Favoritism is the display of partiality
toward certain individual or group of individuals. Unfortunately some managers succumb
to this behavioral trap. They favor individuals or group of individuals in
their organization without regard to the negative effect that it will create to
their organization.
For example during job promotion; there
are many instances most especially in government that
an employee is not promoted based on his/her competence. He is promoted because
he has connections or he is a favorite of some powerful people in the
organization. This person is promoted not based on what he knows about the job,
his promotion is anchored on his connections.
Who is the loser if there’s a triumph of
favoritism in an organization? The first loser here is the person who exercised
favoritism and the second is organization itself. Consider
here the damage that is done to his reputation and the dysfunction that it
creates to the organization. This is one of the many negative effects when
someone pushes his weight around just to get what he wants.
The second loser is the person who was
promoted based on his powerful connections. There would be negative remarks
about himself and questions also about his competence would arise. The third loser is the
human resource manager. What if the competent person who was not promoted would
question the decision of the human resource manager? What if there would be a
groundswell of support coming from the employees union for this deserving
person who was not promoted?
Favoritism in organization is immoral
because it will sooner or later destroy the organization. Just imagine an
organization being run by undeserving employees and visualize the havoc that it
will create in the organization. - Marino J. Dasmarinas
