Finding the positive in corporate politics

Niven Postma discusses the importance of embracing diverging narratives and opening up to different possibilities.

Niven Postma, MD of management consultancy Niven Postma Inc., argues for the power of opening up our minds to many possible stories – about ourselves, about our organisation – and she lives that message. When CHRO Magazine asked her about her background, she shared a lively and winding history of education, achievement, career paths, and professional relationships.

Niven's career path has taken her from CEO of the Business Women’s Association (BWA) to leading the children’s NGO, NOAH. It is clear that Niven is made up of more than a single thread or story, and she believes you are too. This diverging and multiplicity of narrative is how she is redefining the term “corporate politics” in her successful leadership consulting work.

Not to be stereotyped

Niven held the role of CEO of the BWA for three years. She describes it as a role she loved and grew into, but she was also cognisant of the need to avoid becoming synonymous with the organisation, and it with her. So when she chose to leave, and a member suggested she look into NOAH, an established NGO that provided care and support for orphaned and vulnerable children, she jumped at the chance.

Niven admits that the move – from a high-powered, glossy association, to working with communities in some of South Africa’s poorest areas – might seem odd. But it was a role she relished, and one she credits with helping her better understand privilege and the gaping divide of inequality in South Africa.

Self-care for leaders

“But [this role] was also hard on an emotional level,” she says, and this coincided with “a bunch of personal things”, all of which meant she knew she needed a serious break. “This ended up being a year's break, a year of reading,” she explains. “I knew I was very close to burn-out, and I thought if I tip over into burnout it will be very hard to come back from that.”

This experience helped cement the idea that personal leave and advocating for your needs is just as critical for leaders as the driving focus that is universally praised. To her mind, Niven says, the idea of feeling exhausted while having unused leave is silly. “If you’re waiting for permission to take your leave, it is never going to happen. Rather, take the leave and know that it is what you need, and what you deserve, and come back replenished.”

She continues: “When people see ‘always contactable, always on’ as a sign of strength and commitment to a company, I am flabbergasted. If your role as a leader is to develop people and make them realise they are capable of more than they thought, then how is you being indispensable an achievement? In my books, that is failing at your first task of leadership, which is to develop people. If you cannot go on leave and trust people to have the capability and integrity to do their job in your absence, then you have failed as their leader.”

Back into the deep end

After her ‘year of reading’, Niven moved back into the working world at the Reserve Bank, under Gill Marcus. Gill, she says, was keen to bring diverse skills and people into the Bank, those outside of the typical profile of central bankers. Niven spent five years here, and then once again took time out for herself – “to go travelling around South Africa”.

Her last corporate position thereafter was at Standard Bank, as the head of leadership and culture for the whole group. Then she struck out on her own, developing her brand as a consultant and facilitator, focusing on leadership, strategy, and organisational culture.

“That is where I have implicitly worked for most of my career, and then explicitly at the Reserve Bank and Standard Bank. It is the sweet spot of what I enjoy. I also enjoy working for myself. I cared deeply about all the roles I had held and organisations I had worked in, but to work for an organisation you do sacrifice autonomy to a degree, and I am loving the autonomy of self-employment right now,” she says.

Leader of leaders

A born Joburger, Niven actually completed high school in Port Elizabeth where she showed an early aptitude for leadership, as head girl of Collegiate Girls. She says her friends joke that her leadership roles since have all been an attempt to “be head girl again”. But her various roles in C-suite and executive capacity have meant that not only can she consult on these matters, but she has the experience to back this up.

If there is a single common characteristic to the leaders with whom Niven has worked, she says it is that “they give a damn”. She says: "From formal,

top-of-the-pile business leaders, to community leaders who are completely invisible to the rest of South Africa, the one thing that I see in common is that they care about the people and situations around them.”

“There is a difference between leadership and authority. They are not mutually exclusive, of course, but there is a fundamental difference between the two. And the true leaders that I have seen come from a place of really caring about what they are trying to do, of knowing what matters to them, and of being clear what impact they want to make in the world. They make a difference, and that doesn’t have to be on a huge stage, it can be within a small community, but they make it happen.”

She adds: “There is so much about leadership that is overhyped, and we are desperate for leaders, and desperate to put the label of ‘leader’ onto people. For me, what it boils down to is ‘give a damn and show up’.”

“There is a difference between leadership and authority. They are not mutually exclusive, of course, but there is a fundamental difference between the two.”

Broadening the definition of politics

A tactic that Niven teaches – and will be presenting at the HR Indaba this year – is a rethinking of the notion of corporate politics.

“The single-story version portrays corporate politics as vicious, destructive, and backstabbing. It would be naïve not to acknowledge that as only one version of it. But the mission and definition of corporate politics is actually neutral. It is the ‘informal, unofficial, behind-the-scenes effort to sell ideas, build power and achieve various objectives'."

“It can be toxic or positive. The reality is that there isn't a single organisation that doesn’t have politics, but I ask what these tactics are being used for and to what end. They can be employed for building relationships and using influence effectively and ethically, which you need to do to be an effective leader or yes, of course, they can be used to

Creating culture

malign, side-line, protect and destroy.” She continues: “But organisations need ethical politicians and in my course I help people realise this – generally for the first time ever in their career. And that is hugely liberating for them. At a workshop I held recently, one of the delegates said to me that the insights I offered were going to change their career totally. And another delegate said that I may just have helped her save her job. That is incredibly rewarding to be a part of.”

This influence is critical to shifting cultures in an organisation, something Niven admits is notoriously hard to do, “especially in a large complex organisation with all kinds of dynamics, histories, and subcultures, and competing agendas”.

“Every organisation is different, and for me the most important thing is to understand the context in which your organisation is working and where it comes from. It is a cliché because it is true. I have worked with some remarkable leaders who use every opportunity to talk about vision and mission, and to lead by example and others who have said all the right things but to reconstitute the quote by Ralph Waldo Emerson: ‘What they were doing spoke so loudly I couldn’t hear a word they said’.”

Niven believes people need something to begin embracing change, and that isn’t a ‘burning platform’. “That term is about fear, and fear motivates but only to a point. Rather, until there is some kind of ‘shining light’ – something that people see as compelling, powerful and intrinsically something they want to do – visible in the way that leadership portrays itself and communicates, very little is going to change.”

This is why she is trying to change the leadership rhetoric from “I’ve got to” to “I get to” – a shift that is about potential, and inherently about embracing a plethora of stories; of possibilities. 