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By this time, the result of the closely watched US election will be known. During the long lead-up, the two sides in the presidential campaign used vote-catching tactics from which we fellow managers can glean some useful things. Although we are not politicians, we are meant to be leaders, and campaigns need to be chosen carefully and advanced thoughtfully. After all, to build support, managers cannot count solely on their intellect or temperament; persuasiveness is an important trait required in our profession.

One political strategy we have seen involves taking extreme positions at the outset of the campaign, further to the left or right, to explore and capture "fringe" voters. As the campaign progresses the positions converge towards the centre, to gather a larger portion of the votes. The move can be considered a hedge, allowing campaigns to veer to the right or left as the need arises.

Commonly in politics, once a candidate wins office, the extreme "fringe" ideology is tossed away. A moderate, centrist position will usually be adopted to avoid undue controversy once power is in hand.

This strategy is often used in the corporate world. Before managers arrive at a final course of action, or an important change of direction for the company, extreme positions may be proposed at the start, as a test.  Once the extremes prove themselves unacceptable, the remaining alternatives rapidly appear to be more acceptable. The pattern is clear: put up the undesirable choices first and have them visibly marginalised. The path to the real choice is then unimpeded.

There was a recent report about a firm that was facing an immediate and substantial payroll cut. Management invited all staff to a meeting to brainstorm agreement on a way forward. Extreme positions, such as elimination of the least-tenured members or highest-salaried ones, were paraded at that first meeting. 

As expected, these were unacceptable. The employees, also as expected, volunteered to go away to work out the most suitable path.  In the end, the management got the plan they had in mind all along, but this particular campaign helped the employees feel that they were allowed to take part in the process.

This process need not be seen as devious. Managers from time to time have to present a well-designed campaign to move the firm in a desired direction. 

In the US, the candidates accused one another of standing for (false) hope or raising (irrational) fears. In the much smaller context of the firms for which we work, we too must invoke hopes or fears to achieve an outcome. Our main job is to pull the management team and staff together to engage in a healthy debate, to take the most desirable decision and to act as one.

Now that we are immersed in recession, managers are once again called upon to lead. We may not be able to control the length of the recession or the outcome, but we can campaign to pull all our players in the same direction.  Choose your strategy and your tactics, but make absolutely sure you know where you want you and your firm to end up.

Dr Don Bhasavanich is a councillor for the Thailand Management Association.  Follow his articles every first Wednesday of the month. He may be contacted at dbhasa@gmail.com.