How to Handle Information Hoarders

Information is power. Withholding it is how people can force themselves into a decision-making cycle or weaken your efforts to get things done.

Every organization suffers from some level of political intrigue. Whether it’s hoarding of resources, manipulative tactics, or passive aggressive behavior office politics distract your organization from getting things done. It also makes time at the office stressful and discouraging. Ignoring these dynamics can create risk for you, but you can take a productive approach to dealing with common political issues.

Information hoarding

Information is power. Withholding it is how people can force themselves into a decision-making cycle, or weaken your efforts to get things done. Without their information, your idea can’t move forward. Even worse, they might wait until the last minute to share information and show how bad your idea is. To counter these situations, make it public what information you need, and ask them to provide it. If they won’t provide it, tell them you’re going forward with what you have. This forces their hand. When they don’t provide the information, call it out.

I dealt with one client who was a vice president, and we were trying a cost reduction project for their organization. I was an external consultant at the time. I went to her and I said, “Hey I need this data to be able to make the business case.” She said, “Well I’m not really comfortable sharing that data outside the organization.” I pointed out that we had a confidentiality agreement in place and she still said, “Yeah I’m not really comfortable sharing that information with you.” So I worked on the project as best I could, but the steering committee meeting was going to be the next week. I went to her and I said, “Hey I really need that information to make this case.” And she said, “Yeah, I’m not going to provide it.” So I went back the next day and I said, “Here are the numbers I’m going to share with the steering committee.” And she said, “Well those are totally wrong.” “It’s the best I got without that data, so this what I’m going to present.” She then realized that the steering committee knew that she was the guardian of that information. If I went and presented an idea that was bad or with incomplete numbers, it was going to reflect on her. That situation then flipped her hand, and she provided the information I needed.

I know one other individual who was a senior vice president, and he saw an idea that publicly he was very supportive of. The person leading the project asked him, “What are your concerns?” And in that meeting he said, “I have these two concerns, and here’s how you can address them.” The person went off, they addressed the concerns, and they came back for the final meeting. When they presented their idea, this senior vice president threw out a huge objection right at the last moment, and it was based on information that he knew and nobody else did. Needless to say, the project stopped. This individual had to get that project back on track, and the way they did it was they went back to that SVP, they clarified what his concerns were, and they shared that information in that final steering committee meeting, but not before they had been embarrassed.

When you’re dealing with these situations, be rigorous about the information gathering efforts you’re putting in place. Do your stakeholder management. I like using a tool called a RACI matrix. RACI stands for Responsible, Accountable, Consulted, and Informed. What you do is you make a list of all the stakeholders, and you let people know the role they’re playing in the process. It tells people who’s providing what information to the project. It lets everyone know that these people are being consulted, and they have inputs into the process. Basically you’re putting them on notice that you’re telling everyone that they are providing specific information for that recommendation. When you go to present the idea, you can even ask this person who has the information to present that part of the recommendation. Involve them in the process. When you do that, they have to own it. They won’t want to present incomplete or inaccurate data in those situations.

Getting the information you need is how you’re going to advance your ideas and your agenda in the organization. When you see somebody holding back that information, make sure they’re put on notice, and people understand their role in how that recommendation moves forward.

Want to learn more about navigating politics as a senior leader? How about taking an entire course on it? Go directly to the course and start learning how to navigate politics as a senior leader. The entire course is available at LinkedIn Learning. Enjoy!

Did you enjoy this post? If so, I highly encourage you to take about 30 seconds to become a regular subscriber to this blog. It’s free, fun, practical, and only a few emails a week (I promise!). SIGN UP HERE to get the thoughtLEADERS blog conveniently delivered right to your inbox!