For your first post in the first week of this module, try to find a good example of a recent TV series or movie that you watched that you thought was a good example of any of the concepts from this module.
Give a short synopsis of the story involved and how it reflected concepts from the background readings. If you can find a YouTube clip from this show or movie, share the link with your classmates. Also, discuss how realistic the TV show or movie was-did it seem similar to what you might find in real life?
Breakout Kings
Joseph
Breakout Kings was originally a A&E program but I caught up to it on Netflix. I enjoyed the first couple of seasons as a distraction. As related to office politics this show has it all. The premise is that the cops enlist four criminals to help them catch worst criminals who have broken out of confinement. The group of "good" convicts are thrown together and immediately resort to various political behavior.
The circumstances are ripe for political moves within the group. First, there is a lack of trust not only between all the team members but also in the system that is supposed to reward them for their help. To protect themselves each player starts carving out their own protective bubble, they start buffing and looking for ways to make one of the other players the scapegoat, in case things go wrong. (Pearson, 2014)
There is also a level of uncertainty that the rewards that they have been promised will actually materialize. In the first season the team shows signs of political maneuvers to make their individual contribution seem greater than the others. The logic probably is that if the is only a limited amount of reward given then they as individuals need to get as big of a slice of the pie as they can, even if it is to the detriment of the others, a typical Zero-Sum Reward Practice (Pearson, 2014).
The team goes through some Hollywood contrived struggles and eventually the leader cast the bright light of reality on the team. By acknowledging the political tactics and games that have been going on which everyone thought was unnoticed the leader is in a better position to manage the team.