The politics, problems, and practicalities of serving as effective user advocate in an obstinate organization

We are all, to some extent, political animals who continually work with definitions and categorizations, trying to determine who is inside our group, who is outside our group, who is supportive of our group, who is detrimental who is useful and productive and who is not. These politics of organization, classification, division and association are intensified as the pressures on our groups to successfully work toward any goal also increase. (Baecker, 1993) Therefore, we react to organizational and goal-driven pressures by making even finer distinctions about who is "inside" our group and who is "outside". These distinctions in turn define the world for us and lead us to make projections (either accurate, or inaccurate) about the obstacles we must overcome, and lead us to consider who might get in the way of our goals. These types of social/political distinctions help us establish who is "with" us and who is "against" us.