investigation
To answer the issue at hand that is whether corporate strategies and policies affect the
organization performance and productivity, we as researcher conducted the causal study
to delineate the factors that can be influential in increasing or decreasing organization
performance and productivity. Our intention to conduct this study was to establish a
cause and effect relationship between organizational or corporate strategies/policies such
that if corporate policies are designed in a fair way they can be influential in raising
performance and productivity of an organization.

 Unit of analysis
Our research focuses on impact of corporate strategies on performance of an
organization. For this research, we have to find out whether performance of individuals,
groups and ultimately the performance of organization changed as a result of change in

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corporate strategies or not. So our major unit of analysis will be individuals but dyads
and groups can also be analyzed for finding in-depth effect corporate policies and
strategies casts on organization performance and productivity. Data will be gathered from
each individual and each individual’s response will be treated as an individual data
source.

 Sampling technique

Convenience Sampling
The sampling method that will be used for this research is convenience sampling. In
this sampling method, people were chosen on the basis of being easily available, and
this will surely complement our research in the sense that it will help us in
formulating a sample in the shortest time possible. Data will be collected from the
respondents via self-administered questionnaire technique survey.

 Respondents of the study

Our study focuses upon participants who are within the age limit of 23-40 years. These
participants will be:
 Employees within an organization
 Business Professionals
 Top Management
 Middle Management
 Low-level Management

 Data collection mechanism

The research will be a mixed study since both qualitative and quantitative methods of
study were utilized. The reason for choosing a mixed method study was that it will help
us in knowing what factors make an organization successful are or failure.

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In the study, the qualitative aspect of data collection included Secondary Data Analysis
through 10 literature surveys. However due to unavailability of significant local
literature, we were restricted to utilize mostly the foreign literature for our study.

LITERATURE REVIEW

The article is a context from book of Dr. Marilyn Manning and Patricia Haddock,
Developing as a Professional. The article depicts that “A variety of values, standards,
and cultural differences sometimes manifest themselves in the form of office politics.
When this happens, workers sometimes spar off against each other. As a business
professional, you don’t want to get caught in the winds and tides of politics. To stay clear
Managers must avoid people who do irrelevant talks, groups, critics and they must keep
their heads cool and calm. Don’t take pain of others just do what is fair and best.”
Don.R.Beeman and Thomas.W.Sharkey in their article “The Use and Abuse of
Corporate Politics” explains that the political propensity of an organization depends
upon the system complexities and competitiveness of competitors. Secondly, the author
also depicts that power and influence are the components of politics and these are the
facts that determine the political behavior of individuals.
Peter Stevenson in his chapter “keeping the job” in his book “Factors affecting
organizational performance” says that there is a huge difference between learning to be
good at office politics and being a “brownnoser.” People who succeed at the former are
much more likely to advance than those who attempt the latter. The “brownnoser” is also
more likely to earn the disdain of his or her fellow workers. You will impress both your
boss and your coworkers much more by working hard and keeping your mouth closed
than by “tooting your own horn” or by being a “yes man.”
The article “Office politics the biggest contributor to workplace stress” has been
taken from pathways group official website. The article says that rise in office politics
is the single biggest concern for managers in the 21st century; a survey of management
trends has shown. Conflict in the workplace has increased in recent years, with 44% of
people stating that organizational politics was the main cause of the growing discord.
Conflict is an unfortunate fact of workplace and in situations where people have more

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flexible roles, and there are more opportunities for misunderstandings and for things to
go wrong.
Ginger Lapid-Bogda in his article “Office Politics and the Pursuit of Power” depicts
that Political prowess is rare among young professionals. They think of power as either
self-serving or destructive. The author says that if young professional learns to acquire
and use power constructively early in your career, they will likely enjoy tremendous
professional success. To get power young professionals should get expertise and
knowledge. They should be energetic, charismatic and credible, boss and peer support
can add to their power.
Dale Kurow in his article “Surviving Office Politics” gives some tips about how to
survive politics. He says that to survive office politics one should be focused on his
performance should not complain or back-bite negatives about company, and one should
always think before he speaks.
Michelle Neely Martinez in his article “Politics come With the Office” says that Even
if you are a person who takes no active part in [office] politics,” he advises, “knowing
how the game is played, helps you in surviving the game. The rules for the game are that
politics is about power, learn from the past, don’t ignore (or believe everything you hear
from) the grapevine, and try to fulfill performance standards what your boss is
demanding from you.
The context is taken from discussion about corporate politics on the topic “The Good &
Bad of Corporate Politics”. The conclusions at the end of seminar of the seminar were
that when people talk about organizational politics, they usually mean something dirty or
underhanded. Just say the words “office politics”, and you sense the disdain. When you're
out to get something done you have to play politics. No one exists in an atmosphere
where every one agrees. Politics is the art of trying to accomplish things within
organizations. Those who think they’re too smart to engage in politics will be governed
by those who are dumber.”

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BIBLIOGRAPHY

 Developing as a Professional
By Dr. Marilyn Manning and Patricia Haddock
 “The Use and Abuse of Corporate Politics”
By Don.R.Beeman and Thomas.W.Sharkey
 “Factors affecting organizational performance”
By Peter Stevenson
 “Office politics the biggest contributor to workplace stress”
By pathways group official website
 Office Politics and the Pursuit of Power
By Ginger Lapid-Bogda
 Surviving Office Politics
By Dale Kurow

 Politics come With the Office

By Michelle Neely Martinez

REFERENCES

 www.google.com.pk (Search Engine)

 www.pathwaysgroup.co.uk