The Biological Cost of Politicking: Why Your Nervous System Knows Before Your Spreadsheet Does

Lesson 9 of 25 from podcast conversations with leaders who leave the world better than they found it

Ann de Passos said something in our conversation that's changed how I think about organizational dysfunction:

"Organizations spend so much energy on politicking and frustration instead of solving actual problems. If we were nervous system first, conversations would be clearer, decisions faster."

She's talking about something most organizations treat as "soft" concern but is actually deeply strategic: the biological cost of dysfunctional culture.

When teams operate in constant stress—navigating unclear power dynamics, managing interpersonal tension, second-guessing decisions—that stress lives in people's bodies. It shows up as physical symptoms long before it shows up in metrics.

And those physical symptoms signal something important about organizational health.

Why Bodies Matter For Strategy

Here's what we know from neuroscience and organizational research:

When people feel unsafe—physically or psychologically—their bodies activate survival responses. The sympathetic nervous system kicks in. Heart rate increases. Digestion slows. The prefrontal cortex, which handles complex thinking, goes partially offline.

This is brilliant design for escaping physical danger. It's terrible design for strategic decision-making.

But organizations inadvertently trigger these survival responses all the time.

Unclear power dynamics. Passive-aggressive communication. Fear of speaking truth. Inconsistent feedback. Lack of psychological safety.

Every one of these creates low-level stress that accumulates in people's nervous systems.

And that accumulated stress has costs that don't show up on organizational dashboards:

Slower decision-making because people are processing threats, not information.

Relationship friction because people are defending rather than collaborating.

Innovation shutdown because survival mode doesn't create space for creative thinking.

Physical illness because chronic stress literally makes people sick.

Organizations measure engagement scores and retention rates. They track deliverables and productivity. But they miss the underlying biological reality: people can't perform at their best when their nervous systems are in survival mode.

The Politics Tax

Ann talks about "politicking"—the energy organizations spend navigating interpersonal dynamics, managing egos, decoding unclear communication, protecting themselves from potential consequences.

Every organization has some amount of this. But the amount varies dramatically.

In dysfunctional organizations, people spend most of their energy managing relationships and protecting themselves, with whatever's left over going to actual problem-solving.

That's a massive tax on capacity.

And it shows up in bodies before it shows up in metrics.

That team member who's always sick? Maybe their immune system is compromised by chronic stress.

That leader who seems short-tempered? Maybe their nervous system is in constant activation because they feel under threat.

That meeting where nobody speaks honestly? Maybe everyone's bodies are screaming "not safe" and shutting down truth-telling.

Organizations that ignore these biological signals are missing critical data about what's not working.

What Nervous System First Looks Like

Ann teaches people to pay attention to their nervous systems. Not as self-care practice—though it helps with that—but as organizational capacity strategy.

When your nervous system is regulated—when you feel genuinely safe—you have access to your full cognitive capacity. You can think clearly. Listen deeply. Process complexity. Make good decisions.

When your nervous system is dysregulated—when you're in any flavor of survival mode—your capacity shrinks. You react instead of responding. You defend instead of being curious. You simplify instead of sitting with complexity.

Now imagine a leadership team where everyone's nervous systems are dysregulated.

That meeting will be terrible. Not because people aren't smart or committed. But because their biology is working against them.

Compare that to a leadership team where everyone comes in grounded, regulated, present.

That meeting will be different. Decisions will be faster because people aren't processing threat. Conversations will be clearer because people can listen without defending. Conflict will be productive because people have capacity to stay curious.

This isn't "soft" stuff. This is strategic capacity.

The Two-Minute Practice That Changes Meetings

Here's something you can try at your next leadership team meeting:

Start with two minutes of intentional breathing.

Not meditation. Not mindfulness practice. Just: everyone stops talking. Puts their phones down, and focuses on breath. Two minutes.

Then notice what happens in the meeting.

Do people listen differently? Do decisions move faster? Does conflict feel less reactive?

I've seen this shift meetings dramatically. Not every time—sometimes there are real strategic disagreements that breathing doesn't resolve. But more often than you'd expect, the conflict was rooted in activated nervous systems, not genuine strategic difference.

When people's bodies feel safer, their thinking gets clearer.

Two minutes of breathing creates that safety. It brings people out of survival mode and into presence.

And presence changes everything about how meetings function.

Why This Matters For Mission-Driven Work

I think a lot about the irony of mission-driven organizations running on stress.

We're trying to create positive change in the world. We care deeply about the work. We're committed to the mission.

And we're doing it in ways that exhaust people, activate survival responses, and undermine the very capacity we need to achieve our goals.

Ann's framing—nervous system first—flips this.

What if we designed organizations around biological reality instead of fighting it?

What if we recognized that people can't do their best thinking when they're chronically stressed?

What if we treated psychological safety as infrastructure, not nice-to-have culture work?

What if we measured organizational health by how people's bodies feel, not just what they produce?

This would change:

How we structure meetings. Build in space for regulation, not just information transfer.

How we make decisions. Check whether people are regulated enough to think clearly before expecting good strategic thinking.

How we evaluate culture. Pay attention to physical signals—who's getting sick, who's exhausted, who's on edge—as data about what's not working.

How we lead. Model regulation rather than hustle. Show that presence matters more than performance.

From Metrics To Bodies

Most organizational assessment focuses on outputs. How much did we produce? How efficiently? What results did we achieve?

Those metrics matter. But they're lagging indicators.

Leading indicators show up in bodies.

That team member who seems disengaged? Their nervous system might be telling them something isn't safe here.

That leader who's snapping at people? Their system might be in chronic activation.

That meeting where nobody speaks? Bodies are recognizing threat and shutting down.

Organizations that pay attention to these signals catch problems early. Before engagement drops. Before retention suffers. Before performance declines.

Organizations that ignore them keep optimizing for output while their people's nervous systems are screaming that something's wrong.

The Permission To Care About Biology

Ann's work gives leaders permission to care about something we usually dismiss as too personal or too "wellness."

Your team's biology isn't separate from their capacity. It's foundational to it.

You can't strategize your way out of dysregulated nervous systems. You can't productivity-hack your way out of chronic stress. You can't culture-statement your way out of environments that feel unsafe.

You have to actually create conditions where people's bodies can relax. Where nervous systems can regulate. Where survival mode isn't the baseline.

And when you do, something remarkable happens: decisions get faster. Relationships get easier. Innovation becomes possible.

Not because people worked harder. Because their biology could support their best thinking.

Your nervous system knows before your spreadsheet does.

Maybe it's time to listen.

This is lesson 9 in a 25-part series exploring insights from podcast conversations with leaders who leave the world better than they found it.

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