Stuck in Kansas

Let me start off by saying that I don't hate them all, but I do hate enough of the 48 Laws of Power to write an entire blog post about them.

With all due respect to the authors of the 48 Laws of Power [Robert Greene and Joost Elffers] some of their suggestions, some of their recommendations turn my stomach and frankly explain why there is so much jockeying for position and ill-treatment of staff in the American workplace.  But let me not get ahead of myself.  Let me start at the very beginning, a very good place to start.....

Again, all due respect to the authors, I do wonder whether some of what's included in those laws isn't part of the problem with American business today?  I mean, Law #17: Keep others in suspended terror? (I guess now we know why folk sometimes run amok at work huh.)  Or what about this one:  Law #6: Court attention at all cost (reality TV anyone?); or worse still, Law #7: get others to do the work for you, but always take the credit.  WOW!

I'm no expert, but I wonder if less game playing might result in more productivity?  I wonder if less attention-seeking might result in more actual attention-getting (for the right reasons)? I wonder if less time spent on trying to "crush your enemy totally" (Law #15) might result in a more cooperative environment where, I don't know, WORK might actually get done? 

Had the authors of the Laws of Power offered up the simple caveat that one needs to actually achieve something, work hard at something, offer something to one's organization, I could possibly get behind the Laws of Power.  Possibly, but not probably.  The truth of the matter is that much of the machination that the Laws suggest is the lazy man's approach to getting ahead.  It's not about achievement, it's about what I can steal from another and pass off as my own. Perhaps that is indeed a law of power and perhaps I'm Dorothy and need to come to the realization that I'm not in Kansas anymore.  All I know is this: every time there is a major catastrophe in the business world - think Toyota's massive recall, BP's massive oil spill, Arlington National Cemetery's massive grave mix up - there's a Machiavellian climber sitting at the top of the food chain, scratching his/her head wondering how ever it all got so mucked up.  Others may wonder, but I've got it figured out, it's because they used (all too successfully) some set of laws for game-playing instead of the laws of work-doing, to get ahead.

I realize that there are people out there whose orientation is towards climbing the social, professional and economic ladders.  I have nothing against that.  I'd like to climb a bit myself, but to focus so fixedly on the climb leads to behaviors that make workplaces awful, awful places to be.  Which explains why folk do terrible things to coworkers when they simply can't take it any more.

I have a suspicion that the authors of the laws are zero sum guys.  They believe that the universe is finite and whatever you get means that necessarily there's that much less for me.  I'm not that way myself, and no matter the challenges I face on a baily dasis (yes I said "baily dasis", it's a Spoonerism), I will continue to believe that your prosperity does not interfere with mine.  I don't, therefore, have to climb over you like a veritable crab in a barrel, to be able to find my way.  But that's just me.  Clearly, my name is Dorothy and I'm still in Kansas.