Q&A: Working with people who suck up to the boss

Hello everyone. Today I am going to answer a question about the games people play at work in the name of office politics. Our question comes from Harriet from Singapore who has asked the following question:

"Hi Limpeh. In the office where I work, there is a culture of sucking up to the boss - it is pretty extreme. I'm not just talking about getting the boss coffee or little mid-afternoon snacks, or paying the boss compliments, there are people who do go out of their way to become the boss' friend. Let me give you an example: my boss has a ten year old son and my colleague who has a nine year old daughter heard that the boss' son is learning tennis, so she got her nine year old daughter to enroll in the same tennis club just to get the chance to get their kids to play tennis together, then they can hang out together whilst their children play tennis on the weekend.

There are other examples: like when my boss mentioned that he was going to Sri Lanka on holiday, immediately my colleague said, "oh I've always wanted to go to Sri Lanka but never have anyone to go there with, maybe we can go together?" There have been just too many incidents like that which are evident of a culture of sucking up to the boss. I despise it - don't get me wrong, I have nothing against my boss but I hate people who think they can get a raise or a promotion simply by sucking up to the boss. Personally, I prefer to keep my work and my personal life separate and I would much rather prove my worth to my boss through the work that I do. Shouldn't that be the way things are done?

Does office politics drive you mad?

I am in a moral dilemma. There's a part of me that says, grow up, I need to put my morals aside and at least make some effort to adapt to the environment I am in, otherwise I may lose out simply for being just so bloody stubborn. If being nicer to the boss can help advance my career, then I ought to do whatever it takes to get what I want. On the other hand, there's another part of me that thinks, this is bullshit, surely the boss is not that stupid to fall for this shit, right? Or am I the one who is being naive to have this sense of self-righteousness about the whole situation I am in? Could you help me please? I talked to my parents about it but they're clueless about office politics and I know you've been through a lot over the years in the corporate world. Thank you so much for your help Limpeh.
-Harriet"

Thanks for your question Harriet. I don't have a simple answer for you as this is a complex issue and also I don't know enough about your company to advice you either way. For what it is worth, I am going to talk more generally about the issue to help you make up your own mind on the issue. Personally, I agree with you - I think that I would much rather keep my personal life and work separate. I usually make little effort to socialize with my colleagues, there is this culture here in the UK where colleagues like to go to the pub after work and I never ever join them. It's not my style - I've just spent nine hours seeing you in the office, what makes you think I want to spend another hour with you in the pub? Oh no, no thank you guys, I would go to the gym, go home or go see some other friends after work instead.

Do you feel obliged to socialize with your colleagues?

I can appreciate that it can be annoying when you see people blatantly trying to "saka" (suck up to) the boss - urgh. I remember years ago, I worked in this company where my boss would bring his son to the office and I had some colleagues who went out of their way to play with the boss' son. And I'm like, come on, that's so fake. Why are you pretending to be the kid's best friend and be so nice to him when you hardly know him? I barely spoke to the kid when he was in the office. I didn't feel the need to be nice to the kid just because he was the boss' son and I don't believe my rather cold attitude harmed my prospects in that company.

There is an art of sucking up to the boss and I don't think that many people actually get it right - sure many people try it, but some actually do fail and it can backfire. Let me give you an example. There was one particularly creepy Indian guy who went out of his way to be nice to my boss' wife and the problem was that this creepy Indian guy didn't know how to communicate with her. There was this company dinner at a lovely restaurant where the boss decided to bring his wife along - the Indian guy was sitting near her at the dinner table and chose to make conversation with her.

Delicious food & awkward conversation = company dinner

He failed to pick up on the fact that she was merely being polite but was not really interested in talking to him, nonetheless, he persisted bombarding her with a mix of personal questions and compliments. She clearly found the situation rather awkward and uncomfortable, so after about 25 minutes, she declared, "oh I want to ask Susan about something." She then changed seats and relocated herself to the far end of the room, putting maximum distance between her and the creepy Indian guy. She then told the boss that the Indian guy was disturbing her and the boss got another colleague to tell the Indian guy to please leave her alone. I can still remember him say, "but I was only being friendly! I swear I was not flirting with her! Why is she upset about me just talking to her?"

