PMs face all types of work environment challenges. My clients work at all kinds of places around the world, in startups, scale-ups, and big tech—and I’ve had to help them navigate many types of challenges.
I want to share one such challenging story with you all.
Navigating power dynamics in a workplace contaminated with fear
What often appears as difficult behaviour in the workplace is frequently rooted in power dynamics.
When stakeholders or co-workers start projecting ownership that doesn’t exist, pushing administrative work to others, or engaging in credit-taking behaviour, it’s important to assess if these actions are manifestations of organisational politics, purely personal conflicts, or something worse.
One such client of mine, working as the sole PM at a startup under duress (CEO turnover, quiet layoffs and firings, just a bit of chaos really), came to me and shared how an environment filled with fear & uncertainty led to even more challenging circumstances to navigate.
Here’s what was happening:
A Head of from a different department, with no direct authority or responsibility of the Product function, began requesting status updates from my client.
Seems like a typical stakeholder request at first. Then they asked for direct access to all of the Product department's files and artefacts. Next, they started treating my client, and their peers, like direct-reports rather than collaborators.
Was a change in org structure coming?
Was this stakeholder shifting focus to maintain their job?
Was there reason to even spend time thinking about this?
Taking action
After covering all of this in a coaching session, we arrived at an action plan to first try and understand the motivations of this stakeholder with a collaborative approach to find out: were they focused on achieving an outcome that was important to the business, or was it survival-at-any-cost behaviour?
The stakeholders response made it clear it was the latter.
And it got worse.
When it had gone too far
A few weeks later, I received a WhatsApp message from my client. This same person had started plagiarising my clients work, claiming it as their own. Not just internally, but publicly as well.
My client was understandably frustrated by this. They confronted the stakeholder who responded that copying their work should be seen as "a form of flattery."
Yeah, no.
Precautionary measures
At this point it was clear a collaborative approach with this stakeholder wasn’t going to work. Then, it became more of a game of defence—having more frequent touch points with the new CEO, making it clear what Product was responsible for and the outcomes my client was driving directly.
At the same time though, it was clear this workplace became more of a drag than one of opportunity, leading my client to seek a new role. A story for another day.
What kind of difficult situations are you facing at work? Write me back and I’ll see how I can help.
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Setup a discovery call and let’s talk.