[cthalupa]

No, but you need political capital even if your goal is making cool shit and not moving up the corporate ladder.

Human interaction is political - unless your work is entirely self sustaining, you have to be able to navigate the politics of human interaction. These get worse when money is involved, and all of the other competing interests at a company. I'm not saying focus on politics to the exclusion of directly productive work, but this idea that you can ignore politics and still accomplish things larger than one man projects seems incredibly naive. I don't buy for a minute that Altman hasn't engaged in plenty of politics over his career.

[Ididntdothis]

“I don't buy for a minute that Altman hasn't engaged in plenty of politics over his career.”

He is probably a natural at it so he doesn’t even notice that he is doing it. Reminds me a little of Steve Jobs. He was able to cut through bullshit but he was also naturally a world class bullshitter himself.

[SpicyLemonZest]

It seems like the kind of advice that's meant to correct against bad tendencies. I know people who'd spend 100% of their time on politics if they didn't control themselves, because their instinct is to resolve all personal conflicts they see.