“The Secret Handshake” is a book on career advancement and career strategies in which author Kathleen Kelley Reardon states that there are unwritten rules shared by all people at the top, and that they must be obeyed to join them at the top.
Overview
- There are non-written rules and behavior that allow you -or stop you- from joining those at the top (secret handshake)
- You’re largely assessed in terms of personal and interpersonal power (see ‘executive skills‘)
- Political awareness is a skill you can and should develop
Notes
About the Author:
Kathleen Kelley Reardon is a professor of management at the University of Southern California’s Marshall School of Business, and she earned her Ph. D. with summa cum laude and distinction at the University of Massachusetts.
Kathleen also works as a management consultant on topics such as company culture, and effective communication, and she enjoys writing on her blog on female empowerment.
The Higher You Go, The More Subtle The Game
The higher you go, the more professionalism matter.
And more professionalism means that people there strive to look above pettiness and “games”.
But they’re not really.
It’s just that the game becomes more hidden and stealthy.
And if you want to make it into that club, you need to learn to play that game.
Why Politics Are Crucial
Kathleen defines politics as “politics is an illegitimate means of getting things done”, and every successful manager has done.
And she rightly says that being good at politics is not a trait you’re born with, but it’s a skill that you can learn.
Says the author:
The word “politics” has fallen into some disrepute, not because of what it means, but because of how it has been used. (…) Like it or not, the way things get done in most organizations. And it’s high time we started to train people in how it works.
Also read:
Learning Politics Is Learning to Read Meaning Beyond Words
Says the author:
Cues that provide information extras are rarely missed by the more politically savvy. You can’t reach the inner circles of business by missing or misreading cues on a regular basis. It’s important to become a sophisticated interpreter of meaning, observant of both content and relational levels of conversation
This is what we call sub-communication at The Power Moves.
People who fail to read nonverbal cues not only do poorly at work, but at life in general.
Also read:
When You Acquiesce to Poor Behavior, You Reinforce Your Weaker Position
Imagine for example that someone says something patronizing.
If you accept it, then you reinforce the perception that the person has power over you.
Even if you just made a comment that his words were patronizing instead opens up his frame to discussion, and the power relationship is also open to discussion.
Power is negotiable, says the author, and you should always be ready to renegotiate it.
Work In a Politically Suited Environment
Organizations differ in their skills and enjoyment of politicking.
Thus, it follows that people will be most effective if they find an organization where the amount of politics matches the amount of politics they can stomach -or the amount they can thrive in-.
A politically skilled player can actually do well in a very politicized environment because he can play by his strengths.
And, on average, keep this in mind: the more political the organization is, the more you need to be able to read between the lines.
The Political Savvy of The Balancing Act
The balancing act is how politically savvy players balance their own needs, with the needs of the projects or task, plus the needs of the people that matter.
Politically savvy people for example don’t just promote their ideas based on what sounds good to them, but they also wonder what it will mean for senior management, who looks good if it’s adopted, and who looks poor.
Taking sides and competing with those who have more power than you results in an obvious loss for you.
Says the author that “if you go the mat, you better be the one with the decision power”.
If you don’t, it’s much better to find ways to present your thoughts, decisions, and actions, in a way that’s palatable to those who have more power than you have.
See:
Also read:
Learn to Read Your Boss
Contrary to Daniel Goleman’s ‘emotional intelligence myth‘, it’s reports that need to be emotionally intelligent towards their bosses, not the other way around.
That means that you must learn to read your boss’s nonverbal cues.
If you notice for example that he often high praises but only mild praises to you, that might be the sign he’s not yet happy with you, and that you must change something.
Some other indirect bosses show displeasure by avoiding you, or by interacting with you less.
For example, if you’re speaking at a meeting and the boss is not looking at you in the eyes, that possibly means you have offended him recently.
And by the way, if your boss is acting like that with someone else in your team, you should avoid engaging with that person as well, lest you send the message that you’re siding against your boss.
