Example from the Development Guide
Organizational Awareness Competency
Interpersonal awareness is a combination of the ways self-awareness affects the ability to interact with others.
Sample Behavioral Indicator from the Survey
Know whom the real decision makers and influencers are in order to make use of informal systems to get things done.
Recommendation from the Development Guide
Learn how people perceive your reputation.
Understanding how people perceive you politically is crucial, and this is different from understanding what your strengths and weaknesses are, though it will include them. Use your informal contacts and trusted friends at all levels in the organization to gather information on how others perceive you, what interests and alliances you are perceived to advance; what adversaries or causes you are perceived to oppose; and what reputation you have as a “player.” At the same time, ask how people from one discipline, like manufacturing, perceive people from your discipline generally. This is often a startling exercise, full of pleasant and unpleasant surprises. Take in all the information appreciatively, thanking your sources, and ensuring to keep their confidences. Reflect on the information objectively, not dismissing any of it, however unpleasant or fallacious. If you got only positive reflections, you need to do more digging. Treat all of it as valid perceptions creating the political reality in which you work; perceptions are no less “real” because they are not “facts.”