Presidential Campaign Staff as a Political Machine

Posted on August 8th, 2008 by Terri Kruzan

As soon as I wrote my last post about the workplace culture of a presidential campaign staff, a friend referred me to Tom Dickinson’s 7/10/08 post in Rollingstone.com called “Obama’s Brain Trust”. This post explores the ins and outs of Barack Obama’s campaign staff. Upon reading, it reminded me of a few ah hah’s about how a workplace culture can make or break a leader’s legacy.

Leaders are the primary creators of a culture for their organization – some do it unwittingly, by just acting the way they do. Others are very mindful and clearly articulate their personal beliefs and model their expectations about how people should act in the organizations they lead. It appears that Obama’s approach is one of mindfulness as seen in the following quote from Dickinson’s post.

“When I (Obama) started this campaign, “I wasn’t sure that I was going to be the best of candidates. But what I was absolutely positive of was that there was the possibility of creating the best organization. The way great things happen is when people are willing to submerge their own egos and focus on a common task. That’s my old organizing mind-set. It’s not just a gimmick, it’s not just a shtick. I actually believe in it.”

You can see from this quote that Obama is talking about his expectations about how people should act and he tells them why – based upon past experiences that proved successful and personal beliefs. What also struck me while reading the post was how mindfully Obama models how he wants others to act in his organization as seen by this quote from one of Obama’s staffers.

“When he (Obama) is running a meeting, he does more listening than talking, asking questions and taking the temperature of everyone in the room. Regardless of wherever you fall in the hierarchy, he listens to you as though you are the campaign manager. He focuses, he prods, he pushes, to make sure that he fully understands your position. That sets an important tone as well: When you go into a meeting expecting to learn and not dictate, it fosters camaraderie.”

Mindfully setting the tone is a primary role for leaders – most focus on the behaviors that enable strategies and for Obama this includes how his campaign team works together to execute. It is a balanced internal and external focus and usually the make or break practice that allows leaders to create legacies and presidential candidates create political machines.