OGL 481 Pro-Seminar I:

PCA-Political Frame Worksheet

Worksheet Objectives:
1. Describe the political frame
2. Apply the political frame to your personal case situation

Complete the following making sure to support your ideas and cite from the textbook and other
course materials per APA guidelines. After the peer review, you have a chance to update this and
format for your Electronic Portfolio due in Module 6.

1) Briefly restate your situation from Module 1 and your role.

The restated situation with the organization I chose: Twitter has continued to evolve
ever since Elon Musk acquired Twitter in 2022 and made profound changes. On the
structural forefront, there are issues that have arisen, for example, the organizational
structure changed abruptly when the workforce was reduced substantially creating a
mass-layoff situation (Pintado, 2022). In addition, there are HR issues that have
surfaced for example, with the newer more authoritarian leadership of Elon Musk,
employees have had a difficult time adjusting to this type of leadership and this has
changed internal work processes. Elon Musk came to the company in a way that
seemed to force his way in and this caused blaming individuals for what happened.
According to the textbook, the first and most common fallacy is blaming as this
approach casts every failure as a product of individual blunders creating problems that
result from egotism, bad attitudes, abrasive personalities, neurotic tendencies, or
incompetence (Bolman & Deal, 2017). For instance, the remote work policy was
ended forcing all employees to return to work in person causing many employees to be
unhappy. Moreover, employees have been requested to work longer hours, and the
interpersonal relationships between staff and management have suffered. Overall, the
situation with Elon Musk’s drastic and sudden changes at Twitter have destabilized the
company and almost everyone is asking themselves if these changes were necessary
for the company to continue its business structure as it remains to be seen even though
the company continues to be popular amongst its users.

My chosen role in the organization is a Senior Communications Specialist. In this

realm, a communications specialist is an important internal role that focuses on
handling public relations to safeguard the image of the company, providing
information output on the platform, and managing media requests. In addition, in this
role, another important aspect is planning social media campaigns and conducting
advertising efforts to increase the site’s usability and profitability.

1
2) Describe how the politics of the organization influenced the situation.

The politics of the Twitter (X) organization influenced the situation in many different
ways, however the most promiment are Elon Musk’s extreme views in some areas of the
culture, how things are run at Twitter and the work requirements at the organization level.
For instance, the culture at the organization immediately started getting affected after
Elon Musk’s taking over the company. He overhauled the account verification methods
and also the moderation policies of Twitter’s accounts which changed the landscape in
terms of how accounts leaning to the rigtht were more free to post/voice their opinions
changing the landscape of the platform. In addition, Musk’s views were more prone to
the political right which received backlash from employees, subscribers and stakeholders
alike and increased participation from conservative viewpoints.

Moreover, the work requirements and expectations promptly implemented after Musk’s
takeover were very potilicized and constituted a revamp by Musk to create a more
competitive company that could contend with its rivals at a higher rate to achieve more at
the worker’s expense. In the requirement by Musk for its employees work he required
most employees come back to work in-person an also that managers and their supervisors
should ideally meet in-person weekly otherwise there would be consequences making a
very politized environment. According to the textbook, an organization is both an arena
for internal conflict and a political agent operating on a field crammed with other
organizations pursuing their own interests and as arenas organizations house an ongoing
interplay of players and agendas. As agents, organizations are powerful tools for
achieving the purposes of whoever calls the shots (Bolman, 2017). The bigger issue is
that Musk did not consult the different departments/staff or at least got their buy-in to see
what would work best and give some warning about work in-person/remote requirements
and instead all of the changes were in place suddenly and not giving employees a time to
adjust (Elias, 2022).

3) Recommend how you would use organizational politics for an alternative course of
action regarding your case.

In recommending how organizational politics would play an alternative course of action

would start by giving employees a time to voice their opinions in town-hall meeitings,
also giving the managers a time to get the employees buy-in and help them acclamate to
the changes before they were implemented was necessary in order to support the change
in work expectations and would have caused less of organizational policies and negative
changes. In addition, another point is that an alternative course of action would have been
good in Musk not overly promoting his extreme views and instead maintaining the
culture of Twitter before the take over in order to maintain the balance of the political
issues taking place at the company level. According to the textbook, viewing
organizations as arenas that house political activity is a way to reframe many

2
 organizational processes and organization design, for example can be viewed not as a
rational expriesion of an organization’s goals but as a political embodiment of contending
claims (Bolman, 2017).

It seems that there was an agenda to change a lot of things at once without really thinking
it through which caused chaos and shock to the many affected employees. Elon Musk’s
influence and informal changes were seen as rebellious and affected the company since it
changed the organization’s reputation and created imminent changes that were not
popular with many. Also there was a lot of resistance from many of the employees who
were used to a more relaxed welcoming environment and instead were experiencing a
more autocratic political activity that created lots of discontent and distrust from the
employees changing the landscape of the company for good.

4) Reflect on what you would do or not do differently given what you have learned
about this frame.

In reflecting on what could have been done differently in regards to this frame, there are
areas that could have been implemented in a different way to create a more balanced
approach that is not politically driven. For instance, one area that could have been helpful
is to have employees voice their opinions and create a forum for them to give input and
build communication bridges so that employees feel included in the changes taking place.
In addition, with the changes that Elon Musk implemented so quickly there could have
been a time where the changes could be first announced and changed proactively in a
timeframe that allowed employees and stakeholders to absorb those changes and
acclimate to the new environment to provide time for acceptance of the new changes.
Lastly, a good way to keep the balance is for Elon Musk to keep the status quo for a
certain period of time while he really analized Twitter’s environment and political
situation in order to assess the organization and really see what changes needed to be
made instead of abruptly making so many changes that affected the whole organization
so drastically.According to Bolman, organizations are both arenas for internal politics
and political agents with their own agendas, resources, and strategies (Bolman, 2017).
Overall, as politics change in an organization, there needs to be different perspectives
looked at from different angles and including the many voices represented in the
company whether is employees, customers, stakeholders, the media and influences that
have an interest in the company.

3
References

Bolman, L. G., & Deal, T. E. (2017). Reframing organizations: Artistry, choice, and
leadership (7th ed.). San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass

Elias. J. (2022, November 17). Elon Musk sets more in-office requirements at Twitter,
threatens lax managers. CNBC. https://www.cnbc.com/2022/11/17/elon-musk-
sets-more-in-office-requirements-at-twitter.html