Some other bosses will not tell you when they have little time, but you will see them fidgeting, or looking at their computer screen, or talking more rapidly. That’s the sign you should say “OK boss, I don’t want to disturb right now, maybe I come back later”.
Confident, Yes, But Don’t Overdo It
A mistake I made at the beginning of my career:
Confidence is an aspect of personal power. Yet there’s always the risk of overdoing it or even the appearance of overdoing it. One of the CEOs interviewed for this book told me he overstepped his confidence quotient one time. By word of mouth it got back to him after he’d missed a promotion that one of the senior executives had said at the promotion meeting, “I don’t like that guy. He’s a peacock strutting around.” And, this CEO told me, “The guy was probably right.”
Pretty much the same feedback that prevented me from getting a reward international assignment at the end of my talent graduate programme.
Adapting to Male & Female Style
While a male/masculine boss might find it irritating that a woman doesn’t move quickly to greet him and show deference, a female boss might find it irritating that men self-promote and, as the author calls it, engage in “male posturing“.
The best way to handle your boss then is to become aware of what he prefers. And to learn the typical differences between men and women.
Also see:
At The Top, It’s All About People’s Skills
Says the author:
As you move closer to the top, people skills dominate over technical skills
That much is true.
Technical skills help you the most when you’re starting out. But to get to the top, it’s all about people skills.
Also read:
Quotes
On technical competence VS general competence, including political savvy:
Surely competence is critical to success; in fact, its very foundation. But technical competence is rarely sufficient.
On power:
The interesting thing about power is that it is often both a means to get ahead and the reward for getting there.
On “concealing your intentions“, as Robert Greene would put it:
The time to tell your boss that you’re leaving is when you are leaving, not when you’re thinking about it.
On politically smart hard work:
Being dedicated doesn’t necessarily mean putting in long hours or being constantly available. To the contrary, it’s important to put in long hours and be available when it matters to those in a position to notice your dedication.
On the importance of being like those who lead:
This preference for one’s own kind is exactly why organizational diversity is so difficult to achieve. If the people running your organization aren’t like you in fundamental ways, you’ll have difficulty achieving the secret handshake.
Competition above teamwork:
Despite all the talk about teams in business circles today, competition is rewarded more than cooperation, and so conflict is the inevitable result.
Real-Life Advice
- Never say you will leave as soon as you can: yes, you might be angry, but telling someone you will leave before you have any offer is plain silly
- Meet people with “chance encounters”: master politicians do their homework before attending network events and then “accidentally” meet the people they wanted to meet
- You owe your mentor: even if he never said so. Keep that in mind and show you understand the basic rules of social exchange and “WIIFT“
- Watch out for “fake self-disclosers“: these are people who feign giving you good information to get good information in exchange, but they’re really just embellishing useless info to get real intelligence
Give positive recommendations
Your negative recommendation can make you enemies.
That’s what happened to me when the head of internal management consultants asked me for feedback on Julien, one of the guys on his team.
I gave detailed feedback on how sometimes Julien rubbed people the wrong way with a badly concealed haughty attitude. When I saw Julien again it took me one second to realize from his face that he knew something he shouldn’t have known.
Theoretically, your feedback should be anonymous.
But it will not always be. Hopefully, the receiver is honest enough not to share your name. But it might slip out of him, or some details might surface and the subject of your review might be able to put two and two together.
Yes, reviewing someone is a chance for self-promotion. But it’s also a politically delicate situation.
My advice is to be honest, to also use the occasion to showcase your emotional and social intelligence, but to be very careful with negative feedback.
In case you need to provide harsher reviews, consider delivering them verbally. Once you send an email, you also lose control over it, and you never know where your email might end up.
Review
“The Secret Handshake” is a lesser-known gem of political savvy and career advancement.
The central idea of a “secret handshake” is one of the most important unwritten rules of success and something we agree with: act the part, learn how to behave high-value, or you’ll never make it to the top.
The author also shares an incredibly useful approach for analyzing frame dynamics and some valid frame control techniques that I even borrowed for our training program Power University.
If you want to learn how more about how to adapt these principles for both life and career success, see our program:
