July 5, 2006	Volume 6, Issue 27
Recommend this issue to a friend Join the Friends of Point Lookout HTML to link to this article…	Archive: By Topic    By Date Links to Related Articles Sign Up for A Tip A Day!
Create a perpetual bookmark to the current issue
| Follow @RickBrenner	Random Article

---

Are You a Fender?

by Rick Brenner

Taking political risks is part of the job, especially if you want the challenges and rewards that come with increased responsibility. That's fair. But some people manage political risks by offloading them onto subordinates. Be certain that the risk burden you carry is really your own — and that you carry all of it yourself.

n December, 1972, about 117 hours into the Apollo 17 lunar mission, as Astronaut Eugene Cernan was loading the Lunar Rover for the mission's first excursion across the surface of the moon, he accidentally caught the right rear fender of the rover with a hammer. He damaged it, and made a quick repair that really didn't hold. Overnight, Houston worked out a more durable repair that the astronauts installed in the morning, and it held up well during two subsequent excursions.

It's a good thing, too. On Lunar Rovers, fenders are important. They protect the vehicle and the astronauts from the dust and rocks kicked up by the wheels. Fenders do something similar for cars, bicycles and motorcycles.

And sometimes, people serve an analogous role for their supervisors. At work, a fender is anyone who serves to prevent political mud from splashing on the fender's boss. Here are some indicators that you might be a fender.

Other people are fenders

If one or more of your peers or predecessors (or their predecessors) were or are fenders, you might be one yourself. Sometimes it's easier to see in others than in yourself.

You can't exercise your authority

Even though you have formal authority for something, you can't really exercise it without your boss's approval. For instance, if you want to initiate a replacement process or a performance improvement plan for a problem subordinate, and your boss insists on detailed involvement in the procedure, you might be a fender. In extreme cases, you might be told to wait for a "more convenient" time, or that a replacement requisition won't be available. A fender is someone
whose role is to protect
the boss from being splashed
with political mud

If the task is risky, it's yours

Most managers handle some tasks through delegation, and some personally. But if your boss tends to delegate tasks to you if and only if they are high-risk politically, you might be a fender.

The consequences for the individual fender are unpleasant enough, but the existence of fenders also harms the organization.

Tolerating unethical behavior

While it might be OK to use an inanimate object as protection from the consequences of your actions, using human beings that way is unethical. Tolerating one form of ethical breach could be a signal of breaches elsewhere.

Disguising the real problem

To enable the organization to take corrective action, bad management must be revealed. Using a subordinate as a fender enables managers to trick the organization into believing that the problem was in the subordinate. This can lead to mistaken corrective action.

Even if you're pretty sure that you aren't using fenders yourself, think carefully. Are you someone who benefits from subordinates who designate and manage fenders on your behalf?  Top    Next Issue

For more about the Lunar Rover, see A Brief History of the Lunar Roving Vehicle, NASA Marshall Space Flight Center, 3 April 2002.

And for more about the Apollo 17 mission, see Apollo Lunar Surface Journal,edited by Eric M. Jones, NASA Headquarters, November, 2005.

---

Is every other day a tense, anxious, angry misery as you watch people around you, who couldn't even think their way through a game of Jacks, win at workplace politics and steal the credit and glory for just about everyone's best work including yours? Read 303 Secrets of Workplace Politics, filled with tips and techniques for succeeding in workplace politics. Order Now!

Would you like to see your comments posted here? Send me your comments by email, or by Web form. Thank you for reading this article. I hope you enjoyed it and found it useful, and that you'll consider recommending it to a friend.

Point Lookout is a free weekly email newsletter. Browse the archive of past issues. Subscribe for free.

Support Point Lookout by joining the Friends of Point Lookout, as an individual or as an organization.

Do you face a complex interpersonal situation? Send it in, anonymously if you like, and I'll give you my two cents.

More articles on Workplace Politics:

The "What-a-Great-Idea!" Trap

You just made a great suggestion at a meeting, and ended up with responsibility for implementing it. Not at all what you had in mind, but it's a trap you've fallen into before. How can you share your ideas without risk of getting even more work to do?

When All Your Options Are Bad

When you have several options, and all seem politically risky, what can you do? Here are two guidelines to finding your way to a good outcome.

Devious Political Tactics: Credit Appropriation

Managers and supervisors who take credit for the work of subordinates or others who feel powerless are using a tactic I call Credit Appropriation. It's the mark of the unsophisticated political operator.

Devious Political Tactics: The False Opportunity

Workplace politics can make any environment dangerous, both to your career and to your health. This excerpt from my little catalog of devious political tactics describes the false opportunity, which appears to be a chance to perform, to contribute, or to make a real difference. It's often something else.

Plopping

When we offer a contribution to a discussion, and everyone ignores it and moves on, we sometimes feel that our contribution has "plopped." We feel devalued. Rarely is this interpretation correct. What is going on?

See also Workplace Politics and Managing Your Boss for more related articles.

Coaching services

I offer email and telephone coaching at both corporate and individual rates. Contact me for details at rbrenner@ChacoCanyon.com or (617) 491-6289, or toll-free in the continental US at (866) 378-5470.

Get the e-book!

Past issues of Point Lookout are available in four e-books:

• Get 2001-2 in Geese Don't Land on Twigs (PDF, USD 11.95)
• Get 2003-4 in Why Dogs Wag Their Tails (PDF, USD 11.95)
• Get 2005-6 in Loopy Things We Do (PDF, USD 11.95)
• Get 2007-8 in Things We Believe That Maybe Aren't So True (PDF, USD 11.95)
• Get all of the first eight years (2001-2008) in Eight Years of Point Lookout (PDF, USD 26.95)

Are you a writer, editor or publisher on deadline? Are you looking for an article that will get people talking and get compliments flying your way? You can have 500 words in your inbox in one hour. License any article from this Web site. More info

Public seminars

Managing Virtual Teams for Real Results

Managing global or dispersed teams is challenging — miscommunications, misunderstandings, and interpersonal conflict all thrive in the typical environment of the distributed team. And they're even more common in global teams, because of time-zone offsets and language and cultural differences. We'll inventory the challenges distributed and global teams face, and provide tools for anticipating and addressing them. The focus of this program is practical — attendees will learn concrete techniques for preventing and dealing with the problems that accompany global and distributed teams. Read more about this program. Here's an upcoming date for this program:

• Download to
  your calendarKitchener, Ontario: May 19, Dinner Meeting, PMI Canada's Technology Triangle Chapter.