There are four tactics that your enemies can use to render you powerless:
- Diversion
You’ll be given a tonne of work, overwhelmed with volume, kept busy on unimportant matters. They want you to neglect your most important tasks.
- Marginalisation
You’ll be excluded from committees, meetings, gatherings. Kept in the dark. Rendered irrelevant.
- Seduction
Your enemy will try and co-opt you. Hire you, pay you a retainer, invite you to join a committee, somehow make you dependent on him.
- Attack
“Play the man, not the ball.” This is the strategy adopted when the enemy gets desperate. He’ll attack your character, slander your name, spread rumours, doing anything to diminish your credibility and undermine your work.
There is one way to combat these tactics: Focus.
Ignore diversion, marginalisation, seduction and attacks.
Keep your head down, focus on what you’re doing.