Politics and Workplace:An Empirical Examination of the Relationship Between Perceived Organizational Politics and Work Performance

Workplace politics is a reality of organizational life and one of the options for those who wish to influence decisions. Its basic objective is to protect and enhance the self-interests of an individual. In earlier literature, organizational politics have been construed in negative terms by employees revealing dysfunctional outcomes for individuals, groups or organizations. This study empirically evaluates the degree of Perceived Organizational Politics (POP) and its influence on job satisfaction, organizational commitment, job involvement, job stress and turnover intentions. 300 questionnaires were distributed among the participants of various management courses of a renowned institute of business administration. The respondents were mid-career employees representing a variety of business organizations in Pakistan. In all 256 (85%) usable responses were obtained. Correlation analysis and analysis of variance showed that POP was negatively related to job satisfaction, organizational commitment and job involvement, and positively associated with job stress and turnover intentions.