Identity, Role, Altercasting: Voting and Selling

What if you want people to behave in a particular way? A teacher would want students to study, a shirt seller would want people to buy shirts and a political party would want people to vote for it. 

So, what should you do?

Use the subtle technique of persuasion called altercasting. Activate an identity or cast people into an identity which has a clearly defined role. People of that identity are expected to behave in a certain manner. Teachers are expected to teach and parents are expected to take care of their families.

Have you encountered a situation when your teacher told you, ‘You are a good student , you must do assignments on time’ or a colleague telling you, ‘Now that you have become a Vice President, get a car that fits your status’.

In these examples, an identity has been activated like that of a ‘good student’ and ‘person of position’. The actor (teacher and colleague) also called ‘Ego’ casts the ‘other’ into an identity (student and person with position) to elicit an intended response or task (do assignment and buy a car). These identities come with defined social roles or expectations. The result of this altercasting is that this process creates expectations to not violate the role or conform for two reasons:

First  is the need for validation. The role is validated  when behaviour conforms with the expectations.

Second, the violation activates the process of cognitive dissonance. Altercastng serves as a reminder of a role and expectations. The inconsistency between behavior and beliefs results in friction.

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People enter in the political market with multiple identities including gender, age, state, religion, caste. Which identity should a party bring to the fore or make salient that is consistent with the task (eliciting favorable response) or intended response.

BJP’s long-standing campaign seeks to make nationalist identity salient. This nationalist identity clearly casts people into a role that sets expectations to favour a party that is seen as legitimate custodian of the nation (by default the other parties are positioned as non-nationalistic) through a carefully crafted narrative. Once this identity is brought to the fore, the other identities are rendered less meaningful during the elections.

Conforming imperative imposed by this process aims to seek a common denominator across differences.

But the nationalistic narrative has power only when an enemy is perceived, real or imaginary. Will this evocation of nationalist identity work this time?

Business as coalition and compulsions of coalition

A firm is an organization for business purpose. Organization in management literature means a unit created made of parts or component by act of bringing them together. It is an act of crating something. What are the parts that typically make a business organization? The parts of an organization are structurally called departments. These include sales, finance, human resources, production, R&D, and procurement. This essentially means organization is a coalition of different groups. Consider the following:
• Mr Human joins the business and he is very clear about the fact that he joins the business for compensation and progression.
• Mr Operations has technical guy who joins the business for making sure that operations run smoothly for longer runs and nothing upsets the production process.
• Mr Finance has had grounding in capital budgeting and cost of capital. He sees success in risk and uncertainty minimization.
• Mr Research has all along been known for his ability to invent. For him the organization is a new laboratory to experiment and create breakthroughs that make headlines.
• Mr Procurement knows it is easier to buy a few things from a small base of friendly suppliers. More suppliers and more number of purchase units upset their lives.
• Mr Engineering brings their design skills and knowhow to create new products and processes but with an eye only for the technical strength.
• Mr Manufacturing wants his production lines run as smoothly as possible. Frequent changes and modifications complicate their system.
• Mr Sales is always keen to convert whatever is given to him in cash by hook or the crook.
On the whole these coalitions making an organization bring different notions of effectiveness. Consequently it is natural for business firm to experience politics of coalition. Each of the coalition partners attempt to pull the entire decision making in the direction that deems fit (see the figure) . The localized effectiveness is pursued at the cost of global effectiveness.

This political way of functioning of business organization undermines the very purpose for which it comes into existence- the business. Business means actualization of a potential exchange with the prospect i.e. the customer. And in a competitive scenario the only way to succeed is to get the customers to say ‘yes’ to what a firm condenses in a product or service. The value offered by a firm is sigma of decisions made by different coalition members. The issue then is what is the probability that target customer would say yes to what firm has done? It is very low because typically none of the coalition groups represent customers. And when the customer pronounces ‘no’ to a firm’s offering the entire system loses because the revenue stream is cut. How can a business survive without its customers responding favorably to what it does? Business survives and prospers when customers open up their wallets for a product or service. Without this a product is an unrecovered cost.
It is in this context the top management is expected to perform a harmonizing role. A coalition is compulsorily likely to have conflicts arising out individualized or localized concepts of effectiveness. Consequently the system would get pulled in different direction readying it for failure. It is akin to making safe cabins in Titanic. People must go out of their cabins and make the Titanic safe. The concept of global ‘right’ or ‘effectiveness’ must be appreciated. A business does right when its products or services win target customers. It must be understood that a firm is an organization of coalition partners for the purpose of business. And business is about actualizing exchange with potential customers which happens organization creates satisfied customer. Therefore converge of goals and roles are essential to survive in a competitive market.

Managing coalition is a challenging task. All the companies which consistently perform well manage to do so by creating goal convergence amidst confusion and chaos. This is reason why only a few managers rise up to the top.