This week I was a presenter at a CASE institute for senior marketing and communication professionals. One of the sessions I led was a review of my latest book which attempts to outline a subject matter for understanding and dealing with internal politics. I made the point that senior professionals are likely to spend half their time dealing with the politics of their institution. Most agreed. Some said they spend more than half.
We had only an hour to review the topic. So I asked the participants if they would attend a day and a half program exploring the topic in-depth with a faculty of seasoned survivors. I explained that their time would be spent in interactive sessions discussing all facets of the problem. Their response was quite encouraging.
I imagine that such a conference might be organized around topics such as:
1. The Political Nature of Institutions
2. Characteristics of Academic and Support Cultures
3. How Leadership Styles Define Political Problems
4. Institutional Misconceptions and Attitudes to Overcome
5. Identifying Typical and Individual Problems
6. Examples of Potential Solutions and Initiatives
7. How New Responsibilities Can Change People
8. Essential Political Survival Tools
9. Teaching Your Institution About What You Do
The purpose of this institute would be for each participant to leave with his or her political challenges thoroughly addressed, and with some tested ideas about what to try next.
Each time I point out how much time we spend dealing with internal politics, I have been reminded that no program or course is ever offered on the subject! This institute would finally solve that problem. I welcome your candid thoughts.
Larry D. Lauer 
Larry, it was a pleasure meeting you at CASE and learning more about your role at TCU. The presentation you gave on institutional politics was excellent — I wish we would have had more time to delve deeper.
One thing that I notice from the “other side” as a vendor to higher education is that often institutional politics can also be lateral, and not just hierarchical. With different departments fighting for a piece of an ever-shrinking resource pie, many times the needs or wants of an individual department are placed ahead of what may be the best choice or solution for the institution as a whole. This is unfortunate for all stakeholders, but most of all for the students. It would be so refreshing to see different departments (admissions, communications, student affairs, etc.) working together to pool resources to accomplish goals, versus pulling back into their silos to protect their own resources. This problem is not unique to higher education, of course.
Again, very much enjoyed meeting you and your presentations. Safe travels!
Amy Mengel
http://www.readabout.me
One issue that may fall under #2 in your list would be to recognize the temperaments, time perspective differences, and training among the various parts of university. For example, in our graduate-level health science center, the perspective and time orientation of a physician is quite different from a biomedical researcher which is different from a public health person and so on. Throw in a business-oriented leader or marketing staff coming into academia from the corporate world, and it makes for a very “positive tension” as we like to say. Being savvy to these differences is important to the communications/advancement person’s success.