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Unfortunately many top-level decision makers do not realise that politics divides the company and is probably the most common cause of morale destruction.

It can drastically reduce productivity and ultimately be the undoing of the organisation.

Office politics also stem from the jealousies of individuals who feel they deserve more recognition. Therefore, it is up to chief executives to recognise and prevent office politics.

I have seen cases where chief executives themselves encourage office politics, resulting in very

low morale, jealousies among peers, divisions within teams.

The end result is lower product-ivity and lower customer satisfaction.

Innovative companies are encouraging less politics through special departments that implement harmony programmes that stimulate teamwork, and they have seen tremendous positive results.

This may sound like an impossible mission, but we all have to remember that less politics makes for a better organisation.

The key to positive results is to ensure the company works in one direction as a team, and each individual gets opportunities to contribute toward realising the goal. Employees are judged on their attitude in addition to their job

performance.

In my experience, the hard work of eliminating office politics gets managers involved at different levels as much as possible.

Most of the workers thus get to hear what the management's intentions are, reducing the communication gap between staff and the top leaders.

However, there are also many other innovative management techniques to maintain unity in an organisation.

In today's business, it is much more difficult to drive sales, improve services and secure a strong bottom line, therefore it

pays to have your team playing together to win rather than playing against each other in a game where individuals might win but the organisation falls to pieces.

The only way this can be achieved is through exemplary leadership.