Decisions happen somewhere you are not
The meeting confirms what was agreed elsewhere, and you were not there.
Courses
See what you would learn
Read the politics at work without becoming a politician.
A course on informal influence in organisations, for people who find it distasteful and cannot afford to ignore it. It covers recognising incentives and alliances, building honest relationships, and responding to office politics with integrity intact.
Open Cadence on the App Store, type the sentence when it asks what you want to learn, and answer a few setup questions. Free to start. Android testers can request early access.
Type this when Cadence asks what you want to learn
I want to understand informal influence at work without becoming cynical. Help me recognize incentives, build honest alliances, and respond to office politics with integrity.
Change any word so it fits your situation. The course is built from what you type and a few setup questions.
- Best for
- Work relationships
- Prerequisites
- None. Bring the situation you have.
- Course length
- 7 to 30 lessons, sized to your goal
- Lesson pace
- About 10 minutes a day
- Format
- Read it, or play the audio
- Access
- Available on the App Store, with early features and Android testing access
Before the course is built
Setup asks about your situation first.
Lesson 1 opens on the moment you describe, and the examples use your role. For this request, expect questions like these.
- Is your organisation small and informal, or large with layers?
- Do you feel naive about the politics, or worn down by them?
- Is there a decision or situation right now where the informal side is winning?
Right for now
If any of this sounds familiar, start here.
You refuse to play and it costs you
Good work loses to well-connected work, and opting out has not protected you.
You cannot read the room
Alliances, grudges and unspoken rules are invisible to you until you trip on one.
Course arc
Where the course goes, in order.
Cadence writes the lessons for you, so the exact path follows your answers. This is the ground a course built from this sentence covers.
01 / 06What politics is
Influence and incentives in any group of people, and why it is not inherently dirty.
Reading incentives
What each person is measured on, afraid of and hoping for, and how that predicts behaviour.
Where decisions really happen
Pre-meetings, corridors and sponsors, and how to be part of the conversation earlier.
Honest alliances
Finding shared interests and helping first, without keeping score.
When someone plays dirty
Naming what is happening, protecting yourself and choosing your battles.
Your own integrity
Lines you will not cross, and how to influence within them.
What changes
What you will be able to do, and what you will stop believing.
You will be able to
Map the informal organisation
See who influences whom, and what each person is optimising for.
Build alliances honestly
Create relationships based on shared interests rather than manipulation.
Respond to politics with integrity
Handle manoeuvring without joining it or being flattened by it.
Ideas this course corrects
Politics means manipulation
Politics means influence. Manipulation is one bad way of doing it; there are honest ways.
Good work should be enough
Work is judged by people. Helping them see it is part of the work, not a betrayal of it.
Course questions
What to know before you start.
Is this a fixed course?
No. Cadence builds the course when you type the sentence and answer a few setup questions, so the lessons follow your situation. This page describes what a course built from this request covers. You see the whole path before Lesson 1.
Who is this course for?
A course on informal influence in organisations, for people who find it distasteful and cannot afford to ignore it. It covers recognising incentives and alliances, building honest relationships, and responding to office politics with integrity intact. It sits under Work relationships in the Work & ambitions part of the library.
Do I need any prior experience?
No. Setup asks what you already know and where you want to use it, and the course starts from there. Bring a real situation if you have one; the examples are built around it.
How long does it take?
Courses run 7 to 30 lessons of about 10 minutes, sized to what you asked for. One lesson a day is the intended pace, and you can go faster. Lessons can be read or played as audio.
Does this course award a certificate or degree?
No. Cadence is for practical self-learning and does not award accredited degrees or professional certification.
Start today
Type it, answer a few questions, open Lesson 1.
The sentence to type
I want to understand informal influence at work without becoming cynical. Help me recognize incentives, build honest alliances, and respond to office politics with integrity.
Open Cadence on the App Store, type the sentence when it asks what you want to learn, and answer a few setup questions. Free to start. Android testers can request early access.