ALUMNI RELATIONS

AT SALEM STATE
ORGANIZATIONAL POLITICS
Randy Cloke
AGENDA

 Overview of Practicum Site

 Goals
 Position
 Organizational Chart
 From then ‘til now
 Overview of Bolman and Deal Frames
 Organizational Politics, Michael Jarrett
 The Weeds
 The Rocks
 The High Ground
 The Woods
 What I See and What I Do
 Discussion
PRACTICUM OVERVIEW

 Working with Staff Assistant for Alumni Relations

 Rebooting a job-shadowing/professional mentor
program
 “Mentor a Viking Job Shadowing Program”
 Using online platform for making connections and
networking
 Mentorship ^ retention
 Began as $5k donation from alum for BSB students
 BEFORE I BEGAN…

 Committee created, vendor chosen

 Vendor based on price
 Initial vendor
 Could not keep service promises
 Months of delays for basic, necessary features
 Creating an account
 Terminated contract
 $ down the drain
 Previous iterations of program was done with pencil and
paper
 Biased process?
 Tracking and reporting?
 Staff Assistant assigned project
 Hired in February 2017
 OKAY, I’M HERE NOW

 Search for new vendor

 Graduway
 FirstHand
 PeopleGrove
 Strong integration with campus systems
 Company interest in positive relationship between mentoring
connections and retention

 Financing
 Institutional funding?
 Henry Bertolon Endowment for Career Readiness
 Dean,
Bertolon
School of
Business
Senior
Graduate Director,
Student Alumni
Relations
NOT TOO SHABBY FOR
GOVERNMENT WORK
Staff Committee Assistant
Dean,
Assistant,
Student
Alumni
Success and
Relations
Transition

Faculty, Associate
Bertolon Director,
School of Employer
Business Relations
 THE PROCESS

No vendor Costs too much No funding Contract

• Outreach to new • Email to company • Institutional funding? • State

vendors founder about pricing contract can
• Endowment funding be off-
• Product demos • Agreement on first approval process putting
• Evaluation of needs vs. year price with data
sharing • Bid process?
platform abilities
• IT approval
• Purchasing
approval
POLITICAL FRAME

 Coalitions of different interests

 Differing views of coalition members across many spectrums
 Nothing matters more than cutting up a small pie
 Conflict is key and power is all
 Organizational direction and decisions derived from negotiation

Differences Competition Negotiation Bargaining

Bolman & Deal, 2012, p.188

STRUCTURAL FRAME

 Specialization and division of labor key to structurally framed organization

 Coordination and control necessary to meet objectives
 Rationality > personal goals
 Restructuring often necessary to address “structural deficits”

Employee
3

Employee
2

Employee
1

Bolman & Deal, 2012, p.44

SYMBOLIC FRAME

 Meaning, not event or action

 Experiences not uniform; interpretations unique
 Expression, not production—ceremonies, heroes, myths
 Culture keeps organization together and achieves goals

Bolman & Deal, 2012, p.248

Wikimedia, 2006
HUMAN RESOURCES

 Organizations serve humans

 “Organizations and people need each other”
 Poor compatibility affects both organization or person or both
 Good compatibility increases effectiveness of both person and organization

Person

Effective;
met
goals
Organization
Bolman & Deal, 2012, p.117
ORGANIZATIONAL
POLITICS
 THE WEEDS
INDIVIDUAL AND INFORMAL

 Personal influence and informal networks

 Grows mostly unchecked, unmaintained; “naturally”
 If unchecked, nothing can get through
 To navigate:
 Understand informal networks
 Understand power brokers and gaps between them
 Ally if good, isolate if not

Jarrett, 2017
 THE ROCKS
INDIVIDUAL AND FORMAL

 Power:
 from individual actions and “formal” authority, like
roles and titles
 bolstered by formal ties to important groups
(membership on important board or in group)
 To navigate:
 Use formal source of power, whether authority or
relationship
 Rational argument, like “Leaving a legacy”—how do
you want to be remembered?

Jarrett, 2017
 THE HIGH GROUND
ORGANIZATIONAL AND FORMAL

 “Control systems, incentives, and sanctions”

 Determine power
 Can make organization too bureaucratic
 To navigate:
 Use feedback from clients and customers about over-
structuralization
 “The way we’ve always done it” can be bad
 Outside group to assess issues can create other
power source(s)

Jarrett, 2017
 THE WOODS
ORGANIZATIONAL AND INFORMAL

 Formal processes and procedures, but also

unwritten rules, “understood” beliefs
 Combination can stifle ideas and change
 Can bewilder newcomers, including change
agents
 To navigate:
 “ask the stupid question”
 Ask “external agents” about their understanding
of the organization
 Start sooner

Jarrett, 2017
SALEM STATE ALUMNI RELATIONS:
THE WOODS

Where does • Understand who is where

political • Organizational level • Organizational structure(s)
activity • Become part of structure
come from?

• More power drawn

from understanding • Asking the “dumb” question
Where does
of informal policies, • Knowing who to ask
power rules, connections • Seeking knowledge outside of the given
come from? than title…generally. structure
DISCUSSION

 Where do you think your

practicum experience falls?
 Do you think frames other
than Political can help a
person navigate the “4
metaphors”?
 Which of the “4 metaphors”
do you think you are best
able to navigate?
QUESTIONS?
REFERENCES

 Bolman, L. G., & Deal, T. E. (2013). Reframing organizations: Artistry, choice, and
leadership. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.
 Jarrett, M. (2017, April 24). The 4 types of organizational politics. Retrieved from
https://hbr.org/2017/04/the-4-types-of-organizational-politics
 Wikimedia. (2006, June 27). Apple logo [Logo]. Retrieved from
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/f/fa/Apple_logo_black.s
vg/2000px-Apple_logo_black.svg.png