So there you go - sometimes, attempts at sucking up to the boss may backfire spectacularly so not all your colleagues may necessarily be rewarded for their efforts. So it may be wise to take a step back and look at the situation carefully before you declare war on the colleague who is sucking up to the boss: you may not even need to do anything if the suck up is sabotaging himself. You see, different people react differently to this kind of behaviour: take that awkward company dinner episode I described above. Some people may enjoy being the center of attention whilst others may find such uninvited attention intrusive and uncomfortable. Hence in your case Harriet, I don't know what kind of person your boss is, perhaps you can enlighten me: how does he respond to flattery or any of these attempts to suck up to him? If he is impervious to this kind of behaviour, would your colleagues have persisted in sucking up to him?

What if the boss is in the wrong, then what?

Suppose your boss is really the kind of person who does thrive on attention and loves flattery, then what should you do? Certainly people with big egos exist and they love nothing more than having their egos massaged. It is human nature to enjoy that kind of attention and flattery - but a rational boss would put the interest of the company ahead of his own ego and be able to recognize those who do add value to the company and those who are trying to get ahead by sucking up to the management. If you have a boss who puts his ego before his company, then perhaps that's your cue to start looking for a new job if that is really the harsh reality you have to face.

But of course, life is never that straight forward - that creepy Indian colleague of mine was actually really good at his job and was extremely productive, yet somehow he felt that he simply had to resort to sucking up to the boss in order to secure his place in the company. Honestly, I really don't know why he felt the need to resort to doing this, perhaps it is a cultural thing for him. Some people may be insecure despite being quite good at what they do, so they turn to such behaviour to make them feel more secure about their position at work especially in a very competitive environment.

How do you prove your worth to your employer?

I guess the question for you is whether you should join in with this culture of sucking up to the management and I would say, do what you feel comfortable and do not force yourself to do anything you really don't want to. For example, years ago when I was in the army, the officer I worked for was a vegan and she was particularly keen to share her ideas about being a vegan and a Buddhist with others - I am by no means a vegan (oh no, I like to eat meat) but I pretended to be interested in her ideas and we should spend ages talking. She told me about her dream to buy a plot of land in Johor and start her own organic farm there, she knew exactly what she wanted to grow on her farm.

Was I sucking up to her? Perhaps, but I didn't think so at the time. Was I faking interest in her ideas? Not really, whilst I neither embraced Buddhism nor did I become a vegan, listening to her ideas was an interesting enough way to pass the time and learn something new whilst I was in the army. Would I have befriended this officer if she wasn't a nice person? No, I only befriended her because I thought she was genuinely a very nice person. I don't think I was consciously sucking up to her to try to get something out of that relationship, rather, I treated her as a person as she was not your typical female regular office in the army. If she treated me better as a result of my friendship with her, then great - if she treated me no different than everyone else, then that would have been fine with me as well.

I became good friends with an officer I worked for in the army.

I think it is perfectly fine to extend the hand of friendship out to your boss and others in senior management - ethically, there's nothing wrong with befriending others in your company even if they are in senior positions. It's entirely your choice. If there's someone you like, befriend them. If you don't like them, then treat them merely as colleagues and not friends. You're in control, it's your choice and you certainly should be compelled to try to become everyone's best friend at work. Believe me, trying to please someone you don't even like is bloody hard work - your colleagues who are busy sucking up to the boss, well they're not exactly enjoying what they're doing and there's no promise that what they are doing will pay off in the end. So whilst you're taking a small risk in missing out by not sucking up to the boss, but you're definitely sparing yourself the torture of forcing yourself to be nice to someone you don't even like.

Don't forget there are still plenty of ways for you to consolidate your position at work: such as making sure you claim credit for the good work that you've done, making sure you look better than everyone else in the office, constantly improving your skills by taking courses and studying, making sure you get along with other colleagues so you form allies who can help you in the office as well as the obvious: becoming really good at your job so you justify the value you bring to your company. If your work is excellent, then you won't be afraid of competition in any shape or form. 

So that's it from me on this issue, I hope I have shared some useful ideas with you. I invite the rest of my readers to also join in the debate - how do you feel about colleagues who suck up to the boss? Have you encountered people like that at work? Do use the comments section below to let me know what you think, many thanks for reading.