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Objective/context: By developing an empirical study on the Colombian case, this article tests a flexible typology to identify the variants of partisanship of 196 ministers, grouped in 91 different cabinets, during six governments between 1998 and 2022. The paper also explores the factors associated with the strategic decision made by a president regarding the degree of partisanship of their cabinet. Methodology: For the former, we classified different variants of partisanship based on a biographical log, which grades the partisan experience of the ministers at the time of appointment. For the latter, we estimated a linear regression model, taking the aggregate index of cabinet partisanship as the dependent variable. Conclusions: A better identification of the ministers who are considered partisan allows for finding a statistically significant correlation between the president’s image and the cabinet’s degree of partisanship. Originality: We used an original database containing information on 196 ministers.