Page 108 - Executive Warfare

EXECUTIVE W ARF ARE

If this kind of thing happens a few times in six months, you know that
the long knives are out for you. Don’t believe in coincidence.
For a campaign of rumors to be really effective, it either has to have a
smidgen of truth to it—you do get drunk in public, just not as often as
they say—or it has to be a “cross-cut” attack that undermines your self-
defined strengths—you present yourself as a disciplined person who
would never get drunk in public, but maybe you are just a hypocrite.
In presidential elections over the last 20 years, Republican political oper-
atives have employed this cross-cut technique brilliantly. For example,
when John Kerry began emphasizing his history as a highly decorated Viet-
nam War veteran in his 2004 presidential run, big Republican donors
instantly turned this image against him.
They funded a group called “Swift Boat
FOR A CAMPAIGN Veterans for Truth”that disputed Kerry’s
OF RUMORS TO BE accounts of heroism and unfairly
REALLY EFFECTIVE, painted him as a liar and an opportunist.
IT EITHER HAS TO The advantage of an attack like this is
HAVE A SMIDGEN that you do half the work for your
OF TRUTH TO IT, OR attacker. They take the energy attached
IT HAS TO BE A to your good qualities—the time,
“CROSS-CUT” money, and effort you’ve spent building
ATTACK THAT a certain image—and use it against you
UNDERMINES YOUR to make you seem like a fraud. Such
SELF-DEFINED attacks are very common, not just in
STRENGTHS. politics, but also in organizational life.
So learn to expect them, and learn
how to deal with them. If you have a
reputation as a good manager of people, and an enemy hears that you
never say hello to the receptionist in the morning when you walk by, he
may very well make that known. And because you are a candidate for
higher office, everything you do is magnified. If you’re a middle manager
and you snub somebody? For the most part, no one cares.

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