Designing and explaining the political savvy model of middle managers of the state based on the method of grounded theory generation

Hierarchical promotion, organizational acceptance, and achieving reputation in Public organizations are becoming increasingly difficult due to structural barriers, process-oriented, ambiguous organizational goals, and the lack of proper metrics for Promotability. However, successful managers and those with special political savvy achieve their goals by using political networking and managing key stakeholders, accumulating communicational capital, and properly analyzing the political arena of the organization. The present study aims to design a model of political savvy of middle managers of the state.

The research method is qualitative and based on the method of grounded theory generation. Semi-structured interviews were used to collect data and data analysis was performed by Strauss and Corbin method and paradigm model. Sampling was done in a theoretical way using purposeful (judgmental) and snowball (chain) techniques, based on which 19 interviews were conducted with former and current middle managers of Public organizations.

The results of analyzing the data obtained from the interviews during the open, axial and selective coding process and using Maxqda 2018 software led to the creation of a political savvy model of middle managers of the state based on the method of grounded theory generation including 6 dimensions and 20 concepts.

By understanding and identifying causal conditions of political savvy such as political knowledge and skills and learning tactics of influence and improving the context conditions, middle managers of the state can devise strategies to achieve an acceptable level of political savvy by considering intervening conditions such as structural barriers and process-oriented.