Don’t Destroy Employee Morale by Bringing Politics into the Workplace
This past weekend I went out to dinner with a few close friends. After the meal our conversation turned to politics and the upcoming presidential race. One of my friends who is not particularly fond of politics, Mary, shared a story that really blew my mind.
Mary works for a privately owned company that has a couple dozen retail stores across the Upper Mid-West. It is pretty well known within her organization that the founder and owner of the company is an ardent supporter of his chosen political party.
Mary mentioned that at several recent team meetings politics had been brought up and store leaders had stated emphatically that if employees of the store cared about their organization's success that they would vote for the candidate of Party X in the general election. These store leaders stressed that if a candidate from party Y were elected it would be disastrous for Mary's organization. They even suggested that in the upcoming state primary - just a few weeks away - employees should go out and vote for a certain candidate from party Y because he/she would have a harder time beating a candidate from party X in a general election.
Furthermore Mary informed us that during the 2004 presidential election (she wasn't working with her current employer at the time) the owner of the company had send out an email to every employee in the organization urging them to vote for his party's candidate – again stressing the importance to the organization's success.
Pretty crazy huh?
Mary finished her story by telling us that she was even grilled by an assistant store manager and a couple of fellow team members about who she was going to vote for as she had been "awfully quite" about the issue. They accused her of supporting "the other guy" and again stressed to her the importance of voting for their candidate. She told them that she hadn't decided yet and that it was none of their business. By the end of her story Mary was visibly upset and it was clear that she had been demoralized by her recent experiences.
Think about the effect this had on Mary's performance in her job… Do you think that she provided the high level of service her company prides itself on that afternoon? Probably not.
Do you think she was excited to go to work the next morning? Probably not.
Now I'm not so naïve to believe that politics can be kept out of the workplace, and I also acknowledge that this private business owner was well within his rights to voice his political views to his employees. However Mary's story made it clear to me that such actions can have a devastating effect on employee morale. If Mary was turned off by her employer's actions, you can bet others were too. Heck, I was even a little riled up by the time she finished her story.
My point here is that employee morale is just too critical to an organization's success to allow it to be destroyed by pushing a particular political view on others. If you are a leader or manager in your organization, do your organization a favor and leave politics where it belongs – cocktail parties and meals between close friends!
Now go Maximize Possibility!
Other blog posts you may be interested in:
- 8 Tips for Improving Employee Morale
- Favortism and Nepotism - A Cancer on Employee Morale
- Five Signs Your Management is Destroying Employee Morale
- "Rudeness" Leads to Morale Issues
- Five Signs that Personal Accountability Isn't a Core Cultural Value
Chris Young helps organizations Maximize Possibility through talent management, cultural transformation, and strategic intervention. Bring Chris in today!
