Workplace Culture & Politics

Double Standards and Glaring Inconsistencies – posting 3 of 6

This is an environment of contradictions and it can be difficult to know what to do when it is so changeable. You really need to observe, listen, ask questions and get some sort of independent verification; but it can be dangerous to do so. At the same time no matter what you are told you, you come to realise you can take nothing and no-one at face value. Therefore what do you believe and what do you do? You are highly vulnerable in these conditions. Not surprisingly it was easy to be a target for the unscrupulous and to be confused and sceptical. It was very stressful.

You had to weigh things up such as following instructions and saying what you think or saying what they wanted to hear. The later is a particular feature. There was independence and acquiescence and when pushed they wanted the later, no matter what they told you. There were professional approaches and political approaches. It was we’ve brought you on board to help out and provide professional advice versus adapting, assimilating and becoming part of the problem. It was tell us what you think versus keep opinions to yourself. It was those who were empowered, on the inside and in the know versus those with little or no information or power and on the outer. It was those who were protected or untouchable versus those who were unprotected and hounded. It was those with power or influence openly flouting the rules and values they espoused and it was power to them and their cohorts but no accountability for their actions. It was behind peoples back, smoke screens and anti-team behaviour versus orderly behaviour, fairness and a team focus.

They are extremely subtle and veiled people and there was such a focus on face and not embarrassing people and yet they could openly insult and humiliate you. Therefore they can be both oblique and sledgehammer blunt. Likewise you observe the elegant finesse in handling situations and at the same time the brutal impact on people's peace of mind and health. It was masks and charades hiding behind the scenes realities and you hear about or observe behaviour which is devious and compare this to surface behaviour which presents a different picture.

They expect teams from vastly different backgrounds to more of less think and act homogenously but they are highly factional and tribal. It was massive cultural differences hidden within and behind a so called homogenous group. Fairness, a flat structure, a team approach and cooperation values were stressed but the application of these values was so uneven that you could reasonably question whether they were being applied at all. It was a focus on being fair versus blatant discrimination in an environment that is in no way a level playing field. They could blow petty incidents up into anything and at the same time completely trivialise the basic rights and concerns of individuals. They talk about the importance of teamwork and the team culture but their methods are highly divisive and underhanded and worked against the team. It was very clear there were factions, favourites and those less important or out of favour. One person’s trusted yes-man was another’s self serving troublemaker. It was the ‘good guys’, the ‘bad guys’ and different views about who was who.

It was the maximum versus no information, misinformation and contradictory information. They can push you to finish work but punish you for not checking with them or for doing the wrong thing. At the same time they may change their mind, they may not be available to comment, they may not communicate and they may take days or weeks to get back to you, if at all. There is a strong emphasis on doing work fast and yet this urgent and completed work would then sit with management for weeks or months, so why the 'urgency'. On the other hand important tasks could sometimes be done in minutes but they really required weeks if not months of work given their importance. There was so much emphasise placed on local experience and yet only a few staff were afforded strong opportunities to gain this experience while others were restricted to a back room role, thus ensuring they fell behind their colleagues. They seemed to have little idea or interest in allocating and balancing work across a team and some people were very busy while others had little to do for weeks or months. Some team members were overseen daily while others weren’t. You are pushed to speak up and then censored for doing so and their prejudices and preferences would make voicing your opinion dangerous. They will tell you to keep opinions to yourself yet they will solicit information about staff and relay hearsay on (‘I hear that’). They’ll accuse staff of being sheep, or consultants of taking the money or treating them like fools and yet the whole environment is about conformism and in essence counter to independent professionalism. They also will treat you like a fool offering the most unconvincing excuses.

Contradictions and extremes
It is very hard to reconcile such an extreme environment by giving a balanced overview. On the one hand we were reasonably and generously dealt with and far more than we expected. For most of us this was during the initial honeymoon period of about 6-8 weeks. During this period management were hospitable, generous, welcoming and helpful and beyond the call of duty. However it did change and almost overnight. You were given good reason to be grateful and to acknowledge the decency of key people and in turn the wrong and harm done later on. It was happy days but then getting down to reality but what was reality in such an environment? Therefore someone that was open and accessible could become the complete opposite. Likewise you may have a cheerful and helpful friend/s who may not be what they seem. Eventually it was hard to work out who was your friend and who was your enemy. Likewise who was the good guy and who was the bad guy and you could have the same person in turn both heavily criticised and highly praised by management and others.